World History: The American Revolution

When completing his history of the world in The Age of Extremes Eric Hobsbawm placed the Age of Revolution as starting in 1776 with that of the American Revolution, (although he originally placed it in 1789 due to his series starting as a history of Europe). The American Revolution was one of the key events in modern history with it leading to the creation of the USA and helped spawn ideas of liberty. The Revolution was a complex event leaving long-lasting and contradictory legacies which continues to influence the world today. In this post we'll look at the ideological origins of Revolution, the events which set the stage for Revolution, the War of Independence, its impact, results, and legacies. 

Origins

In 1764 the editor of the New-Hampshire Gazette wrote 'By this means the spirited Englishman, the mountainous Welshman, the brave Scotsman,and Irishman, and the loyal American, may be firmly united and mutually resolved to guard the glorious throne of Britannia.' How then, around a decade later, did the colonists of the Thirteen Colonies come to revolt against Britain? As with many events in history we have a series of reasons behind the origins of the Revolution. Last World History post we looked at the Seven Years' War which contributed to the origins of Revolution. The War pushed France out of North America opening former French lands to British settlement and into conflict with Native Americans. A mixture of encroachment into their land and 'pan-Indianism' from a Delaware religious prophet named Neolin, (these two points will become a recurring factor in American-Native American relations in the years to come), caused a war, called Pontiac's War, on May 7 1763 when British troops were attacked by Chippewa warriors at Lake St. Clair, near Detroit. The war would last until 1766 when more land was taken from Native Americans but in 1763 the king, George III, issued a proclamation creating new colonies and forbidding white settlement east of the Appalachian Mountains. The reason for this was because Britain was unwilling to be drawn into a series of border wars, but the American colonists and land speculators saw this as a personal attack. They wanted to settle, or buy, the land although in practice the 'Proclamation Line' was ignored. By 1771 over 10,000 colonists had settled in the Ohio Valley causing massacres of Native Americans, such as in Pennsylvania. In the 1730s and 1740s a Protestant religious revival called the Great Awakening swept over the colonies where even those sceptical of religion, like Benjamin Franklin, became enraptured by religious preachers. Not only did this lay the foundation of Revolution as it encouraged greater social participation and there were calls for the people to choose their ministers, but one particular act passed by Britain fed into this. When Britain took French colonies in Canada this brought into the empire more Catholics. To secure their allegiance in 1774 the Quebec Act expanded the colony of Quebec and emancipated Catholics. The revitalised Protestants saw this as a betrayal of their faith and London strengthening Catholics, and settlers were aggravated as the expanded Quebec ate into land which they could settle. 

A critique of the Stamp Act

The Seven Years' War was very expensive costing Britain around £161 million. Taxes were raised across the empire and especially in the American colonies as it was seen that as Britain had fought the war for them they should pay for it. As a result, a series of taxes were passed which aggravated colonists - we'll get to them soon so we'll discuss the ideology behind opposition to taxes now. A common misconception, which seems to largely be held by aspects of the political Right, was that the protests were over taxation; it is often overlooked that the actual phrase was 'No Taxation without Representation'. A prevailing thought among British politicians at the time was 'virtual representation' as opposed to 'direct representation'. With virtual representation it was believed that those who sat in parliament represented the entire empire; the merchants who sat in parliament therefore represented all merchants across the empire. This idea was highly contested in both Britain and elsewhere in the colonies; it is no lie to say how corrupt this could be, until 1832 Old Sarum with a population of 7 had equal representation in parliament as Newcastle-upon-Tyne. This also linked to ideas of liberty. Many of the leaders of the American Revolution were influenced by the British Enlightenment. When we say Enlightenment we should really say 'Enlightenments' as each region of Europe had their own specific Enlightenment. The British Enlightenment, (we can also say Scottish due to how many Scottish thinkers there were), focused on ideas of individual liberty, property rights and secularism. Of these included the 'Father of Capitalism' Adam Smith and humanists like David Hume. Enlightenment humanism, in contrast to Renaissance humanism, placed emphasis on secularism, the separation of religion and state, and emphasis on logic over superstition. The famous figures of the Revolution including Thomas Jefferson and Benjamin Franklin were deeply inspired by this branch of the Enlightenment. 

Thomas Paine

I want to focus on one particular part of the ideological origins of the American Revolution which inspired people across the US, Britain, and France. This was a short pamphlet written in simple English called Common Sense by Thomas Paine. Written in 1776 John Adams said 'Without the pen of the author of Common Sense, the sword of Washington would have been raised in vain.'  Originally from Norfolk in Britain Paine emigrated to Philadelphia in 1774 where he soon became embroiled in the radical politics of the city's artisans. Paine was deeply inspired by liberalism and individualism writing that 'For were the impulses of conscious clear, uniform and irresistibly obeyed, man would need no other lawgiver; but that not being the case, he finds it necessary to surrender up a part of his property to furnish means of protection of the rest.' For a long time the British constitution was seen as being the best granting liberty to people in a world gripped by despotism. Paine disagreed. He viewed the only free and republican aspect of Britain was the parliament which he saw as being corrupted by the monarchy. 'For all men being originally equals, no one by birth could have a right to set up his own family in perpetual preference to all others forever.' Paine argued that through the free market and an independent republic based on a broad franchise, annual assemblies, and a rotating presidency could people find liberty. Common Sense was immensely popular selling over 100,000 in 1776 alone and more people than that knew what was written inside; being written in vernacular English it could be read out in public for those unable to read it themselves. Paine would release future editions responding to critiques and his own views would later become more radical; he became a vocal deist and thanks to his critiques of Christianity only six individuals came to his funeral. Nevertheless, Paine offered the ideological backbone for what Gordon Wood would describe as 'The radicalism of the American Revolution'.

