French Tit for English Tat

Cape Breton Island (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Sacré bleu! 

The French were worried.

Acadia, the lands around Hudson's Bay and Newfoundland

were handed over to Britain in 1713 by the Treaty of Utrecht.

The fur trade was going strong and men like explorer

LaVerondrye, (the first European to reach the Winnipeg basin),
 
were finding it more and more difficult to avoid the British

or their Indian allies.

 

So the French built a big scary fortress called Louisburg on

what later became Cape Breton Island. 

This was happy-making for the disgruntled Acadians.

They tweeted Louisburg constantly.

They did not tweet London.

So the British unffriended them saying they were hostile and

refused to swear loyalty to the English Monarch.

The not swearing of loyalty thing REALLY irritated the Brits.

Big time.

They were so pissed off they built Halifax in 1744

just to get in the face of the French King at Louisburg.

(Not that he actually lived there.)

And that was it.

The dye was cast.

The building of Halifax it made it inevitable that the antagonists

would have a major confrontation sooner rather than later.

 

The cataclysmic last years of the 18th century

were upon them all.

 

 

 

 

 

Canadian Bacon

English: Map of the location of major tribes involved in the Beaver Wars laid against a period map showing colonial settlments (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Way back in December I left the English in New England,

the French in New France and the Iroquois in the land between

them, 7thdecadegirl.blogspot.com/2012/12/beaver-wars.html. 

It was the end of the 17th century and if they weren't exactly

singing "Happy Trails" to each other everybody was more

or less behaving themselves.

As a matter of fact in 1701 things were so jolly that the

three groups got all weepy and sorry and signed a

'cross-my-heart-and-hope-to-die-if-I'm-lying' peace treaty.

 

But England and France can only feel the love for so long so

a year later they declared war on each other.

 

Again.

 

You know, I really think Canada would have had a better chance

if our two founding nations had been North and South Korea.

 

Anyway.

 

It was the usual thing. 

In 1704 the French destroyed the English settlement of Bonavista

and in 1707 the English marched up from Massachusetts

and destroyed Port Royal.

 

Lots of other nasty stuff happened but the main thing for us

to note is that when the war ended in 1713 and

everything wad divvied up by the Treaty of Utrecht,

England was handed Acadia.

 

And if the mention of Acadia falling into the hands of the Brits doesn't

just fry your historical bacon then... well,

you just aren't Canadian, eh?