The New World wasn't exactly new.  Native Americans, for thousands of years, prospered before European contact.  Spain possessed much of South America, while France acquired the central portions of North America.  On May 14, 1607, a group of roughly 100 British members of a joint venture called the Virginia Company founded the first permanent English settlement in North America on the banks of the James River. Famine, disease and conflict with local Native American tribes in the first two years brought this Atlantic coastal colony to the brink of failure before the arrival of a new group of settlers and supplies in 1610.