THE FRENCH AND INDIAN WAR
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It all began with France and England fighting over the Ohio River Valley. A very young George Washington commanded the British troops (he then fought against them years later for independence)
British colonists wanted to take over french land in North America and the fur trade apprehended in French territory.
It was called the French and Indian war because Native Americans allied with the French against the British because they feared the British in America could take over their territory. It was also called the SevenYear War in Europe. It spread through Eurpoe, Asia and West Indies.
First the British suffered loses from 1756 to 1758. French and Indian allies started to expand in areas that British had claimed. They destroyed British forts in Lake Ontario and Georgia and captured English trading posts. They also destroyed a Miami village called Pickawillany in what is now western Ohio that hosted English traders and built Fort Duquense. Then in 1756 the war was declared by England even though it had started two years ago. Indians had covered most of the native American territory claimed during the war.
But from 1758 to 1759 the war shifted in favor of the British with William Pitt as British Secretary of State. The British blocked the French shipment and also built their own forts like Fort Necessity with the leadership of George Washington to defend their territory from French threats, they took over Fort Duquesne. Indians then abandon the French and this allowed British to capture French forts that protected the entrance to the Saint Lorens River. In 1759 the British won the battle, which allowed them to take up Quebec. The next year British Major General James Wolfe and his troops marched down to Montreal and captured it. They forced the French governor general to surrender and give up Canada including forts protecting the Great Lake and Florida.
In 1763 the Treaty of Paris ended the war in favor of the British. The Mississippi River became the boundary between the British and Spanish claims.
As a result of the war, the British Parliament began taxing the colonists to recover the expenses of the war, since the war had caused a great debt that nearly destroyed England's government. Colonists protested as they did not want to pay any taxes except for those levied by their representatives. This is one of the leading tensions that caused the American Revolution.
