The Northeast Coast campaign of 1746 was a series of raids conducted by the Wabanaki Confederacy against New England settlements during King George's War. The campaign arose from escalating tensions following New England's expedition against Louisbourg, which concluded in June 1745. In response to this military action, the Wabanaki retaliated by attacking the New England border settlements. Governor William Shirley had previously placed a bounty on the Passamaquoddy, Mi'kmaq, and Maliseet on October 20, 1744, following two attacks on Annapolis Royal. On August 23, 1745, Shirley declared war against the remaining members of the Wabanaki Confederacy—the Penobscot and Kennebec tribes—setting the stage for the 1746 campaign.
From July until September 1746, the Wabanaki Confederacy launched coordinated attacks against English settlements along the coast of present-day Maine between Berwick and St. Georges (Thomaston, Maine). Within two months, nine raids had occurred, with every town on the frontier coming under attack. Casco, also known as Falmouth and Portland, was identified as the principal settlement targeted during this campaign. In anticipation of such attacks, New England had appointed a provisional force of 450 soldiers to defend the frontier. Following the initiation of the raids, the number of defensive soldiers was increased.
The campaign demonstrated the Wabanaki Confederacy's capacity to mount sustained military pressure against English colonial settlements in response to imperial warfare. The widespread nature of the raids—affecting every frontier town within a two-month period—illustrated the vulnerability of the dispersed New England settlements and the military effectiveness of the Wabanaki strategy.
European colonization of North America accelerated after 1600, with England, France, Spain, and the Netherlands establishing competing settlements along the Atlantic coast, the St. Lawrence River, the Gulf of Mexico, and the Mississippi Valley. The first permanent English settlement at Jamestown, Virginia (1607) struggled with starvation and conflict; the Plymouth colony (1620) and the Massachusetts Bay Colony (1630) followed. By the mid-1700s, thirteen English colonies stretched along the Atlantic seaboard, governed through a mix of royal charters, proprietary grants, and elected assemblies. The colonial economy depended on tobacco in Virginia and Maryland, rice and indigo in the Carolinas, and maritime trade in New England — all increasingly reliant on enslaved African labor after 1619. Conflict with Indigenous peoples over land was continuous, punctuated by major wars including King Philip's War (1675–1676) in New England and the Yamasee War (1715–1717) in the South. The French and Indian War (1754–1763), part of the global Seven Years' War, ended French power in North America and left Britain deeply in debt — triggering the taxation disputes that would lead to revolution.
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