Canadian Ohio

What would happen if the British had kept all of the Old Northwest Territory after the American Revolutionary War?
 
If this were the case then pretty much all of America's political and military efforts would have been aimed at gaining control of that territory. Britain most likely would have set it up as an Indian Territory but the continuing influx of American settlers would have immediately caused tension. It is very likely that the Louisiana Purchase would still have gone through, because just as Alaska was seen as a way to surround Canada to pave the way for future annexation, control of Louisiana would have put the US in a much better position to take the NW Territory.

It is likely that when something similar to the Chesapeake Affair occurs even Jeffersonians and New Englanders will support a war against Britain to gain control of the NW. This will be a much more difficult war for Britain, because unlike taking Canada seizing the NW Territory will be extremely popular and the war is more likely to happen at the height of Napoleon's power than during his later decline.
So more than likely the US will fight a victorious War of 1807 that sees it take the NW Territory, perhaps with even better border concessions than OTL Webster-Ashburton Treaty of 1842. If the war focuses on the NW with no invasions of Canada than it may have lasting effects on Canadian nationalism as well.

In OTL the British conceded the NW rather early on for two reasons...to curry favor with the newly independent US, thus splitting it from its French and Spanish allies and because they knew holding the NW when faced with the influx of American settlers would be extremely difficult.

Benjamin
 
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It gets Texas-ized. There were several thousand American settlers west of the Proclamation line before the Revolutionary War, and that number is just going to get bigger. Settlement would probably go slower, because of the lack of a US army to protect the settlers from the Indians (I doubt a British government would feel the need to protect American settlers). Eventually, the territory would end up American.
 
(I doubt a British government would feel the need to protect American settlers).

How could you tell the difference between Americans and Loyalists? In OTL colonial governors encouraged American settlement and launched an extensive advertising campaign about Canada's agricultural potential. Settlement promoted economic growth and was also seen as a way to assimilate the French population. They expected the southern republic to break apart or ask to be re-admitted to the British Empire.
 
Iotl a great deal of Canada was actually settled by Americans looking for land (my maternal grandfather's dad's family is from North Dakota). So it's hard to say whether it would end up in American hands just later, or what.
 
Loyalists would probably go there as well as Southern Ontario.
Quite likely it would be split later on to reduce tension. America gets the southern part, Britain keeps the northern part.
 
I doubt if many Loyalists would go there. It was way off the beaten path and Britain had per the Proclamation Line of 1763 already expressed their interest in keeping the region closed to white settlement. Even so American immigration would still soon swamp the Loyalists in number. American population growth all the way into the mid-1840s was almost exclusively due to natural growth and not immigration into the US. This means that the majority of those moving into the NW will not be recent foreigners with little attachment to the American government. Instead they will be the younger sons of long time Americans and as such will have been raised as Americans. These family and ideological ties will be very important in the long run.

Splitting the region with Britain retaining the north may be a temporary solution but just as America "needed" control of the Mississippi; control of at least one side of the Great Lakes waterway will be seen as critical. This is both a military and an economic imperative. While I'm not saying its impossible for Britain/Canada to retain control of all or some of the Old NW indefinitely, I do think their doing so will cause nearly eternal friction with the US and a series of wars until Britain either completely crushes and dismembers the US (a difficult proposition if the US finds European allies or times its belligerency to coincide with other conflicts), or the US gains control of all of the NW.

I know this sounds a bit like a broken record, but having read a lot on early American diplomacy and foreign policy I feel confident that it would play out this way. Of course moving the POD to an earlier date could affect this one way or the other.

Benjamin
 
What about slavery? I'd expect that the Southern states would have to make some sort of concession to the North.
 
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