A British Empire with the 13 colonies.

Hello all! I have been reading through some of the threads for the last few weeks and thought it was about time I got my own out there. I am still getting used to all the terminology and acronyms so please bare with me! I know at the time I open, there was no way that the British would of allowed a parliament other than the one centred in London to exist, but it was the only way I could fathom for an easy avoidance of the American revolutionary war and I wanted to explore how the empire would have developed if it had never happened and the 13 colonies remained part of the British empire.
My ultimate goal is to explore the 20th century and both world wars and how they would of developed if there was the military and economic might of the USA backing the whole of the British empire and how this would of changed our timeline had it not have developed separately. But first, I wanted to develop a background for how other things may have developed. Below is where I am up to so far and at the bottom are some ideas I want to explore for the future. So here is what I have so far…


British Empire alternative history

Master: Black- what actually happened in our time line. Green- alternative history from our time line. Red- additional background info.
1763- Signing of the treaty of Paris 1763. Britain gains Canada as well as additional land up to the Mississippi river. But keeps Cuba, all of Florida and Guadeloupe (Guadeloupe- French sugar colony worth £6m per annum).
1764- Britain forms an American parliament, based in Boston, consisting of locally elected MPs for all the 14 colonies (13 colonies and Florida) and Canada. This parliament still answered to the British parliament but could introduce its own laws and taxes. This helps to massively ease the hatred of taxation leading to the American revolutionary war.
1765- Britain forms a Caribbean parliament based in Havana to help govern its Caribbean colonies.
Both additional parliaments function much the same as the existing British parliament and all laws must be passed by the British House of Lords and the monarch. However the self governance (even if in some ways it is an illusion) is enough to keep the colonists happy enough to avoid large spread dissatisfaction leading up to the American Revolution.
1766- First Anglo- Mysore war begins.
1769- First Anglo- Mysore war ends in British defeat.
1774- First Anglo- Maratha war begins.
1775- In place of the American revolutionary war, the first colonial war with the other major colonial powers of France, Spain and the Netherlands breaks out. Mainly down to Britain keeping additional territories in the first treaty of Paris in 1763 and increasing hostility between the major powers caused by Britain’s rising interest in other colonies.
1780- Second Anglo- Mysore war begins.
1783- British victory in the First colonial war cements Britain's place as the dominant power in the world at the time. Senegal and some Dutch East Indies colonies were gained in the fighting as well as all islands in the Caribbean handed over to the British. All the Caribbean gains were administered by the Caribbean parliament. With the massive increase in revenues gained in the Caribbean, large amounts of it were re invested into the development of all the American territories. Build up of naval and land forces in the American colonies to hold the now very valuable sections of the empire as well as to push further into native American territory was paid for by this intake as well as being used to fund future wars.
1783- First Anglo- Maratha war ends. Gain of Salsette Island.
1784- Second Anglo- Mysore war ends.
1788- First Australian colony established at Botany Bay (later Sydney).
1789- Third Anglo- Mysore war begins.
1792- Third Anglo- Mysore war ends. Whole of Mysore conquered.
Around this time the American & Caribbean colonists reach a similar level of taxation to the British back at home.


Possible Territory Gains/ Wars
European theatre
Iceland?
Greenland?
Gibraltar?
Malta?
Hannover?
Minorca/ Menorca?
Cyprus?
Some Greek islands, maybe Crete?

North American theatre
Hawaii?
Alaska?
West USA?

African Theatre
Mass wars for control? Maybe not that different from OTL

Middle East Theatre
Iran?
Syria?
Saudi Arabia?
Oceania Theatre
Same as Africa, large scale war for control over all islands?

Asia Theatre
Additional territory in south East Asia?
Large scale war with China? Opium wars etc. land invasion?
War with Japan? Maybe china and japan against British?


Background of other nations?
Catholic alliance? Spain & France single nation? Maybe Italian states as well? Portugal?
Russian conquest of Scandinavian nations? War with Japan? War with China? Mongolia?
Austrian and German unification into single nation? Earlier on the more colonial power?
Fate of Eastern Europe? Maybe total conquest by German-Austrian union? Russian invasion?
Fate of the Ottoman Empire? British weakened the empire and German-Austrian occupation? Russian intervention?
Spanish/French/Catholic alliance invasion of British Held India?
Collapse of Spain Empire/ weakening of catholic alliance kick start of South American independence and then “unification” wars? If unified, the earlier the more powerful? Potential European rival?

i look forward to your feedback :)
 
Interesting concept.

My questions are -

Why does the British Parliament approve of the colonies having self rule? They've served for decades, why do they need their own power now? Could this set a presedent for other colonies? If we give the Americas self-rule, what about the rest of the Empire? Could be dangerous, spreading the concept of democracy. There would need to be a good reason, not based on hindsight. Its easy to see rebellion was inevitable looking back, but back then there wasn't exactly a need for it.

