IX.

1748.

sand pounds sterling. That province therefore, CHAP. during the war, must have been at the expense of more than half a million sterling. The other three New England colonies, with New York, probably expended nearly an equal sum. The expenses of South Carolina were very great, as has been noticed in a preceding chapter. All the colonies suffered in their trade and husbandry.

In the close of the war especially, they sustained Lossoftbe very great losses in their shipping and commerce. colonies. The ships which had been stationed on the coast for the protection of the trade, were called off to form a squadron under admiral Knowles, for the reduction of St. Jago, the capital of Cuba. While the coasts were left bare, the French privateers seized their opportunity, and carried off from the colonies many of their vessels without the least molestation. They became so bold as to sail up Delaware river almost to Philadelphia. They ventured up many leagues into Chesapeak bay, and sailed up Cape Fear river in North Carolina. *

In the expeditions against Cuba and Louisburg, in garrisoning the latter, and in the defence of Nova Scotia, New England lost three or four thousand of her young men. Such were the losses of the two colonies of the Massachusetts and New Hampshire, in this and the last Indian war, that from seventeen hundred twenty two, to seventeen hundred forty nine, a term of twenty seven years, there had been no increase of their numbers. This was a term in which, otherwise, they would have more than doubled the number of their inhabitants. At the time, when governour Hutchinson wrote his history,t he observed, “ It is probable that there would have been two hundred thousand souls more than there are at this time, in New England, if the French had been expelled from Canada an hundred years ago.'

IX.

CHAP. and last, swept off great numbers of the inhabitants

of New York, as well as of New England. The 1748. employment of so many men in the late war, and for

so many years, with the loss sustained, was a great check to population, exceedingly retarded the extension of set:lement and the cultivation of the country.

In this war the colonies had exhibited the most striking evidences of their loyalty and zeal, in his majesty's service. But neither from these, nor from all their losses and expenditures, did they derive any considerable advantage to themselves. Though it be true, that the crown, in some good part, repaid the bare expense of the expedition to Louisburg, yet this did by no means compensate the country. She had nothing to compensate her loss of men, or the damages sustained by the depreciation of the currency, nor her numerous other losses and services. Great Britain engrossed all the advantages of the reduction of Louisburg. It was finally given up, to recover what had been lost in Germany, and to purchase peace for the nation. The prodigious quantities of clothing, arms, and ammunition purchased by the colonies, for their soldiery, while it greatly impoverished them, increased the trade of Great Britain, and was no inconsiderable emolument to the parent state.

The colonies were obliged, during the war, to emit such sums in bills of credit, that they were scarcely able to redeem them before the commencement of the next French war. Before the complete redemption of the bills, in those colonies where their credit was the best supported, the depreciation was nearly twenty for one. This was a great injury to commerce, public credit, and the morals of the people, for years after the termination of the war.

CHAPTER X.

Erench war, 1755. Reasons of the war. Colonel Washington's ex

pedition. Convention at Albany. Expedition against Nova Scotia, Fort du Quesne, Crown Point, and Niagara. Success in Nova Sco. tia. General Braddock defeated by the French and Indians. Baron Dieskau defeated and taken by general Johnson. Unhappy divis. ion of the southern colonies. Colonel Bradstreet defeats a party of the enemy. Oswego taken. Inactivity of Lord Loudon. Conduct of the southern colonies. Comparison between the campaigns of 1755 and 1756.

X.

DURING the term of about seven years after the char. treaty of Aix la Chapelle the colonies enjoyed general tranquillity. They vigorously addressed themselves to the arts of peace. By industry, economy, population, the extension of their settlements, and the increase of commerce, they were making strenuous exertions to recover themselves from the losses and impoverishment, which they had sustained by the preceding war. As the great number of bills of credit, which had been thrown into circulation, had injured trade, wounded the public credit, and had an ill effect on the morals of the country, particular attention was paid to the restoration of public credit and the remedying of these evils. These were matters of capital importance to the general prosperity.

While the colonies were prosecuting these great objects, the French were making encroachments on their eastern, northern, and western frontiers : They were also attempting, in such a manner, to French compass the colonists with a line of posts and fortifi- encroachcations, as, that, in case of war, their frontiers would ments. be exposed to the continual alarms and devastation of the French and their Indians. Though the whole country of Acadia or Nova Scotia, had been expressly ceded to Great Britain, by the twelfth article of the treaty of Utrecht, and that cession had been confirmed by all subsequent treaties; yet the French

X.

the war.

sea.

CHAP. claimed a considerable part of that country; and in several places, were erecting fortifications. At the

, 1749. northward, they had encroached on the English, by

the settlement and fortifications at Crown Point. At the westward, they were not only attempting to complete a line of forts, from the head of St. Lawrence to Missisippi, but were encroaching far on Vir

ginia. Reasons of While under the auspices of peace, agriculture

and maritime commerce flourished on her coasts, the Indian trade drew many of her wandering traders far into the inland country, beyond the great mountains. Here they found themselves in a delightful climate, exuberantly fruitful, and watered with many fair and navigable rivers. It was apprehended, that these advantages, in conjunction with the Indian trade, would amply compensate its distance from the

A number of noblemen, merchants, and planters of Westminster, London, and Virginia, called the Ohio company, obtained a charter grant, of

a six hundred thousand acres, on and near the Ohio

river. In pursuance of the terms of their patent, the 1751. lands were surveyed, about two years after the grant,

and settlements were soon made.

The governour of Canada, had early intelligence of the transactions of the company, and was alarmed with apprehensions, that they were prosecuting a plan, which would effectually deprive the French of the advantages, which they derived from their trade with the Twightwees; and what was still worse, would cut off the communication between the colonies of Canada and Louisiana. The French claimed all the country from the Missisippi, as far in upon Virginia, as the Alleghany mountains. This claim was founded on the pretence, that they were the first discoverers of that river. To secure their claims and preserve the communication between their two colonies of Canada and Louisiana, they had not only erected a fort on the south side of lake Erie, but one about fifteen miles south of that, on a branch of the

a

Ohio, and another at the conflux of the Ohio and the CHAP.

X. Wabache. Nothing could be more directly calculated to dash a favourite plan of France, than the settlement of the Ohio.

The governour of Canada therefore wrote to the governours of New York and Pennsylvania, representing that the English traders had encroached on the French, by trading with their Indians, and threatening that if they would not desist, that he would seize them wherever they should be found.

The Indian trade had been managed principally by the Pennsylvanians; but the Ohio company were now about to divert it to a different channel. By opening a road through the country, and erecting a trading house at Will's creek, they were, by the Patomac, conducting it directly to Virginia. The Pennsylvanians, influenced by a spirit of selfishness and revenge, gave early intelligence, both to the French and Indians, of the designs and transactions of the company. The French governour, therefore, put his menaces into execution. A party of French and Indians seized the British traders, among the Twightwees, and carried them to their fort on the 1753. south side of lake Erie. The Twightwees, resenting the injury done to the British traders, their allies, made reprisals on the French, and sent several of their traders to Pennsylvania. The French however persisted in their claims and continued to strengthen their fortifications.

The Indians at the same time, jealous that settlements were about to be inade on their lands, without purchase or consent from them, threatened the set

These claims and encroachments of the French, and threats of the Indians, struck at the very existence of the Ohio company. Complaints were therefore made to lieutenant governour Dinwiddie, of Virginia, and the province began to interest themselves warmly in the affair. The Indians were, in some measure, pacified, by a pretended message delivered them from the king. Major Washington