Lead up to Revolution

The Sons of Liberty tarring and feathering someone ignoring the boycott

In 1763 Britain had a deficit of £122 million which the new prime minister, George Grenville, opted to solve by taxing the colonies. If the Seven Years' War had been fought on behalf of the colonies why shouldn't they pay their dues? As this was happening we see the grievances over the Proclamation Line as well. Before 1764 the colonies had been lightly taxed: someone in Massachusetts on average paid a shilling in tax a year compared to a counterpart in Britain who paid twelve. In 1764 Grenville passed the first taxes but saw this as a way to formally establish authority over the lightly ruled colonies; a Royal Governor and local assembly governed each colony largely independent from Westminster. In March 1765 the Stamp Act was passed beginning the Stamp Act Crisis. This was a tax on anything with a stamp and this act also had anything published in the colonies to legally have a stamp on it. This covered everything from newspapers and legal documents to playing cards. Compared to the Sugar Tax from the year prior which regulated trade between the colonies and the rest of the empire it was seen as being illegal as it directly taxed the colonists. Although a light tax, the highest was £10 for attorney licenses, there was a fear acceptance of the Stamp Act would lead to heavy taxes and then entirely shifting the tax burden from Britain to the colonies. We also have the issue of 'No Taxation without Representation'. It was imposed by a body which the colonists had no say in despite Grenville saying they did through virtual representation. At the same time the Quartering Act was passed forcing colonists to house soldiers in their houses if needed which was seen as another tax. In 1765 the Sons of Liberty were formed among New York's labourers, sailors, and craftsmen, and soon similar groups emerged in Boston. In November 1765 a crowd made of sailors, youths, African-Americans, and labourers hurled stones at Fort George in Manhattan, and then destroyed the home of Major Thomas James, a British officer who threatened to force the stamps down the New Yorkers' throats. Virginia condemned the Act and in October 1765 27 delegates from nine colonies formed the Stamp Act Congress in New York to combat the Act. John Adams was seen as being the 'soul of the Congress'. They endorsed Virginia's position, agreed to act together, and vowed the boycott British goods. This was a breakthrough as the colonies started acting together instead of individually and none of the West Indian colonies turned up. As the Thirteen Colonies made up a third of British exports, enforcing the Stamp Act became difficult thanks to American protests, and the Stamp Act was unpopular in Britain as well in 1766 the new government started debating whether to repeal it. Benjamin Franklin even journeyed to London to criticise the Stamp Act. Parliament repealed the Stamp Act but as they did they passed the Declaratory Act; this act confirmed that what London said went. Despite the warning colonists celebrated and the road to Revolution was on its way. Backing down over the Stamp Act showed that British power could be challenged. 

Paul Revere's Boston Massacre engraving

In 1767 the new prime minister, Charles Townshend, created a series of custom duties, called the Townshend Acts, on goods including glass, tea, and paper in order to pay American governors and judges. This affected merchants the hardest and as many merchants were concentrated in Massachusetts that colony became the focal point for resistance to the Townshend Acts. Unlike the earlier Stamp Act boycott the boycotts against the Townshend Acts were less successful due to them being levied on everyday items. One of the key texts illustrating colonial views were the Letters from a Farmer in Pennsylvania by John Dickinson who published them in a Philadelphia newspaper between 1767 and 1768. Inspired by Enlightenment thought from figures like David Hume it called for Americans to hold the same rights as the British while reconciling with the mother country. Meanwhile, a grassroots and elite opposition to the Townshend Acts emerged where homemade goods were bought instead of British goods. The Sons of Liberty would tar-and-feather those who bought British goods and women got involved. The Daughters of Liberty organised social ostracising of those who continued to buy British goods and wove their own clothes to sell. The landowners and planters of the South, like George Washington, readily took up non-importation in order to pay off debts to British merchants (as well as encourage the sale of their own crops), and urban merchants were grateful for a drop in competition with British merchants. The heavy-handedness of the British in order to establish their authority aggravated the colonists. The navy seized a sloop called Liberty owned by Boston merchant John Hancock believing it was being used for smuggling. Hancock was well respected and riots broke out in 1768 causing soldiers to be stationed in Boston to enforce the law. Quickly Anglo-American relations soured. On March 5 1770 a protesting crowd, including a sailor of mixed Native American-black-white background called Crispus Attucks, started throwing snowballs at British troops. One was hit causing his weapon to discharge and, in turn, causing the other soldiers to fire into the crowd. Three were killed including Attucks who was later remembered as 'the first martyr of the American Revolution'. The commanding officer and eight soldiers were tried and defended strangely by John Adams who saw most of them acquitted. A local member of the Sons of Liberty, Paul Revere, stirred up opposition to the British by issuing a famous engraving print depicting the 'Boston Massacre' despite it being inaccurate. However, by 1770 the non-importation movement was declining as more and more of the elite couldn't do without British goods so a deal was drawn up: the boycott would end in return for removing troops from Boston and repealing all the taxes bar the one on tea. 

The Boston Tea Party

Throughout this time popular but radical journalist John Wilkes caused controversy in Britain and he gained popularity in America; the calls of 'Wilkes and Liberty' was a rallying cry across the Atlantic and for generations after people would name their children after him (including John Wilkes Booth). Meanwhile, the East India Company saw a dip in its stock so the government encouraged selling tea in America to reinvigorate it, and tea soon became widely drunk across all classes in Britain and America. Prime minister Lord North hoped to further reinvigorate sales by offering tax exemptions and rebates enabling it to dump cheap tea into America to undercut Dutch sales which ended up undercutting sales of established merchants and smugglers. Taxing the tea would then defray the costs of the colonial government threatening the assemblies' control over finance. Thus began the most famous protest of this period. On December 16 1773 a group of colonialists disguised as Native Americans boarded tea ships in Boston Harbor a threw 300 chests of tea costing £10,000 (£4 million in today's money). So popular was this that commemorative teapots were made! North was furious. The Coercive Acts, called the Intolerable Acts in the colonies, decided to punish Massachusetts including closing Boston Harbor; restricted town meetings; issued in another Quartering Act; replaced the local government with a military one under Thomas Gage; and Gage imposed martial law. Around this time the earlier mentioned Quebec Act was also passed. In Philadelphia on September 1774 the First Continental Congress saw twelve of the thirteen colonies (Georgia did not attend) represented by political leaders including John Adams and his more radical cousin Samuel for Massachusetts and George Washington and Richard Henry Lee from Virginia. Here the path to independence was laid out with Lee giving a speech stating that 'The distinctions between Virginians, Pennsylvanians, New Yorkers, and New Englanders are no more. I am not a Virginian, but an American.' He would later say a phrase now synonymous with the Revolution: Give me Liberty, or Give me Death! The Congress opted to lead a new boycott, prepare for a second Congress, transfer power to a new government in each colony, and send letters of invitation to the other colonies in North America. Instead on trying to base their rights on tradition they instead opted to base it on more abstract ideas based off of the Enlightenment. 

Creating Independence

In February 1775 Massachusetts was declared to be in a state of rebellion and troops were ordered to seize the arms of the local militias. This caused the now famous ride of Paul Revere warning the militia leading into the Battle of Lexington and Concord which Ralph Waldo Emmerson would later describe as 'the shot heard 'round the world'. This inspired other militias and armies to form and fight the British; May 1775 saw Ethan Allen and the Green Mountain Boys joined with militia from Connecticut under Benedict Arnold to surround Fort Ticonderoga in New York as Henry Knox took some of the Ticonderoga cannon to help break the siege of Boston. On June 17 1775 the British fought the Americans at Breed's Hill but the battle has since been known as the Battle of Bunker Hill. Technically the British won with Sir William Howe even cutting down the original Liberty Tree but due to higher casualties and how it largely unaffected the colonists it was a hollow victory. Some have even suggested that it is more an American victory over a British one. As this was happening the Second Continental Congress convened with Georgia attending this time. However, a letter was sent to George III saying that they wanted reconciliation and blamed parliament, not him, for the division causing disdain from the radical Thomas Jefferson. Regardless the Congress raised an army and printed money to pay for it. John Adams got Washington to lead the army arguing that a southerner in charge would help bolster unity. Independence was not certain at this point but after debates and actions by the British (which we'll get to), and the publishing of Common Sense, it was decided that independence was their only choice.

