Geopolitics

By 1700 much of North America was being administered as New Spain, New France, the English Colonies and Prince Rupert Land (Hudson's Bay Company). The boundaries between these colonies was necessarily vague and tenuous as no-one had real knowledge of the extent of the continent. Although a small party of Frenchmen in canoes might make a claim to the entire Mississippi River Basin based on floating that river down to the Gulf of Mexico, actual wilderness boundaries were better defined by the alignment of Indian tribes. The Indians tended to align themselves with those who could better supply them with trade goods, although as settlements encroached on Indian lands, friction leading to warfare was usually the result. Of the four major geopolitical divisions, only Prince Rupert Land, which was administered by a commercial, quasi-governmental, for-profit, monopoly, did not suffer from major internal rivalries. (continued below the map)

By the earliest 1500's French, English, Portuguese and Basque fishing fleets were common in the Grand Banks off of Newfoundland. In order to preserve their catch, the fishing boats would land on the North American coast in order to butcher, salt and air dry the fish prior to transport back to Europe. Local Indians would visit these processing camps, and found that everyday tools used in the trade by the fisherman had immense value to the Indians. Knives, axes, awls, tools, and other items of European manufacture came to be prized, and quickly a trade developed where furs, which the natives possessed in surplus were traded to the fisherman. In the early years, undoubtedly each side thought the other to be naive and unsophisticated in recognizing the true value of what was being traded. By the time Jaques Cartier explored the St. Lawrence River in 1534, the local Indians paddled canoes out to meet his vessels, fully expecting to be able to trade their furs to him for knives and axes. By 1581, ships were being sent to North America solely for the purpose of trading. As competition for furs intensified, particularly along the St. Lawrence River, some traders found a competitive advantage in establishing permanent trading posts at strategic locations. Thus was the beginning of New France. The English were not long in establishing similar permanent posts.

New France. In 1600, Pierre Chauvin established a permanent trading post at the mouth of the Saguenay River on the St. Lawrence. Life at the post was grim for the first few years due to the extremely harsh climate, and the lack of food and logistical support. In subsequent years other posts were established but it wasn't until 1608 when Samuel de Champlain established L'Habitation du Quebec, far up the St. Lawrence, that a location that could support a colonial population was located. Champlain sought to establish long term diplomatic and trade relations with both nearby and distant Indian tribes by sending out young men to live among the Indians and learn their language and culture. Although these efforts were largely successful, Champlain did manage to make implacable enemies of the powerful Iroquois Confederation when he aligned French interests with the Hurons. The Iroquois controlled transportation routes from the Great Lakes and continental interior, and eventually would destroy the Hurons, and at times nearly destroyed Quebec and Montreal, and threatened the very existence of New France. The Iroquois would maintained their enmity with the French for several hundred years, in spite of the best efforts of the French to reconcile their differences.

The French fur trade was also hampered by continuous struggles by various commercial groups seeking to obtain and protect monopolies to the trade, poaching of furs from monopoly areas by interlopers, and by French Catholic Church which sought to dictate the conduct of the trade, and to direct the profits earned there-from. In spite of these difficulties and problems with the Iroquois, the French Traders did have the advantage of controlling the principal transportation routes to the Great Lakes region and beyond, into which drained the most productive fur-bearing regions in North America. Furthermore, the region was inhabited by a large population of Indians anxious to obtain European trade goods.

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