Successful Darien Project

If we could have actually sold things the natives wanted, somehow survived the diseases and formed some sort of pact with the Spanish then it might have just saved Scotland's independence. Ina ll reality it was a pipe dream however. :(
 
We'd have been far better off with a couple of decent sized islands in the Caribbean for sugar, and possibly a coastal province in America for tobacco (there were places in the modern day US which were so heavily settled by Scots that they were practically Scots colonies).

Alternatively, a company trading to India - maintaining trading posts in Africa along the way - could potentially do quite well. There were still opportunities for small nations in the far east, and Scotland's capital would have been far more profitably deployed in that direction.

As it was, Darien was always going to be an unmitigated disaster. If the Spanish - who had managed the place for a hundred and fifty years -couldn't do anything with it, what were the chances of Scotland managing? Until there are cures for malaria and yellow fever, Panama is functionally useless.
 
Of course if the English in Jamaica had been a little more supportive and provided supplied when asked to the Scots could have kept the venture going a little longer. That way they could have throw even more good money after bad. As it was, it has been estimated that 25% of the nation's savings were wiped out. Propping it up so the Spanish would have even more effort removing it looking like a win-win situation for England, poorer Scots, poorer Spanish.
 
It wouldn't have made sense for the English, because greater foreign policy considerations meant it was in England's interest to keep Spain on-side at that exact moment in time. There were plenty of occasions when the Scots could have founded such a colony, and would have received passive (or even active) assistance from the English, but the early 18th century just wasn't the time.

There's no way to make a winning situation out of Darien. If William Paterson hadn't helped found the national bank, and suffered so personally from his hair-brained scheme, he would have been thrown in prison as an idiot and a con-man.
 
Pete and I did look at a British Fuego founded by Scots...

...But 'Fitzroy's Folly' was more fun.

Darien was too close to Spanish dominated lands to survive successfully - and it was in a fever hole. What if the Scots had gone for dominating the Newfoundland fishery, or controlled Cape Town? Otherwise I'm for one of the Windward Islands...
 
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