The Continental Congress

On July 2 1776, not July 4, Congress formally declared independence and two days later the Declaration of Independence was issued. The Declaration remains a key focal point in the US to this day and is largely the child of Thomas Jefferson and John Adams - there were three other drafters including Franklin. The Declaration shows the radicalism of the Revolution and also its limits. Of course there is the most famous line: We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable rights, that among these are Life, Liberty, and the pursuit of Happiness. In a world when republics were rare and the ones in existence were more like monarchies the Declaration really was a radical document. Unlike the earlier Olive Branch Petition to George III the Declaration savages the monarch; as parliament was the democratic part of Britain they opted to not criticise parliament despite it issuing the hated taxes. However, it did have its limits. Jefferson was seen as getting too excited and added a criticism of slavery and the slave trade which the other drafters scrubbed out. In 1775 the royal governor of Virginia, Lord Dunmore, issued a proclamation offering freedom to slaves if they fled their rebellious masters which caused the southern states to favour independence. Regardless the Declaration would, and still does, remain a key document in the Revolution before the creation of the Constitution.

The War of Independence

The rebels had to win their independence. The War of Independence, despite the popular image of it, was a brutal civil war. Historians are divided on whether Britain could have won; Francis Cogliano believes that they could have capitalised on their early advantages but made mistakes confirming their defeat whereas Hugh Brogan disagrees arguing that the British never really had a chance. Personally, I side more with Cogliano although Brogan is not inaccurate. Early on John Adams lamented that a third of the population were Patriots, a third were Loyalists, and a third were neutral; in reality it was largely two-fifths were Patriots (of which half actively fought), two-fifths were neutral, and a fifth were Loyalists. You may be wondering why there were Loyalists judging by the events of the 1760s and 1770s? There are no concrete reasons and Loyalists came from all walks of life. Naturally Dunmore's Proclamation encouraged slaves to join the British although more just opted to flee instead - Jefferson lost 10% of his slaves! Some feared the possible lawlessness and unleashing of liberty of the Revolution and others, (lawyers, Anglican ministers, merchants and officials), needed close ties with Britain for work. Religious and ethnic minorities, like Highland Scots in South Carolina, feared majoritarian repression if the rebels won. It is no exaggeration to say that at times the War of Independence was more like a civil war than a regular independence one. Loyalism and Patriotism shifted as well. Benedict Arnold is the most famous example of someone switching sides but it happened regularly. One British officer in Virginia commented that the town which welcomed then would be the first ones to shoot at them when the Patriots came. Also, neutrals who opted out of fighting for various reasons could suffer reprisals. For example, Quakers and Mennonites remained pacifist so saw their lands confiscated.

A depiction of a Hessian

As I mentioned in the post on the Seven Years' War I'm not a military historian so I won't go into too much detail on battles and why they were won/lost. As mentioned earlier despite Washington's skill the rebels were not certain of victory. Benedict Arnold's invasion of Canada in the winter of 1775 failed spectacularly thanks to the British forces and a smallpox outbreak decimating his forces. Washington himself was incredibly skilled lifting the siege of Boston in March 1776 causing General William Howe to head to New York hoping that there would be more Loyalists there. A force of 30,000 managed to take New York and the British would hold it until 1783. Britain also hired mercenaries from Hesse-Cassel, Hesse-Hanau,Waldeck, and Brunswick, later referred to as 'Hessians', to fight for them. Throughout the war 30,000 Hessians fought for the British costing over £4.7 million. The British also built an alliance with Native Americans, largely the Iroquois, to fight for them as well. The rebel Continental Army faced defeat after defeat but Howe could never formally wipe out Washington's forces although he came close; initially Washington had 18,000 troops which dropped to 2,000 by winter. Underpaid, when paid at all, the rebels were further demoralised and the sheer amount of desertions caused Washington to have them publicly flogged. The rebels needed a victory or face the disintegration of their army. Washington's famous crossing the Delaware at night saved the remnants of the Continental Army  writing on December 18 'I think the game is pretty near up.' The heavy-handed treatment of Americans by the British and Hessians alienated the locals with plunder and rape happening regularly. Lord Rawdon wrote that 'A girl cannot step into the bushes to pluck a rose without running the most imminent risk of being ravished, and...of consequence we have the most entertaining court-martial every day.' On Christmas night Washington crossed the Delaware again attacking the Hessian garrison at Trenton capturing nearly 1,000 followed by the defeat of a garrison at Princeton on January 3 1777. These quick victories boosted Patriot moral.

In 1777 the British hoped to splinter in half the rebel cause as General John Burgoyne invaded New England from Canada. At the same time Howe utilised the navy by loading 13,000 troops with their horses and supplies on July 23 and landing them just outside of Philadelphia. Congress fled and Washington's counterattack failed in September. However, the rebels got a reprieve when Burgoyne was defeated. Bogged down by the wilderness they had little support which evaporated when his Iroquois allies attacked local farms. One publicised incident flamed race relations when two Iroquois killed Jane McCrea, a young woman engaged to a Loyalist. Continental general Horatio Gates repeatedly fought Burgoyne finally defeating him at the Battle of Saratoga in October 1777. This was an important turning point. Early on Benjamin Franklin was sent to Paris to enlist French support going as far as to dress as a Quaker to appear as a bumbling countryman based on the stereotype Europeans had of Americans. France and other powers had been sending weapons to the rebels but Saratoga showed Europe that the rebels had a chance of winning. Despite being bankrupt Louis XVI declared war on Britain and joined the rebels followed by Spain in 1779 and the Netherlands in 1780. Spain never allied themselves with the rebels, they feared that this would encourage their own colonies to rebel. Entry of other powers shifted British attention. In 1778 65% of the British army was in North America which dropped to 29% in 1780. The Caribbean and Europe replaced America as the main area for combat with Britain diverting its navy and army to the mainland in fear of a Franco-Spanish invasion. 