Also, is you have reason for the above, what is the relationship to the Parliament? Do you envision it setting its own taxes? (This will basically be ASB, there is no way the British Parliament will allow any adjust on the taxes it demands from its colonies, or hand that power to them). Or does it merely have low level local power (which doesn't solve the issue of giving the American colonists the power to prevent the British homeland demanding as much tax as they like).

Its an interesting concept for sure, I'd love to see if it could be realistically done.
 
If the 13 colonies or some variation remained part of the empire into the 20th century, I don't think anything even remotely ressembling OTL World wars would have ever occured?
 
These TLs are tricky, but I like it so far. A few questions/thoughts:

  • What happens to Ireland? Is there still an act of union with the UK, or does it get its own parliament?
  • If you thought the great powers accused Britain of upsetting the balance of power after the 7YW OTL, just imagine how pissed they'd be here. Britain would be a pariah, and I see a pretty strong coalition forming to defeat it, possibly before 1775.
  • Is there a proclamation line forbidding western settlement? Are more colonies in the works?
  • Parliament won't be happy about setting up multi-colony parliaments (even if technically subservient). Maybe let each colony send a delegate to the privy council and combine it with colonial assemblies?
  • What's going to happen to the Navigation Acts? https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Navigation_acts
 
Two questions:
- How do Britain manage to obtain Cuba, Florida, Guadelope and Canada?They must have one hell of a persuasive diplomat :p.
- How does Britain go in just over a decade to being able to defeat France, Spain and the Netherlands (three of the strongest powers at the time) single-handedly?

Otherwise, welcome to the board and keep it up. I love timelines where Britain does better.
 
Interesting concept.

My questions are -

Why does the British Parliament approve of the colonies having self rule? They've served for decades, why do they need their own power now? Could this set a presedent for other colonies? If we give the Americas self-rule, what about the rest of the Empire? Could be dangerous, spreading the concept of democracy. There would need to be a good reason, not based on hindsight. Its easy to see rebellion was inevitable looking back, but back then there wasn't exactly a need for it.

Also, is you have reason for the above, what is the relationship to the Parliament? Do you envision it setting its own taxes? (This will basically be ASB, there is no way the British Parliament will allow any adjust on the taxes it demands from its colonies, or hand that power to them). Or does it merely have low level local power (which doesn't solve the issue of giving the American colonists the power to prevent the British homeland demanding as much tax as they like).

Its an interesting concept for sure, I'd love to see if it could be realistically done.


I appreciate the feedback, and i do agree with your view point completely. however the presidence is to try and assume that they are willing to give local control as well taxation control over to a colonial parliments. the colonial parliments are of course answerable to the London based parliament, and follow their directives. it was the most plausable way in my opinion to keep the 13 colonies within the empire. open to other suggestions/ideas and happy to edit but the idea is to push further on in history and i just wanted feedback assuming that that was a plausable explanation. but yes it does lay a ground work for other parliments and localised control of the other colonies but as of yet, i havnt decided where and to what degree.
 
If the 13 colonies or some variation remained part of the empire into the 20th century, I don't think anything even remotely ressembling OTL World wars would have ever occured?

i cant see a reason why they would have that kind of massive influence, but yes they will change the balance of power and they may well change the actual combination of nations that participate, but thats all to come...
 
These TLs are tricky, but I like it so far. A few questions/thoughts:

  • What happens to Ireland? Is there still an act of union with the UK, or does it get its own parliament?
  • If you thought the great powers accused Britain of upsetting the balance of power after the 7YW OTL, just imagine how pissed they'd be here. Britain would be a pariah, and I see a pretty strong coalition forming to defeat it, possibly before 1775.
  • Is there a proclamation line forbidding western settlement? Are more colonies in the works?
  • Parliament won't be happy about setting up multi-colony parliaments (even if technically subservient). Maybe let each colony send a delegate to the privy council and combine it with colonial assemblies?
  • What's going to happen to the Navigation Acts? https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Navigation_acts

thanks for the feedback, please see my comments.

· a good point i had not considered to researched at all if i am honest, i will look into the OTL events and decide on a course of action. i have no knowledge of what actually went on there.
· i agree, i am toying with bringing the first coalition war forward in time and it mainly been fought against the British. this is the very next thing in my time line i am looking at so update to follow.
· if you wouldn’t mind providing a little more detail on this, i am not entirely sure what you mean.
· i am working towards it been a single parliament centred in London but clearly they don’t quite have the communication or transport capability technologically just yet to be able to have this. yet anyway. perhaps breaking them down more so there are a few different ones all answerable to the London parliament.
· again another point i had not considered i will look into and come back.
i may have focused a little too much on wars etc. and territorial gains and i have tried looking into the bases and background of others but the replies i am getting back seem to tell me i need to do more research than i have done! but thank you for the feedback all the same!
 
