AHC: Spanish colony in the OTL 13 colonies

In a PoD between 1600 and 1776, Spain must have a colony in the OTL 13 colonies (Besides Southern Georgia or whatsoever)
 
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Spanish get the Ajacan mission up, running, and as a basis for something more?

Of course, that also means perhaps Guale in *Georgia will have basis between Florida and Ajacan if butterflies ensure a *Georgian mission is established. :)

Onwards, glorious Castilians! Onwards north, to Canada!
 
Spanish get the Ajacan mission up, running, and as a basis for something more?

Of course, that also means perhaps Guale in *Georgia will have basis between Florida and Ajacan if butterflies ensure a *Georgian mission is established. :)

Onwards, glorious Castilians! Onwards north, to Canada!

How about use the Ajacan to convert the Powhatan?
 
Kind of tricky, that. They didn't have nearly the same drive to settle that the English did; Virginia doesn't have the same appeal to a potential conquistador that it might have for a gold prospector with no dreams of martial glory. There's also the matter of the Swedes and Dutch; if they went too far north, they'd have to get into another fight with the Dutch overseas, and the Spanish had already demostrated their utter failure at containing Dutch ambitions through the loss of Recife and the East Indies monopoly.

I suspect if the Spaniards did manage to successfully claim control of some that land, the population of the Spanish "Thirteen Colonies" would be way lower than that of the historic, British colonies. At best, it'd probably be cluttered with missions where a few Franciscan monks each preside over a congregation of disinterested Powhatan indians and make them work the land, etc.
 
By framing the geographic challenge in terms of "OTL 13 colonies," my mind jumped to the additional challenge of having that Spanish colony be one of the rebel colonies that forms the USA!

So, WI Spain makes a bigger effort to colonize Florida so there is a significant Spanish-speaking population there (not necessarily all Spaniards; they could have imported a fair number of their subjects from elsewhere in the Spanish Americas, not to mention slaves from Africa, and a certain number of Native Florida tribal peoples might have survived the disease epidemics too)--then sometime in the mid-18th century, say the 1730s or so, the British conquer the province and organize it as another colony, south of Georgia? Lots of English and other typical colonists the British promoted do settle there, but not enough to swamp out the Spanish culture there. The British are astute enough, in the early decades anyway, to find local elites who decide they are better off, even under a heretical monarchy, especially since the negotiators throw in Catholic toleration (to the point that the Catholic Church enjoys near-parity with the Anglican church, on Floridian soil anyway) as part of the deal. So the colony is now British politically, though very Spanish culturally. They nevertheless manage to perceive grievances in parallel with the Anglo dissidents to the north, and throw in with them at the Continental Congresses (their envoys speak English just fine of course, though the eventual USA does specifically rule out imposing it as a mandatory universal language in the Articles of Confederation and eventual Constitution, and implicitly recognizes Spanish as the second, legally co-equal, operating language of the Union).

This is quite a stretch if one bears in mind the severe ideological warfare between British dominant society and Catholic Europe, and the rivalry between Britain and Spain--which by late in the 18th century had largely subsided as the British became de facto dominant in the trade of the Spanish Empire and Spain was more and more often an ally rather than enemy. That's one reason I put the British acquisition of Florida rather late--to give the notion of Toleration a better chance in London (bearing in mind that rioting mobs against Popery were quite common right up to and after the years of the American Revolutionary War to be sure) and the possibility of a quasi-amicable transfer from Spain to Britain.

Also of course I've added a 14th colony rather than picked out one of the others!

But I do think if the Spanish were going to make a move on the Northeast seaboard of North America they'd surely start with Florida; if they were going to have a colony (one that by OP presumably is not part of British North America and does not join the USA when it forms) in the territory of the 13, it would be their second, after Florida.
 
All this would require is that

La Florida gets a northern buffer zone allied with the Cherokees and including a few Spanish forts.
 
By framing the geographic challenge in terms of "OTL 13 colonies," my mind jumped to the additional challenge of having that Spanish colony be one of the rebel colonies that forms the USA!

So, WI Spain makes a bigger effort to colonize Florida so there is a significant Spanish-speaking population there (not necessarily all Spaniards; they could have imported a fair number of their subjects from elsewhere in the Spanish Americas, not to mention slaves from Africa, and a certain number of Native Florida tribal peoples might have survived the disease epidemics too)--then sometime in the mid-18th century, say the 1730s or so, the British conquer the province and organize it as another colony, south of Georgia? Lots of English and other typical colonists the British promoted do settle there, but not enough to swamp out the Spanish culture there. The British are astute enough, in the early decades anyway, to find local elites who decide they are better off, even under a heretical monarchy, especially since the negotiators throw in Catholic toleration (to the point that the Catholic Church enjoys near-parity with the Anglican church, on Floridian soil anyway) as part of the deal. So the colony is now British politically, though very Spanish culturally. They nevertheless manage to perceive grievances in parallel with the Anglo dissidents to the north, and throw in with them at the Continental Congresses (their envoys speak English just fine of course, though the eventual USA does specifically rule out imposing it as a mandatory universal language in the Articles of Confederation and eventual Constitution, and implicitly recognizes Spanish as the second, legally co-equal, operating language of the Union).

This is quite a stretch if one bears in mind the severe ideological warfare between British dominant society and Catholic Europe, and the rivalry between Britain and Spain--which by late in the 18th century had largely subsided as the British became de facto dominant in the trade of the Spanish Empire and Spain was more and more often an ally rather than enemy. That's one reason I put the British acquisition of Florida rather late--to give the notion of Toleration a better chance in London (bearing in mind that rioting mobs against Popery were quite common right up to and after the years of the American Revolutionary War to be sure) and the possibility of a quasi-amicable transfer from Spain to Britain.

Also of course I've added a 14th colony rather than picked out one of the others!

But I do think if the Spanish were going to make a move on the Northeast seaboard of North America they'd surely start with Florida; if they were going to have a colony (one that by OP presumably is not part of British North America and does not join the USA when it forms) in the territory of the 13, it would be their second, after Florida.

Well ITTL I can imagine not only Texas, but all of Mexico joining the US ... a less racist one too ... but even more difficult to govern than OTL ... an interesting idea.
 
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