The early voyages
of Giovanni da Verrazano and Jacques Cartier in the early 16th century, as well
as the frequent voyages of French fishermen to the Grand Banks off Newfoundland throughout that century, were the precursors
to the story of France’s
colonial expansion. But Spain’s
jealous protection of its American monopoly, and the disruptions caused in France itself
by the Wars of Religion in the later 16th century, prevented any consistent
efforts to establish colonies. Early French attempts to found colonies in
Brazil, in 1555 at Rio de Janeiro (the so-called France Antarctique) and in
1612 at São Luís (the so-called France Équinoxiale), and in Florida were
unsuccessful, due to Portuguese and Spanish vigilance.
The story of France’s colonial empire truly began on July 27,
1605 with the foundation of Port Royal in the colony of Acadia in North
America, in what is now Nova Scotia, Canada. A few
years later, in 1608, Samuel de Champlain founded Quebec,
which was to become the capital of the enormous, but sparsely settled,
fur-trading colony of New France (also called Canada).
Although, through
alliances with various Native American tribes, the French were able to exert a
loose control over much of the North American continent, areas of French
settlement were generally limited to the St. Lawrence
River valley. Prior to the establishment of the 1663 Sovereign
Council, the territories of New France was
developed as mercantile colonies. It is only after the arrival of intendant
Jean Talon that France
gave its American colonies the proper means to develop population colonies
comparable to that of the British. For most of the history of New France, even Canada was far
behind the British North American colonies in both population and economic
development. Acadia itself was lost to the
British in the Treaty of Utrecht in 1713.
In 1699, French
territorial claims in North America expanded still further with the foundation
of Louisiana in the basin of Mississippi River.
The extensive trading network throughout the region connected to Canada through the Great Lakes and was
maintained through a vast system of fortifications, much of them centered in
the Illinois Country and in present-day Arkansas.
As the French
empire in North America expanded, the French also began to build a smaller, but
more profitable empire in the West Indies.
Settlement along the South American coast in what is today French Guiana began
in 1624, and a colony was founded on Saint Kitts in 1627 (the island had to be
shared with the English until the Treaty of Utrecht in 1713, when it was ceded
outright). The Compagnie des Îles de l’Amérique founded colonies in Guadeloupe
and Martinique in 1635, and a colony was later founded on Saint Lucia
(1650). The food plantations of these colonies were built and sustained by
slavery from the abduction of slaves from Africa.
Local Resistance by the indigenous peoples resulted in the Carib Expulsion of
1660.
The most important
Caribbean colonial possession did not come until 1664, when the colony of
Saint-Domingue (today’s Haiti)
was founded on the western half of the Spanish island of Hispaniola.
In the 18th century, Saint-Domingue grew to be the richest sugar colony in the Caribbean. The eastern half of Hispaniola also came under
French rule for a short period, after being given to France
by Spain shortly after the
loss of Saint-Domingue to France
by the Haitian Revolution.
French colonial
expansion was not limited to the New World,
however. In Senegal in West Africa, the French began to establish trading posts
along the coast in 1624. In 1664 the French East India Company was established
to compete for trade in the east. Colonies were established in India in Chandernagore in Bengal (1673) and Pondicherry in the
Southeast (1674), and later at Yanam (1723), Mahe (1725), and Karikal (1739)
(see French India). Colonies were also founded in the Indian Ocean, on the Île
de Bourbon (Réunion, 1664), Île Royale (Mauritius,
1718), and the Seychelles
(1756). During Napoleon’s early career, Egypt
was also conquered for a brief period, but French rule there only extended to
the immediate area around the Nile.
Colonial conflict
with Great Britain,
1744-1815
In the mid-18th
century, a series of colonial conflicts began between France and the Kingdom ofGreat Britain, which
would ultimately result in the demise of most of the first French colonial
empire. These wars were the War of the Austrian Succession (1744-1748), the
Seven Years War (1756-1763), the War of the American Revolution (1778-1783),
and the French Revolutionary (1793-1802) and Napoleonic (1803-1815) Wars.
Although the War
of the Austrian Succession was indecisive—despite French successes in India
under the French Governor-General Joseph François Dupleix—the Seven Years War,
after early French successes in North America, saw a catastrophic French
defeat, with the British conquering not only New France, but most of France’s
West Indian colonies, and all of the French Indian outposts. While the peace
treaty saw France’s Indian outposts, and the Caribbean islands of Martinique
and Guadeloupe restored to France, the competition for influence in India had
been won by the British, and North America was entirely lost—most of New France
was taken by Britain, except Louisiana which France ceded to Spain as payment
for Spain’s late entrance into the war (and as compensation for Britain’s
annexation of Spanish Florida). Also ceded to the British were Grenadaand Saint
Lucia in the West Indies.
