The Darien Myth and the Origins of the Union

The Darien Scheme’s failure is often cited as the self-inflicted wound that made the Union inevitable. 

In fact, England sabotaged the Darien project from the beginning. 

17th century England was continually at war, mainly with Holland and France. This impacted Scotland because France was Scotland’s largest trading partner but England’s biggest rival. 

After the 1603 Union of Crowns, England revoked trading privileges between the Scots and French, severing the largest component of Scottish income. The 1660 Navigation Act barred Scotland from trading with the American colonies,[1]and England raised the tariff on Scottish linen imported by England. As a result, Scotland had no choice but to create new trading outlets.[2]  

William Paterson, a well-respected Scottish merchant and Bank of England founder, conceived of and carefully planned the Darien project to break the monopoly of the English East India company by establishing a Scottish port linking the Atlantic and the Pacific that would be open to all European traders.[3]

Paterson’s plan, deemed sound, was approved by London’s elite. What wasn’t anticipated was sabotage by England. Westminster discouraged investors and William III ensured that no governor in the region would trade or aid the Scots.[4]

England threatened Scotland with land and sea invasion if it didn’t sign the Treaty of Union and it bribed the signatories. 

The sovereign Scottish people are realising they have the power to end a union that has subjugated them for centuries. That power is what England fears most.

Leah Gunn Barrett

08/05/23

[1] P. H. Scott, The Union of 1707: Why and How (Berlin: Birlinn, 2013), 15.

[2] Plantagenet Somerset and Fiona Somerset Fry, The History of Scotland (London; Boston: Routledge & Kegan Paul, 1982), 184.

[3] Philip J. Stern, “British Asia and British Atlantic: Comparisons and Connections,” William and Mary Quarterly 63, no. 4 (2006): 693–712, http://www.jstor.org/stable/4491576, 707.

[4] “Report by William Paterson to the Directors,” Dec. 19, 1699, Darien Papers, 191.