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The French and Indian War (1754 -1763) was one in a series of wars fought between England and France beginning in the late 1600s. What made the French and Indian War different from the earlier conflicts was that it began in the New World. All previous wars had begun in Europe, and with the exception of King George's War (1744 � ' 1748), no battles had been fought in the New World. Most of these conflicts began because each side hoped to gain trade or military advantages in Europe as well as in various European colonies in Africa, Asia, and the Americas.
The reason why the French and Indian War began in the New World involved the Ohio Country. Both the English and the French claimed the land west of the Appalachian Mountains. Beginning in the 1740s both countries had merchants engaged in the fur trade with the Native Americans in Ohio. By the 1750s, English colonists, especially the investors in a venture called The Ohio Company, also hoped to convert the wilderness into viable farms.
The French and Indian War continued in Europe, Africa, and Asia for three more years. In 1763, both sides signed the Treaty of Paris (1763), which formally concluded the war. The end result in the New World was France's loss of practically all of its colonies in North America to the English. England now owned most of modern-day Canada and most of the land between the Atlantic seaboard and the Mississippi River. Although French territory now belonged to England, the British did not have firm control over most of it. Native Americans, including those in the Ohio Country, stood ready to defend their territory from the colonists' westward expansion. Most tribes hoped that friendly trading arrangements could be made, but they also feared the large number of English colonists in the New World.
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[[Category:Exploration To Statehood]]