The colony of British Columbia was formed August 2, 1858, with Sir James Douglas appointed as the first governor. 

BC was created as a response to growing threats by American expansionist interests. 

What the Americans did not count on was that the gold rush forced Britain’s hand. This distant part of the world was not as useless as it had seemed to be. Sir James Douglas, a fur trader who governed the colony of Vancouver Island, acted on his own initiative to keep the gold rush from spinning out of control, but he could do so for only so long. On 2 August 1858, Britain declared the mainland a separate British colony, named British Columbia, with Douglas in charge. Over the next months and years, Douglas acted forcefully to maintain order and provide access to the goldfields. The Fraser River Gold Rush and the Founding of British Columbia | The Canadian Encyclopedia

The 150th Anniversary of Sir James Douglas as Governor of British Columbia
Issued by Guyana in 2008

“The soil and climate are good, healthy and genial: timber, coal, and fish abound without limit… and as the country becomes better known to the world, there can be no doubt that its advantages will be better availed of,” wrote Donald Fraser about the British territory west of the Rocky Mountains.

That same year, Queen Victoria declared the region a new colony and called it British Columbia. Soon the isolated but resource-rich colony would start attracting waves of settlers, putting it on the road to Canadian Confederation.
Colonization