Between 1700 and 1750, the population of the Thirteen Colonies expanded rapidly from just over 250,000 to 1.2 million, fueled by immigration and a significant baby boom. The colonists were all about pumping out them babies, with the average family having seven children, a greater number of which survived to adulthood compared to Europe thanks to a higher standard of living. The rapid growth in population created a bit of an issue in many of the more well-established colonies, specifically a shortage of available land. Much of the success of the Thirteen Colonies had long been tied to vast swaths of land available to settle, but by the mid-eighteenth century good arable land east of the Appalachians was becoming hard to come by, sparking an economic recession which in turn led to previously unheard of levels of poverty and crime. As a result, settlers began pushing further westward, leaving many of the colonial governments in the position of both supporting such settlement to relieve their economic woes while also scrambling to setup new treaties with the natives to keep the peace. Virginia was the most aggressive in doing this, being both the oldest and most populated colony at the time. By 1750, the wealthy elite of Virginia had gotten permission from the British government to claim lands further westward and had founded three companies to survey and claim land to sell to settlers, the largest being the Ohio Company.
For many of the colonists on the move, the lands west of the Appalachian Mountains seemed rather empty, which realistically it was, at least to their European standards, and nowhere seemed more empty than the Ohio Country. Encompassing most of what is today Ohio, West Virginia, and western Pennsylvania, the Ohio Country had largely been depopulated during the Beaver Wars a century prior. The Iroquois Confederacy, in an attempt to dominate the fur trade, had pushed out the Algonquian tribes which had lived there, only later allowing a few to return. The largest of these were the Shawnee, who had been pushed south by the Iroquois, and the Lenape, which were the collective remains of various tribes who had once lived east of the Appalachians, both of whom had to swear fealty to the Iroquois for the privilege. Dependent on the buckskin trade to get European goods, the Iroquois kept the Ohio Country sparsely populated to retain it as a productive hunting ground. This significant source of income, combined with their fierce reputation, gave them significant political power and influence, allowing them to retain their traditional homeland in what is today western New York long after other tribes had been pushed westward.
Unfortunately, the power of the Iroquois Confederacy was increasingly an illusion. Ravaged by disease and facing an ever growing colonial population, they took great pains to avoid becoming embroiled in the conflicts between Britain and France, even as the Confederacy itself was increasingly strained by debate between those who wanted to maintain their traditional way of life and those who saw embracing a European style of living as the best course of action. A debate which only became more heated when in 1752 representatives of the Ohio Company came to ask permission to settle lands southeast of the Ohio River. Wishing to avoid conflict, the Iroquois signed a treaty selling the requested land to the Ohio Company as well as the rights to build several forts in what is today western Pennsylvania. This turn of events severely pissed off the Shawnee and Lenape, who saw lands where they lived suddenly given away without their consent. Furious, they turned to the French for help, which the French were more than willing to give.
The French viewed any encroachment by the British as a direct threat to their vast fur trading network, which by that time stretched from Quebec and the Great Lakes south to Louisiana and west to the Rocky Mountains. Not content with just arming the natives to attack any potential colonists, in 1753 they marched an army of French regulars and various allied native tribes from the eastern Great Lakes region into the Ohio Country, chased out any British or colonial traders they found, and began construction on several forts. Not too happy about this, the Iroquois sent a delegation to the French demanding they leave, to which the French replied fuck off. The Iroquois then went to the various colonial governments to ask for help, but found most of the colonies less than willing, all of them being worried about securing their own borders for the likely coming conflict, the one exception being Virginia. With the Virginia elite heavily invested in the Ohio Company, the government quickly dispatched a delegation to insist the French leave, which was every bit as successful as the Iroquois in convincing them. Not willing to back down, the following spring they sent their volunteer militia to forcibly dislodge the French. The well-trained French soldiers beat the shit out of the militia and forced them to retreat.
This chain of events sparked a panic amongst the colonies. A large French force was firmly entrenched in the Ohio Country and more soldiers were sailing from France, the Shawnee and Lenape were raiding colonial settlements, the Wabanaki Confederacy was attacking New England, and the Iroquois Confederacy was splintering with some members joining the French and more threatening to do so. With the British mired in their own negotiations with the French, the colonists decided to see to their own defense. In the summer of 1754, delegates from the colonies of Connecticut, Maryland, Massachusetts, New Hampshire, New York, Pennsylvania, and Rhode Island, as well as the Iroquois Confederacy, met in Albany to discuss aiding each other in their mutual defense. While the congress did secure the Iroquois Confederacy firmly to the colonial side, it also went a bit off the rails, with delegates ratifying a plan for a united colonial government to oversee such issues affecting all of the colonies. However, all seven of the colonial assemblies rejected the plan as soon as hearing it, none willing to give up any of their individual independence to such a united government. It didn’t matter. In the winter of 1755, Britain declared war on France, dispatching the Royal Navy to harry French shipping and sending an army of British regulars to take the Ohio Country by force. The French and Indian War had begun.
