The Northwest was acquired from France by Great Britain through conquest and treaty; in a precisely similar way—­Clark taking the place of Wolfe—­it was afterwards won from Britain by the United States.  We gained it exactly as we afterwards gained Louisiana, Florida, Oregon, California, New Mexico, and Texas:  partly by arms, partly by diplomacy, partly by the sheer growth and pressure of our spreading population.  The fact that the conquest took place just after we had declared ourselves a free nation, and while we were still battling to maintain our independence, does not alter its character in the least; but it has sufficed to render the whole transaction very hazy in the minds of most subsequent historians, who generally speak as if the Northwest Territory had been part of our original possessions.

The French who dwelt in the land were at the time little affected by the change which transferred their allegiance from one European king to another.  They were accustomed to obey, without question, the orders of their superiors.  They accepted the results of the war submissively, and yielded a passive obedience to their new rulers.[13] Some became rather attached to the officers who came among them; others grew rather to dislike them:  most felt merely a vague sentiment of distrust and repulsion, alike for the haughty British officer in his scarlet uniform, and for the reckless backwoodsman clad in tattered homespun or buckskin.  They remained the owners of the villages, the tillers of the soil.  At first few English or American immigrants, save an occasional fur trader, came to live among them.  But their doom was assured; their rule was at an end forever.  For a while they were still to compose the bulk of the scanty population; but nowhere were they again to sway their own destinies.  In after years they fought for and against both whites and Indians; they faced each other, ranged beneath the rival banners of Spain, England, and the insurgent colonists; but they never again fought for their old flag or for their own sovereignty.

From the overthrow of Pontiac to the outbreak of the Revolution the settlers in the Illinois and round Vincennes lived in peace under their old laws and customs, which were continued by the British commandants.[14] They had been originally governed, in the same way that Canada was, by the laws of France, adapted, however, to the circumstances of the new country.  Moreover, they had local customs which were as binding as the laws.  After the conquest the British commandants who came in acted as civil judges also.  All public transactions were recorded in French by notaries public.  Orders issued in English were translated into French so that they might be understood.  Criminal cases were referred to England.  Before the conquest the procureur du roi gave sentence by his own personal decision in civil cases; if the matters were important it was the custom for each party to name two arbitrators, and the procureur du roi a fifth; while an appeal might be made to the council superieur at New Orleans.  The British commandant assumed the place of the procureur du roi, although there were one or two half-hearted efforts made to introduce the Common Law.