page_title: Falkland Islands sovereignty dispute
section_title: British settlements
hierarchical_section_title: Falkland Islands sovereignty dispute / Historical basis of the dispute / British settlements
caption_attribution_description: English: A map showing the Falkland Islands prior to 1794 with marginal notes describing the division of the Islands between British West Falkland and Spanish East Falkland.
context_page_description: Sovereignty over the Falkland Islands is disputed by Argentina and the United Kingdom.
  The British claim to sovereignty dates from 1690, when they were the first to land on the islands, and the United Kingdom has exercised de facto sovereignty over the archipelago almost continuously since 1833. Argentina has long disputed this claim, having been in control of the islands for a few years prior to 1833. The dispute escalated in 1982, when Argentina invaded the islands, precipitating the Falklands War.
  Contemporary Falkland Islanders overwhelmingly prefer to remain British. They gained full British citizenship with the British Nationality Act 1983, after British victory in the Falklands War.
context_section_description: The British first landed on the Falklands in 1690, when Captain John Strong sailed through Falkland Sound, naming this passage of water after Anthony Cary, 5th Viscount of Falkland, the First Lord of the Admiralty at that time. The British were keen to settle the islands as they had the potential to be a strategic naval base for passage around Cape Horn. In 1765, Captain John Byron landed on Saunders Island. He then explored the coasts of the other islands and claimed the archipelago for Britain. The following year, Captain John MacBride returned to Saunders Island and constructed a fort named Port Egmont. The British later discovered the French colony at Port Saint Louis (founded 1764), initiating the first sovereignty dispute.
  In 1770 a Spanish military expedition was sent to the islands after authorities in Buenos Aires became aware of the British colony. Facing a greater force, the British were expelled from Port Egmont. The colony was restored a year later following British threats of war over the islands; However, in 1774, economic pressures leading up to the American Revolutionary War forced Great Britain to withdraw from the Falklands along with many of its other overseas settlements. They left behind a plaque asserting British sovereignty over the islands. Although there was no British administration in the islands, British and American sealers routinely used them to hunt for seals, also taking on fresh water as well as feral cattle, pigs and even penguins for provisions. Whalers also used the islands to shelter from the South Atlantic weather and to take on fresh provisions.
  The Government of the United Provinces of the River Plate attempted to control the islands through commerce, granting fishing and hunting rights to Jorge Pacheco in 1824.  Pacheco's partner Luis Vernet established a toehold in the islands in 1826 and a fledgling colony in 1828.  He also visited the British consulate in 1826, 1828 and 1829 seeking endorsement of his venture and British protection for his settlement in the event of their returning to the islands. After receiving assurances from the British minister chargé d'affaires, Sir Woodbine Parish, Vernet provided regular reports to the British on the progress of his enterprise. He expressed the wish that, in the event of the British returning to the islands, the British Government would take his settlement under their protection; Parish duly passed this wish on to London.   In 1829, he sought a naval vessel from the United Provinces to protect his colony but as none were available he was appointed Military and Civil Commander, prompting British protests. Attempts to regulate fishing and sealing lead to conflict with the United States and the Lexington raid of 1831. With the colony in disarray, Major Esteban Mestivier was tasked to set up a penal colony but was murdered in a mutiny shortly after arriving in 1832. Protests at Mestivier's appointment received no response and so the British dispatched a naval squadron to re-establish British rule.
  After the Government of the United Provinces of the River Plate appointed Vernet as governor in 1829, Parish protested to Buenos Aires, which merely acknowledged the protest. Britain protested again when Vernet announced his intention to exercise exclusive rights over fishing and sealing in the islands. (Similar protests were received from the American representative, who protested at the curtailment of established rights and stated that the United States did not recognise the jurisdiction of the United Provinces over the islands.) Vernet continued to provide regular reports to Parish throughout this period.
  The raid of the USS Lexington in December 1831 combined with the United Provinces assertions of sovereignty were the spur for the British to establish a military presence on the islands.
  On 2 January 1833, Captain James Onslow, of the brig-sloop HMS Clio, arrived at the Spanish settlement at Port Louis to request that the Argentine flag be replaced with the British one, and that the Argentine administration leave the islands. While Argentine 
caption: A map from a world atlas published in 1794 complete with marginal notes describing sovereignty: the Falklands belonged "to Great Britain by right of first discovery", the British had "a fort and settlement" on "the North of Western Falkland", while Spaniards "had a fort in the Eastern Isle".
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