American History

American History

Introduction

A conflict that began as a minor rebellion but ended as a war of secession from empire by thirteen of twenty-six of Britain's North American and Caribbean colonies. (Upper Canada, Newfoundland, and Nova Scotia remained loyal, as did all British colonies of the West Indies; Lower Canada was effectively occupied.) The colonists rebelled for many reasons, among which were efforts to secure greater economic freedom from England's mercantilist policies; a desire for enhanced but still limited self-government, which rapidly evolved into demands for full political independence from the crown; a movement to preserve traditional colonial liberties against more direct imperial administration; and population pressures that fed into the powerful desire by new settlers to expand into historic Indian lands in New York and Ohio, then forbidden to white settlement by Indian treaties and alliances with England.

Discussion

The rebellion grew out of the Seven Years' War (1756-1763), which, in the Treaty of Paris (1763), removed the French threat from North America, thereby reducing colonist need for British military protection. That change also gave rise to demands for Britain to lift old restrictions on further expansion into the vast interior of North America, then still in Indian lands. Imperial policy saw the colonies in larger terms of global empire: London sought an orderly frontier and an end to its American wars and thus continued to deny western expansion to the colonists, knowing full well that further settlement would bring war with frontier Indian nations. In 1763 an order was issued forbidding settlers to cross the Appalachian divide, beyond which the land was to remain in Indian hands. London's alliances with, and perceived protection of, the Iroquois and other Indian interests chafed among the settlers as much as, or even more than, the presence of British garrisons and tax collectors.

On the other ...