American Indian Heritage Day, 2017

The War that Made America - Fred Anderson

The French and Indian War (1754 - 1763) is the American name for the war that the British call The Seven Years’ War. Winston Churchill called it the first world-wide war because hostilities broke out from Canada to the Caribbean, from India to the Philippines. American historians have tended to see the conflict as a mere prelude to the American Revolution and emphasized it was the war in which George Washington gained his knowledge, skills, and abilities in things military.

However, through Anderson’s chronicle, we see that in many ways the French and Indian War was the most important war of the eighteenth century.

Anderson opens this readable history by underlining the importance of Indians and French in the conflict. The two empires – the Protestant British and the Catholic French – had difficulties over Indians on the frontier. He provides much information about how British commanders failed to understand how to win colonial (and Indian) loyalty and, indeed, how they drew entirely the wrong lessons from their extended acquaintance with colonials. Anderson is especially provocative on the effect of wartime experience on alienating American colonists, especially New Englanders, from their colonial masters. About 13 years after the British victory, the British Americans would demand and, in the end win, independence. 

He writes vividly and fluidly, making this book of interest not only to grad students need who quick information as background but also to general readers, which is the target audience.