William Weston

Who is William Weston?

William Weston was a 15th-century English merchant from Bristol, who was probably the first Englishman to lead an expedition to North America, the voyage itself taking place in either 1498, 1499 or 1500. The main evidence for the expedition is found in a letter from Henry VII to his Lord Chancellor, John Morton first published in 2009. An annotated transcript, accompanied by an introduction and a photograph of the document was published in 2011. The King's letter provides for a suspension of legal action against Weston because it was the King's intent that Weston would 'shortly with goddes grace passe and saille for to serche and fynde if he can the new founde land'.

Dr Evan Jones, who first published the letter, and his research associate, Margaret Condon, suggest that William Weston was probably operating under the Letters patent granted to the Venetian explorer John Cabot. In March 1496 Cabot had been awarded the monopoly right in England to undertake voyages across the Atlantic, in search of new lands or trade routes. One of the stipulations of the patent was that Cabot should sail only from Bristol. That Weston was a deputy or assign of Cabot, seems likely given the King's personal support for the Bristol explorer. That Cabot and Weston were working together is further supported by the discovery of a 40 shilling reward made by Henry VII to the Bristol merchant in January 1498, at a time when Cabot was in London sorting out business relating to a pension he had been granted by the King and making preparations for a new voyage. While details of the reward have not yet been formally published, they were reported in the Canadian Press in August 2009. Since that time Jones and Condon also claim to have found that the King later paid Weston a much larger reward, as a way of recompensing him for expenses incurred in his voyage to the New World. This is one of the finds of a research programme dubbed "The Cabot Project" at the University of Bristol, to find more information about the Bristol discovery voyages of this period. It is hoped that the reward itself, along with a much more detailed study of William Weston, will be published in an academic journal in 2012.