Settlement of Lower Columbia

The settlement of Lower Columbia by Europeans began in 1560, with the arrival of the first settlers. Unlike other countries in the Americas, Lower Columbia never went through a colonial period; in other words, it was not settled as the result of any land grants by European monarchs, nor was it ever ruled by any outside government. Instead, the settlers who came to Lower Columbia did so without any government involvement or direction; indeed, many were forced to flee their homes in Europe due to persecution or legal trouble. Consequently, the settlement of Lower Columbia was haphazard and unorganized, especially in its first few decades.

Background
The origins of the first wave of settlement in Lower Columbia date back to the mid-16th century and the early years of the Counter-Reformation, when the Roman Catholic Church began condemning what it defined as Protestant heresies at the Council of Trent. These condemnations, in turn, resulted in persecution of Protestants across much of Western Europe, as the Catholic Church reasserted itself. Protestants in France and Scandinavia were subjected to especially severe persecution, and therefore were desperate to escape their homelands in search of religious freedom.

At the same time, the ongoing political battles between Catholics and Protstants in England resulted in English Catholics and Protestants alternately being persecuted, with many of those who managed to escape martyrdom choosing to flee. These English refugees followed the other persecuted Europeans in their exodus from Europe, though they rarely interacted with other groups of refugees. Even when they did, any theological differences between them rarely mattered; their common bond as refugees seeking a new homeland usually overcame any potential animosity between them.

Regardless of their national origin, these migrants all followed similar paths eastward, traveling by sea to the Ottoman Empire. While some of them were able to stay in Ottoman cities and make a new life for themselves, the majority were viewed with suspicion by the Muslim authorities and persecuted once again, forcing them to continue their journeys. Their fortunes did not improve when they reached India, which at that time was also dominated by Muslim emperors, and so they set sail once again. After rounding the Malay Peninsula and heading north, the migrants arrived in Okatabawashi and Japan, where isolationism had produced very xenophobic populations. Although the first European arrivals were allowed to stay and establish new businesses, their efforts to convert the locals eventually drew the ire of local officials, who forced them out.

Now at the edge of the known world, the Europeans who had made it thus far had no choice but to sail across the open waters of the Pacific Ocean and hope to reach land before they ran out of supplies. Fortunately for them, however, their final ports of departure lay close to the North Pacific's great natural highway. With little effort, the refugees sailed into the Kuroshio Current, which eventually merged into the North Pacific Current, carrying their ships much faster than they could otherwise have gone. As such, they reached the shores of North America only a few weeks after setting sail from Asia.