Two questions:
- How do Britain manage to obtain Cuba, Florida, Guadelope and Canada?They must have one hell of a persuasive diplomat :p.
- How does Britain go in just over a decade to being able to defeat France, Spain and the Netherlands (three of the strongest powers at the time) single-handedly?

Otherwise, welcome to the board and keep it up. I love timelines where Britain does better.

thanks for the feedback.
if your that good your that good ;). haha! more seriously, lets assume they really kicked the others a bit more than they did in OTL and not forget they did win the war after all. they did actually take all these colonies in the war, so if they made the spanish and french really suffer (more than OTL anyway) then they could well of still bought into these terms. As far as i am aware none of these were dutch so no concerns for them, correct me if i am wrong?

Thank you, i am trying my best for a first go! yes i agree, it doesnt have anything to do with the fact that i am from the UK or anything!
 
thanks for the feedback, please see my comments.

· a good point i had not considered to researched at all if i am honest, i will look into the OTL events and decide on a course of action. i have no knowledge of what actually went on there.
· i agree, i am toying with bringing the first coalition war forward in time and it mainly been fought against the British. this is the very next thing in my time line i am looking at so update to follow.
· if you wouldn’t mind providing a little more detail on this, i am not entirely sure what you mean.
· i am working towards it been a single parliament centred in London but clearly they don’t quite have the communication or transport capability technologically just yet to be able to have this. yet anyway. perhaps breaking them down more so there are a few different ones all answerable to the London parliament.
· again another point i had not considered i will look into and come back.
i may have focused a little too much on wars etc. and territorial gains and i have tried looking into the bases and background of others but the replies i am getting back seem to tell me i need to do more research than i have done! but thank you for the feedback all the same!

The "Proclamation Line" comment was referring to this: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Royal_Proclamation_of_1763

Prohibiting settlement over the Appalachians was designed to reduce conflicts with the natives, but it was considered "intolerable" by the colonists. Maybe you cut off settlement for a few years to get affairs with the Indians in order (although the Indians weren't idiots, they'd know settlers were coming and unite to fight - see https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pontiac's_Rebellion). Then make the colonies pay for the defense of the west. Get the crown additional revenue by selling off Ohio (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Land_Ordinance_of_1785).

The Navigation Acts are tricky. Even Adam Smith acknowledged their benefits to England, but they reduced colonial industrial development. I think were one of the "real" reasons for the ARW. They may have outlived their usefulness by this point, but you'll have to convince Parliament of that.

And if Cuba is British, you can bet Spain will go all out next war to get it back. They're getting a lot of silver from Mexico and Bolivia, and they'll put it to good use like in OTL. A landing on Cuba can definitely happen as long as Spain has PR, and the local Cubans could join in the reconquest. The Cubans weren't too thrilled about being British OTL during the 7YW even with the increase in British trade.
 
i cant see a reason why they would have that kind of massive influence, but yes they will change the balance of power and they may well change the actual combination of nations that participate, but thats all to come...


I see a huge shift in the balance of power. If in this scenario Britain keeps the US and in turn pretty much all of north america minus mexico etc. and the US industry and growth in population etc. continues on not too dismilar form OTL, you'd pretty much have the British Empire as some sort of hyperpower with few to no rivals by the dawn of the 20th century.

You'd be foolish to try and egg on a power as such with war. There's actually a "what if" book that had such a scenario and talks about how that would have averted the world wars had britain always retained the colonies in the first place.
 
One would think that the American and Caribbean (British) Colonials would want to have less of a tax burden put upon their folks tho if you are able to immigrate excess population from Great Britain to the Fourteen Colonies, that might slowly increase the Tax-base as those folks that had immigrated will get a better chance of improving their lot and hopefully produce / generate sufficient wealth to contribute to the common defense of the Realm

; mainly North America ;

and reduce the financial burden of the British Crown and commitment of their Naval and Army units from garrisoning the Fourteen Colonies and watch for their rivals build-up their forces against England and move their units to prepare for battle against them.......
 
