ABSTRACT

GRASSO, BLAKE ANTHONY. Sheep in the Wolf Den: The End of the Struggle for the Upper Ohio in the Seven Years’ War, 1758-1759. (Under the direction of Dr. Megan Cherry).

The French presence on the Upper Ohio during the Seven Years’ War was secured by their alliances with local Indigenous nations and bolstered by a resilient logistics network. With

Lenape, Shawnee, and Mingo combatants leading offensives against the Middle Colonies and the

Illinois Country providing sustainment via Ohio River convoys, the French position in the region remained robust into the autumn of 1758. However, by late November of that year the French surrendered the Forks of the Ohio and abandoned Fort Duquesne without firing a single shot in its defense. They were forced from their position through a combination of their own diplomatic failings and the shrewd machinations of an Anglophile faction led by the Lenape leader

Tamaqua. From Tamaqua’s base at Kuskusky, he molded British peace overtures to make them palatable to his neighbors and worked to expand pro-British sentiment beyond his own Turkey subdivision of the Lenape. Tamaqua’s Anglophile group also undermined French confidence in the Ohio Franco-Indigenous alliance that had proved devastatingly effective in the previous three years of sustained warfare. The French maintained a large degree of support in the region, as evidenced by the combined force they assembled in the spring of 1759 to retake the Forks of the

Ohio. However, Tamaqua and his group’s efforts convinced the French that local Lenape,

Shawnee, and Mingo had abandoned the French alliance en masse as General Forbes’ British force limped to the Forks in November of 1758. The fall of Fort Duquesne was the direct result of Indigenous diplomatic efforts that obfuscated the level of French support in the region, and the subsequent violence of Pontiac’s Rebellion in 1763 can be explained in part by Francophile sentiment that had been concealed through Tamaqua’s efforts.

Sheep in the Wolf Den: The End of the Struggle for the Upper Ohio in the Seven Years’ War, 1758-1759.

by Blake Anthony Grasso

A thesis submitted to the Graduate Faculty of North Carolina State University in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Master of Arts

History

Raleigh, North Carolina

2021

APPROVED BY:

______Dr. Megan Cherry Dr. Judy Kertesz Committee Chair

______Dr. Keith Luria

BIOGRAPHY

Blake Grasso grew up in Kailua, Hawaii before moving to Virginia and graduating from

Stafford High School in 2009. He attended the College of William and Mary and graduated with a Bachelor of Arts in History degree in 2013. After spending a year in Charleston, South

Carolina working for an importation and shipping company, he enlisted in the United States

Army as an Officer Candidate. Upon commissioning as a Second Lieutenant in the Armor branch, he was selected for an exchange program with the British Army and spent a year attending the Royal Academy Sandhurst in the United Kingdom. After he returned to the United

States, he spent time at Fort Benning and Fort Stewart, Georgia before being assigned to Camp

Hovey, South Korea. Blake left the Army and enrolled in North Carolina State’s MA in History program in 2019. He plans to graduate with a Master of Arts degree in History in May, 2021.

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ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

This thesis would not have been possible without the help and guidance of numerous individuals. Dr. Paul Mapp ignited both my interest in French North America and the pursuit of my studies beyond the undergraduate level. Major Stuart Clark and Colour Serjeant Collins both helped instill the discipline and work ethic I would need to complete a thesis during a work- from-home pandemic that stretched over a year. I also would like to thank the History

Department faculty at North Carolina State. From Dr. Akram Khater’s patience with my early graduate school writing (a truly painful experience for any reader), to Dr. Judy’s Kertesz’s insights that changed the way I conceived of historical issues, to Dr. Keith Luria’s feedback on my first grasping attempts at approaching my thesis, this project could not have been completed without you. Most importantly, I owe an immense debt of gratitude to Dr. Megan Cherry. Her otherworldly patience as I remembered (and promptly forgot) how to use commas, adjusted to life as a graduate student, and worked toward my thesis was remarkable. Her knowledge, expertise, and work ethic inspired me to put forth my best effort even as pandemic fatigue drained my energy.

To my parents Dominic and Barbara Grasso, thank you for helping me navigate a difficult life transition and providing a solid bedrock to fall back on if I ever need it. To Bear,

Rusty, and George, thank you for keeping me sane during this pandemic. I couldn’t have made it without you laying at my feet.

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TABLE OF CONTENTS

LIST OF FIGURES ...... v

Introduction ...... 1 Historiography ...... 2 Methodology and Sources...... 7 Organization ...... 13 Chapter 1. Horsemeat and Habitants ...... 15 Forbes’ Campaign ...... 16 French Patterns of Sustainment in the Ohio Valley ...... 19 Fort Duquesne’s Supply Situation in 1758 ...... 22 Gifts and Trade Goods: French Logistics and their Indigenous Allies ...... 29 “Readiness to March at an Hours Warning”: Defeat from the Jaws of Victory ...... 32 Chapter 2. You Have Disturbed Our Peace ...... 34 The Upper Ohio Country Before 1758: Paradise Lost and Found...... 36 Imperial Fulcrum ...... 41 Martial Success: 1755-1758 ...... 46 Complicated Politics on the Upper Ohio and Christian Frederick Post ...... 52 Chapter 3. The Upper Ohio in the Balance ...... 76 “Peace” after Easton ...... 78 The Fall of Fort Duquesne ...... 84 Retreat ...... 91 Reorganization and Resistance ...... 98 Counterattack ...... 102 End of an Era ...... 109 Conclusion ...... 112 Bibliography ...... 117

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LIST OF FIGURES

Figure 1 Territorial claims map ...... 14

Figure 2 Forts and invasion routes map ...... 18

Figure 3 Supply route map ...... 25

Figure 4 Pre-European contact Lenape map ...... 38

Figure 5 Lenape migration map ...... 53

Figure 6 Indigenous towns map ...... 89

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Introduction

On November 23, 1758, the French presence at the Forks of the Ohio came to an ignominious end. Outmaneuvered by a détente between the British and Indigenous Ohioans and suffering from a lack of supplies that made further campaigning impossible, Francois-Marie Le

Marchand de Lignery ordered the destruction of Fort Duquesne and the abandonment of the

Forks of the Ohio.1 Beginning with the defeat of General Braddock in 1755, the fort had served as the symbolic axis from which three years of wildly successful offensives rolled back the

Pennsylvania frontier to within a hundred miles of Philadelphia. The methodical expedition of

1758 under General John Forbes was the first major British effort to advance on the fort since

Braddock’s catastrophe, but it was unable to defeat the combined forces of the “Ohio Indians” and French in the field.

The destruction of Fort Duquesne without a single shot fired in its final defense was not the result of battlefield losses. Instead, enduring historical narratives regarding the quiet end to the French presence in the Ohio Valley have blamed material shortcomings (particularly shortages of foodstuffs, gunpowder, and assorted “Indian goods”) and the independent actions of

Indigenous Ohioans for the French loss. Bereft of food and abandoned by their allies at the critical hour, the French were left with no option except retreat. Lignery dispersed some of his garrison down the Ohio to the Illinois Country and took the remainder north to Fort Machault.

The French would linger on the periphery of the Upper Ohio for nearly a year, until the disaster at the Battle of La Belle-Famille and the loss of Fort Niagara in the summer of 1759. The

1 In this thesis, “Forks of the Ohio” and “Forks” refer to the immediate area surrounding Fort Duquesne at the confluence of the Allegheny and Monongahela Rivers. The terms “Ohio Country” and “Ohio Valley” refer to a region spanning modern-day western Pennsylvania, northwestern West Virginia, and Ohio. The term “Upper Ohio” refers generally to the Ohio’s river basin upriver from the modern Pennsylvania-Ohio border. 1 capture of Québec later in the year ensured the end of French aspirations in the Ohio Valley, and by 1760 New France itself would capitulate for good.

