Unsettling the West
Page 7
the pennsylvanians wished to confront the redstone colonists, they would
containment, 1765–72
31
have to do so on their own.14 Knowing they could do nothing without six
nations support, Frazier and Thompson gave up their plans.
This sudden reversal reflected divisions among the western haudenos-
aunee. to the six nations council hundreds of miles away, and even to
guyasuta at pine creek, the redstone colonists were an abstract impediment,
but two creeks hunters knew them as neighbors, trading partners, and po-
tential y deadly enemies. in a private meeting with the pennsylvania com-
missioners, guyasuta explained that “all our . . . young men” refused to help,
unwilling to risk earning “the ill Will of those people.” noting that the six
nations would soon sell the land around redstone to the British, and that the
evicted colonists would then return, haudenosaunee men had argued against
giving them “reason to dislike us, and treat us in an unkind manner when
they again become our neighbours.”15 guyasuta could have aided the penn-
sylvanians anyway, but the tenuousness of his authority gave him pause. he
and his fellow senecas sought a secure position in the region’s future political
order, and this pursuit led them, in this instance, to refuse to help pennsylva-
nia’s proprietary government. The outcome foiled the plans of pennsylvania
officials but preserved the informal relationships that upheld the region’s ten-
uous peace.
The six nations’ ensuing treaty with Britain threatened to undo that peace,
but intracultural divisions and intercultural compromise still fended off hos-
tilities. at Fort stanwix, hundreds of miles northeast of pittsburgh, the six
nations planned to sell the upper Ohio Valley, but Britain’s indian superin-
tendent, William Johnson, instead negotiated a much larger cession that en-
compassed nearly all of Kentucky as wel . The six nations made little use of
Kentucky’s resources, but their leaders nonetheless argued that their ances-
tors had conquered it over one hundred years earlier. to them, the extended
cession promised to protect more vital haudenosaunee territory by directing
colonial migration into the west. But shawnees, cherokees, and others relied
heavily on Kentucky’s prolific deer and bison herds. Western nations imme-
diately denounced the treaty, insisting that Kentucky was “as much theirs” as
the six nations’. Upper Ohio senecas protested that they had received no
share of the purchase price; when the British ignored their complaints, they
shot the cattle of nearby colonists. From london, colonial secretary lord
hil sborough berated Johnson for deviating from his instructions. Though
the crown nominal y accepted the larger purchase, hil sborough prohibited
any colonization west of the Kanawha. a separate treaty with the cherokees
32
chapter 1
similarly established a Kanawha boundary. Virginian speculators fumed, but
the plan delighted george croghan, who had joined a coterie of investors
backing a proposed new western colony called Vandalia. The Kanawha
boundary promised to rein in rival speculators until the Vandalia backers
could secure Kentucky for themselves; in return for croghan’s diplomatic aid,
they promised to confirm his legal y dubious land claims. anxious to appease
the peoples whose land he coveted, croghan repeatedly announced the new
policy to Ohio indian leaders.16
Ohio indians broadly accepted the Kanawha boundary and set about en-
forcing it. British officers had repeatedly assured them that trespassers on
indian land were “lawless raskals” and “no part of us.” now, British officials
advised cherokees to seize the possessions and burn the houses of “any peo-
ple hunting or settling beyond the line.” Ogayoolah, a cherokee leader, re-
ceived a written pass authorizing him to take “all the deer skins . . . guns
and horses” found “in possession of the tresspassors.” shawnee and chero-
kee hunters complied. in the second half of 1770, they reportedly confiscated
at least 1,400 deerskins. in contrast to their counterparts in england, where
convicted poachers suffered death, these indian game wardens only rarely
resorted to lethal force. When one cherokee hunting party killed a few Vir-
ginians, they met with scorn and censure in their own community. more
often, the captors freed the interlopers and warned them not to come back.17
many colonial hunters ignored the warnings, but through the early 1770s
they remained only transient visitors, bringing no families and building no
permanent homesteads. as imperial officials despaired of controlling an un-
ruly frontier population, cherokees and shawnees did so for them.
