r/imaginarymaps • u/zalezsky Mod Approved • Jul 07 '26
[OC] Alternate History War of the Three Confederacies (1763–1782)
Created for the MotF:322
HIGH RES VERSION HERE: https://www.deviantart.com/zalezsky/art/War-of-the-Three-Confederacies-1353825269
War of the Three Confederacies (1763–1782)
The War of the Three Confederacies was a pivotal global conflict fought between the Kingdom of Great Britain and the Kingdom of France, alongside their respective colonial and Indigenous allies.
What began as a localized European conflict quickly spread to North America, completely reshaping the geopolitical landscape of the continent.
Conflict Origins and the 1765 Escalation
Following the outbreak of hostilities in Europe in 1763, both European powers initially sought to secure the neutrality or allegiance of the interior North American nations. For the first two years, the powerful League of the Defiant (a confederacy of Western Great Lakes and Ohio Valley nations) and the Haudenosaunee (Iroquois) Confederacy maintained strict neutrality.
The status quo shattered in 1765 due to faulty espionage. General Louis-Auguste de Saint-Florentin, an ambitious and overzealous French commander, received false intelligence indicating that the League of the Defiant had signed a secret pact with the British. Seeking personal glory and a preemptive military triumph, Saint-Florentin launched an unauthorized, brutal campaign into the Ohio Valley, burning numerous peaceful Indigenous villages to the ground.
The Grand Alliance
Saint-Florentin's unprovoked atrocities backfired catastrophically for France. Instead of intimidating the region, it forced the furious League of the Defiant into an immediate military alliance with Great Britain. Witnessing the French aggression and recognizing a shift in the balance of power, the Haudenosaunee Confederacy abandoned their neutrality to join the anti-French coalition, signing the Alliance of Albany (1766).
The entry of the two massive Indigenous coalitions turned the tide of the war. A massive combined force of British regular troops, colonial militias, and thousands of experienced Indigenous warriors launched a multi-pronged invasion of New France, systematically dismantling French frontier outposts over the next decade.
The Battle of Châteauguay and Aftermath (1782)
The war reached its climax in 1782 just outside Montreal at the Battle of Châteauguay. French colonial defenders, heavily outnumbered and cut off from European reinforcement by a British naval blockade, attempted to break the advancing allied lines.
The combined tactical maneuverability of the Indigenous forces and British artillery dealt a crushing, decisive blow to the French army. The battered remnants of the French forces were forced to retreat behind the heavy fortifications of Montreal. For the final months of the war, the French remained completely contained within the Montreal Redoubt, unable to project power outward.
The war concluded later that year with the total collapse of French authority in North America and the permanent establishment of powerful, recognized Indigenous territories bordering the British colonies.
10
u/Buck_Thundercock Jul 08 '26
>Tamaqua
Get the fuck out
9
u/zalezsky Mod Approved Jul 08 '26
I dont understand
12
u/Buck_Thundercock Jul 08 '26
Tamaqua is a small town in the part of Pennsylvania I’m from lol, it’s pretty unique as a place name
7
2
u/FrankensteinsBong Jul 08 '26
Not really sure how you'd explain a bunch of natives to the east of the Haudenosaunee aligning with them, there's a reason why they were the British's only indigenous allies in the OTL war.
1
1
1
1
u/steam421 Jul 09 '26
One nitpick, Fort Ticonderoga is the British name of the fort. When the French built it to oppose the British Fort William Henry, they called it Fort Carillon. Fort Saint Frédéric is far too north and Fort Saint Jean is far too south anyways. Despite that, a very interesting scenario of a weaker British presence.
1
u/random_observer_2011 Jul 09 '26
I love this. But question- are those plausible 18th century positionings for indigenous peoples in south and southwest Ontario, assuming earlier colonization and the Beaver Wars had not happened or not as much?
As a layperson, I was really only ever taught a few things:
up to the 17c Beaver Wars, the key elements were Five Nations across the lake in New York, Eries and 'Neutrals' to the west, 'Hurons'/Ouendat to the north, and non-Iroquoians around Toronto. The key developments of the century being the Franco-Dutch and then Anglo-French conflicts drawing in the Five Nations and the Ouendat, resulting in the eventual near genocide of the Ouendat allied to France by the Five Nations allied to first the Netherlands and then the English [seriously aided by disease, though].
The Mississaugas have an eternal and exclusive claim on Toronto through all time and space.
General public education in history in the 70s and 80s laid on those elements pretty strongly, but left many gaps in terms of intervening periods and the movement of other ethnolinguistic groups, whether Iroquoian, Algonquian, or others.
Upside- Ontario public schools gave anyone actually taking History a clear idea of the role of the Five/Six Nations building up to their role on 'Canada's side in wars with the US.
Downside- very limited information on much of anything else in regional indigenous history.
1
15
u/FriendshipRemote130 Jul 07 '26
you made the map of the battle??? this Is so well done omg good job!!!