:''For the 1563–1570 war, see
Nordic Seven Years' War. For the 1592–1598 war in Korea, see
Japanese invasions of Korea (1592-1598).''
The 'Seven Years' War'
(i) (1754 and 1756–1763), incorporating the 'Pomeranian War' and the '
French and Indian War', enveloped both
European and
colonial theatres. It is estimated that between 900,000 and 1,400,000 people died.
[1]
This war involved all of the major European powers of the period:
Prussia,
Hanover, and
Great Britain (including
British colonies in North America, the
British East India Company, and
Ireland) were pitted against
Austria,
France (including the North American colony of
New France and the
French East India Company), the
Russian Empire,
Sweden, and
Saxony.
Spain and
Portugal were later drawn into the conflict, and a force from the neutral
Netherlands was attacked in
India.
The war ended France’s power, both in the
Americas (where it lost all of its possessions except
French Guiana,
Guadeloupe,
Martinique,
Saint-Domingue and
Saint Pierre and Miquelon) and in continental Europe,
[1] until the time of the
French Revolution.
Great Britain, meanwhile, emerged as the dominant colonial power in the world. The
French Navy was crippled, which meant that only an ambitious rebuilding program in combination with the
Spanish fleet would see it again threaten the
Royal Navy's command of the sea.
[2] On the other side of the world, the British East India Company acquired the strongest position within India, which was to become the ''"jewel in the
imperial crown"''. The war was described by
Winston Churchill as the first
world war,
[3] as it was the first conflict in human history to be fought around the globe, although most of the combatants were either European nations or their overseas colonies. As a partially Anglo-French conflict involving developing empires, the war was one of the most significant phases of the eighteenth century
Second Hundred Years' War.
[4]
Names
In
Canada and the
United Kingdom, the ''Seven Years' War'' is used to describe the North American conflict as well as the European and Asian conflicts. In
French Canada, however, the term ''War of the Conquest'' is commonly used. The conflict in India is termed the ''
Third Carnatic War'' while the fighting between Prussia and Austria is called the ''
Third Silesian War''.
While most U.S.-based historians refer to the conflict as the ''Seven Years' War'' regardless of the theatre involved (such as Fred Anderson in ''A People's Army: Massachusetts Soldiers & Society in the Seven Year's War''), non-scholars often use the term to refer only to the
European portions of the conflict (1756–1763), not the nine-year North American conflict or the Indian
campaigns which lasted 15 years (including
Pontiac's Rebellion), which are known as the
French and Indian War. The latter name arises from the fact that the British fought against the French and most
Native American Nations, though some Nations did fight alongside the British.
Causes
The Seven Years' War may be viewed as a continuation of the
War of the Austrian Succession, in which King
Frederick II of Prussia had gained the rich province of
Silesia. Empress
Maria Theresa of Austria had signed the
Treaty of Aix-la-Chapelle only in order to gain time to rebuild her
military forces and to forge new
alliances, which she did with remarkable success. The political map of Europe had been redrawn in a few years. During the so-called
Diplomatic Revolution of 1756, century-old enemies France, Austria and Russia formed a single alliance against Prussia.
Prussia had the protection only of Great Britain, whose ruling dynasty saw its ancestral
Hanoverian possession as being threatened by France. In Great Britain's alliance with Prussia the two powers complemented each other. The British already had the most formidable
navy in Europe, while Prussia had the most formidable land force on continental Europe, allowing Great Britain to focus her soldiers towards her colonies.
The Austrian army had undergone an overhaul according to the Prussian system. Maria Theresa, whose knowledge of military affairs shamed many of her generals, had pressed relentlessly for reform. Her interest in the welfare of the soldiers had gained her their undivided respect.
The second cause for war arose from the heated colonial struggle between the
British Empire and
French Empire. These causes of the
French and Indian War are described on that page.
War begins
In the European theatre,
Prussia was outnumbered, but not outclassed, by her opponents. Prussia was a small state, but as
Voltaire once remarked: "''Where some states possess an army, the Prussian Army possesses a state!''"
At the start of the war, Frederick crossed the border of Saxony, one of the smaller German states in league with Austria. The Saxon and Austrian armies were unprepared, and at the
Battle of Lobositz, Frederick prevented the isolated Saxon army from being reinforced by an Austrian army under General
von Browne. However, Saxony had successfully delayed the Prussian campaign. In the Mediterranean, the French opened the campaign against the British by an attack on Minorca; a British attempt at relief was foiled at the
Battle of Minorca and the island was captured (for which
Admiral Byng was court-martialed and executed).
