French naval officer Jean Ribault, born in…
1562 CE
French naval officer Jean Ribault, born in the town of Dieppe on the English Channel, had entered into the French navy under the command of the great Huguenot admiral Gaspard de Coligny, who in 1562 chooses him to lead an expedition to the New World to found a colony.
Leaving France on February 18 with a fleet of one hundred and fifty colonists, he crosses the Atlantic Ocean and explores the mouth of the St. Johns River in modern-day Jacksonville, Florida.
He names it the "River May", as this is the month when he finds it, and erects a stone column claiming the territory for France.
Ribault's fleet now proceeds north.