The French And Indian War

The French and Indian War (1756-1763) took place in the New World with the British against the French. This war led to change in the political, economic, and ideological relations between Britain and its American colonies that later led into the Revolutionary War. The British gained control of many territories while the American colonies gained an extensive new land to explore. With France removed from North America the vast interior of the continent laid open for Americans to colonize (as seen in document A).

The American colonies were affected politically after the war. One of the main ways that the colonies were politically changed was that British invincibility was destroyed. The American people had seen the British regulars disheartened and feeble. As stated by a Massachusetts soldier (document D) "...British regulars who are but little better than slaves to their officers." This shows that the Britain's were not as tough as they seemed. A second way that the American colonies were affected politically after the war was they took their political and cultural cues from Great Britain according to the Divine textbook.

Not only did the French and Indian War affect the colonies politically but also economically. The American colonists helped pay for some of the war although the Britain's believed they were not helping enough. Colonists had supplied almost twenty thousand soldiers and spent over 2 million dollars. The effects of frontier raids and thousands of refugees also disrupted the colonial economies. A major economic distress in the colonies was parliamentary taxation in America. The English went bankrupt due to the cost to send over men and supplies from a long distance away. The Stamp Act of 1765 required all papers to carry a tax stamp for which Britain could use the money to repay the suppliers from the war. With new colonial taxes, this eventually led to the American Revolution. According to document H,