The War That Made America: A Review

Colin G. Calloway, author of Scratch of a Pen: 1763 and the Transformation of America reviews the PBS documentary “The War That Made America”:

Looking back, it often seems difficult for modern-day Americans to see beyond the Revolution and understand the colonial era as much more than just a prelude to that nation-forming event. Until recently, the Seven Years War (1756-63), known in America as the French and Indian War, has received short shrift in comparison to the Revolution. The Revolution, it seems, had clear causes– and a just cause– a compelling narrative, clearly identified enemies, and a clear and proper resolution. Its predecessor, by contrast, looks rather messy: Americans and British fighting as one, yet divided by squabbles between colonial and imperial administrators and between individual colonies; Indians supposedly fighting for the French but some fighting alongside the British and others shifting sides; an American victory, yes, but one they shared with an empire they would soon be fighting against. As the United States begins its commemoration of the 250th anniversary of the conflict, “The War That Made America” helps to clarify our view of the past. This four-part, four-hour series on PBS provides an effective overview of the French and Indian War, offers a fuller understanding of what it meant for the people involved, and emphasizes its importance in bringing about the “bigger” conflict that erupted a dozen years later.

The film starts well. Focusing on the skirmishes near the Forks of the Ohio that catapulted the world into armed conflict, it depicts a young but ambitious George Washington out of his depth in a dangerous contest of international, inter-and intra-tribal politics. Events spiral out of G.W.’s control and he watches in open-mouthed horror as Tanaghrisson, the Ohio Seneca known as the Half King, tomahawks a wounded French officer. It is an image (like the mortal wounding of General Braddock at the Monongahela) that the film repeats time and again, and it was a key event in sparking the war. But the film sets its tone early on by attempting to unravel the complex tangle of interests and agendas that explains why Tanaghrisson did such a thing. Marking it down to Indian brutality will no longer suffice. Soon after, we see Tanaghrisson in an Iroquois longhouse, with clan mothers offering counsel. Indians are no longer faceless killers who emerge from the forests; they are people living in perilous times making difficult choices to preserve their lands and loved ones. What’s more, the film makes clear, they hold the balance of power in this contest. In other words, finally, here is a film that tries to show what Indians were doing in the so-called “French and Indian War.”

Elsewhere, the film zeroes in on common soldiers and militiamen, on camp followers, and on Mary Jemison and Susanna Johnson–white women taken captive by Indians. (The Abenakis ransomed Susanna Johnson to the French; Mary Jemison lived the rest of her life as a Seneca). There is ample attention to the men in powdered-wigs who made the decisions, but the lives of the ordinary people whom their decisions affected are not ignored. It seems to have become standard fare in made-for-television historical documentaries to use re-enactors who look like they don’t belong in the clothes they are wearing and to depict action scenes in slow motion. “The War That Made America” provides numerous vignettes, carefully considered interior shots, and battle scenes that emphasize chaos and confusion. Conveying eighteenth-century American life and death to a twenty-first century television audience is a formidable challenge, but “The War That Made America” does it as well as anything produced so far.

The filmmakers employed an appropriate cast of historical consultants, but the film itself is refreshingly free of talking heads. Actors portray the historical characters and on occasion turn to face the camera, reciting their own words and confiding in the audience as if in a Shakespearian aside. Oneida actor Graham Greene’s role as walk-on narrator could be annoying but his dead-pan appearances help keep the story moving, provide important context, and actually constitute a welcome departure from cut-away interviews with historians.

The Seven Years War was huge. Winston Churchill called it the real first world war and he was right. Unfortunately, “The War That Made America” gives only cursory attention to the war in Europe, India, and the West Indies. It does not adequately explain how British subsidies to Prussian princes helped keep French forces bogged down in vast European battles, and how British naval victories severed New France from Old France. Instead, the main theme that emerges is the maturation of George Washington, as a result of his French and Indian War experiences, into the man who would lead his country to independence.

Nevertheless, the film covers American territory comprehensively and manages to combine different and overlapping stories in a comprehensible and compelling narrative. In the end, Britain’s victory was decisive. The French lost their North American empire and immediately began planning to get it back. The Indians who had fought for their lands and freedom found both threatened as never before. The British gained an empire greater than Rome’s, but the task of administering its vast new empire taxed Britain’s resources and statesmanship to the breaking point and divided the British Atlantic world. Without the Seven Years War, the American Revolution would not have happened when and how it did and, yes, George Washington would not have been the leader he was.

Colin G. Calloway is Professor of History and Samson Occom Professor of Native American Studies at Dartmouth College. Scratch of a Pen is the latest book in the Pivotal Moments in American History series.