In the spring of 1757, Frederick again took the initiative by marching on Prague. After the bloody
Battle of Prague, the Prussians started to besiege the city, but had to lift the siege after Frederick's first defeat at the
Battle of Kolin. In summer, the Russians invaded East Prussia and defeated a smaller Prussian force in the fiercely contested
Battle of Gross-Jägersdorf
Things were looking very grim for Prussia at this time, with the Austrians mobilizing to attack Prussian-controlled soil and a French army under
Soubise approaching from the west. In what
Napoleon would call "a masterpiece in maneuver and resolution", Frederick thoroughly crushed both the French at the
Battle of Rossbach and the Austrians at the
Battle of Leuthen. With these great victories, Frederick once again established himself as Europe's finest general and his men as Europe's finest soldiers.
British amphibious "descents"
The British planned a "descent" (an
amphibious demonstration or raid) on
Rochefort, a
joint operation to overrun the town and burn the shipping in the
Charente. The expedition set out on
September 8,
1757,
Sir John Mordaunt commanding the troops and
Sir Edward Hawke the fleet. On
September 23, the Isle d'Aix was taken, but due to dithering by the military staff such time was lost that Rochefort became unassailable,
[5] and the expedition abandoned the Isle d'Aix and returned to Great Britain on
October 1.
Despite the operational failure and debated strategic success of the descent on Rochefort,
Pitt — who saw purpose in this type of asymmetric enterprise — prepared to continue such operations.
[5] An army was assembled under the command of the
Charles Spencer, 3rd Duke of Marlborough; he was aided by
Lord George Sackville. The naval escorts for the expedition were commanded by
Anson, Hawke, and
Howe. The army landed on
June 5,
1758 at
Cancalle Bay, proceeded to
St. Malo, and burned the shipping in the harbor; the arrival of French relief forces caused the British to avoid a siege, and the troops re-embarked. An attack on
Havre de Grace was called off, and the fleet sailed on to
Cherbourg; but the weather being bad and provisions low, that too was abandoned, and the expedition returned, having damaged French privateering and provided a further strategic demonstration against the French coast.
Pitt now prepared to send troops into Germany; and both Marlborough and Sackville, disgusted by what they perceived as the futility of the "descents", obtained commissions in that army. The elderly
General Bligh was appointed to command a new "descent", escorted by Howe. The campaign began propitiously: with the support of the navy to bombard Cherbourg and cover their landing, the army drove off the French force detailed to oppose their landing, captured Cherbourg, and destroyed its fortifications, docks, and shipping. The troops were re-embarked and the fleet moved them to the
Bay of St. Lunaire in
Brittany where, on
September 3, they were landed to again operate against St. Malo; however, this action proved impractical. Worsening weather forced the two arms to separate: the ships sailed for the safer anchorage of
St. Cast, while the army proceeded overland. The tardiness of Bligh in moving his forces allowed a French force of 10,000 men from
Brest to catch up with him and open fire on the re-embarkation troops. A rear-guard of 1,400 under General Drury held off the French while the rest of the army embarked; they could not be saved, 750, including Drury, were killed and the rest captured.
Continental warfare
Frederick invaded Austria in the spring of 1758 and failed to score an important victory. In the west, the French were beaten in the
Battle of Reichenberg and the
Battle of Krefeld by Prince
Ferdinand of Brunswick.
operations of Russian army from Polish territory during Seven Years' War 1756-1762
In the east, at the
Battle of Zorndorf in Prussia, a Prussian army of 35,000 men under Frederick fought to a standstill with a Russian army of 43,000 commanded by Count
Fermor. The Russians withdrew from the field. In the undecided
Battle of Tornow on
September 25, a Swedish army repulsed six assaults by a Prussian army. On
October 14, the Austrians surprised the main Prussian army at the
Battle of Hochkirch. Frederick lost much of his artillery but retreated in good order.
The year 1759 saw some severe Prussian defeats. At the
Battle of Kay, or Paltzig, the Russian Count
Saltykov with 70,000 Russians defeated 26,000 Prussian troops commanded by General
von Wedel. Though the Hanoverians defeated an army of 60,000 French at
Minden, Austrian general
Daun forced the surrender of an entire Prussian corps of 13,000 men in the
Battle of Maxen. Frederick himself lost half his army in the
Battle of Kunersdorf, the worst defeat in his military career, and one that drove him to the brink of abdication and suicide. The disaster resulted partly from his misjudgment of the Russians, who had already demonstrated their strength at Zorndorf and at
Gross-Jagersdorf.
