Seven Years' War — Global Colonial Dimensions
The Seven Years' War ran from 1756 to 1763 and was fought in Europe, North America, the Caribbean, West Africa, India and the Philippines — the first conflict that can reasonably be called a world war. Its European origin was Austria's determination to recover Silesia, which Frederick the Great had seized in 1740. Its colonial origin was separate and earlier: fighting between British and French forces in the Ohio valley had begun in 1754, with a skirmish involving a twenty-two-year-old Virginian officer named George Washington. The Diplomatic Revolution of 1756 reversed two centuries of alliances. Austria abandoned Britain for France; Britain allied with Prussia. Frederick opened by invading Saxony and spent the war surrounded by France, Austria, Russia and Sweden, holding on through interior lines, extraordinary victories at Rossbach and Leuthen in 1757, and near-annihilation at Kunersdorf in 1759. He was saved in 1762 by the death of the Empress Elizabeth of Russia, whose successor idolised him and made peace — the miracle of the House of Brandenburg. Britain, under Pitt, subsidised Prussia and concentrated on the sea and the colonies. The year 1759 brought Quebec, Quiberon Bay, Lagos and Minden. At the Peace of Paris in 1763 France ceded Canada and everything east of the Mississippi, and effectively withdrew from India. The cost transformed both winners. Britain's attempt to make the colonies pay for their own defence produced the Stamp Act and, twelve years later, a revolution; France's debts contributed directly to 1789. Prussia emerged as a great power having gained nothing but Silesia and survival. Britain emerged with an empire it did not know how to govern.
- Year: 1756 CE
- Category: Military