The abovementioned, established chronicle of the loss of the Forks is teleological to the extreme and insufficiently examines questions of logistics and Indigenous diplomacy that supposedly defined the French defeat. As this thesis will show, neither supply shortages nor shifting Indigenous alliances forced the French from the Ohio Country. The French were defeated at the Forks because they failed to understand the political diversity of their Indigenous allies. Ironically, historians of the region have fallen victim to this same mistake. In treating local Indigenous groups as a monolithic political entity, the French failed to understand that some communities’ goals were closely aligned with French interests, while others maintained an

Anglophile position. In order to maintain their position on the Upper Ohio, the French needed to understand which Indigenous groups most strongly supported them and work with Indigenous leaders to utilize Francophile sentiment. In contrast to their reputation as able Indigenous diplomats, the French utterly failed to marshal the vast amount of support that they maintained in late 1758. They were outmaneuvered by an Anglophile faction of the Turkey subdivision of the

Lenape that managed to sway enough of their neighbors to throw the French into disarray. The

Anglophile faction’s success was limited: until the final French defeat at La Belle-Famille, significant numbers of Shawnee, Lenape, and Mingos continued to fight with the French.

However, their own diplomatic inadequacies led the French to misinterpret their position and abandon the Forks without a fight.

Historiography

The earliest scholarship on the struggle for the Ohio Valley and the expulsion of the

French relegated the region’s Indigenous inhabitants to a peripheral role and cast the French as

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“passively submissive… [due to] the unchecked control of a hierarchy [that] robbed him of the independence of intellect and character.”2 While historians have generally progressed beyond such perceptions, one of the primary reasons given for the French abandonment of the Forks continues to be a failure to adapt to and overcome a shortage of supplies. These accounts argue that the British capture of Fort Frontenac cut off Fort Duquesne from its most reliable supply route and forced Lignery to abandon his position at the Forks as “foodstuffs were extremely difficult to obtain from the Illinois, owing to the low water in the Ohio. Even if he were not attacked by the enemy, he might be defeated by hunger.”3 Due to “the scarcity of provisions,” the French were left with no options other than to leave the Ohio Valley.4

The argument that supply deficiencies determined French actions has been expanded in recent years to help explain the alienation of New France’s Indigenous allies. Historians that take this perspective argue that France’s allies relied on the French to provide food because normal hunting patterns were disrupted by offensives against the British. Hunting, usually the purview of Native men, was neglected as campaigning took precedence.5 When hunts did occur, they often met limited success as newly arrived French soldiers and allies from the pays d’en haut (Great Lakes region) overstrained the supply of wild game.6 Combined with a decreased ability to supply “Indian goods” (ranging from rifles and powder to manufactured goods and cloth), the Lenape, Shawnee, and Mingos of the Upper Ohio supposedly turned to the British

2 Francis J. Parkman, Montcalm and Wolfe (Boston: Little, Brown and Company, 1884), 22-23. 3 G.F. Stanley, New France: The Last Phase (Toronto: McClelland and Stewart Limited, 1968), 190; Ian Steele, Warpaths: Invasions of North America (New York: Oxford University Press, 1994), 215. 4 Stephen Auth, The Ten Years’ War: The Indian Conflict in Pennsylvania (New York: Garland Publishing, Inc., 1989), 51-52; Guy Fregault, Canada: The War of Conquest, trans. Margaret M. Cameron (Toronto: Oxford University Press, 1969), 224. 5 Matthew C. Ward, “Fighting the ‘Old Women’: Indian Strategy on the Virginia and Pennsylvania Frontier, 1754- 1758.” The Virginia Magazine of History and Biography 103, no. 3 (1995), 307. 6 Michael N. McConnell, A Country Between: The Upper Ohio Valley and Its Peoples, 1724-1774 (Lincoln: University of Nebraska Press, 1992), 125. 3 because the French could no longer meet their material needs.7 These arguments present the

Indigenous-French alliance as one based on material exchange, whereby “As French inventories dwindled so too did the ardor of native fighters.”8

The shift in emphasis from French supply shortages and their impact on French forces to the impact supply shortages had on Indigenous relations is reflective of a general change in early modern North American historiography. Work like Richard White’s The Middle Ground and

Michael McConnell’s A Country Between signaled a profound shift in the study of Indigenous-

European relations along the Upper Ohio. White and McConnell argued that the “Ohio Indians” were a powerful force in the region, capable of dictating the course of events to both the French and the British. White exemplified this notion when he wrote that local Lenape and Shawnee refusals to come to Lignery’s aid at Fort Duquesne in November of 1758 “made the rotten and crumbling post untenable.”9 The separate peace the “Ohio Indians” reached with the British forced the French to abandon the Ohio Valley without a fight and never return.10 Historians finally recognized that Europeans did not have a monopoly on power in the region, and they provided compelling evidence that the “Ohio Indians” were decisive actors in a multipolar power struggle.

7 Matthew C. Ward, Breaking the Backcountry: The Seven Years’ War in Virginia and Pennsylvania 1754-1765 (Pittsburgh: University of Pittsburgh Press, 2003), 165. “Mingo” is usually translated as “an Algonquian term of reproach” that means “stealthy” or “treacherous.” Some historians assert that the original pejorative connotation remains and refrain from using the term. However, many names that Indigenous peoples use to refer to themselves today were originally pejoratives given to them by enemies. This thesis follows the majority of historians who use the term “Mingo” to refer to Haudenosaunee who migrated to the Ohio Valley. For a refusal to use the term “Mingo,” see James H. O’Donnell III, Ohio’s First Peoples (Athens, OH: Ohio University Press, 2004), 136. For a discussion of the origin of the term, see Parmenter, The Iroquois and Native American Struggle, 106. 8 McConnell, A Country Between, 128. 9 Richard White, The Middle Ground: Indians, Empires, and Republics in the Great Lakes Region, 1650-1815 (New York: Cambridge University Press, 1991), 252. 10 Eric Hinderaker, Elusive Empires: Constructing Colonialism in the Ohio Valley, 1673-1800 (New York: Cambridge University Press, 1997), 144; Christian Ayne Crouch, Nobility Lost: French and Canadian Martial Cultures, Indians and the End of New France (Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 2014), 119; Fred Anderson, Crucible of War: The Seven Years’ War and the Fate of Empire in British North America, 1754-1766 (New York: Random House, Inc., 2000), 282-283. 4

While the work of White, McConnell, and their peers represented a leap forward in the historiography, more recent works regarding Indigenous-European relations have demonstrated that interactions between the two were often not conducted on a “Middle Ground” of relative parity. Instead, these interactions took place on “Native Ground,” a term first coined by

Kathleen DuVal in her book The Native Ground: Indians and Colonists in the Heart of the

Continent. 11 The concept of “Native Ground”, a state of affairs in which Indigenous North

American peoples dominated relations with Europeans and dictated the nature of their relationships, has led to a variety of new perspectives on early North American history. Work by historians like Brett Rushforth and Michael Witgen has been at the forefront of this new approach. In Rushforth’s book Bonds of Alliance, he demonstrates how Indigenous nations limited French expansion by entangling the French in systems of Indigenous slavery that the

Europeans did not understand. France’s Indigenous allies in the pays d’en haut were able to dictate the bounds of France’s Indigenous alliances by using the slave trade to ensure their own enemies were also hostile towards the French.12 The French unwittingly infuriated potential allies by sending their enslaved kin into the wider French Atlantic, an ideal outcome for older

French allies who did not wish to see French alliances expand to include their traditional enemies.

