The History

Prince Edward Island was called "Abegweit" by the Micmac Indians, who lived there for some 2 000 years before the arrival of the Europeans. The name means "lying down flat," but is freely translated as "cradled by the waves." There is evidence that the ancestors of the Micmacs lived on the island 10 000 years ago, presumably having migrated across the low plain now covered by Northumberland Strait.

The Europeans discovered the island when Jacques Cartier landed there in 1534; he described it as "the most beautiful stretch of land imaginable." In spite of his enthusiastic description, it was a long time before the island was settled. No permanent colony existed until the French established one in 1719; thirty years later, the population numbered a mere 700.

The English population of the island multiplied after the British deported the Acadians from Nova Scotia in 1755. By 1758, the island's population had risen to 5 000. In 1766, Captain Samuel Holland prepared a topographic map of the island, then known as the Island of Saint John, dividing it into 67 parcels of land and distributing it by lot to a group of British landowners. The absentee landlords, many of whom never set foot on the island, gave rise to numerous problems. Some refused to sell their lands to their tenants, while others demanded exorbitant purchase or rental prices.

In 1769, the Island of Saint John became a separate colony, and in 1799 it was given its present name, in honour of Prince Edward of England. Prince Edward Island is known as the "Cradle of Confederation," since Charlottetown, its capital, was the site of the 1864 conference that set Canadian Confederation in motion. This distinction notwithstanding, the island waited until 1873 to join the Dominion of Canada.