French and Indian War

I

Introduction

French and Indian War (1754-1763), part of a “great war for empire”, a determined and eventually successful attempt by Britain to attain a dominant position in North America, the Caribbean, and India. Although the French and Indian War was fought in America, it corresponded to the Seven Years' War in Europe, and the Third Carnatic War in Asia (see Carnatic Wars). The French and Indian War stripped France of its North American empire and its expense caused Britain to re-evaluate the imperial relationship to its North American colonies.

II

Early Rivalries

By the end of the 17th century, Britain had established flourishing colonial settlements along the Atlantic Coast in New England and in the Chesapeake Bay region. At the same time, France had founded small communities along the St Lawrence River and had claimed the entire Mississippi River Valley, following the expeditions of French explorers Louis Jolliet and René-Robert Cavelier, sieur de La Salle. These North American colonies became part of an intense rivalry between Britain and France. Each country tried to equal or surpass the economic, political, and military power of the other through colonization, alliances, and warfare.

Beginning in 1689, Britain fought a century-long series of wars with France and its ally, Spain. On three occasions prior to the French and Indian War, these hostilities spilled over into the western hemisphere where Britain and France competed to control the valuable fur trade on the North American mainland and the rich sugar production on the islands of the West Indies. Both nations received military assistance from colonists in these wars, but also relied on the help of Native Americans who participated because of their own rivalries for land and power.

The first of these conflicts was King William’s War, known in Europe as the Nine Years’ War, and consisted of little more than a number of skirmishes that produced no changes in territory. The next conflict was Queen Anne’s War, known in Europe as the War of the Spanish Succession. During this war, the major battle in North America was a British and colonial attempt to capture Quebec in 1710. Although the expedition failed, Britain used victories in Europe to gain significant additional territory from France in the Peace of Utrecht, including Newfoundland, Acadia, and the Hudson Bay region of northern Canada, as well as greater access to the Native American fur trade. A new conflict, King George’s War, began outside North America as part of the War of the Austrian Succession. In 1745 New England militiamen captured the French naval fortress of Louisbourg on Cape Breton Island but the Treaty of Aix-la-Chapelle returned the fortress to France.

III

Beginning of the French and Indian War

The French and Indian War began in the struggle for control of the Ohio Valley. For more than a generation, the powerful Iroquois Confederacy dominated a middle ground between the French and British colonies in North America. They had gained control of a vast region in the interior of the continent by alliances with other Native American tribes and had successfully excluded the European nations from this territory. The Iroquois were able to maintain their power against that of both the British and the French, but this three-way balance of power began to break down during the 1740s. British traders penetrated deep into the Ohio country and established direct relations with tribal groups who previously had been controlled by the Iroquois, or had traded only with the French.

The Ohio Company, an association of land speculators based in Virginia, encouraged these excursions. The company had received a grant of 500,000 acres from George II and wanted to move traders and settlers into this interior region. In 1753 Governor Robert Dinwiddie of Virginia, who was also a leading member of the Ohio Company, despatched 21-year-old George Washington to carry an ultimatum to the French, warning them to leave the region. In the following year Governor Dinwiddie ordered the construction of a fort at the forks of the Ohio (where the Monongahela and Allegheny rivers meet, later the site of Pittsburgh).

Recognizing the need to dominate the Ohio Valley militarily in order to protect their strategic interests in the American interior, the French immediately reinforced their existing forts south of Lake Erie and expelled the British from the forks of the Ohio before Dinwiddie’s fort was completed. There they built a new military post, Fort Duquesne, and established firm title to the region.

These rival territorial claims in the Ohio Valley quickly led to violence. An armed party of Virginians under the command of Washington defeated a small French force east of the Ohio River and built a log stockade that became known as Fort Necessity. The French gathered more troops and quickly laid siege to this small fort, forcing Washington and his troops to surrender on July 4, 1754. The French then sent Washington and his troops back to Virginia.

In the meantime, in anticipation of the outbreak of war and on the urging of the British Board of Trade, the colonial governors convened a gathering of delegates from the seven British colonies in Albany, New York. The Albany Congress formalized an alliance with the Iroquois and planned other defensive measures. However, a plan of union developed by Benjamin Franklin, known as the Albany Plan, which was prophetic of the final constitutional settlement following independence, was rejected.

IV

The Military Struggle

The British had no desire to begin a war in America. The last conflict with France, which ended in 1748, had depleted the British treasury, and Parliament refused to impose new taxes. Yet many British leaders, such as William Pitt who wished to expand British imperial power in order to increase trade, demanded action.