Ohio Country
British settlers were also expanding into the Ohio Country at this time. The British colonies were far more populated than the French (there were about 1.5 million British subjects living in North America in 1754, meaning that the British outnumbered the French almost twenty to one), and settlers were eager to move over the Appalachian Mountains and into the Ohio Country and other western lands. Most British traders declared that, despite the facts that the French had been trading in the Ohio Country for years and that more and more displaced Native Americans were moving west from the Atlantic coast every year, the Ohio Country was unsettled, uncharted, and therefore unclaimed land that should be open to all traders. The French had no interest in trying to compete with the British for trade in the Ohio Country. Due to their high population and large colonial cities, British traders could offer Native Americans cheaper, higher quality goods than could their French counterparts. The French therefore set about keeping the British as far away from the Ohio Country as possible.