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| 1754 |
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| Virginia troops dispatched to the Ohio, with Washington second in command. The French had, in the meantime, built Fort Duquesne at the forks of the Ohio. Washington pushed on to Great Meadows, where he constructed Fort Necessity. He was attacked by the French and forced to surrender. | 1 |
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| 1754, June 19 |
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| The Albany Convention. The advance of the French had shown the need for a common plan of defense. Representatives of New York, Pennsylvania, Maryland, and the New England states met with the Six Nations (the Five Nations of the Iroquois confederacy and the Tuscaroras). Upon the suggestion of Benjamin Franklin, the convention drew up a plan of union which was, however, rejected by the colonies. The plan called for union under a president appointed by the crown, with a grand council of delegates elected by the colonial assemblies, this body to have legislative power subject to approval by the president and the crown. | 2 |
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| 1755 |
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| British authorities in Nova Scotia relocated some 6,000 French Acadians to British colonies from Massachusetts to South Carolina when they failed to swear an oath of allegiance to the British crown. Immigrants from Britain, Germany, and Switzerland had staged a rebellion against British policies in 1753 and set the stage for attacks on the Acadians. | 3 |
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| 1755–63 |
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| The FRENCH AND INDIAN WAR, the American phase of the Seven Years’ War in Europe (See 1756–63). In 1755 the governors of Virginia, North Carolina, Pennsylvania, Maryland, New York, and Massachusetts met in conference at Alexandria (Virginia) with General Edward Braddock, the British commander. They planned a fourfold attack on the French. In 1756 war was formally declared between France and Great Britain. | 4 |
| For the year 1759 the English planned four campaigns: against Niagara, against settlement on Lake Erie, against Ticonderoga and Crown Point, and against Quebec. The Battle of the Plains of Abraham (Quebec) was fought on Sept. 13, and both Major General James Wolfe and Commander Marquis de Montcalm were killed. Quebec surrendered to the British on Sept. 18. On Sept. 8, 1760, Montreal surrendered and all Canada passed into the hands of the British. In 1762 Admiral George Rodney forced the surrender of Martinique, Grenada, St. Lucia, St. Vincent, and the other French West Indies. | 5 |
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| 1763, Feb. 10 |
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| The TREATY OF PARIS (See 1763, Feb. 10), among Great Britain, France, Spain, and Portugal. France ceded to Britain all claim to Acadia, Canada, Cape Breton, and all of Louisiana situated east of the Mississippi except the island of Orleans. France retained certain fishing rights on the Newfoundland Banks and was given the islands of St. Pierre and Miquelon. Britain restored to France the islands of Guadeloupe, Martinique, Belle Isle, Maria Galante, and St. Lucia. Britain restored Havana to Spain, in return for which Spain ceded Florida to Britain. France, by a previous treaty (Nov. 3, 1762), had ceded to Spain all French territory west of the Mississippi and the island of Orleans as compensation for the loss of Florida to Britain. | 6 |
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| 1763 |
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| The Rebellion of Pontiac. This was an aftermath of the war. Indians north of the Ohio, fearing eviction by the British, embittered by the arrogance and dishonesty of British traders, and disappointed by the ecomony of General Amherst in the matter of presents, were ready to revolt against British occupation of the posts recently held by the French. Pontiac, chief of the Ottawas, organized a rising of the Algonquins, Iroquis, and Indians on the lower Mississippi. In a simultaneous attack, all but three of the northwestern posts fell in May. By 1765, however, the British forces were in possession of the last of the French posts in the west. | 7 |
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| 1763, Oct. 7 |
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| Proclamation of 1763, issued by George III. It created four distinct provinces from the recent conquests; Quebec, East Florida, West Florida, and Grenada. It also temporarily closed to white settlement all lands west of the Appalachian Mountains and north of the streams flowing into the Atlantic Ocean. Fur trade in this Indian reserve was opened to licensed subjects. In 1764 Lord Hillsborough drew up a plan for the management of the Indians and the fur trade. It continued the northern and southern departments for Indian affairs (created in 1755) and provided that in the north all trade must be conducted at regularly established posts and in the south at the Indian towns. | 8 |
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