Witgen’s book An Infinity of Nations is another striking example of “Native Ground” or the “Native New World.” He adroitly demonstrates how Indigenous people of the pays d’en haut and Great Plains were powerful nations in their own right that maintained demographic and

11 Kathleen DuVal, The Native Ground: Indians and Colonists in the Heart of the Continent (Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press, 2006); Susan Sleeper-Smith, Indigenous Prosperity and American Conquest: Indian Women of the Ohio River Valley, 1690-1792 (Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 2018). 12 Brett Rushforth, Bonds of Alliance: Indigenous and Atlantic Slaveries in New France (Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 2013), 197-204. 5 military superiority in their home regions throughout the eighteenth century.13 Witgen utilizes

Native names for nations and geographic locations while proving that “the politics of the Middle

Ground began to give way to politics of the Native New World” as the French struggled to maintain influence in the pays d’en haut.14 Unable to enforce sovereignty over the region, the

French were forced to accept Anishinaabe demands.15

The work exemplified by Rushforth and Witgen is a dramatic departure from both the earliest Euro-centric works and more recent treatments that grant Indigenous peoples some parity in their dealings with Europeans. The newest scholarship does not define and investigate

Indigenous nations only in relation to Europeans. Instead, Indigenous nations are treated historically in the same manner that European nations have long been treated. Tribal designations alone have been rendered inadequate categories for exploring the political, economic, and social diversity among Indigenous nations. Interactions among different

Indigenous communities are likewise recognized to be as historically significant as interactions between Europeans and Indigenous peoples. This approach, as is often the case with new perspectives in historiography, seems almost obvious at first glance. Why wouldn’t one use the same nuance and detail when investigating Indigenous history that is used to explore European

North American colonies? However, ingrained norms and archival biases have slowed this effort until recently.

This thesis is set firmly within the new perspective of Indigenous history. Other, more capable historians have laid the framework and produced excellent monographs that uncover the history of otherwise poorly-studied Indigenous nations. This thesis seeks to contribute to the

13 Michael Witgen, An Infinity of Nations: How the Native New World Shaped Early North America (Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press, 2012), 27. 14 Witgen, An Infinity of Nations, 297. 15 Witgen, An Infinity of Nations, 265. 6 historiographical movement powered by historians like DuVal, Rushforth, and Witgen by applying their perspective to a time and place that has not yet moved beyond the “Middle

Ground.” In the second half of 1758 and the first half of 1759, the Upper Ohio was the scene of frantic diplomatic machinations, intense warfare, and numerous Indigenous factions with diverse motivations and political stances. Material shortages and the changing allegiances of the “Ohio

Indians” are logical explanations for why the French were forced from the Upper Ohio, but they leave larger questions about Indigenous actions and the French expulsion unanswered. After three years as comrades in arms and decades of intimate relations, why were the French blindsided and “left aghast” by the decision of local allies to abandon the alliance in its final days?16 Why did an alliance, undefeated in combat and united in its goal of keeping the British homesteaders out of the Ohio Valley, cease to exist at the last possible moment? If material concerns and the capture of Fort Frontenac were to blame, why was Fort Duquesne captured with

“very considerable” Indian goods and why did some leaders boast about the quantity of goods they received from the French?17

Methodology and Sources

To answer the questions surrounding the defeat of the French on the Upper Ohio, I will use the newest perspectives in Indigenous history to build on the work of earlier historians of the region. Previous scholarship has made clear that the French position could not be sustained without the help of their Indigenous allies.18 These contentions accurately display the power wielded by Indigenous groups in the region, but repeat some of the same mistakes of earlier

16 Ward, Breaking the Backcountry, 183. 17 Bouquet to William Allen, November 25, 1758, in The Papers of Henry Bouquet Vol. 2, eds. Autumn L. Leonard, Donald H. Kent, and Sylvester K. Stevens (Harrisburg: The Pennsylvania Historical and Museum Commission, 1951), 610; Ward, Breaking the Backcountry, 165; Crouch, Nobility Lost, 225. 18 Witgen, An Infinity of Nations, 313; Hinderaker, Elusive Empires, 144; Crouch, Nobility Lost, 119; Anderson, Crucible of War, 282-283; White, The Middle Ground, 252. 7

Eurocentric works by merging distinctive groups and subgroups under the singular “Ohio

Indians” moniker.19 The Treaty of Easton could not “neutralize the Indian allies of New

France,” because the Shawnee, Lenape, and Mingos on the Upper Ohio did not represent a unified political entity that was united in its foreign policy decisions.20 Opinions and actions differed greatly within towns, tribal affiliations, and even families. When the French tried to summon military aid from Kuskusky in late November of 1758, they found a subdivision of

Lenape who were unwilling to join the French in defense of the Forks. However, the extrapolation of this refusal to the wider Indigenous population of the region has overlooked the numerous groups who believed that alliance with the French remained the best way to achieve their goals.21 By paying greater attention to these voices, this thesis reveals that the “peace” obtained by the British in the Ohio Valley during the Seven Years War was conditional, dictated by Indigenous peoples, and far from universal.

19 The Treaty of Easton in October of 1758 “secured the neutrality of the Delawares, Shawnees, and Mingos in the Ohio Country,” in Crouch, Nobility Lost, 119; “The decision by the leaders of the Ohio Indians to accept Pennsylvania’s offer ‘struck the French a stunning blow,” in Hinderaker, Elusive Empires, 144; “The 1758 Treaty of Easton…(neutralized) the Indian allies of New France,” in Parmenter, “The Iroquois and Native American Struggle”, 110; “The refusal of the Delawares and Shawnees to provide further aid to Fort Duquesne had made the rotten and crumbling post untenable,” in White, The Middle Ground, 252; Indians “guilelessly” assumed the British would honor the Treaty of Easton in William J. Eccles, The French in North America 1500-1783 (East Lansing: Michigan State University Press, 1998), 219; “The (Ohio) Amerindians agreed to withdraw support from the French,” in Steele, Warpaths, 207-215; “The French desertion of the Delaware compelled them to make peace,” in Auth, Ten Years’ War, 52; “Exhausted by the long war and short of military supplies, the Ohio Indians even stood back when a new British army…evicted the French from Fort Duquesne,” in Sami Lakomäki, Gathering Together: The Shawnee People through Diaspora and Nationhood, 1600-1870 (New Haven: Yale University Press, 2014), 74; Delaware acceptance of Pennsylvania’s peace belt in Anderson, Crucible of War, 282; In Breaking the Backcountry Matthew Ward acknowledges that the immediate aftermath of the Treaty of Easton pacified only specific Delaware local to Fort Duquesne. A larger investigation of the Lenape, Shawnee, and Mingo of the region is beyond the scope of his book. Ward, Breaking the Backcountry, 182-183. 20 John Parmenter, “The Iroquois and Native American Struggle for the Ohio Valley, 1754-1794,” in The Sixty Years’ War for the Great Lakes, 1754-1814, eds. David Curtis Skaggs and Larry L. Nelson (East Lansing: Michigan State University Press, 2001), 110. 21 For Lenape refusal of French war belts at Kuskusky see Anderson, Crucible of War, 282-283; Ward, Breaking the Backcountry, 183; McConnell, A Country Between, 133-134; Francis Jennings, Empire of Fortune: Crowns, Colonies, and Tribes in the Seven Years’ War in America (New York: W.W. Norton & Company, 1988), 409; Crouch, Nobility Lost, 118; Parmenter, “The Iroquois and Native American Struggle”, 110; Richard S. Grimes, The Western Delaware Indian Nation, 1730-1795: Warriors and Diplomats (Bethlehem, PA: Lehigh University Press, 2017), 125. 8

This thesis will focus specifically on the Lenape (Delaware), Shawnee, and

Haudenosaunee Mingo inhabitants of the Upper Ohio. The region contained a diverse array of resident and seasonal combatants from the pays d’en haut, but the largest three groups and their leaders appear most often in the historical record and played a principal role in determining the course of events. Within these groups, subdivisions and influential individuals often differed in their opinions and actions. A single group denoted by a tribal designation like “Lenape” never made peace with the British as long as the French continued to fight. Some groups within the

Lenape subdivisions agreed to peace, but others continued fighting until the French abandoned the region for good in the summer of 1759.

