British Guiana was the name of the British colony on the northern coast of South America, now the independent nation of Guyana.
The area was originally settled by the Dutch at the start of the 17th century as the colonies of Essequibo, Demerara, and Berbice. These three colonies were captured by the British in 1796; they were returned to the (Dutch) Batavian Republic in 1802, but were again captured by British forces a year later and were officially ceded to the United Kingdom in 1814, and consolidated into a single colony in 1831. The colony's capital was at Georgetown (known as Stabroek prior to 1812). Guyana went on to become independent of the United Kingdom on 26 May 1966.
Read more about British Guiana: Stamps and Postal History of British Guiana
Famous quotes containing the word british:
“These battles sound incredible to us. I think that posterity will doubt if such things ever were,—if our bold ancestors who settled this land were not struggling rather with the forest shadows, and not with a copper-colored race of men. They were vapors, fever and ague of the unsettled woods. Now, only a few arrowheads are turned up by the plow. In the Pelasgic, the Etruscan, or the British story, there is nothing so shadowy and unreal.”
—Henry David Thoreau (1817–1862)