The famous painting of Cornwallis' surrender

Despite victories rebel victory was still no certain. The Continental Army was struggling with moral and paying troops, some of Washington's commanders were useless, and Arnold switched sides in 1780. The Patriots won back Philadelphia in 1778 following the Battle of Monmouth Court House but only because Washington overrode his subordinate, Charles Lee, who called for a retreat. With the loss of Philadelphia the British moved to the South believing that there would be Loyalists there. In December 1778 Savannah fell bringing the Georgian coastline under British rule and a second invasion in 1780 saw Charleston fall. There were few Loyalists and the Patriots resorted to guerrilla warfare which crippled the British army. Under Cornwallis the British continued fighting to no avail so he ordered a retreat to Yorktown, Virginia hoping to be picked up by the Royal Navy in 1781. However, the Battle of Chesapeake saw the French navy destroying the British navy and Cornwallis was soon trapped. In October Cornwallis surrendered ending the fighting despite the British still occupying New York, Savannah and Charleston. The 1783 Treaty of Paris would end the war and see the Americans finally become independent.

African-Americans and Revolution

A later painting of Crispus Attucks

Throughout the colonial period slavery was a big issue in the colonies where some states, like Georgia, slaves made up a greater part of the population than people who were free. Some colonists described the British taxes as reverting them to slavery despite the fact many owned slaves themselves; this was not lost on commentators, the creator of the dictionary Samuel Johnson wrote 'How is it that we hear the loudest yelps for liberty among the drivers of negroes?' The drive for revolution were entwined with slavery and freedom. Earlier we mentioned Dunmore's Proclamation which caused the South to support independence but this started earlier in 1772. In Britain a slave, James Somerset, managed to win his freedom when a judge ruled that slavery went against English Common Law. A conspiracy emerged that this would lead to the end of slavery. Many of the revolutionaries, including Jefferson and Washington, held slaves so it was hard to reconcile equality of men and property rights when men were property. Some colonies saw the hypocrisy and started gradual emancipation where in 1774 Rhode Island and Connecticut forbade the slave trade; 1776 the Quakers forbade slavery; 1777 the Vermont Constitution banned slavery; and 1780 Pennsylvania adopted gradual emancipation as some examples. African-Americans also utilised the Revolution to end slavery. Between 1773 and 1775 five petitions using the rhetoric of the Revolution were made by Freemen to the Massachusetts government demanding emancipation. A slave would be the one to end slavery in Massachusetts though. Elizabeth Freeman was hit by her mistress in 1780 with a burning shovel and she went to lawyer Theodore Sedgewick saying this went against the new Bill of Rights. The lawsuit ended up ending slavery in Massachusetts. Despite Washington barring African-Americans from being in the Continental Army several colonies in the North allowed them to enlist. Slavery would, however, persist in the South. In Virginia when Patriots were chanting 'Liberty' nearby slaves chanted it as well causing the local police to shoot them. Here we see both the radicalism and limits of the Revolution: it managed to grant liberty but not to all.

Native Americans and Revolution

The Revolution greatly affected Native Americans. Some tribes sided with the British (like the Iroquois), others sided with the Patriots (like the Passamaquoddy), and others were divided. The Cherokee faced a split as the young sided with the British and elders sided with the Patriots. However, most tribes ended up siding with the British seeing them the lesser of two evils. After all the Declaration of Independence directly attacked the British seeking alliance with Native Americans. War lasted longer than 1775 and 1783 with the Native Americans. Lord Dunmore himself had been at war with the Shawnee and Mingos in the Ohio Valley which involved massacres of innocent people at the Yellow Creek Massacre. Smallpox is even believed to be used as a biological weapon during this war. Throughout the Revolutionary War Native Americans could be targeted, such as how Washington ordered that the Iroquois should not only be 'merely overrun but destroyed' in retaliation for their alliance with the British resulting in a civil war among the Iroquois. The famous scene in The Patriot where the British burn down a church with people inside did happen except it was Patriots burning down a church with ten Christian Native Americans inside. Fighting didn't end after the war. After 1783 the Delawares, Shawnees, Miamis, Chippewas, Ottawas, and Potawatomis formed an alliance called the Western Confederacy, (covertly armed by the British), to do as Pontiac did two decades earlier and resist Euro-American settlement. This continued conflict went badly for the newly formed USA with the Confederacy destroying American armies along the present border of Ohio and Indiana in 1790 and 1791. A Miami war chief, Little Turtle, and Shawnee, Blue Jacket, managed to defeat Arthur St. Clair so thoroughly that he saw 632 of his men dead and 264 wounded while Little Turtle just lost 66. To put it into perspective St. Clair lost lost three times more men than Custer did at the Battle of Little Bighorn. In 1795 the Western Confederacy was defeated and they lost their land. When the British invaded during the War of 1812 another pan-Indian confederacy fought the Americans again. These conflicts would be repeated across US expansion over the rest of the continent which would tragically end in genocide. 

Women

Abigail Adams

As shown earlier women were integral in enforcing support for the boycotts and they remained important throughout the Revolution and after. Some women even did enlist and fight but this was exceedingly rare. It was more common for women to be camp followers where they would follow the Continental Army and act as nurses, cooks, and cleaners in order to support the Revolution. African-American women also took part in this seeing the Revolution as a way to get racial and gender emancipation. Women were also used in propaganda either being portrayed as martyrs, like Jane McCrea, or supporting their husbands, brothers and fathers fighting. A well known poem of the Revolution is by sixteen year old Ruth Bryant from Massachusetts who in The American Maid's Choice saying that her ideal man was a valiant Patriot. As you can probably tell women's roles were seen as being linked to servitude and domesticity. Despite Abigail Adams telling John to 'remember the Ladies' they were often sidelined or forced into the home. Following the Revolution the patriarchal society ideas of Republican Motherhood were stressed. This idea was that the new republic had to have a new generation be taught about the virtues of being republicans, and it was women's roles to teach this new generation. They had to keep their husbands on the straight and narrow, teach their children to read and have lots of children in order to benefit the future generations, (if you see a parallel with The Handmaid's Tale there is a reason why). Despite the reinforcing of traditional roles it did allow a reinforcement of educating women as well as men which would allow women to capitalise on this later. Women, just like African-Americans, used the language of the Revolution to critique their role in society and some even exploited a loophole in New Jersey. The 1776 Constitution was worded in a way which said that 'all inhabitants' who owned property could vote. Widowed and unmarried women used this to vote for but unfortunately by 1807 they had changed the law to exclude women. Nevertheless, the Revolution inspired women and it is no mistake that Susan B. Anthony would later use the language to critique sexism and slavery.