The political divisions among Indigenous groups appear in the margins of the documentary record. As is often the case, Indigenous words were almost universally transcribed and recorded by Europeans. Likewise, European sources often contain implicit biases rooted in cultural differences. Both require reading against the grain in order to accurately understand the political and diplomatic situation at the time of writing. I make use of a wide array of sources from the major factions active in the region. Often, I will use tribal designations like “Lenape,” but when the documentary record allows I will breakdown these labels into specific groups or factions and their leaders. British sources provide a valuable outside perspective on the French material situation as well as the disposition of the local Lenape, Shawnee, and Mingos. Excerpts from the Colonial Records of Pennsylvania and the papers of Sir William Johnson,

Superintendent for Indian Affairs, provide insight into British civil evaluations of French capabilities and firsthand accounts of diplomatic efforts to make peace with the “Ohio Indians.”

In an attempt to get closer to the Indigenous perspective, I utilize the journal of Christian

Frederick Post, a Moravian missionary sent by the government of Pennsylvania to convince the

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“Ohio Indians” to accept a peace accord with the British colonial government. Post’s account provides an intimate look at Indigenous (primarily Lenape) opinions and reactions towards the

French at a critical time in the war. His close contact with the Lenape allows for insight into

French policy from an Indigenous perspective. Captivity narratives provide another useful, if still flawed, insight into events. Captives’ perspectives were Eurocentric, and the shock of their captivity combined with embedded prejudices means their accounts have to be parsed carefully to separate fact from dramatization. However, the authors of these narratives were present in

Indigenous households and towns, and at a lesser remove from Indigenous voices than most sources.

The nature of one’s captivity undoubtedly affected their outlook. Indigenous captives taken in the Ohio Valley during the Seven Years’ War faced a range of possible fates.

Indigenous slavery and captivity existed before European contact, but it adopted new forms as

Native and European societies interacted. Native and European cultures, time, and space all shaped the form captivity and slavery took.22 Some captives were killed as retribution for lost kin. Many others were utilized as coerced labor, helping their captors farm, cook, hunt, and even nurse children.23 Some of those utilized for labor were also adopted into Indigenous families.

They occupied a complicated position in their adoptive society, as they typically enjoyed some

22 There are numerous recent works on both enslaved Indigenous persons and Indigenous slaveholders. In Christina Snyder’s Slavery in Indian Country (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 2012), she traces the evolution of Indigenous slavery in the American Southeast as its previous fluidity was replaced with hardened racial categories. In Brett Rushforth’s aforementioned Bonds of Alliance, slavery in the pays d’en haut is described in its many forms, including as replacement for lost kin, labor, and as diplomatic bargaining chips. Indigenous and Atlantic slaveries gave birth to new forms of captivity in the region. Edited by Robbie Ethridge and Sheri M. Shuck -Hall, Mapping the Mississippi Shatter Zone: The Colonial Slave Trade and Regional Instability in the American South (Lincoln: University of Nebraska Press, 2009) examines Indigenous societies in the Mississippi River Valley and their participation in increasingly European styles of captivity. In general, these works emphasize that fluid, gender and age-based forms of captivity were replaced with rigid, race-based modes after prolonged contact with Europeans. No substantial works have yet been focused on the characteristics of Indigenous captivity in the Ohio Valley during the Seven Years’ War, despite its presence in primary sources . 23 Matthew C. Ward, "Redeeming the Captives: Pennsylvania Captives among the Ohio Indians, 1755-1765." The Pennsylvania Magazine of History and Biography 125, no. 3 (2001), 172. 10 degree of freedom but lived under the threat of violence. The culture shock they experienced is present in their accounts and colors many of their descriptions, often rendering them less reliable than Post’s account of his diplomatic mission. Nevertheless, these narratives are some of the few sources available that recount events that occurred within Indigenous-dominated spaces. When possible, I utilize Indigenous names for groups, places, and individuals. The first time a name appears, the most common Anglicized version will follow it in parentheses to facilitate recognition among readers.

French sources are also critical to the project and often underutilized in Anglophone scholarship. Letters from Governor-General Pierre de Rigaud de Vaudreuil to his subordinate commanders in North America and superiors in France have been widely examined by previous historians, particularly the manuscripts collected in Documents Relative to the Colonial History of the State of New York. They remain useful for their descriptions of the French strategic situation both logistically and in their relations with Indigenous peoples. Translated memoirs of

French officers like Pierre Pouchot and the Comte Maures de Malartic are also valuable. While neither officer served in the Ohio Country during the Seven Years’ War, they both handled logistics and the transfer of information to and from the Ohio Valley, granting a close perspective on French operations. Letters between Francois-Marie Le Marchand de Lignery, the commandant of Fort Duquesne at its fall, and Governor-General Vaudreuil also present an excellent opportunity to explore French actions in the Ohio Country. Unless noted, translations of French sources are not my own.

A thorough investigation of the political divisions on the Upper Ohio from the summer of

1758 to the summer of 1759 has not been undertaken previously for several reasons. First,

Native peoples who remained allied with the French counter teleological Anglophile narratives

11 surrounding the British seizure of the Forks. The idea that the peace treaty and supply shortages led to Indigenous withdrawal from the war and French defeat is uncomplicated and conveniently utilizes the seemingly overpowering strategic advantages of Great Britain. Second, the Lenape,

Shawnee, and Mingos who advocated for peace with the British are naturally the most likely to show up in the English-language archives. It was these leaders who reached out to British officials, made the long journey to conferences at Easton, and conversed openly with the provincial government. Pro-French Native leaders were engaged in active warfare with the

British and less likely to parlay and have their words recorded in perpetuity. Moreover, the

French in Ohio were operating at the absolute end of a long and tenuous chain of forts and simply did not have the record-keeping apparatus available to provincial British officials.24

An accurate determination of French support in the region following the fall of Fort

Duquesne has significant intellectual payoff. It reclaims agency for Indigenous groups and individuals and explores their history beyond reductionist tribal affiliations or regional designations like “Ohio Indians.” Indigenous nations are historicized in relation to each other, rather than only against the settler-colonial apparatus. Groups that continued to support the

French after the Treaty of Easton have been ignored by history. The investigation also serves to counter enduring (if increasingly less common) narratives of “guileless” “Indians” who are deceived by intellectually superior Europeans into signing away their lands before they succumb to an inevitable tide of modernity and civilization. Work that fails to acknowledge the substantial number of individuals who continued to support the French subtly supports this narrative by failing to demonstrate that many Indigenous people understood the geopolitical

24 For an excellent look at the difficulties involved in the transfer of information in the French Atlantic, see Kenneth Banks, Chasing Empire Across the Sea: Communications and the State in the French Atlantic, 1713-1763 (Montréal: McGill-Queen’s University Press, 2006). 12 situation they were facing and were not swayed by the British promises at Easton. Even if the

British government sought to prevent further settlement west of the mountains, numerous leaders understood that landless Europeans would continue to move into Indigenous territory.

