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U.S. History. The French and Indian War. Opening. Today you will see how the end of Anglo-French imperial competition as seen in the French and Indian War and the 1763 Treaty of Paris laid the groundwork for the American Revolution. Competing European Claims .
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Opening • Today you will see how the end of Anglo-French imperial competition as seen in the French and Indian War and the 1763 Treaty of Paris laid the groundwork for the American Revolution.
Competing European Claims • In the middle of the 18th century, France and England had competing claims for land in North America. • The French held trapping and trade routes in the Ohio Valley. • The English colonies were encroaching on French territory as the population grew. • They also competed over trade issues with the Native Americans in the disputed region.
The beginning of the French and Indian War • Summer 1754: George Washington was sent into the Ohio Valley to challenge the French • Washington built a stockade (Fort Necessity) close to a French outpost and unsuccessfully tried to attack it • Washington and his soldiers were trapped inside Fort Necessity, and Washington had to surrender
Braddock’s Defeat • In July 1755, the British sent a force from Virginia to attack Fort Duquesne. • The larger and better equipped English force was defeated by the smaller French force and their Native American allies. • Both the British commander, Braddock, and the French commander Beaujeu, were killed. • 23 year old George Washington won accolades for rallying the defeated British and preventing the battle from turning into a rout. • The first two years of fighting were characterized by humiliating defeats for the British.
The Seven Years War in Europe • The French and Indian War was essentially the North American theatre of a larger conflict, the Seven Years War, in Europe. • Britain, Prussia, and Hanover fought against an alliance of France, Austria, Saxony, Russia, Sweden and Spain.
Victory at all costs • In 1757, William Pitt became the British Prime Minister and promised to lead country to victory. • He concentrated on: • getting the French out of North America • buying the cooperation by the colonists by stimulating the North American economy with a massive amount of British money through trade • buying the support of the Native Americans with promises of fixed territorial boundaries.
The Seven Years War in Europe • Prime Minister Pitt of England gave money to Prussia to help England fight in Europe and committed British troops and resources to winning the war against the French in North America. • The European phase of the war lasted from 1757 to 1763.
The momentum changes • The heavily outfitted force of English soldiers overwhelmed the French allies, the Cherokee Indians to the south and started capturing strategic French forts and cutting off the supply lines to those French soldiers. • The British conquered Quebec in 1759. • In 1760, they captured Montreal.
Fortunes Reverse • In the final years of the war, the British defeated the French Navy and took French colonies in the Caribbean. • The French Empire in North America came to an end.
French Defeat: Treaty of Easton • The Treaty of Easton, signed in 1758, essentially sealed France’s fate. • In the treaty, the British promised the Six Iroquois Nations to stop settlements west of the Appalachian Mountains in exchange for their neutrality in the war. This caused the French to abandon Fort Duquesne and, by 1760 Detroit and Montreal, the last two French strongholds in North America, had fallen. This was the end of major fighting in North America.
The Treaty of Paris (1763) • Often called the Peace of Paris, or the Treaty of 1763, was signed by the kingdoms of Great Britain, France and Spain, with Portugal in agreement. • Together with another treaty, it ended the French and Indian War (Seven Years' War).
The Treaty of Paris (1763) • For seven years England and their colonists had battled against the French and their Native American allies. • The treaties marked the beginning of an extensive period of British dominance outside of Europe. • England had received control of all French possessions as well as most of the territory east of the Mississippi River, including the Ohio Country. • Native Americans in Ohio feared that colonists would move onto their lands.
The Proclamation of 1763 • Forbade English colonists from living west of the Appalachian Mountains, and it was hoped to prevent further conflict by easing the Native Americans' fears. • Many colonists became upset because the Proclamation prohibited them from moving to the Ohio Country. • The colonists’ desire to move onto this land claimed by both England and France was a primary reason for the French and Indian War. • England’s action convinced many colonists that England did not understand life in the New World and helped lead to the American Revolution.
