First English Colony in New World The first English colony in the New World is established at Roanoke Island (modern North Carolina), organized by Sir Walter Raleigh and governed by Ralph Lane. It was not successful, and the colonists withdrew in June 1586. See the Source Sir Francis Drake Sacks Santiago Sir Francis Drake, an English admiral who circumnavigated the globe, sacks the slave-trading settlement of Santiago in the Cape Verde Islands. See the Source