Thursday marks what would have been the 250th birthday of Prince Edward, Duke of Kent and Strathearn — the British royal with whom P.E.I. shares a name.

Edward, born Nov. 2, 1767, never actually set foot on the Island. Instead, it was a mix of the Island needing a name — and Prince Edward advocating on its behalf — that landed him the namesake.

Too many Saint Johns

The Island we now know as P.E.I. is called Epekwitk by the Mi'kmaq — meaning "lying on the water."

Under French rule it become Île-Saint-Jean, and when the British took control in 1763 they translated the French name to St. John's Island.

A map of the island of St. John, circa 1775. (Library and Archives Canada)

However, it was easily confused with Saint John and St. John's, explained UPEI history professor Ed MacDonald, and the local government wanted to change the name.

In the 1780s, the government of the Island tried to change the name to New Ireland, but Britain refused, MacDonald said. Britain offered a couple of different options in return, which the Island government declined.

'A fit of gratitude'

"So we were were stuck with our old name until 1799, when we had heard that Prince Edward, son of the king of England, had taken an interest in the welfare of the colony," MacDonald said.

Edward had lived in Canada for nine years, and was stationed with the British military in Nova Scotia and Quebec.

He literally has a province named after him, yet nobody understands that Prince Edward was a person. - Nathan Tidridge, author of biography on Prince Edward

"He did suggest that there should be improvements made to the defences on Prince Edward Island in Charlottetown — that money should be spent improving our defences," MacDonald said.

MacDonald called it "a fit of gratitude" and "a romantic attitude towards the British Crown" that led the colony to request Prince Edward Island as a name. The new name was approved.

"We have a long history of admiring and wishing to connect ourselves to the royal family," said MacDonald, pointing to Charlottetown and Georgetown, named after Prince Edward's parents — King George III and his wife, Charlotte. Victoria Park is named after Edward's daughter, Queen Victoria.

'Nobody knows about him'

Nathan Tidridge, who wrote a biography about Edward, said Edward had travelled the Maritimes extensively, but he never made it to the Island — his plans to visit were cancelled when he injured himself by falling off a horse.

"He's one of our most memorialized figures, yet nobody knows about him," Tidridge said. "He literally has a province named after him, yet nobody understands that Prince Edward was a person."

A sketch of Prince Edward meeting with First Nations chiefs in Halifax by Charles William Jefferys. (Library and Archives Canada)

Tidridge said he is the first person on record to use the term "Canadian" to mean both the French and English inhabitants — prior to that it only referred to the French, he explained.

"He went and quelled a riot outside of Quebec City, and he said, 'We're not French, we're not English, we're all Canadian now,'" said Tidridge. "He really appealed to that unity."

Edward also wrote about combining the colonies to form a confederation — decades prior to the Charlottetown Conference.

"As a cultural figure, he kind of looms large," said Tidridge.

Mi'kmaq 'not consulted' on name

The Mi'kmaq Confederacy of P.E.I. said the Mi'kmaq were never consulted on the renaming of the Island.

"The arbitrary renaming of Epekwitk … the name the Mi'kmaq used for this Island for thousands of years, shows the colonialist attitude of the time," reads a statement from the confederacy. "The concern today, however, is the recognition of Mi'kmaq Aboriginal rights and title."