Background
Ferdinando Gorges was was born at Long Ashton, Somersetshire, in 1565 or 1566.
Ferdinando Gorges was was born at Long Ashton, Somersetshire, in 1565 or 1566.
Very little documentation exists regarding his education.
In 1587 Gorges was captured by a ship of the Spanish Armada and held prisoner for some time. Two years later he was in command of a troop fighting for Henry IV of France and after the siege of Rouen in 1591 was knighted for the part which he played.
In 1596 Gorges was appointed governor of the fort and castle of Plymouth and captain of St. Nicholas Island.
He went with the Earl of Essex to the Azores in 1597 and, two years later, assisted him in the attempt to put down the Tyrone rising in Ireland.
In 1600 he was involved with Essex in his own rebellion in London, and a year later he gave evidence against the earl at his trial.
Gorges was temporarily suspended from his governorship in 1603, on the accession of James I, but was restored and served until 1629; then, disgusted with the conditions under which he served, he resigned. His interest in the colonization of America began in 1605, when five Indians were brought to England and he took three of them into his house, teaching them English and learning much about their country in return.
He became a member of the Plymouth Company in 1606, and was influential in outfitting three ships which sailed from Plymouth on May 31, 1607, landing at the mouth of the Kennebec River in Maine. This colony was known as the Popham colony, after Sir John Popham, chief justice of England. The settlement was abandoned early in 1608, but Gorges continued to fit and send out other expeditions. He obtained a new charter for the Plymouth Company in 1620, and was granted at various times large tracts of territory in Maine. When the council resigned its charter to the king of England in 1635 Gorges determined to set up a minor sovereignty in Maine. He obtained a charter from the king which established him as lord proprietary of Maine and sent his son, Thomas Gorges, as deputy governor.
In Gorges married Ann Bell (d. 1620). They had two sons and two daughters.
In 1621, he married Mary Fulford.
In 1627, Ferdinando married Elizabeth Gorges (d. 1629), who died a few weeks after the marriage.
And in 1629, he married Elizabeth Gorges, Lady Smyth.