How did Freemasonry spread globally?

The global expansion of Freemasonry was carried out principally by sea captains, merchants, and military or naval lodges acting as Masonic missionaries across foreign ports and colonies 1.

In the Americas, informal or occasional lodges met in the early eighteenth century prior to formal charters 2. Regular authority was established with provincial deputations in the 1730s, establishing warranted lodges across North America, the West Indies, and South America 2.

In India, the Craft was introduced without any prior native antecedent by British merchants, soldiers, and sailors 1. The Grand Lodge of England constituted lodges at Madras in 1752 and Bombay in 1758, followed by Scottish and Irish warrants, as well as a military lodge in Ceylon in 1761 1.

Across Africa, expansion occurred through multiple European jurisdictions working alongside one another 1. In South Africa, the Dutch established the first lodge in 1772, followed by English, Scottish, and Irish lodges operating under a shared, amicable territorial presence 1. European grand bodies similarly erected lodges across West, East, and North Africa, while independent Grand Lodges were formed in Liberia, Egypt, and Tunis 1. In Belgium, early eighteenth-century lodges led to the formation of a Grand Orient, which later chartered lodges in the Belgian Congo alongside French warrants 1.