Hello all! I have been reading through some of the threads for the last few weeks and thought it was about time I got my own out there. I am still getting used to all the terminology and acronyms so please bare with me! I know at the time I open, there was no way that the British would of allowed a parliament other than the one centred in London to exist, but it was the only way I could fathom for an easy avoidance of the American revolutionary war and I wanted to explore how the empire would have developed if it had never happened and the 13 colonies remained part of the British empire.
My ultimate goal is to explore the 20th century and both world wars and how they would of developed if there was the military and economic might of the USA backing the whole of the British empire and how this would of changed our timeline had it not have developed separately. But first, I wanted to develop a background for how other things may have developed. Below is where I am up to so far and at the bottom are some ideas I want to explore for the future. So here is what I have so far…


British Empire alternative history

Master: Black- what actually happened in our time line. Green- alternative history from our time line. Red- additional background info.
1763- Signing of the treaty of Paris 1763. Britain gains Canada as well as additional land up to the Mississippi river. But keeps Cuba, all of Florida and Guadeloupe (Guadeloupe- French sugar colony worth £6m per annum).
1764- Britain forms an American parliament, based in Boston, consisting of locally elected MPs for all the 14 colonies (13 colonies and Florida) and Canada. This parliament still answered to the British parliament but could introduce its own laws and taxes. This helps to massively ease the hatred of taxation leading to the American revolutionary war.
1765- Britain forms a Caribbean parliament based in Havana to help govern its Caribbean colonies.
Both additional parliaments function much the same as the existing British parliament and all laws must be passed by the British House of Lords and the monarch. However the self governance (even if in some ways it is an illusion) is enough to keep the colonists happy enough to avoid large spread dissatisfaction leading up to the American Revolution.
1766- First Anglo- Mysore war begins.
1769- First Anglo- Mysore war ends in British defeat.
1774- First Anglo- Maratha war begins.
1775- In place of the American revolutionary war, the first colonial war with the other major colonial powers of France, Spain and the Netherlands breaks out. Mainly down to Britain keeping additional territories in the first treaty of Paris in 1763 and increasing hostility between the major powers caused by Britain’s rising interest in other colonies.
1780- Second Anglo- Mysore war begins.
1783- British victory in the First colonial war cements Britain's place as the dominant power in the world at the time. Senegal and some Dutch East Indies colonies were gained in the fighting as well as all islands in the Caribbean handed over to the British. All the Caribbean gains were administered by the Caribbean parliament. With the massive increase in revenues gained in the Caribbean, large amounts of it were re invested into the development of all the American territories. Build up of naval and land forces in the American colonies to hold the now very valuable sections of the empire as well as to push further into native American territory was paid for by this intake as well as being used to fund future wars.
1783- First Anglo- Maratha war ends. Gain of Salsette Island.
1784- Second Anglo- Mysore war ends.
1788- First Australian colony established at Botany Bay (later Sydney).
1789- Third Anglo- Mysore war begins.
1792- Third Anglo- Mysore war ends. Whole of Mysore conquered.
Around this time the American & Caribbean colonists reach a similar level of taxation to the British back at home.


Possible Territory Gains/ Wars
European theatre
Iceland?
Greenland?
Gibraltar?
Malta?
Hannover?
Minorca/ Menorca?
Cyprus?
Some Greek islands, maybe Crete?

North American theatre
Hawaii?
Alaska?
West USA?

African Theatre
Mass wars for control? Maybe not that different from OTL

Middle East Theatre
Iran?
Syria?
Saudi Arabia?
Oceania Theatre
Same as Africa, large scale war for control over all islands?

Asia Theatre
Additional territory in south East Asia?
Large scale war with China? Opium wars etc. land invasion?
War with Japan? Maybe china and japan against British?


Background of other nations?
Catholic alliance? Spain & France single nation? Maybe Italian states as well? Portugal?
Russian conquest of Scandinavian nations? War with Japan? War with China? Mongolia?
Austrian and German unification into single nation? Earlier on the more colonial power?
Fate of Eastern Europe? Maybe total conquest by German-Austrian union? Russian invasion?
Fate of the Ottoman Empire? British weakened the empire and German-Austrian occupation? Russian intervention?
Spanish/French/Catholic alliance invasion of British Held India?
Collapse of Spain Empire/ weakening of catholic alliance kick start of South American independence and then “unification” wars? If unified, the earlier the more powerful? Potential European rival?

i look forward to your feedback :)

If Britain gets Cuba then it doesn't get Florida.

European gains just why, Greenland and Iceland are Norse, Britain already owns gib, and Cyprus is OE

Other gains WTF

Spain and France one country, no! Seriously research first
 
I forgot to mention with George III as King there will never be a parliament in colonies.

Prussia-Austria nope

France and Spain invading India, nope
 
So Britain manages to hold onto her American colonies.

So they'd have less interest in the South Pacific and maybe some othet power steps up to the plate and starts to colonise New Holland, Aoteroa and the islands. Could be interesting.
 
alright so maybe i got a little carried away and OTT with britain taking a few too many places. what do we think would be the most viable way of avoiding the ARW and maintaining the 13 colonies within the empire? unless someone can advise on another board where this is been discussed (i did look and no i couldnt find it)

i might work on a bit more realistic timeline in the background and post later on.
 
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