Subsequent events like Pontiac’s Rebellion must also be reassessed if enduring support for the

French is established. The rebellion becomes less of an uprising and more of a continuation of the conflict that began in 1755.

Finally, our understanding of the French position in the region is fundamentally changed if the French maintained Indigenous support before and after the fall of Fort Duquesne. Instead of being out abandoned by their Native allies, the French failed to effectively recognize and marshal their support in the region. Their defeat is the result of poor diplomacy and intelligence gathering rather than a complete loss of their alliance. The Lenape, Shawnee, and Mingos did not come to terms with the British as one after the Treaty of Easton. Some groups made peace while others continued to fight and support their alliance with the French. This has not been treated adequately in the historiography and has numerous implications for our understanding of the French and various Indigenous peoples who fought from the Ohio Valley in the Seven Years’

War.

Organization

Chapter 1 investigates the long-standing claim that supply shortages forced the French from the Upper Ohio. I argue that local food sources, captured livestock, and most importantly western supply chains worked in unison to mitigate any shortages. The French had years of experience dealing with poor Canadian harvests, and Fort Duquesne had the unique advantage of a water route connecting it to the astoundingly fertile Illinois Country. Food shortages did not produce the French defeat, and another cause must be identified. Chapter 2 examines the

13 diplomatic situation in the region up to the abandonment of Fort Duquesne. I trace the development of Anglophile factions on the Upper Ohio as they work to sway other groups to their position. Ultimately, I argue that when Fort Duquesne was abandoned the French still maintained numerous supporters in the region. Chapter 3 investigates the disposition of

Indigenous groups on the Upper Ohio from the fall of Fort Duquesne to the Battle of La Belle-

Famille in July of the following year. I use evidence of continued Indigenous attacks on British supply lines and large numbers of assembled allies at Fort Machault to demonstrate that

Francophile sentiment continued to run high even after the supposed end of the alliance. Many

Indigenous groups saw alliance with the French as the best way to guarantee the continued independence of the Ohio Valley from both Europeans and the Six Nations. Their actions in pursuing this vision will finally be brought to light and French diplomatic failures will be belatedly exposed as the result of their own incompetence in utilizing Indigenous support.

Figure 1. European territorial claims at the start of the Seven Years’ War. Much of the territory claimed by France and Great Britain was in reality inhabited and controlled by Indigenous nations. Map is from Wikimedia Commons.

14

Chapter 1. Horsemeat and Habitants

On the surface, material shortages offer an appealing explanation for the French defeat at the Forks of the Ohio in November 1758. The French famously struggled to achieve productive harvests in Canada, and British naval superiority provides a logical reason for the inability of the metropole to consistently resupply its erstwhile colony. Likewise, the capture of Fort Frontenac and Francois-Marie Le Marchand de Lignery’s final letters from Fort Duquesne contribute to the perception that the outpost was down to its last few allotments of corn and salted meat.

However, these logical conclusions lack the wider context of French North America. The pays d’en haut and Illinois Country had been major suppliers of foodstuffs to Fort Duquesne during the war and their productive farmlands more than offset the inconsistency of supply lines from

Canada. The western supply lines were safe from British attack, and despite arduous journeys across Lake Erie or up the Ohio River the French routinely managed to deliver supplies from their western outposts.25

Other hypotheses that posit “overhunting” on the Upper Ohio ignore evidence that the region still contained plenty of fauna for subsistence hunting. Individual accounts recorded travelers, fleeing captives, and soldiers who sustained themselves without difficulty via wild game into 1759. It wasn’t until the large-scale migration of white homesteaders to the region in the early 19th century that the “unsurpassed hunting area” of the Ohio began to falter.26

Moreover, the arguments citing material shortages ignore French successes in countering

General Forbes’ 1758 campaign for the Forks. On multiple occasions, large quantities of draft animals were captured from the British and supplemented Fort Duquesne’s reserves of food.

25 Paul Mapp, The Elusive West and the Contest for Empire, 1713-1763 (Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 2011), 265. 26 Sleeper-Smith, Indigenous Prosperity, 19. 15

When combined with local food sources and western supply convoys, the captured livestock provided more than enough food for the French to maintain Fort Duquesne over another winter.

I. Forbes’ Campaign

The French supply situation on the Upper Ohio in 1758 unfolded against the backdrop of

General John Forbes’ campaign to take the Forks. Forbes, a fifty-year old Scot, had a reputation for administrative competence that had been sorely missing in Braddock’s infamous campaign three years earlier.27 Whereas Braddock rushed headlong towards Fort Duquesne and suffered a humiliating defeat, Forbes planned a methodical offensive that established key forts and supply lines. His plan ensured that unlike in the aftermath of Braddock’s hubristic defeat in 1755, a single battlefield loss would not catastrophically expose the Middle Colonies to offensives by

French and Indigenous forces.

Despite Forbes’ methodical approach, his campaign suffered a continuous series of defeats as it cut a road from Pennsylvania to Fort Duquesne. On September 12th, Colonel Henry

Bouquet sent Major James Grant to reconnoiter and raid Fort Duquesne without Forbes’ permission. The raiding force managed to reach Fort Duquesne undetected, but were thoroughly routed by French and Indigenous forces when Grant decided to engage in open battle. The 750 regulars and provincial soldiers under Grant’s command suffered a heavy defeat, losing 291 men and officers killed or captured (including Major Grant himself) and another 40 seriously wounded.28 Forbes, fighting severe illnesses and committed to a slow, orderly advance on Fort

27 Anderson, Crucible of War, 233-235. 28 Ward, Breaking the Backcountry, 175. Ward obtains his casualty figures from “List of Killed & Wounded at Ft. Duquesne,” Sept. 14, 1758, Shippen Family Papers: Military Notebook No. 7. 16

Duquesne, was greatly distressed by both the loss of men and the continued strength his adversaries demonstrated.29

Exactly a month later on October 12th, Forbes would suffer another defeat when a force of 600 fighters conducted a raid on the post at Loyalhanna (Fort Ligonier). Most Anishinaabe,

Wyandot, and other pays d’en haut allies had returned home following the defeat of Grant’s column, but the battle at Loyalhanna demonstrated that local French, Lenape, Shawnee, and

Mingo were more than a match for the advancing British force.30 The attackers pinned a force twice their size within the fort while they made off with hundreds of cattle and packhorses from

Forbes’ logistics train. On November 11th, Forbes convened a council of war and determined that with the approach of winter, any further campaigning risked the loss of his entire army. He made the decision to enter winter quarters and restart the offensive during the next campaigning season. The following day, another attack at Loyalhanna resulted in British losses when two of their own units accidently opened fire on each other.31 The unfortunate incident seemed to be a fitting end to a wasted campaign. However, the British did manage to capture three prisoners, including one with the Anglophone surname “Johnson”. The interrogation of this prisoner would provide information that completely reversed the development of the British operation.32

Johnson told Forbes that the French had greatly reduced their garrison size to prepare for the winter, that the walls of the fort were unimpressive, and that rations were running low.33

While some of Johnson’s intelligence would later be revealed to be inaccurate, this information

29 Forbes to General Abercromby, September 21, 1758, in Writings of General John Forbes Relating to His Service in North America, ed. Alfred Procter James (Menasha, Wis.: The Collegiate Press, 1938), 218; see also Forbes to Bouquet, September 23, 1758, in James, Writings, 219. 30 Anderson, Crucible of War, 281. 31 Forbes to Abercromby, November 17, 1758, in James, Writings, 255. 32 Douglas R. Cubbison, The British Defeat of the French in Pennsylvania, 1758: A Military History of the Forbes Campaign Against Fort Duquesne (London: McFarland & Company, Inc., 2010), 154. 33 Cubbison, The British Defeat of the French in Pennsylvania, 1758, 154. 17 gave Forbes the impetus he needed to restart the campaign a day after the decision to abandon the offensive had been made. On November 23, as Forbes’ army approached Fort Duquesne,

Lignery reduced the fort’s walls to smoking rubble and gifted the British control of the strategically vital confluence of the Allegheny and Monongahela rivers. Forbes’ army managed to accomplish its goals without any victories in the field, and subsequent evaluations have credited diplomatic breakthroughs and a dire French logistics situation with the triumph.