While some indians drove off colonial poachers, others forged new alli-
ances. pontiac’s War had failed to expel the British or bring back the French,
leaving many to dread renewed hostilities. Ohio indian leaders still aimed for
the same goals that had led them to war— physical security, territorial sover-
eignty, and flourishing trade— but now pursued them through diplomacy. in
particular, many labored to unite western nations to oppose further land
grabs. These proponents of pan- indian unity sought to counter the influence
both of the six nations, whose land cessions had forced thousands of dela-
wares and shawnees to move west, and of their al y William Johnson. The
alliance they envisioned would command imperial respect where scattered
independent towns did not. some continued to press for a new anticolonial
war but found it necessary to rein in their rhetoric and seek common ground
with moderates.18
containment, 1765–72
33
in 1769, two shawnee leaders brought a curious account of the Fort stan-
wix treaty to a council of great lakes nations at detroit. after explaining the
sale of Kentucky, they reported that William Johnson worried that the six
nations “perhaps had not power to make . . . such a gift,” as “all that land
does not belong to them.” They claimed he had asked them to discuss the
matter with other western indians, urging them to “Be always united” and
“have only the same mind, all of you who inhabit the same continent, and
are of the same colour.” Johnson had said nothing of the kind. he had in-
sisted that the shawnees had no say over the treaty, and he dreaded the
thought of pan- indian unity. The shawnee spokesmen had exploited their po-
sition as intermediaries to promote a starkly different agenda. even so, their
performance was markedly moderate. rather than openly promoting war, or
obsequiously al aying British fears, they tried to bolster their call for pan-
indian unity with the stamp of imperial approval, at least partly to reassure
indians who feared renewed fighting. Western nations could stand together
against the stanwix cession, they suggested, without unduly antagonizing
their colonial neighbors. The deception reflected sharp divisions. some hoped
to exploit resentment of land cessions to ral y support for war. Others sought
greater diplomatic leverage by presenting a united
front.19 achieving unity
among such diversity required finessing sharp disagreements about means
and ends. proponents of unity broadened their coalition by muddying its
purpose.
Throughout the interwar period, western indians labored to rebuild and
expand the multiethnic alliance of pontiac’s War, but they downplayed its
potential militancy. in 1765, western senecas began forging what croghan
later called “a gineral Union” to stop colonists from “coming into thire cun-
try to setle any further.” in the summer of 1767, hundreds of indians from
thirteen nations met at the scioto Valley shawnee towns to pursue this proj-
ect. after Fort stanwix these efforts accelerated. in may 1769, at a new scioto
council, delawares, shawnees, senecas, and members of several Wabash Val-
ley nations announced a new multiethnic alliance separate from the six na-
tions, pledging to “defend themselves against any enemy that may hereafter
Quarrel with either of them whether english or indians.” Before year’s end,
shawnee messengers had visited the chickasaws, cherokees, and creeks in
the south “to form a general confederacy on the principle of defending their
lands.” cherokee and creek leaders rebuffed their proposals, but at a 1770
scioto council a number of cherokees pledged to make peace with the west-
ern nations. Throughout, they stressed the need to counterbalance the six
34
chapter 1
nations and prevent a repetition of Fort stanwix. By late 1772, some western
haudenosaunee flatly refused to attend the league’s Onondaga council fire
because of “the [co]ntempt and neglect shown them.” The six nations’ dom-
ination of neighboring nations, a decades- old presumption of regional diplo-
macy, seemed increasingly flimsy.20
While more militant coalition partners aimed to keep preparations for
war secret, moderates publicized their activities to press for further British
concessions. in 1769, a delegation told British agents that they had “great
trouble in preventing some of our rash unthinking young men” from retaliat-
ing violently for the stanwix cession. in a private conference with the indian
agent alexander mcKee, a shawnee leader explained that if the British failed
to respond satisfactorily to the westerners’ demands, “they are then to pursue
their own measures.”21 in effect, moderate pan- indian leaders sought to build
two distinct coalitions: one of western indian nations to gain diplomatic
leverage with the British, and another with British officials to squash militant
cal s for war. By unifying western nations, and serving as an internal bulwark
against militant schemes, they forced the British to take them seriously. By
winning concessions from the British, they strengthened their own authority
and lessened the appeal of military action.
in march 1771, John and Joseph, two stockbridge mohicans who had set-
tled among the shawnee and delaware, warned British indian agents that a
large gathering of Ohio, Wabash, and great lakes indians had agreed to “strike
the english” that spring. Other moderates soon confirmed the report. The in-
formants were themselves part of this new alliance— John had sat “at all their
councils” but “dread[ed] being forced into” war. to end the plot peaceful y,
they invited British agents to the next scioto conference. The militants had
claimed six nations and cherokee support, but a subsequent six nations dele-
gation flatly denied it and demanded that the western indians “confirm a last-
ing peace.” The refutation threw “the Western nations into great confusion”
and doomed any hope of a broad pro- war coalition.22 Both moderates and mil-
itants continued to pursue a pan- indian alliance, but the moderates had
blunted its militant potential, while reminding British officials of their value as
allies. and with shawnee and cherokee game wardens guarding Kentucky,
they could persuasively argue that “a lasting peace” with the composite, inter-
dependent empire might preserve remaining indian land from colonization.
