When you picture the age of empire‑building, you probably imagine grand visions, intrepid explorers, and, inevitably, spectacular blunders. In reality there were ten settlements that were doomed from day one – a perfect storm of hostile terrain, flawed leadership and outright misfortune. Below we count down the 10 colonies doomed, each a vivid lesson in how not to launch a new community.
10 Cosme And New Australia: Australian Socialists In Paraguay
After a wave of strikes over pitiful wages and appalling working conditions, a swath of Australian bush workers abandoned the notion of a workers’ utopia back home. They latched onto a plan hatched by English journalist William Lane to carve out a socialist “New Australia” in Paraguay – a country still reeling from the War of the Triple Alliance, which had wiped out as much as 70 % of its population. The first 220 pioneers disembarked in Asunción on 22 September 1893, then trekked six weeks through mosquito‑infested wilderness.
Things began to unravel almost immediately. Lane, a rigid teetotaler, outlawed alcohol and forbade any mingling with the native Guaraní people. Comic‑artist Robin Wood, a descendant of those settlers, summed him up bluntly: “For a socialist, he was very racist, and very stupid.” The rum ban and the allure of Guaraní women – plentiful because of a shortage of adult Paraguayan men – were quickly ignored. When Lane tried to expel a man caught with rum, the colony split. Lane led a loyalist splinter to found Cosme, where living conditions were arguably worse than back in Australia.
By 1899 Lane had abandoned the settlement, a far cry from his bold proclamation as the ship left Sydney Harbour: “The world will be changed if we succeed, and we will succeed!” Paraguayan authorities eventually dissolved the colonies, granting individual settlers parcels of land. Some 2,000 descendants still live in the country today.
9 Two Forts Named Jacob: Couronians In Tobago And Gambia
You probably haven’t heard of Courland, a tiny vassal duchy of the Polish‑Lithuanian Commonwealth perched in modern‑day Latvia, home to just 200,000 souls. Yet under Duke Jacob Kettler’s golden age in the 17th century, Courland launched a surprisingly ambitious overseas programme, establishing two colonies that would prove short‑lived.
In 1654 the Couronians founded Fort Jacob on Tobago, renaming the island New Courland. This was impressive, given the Caribbean was already hotly contested. A Dutch settlement had been massacred by the Spanish in 1637, and three English attempts had failed in the 1640s. Couronian persistence was evident – the 1654 venture was their third attempt after previous settlers were slaughtered by locals.
However, they could not match the resources of larger rivals. The Dutch colony of Nieuw Flushing sprang up across the bay, quickly outpacing Courland’s efforts. In 1655 the “Swedish deluge” – a massive Swedish invasion of the Polish‑Lithuanian Commonwealth – crippled Courland’s home base. Their capital was occupied for two years, Fort Jacob was captured, and their merchant fleet and shipyards were devastated, leaving the overseas outpost unsupported. Seizing the moment, the Dutch forced the surrender of Fort Jacob in 1659. Over the next three decades Tobago swapped hands among the Dutch, pirates, the English and the French. Courland made occasional claims, sometimes recognised, but none ever materialised. The other Fort Jacob, erected in 1651 on St. Andrew’s Island at the mouth of the Gambia River (today Kunta Kinteh Island), suffered a similar fate: seized by the Dutch in 1659, after a brief subterfuge where the Dutch pretended to garrison the island while Courland dealt with European turmoil, only to expel them. The English later took over, turning the island into a slave‑trade hub.
8 Fort Saint Louis: French In Texas
René‑Robert Cavalier, Sieur de La Salle, and his 300‑strong French expedition set out to claim the mouth of the Mississippi River. Thanks to shoddy charts, they missed their target by a staggering 650 km (400 mi) and landed in Matagorda Bay, Texas. The misadventure cost them two ships – one lost to Spanish pirates, another wrecked – and most of their provisions. Their rag‑tag colonists comprised vagrant youths, a hundred so‑called soldiers drawn from the lowest echelons of French port towns, and craftsmen who exaggerated their skills. One‑third of the party wisely chose to return home after glimpsing the Texan coastline.
La Salle, prone to mood swings and paranoia – some called him manic‑depressive – insisted on searching for the Mississippi, losing his last remaining ship in the process. By January 1687 the settlement dwindled to 40 souls. La Salle led half of them on a perilous overland trek to a fort he had previously established in what is now northern Illinois. The expedition fell apart in mutiny; La Salle was killed, several joined the Indians, and only five eventually reached friendly territory.