Constitution and Aftermath

The Treaty of Paris gave the colonies their independence, Florida to Spain, and land between the Appalachians and the Mississippi to the new republic. The reason for this was because Britain wanted to stop French expansion and they thought the new republic would collapse returning the land to them. The US was on a shaky start: bankrupt, no allies, little legitimacy, and the British still occupied forts until 1795 supplying the Western Confederacy. Debates over an American Constitution split the political elite. The people were also disappointed. John Adams in 1776 wrote: We have been told that our Struggle has loosened the bands of Government elsewhere. That Children and Apprentices were disobedient - that schools and colleges were growing turbulent - that Indians slighted their Guardians and Negroes grew insolent to their Masters... There will be no End of it. New Claims will arise. Women will demand a Vote. Lads from 12 to 21 will think their Rights not enough attended to...It tends to confound and destroy all Distinctions, and prostrate all Ranks, to one common Levell.' In 1786 farmers hit hard by debt under Daniel Shay rose up in Massachusetts demanding an end to their debts and a government elected directly. In response Boston raised an army putting down the rebellion. Washington supported the crushing of it while Jefferson sided with the rebels. The Constitutional Convention of 1787 tried to form a Constitution and as Washington took part this gave it legitimacy. There were conflicting debates over the Constitution and despite Washington's opposition to it partisanship emerged. On one side represented by figures like John Adams and Alexander Hamilton were the Federalists who supported a federal republic against the Anti-Federalists, (also called the Democrats, Republicans and Democratic-Republicans), who opposed this including Thomas Jefferson. In private Washington sided with the Federalists. The drafters of the Constitution wanted representation but not democracy seeing it as mob rule. Hence, why now the president decides the Supreme Court judges and the Electoral College exists - the College initially was meant to be made of people who knew politics so could decide if the public voted the right way. Slavery was also an issue. Slave states wanted slaves to be counted as it would give them greater representation while non-slave states opposed this. The 3/5 Compromise emerged as a result: three out of every five slaves would be counted in a state's representation. The ease the minds of Anti-Federalists a Bill of Rights was drafted which exists to this day. Eventually the Constitution was ratified and in 1789 Washington became the USA's first president.

Conclusion

The veneration of the Revolution: on Washington's death this was painted showing him being guided to Heaven by angels as Lady Liberty and a Native American woman weeps

The American Revolution has since been very influential with it continuing to shape the US to this day. However, the limitations of the new Constitution meant that it has since been amended various times, including abolishing slavery, banning alcohol and bringing it back, and granting women the right to vote. We have to think though: how radical was the Revolution? Gordon Wood has insisted that it is in fact radical - the ideas of equality, republicanism and property rights being legally protected in a state's constitution was radical for the time. Some thinkers even started advocating shared for communal property rights in a precursor to Marx. Although it did exclude African-Americans, women and other groups it did start a precedent for future emancipation. The secular aspects also allowed emancipation of all Christian denominations, and even Jews, which caused America to see a greater amount of Church goers than their European counterparts. However, it certainly was limited. Initially revolutions in France, Haiti, and Latin America were welcomed but they quickly soured (especially with Haiti). Thomas Paine was seen as a radical for his deism, increased calls for equality, and possible abolitionism but when he went to France he was seen as a moderate. Paine would become critical of Washington, (although that may be due to the president letting him rot in a French prison), abolitionists in the 1840s would condemn the Constitution for allowing slavery, and anarchists in the 1880s/90s would call themselves 'unrepentant Jeffersonians'. The legacy of the American Revolution really depends on whether you place ideas over actions or vice versa.

Thank you for reading. The next few World History posts will be looking at the 'Age of Revolution' and we'll be focusing next on the French Revolution. For other World History posts please see our list, and for future blog updates please see our Facebook or catch me on Twitter @LewisTwiby.

The sources I have used are as follows:

-Gordon Wood, The Radicalism of the American Revolution, (New York, NY, Alfred K. Knopf: 1992)

-Thomas Paine, Common Sense, (London, Penguin Books: 1776, Penguin edition 1986)

-The Declaration of Independence and US Constitution

-Lance Banning, 'Republican Ideology and the Triumph of the Constitution, 1789-1793', William and Mary Quarterly, 31:2, (1974), 167-88

-Colin Calloway, The American Revolution in Indian Country: Crisis and Diversity in Native American Communities, (New York, NY: 1995)

-Hugh Brogan, The Penguin History of the USA, Second Edition, (London, Penguin Books: 1999)

-Eric Foner, Give me Liberty! An American History, Fourth Edition, (New York, NY, W.W. Norton: 2014)

-Francis Cogliano, Revolutionary America, 1763-1815: A Political History, Second Edition, (New York, NY, Routledge: 2009)

-Alan Taylor, American Revolutions, (New York, NY, W.W. Norton: 2016)

World History: Seven Years' War

A depiction of the Battle of Warburg, 1760

The Seven Years' War was a key war in shaping the world in which we live in today. For one, it has been seen as the first truly world war - Winston Churchill's A History of the English Speaking Peoples goes as far as to call it the First World War and some historians refer to it as World War Zero. American readers would likely know this war by another name - the French-Indian War. What is now Canada and the United States proved instrumental in both causing the war and making them the centre of world politics. From the Seven Years' War Britain and Prussia emerged as great powers, British rule in India became established, and the seeds of the formation of the United States were planted. Events in the Americas greatly linked to the events of Europe which linked to events in India, Africa and the Philippines. We also see a bit of a conundrum in how long the war was. From official declaration of war to the peace treaties the war lasted just under seven years (six years and eight months), fighting broke out in America in 1754, and some historians place it as an extension of earlier wars. I will warn people now; I am not a military historian so I'll be focusing less on battles as I won't be able to properly describe them.

Background

A map of the Five Nations in modern New York and Pennsylvania

Some historians, such as Fred Anderson, place more emphasis on the American origins whereas others, like Franz Szabo, place more emphasis on Europe. Thanks to how intertwined European and American affairs were during this war both are technically correct. In this section we'll look at the background of the war in Europe, the Americas, and India. We'll first look at the Americas. Since the start of the 1600s England (after 1707 Britain) and France had established colonies in North America and the Caribbean and by 1750 they started becoming prosperous. Of course sugar, tobacco, indigo, and coffee plantations in the Caribbean based on slavery made a fortune so until the 1700s London viewed its colonies in what is now the US as a bit of a backwater wilderness. However, thanks to the Navigation Acts of 1651, 1660, and 1663, which prevented non-English shipping to the colonies, they became a thriving market for English/British exports causing the population to boom from 234,000 in 1700 to 1,206,000 in 1750 (of which 242,000 were slaves). For this Britain needed a big navy to protect their maritime merchants. Meanwhile, French colonies in the Caribbean, like Martinique and Saint-Domingue, prospered and they took advantage of their position on the mainland by controlling the Mississippi through New Orleans. French Canada was not prosperous, called a 'barren frontier', but was kept as described by Admiral Roland-Michel Barren, comte de la Galissoniere, who argued that France needed to keep Canada to limit British expansion which would give their enemy an economic advantage. Finally we have the Native Americans. European settlers and traders confronted various Native American peoples including the Iroquois Five Nations, (composed of the Mohawk, Oneida, Seneca, Onondaga, and Cayuga) which became the Six Nations when joined by the Tuscarora. Europeans traded weapons with the Five Nations in return for crops, fish, and pelts where in the mid-1600s the Nations waged a vicious and bloody war of conquest to get access to more land. The Hurons, Eries, and Neutrals were dispersed from the Great Lakes and the Ohio Valley of Monongahela, Shawnee and other residents so they could have greater access to resources. The Five Nations, and other Native Americans, when they could would pit English and French colonies against one another profiting as the two went to war although at times it did backfire, especially when Anglophile, Francophile and Neutral factions threatened to tear the confederacy apart in 1701. 