The French planned to invade the British Isles during 1759 by accumulating troops near the mouth of the Loire and concentrating their Brest and Toulon fleets. However, two sea defeats prevented this. In August, the Mediterranean fleet under M. de la Clue was scattered by a larger British fleet under
Edward Boscawen at the
Battle of Lagos. In the
Battle of Quiberon Bay on
November 20, the British admiral
Edward Hawke with 23
ships of the line caught the French Brest fleet with 21 ships of the line under
Marshal de Conflans and sank, captured or forced aground many of them, putting an end to the French plans.
1760 brought even more disaster to the Prussians. The Prussian general
Fouqué was defeated in the
Battle of Landshut. The French captured
Marburg, and the Swedes part of
Pomerania. The Hanoverians were victorious over the French at the
Battle of Marburg, but the Austrians, under the command of
General Charles Flynn captured
Glatz in Silesia. In the
Battle of Liegnitz Frederick scored a victory despite being outnumbered three to one. The Russians under
General Saltykov and Austrians under
General Lacy briefly occupied his capital,
Berlin. The end of the year saw Frederick once more victorious in the
Battle of Torgau.
1761 brought a new country into the war. Spain declared war on Great Britain on
January 4. In the
Battle of Villinghausen Prince
Ferdinand of Brunswick defeated a 92,000-man French army. The Russians under
Zakhar Chernyshev and
Pyotr Rumyantsev stormed
Kolberg in Pomerania, while the Austrians captured
Schweidnitz.
Great Britain now threatened to withdraw her subsidies, and, as the Prussian armies had dwindled to 60,000 men,
Frederick's survival was severely threatened. Then on
January 5 1762 the
Tsaritsa died. Her Prussophile successor,
Peter III, at once recalled Russian armies from Berlin (see: the
Treaty of Saint Petersburg (1762)) and mediated Frederick's truce with Sweden. In the aftermath, Frederick was able to drive the Austrians from Silesia in the
Battle of Freiberg (
October 29 1762), while his Brunswick allies captured the key town of
Göttingen.
War in the Colonies
''For North American events, see
French and Indian War.''
Battles occurred in
India,
North America,
Europe, the
Caribbean isles, the
Philippines and coastal
Africa. During the 1750s up to 1763, Great Britain gained enormous areas of land and influence at the expense of the French.
Robert Clive expelled the French from India, and General
Wolfe defeated the French forces of General
Montcalm at the
Battle of the Plains of Abraham, a victory which led to the surrender of
Quebec to the British. Great Britain lost
Minorca in the Mediterrean to the French in 1756 but captured the French colonies in
Senegal on the African continent in 1758. The
Royal Navy captured the French sugar colonies of
Guadeloupe in 1759 and
Martinique in 1762, as well as the Spanish cities of
Havana in
Cuba and
Manila in the Philippines.
In 1758, the British mounted an attack on
New France by land and by sea. The French fortress at
Louisbourg on
Cape Breton Island fell in 1758. And on
September 13 1759, General James Wolfe defeated the French forces at
Québec. By the autumn of 1760, French America had become British.
Towards the very end of the war, in 1762, French forces attacked
St. John's, Newfoundland. If successful, the expedition would have strengthened France's hand at the negotiating table. Though they took St. John's and raided nearby settlements, the French forces were eventually defeated by British troops at the
Battle of Signal Hill. This was the final battle of the war in North America, and it forced the French to surrender to the British under Colonel Jeffrey Amherst.
The history of the Seven Years' War, particularly the siege of Québec and the death of Wolfe, generated a vast number of ballads, broadsides, images (see
The Death of General Wolfe), maps and other printed materials, which testify to how this event continued to capture the imagination of the British public long after Wolfe's death in 1759.
[7]
Peace
The British-French hostilities were ended in 1763 by the
Treaty of Paris, which involved a complex series of land exchanges, the most important being France's cession to Spain of
Louisiana, and to Great Britain the rest of New France except for the islands of
St. Pierre and Miquelon. France was given the choice of keeping either
New France or its Caribbean island colony
Guadeloupe, and chose the latter to retain one of its sources of
sugar.
[8] This suited the British as well, as their own Caribbean islands already supplied ample sugar, but with the handover of New France they gained control of all lands in North America east of the
Mississippi River with the exception of New Orleans. However, the end of the threat from New France to the British American colonies and the subsequent reorganization of those colonies would later become one of the enabling triggers for the
American Revolution. Spain lost control of
Florida to Great Britain, but received
New Orleans and the
Louisiana Territory west of the
Mississippi River from the French. France also returned Minorca to the British.
