French and Indian War

The French and Indian War was the North American part of the global Seven Years' War, fought between Britain and France and their respective colonists and Native American allies. It began with a clash in the Ohio Valley involving a young militia officer, George Washington, as both powers claimed the area. After early French successes the British captured Louisbourg and then, in 1759, Quebec, where both commanders, Wolfe and Montcalm, were killed. In the Treaty of Paris in 1763 France gave up Canada and its lands east of the Mississippi River. The cost of the war led Britain to raise taxes in its American colonies, which contributed to the tensions that led to the American Revolution.

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