The Treaty of 1818 set a partial boundary between the U.K., known as British North America and the United States. The boundary was set along a stretch of the 49th parallel at the north latitude but only from Minnesota to the Rocky Mountains. The region west of the Rocky Mountains was left under joint control. It was known to the Americans as Oregon Country and to the British as the Columbia Department or Columbia District of the Hudson’s Bay Company. This treaty provided for joint control of that land for ten years.

Joint control steadily grew less tolerable for both sides and as a result, the Oregon Country became a disputed region of the Pacific Northwest of North America. Historically, the Continental Divide was the line between British and United States land possessions in the disputed Oregon Country.

At the time, the Oregon Country was occupied by British and French Canadian fur traders from before 1810, and American settlers from the mid-1830s. The coastal areas north from the Columbia River were frequented by ships from all nations engaged in the maritime fur trade.

To settle the dispute, negotiations resulted in the Oregon Treaty of 1846 that ended disputed joint occupancy pursuant to the Treaty of 1818 and as a result, it established the British-American boundary at the 49th parallel (except Vancouver Island) extending from the Rocky Mountains all the way to the Pacific Ocean.

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