Colonial Despatches

David Scott, an independent Bombay merchant, obtained the East India Company’s approval for his 1785 Northwest Coast expedition with James Strange.1 The goal of the expedition was to establish new trade between India and the Northwest Coast, and to survey the Northwest Coast and document new discoveries.2 Unfortunately, the expedition was a failure on all counts.3

Scott learned to be less supportive of risky expeditions.4 He became chairman of the East India Company from 1796–97 and again in 1801.5

• 1. Barry M. Gough, Distant Dominion: Britain and the Northwest Coast of North America, 1579-1809 (Canada: University of British Columbia, 1980), 57.
• 2. Ibid., 58.
• 3. Ibid.
• 4. Ibid., 65.
• 5. Andrew Scott, The Encyclopedia of Raincoast Placenames (Madeira Park, BC: Harbour Publishing, 2009), 107.