However, the French military victories in the second half of 1758 reflect a wider strength that belies assumptions about strategic logistical shortcomings. Just as the French and local Lenape,

Shawnee, and Mingo were experienced in the most effective methods of warfare in the region, they had also spent years refining and optimizing their supply chains. Their robust and overlapping systems ensured that the Forks would not be abandoned for want of food or ammunition.

Figure 2. Forts on the Ohio front and the two routes British invasion forces took to dislodge the French. Map is from Wikimedia Commons.

18

II. French Patterns of Sustainment in the Ohio Valley

In military campaigns, sustainment is “the support necessary to maintain operations until mission accomplishment.”34 The timely delivery of food, equipment, and munitions is essential for a military force to effectively conduct itself in battle. For the wide-ranging fort system of

New France, successful sustainment required a complex and multi-faceted approach. Bitterly cold Canadian winters and the frequent deployment of militia made crop failures a chronic problem in New France. Flour and salt pork regularly arrived from the French metropole in naval convoys and were essential in supplementing Canadian production and provisioning both the civilian and military populace of Canada.35 In years when the harvest was particularly bad, such as 1757, even provisions from France were not sufficient to prevent starvation among the civilian population of Canada and horse meat was issued to supplement meager stocks of food.36

Once these foodstuffs arrived or were harvested in farms along the St. Lawrence River, a long journey by bateaux and land was required to deliver them to distant posts like Fort

Duquesne. Intercepted naval convoys, mother nature, theft, and enemy forces could all take their toll on this long supply chain. While the French Intendant François Bigot was frequently accused of corruption (and convicted after the war), inefficient administration was often just as harmful as outright graft. In June of 1757, Louis Antoine de Bougainville reported that an inspection conducted by the government of New France on its own citizens found enough grain

“to feed an army of 12,800 for a month.”37 Bougainville was a regular army officer serving under the Marquis de Montcalm, and his disdain for New France and its citizens is well

34 Department of the Army, Sustainment, ADP 4-0 (Washington, DC: Department of the Army, 2019), v. 35 Anderson, Crucible of War, 200. 36 Louis Antoine de Bougainville, “September 9, 1757” and “December 12, 1757-March 1, 1758,” Adventure in the Wilderness: The American Journals of Louis Antoine de Bougainville, 1756-1760, trans. Edward P. Hamilton (Norman: University of Oklahoma Press, 1964), 181, 195. 37 Bougainville, Adventure in the Wilderness, 119. 19 documented. While his personal biases color his commentary, his notes on the inspection remain a valuable source. Even in years of plenty, bureaucracy and personal greed inhibited French sustainment efforts.

The well-documented difficulties involved in provisioning New France and her armed forces were manifold. Crucially, however, the French had decades of experience in dealing with these problems. Commanders at far-flung forts and political officials knew that Canadian harvests frequently failed, supply ships were often captured by the British, and that embezzlement regularly occurred at the king’s expense. Thus, Individual French commanders supplemented their allotted rations wherever possible. Gardens and cornfields outside a fort’s walls were tilled by the garrison to mitigate some supply uncertainty, while hunting and fishing supplemented the available meat.38

The Ohio Country was famous for the richness of its flora and fauna, and the vibrant diversity of plant and animal life meant the French stationed in the region had numerous opportunities to complement official state rations.39 Corn was planted in abundance for both

French soldiers and Indigenous allies.40 Well into 1758, a year when historians have posited the large number of Europeans in the region “may have contributed to the problem by chasing game away,” contemporary accounts exist that speak to the continued richness of the famous Ohio hunting grounds.41 The Moravian missionary Christian Frederick Post’s two trips to the region in late 1758 were made possible in part by the ability to live off the land. Post and his

Indigenous companions routinely hunted to sustain themselves as they maneuvered between two

38 J. C. Bonnefons, Voyage Au Canada: Dans Le Nord De L’Amerique Septentrionale: Fait Depuis L’an 1751 a 1761, ed. Henri Raymond Casgrain (Quebec: Imprimerie Leger Brousseau, 1887), 129, 149, 152. Translations are my own. 39 Sleeper-Smith, Indigenous Prosperity, 14-27. 40 “Further Examination of Michael La Chauvignerie,” Pennsylvania Archives (hereafter PA), ed. Samuel Hazard (Philadelphia: Joseph Severns & Co., 1853), 3:305; “Examination of Francois Fevre, 1758,” ibid., 3:363. 41 McConnell, A Country Between, 125. 20 opposing armies.42 Most French accounts are more concerned with supply lines than local game, but those that do mention hunting in the region give no indication of a decline.43 Even by the spring of 1759, hunting prospects in the region remained healthy enough that one small group fleeing Indigenous captivity sustained themselves near Fort Duquesne with multiple deer in the span of four days.44

Beyond growing and hunting for their own food, trading provided another opportunity for the French to augment their food supplies. Indeed, French traders in the Ohio Country had relied on the region’s permanent residents for food long before Fort Duquesne was established in

1754.45 Manufactured metal goods, textiles, firearms, and gunpowder were all in high demand among Indigenous nations of the region, and food surpluses were readily incorporated into rituals of mutual gift-giving and trade. While unfavorable farming conditions might affect both the

French and their allies, Indigenous experience and expertise gave them an upper hand in dealing with the vagaries of weather and flooding. At Fort Niagara in early 1758, “Indian Squas from the Seneka Towns near the Fort were employed in carrying them Indian Corn, which they sold at a great Price, and so eager were the French to get it…[that they would] pull off their Cloaths, and even their Shirts, and give them to the Indians.”46 In this example, the traditional supply system was inadequately provisioning the French at Niagara. However, their overlapping systems of sustainment (in this case, trade with their Seneca neighbors) allowed them to maintain their position even in the face of logistical failures.