The remaining twenty or so – mostly the sick, women and children – survived until Christmas 1688, when the Karankawa Indians massacred them. In that brutal attack, the first recorded European child born in Texas had his brain smashed against a tree. Some older children were taken in by the Karankawa, later rescued by the Spanish.
7 Klein‑Venedig: Germans In Colombia
In 1528 Emperor Charles V granted the German Welser banking family rights to settle and conquer a vast swath of present‑day Venezuela and Colombia. This arrangement helped settle the emperor’s massive debts and secured his election as Holy Roman Emperor. From the outset, the enterprise was unstable. The Welsers operated under a legal gray area, subordinate to existing Spanish colonial authority, thanks to Charles’ dual role as emperor and king of Spain.
Seeking fast profit, the Welser governors launched violent raids into the interior in pursuit of the mythical El Dorado. The first governor, Ambrosius Ehinger, seized and branded indigenous peoples, founded the short‑lived settlement of New Nuremberg, and eventually died from a poison‑arrow wound. His successor, George Hohemuth, arrived flamboyantly with a slave raid, then also set out for gold. Both expeditions degenerated into starvation and, according to some accounts, cannibalism.
Meanwhile, subordinate Nikolaus Federmann abandoned his post to race a Spanish expedition across the Andes into Colombia. The Spanish won, and despite playing a role in founding Bogotá, Federmann received nothing. The Welsers had now utterly failed to establish anything sustainable. Their brutal raids alienated locals, who fled and could no longer trade. Two of their conquistadors, including Bartholomeus VI Welser (the financier’s son), were murdered by a Spanish colleague. By 1546 the Welser charter was suspended; nine years later, after protracted litigation, the entire area reverted to Spanish control.
6 Darien: Scots In Panama
In the 1690s the Scots, eager to join the colonial race, established the Company of Scotland Trading to Africa and the Indies, launching a scheme to colonise the Darien Isthmus in Panama. The English – who shared a monarch with Scotland – vehemently opposed the venture, forcing English investors to pull out and threatening embargoes on any who dealt with the new company.
After the company’s formation in November 1698, the project quickly went downhill. The land proved unsuitable for agriculture, the natives refused to trade (the colonists attempted to entice them with combs and mirrors, an odd vanity‑based approach), and disease ravaged the settlers. Ships sent to fetch supplies discovered that King William had prohibited English colonies and traders from assisting the Scots, leaving the starving colonists turned away.
When the Spanish announced plans to attack, the remaining 300 of the original 1,200 colonists abandoned the settlement. A second fleet arrived, found the place empty, and launched a surprisingly successful pre‑emptive strike against the Spaniards before being besieged and captured. The whole debacle cost Scotland between a quarter and half of its wealth, and the resulting impoverishment contributed heavily to Scotland’s acquiescence to the 1707 Act of Union.
5 Charlesfort: French In South Carolina
In 1561 France existed in an uneasy truce between Catholic and Huguenot (Protestant) factions. Admiral Gaspard de Coligny, despite his Protestant faith, was a trusted advisor to the staunchly Catholic royal family of Charles IX. He dispatched an expedition to the New World to scout for possible settlements that could serve as a haven for Huguenots while remaining under French protection.
The expedition’s leader, Jean Ribault, built Charlesfort in the spectacular natural harbour of Port Royal. He sailed back to France to report his findings, promising to return to the 27‑man garrison in six months. That promise never materialised. France’s fragile truce collapsed into civil war; Ribault docked in England instead, where he was imprisoned as a spy.
Supplies at Charlesfort quickly ran out, exacerbated by the failure to plant crops. Morale sank, and attempts to force food from the natives soured relations. Eventually, the soldiers mutinied, killing their commander and constructing a crude ship to sail the Atlantic. They cannibalised one of their own before being rescued by an English fishing vessel. One settler, who had maintained friendly ties with the Indians, was captured by the Spanish when they occupied the site. Ribault’s belated return in 1565 ended with him and his new settlers being massacred by the Spanish.
4 Carlota: Confederates In Mexico
Defeat in the American Civil War drove many Confederates to search for a fresh start abroad. Mexico, embroiled in its own civil war, seemed an attractive destination. It attracted eleven Confederate generals, three governors and two former governors.
However, Mexico was far from stable. The nation was in the throes of its own civil war, and only the Royalist regime – led by Austrian Emperor Maximilian and backed by the French – welcomed the settlers. Most ordinary Mexicans, still bitter from the Mexican‑American War, harboured deep resentment. Some Confederates viewed the locals with disdain.
