Nick And His
Adventures With
The French And
Indian War
by: Rhiannon LaPlante and Lexia Dorr
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Nick was a bear and it was getting to be close to winter which means it
was getting close to hibernation time. When it was hibernation time Nick’s
family always hibernated in the same cave. So as usual Nick was stuffing
his corner with extra goodies and a few extra toys so he could fool around
all winter long while everyone else were counting sheep. When he was
stuffing his corner with the coolest toys and the yummiest treat he noticed
something out of the corner of his eyes. At first he thought it was a book,
then he opened it and it was a journal that appeared to be two hundred
years old. It said this is the journal of Edward Braddock the 11th. So when
Nick found the journal he started to read it; he figured he would read it all
winter long when the rest of his family was sleeping.
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When it was finally time to hibernate
Nick looked at the first chapter of the
journal. It was about how the population grew and colonies wanted to explore the Ohio River, but the French
wouldn’t let them because they didn’t
want them to make a profit in their fur
trade. It was titled The “British and
French Rivalry.” He began to read, “The
French and British were competing for
wealth. By the 1700’s there were major
powers in North America. This was
about to cause a war. The British controlled Nova Scotia, and the Hudson Bay
area, in the 1740’s the French attacked
Nova Scotia. Then the New Englanders
went North and captured Louisburg,
they fought over goods and major resources.
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When Nick finished that chapter he was so interested in reading more
about the war that he decided to sit down in the corner of the cave and
read a few more chapters. The next chapter was about the Native Americans taking sides. When Nick started reading this time he was so into it he
forgot that he was reading and thought that he was in a fun dream. The
French and the Native Americans helped each other out. They were not like
the British, because all the British wanted to do was steal land and take it
over. The Native Americans were different though, they wanted to trade
goods. The French were a lot nicer and some of them even ended up marrying Native Americans. The French converted the Native Americans to Catholicism. The Abenaki people joined the French and they attacked the
British frontier outposts.
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Nick kept reading and reading more and more and the next thing he got to
to was about when the American colonists taking action. The Virginians
wanted to settle the Ohio Valley. Washington’s first command was to tell
the French that they were trespassing on land that was claimed by Great
Britain and he demanded that they would leave, but they did not listen.
Dinwiddie made Washington a lieutenant colonel and sent him to Ohio
country with a militia which is a group of civilians trained to fight in emergencies. They had instructions to build a fort were the Ohio river began.
When they arrived Washington found that the French had already built a
fort in the same spot. Instead Washington established a small post named
Fort Necessity nearby their original spot. New York Pennsylvania and
maryland wanted to find a way to work together to defend themselves
from the French. They also wanted to pursue the Iroquois to take their
side again the French. Benjamin Franklin and representatives thought of a
plan to elect a single legislature to govern all the colonies and have power
to collect the taxes, raise troops and regulate trade this was called the Albany plan of union. But the colonists weren’t willing to give up their power.
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The next section that Nick read was
about the Iroquois Confederacy. The
most powerful group of native Americans in the East were the Iroquois confederacy, based in New York. The confederacy was first crafted in 1570, it included five nations the mohawk, Seneca,
Cayuga, Onodega, and Oneida. Other
groups joined later and were taken over
by the Iroquois. By the mid- 1700’s the
Iroquois began to experience great
pressure as the British moved into the
Ohio Valley. Eventually the leaders of
the confederacy gave certain trading
rights to the British and became their
unwilling allies.
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Nick read about when the British takes action next. In 1754 the government of London decided to interfere in the war. In 1754 Great Britain decided to make general Edward Braddock (A.K.A my dad) the commander
and chief of the British forces of America and he was suppose to drive the
French out of the Ohio Valley. My dad set out of Virginia with 1,400, red
coated British soldiers and a few blue coated colonial militia. Native
Americans and French troops attacked the British. Braddock was killed and
the battle ended with defeat for the British, almost 1,000 soldiers were
killed. Washington led the survivors back to Virginia. He was use to fighting in lines in England. He also wasn’t use to people hiding in the woods.
He was use to people standing in lines and firing at each other. Britain improved after William Pitt became the prime minister. Pitt wanted to clear a
path to the western territories ant to conquer French, Canada.
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When news of Braddock’s defeat got
around to London, Britain declared war
on France. That began the beginning of
the Seven Year’s war. During the war
French, British and Spanish forces
clashed in Cuba, the West Indies, India,
and the Philippines as well as in North
America and Europe. The first year of
the Seven Year’s war was not good for
the British. They killed settlers, burned
farmhouses and crops and drove many
families back towards the coast. French
forces from Canada captured British
forts at Lake Ontario and at Lake
George.
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As Nick continued to read he started to understand a lot more about the
war and how it happened. Britain’s amount of money improved after William Pitt came to power as the secretary of state and then the prime minister He was an outstanding military planner, he also knew how to pick
skilled commanders. He oversaw the war from hundreds of miles away. He
sent British troops to North America under the command of such energetic
officers such as Jeffery Amherst and James Wolfe. In 1758 Amherst and
Wolfe led a British assault to recapture the fort at Louisburg. The same
year a group of New Englanders led by British officers , to capture Fort
Frontenac at lake ontario. Another force marched across Pennsylvania and
captured Fort Duquesne.
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Nick kept reading and read about The Battle of Quebec. In the battle of
Quebec, Wolfe’s scout found a unguarded path up the back of a cliff.
Wolfe’s soldiers overtook the guards posted on the path and then snuck up
the path in the night. They assembled during the night outside the fortress
of Quebec on a field called the plains of Abraham. They surprisingly beating the French, but Wolfe died in the battle.
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In the Treaty of Paris, In North America Britain and France were fighting. The
Treaty was in 1763, France was permitted to keep its sugar producing islands
in the west Indies. They were forced to
give up Canada and its land east of the
Mississippi River to Great Britain. In return Spain received French lands west
of the Mississippi River also the port of
New Orleans. This treaty was the end of
France having the power in North America. The continent was now divided between Great Britain and Spain with the
Mississippi River marking the boundary.
When
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Nick kept reading. The Proclamation of
1763, was when King George the 3rd of
Great Britain declared that the Appalachian Mountains were the short term
Western boundary for all the colonies.
The governors were forbidden to grant
land west of the Appalachian Mountains
without permission from the king. This
Proclamation made people mad because
many people owned shares of land past
the boundary, and Britain was ignoring
their land claims. Even though the end
of the French and Indian war made
peace the proclamation, it created tension between Britain and the colonies.
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When Nick had finished reading the
whole entire journal he had learned a
lot of interesting facts about the war
that he hadn’t known before. He decided
to bring the journal home and show his
dad, since he was also a history buff.
When he showed it to his dad, Dad was
so surprised that he didn’t know what
to say. Ever since that day Nick has
been reading and learning new facts
about the French and Indian war. Now
he knows that learning doesn’t always
have to be boring reading out of a textbook, it can be fun. So to this day he
goes treasure hunting with his friends
to try to find more historical artifacts.
Someday Nick wants to be an archeologist and dig up artifacts.
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