42 Christian Frederick Post, “August 11, 1758” and “November 14, 1758,” Early Western Travels, 1748-1846 Vol. 1, ed. Reuben Thwaites (Cleveland: The A.H. Clark Company, 1904-1907), 192, 248. 43 J.C. Bonnefons, Voyage, 129-162. Bonnefons was present at Fort Duquesne for nearly three years. 44 Hugh Gibson, ”An Account of the Captivity of Hugh Gibson Among the Delaware Indians of the Big Beaver and the Muskingum, from the Latter Part of July 1756, to the Beginning of April, 1759,”Collections of the Massachusetts Historical Society ser. 3 v. 6 (Boston: American Stationers’ Company, 1837), 151. 45 Sleeper-Smith, Indigenous Prosperity, 83. 46 Charles Thompson and Christian Frederick Post, “Report of Chas. Thomson and F. Post, of Journey 1758,” PA, 3:415. 21

The singularly most important aspect of Fort Duquesne’s logistics was the Illinois

Country. New France’s far west is rarely mentioned in accounts of the Seven Years’ War, but its relatively large population (around 3,000 habitants by 1752) provided a vital source of food far removed from Canadian and metropolitan supply lines.47 The fertile farmlands of the

Mississippi watershed had long allowed the French to prevent starvation in New Orleans and lower Louisiana through the export of corn, pork, and upwards of 40,000 bushels of wheat annually.48 This agricultural production could also be diverted to Fort Duquesne via the Ohio

River. The journey upriver to western Pennsylvania from southern Illinois was long and arduous, with supply convoys paddling and pulling bateaux hundreds of miles against the current. Low water levels sometimes forced extended portages with boats and supplies carried around rapids by hand. However, the British were incapable of contesting French movement on the Lower Ohio and the fertility of the Illinois Country was far more reliable than difficult

Canadian agriculture. The Governor-General of New France, Pierre de Rigaud de Vaudreuil, quickly recognized the value of New France’s far western settlements. Despite the difficulty involved in making a long, upriver journey, he established Illinois (and to a lesser extent, Fort

Detroit) as the principal supplier of foodstuffs to Fort Duquesne. By the summer of 1758, the regular “convoy from the Illinois” was providing food security for Fort Duquesne and solidified the French position by diversifying their logistics networks.49

III. Fort Duquesne’s Supply Situation in 1758

Food shortages in Canada had negative impacts on all of New France, but soldiers at Fort

Duquesne were spared the worst of the privations. New France has been described as a colony

47 Winstanley Briggs, “Le Pays Des Illinois.” The William and Mary Quarterly 47, no. 1 (1990), 30. 48 Briggs, “Le Pays Des Illinois,” 51-52. 49 Vaudreuil to the Minister of the Marine, July 28, 1758, in Wilderness Chronicles of Northwestern Pennsylvania, eds. Sylvester K. Stevens and Donald H. Kent (Harrisburg: Pennsylvania Historical Commission, 1941), 114. 22 whose primary industry was war, and as a result the army received priority in the allocation of provisions.50 In September of 1757, citizens of Quebec were rationed to four ounces of bread per day. Meanwhile, soldiers were still receiving four pounds of bread per week two months later when the food situation had grown even worse.51 The soldiers’ ration of bread was more than twice that of citizens in Quebec, and even if one takes into account less than uniform early modern standards of measurement, the disparity remains sharp. Civilians would be fed only after the army was provisioned and capable of campaigning.

Sacrificing civilian provisions for army needs helped make food available for Fort

Duquesne, but Governor-General Vaudreuil recognized that more sustainable measures would need to be taken to ensure a continued French presence at the Forks. In July of 1757,

Vaudreuil’s solution was to place the responsibility for provisioning Lignery’s garrison wholly with the Illinois Country. Vaudreuil ordered his subordinates in Illinois and Detroit to reduce the habitants in their region to mere subsistence so that Fort Duquesne and other posts on the

“Beautiful River” (the Ohio) would be able to make it through the winter. He also directed

Lignery to disperse some of his troops to Illinois, reducing the logistical burden at Fort

Duquesne.52 A year and a half before Lignery was characterized as “running short of provisions…[and] desperate to force a decision,” the French demonstrated flexibility and foresight in moderating the impact of supply shortages.53 While hunger raged throughout

Canada in the winter and spring of 1757-1758, the forced sacrifices of Canadian civilians and the breadbasket of Illinois kept Fort Duquesne provisioned.

50 W.J. Eccles, “The Social, Economic, and Political Significance of the Military Establishment in New France.” The Canadian Historical Review 52, no. 1 (1971): 1-22. 51 Bougainville, “October 14, 1757” and “December 10-22, 1757,” Adventure, 182, 187. 52 Vaudreuil to Moras, Montréal, July 12, 1757, in Documents Relative to the Colonial History of the State of New York (hereafter NYCD), ed. E.B. O’Callaghan (Albany: Weed, Parsons, and Company, 1858), 10:580-83 53 William M. Fowler Jr., Empires at War: The French and Indian War and the Struggle for North America, 1754- 1763 (New York: Walker and Company, 2005), 161. 23

French sustainment in the Ohio Valley would face what appeared to be its most difficult challenge following the destruction of Fort Frontenac in August of 1758. Frontenac was an entrepot of provisions and goods from Canada and France to the pays d’en haut and Ohio Valley.

In the summer of 1758, its storehouses held enormously valuable stocks of food and goods to help far-flung French outposts through the winter.54 Despite the logistical importance of the fort it had a small garrison and poor fortifications, relying for its defense on a flotilla of sloops patrolling Lake Ontario. In late August, a well-armed British force under Colonel John

Bradstreet was able to sneak across the lake and had little trouble seizing Frontenac, destroying it, and retreating before reinforcements could stop them. Upon the surrender of the fort,

Bradstreet reported that the French garrison lamented “that their troops to the southwards and western garrisons will suffer greatly, if not entirely starve, for want of the provisions…we have destroyed.”55 Governor-General Vaudreuil did not share Colonel Bradstreet’s conclusions and was not as pessimistic in his assessment as the captured garrison of Frontenac. While he acknowledged the loss of considerable provisions and munitions he also quickly organized small resupply missions to neighboring Fort Niagara.56 As evidenced by his order the year prior that the habitants of the Illinois Country supply Fort Duquesne, Vaudreuil understood that the western posts could fulfill supply shortages caused by the destruction of Frontenac.

The loss of Fort Frontenac did not result in dire food shortages at the Forks. The poor

Canadian harvest and famine of 1757 had led to the establishment of the Illinois Country as Fort

Duquesne’s primary provisioner and the disruption of Canadian supply lines did nothing to impact convoys up the Ohio River. The Great Lakes supply route through Fort Frontenac had

54 Doreil to Belle Isle, September 1, 1758, NYCD, 10:821. 55 Anderson, Crucible of War, 264. 56 Vaudreuil to Massiac, September 2, 1758, NYCD, 10:822-23. 24 become the supplementary supply line for Fort Duquesne after Vaudreuil’s order, with the

Illinois Country producing an oft-overlooked impact on the war. In July of 1758, a convoy from

Illinois arrived at the fort with thousands of pounds of food and trade goods including tobacco.57

Accompanying the convoy was the accomplished Captain Charles-Philippe Aubry with 240

Illinois militiamen to bolster the French alliance in the valley.58 The French forces in the Ohio

Valley, reinforced and resupplied by Illinois in July of 1758, would continue their pattern of military success unhindered by logistics issues.

Figure 3. The voyage to Fort Duquesne from the Illinois Country and Detroit is marked above in red. The journey from Montreal, marked above in yellow, was quicker but also more exposed. The British would take advantage of this when they captured Fort Frontenac in August of 1758, but they were unable to harass the western supply lines. Base map is from the Florida Center for Instructional Technology. Edits are my own.