Frederick II of Prussia

Meanwhile, in Europe the Anglo-French rivalry wove into geopolitics. After 1661 Bourbon France under Louis XIV became the most important continental power challenging their Habsburg opponents in Austria and Spain. The Nine Years' War (1688-97), War of Spanish Succession (1701-14) and War of Austrian Succession (1740-8) had been waged over the Bourbon-Habsburg rivalry which brought in wider states, including Britain. Until just before the Seven Years' War Britain had allied itself to Austria against their mutual rival of France as argued by the Duke of Newcastle in 1743; he argued Britain had to intervene on the continent as if France managed to dominate the continent it would manage to gain the economic and naval might to threaten Britain. Of course there were other intermittent wars which also affected India and America. Times were changing. Ostensibly dynastic wars soon developed other factors - for example thanks to the Treaty of Utrecht (1713) Britain placed economy and strategy over land grabs gaining land in Canada, and the strategic ports of Gibraltar and Minorca. The rise of Prussia in Germany is part of this. Frederick II of Prussia (r.1740-86), later called 'the Great' by nationalists, built upon the military and economic reforms of his father allowing the small state of Prussia to soon become a dominant power in Europe. Taking advantage of the disputed succession of Austria's Maria Theresa he invaded Austria to seize the wealthy lands of Silesia which he kept after the Treaty of Aix-la-Chapelle (1748). Similarly Russia trying to be closer to its western neighbours started intervening more and more. 

Finally we have India. After the death of Mughal emperor Aurangazeb in 1707, which you can read about here, the Mughals started going into a decline. Parts of the empire fell to the rising power of the Marathas, Mysore and other powers, over-taxation caused uprisings, and decentralised rule started to tear apart the empire. Local rulers named nawabs were increasingly granted by Aurangazeb the ability to be 'tax farmers' where they would collect taxes on behalf of the empire and they would get to keep some of the revenue raised via this. As a result over-taxation happened as some nawabs chose to profit by raising taxes to raise their profit. However, some, like the nawabs of Bengal and Oudh, eventually stopped paying taxes to the central government becoming de facto independent from the Mughals. Since the 1500s Europeans had formed the East Indian Trading Companies to trade in Asia and established fortified settlements, called factories, in India (and other areas) to trade. Among these was Pondicherry for France, Goa for Portugal and Surat for Britain. With the decline of Mughal rule Companies had to rely on their own armies to protect themselves and actively court local merchants - in the case of Bengal Jagat Sen and Omi Chand. 

Origins

Fort Duquense

Now that we've looked at the very extensive background we can finally look at the origins of the war. Originally only the European aspects were discussed but since the 1960s the American have started to be seen as being just as, or even more, important as the European origins. The focal point of this was the Ohio Valley. In the early-1740s the wealthy Penn family, of whom Pennsylvania is named after, made a deal with the Six Nations which deprived the Delawares of two-thirds of their land and opened up the region for colonial settlers. At the same time France, wanting to solidify its connection to the Canadian colonies started building forts along the Ohio River which alarmed the British who feared that the French presence would influence Native Americans to attack the settlers. There were few French settlers while instead most were traders so posed far less a threat to their land compared to their Anglo counterparts. Furthermore, religion intervened. French Jesuit missionaries had converted some tribes to Catholicism making them more disposed to be sympathetic to the French compared to the Protestant settlers. Things came to ahead when France, despite threats from Britain, built Fort Duquesne where the Allegheny and Monongehala Rivers met. A colonial militia led by the young George Washington in retaliation attacked a small French force at Jumonville Glen in May 1754 killing ten, including the commander Jumonville, causing a French retaliatory attack on Fort Necessity forcing Washington to surrender. As this was eighteenth-century diplomacy negotiation involved sending more troops to the colonies where in June 1755 the British attacked the French in Canada and then proceeded to expel the Acadians. The following month one of the most famous battle took place during the war. A force of 2,000 British troops under Edward Braddock, with a young Washington, marched to take Fort Duquesne but were ambushed by French and their Native American allies wiping out the force with Braddock even being killed. For two years massacres, atrocities, and battles took place. Hundreds of settlers were killed, around 5,000 Acadians eventually were expelled, British ships attacked the French in the Mediterranean and British forts fell in northern New York. 

As this was happening a 'Diplomatic Revolution' was being organised in Europe. As argued by Franz Szabo victory over Austria had inflated Frederick II's ego while Britain disappointed Maria Theresa by allowing the Habsburgs to lose many key lands. Frederick wanted to continue war against Austria and possibly conquer Hanover but doing so would draw in Britain as through a series of events, which deserves to be talked about by itself, George of Hanover was also George II of Britain. Frederick was unsure if France would be a willing ally as they had been during the War of Austrian Succession as another victory had the potential of making Prussia a big enough power to challenge France. The states of Europe took notice of events in North America and saw a new Anglo-French war was brewing. By 1756 Britain no longer saw Austria as a strong enough to challenge France and George II always preferred Hanover to Britain and believed that Austria was unable to defend his German kingdom. The rising power of Prussia could serve as a good alternative and an alliance was made in the 1756 Westminster Convention formalised in a proper alliance two years later. Seeing this Maria Theresa sent her foreign minister, Count Wenzel Anton von Kaunitz, to approach France who agreed to an alliance with the 1756 Treaty of Versailles as France now viewed the rising Prussia as a bigger threat to them. Hearing about the anti-Prussian alliance and bolstered by the British alliance Frederick invaded Saxony officially starting the Seven Years' War. Doing so, however, enraged Europe who saw it as an unprovoked attack allowing Tsarina Elizabeth of Russia to enter an alliance with France and Austria sending 80,000 to her new allies.

