Empire and the Pan-Atlantic Self in The Female American; or, The Adventures of Unca Eliza Winkfield

Abstract

Although much has been said about the position of The Female American; or, The Adventures of Unca Eliza Winkfield within the field of eighteenth-century circum-Atlantic fiction, little has been posited about this novel’s response to contemporaneous British imperialism and the meaning that could be inferred from the novel within such circumstances.¹ At the time Adventures was published anonymously in London in 1767, outcomes regarding Europe’s imperial struggles in the New World were undetermined. The Seven Years’ War (1756–1763) and Pontiacs War (1763–1766) demonstrate the geographic extent of the conflicts among European powers and between European and Native American nations. Fred Anderson describes the Seven Years’ War as “a violent imperial competition … [a world war] that created a hollow British empire” (2000, xix).² Amerindian nations were still independent powers with the potential to influence the outcome of European colonial efforts in the Americas. Britain’s simultaneous engagement in colonial aggression toward native populations in Ireland and the New World (Fuchs 45–46) diluted Britain’s efforts. British, French, Spanish, and Dutch settlers throughout the Americas experienced significant and sustained uncertainty. Anxiety and insecurity were even more intense for First Nations. In addition, the increasing use of germ warfare by European powers and of psychological warfare by First Nations (already an established feature of European aggression) heightened the emotional frenzy experienced on both sides.