Maximilian’s enthusiasm waned as the reunited United States applied diplomatic pressure and supported his republican opponents. He forbade the Confederates from forming military units (a necessity in a war‑torn zone) and tried to disperse them. Many were forced to surrender their weapons to secure safe passage through rebel‑held lands.
The largest Confederate enclave, Carlota (named for Maximilian’s wife), lay near Veracruz. It suffered from hostility by dispossessed locals and exploitative practices by Confederate leaders – chief agent Commodore Matthew Maury and his associates bought massive tracts of land only to sell them at inflated prices. When the French withdrew in 1866, Maximilian was executed, and the Confederates fled – either slipping back into the United States or moving on to Brazil.
3 Sointula: Finnish Socialists In Canada
In 1900 a group of Finnish coal workers in Nanaimo, Canada, fed up with abysmal conditions, decided to create a community of their own. They invited socialist philosopher‑journalist Matti Kurikka from Finland to lead the effort, negotiated for 28,000 acres on Malcolm Island, and christened the settlement Sointula, meaning “place of harmony.” The name was not meant to be ironic; at first, everything seemed promising. Kurikka’s vision of communal ownership, consensus‑based decision‑making and equal pay for women attracted many.
Unfortunately, the colony lacked economic stability. Its residents – a mix of coal miners, shoemakers, doctors, theosophists, philosophers and anarchists – struggled with the farming, fishing and logging required to sustain the settlement, quickly sinking into debt. Kurikka, steadfast in his radical ideals, insisted that marriage was slavery for women and that children should be raised communally, even as the community grappled with severe economic woes. This strained relations with the colonists – a tension not unlike the one between Kurikka and William Lane of New Australia.
A tragic fire in the communal hall claimed eleven lives, further demoralising the settlers. Kurikka’s unrealistically low bid for a bridge‑building contract proved the final nail in Sointula’s coffin; economics and socialism simply did not mesh. Kurikka abandoned the colony in late 1904, and it was liquidated the following year, though the area still retains a distinct Finnish flavour.
2 Nueva Germania: Germans In Paraguay
In 1886 Paraguay was a sparsely populated frontier, reminiscent of the situation William Lane faced a decade later. Fourteen German families arrived and founded Nueva Germania, driven by a simple yet disturbing vision: a colony of pure Aryan “ubermensch” that could lay claim to the South American continent.
The enterprise was led by Bernhardt Forster and his wife Elisabeth Forster‑Nietzsche, sister of philosopher Friedrich Nietzsche. The colonists were woefully unprepared for the environment, succumbing to a host of maladies – tuberculosis, malaria, snakebites, sand fleas and simple crop failure. In 1889 Forster, despondent, committed suicide; Elisabeth returned to Germany in 1893, where she later twisted her brother’s philosophical legacy to fit her own racist agenda, a stark contradiction to Nietzsche’s own views.
The survivors were reduced to subsistence farming, and the colony remains one of Paraguay’s poorest regions. The Aryan ideology quickly crumbled under necessity. Today, the descendants speak the native Guaraní language, and despite an influx of Nazi fugitives after World War II – possibly including Josef “the Angel of Death” Mengele – they blend indistinguishably with other Paraguayans. Ironically, those who tried to preserve racial purity suffered birth defects due to inbreeding, a grim twist of fate.
1 Sagallo: Cossacks In Africa
In the 1880s Imperial Russia watched the scramble for Africa with envy. Notorious Cossack leader Nikolai Ashinov conceived a bold plan: seize Ethiopia and gift it to the Tsar. On 17 January 1889, Ashinov and a motley crew of 150 Cossacks landed at Tadjoura on the Horn of Africa and occupied the old Egyptian fort of Sagallo.
France had already claimed the area within its sphere of influence, and the Russian government, fearing an international crisis, completely disavowed the venture. Undeterred, Ashinov rechristened Sagallo “New Moscow,” erected a chapel and attempted repairs on the fort, though his Cossacks were more interested in raiding than building.
On 16 February, two French cruisers arrived offshore, sending an officer to negotiate. Ashinov’s response was absurdly blustering – he refused to meet the French governor, declared he would not surrender, and brandished a machine gun. The show of force proved empty; after a brief bombardment that wounded five, he capitulated.
Back in Russia, Ashinov escaped Siberian exile, fled to Paris and attempted to claim damages for his Sagallo enterprise.
Why These 10 Colonies Were Doomed
Each of the settlements above illustrates how geography, leadership failures and ill‑timed politics can seal a colony’s fate from day one. From the teetotaling zealot William Lane in Paraguay to the over‑ambitious Russian Cossacks in Africa, the stories of the 10 colonies doomed serve as cautionary tales of colonial hubris.