US Borders in 1783 with all British North America?

JJohnson

Banned
Hi everyone,

My question is, what would the borders of the US be had all British North America, aside from Rupert's Land, had Quebec and Nova Scotia joined the revolution?

Quebec went from Labrador in the east to Thunder Bay it looks like. And back then, navigation along the Great Lakes for Rupert's Land would've been important, so I'm assuming that the US / UK would've agreed to some land changes there.

My thought was to leave the border from Pigeon River to the Lake of the Woods intact, and cede land east to Rupert's Land, either Lake Nipigon to the Great Lake, or perhaps east to the Montreal River on Lake Superior.

Anyone have any recommendations / suggestions?
 
Quebec went from Labrador in the east to Thunder Bay it looks like. And back then, navigation along the Great Lakes for Rupert's Land would've been important, so I'm assuming that the US / UK would've agreed to some land changes there.

How much of the Rupert's Land fur trade went through the Great Lakes back then? Especially without control of Montreal, a lot of their goods are going to be going through ports on Hudson Bay.

Technically, Rupert's land doesn't go anywhere near the Great Lakes anyway.

My thought was to leave the border from Pigeon River to the Lake of the Woods intact, and cede land east to Rupert's Land, either Lake Nipigon to the Great Lake, or perhaps east to the Montreal River on Lake Superior.
There was no such border to leave intact. OTL, the Minnesota border with Canada was not resolved until 1842, same time as the Maine border.

The border defined in 1783 between Lake Superior and Lake of the Woods was incoherent at best, and referred to landmarks which no one had ever heard of, or at least could apply to numerous locations (such as a "Long Lake" that doesn't exist right inland from Lake Superior). The text of the 1783 treaty is available online, and relatively short as treaties go, read it and try to follow the border it describes yourself.

West of the Lake of the Woods is even worse, since they thought you could draw a straight line west from there to the Mississippi (obviously, you can't).

Basically, the map they were working with was pretty much wrong about everything northwest of Lake Superior. I have no idea if anyone had any better maps to work with, I imagine the only good maps were carried around in the skulls of the natives and the fur traders.

I say, use the Mitchell Map (see last link above, there are copies online) to come up with some nonsense border in the northwest of Upper Canada, or possibly keep using the difficult-to-survey Rupert's Land grant. Then, later have some disputes break out between the USA* and the HBC, which lead to a simple straight line border along some meridian or parallel after negotiations.
 
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