ABSTRACT
Robert Harcourt's rights to the coastline between the Essequibo and the Wiapoco were now combined with the monopoly of the former Amazon Company, stretching from the Wiapoco to five degrees southward of ‘any parte or brannch of the said River of Amazons’. The new company’s writ was conceived to run through the continent from the Atlantic to the Pacific. North and Harcourt’s efforts to launch the venture were attended by a flurry of publications. Secure in the king’s warrant to the Attorney-General, Robert Harcourt made moves to publish a revised edition of his Relation in February 1626. By the early summer of 1627 North and Harcourt had managed to draw in an impressive list of associates. In November 1628 the Little Hopewell left Gravesend for the Amazon, carrying out Robert Harcourt as governor of the first colony with Sir Oliver Cheyney as his deputy and other gentlemen such as Robert Hayman, in his company.
