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Global Competition

By the mid-1700s, the major powers of Europe were locked in a worldwide struggle for empire. England, France, Spain, and the Netherlands competed for trade and colonies in far-flung corners of the globe. The English colonies in North America soon became caught up in the contest.

Britain and France had been competing for wealth for centuries. By 1700 they were two of the strongest powers in Europe. Their long rivalry aroused bitter feelings between British and French colonists in North America.

When France and England declared war on each other in Europe in 1689, French and English colonists in America also began to fight. With their Native American allies, they attacked each other’s settlements and forts. During the 1700s, two more wars between France and England fueled wars in their colonies. Neither side won a clear victory in these wars. A final war, the French and Indian War (1754-1763), decided which nation would control the northern and eastern parts of North America.

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Ohio River Valley Fur Trade

Iroquois Confederacy

The English competed with the French for furs. Also, different Native American groups competed to supply furs to the Europeans. The fur trade created economic and military alliances between the Europeans and their Native American trading partners. The Huron and Algonquin peoples of the Great Lakes region were allied with the French. The Iroquois of upper New York often were allied with the English. Alliances between Europeans and Native Americans led to their involvement in each other’s wars.

The most powerful group of Native Americans in the east was the Iroquois Confederacy, based in New York. When the confederacy was first formed in about 1570, it included five nations – the Mohawk, Seneca, Cayuga, Onondaga, and Oneida. Other groups later joined or were conquered by the Iroquois.

The Iroquois managed to remain independent by trading with both the British and the French. By skillfully playing the British and French against each other, the Iroquois dominated the area around the Great Lakes. By the mid – 1700s, however, the Iroquois came under greater pressure as the British moved into the Ohio Valley. Eventually the leaders of the confederacy gave certain trading rights to the British and reluctantly became their allies.

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British Troop Build-up

in the Ohio River Valley

The seeds for the French and Indian War were planted when British fur traders began moving into the Ohio River valley in the 1750s. British land companies were also planning to settle colonists there. The French and their Native American allies became alarmed. To keep the British out of the valley, a French officer named Charles de Langlade destroyed the village of Pickawillany and its British trading post.

The British traders left, and the French built forts to protect the region linking Canada and the Louisiana Territory. In 1753, the lieutenant governor of Virginia sent a small group of soldiers to tell the French to leave. The governor then sent British troops to build forts to protect their claimed land.

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The French and Indian War

Just the Facts

The French and Indian War was a war that pitted the British against the French and their Native American allies. The conflict, fought from 1754 to 1763, started when the British decided that they wanted to capitalize on the fur trade in the Ohio River Valley. France had already claimed the land and built forts to defend their claims. When the British started to build forts on the land, the French were not pleased and attacked.

Although the British government sent troops from England to fight, much of the war was fought by the colonists who lived in the area. They fought with the hopes that any land gained in the struggle, would be theirs to claim and live one.

The French and Indian War ended with a British victory and the signing of the Treaty of Paris of 1763. France lost all of its previous claims to the North American continent. The British Empire more than doubled its holdings in North America.

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The Young George Washington

George Washington was only 21 years old in 1754. He had grown u p on a plantation in Virginia, the son of wealthy parents. Gifted at mathematics, he began working as a land surveyor at the age of 15. His job took him to frontier lands in western Virginia.

In the spring on 1754, Governor Dinwiddie of Virginia made Washington a lieutenant colonel and sent him to the Ohio country with a militia – a group of civilians trained to fight in emergencies – of 150 men. The militia had instructions to build a fort where the Allegheny and Monongahela Rivers meet to form the Ohio river. When Washington arrived, he found that the French were already building Fort Duquesne on that spot.

Determined to carry out his orders, Washington hurried on. Indian allies revealed that French scouts were camped in the woods ahead. Marching quietly through the night, Washington launched a surprise attack and scattered the French. His success was brief, however. Hearing that the French were about to counterattack, Washington and his men quickly threw up a makeshift stockade. They named it Fort Necessity. A force of 700 French and Indians surrounded the fort. Badly outnumbered, Washington and his militia surrendered. The French then released Washington, and he returned home. This battle is known to be the first shots of a world wide conflict known as the Seven Years War in Europe, and the French and Indian War in America.

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The Albany Plan of Union

In July of 1754, representatives from the British colonies and the Iroquois nation met at Albany, New York. The colonists wanted the Iroquois to fight with them against the French. The Iroquois did not commit to this alliance.

Benjamin Franklin, who admired the union of the six Iroquois nations, suggested that the colonies band together for defense. His Albany Plan of Union was the first formal proposal to unite the colonies. The plan called for each colony to send representatives to a Grand Council. This council would be able to collect taxes, raise armies, make treaties, and start new settlements. The leaders in Albany supported Franklin’s plan, but the colonial legislatures later defeated it because they did not want to give up control of their own affairs.

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The Treaty of Paris, 1763

Although Spain came into the war on the side of the French in 1761, their help was too late. When the Seven Years’ War in Europe ended in 1763, Britain had won. By the Treaty of Paris, Britain claimed all of North America east of the Mississippi River. To reward Spain for its help, France gave it New Orleans and Louisiana, the French territory west of the Mississippi River. Britain, which had seized Cuba and the Philippines from Spain, gave them back in exchange for Florida. The treaty ended French power in North America.

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The Proclamation of 1763

During the French and Indian War, Britain and the colonies fought side by side. Americans took great pride in being partners in the victory over the French. However, when the war ended, problems arose. Britain wanted to govern its 13 colonies and the territories gained in the war in a uniform way. So, the British Parliament in London imposed new laws and restrictions. Previously, the colonies had been allowed to develop largely on their own. This practice is called Salutary Neglect. The British government simply let the colonist govern themselves and make their own decisions will little to no interference. The new laws that were being passed made the colonist feel that their natural rights and freedoms were being limited.

The first of Parliament’s laws was the Proclamation of 1763. It said that colonists could not settle west of the Appalachian Mountains. Britain wanted this land to remain in the hands of its Native American allies to prevent another revolt or war from taking place. The proclamation angered colonists who had hoped to move to the fertile Ohio Valley. Many of these colonists had no land of their own. It also upset colonists who had bought land as an investment. As a result, many ignored the law.

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The Taxing Begins

Britain owed a large debt from the French and Indian War. Keeping troops in the colonies to enforce the Proclamation of 1763 would raise the debt even higher. Britain needed more revenue, or income, to meet its expenses. So it attempted to have the colonies pay part of the war debt. It also wanted them to contribute toward the costs of frontier defense and colonial government. In the past, the king had asked the colonial assemblies to pass taxes to support military actions that took place in the colonies. This time, however, Parliament voted to tax the Americans directly.

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