Some recovery was
made during the French intervention in the American Revolution, with Saint
Lucia being returned to France by the Treaty of Paris in 1783, but not nearly
as much as had been hoped for at the time of French intervention. True disaster
came to what remained of France’s
colonial empire in 1791 when Saint
Domingue, France’s
richest and most important colony, was riven by a massive slave revolt, caused
partly by the divisions among the islands elite resulting from the French
Revolution of 1789. The slaves, led eventually by Toussaint l’Ouverture and
then, following his capture by the French in 1801, by Jean-Jacques Dessalines,
held their own against French, Spanish, and British opponents, and ultimately
achieved independence as Haiti
in 1804. In the meanwhile, the newly resumed war with Britain resulted
in British capture of practically all remaining French colonies. These were
restored at the Peace of Amiens in 1802, but when war resumed in 1803, the
British soon recaptured them. France’s repurchase of Louisiana in 1800 came to
nothing, as the final success of the Haitian revolt convinced Bonaparte that
holding it would not be worth the cost, leading to its sale to the United
States in 1803 (the Louisiana Purchase). Nor was the French attempt to
establish a colony in Egypt
in 1798-1801 successful.
The second French
colonial empire
At the close of
the Napoleonic Wars, most of France’s colonies were restored to it by Britain,
notably Guadeloupe and Martinique in the West Indies, French Guiana on the
coast of South America, various trading posts in Senegal, the Île de Bourbon
(Réunion) in the Indian Ocean, and France’s tiny Indian possessions. Britain finally annexed Saint Lucia, Tobago, the Seychelles, and the Île Royale (Mauritius),
however.
The true
beginnings of the second French colonial empire, however, were laid in 1830
with the French invasion of Algeria,
which was conquered over the next 17 years (see French rule in Algeria).
During the time of Napoleon III, an attempt was made to establish a
colonial-type protectorate in Mexico,
but this came to little, and the French were forced to abandon the experiment
after the end of the American Civil War. Napoleon also established French
control over Cochin-China (the southernmost part of modern Vietnam, including Saigon), as well as a
protectorate over Cambodia.
It was only after
the Franco-Prussian War of 1870-1871 that most of France’s later colonial possessions
were acquired. From their base in Cochin-China, the French took over Tonkin and
Annam (in modern Vietnam) in
1883. These, together with Cambodia
and Cochin-China, formed French Indochina (to whichLaos was added in 1893 and
Kwang-Chou-Wan in 1900). In 1849, French concession in Shanghai was established, which existed until
1946. The French also expanded their influence in North Africa, establishing a
protectorate on Tunisia
in 1881. Gradually, French control was established over much of Northern,
Western, and Central Africa by the turn of the century (including the modern
nations of Mauritania, Senegal, Guinea, Mali, Côte d’Ivoire, Benin, Niger, Chad,
Central African Republic, Republic of Congo), as well as the east African
coastal enclave of Djibouti (French Somaliland). In 1911, Morocco became
a protectorate.
The French made
their last major colonial gains after the First World War, when they gained
mandates over the former Turkish territories that make up what is now Syria and Lebanon,
as well as most of the former German colonies of Togo
and Cameroon.
Collapse of the
empire
The French
colonial empire began to fall apart during the Second World War, when various
parts of their empire were occupied by foreign powers (Japan in Indochina, Britain
in Syria andLebanon, the US and Britain
in Morocco and Algeria, Germany
in Tunisia).
Although France’s colonies
were restored in 1945, France
had almost immediately to engage in suppressing a bitter independence struggle
in Indochina. When this ended with French
defeat and withdrawal in 1954, the French almost immediately became involved in
a new, and even harsher conflict in their oldest major colony, Algeria. Algeria was
particularly problematic due to the large number of European settlers (or
pied-noir) who had settled there in the century and a quarter of French rule;
in addition, a sizeable Jewish community feared that independence would expose
them to retribution by the Muslim majority. Charles de Gaulle’s accession to
power in 1958 ultimately led to independence for Algeria in 1962. Most of the other
French African colonies had already been granted independence in 1960,
following local referendums. Some colonies chose instead to remain part of France, under
the statuses of oversea département or oversea territory.
After
independence, some of France’s
former colonies continued to participate in the French Union, and later in the
French Community, nurturing to varying extents political, economic and cultural
ties with their former colonial power. (from Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia)
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