North America
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The map shows the British Territories, coloured pink, of North America.

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Pre 1965 1965 on

The story of Canada really begins with John Cabot landing in Labrador, Newfoundland and then Cape Breton Island, in 1497. In 1534 the French came. Sailing up the St Lawrence, the first French settlement was founded in 1604 called the Colony of Acadia. Quebec was founded in 1608 by the French and was defended against a British attack in 1691. The French subjugated the hostile Iroquois Indians in a campaign of 1696. Explorers followed the routes of the Great Lakes and the name Canada came to be used in conjunction with that of New France, the name for all French possessions in North America.
Conflict between Britain and France mirrored itself in Canada with the French and Indian wars. By 1713 France had given up most of Acadia, Newfoundland, and Hudson Bay. In 1759 the British defeated the French near Quebec. With the Treaty of Paris in 1763, the colonial wars between Britain and France in North America were concluded. The whole of Canada, the Floridas and Louisiana as far west as the Mississippi river was British.
During or immediately after the American War of Independence approximately 40,000 pro British ‘United Empire Loyalists’ arrived to settle in Nova Scotia (formerly Acadia) and present-day Ontario. St John's Island was renamed Prince Edward Island in 1799 and Cape Breton Island was joined to Nova Scotia in 1820. In 1791 Quebec was divided into Upper and Lower Canada, but following the Act of Union of 1840 the two were reunited to form the Province of Canada.
1867 saw the British North America Act, which created the Dominion of Canada. The new dominion acquired full responsibility for home affairs within the British Empire. In 1870 the Hudson Bay Company territories passed to the control of the Government of Canada. In 1873 Prince Edward Island joined the confederation, British Columbia, including Vancouver Island, having done so in 1871. Britain gave Canada the arctic islands in 1880. Newfoundland joined the dominion in 1949. In 1982 the British Parliament accepted the constitutional changing of the British North America Act, which established the complete national sovereignty of Canada, although it retained allegiance to the British crown as well as membership of the Commonwealth.

The Continental Colours 1775  USA 1777

In 1607 a band of colonists set out from England on three ships to found a settlement they called Jamestown, in honour of their King. The first colony of Virginia had been born, named after the sponsoring company of the colonists. With the arrival of the 'Pilgrim Fathers' in 1620, further colonists and settlers followed them to found the rest of the Thirteen Colonies. The Treaty of Paris in 1763 added Florida and Louisiana as far west as the Mississippi river. These eventually broke away from British rule in the War of Independence, caused by the imposition of taxes on the colonists, to form the United States of America.

Virginia 1607, Massachusetts 1629, Maryland 1632, Rhode Island 1636, Connecticut 1639,
North Carolina 1663, South Carolina 1663, New Jersey 1664,  New York 1664,  Delaware 1664,
New Hampshire 1680, Pennsylvania 1681, Georgia 1732.

With the declaration of Independence on 4th July 1776, the war continued until 1781, and peace formally ratified on the 3rd September 1783, the embryo United States of America was established.