European
boundaries were returned to their status quo ante bellum by the
Treaty of Hubertusburg (February 1763). Prussia thus maintained its possession of Silesia, having survived the combined assault of three neighbours, each larger than itself. According to some historians, Prussia gained enormously in influence at the expense of the
Holy Roman Empire. This increase in Prussian influence, it is argued, marks the beginning of the modern German state, an event at least as influential as the colonial empire Great Britain had gained. Others, including
Fred Anderson, author of ''Crucible of War'', believe the war was needless and overly costly. According to Anderson, "Beyond the inevitable adjustments in the way diplomats would think of Prussia as a player in European politics, six years of heroic expenditure and savage bloodshed had accomplished precisely nothing." (p. 506)
It should be noted, however, that while Frederick the Great's earlier acts of aggression can be blamed for the circumstances that led to the Seven Years' War, it was waged against him by a coalition of larger European powers intent on reversing Prussia's fortunes. Maintaining the defense of Prussia "against the greatest superiority of power and the utmost spite of fortune" in the words of
Lord Macaulay[9], while retaining Prussia's earlier territorial gains, can be seen as an accomplishment in itself. The nations and empires allied against Prussia during the war comprised over half of
Continental Europe, and Frederick's forces were opposed from four different directions. The Austrian army also performed well and sometimes successfully against a Prussian army led by a man later acknowledged by
Napoleon Bonaparte as a greater military leader than himself, and thanks to Maria Theresa's leadership the war was not such a great loss for Austria that Austrian prestige or internal stability were seriously harmed. However, the same cannot be said of France.
The Seven Years' War was the last major military conflict in Europe before the outbreak of the
Revolutionary and
Napoleonic Wars towards the end of the 18th century. From a military point of view, the battles are less interesting than the numerous marches and countermarches in which Frederick excelled. This warfare of mobility would later be studied by
Napoleon Bonaparte.
Reception
★ The novel ''
The Luck of Barry Lyndon'' (1844) by
William Makepeace Thackeray is set against the backdrop of the Seven Years' War.
Stanley Kubrick's movie ''
Barry Lyndon'' (1975) is based on this novel.
★ The board game ''
Friedrich'' is based on the events of the Seven Years' War.
★ The novel ''
The Last of the Mohicans'' (1826) by
James Fenimore Cooper is set in the Northern American Theatre of the Seven Years' War.
★ ''
The Partisan in War'' (1789), a treatise on light infantry tactics written by
Colonel Andreas Emmerich, is based on his experiences in the Seven Years' War.
See also
★
Rule of 1756
Footnotes
1. The Treaty of Paris in England in the Seven Years' War: A Study in Combined Strategy Vol. II., , Julian, Corbett, Longman, Green and Co., ,
2. The Rise and Fall of British Naval Mastery, , Paul, Kennedy, Penguin Books, ,
3. War and British Society 1688-1815, , HV, Bowen, Cambridge University Press, 1998, ISBN 0-521-57645-8
4. Tombs, Robert and Isabelle. ''That Sweet Enemy: The French and the British from the Sun King to the Present''. London: William Heinemann, 2006.
5. Julian Corbett, ''England in the Seven Years' War: A Study in Combined Strategy'', 2 Vols., (London, 1918).
6. Julian Corbett, ''England in the Seven Years' War: A Study in Combined Strategy'', 2 Vols., (London, 1918).
7. Virtual Vault, an online exhibition of Canadiana at Library and Archives Canada
8. The Canadian Encyclopedia, retrieved June 17, 2006.
9. Essay on Frederic the Great, Essays vol. 5 (1866) Hurd and Houghton
References
★ Fowler, William H. ''Empires at War''. Vancouver: Douglas & McIntyre Ltd, 2005
★
Virtual Vault, an online exhibition of Canadian historical art at Library and Archives Canada
External links
★
Seven Years War Reference World History Database
★
PROJECT SYW - Uniform Plates
★
The French Army 1600-1900
★
Events and the participants in the Seven Years War
★
Seven Years' War timeline
★
The Columbia Encyclopedia, Sixth Edition's entry on the Seven Years' War
★
Another Seven Years' War timeline
★
Memorial University of New Foundland's page about the war
★
Seven Years' War Knowledge Base
★
Great Britain Seven Years War Chronology
★
1759: From the Warpath to the plains of Abraham. Virtual Exhibition.
★
National Battlefields Commission. Plains of Abraham. National Historic Park. Quebec, Canada.
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