Course of the War

The Battle of Prague

In this section I'll briefly go over the land and naval battles. Prussia managed to get off to an early lead defeating the Saxon army at the Battle of Lobositz in October 1756 before it could be reinforced by the Austrians and quickly managed to occupy Saxony. Things weren't going as well for Britain. The Battle of Minorca saw the French navy defeating the British and the island fell so the angry British decided to court-martial and execute Admiral John Byng who lost the island. In America more and more forts were captured by the French and their Native American allies. Much more tribes allied to France over Britain for the earlier mentioned reasons, hence why it is called the French-Indian War in the US. Frederick, however, would also start seeing defeat. His own indecision had allowed the Austrians to occupy some of Silesia, and a year later despite winning the bloody Battle of Prague he was roundly defeated as he tried to siege the city while also fighting an Austrian counterattack. In the summer of 1757 Russia took Prussia's key fort in Memel and used it to attack the centre of the kingdom but its own logistics prevented it from doing too much damage. Seeing this Sweden intervened to take Prussian Pomerania, (which is why it is called the Pomeranian War in Sweden), and a Hungarian general, Andras Hadik, defeated Frederick even briefly occupying Berlin. Two British governments, the Duke of Newcastle and William Pitt, fell due to setbacks in America, such as the fall of Fort William Henry, forming a new coalition government which combined the two prime minister's tactics. By 1759 the French-Austrian-Russian alliance was succeeding so much that France even managed to formulate a plan to invade Britain! However, the strength of the British navy prevented this. The British navy managed to destroy the French fleets at the Battle of Lagos and Quiberon Bay scuppering these plans and allowed Britain to blockade French ports. From 1759 to 1763 the war in Europe was largely at a stalemate. Frederick's prestige had been shattered, especially by the Russians, and had only been saved by poor Russian logistics and the destroyed economies of France and Austria. In 1762 Elizabeth of Russia died and her son Peter, who loved Prussia, mediated a peace including Sweden and even placed some of his troops under Frederick's control. However, the following year Peter was ousted in a coup led by his wife, Catherine the Great, who took Russia out of the war. The war in Europe was reaching a stalemate with the combatants slipping to bankruptcy and deaths in the hundreds of thousands. However, the war was instead won outside of Europe.

I want to talk about India separately so I'll discuss the course of the war in the Americas, Africa, and Asia instead. British prime minister William Pitt believed, quite rightly, that the war would be won in the colonies over the Duke of Newcastle's plan to focus on propping up Prussia. It turned out both tactics was needed as shown in his quote by an American contemporary 'The great object of the nation is the American war...the probability of our succeeding in our main point is...much increased by the part the French take in the affairs of Germany, which turns their attention, as well as their money, from their marine, and...making expeditions to our Colonies.' French troops in America were led by the Marquis de Montcalm who managed to thrash the British, with his Native American allies, in the first half of the war capturing Fort William Henry in 1757 and Fort Carillon in 1758. However, despite this Montcalm was unable to prevent the capture of several key forts including Frontenac and finally Duquense and 1759 proved to be disastrous for the French. Under generals James Wolfe and James Murray Louisbourg and Fort Niagara fell to the British opening the way to Quebec which fell in September. At the Battle of the Plains of Abraham the British defeated the French and Six Nations despite the death of Wolfe during the battle with Montcalm also dying a day later from his wounds. Montreal was captured shortly after and the Six Nations in 1760 opted to sign a peace treaty with Britain. When Spain entered the war Britain managed to capture both Cuba and the Philippines, as well as Gaudeloupe in 1759. We also have the African front. In 1758 at the request of traders Pitt sent a fleet capturing the fort of Saint Louis in Senegal which they expanded upon later.

India and the Seven Years' War

The Battle of Plassey

In India the Seven Years' War has been known as the Third Carnatic War, the earlier two had been fought between the British East Indian Company (EIC) and the French Compagnie des Indes and had saw Robert Clive become influential for fighting in the wars. The EIC in Kalikata, (Calcutta), had been reinforcing their factory in case of French attack which made the nawab of Bengal, Siraj ud Daula, fearful. The EIC's connection to the wealthy merchants Jagat Seth and Omi Chand in accompaniment with their own might made the nawab fearful that they were working to undermine his rule. When the EIC continued fortifying Fort William Siraj attacked and local Indian troops deserted leading to the fort's capture in June 1756. What happened next has gone down in infamy from the account of the civilian commander John Zephaniah Howell. We know very little about the 'Black Hole of Calcutta' as it was soon exaggerated to justify war in India. Possibly between 64 and 68 soldiers were kept overnight in a 4.3m x 5.5m room, although Howell and some later historians argued that Siraj did not order and may not have known about the imprisonment. The next day thanks to heat and suffocation only around 23 survived. Stories soon were spread exaggerating the numbers and claiming that women and children had also been captured. It gave easy justification for the EIC to send Robert Clive from Madras (modern Chennai) to retake Calcutta and defeat Siraj. They met at the Battle of Plassey in 1757 but Crispin Bates has argued it is a bit of a stretch to call it a battle. Our earlier mentioned merchants disliked Siraj's high taxes and had made money with their EIC connections so decided to make the battle easier. They bribed a major general, Mir Jaffar, into switching sides and he did marching his troops to join Clive. As a result in a battle with over 60,000 combatants only 522 people died. Strangely the Mughal emperor, Bahadur Shah I, was pleased; he had been angry that Siraj had been stopped sending tax payments which limited attempts at reform. When the war ended in 1765 the EIC was given to them to rule over. After Plassey the EIC and their allies turned on the other Europeans in India, i.e. the French, and roundly defeated them.

Economies and Logistics

The Seven Years' War has been viewed as one of the first 'modern' wars in which the global economy and logistics had to be taken into account. For example, the Russians had failed to reform their supply lines and logistics of such a large army, the Russian army was often twice the size of that of Frederick, since their earlier war with the Ottoman Empire. This meant that although they could take Memel they were unable to properly enter Prussian lands giving Frederick time to breathe. The way the war was thought out also hinged on how they could utilise the economies and resources of their own states and hamper that of their opponents. In 1746 Frederick wrote in General Principles of War that if one wanted to succeed it was legitimate and just to coerce peoples in occupied lands into helping the war effort. Franz Szabo even uses the term 'merciless fiscal exploitation of Saxony' to describe his actions after taking Dresden where 5 million Talers of the 6 million Talers of Saxony's annual taxation went to funding Frederick's war. By the end of the war 50 million was extracted from Saxony. Britain and France were the ones fighting on all fronts so had to balance both. Hence why Britain had to balance Pitt's colonial war and Newcastle's continental one. Small contingents were sent to aid Prussia and after 1758 over £670,000 a year (£91.5 million in 2017's money) was sent to fund the Prussian war. A big part in why it is seen that the Anglo-Prussian (and later Portuguese) alliance won was due to Britain shattering the French and Spanish economy. Capturing the very rich island of Cuba and the Philippines allowed Britain to claim their wealth for itself, Saint Louis allowed Britain to have greater profits from the slave trade, and the seizing of India gave them very lucrative benefits from India trade. Even the conquer of Canada involved breaking of economic access to Quebec. Britain was also very aggressive in attacking neutral ships trading with France, as the Dutch learned, which became a policy they used until the Napoleonic Wars, and British blockades of French ports strangled the economy further. 