Other Ohio indians offered alternative visions. in the spring of 1773, the
delaware White eyes arrived in new Orleans with 1500 deerskins, 300 beaver
pelts, and “other small furrs.” he traded them to a louisiana merchant house,
containment, 1765–72
35
then sailed to philadelphia with £200 in hard currency and credit for the
purchase of a “small cargo” of high- demand european imports, which he
then shipped west to the Ohio Valley. like many eighteenth- century entre-
preneurs, White eyes found himself in legal squabbles with his trading part-
ners for years to come. nonetheless, his long journey marked an impressive
commercial debut.23 The year before, his seneca counterpart, guyasuta, had
toured the eastern colonies dressed in the style of a British army officer.
White eyes, by contrast, had turned himself into an atlantic merchant. But
where most merchants reinvested their profits in new enterprises, he planned
instead to finance a delaware embassy to the court of george iii.
These plans reflected long- standing efforts to turn a collection of autono-
mous towns, scattered from new Jersey to Ohio, into a unified ethnic nation.
Over several decades, the six nations had repeatedly sold delaware land out
from under them. now, in the wake of pontiac’s War, many delawares favored
peace with Britain; even the nativist prophet neolin now declared that “all the
people which inhabit this continent” ought to be “one people, having but one
Father.” nonetheless, the Fort stanwix treaty reminded them that children of
the same father might still steal one another’s land. to forge a more unified
nation, White eyes and his allies recruited eastern delawares to settle in the
muskingum Valley on land the Wyandots had gifted them, making it a coun-
try “which the six nations can not sell to the english.” They also tried to cen-
tralize decision making in a new council of leaders from different vil ages, led
by netawatwees, the preeminent civil leader of the nation’s turtle phatry. si-
multaneously, delaware leaders petitioned British officials to recognize their
territorial claims, offering in exchange both political loyalty and cultural re-
form. during a 1771 visit to philadelphia, Bemineo and gelelemend, the son
and grandson of netawatwees, explained that they wanted British help to “es-
tablish schools . . . for . . . educating their children, & ministers to preach the
christian religion.” They also sought training in “the mechanical Branches
among the White people.” White eyes similarly pledged “to be religious, and
have his children educated,” and argued that declining game populations
would force delaware men to abandon hunting in favor of european- style
commercial agriculture. to secure sovereignty and prosperity, White eyes ar-
gued, the delaware needed to integrate themselves more thoroughly into the
colonial world around them. doing so, delaware leaders assured colonists,
would “annex them by the strongest ties to the english interest.”24
among themselves, delawares strenuously deb
ated such plans. While
some had already embraced christianity, one member of the new council
36
chapter 1
insisted that he could consider the colonists’ religion only when they stopped
trespassing on delaware land. Others insisted that the creator wanted indi-
ans to remain on their own path, rather than attempting to follow that of
europeans. many delaware leaders, though, saw religious conversion as a
bargaining chip to serve their broader agenda. When a missionary, david
mcclure, offered his services, he got council members’ attention by mention-
ing that his sponsors would send a schoolmaster, tools, and a grist mill “to
promote their comfort in this world.” The council ultimately sent mcclure
packing, but they objected less to his theology than to his fellow presbyteri-
ans’ history of murdering christian indians. moravian missionaries enjoyed
greater success, but many scorned them as well for failing to protect their
converts from presbyterian attacks. Bemineo suggested leaving the choice of
missionaries to the British crown, reasoning that the king’s favor would bet-
ter “protect them in war time.” his plan showed a sophisticated understand-
ing of the eighteenth- century english world, in which presbyterians and
other dissenters claimed many adherents but wielded scant influence in pro-
vincial or imperial government. recognizing the political implications of de-
nominational affiliation, delaware leaders aimed to barter their religious
loyalties to bolster security and sovereignty.25
The delaware thus offered Britain both temporal and spiritual allegiance
in exchange for both territorial sovereignty and help adapting to a new colo-
nial economy. But building such a relationship required circumventing Wil-
liam Johnson, who insisted that the delaware and other Ohio indians remain
subordinate to the six nations. Bemineo thus asked the governors of penn-
sylvania, maryland, and Virginia to record his speech in writing and “send it
to the great King” directly. The governors, wary of antagonizing Johnson and
his haudenosaunee allies, repeatedly spurned delaware overtures. lacking