founded on the coast of Phippsburg, Maine in 1607 as a colonization attempt by the Virginia Company of Plymouth. The colony lasted about one year before being abandoned. One of its principal backers was Sir John Popham; his nephew George Popham was the colony's governor for most of its brief existence. George Popham died in the colony in 1608 and was replaced by Raleigh Gilbert. He and the remaining colonists abandoned it after word arrived that John Popham and Gilbert's older brother Sir John Gilbert had died. Plymouth Colony: 1620–1686, 1689–1692 The Plymouth Colony originated as a land grant issued by the London Virginia Company to a group of English separatist Puritans who had fled to Holland to avoid religious persecution. Their migration to the New World in 1620 aboard the Mayflower was funded by the Merchant Adventurers, who sent additional settlers to engage in profit-making activities in the colony. The settlers had intended to establish a colony near the mouth of the Hudson River, within the bounds of the London Virginia Company's territory, but weather conditions on their arrival led them to establish it instead on the shores of Cape Cod Bay at Plymouth, Massachusetts. The colonists acquired a land grant from the Plymouth Council for New England in 1621, but its early governance took place under the terms of the Mayflower Compact, a document which the colonists drafted and signed aboard the Mayflower before they landed. In 1630, the colony acquired a formal charter with authority to govern from the Plymouth Council, but it was unsuccessful in attempts to acquire a royal charter that would guarantee its territory against other claimants. The colony held annual elections for its offices. Between 1620 and 1680, it was ruled by a governor who appointed a temporary replacement if he left the colony. In 1681, they began also electing a deputy governor who would serve in the governor's absence. The leadership was dominated by William Bradford, who served more than 30 terms as governor. The colony was incorporated into the Dominion of New England in 1686, but the dominion was dissolved in 1689 and all the New England colonies temporarily reverted to their previous governmental structures. Plymouth finally received a royal charter in 1691, but it was not the one which they had sought for 70 years. Instead of protecting the colony's autonomy, the charter incorporated Plymouth into the Province of Massachusetts