Why did Britain manage to do this though? Paul Kennedy has written extensively on this and has placed great emphasis on geopolitics and pre-war economics. Kennedy has argued that it is very difficult for a state to be both a continental and a world power. Although a world power France being on the continent meant that it shared land borders with its enemies which needed defending. Protecting the main base took precedence over defending America and India. In contrast Britain had the luxury of being an island offering a natural defence as a naval invasion was far more difficult although not impossible, in 1745 France (and to an extent Spain) helped Jacobite rebels invade Britain. Due to this Britain could focus far more on being a world power - a mentality which can be seen today if you look at the discourse of some of the right-wing supporters of Brexit. Events before 1754 allowed Britain to truly be a world power instead of a continental one. As mentioned earlier Britain had used its colonies to be a market for exports and was eager to take part in the Triangular Trade (slaves from Africa to the Americas whose goods were sold in Britain and the money was then used to buy more slaves). In order to make sure this trade was protected a large navy was needed. Ironic though considering how there were only a few key naval battles during the Seven Years' War and even then Britain lost one, the Battle of Minorca.

Peace and Aftermath

The expansion of British land in the US, the pinky colour is what they gained after the Treaty of Paris

Four peace treaties were signed ending the war: St Petersburg, Hamburg, Paris, and Hubertursburg. The first two, signed 1762, established status quo peace with Sweden and Russia. The other two were signed in 1763 and decided to go to pre-war borders in Europe. Thanks to Hubertursburg Prussia did manage to get Saxony and Austria to drop claims to Silesia but the real changes came thanks to the Treaty of Paris. Areas seized by Spain and France were returned to Britain and Portugal who returned the Indian factories, Guadeloupe, the Philippines, Cuba, Goree, and several Caribbean islands. Britain kept French Canada, Tobago, St Vincent and the Grenadines, Grenada, Dominica, and Florida. France also lost its land in what is now the continental US. Half of French Louisiana had been given to Spain the year before and the rest, from the Mississippi to the Appalachians, was given to Britain. However, France was just glad to keep the wealthy Guadeloupe and Voltaire dismissed Canada as 'A few acres of snow'. 

The Seven Years' War proved to be the most influential war until the First World War. Prussia had managed to establish itself as a continental power managing to survive an onslaught from France, Austria, Russia, and Sweden and thanks to Frederick managed to bounce back thanks to his immigration policies and agrarian reforms. Despite this Prussia would take a century to return to such military strength; in 1806 Prussia was defeated by Napoleon's army of French peasants at the Battle of Jena. Despite this Prussia soon became the state to imitate. The war did influence attempts to reform the Russian and French militaries to reform themselves with Russia replacing France as the key figure in Polish affairs. Over the next thirty years Russia and Prussia, and to an extent Austria, successfully divided up Poland with no interference from France. Britain came to be a great power. Before that it had been seen as second to Spain and France but thanks to the Seven Years' War the British economic and naval might made it a major player in world affairs. Thanks to the Treaty of Paris France agreed to not intervene with British client states in India giving them free reign to establish their own hegemony in India. One could become very rich via the EIC, so much so that it caused a moral panic in Britain, as it was believed that 'nabobs' like Robert Clive could use their wealth to lead a decadent life. EIC officials, and Clive was no exception, soon became as corrupt and brutal as their Indian predecessors - in 1770 misrule allowed a famine in Bengal to kill a third of the population. For a time when the Mughal emperor was captured the EIC used this to establish their rule in the north and eventually conquered the south.

The famous 1770 painting of the death of James Wolfe. Witnessing Wolfe's death are men representing England, Scotland, Wales and Ireland; a trapper for America, and a Native American. Some tribes did fight for the British although more allied themselves with the French

Finally we have events in America. Initially the colonialists had welcomed victory and had expressed their love for the British. It was not uncommon for colonial elites, like Elijah Boardmen of Massachusetts, to make themselves appear like their British counterparts like modelling their homes to resemble the landed gentry, sent their sons to London for study, and Washington even had a coat of arms made! Up until the American Revolution colonialists glamorised the Seven Years' War and some of the major images associated with the war comes from this period. Many of the expelled Acadians went on to settle in Louisiana which explains the remaining strong French aspects of Cajun culture. Tensions remained high though with the Native Americans who were some of the worst affected by the result of the war. With the French out of America they lost a bulwark against Anglo-American encroachment and soon clashes between settlers and Native Americans broke out with the 1763 Pontiac's Rebellion and an attack on Detroit by Ottawas, Hurons and others the same year. This would soon pave way for genocide and displacement which would characterise the late-eighteenth century and the nineteenth. Britain, like other combatants, were bankrupted by the war. At home and America the government raised taxes causing grievances for the colonists. Various other laws, such as emancipation for Catholics and the quartering of soldiers, upset the colonists further. As a result, these all came together resulting in the American Revolution.

Conclusion

As we've looked over today the Seven Years' War went on to shape the world we live in. Caused by politics and economics over dynastic struggles it showed a shift away from the wars of the early modern world and that of the modern. It went on to shape the major factors which would shape the modern world which would last until the Second World War: wars which covered the entire world, the importance of the Americas, British world hegemony, Prussian hegemony in Europe, and British conquest of India. The Seven Years' War, despite not being nearly as destructive or encompassing, was truly the First World War.

Thank you for reading. The next World History post will look at the American Revolution. The sources I have used are as follows:

-Daniel Baugh, The Global Seven Years' War, 1754-1763: Britain and France in a Great Power Contest, (London: Routledge, 2011)

- Patrice Louis-René Higonnet, 'The Origins of the Seven Years' War', The Journal of Modern History, 40:1, (1968), pp.57-90

-Crispin Bates, Subalterns and the Raj: South Asia since 1600, (London: Routledge, 2007)

-M.S. Anderson, Europe in the Eighteenth Century, 1713-1783, Third Edition, (London: Longman, 1987)

-Franz Szabo, The Seven Years' War in Europe, 1756-1763, (Harlow: Pearson Education Limited, 2008)

-Fred Anderson, Crucible of War: The Seven Years' War and the Fate of Empire in British North America, 1754-1766, (New York, NY: Alfred Knopf, 2000)

-Eric Foner, Give me Liberty! An American History, Fourth Edition, (New York, NY: W.W. Norton, 2014)

-Paul Kennedy, The Rise and Fall of the Great Powers: Economic Change and Military Conflict from 1500 to 2000, (New York, NY: Vintage, 1989)

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