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The third of the Georgian kings, George III would preside over the largest expansion of the British Empire to that date but also witness its severest setback. He was actually the grandson of George II as his father Frederick Louis had predeceased his own father. Personally he was a highly frugal and earnest individual - despite the Georgian reputation for excess.
He was about to profit from the successfully run Seven Years War (1756 - 1763) that saw the British take on and beat the mighty French in what was virtually a world war. The British were only able to defeat the French thanks to the modern banking and financing system that allowed the British to fund a war against its larger foes.
The was allowed the British to massively expand their American Empire and gain a substantial foothold in India. In both cases, the French were removed as strategic rivals leaving British power seemingly unchallengable. Back in Britain though, there was some disatisfaction expressed that Britain unduly lenient to their defeated foe. Still, naval bases began springing up all over the globe to help the British supply their American and Indian empires.
The American settlers were not to understand the subtleties of modern financing and were to resent the imposition of taxes designed to repay the loans taken out to fight the French in Canada and around the world. The settlers were particularly keen to avoid paying tax now that the French threat had been removed completely. They were also to be aggravated by the George's determination to halt settler intrusion into Indian lands across the Appalachian mountains. It was considered that these settlers were provoking unnecessary wars with the Indians that had to be paid for. In 1763, he declared that no settlers were to pass the Appalachian mountains and impinge on Native American lands. As a King, he felt that the sovereignty of native rulers (however different from the European model) should be respected and upheld. This would bring his American policies into collision with the ever growing number of settlers who cared more for land than for the rights of Native Americans.
Incompetent ministers were to combine with the King's intransigence to turn resistance to taxation into all out revolution. War began in 1775 and was prolonged in 1779, at the king's insistence, to prevent copycat protests elsewhere. Additionally, the Spanish and French were only too eager to join in with Britain's woes and back the Revolutionaries. The fighting ranged far and wide as the French and Spanish raided and captured British bases around the world. The British were ultimately forced into a humiliating defeat with the recognition of the United States and the loss of many smaller territories around the world. Imperialism was to take a back seat as a result of this setback - although the Revolutionary and Napoleonic Wars would provide an opportunity to regain much of what they had lost to the French and the Spanish at least. Few also appreciated the growing importance of the Indian acquisitions for Britain in the coming century.
The British investment in Naval technology and expertise would ultimately pay dividends with the Victory at Trafalgar in 1805 which allowed British hegemony of the seas to endure for the next Century. The threat from France had also prompted George III's ministers to formalise political control over the island of Ireland through the Act of Union which united Great Britain and Ireland into a single nation - the United Kingdom. George was thus the first king of the new nation. However, this seemingly innocuous annexation would become a major political difficulty for Britain in the future. On a more positive note, 1807 saw Britain become the first European nation to abolish the Slave Trade. Slavery began to sit ill at ease with a country supposedly fighting for values of Liberty against Napoleon's despotism. It was clear that George III's period as King was a complex contradiction of motives. These were not going to be helped by his slipping into a period of increasing mental illness. This became such an issue, that his son had to rule on his behalf from 1811 to 1820 in the period that became known as the Regency.
George III was to rule for sixty years and was to preside over huge changes in British society as the Industrial Revolution intensified. Despite the setback of the American Revolution, Britain was to recover its influence and respect with victory in the Napoleonic Wars and was about to enter into a golden age of development.
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