Lack of supplies, resistance by the local Native Americans, and direct attack by the Spanish quickly ended French attempts to settle on the southeastern coastline of North America.

France was more interested in the fur trade than in settling the land. The British hurt the French traders’ business when they bought fur from the Indians. However, by 1760 the French had lost Quebec and Montreal to the British. The French and Indian War ended after the British defeated the French in Quebec.

The rivers were their main way of traveling. The French wanted to control the American Indian trade in the Ohio River Valley and keep the Pennsylvania traders out. They also needed the American Indians living there to be their allies.

Louis, French Camp, LeFleur’s Bluff, Rosalie in Natchez, Cat Island, Ship Island, the coastal town of D’Iberville, and Bienville National Forest are just a handful of the many places named by the French people who colonized the land that later became the state of Mississippi.

Since 1929, the size of the French empire has shrunk dramatically. But like other European colonial powers, the French empire never disappeared entirely. Today, you can find the vestiges of the French Empire in islands and territories located around the world.

There are, however, still 16 territories under colonial rule by the United Kingdom, the United States, and France. Territories include the Falkland Islands, Bermuda, the Cayman Islands, the United States Virgin Islands, Gibraltar, French Polynesia, Guam, and others.

• Present-day Brazil. France Équinoxiale (Bay of São Luis) (1610–1615)
• Haiti (1627–1804)
• Present-day Suriname.
• Îles des Saintes (1648–present)
• Marie-Galante (1635–present)
• la Désirade (1635–present)
• Guadeloupe (1635–present)
• Martinique (1635–present)

France started colonizing West Africa early and most of those countries only became independent in the 20th century. The main goal of colonizing West Africa was that they wanted to turn West African countries into a “French-state”. The French colonization changed the African culture.

Foccart came up with the treaties that are still in force today. In exchange for military protection against attempted coups and the payment of hefty kickbacks, African leaders guaranteed French companies access to strategic resources such as diamonds, ores, uranium, gas and oil.

New France, French Nouvelle-France, (1534–1763), the French colonies of continental North America, initially embracing the shores of the St. Lawrence River, Newfoundland, and Acadia (Nova Scotia) but gradually expanding to include much of the Great Lakes region and parts of the trans-Appalachian West.

The French and Indian War

What factors led to the French settlement of New France? The Beaver, Fur trade, and setting up many trading post all over present day America.

The conquest was undertaken by the British as a campaign in 1758, with the acquisition of Canada made official in the Treaty of Paris that concluded the Seven Years’ War….Conquest of New France (1758–1760)

In 1763, the Treaty of Paris was signed by France, Britain and Spain to end the Seven Years War. This transferred Quebec from France to Britain, thus giving Britain control over most of North America.

Louis XIV integrated New France into the royal domain, endowed it with a new administration and founded the French West India Company. By the Treaty of Utrecht, France ceded most of Acadia to the Kingdom of Great Britain as well as its claims on Newfoundland and Hudson’s Bay.

The most important economic activity in new France was The fur trade as it was the real economic engine of New France. The exploitation of furs, which has ensured the wealth of Canadians, is largely what has favored the exploration of the continent.

Samuel de Champlain led a group of French colonists through the mouth of the St. Lawrence River to found Quebec in 1608.

Men wore a shift or shirt, breeches with knitted wool stockings, and sometimes a vest or a short waistcoat. They either wore leather shoes with a buckle, clogs, or moccasins. Aboriginal influence on habitants’ clothes was more apparent with men’s fashion.

Three or four rooms on the ground floor with a spacious attic made up the living quarters. The furniture often came from France, and its quality gave the whole interior an air of distinction. As for the habitants, their homes were also of stone or timber–long and rather narrow structures, heavily built, and low.

By the end of the 18th century, the term habitant applied to all those who inhabited rural areas and made a living by working the land, even if they did not own it. Independent landowners who farmed properties in New France in the 17th and 18th centuries.

Slavery in New France was practiced by some of the indigenous populations, which enslaved outsiders as captives in warfare, but it was European colonization that made commercial chattel slavery become common in New France.

The historian Marcel Trudel catalogued the existence of about 4,200 slaves in Canada between 1671 and 1834, the year slavery was abolished in the British Empire. About two-thirds of these were Native and one-third were Blacks. The use of slaves varied a great deal throughout the course of this period.