57 J.C. Bonnefons, Voyage, 163; see also Vaudreuil to the Minister of the Marine, 28 July, 1758, Archives Nationales d’outre-mer (France), C11A, 103/fol. 114-117. Translation is my own. 58 J.C. Bonnefons, Voyage, 162. 25

The Illinois militia and Captain Aubry would first make their presence felt on September

12, 1758 when they performed well in the defeat of Major James Grant’s hasty attack near Fort

Duquesne. A month later, on October 12, 600 fighters under the command of Captain Aubry conducted a raid on the important British forward post at Loyalhanna. The attack inflicted numerous casualties on the British and led to the destruction or capture of 200-400 of their cattle and packhorses.59 While accounts in the Pennsylvania Gazette and some historians have characterized the operation as “desperate” or “failed”, in reality it accomplished its limited objectives.60 October was late in the campaigning season, and a significant disruption to the

British advance was all that was needed to force them to take up winter quarters before they made it to the Forks. Colonel Bouquet, appraising General Forbes of the situation, wrote that

“The affair, between ourselves, appears humiliating to me. A thousand men keep more than

1500 blockaded, carry off all their horses, and retire undisturbed.” He continued by mentioning he was sending a party to observe the Ohio River to see if more boats bringing reinforcements and supplies were continuing to arrive at Fort Duquesne.61 British concern regarding the Illinois supply convoys is enlightening. Bouquet’s actions validate the importance of this supply route and support the idea that Canadian supply lines through Fort Frontenac were of secondary importance. In order to starve out Fort Duquesne, the British would have to isolate the fort from the Illinois Country. This would prove to be an impossible task, as even when the British seized

59 Pierre Pouchot, Memoir Upon the Late War in North America Between the French and English, 1755-1760 ed. Franklin B. Hough (Roxbury, Mass.: W.E. Woodward, 1866), 129-130; Comte Maurès de Malartic, “January 17, 1758,” Glories to Useless Heroism: The American Journals of Comte Maurès de Malartic ed. William Raffle (Solihull, UK: Helion and Company Limited, 2017), 193. Pouchot lists 200 hundred cattle and oxen while Malartic states that the French and their Indigenous allies “killed or took four hundred horses and many oxen.” 60 Fregault, Canada, 224; Auth, Ten Years’ War, 51; “Extract of a Letter from Loyalhanning,” The Pennsylvania Gazette, October 26, 1758. 61 Bouquet to Forbes, October 15, 1758, Papers, 560. 26 the Forks the French still sent Illinois convoys to the region via other waterways leading to Lake

Erie.62

The most important result of the October 12th battle at Loyalhanna was not the destruction of the British pack animals or the casualties inflicted by the Franco-Indigenous force.

Instead, the capture of some cattle and enough horses that “our people returned almost all mounted” represents a critical development in the French effort to sustain their position.63 The cattle represented a welcome addition to beef supplies at Forks, but the horses were also used for sustenance. The issuance of horse meat in the winter of 1757 for rations had caused a minor riot among civilians in Montreal and soldiers initially refused to take any.64 The consumption of horse had religious and cultural prohibitions in Early Modern France, and could be seen as yet another sign of the corruption that many cited as a trademark of close association with

Indigenous North America. However, the animals also represented a source of sustainment that could be utilized if necessitated by military requirements.

The soldiers at Fort Duquesne made use of horsemeat despite its associated taboos. The journal of Christian Frederick Post records a meeting between some Lenape and a French officer in which the Lenape claim to have seen the French “scalp horses, and take others for food. The first he [French captain] denied but the second he owned.”65 The records of the fort’s quartermaster likewise list nine horses, twenty-one dogs, seventy-nine oxen, and twelve cows as being consumed during the months of September through November of 1758.66 The records are mixed with rations consumed by Indigenous allies, so it remains unclear who consumed the

62 Vaudreuil to the Minister of the Marine, Montréal, January 20, 1759, Wilderness Chronicles, 129. 63 Pouchot, Memoir, 130. 64 Bougainville, “December 12, 1757-March 1, 1758,” Adventure, 195. 65 Post, “November 20, 1758,” Early Western Travels, 254. 66 Garaud, “Carte Menstruale des Consommations Faites au Fort Duqué du 15 Juin au 23 Novembre 1758,” Papiers Contrecoeur et Autres Documents Concernant le Conflit Anglo-Français sur l’Ohio de 1745 à 1756, ed. Fernand Grenier (Québec: les Presses Universitaires Laval, 1952) 429-430. 27 animals and if “consumption” refers specifically to the animals being eaten. Regardless, the capture of such a vast quantity of livestock, combined with stores of food from Illinois, further enhanced food security at Fort Duquesne. Ironically, the close proximity of the British forces provided an additional food source for the French.

Using warfare to supplement food stocks was not a new development on the Ohio front.

As early as 1755, war parties penetrating deep into British territory captured oxen, cows, and horses.67 The victorious French and their Indigenous allies would drive back what livestock they could, but much of what they captured was killed in the interest of time. As Forbes’ army drew closer to the Forks of the Ohio, it became easier to drive captured livestock the short distance back to Fort Duquesne and the surrounding towns. The hundreds of cattle and horses purportedly taken from Loyalhanna represented a boon for the French and added another redundancy to their logistics network.

After the successful October operation at Loyalhanna, both Lignery and the Marquis du

Montcalm (the commander-in-chief of French forces in North America) assumed that their efforts to delay the British advance had succeeded.68 By November any change in the weather would be disastrous for the advancing British forces operating at the end of a long, tenuous supply line. Their assessment was shared by a council of war convened by General Forbes on

November 11, after which Colonel Bouquet listed the arguments for and against continuing their advance and glumly concluded that, “The risks being so obviously greater than the advantages, there is no doubt as to the sole course that prudence dictates.”69

67 “Abstract of Despatches from America,” NYCD, 10:486. 68 Montcalm to Cremille, 21 November, 1758, NYCD, 10:901. 69 Bouquet, “November 11, 1758”, Papers, 600. 28

The following day, the French conducted another successful raid at Loyalhanna that again netted the seizure of livestock and resulted in the aforementioned capture of prisoner

“Johnson.”70 Unfortunately for the French, the intelligence Forbes gained from Johnson changed his decision and led him to continue his campaign. In an effort to conserve supplies (but not dictated by their absence), Lignery sent home part of the Illinois militia, allies from the pays d’en haut returned home, and the garrison at Duquesne settled in for the winter after another successful campaigning season.71

IV. Gifts and Trade Goods: French Logistics and their Indigenous Allies

The multitude of strategies employed by the French to sustain their positions on the

Upper Ohio created an overlapping network that was impervious to a single failure. Provisions from the west ensured that the destruction of Fort Frontenac was successfully mitigated while vast quantities of captured livestock supplemented western convoys. This successful network did not address one important issue, however. Trade goods, often referred to as “Indian goods,” could not be supplied by the same system that provisioned French forces on the Upper Ohio.

The Illinois Country was an agricultural breadbasket, but it imported its own manufactured trade goods from New Orleans. Raids on British livestock likewise did not provide items typically associated with the ritualized gift-giving that was essential to the French role of “father” to their

Indigenous allies.

Ritualized gift-giving was integral to French alliances with their Indigenous allies.

Ranging from manufactured goods like kettles and hatchets to textiles and muskets, French gifts to Native Americans were not payments or bribes. Rather, in the pays d’en haut they served to extend kinship and social ties from a French “father” to his Native American children. Important

70 Anderson, Crucible of War, 282. 71 Montcalm to Cremille, November 21, 1758, NYCD, 10:901 29 to this concept is that in many Indigenous nations, fathers were “kind, generous, and protecting.

A child owed a father respect, but a father could not compel obedience.”72 Gifts would also play an important part of French alliances in the Ohio Valley, and their reduction has been blamed for decreasing Indigenous enthusiasm to for the war and ultimately causing the fall of Fort

Duquesne.73

The assumption that a diminishment of gifts caused France’s allies to exit their mutual alliance is problematic for two reasons. The first is that it reduces Indigenous participation in the battle for the Ohio Valley to simple material concerns. While trade goods certainly factored into

Native decision making, the single most important element of the decision to go to war was the desire to keep European settlements (beyond trading forts) out of the valley. The primacy of

Ohioan independence and concern with European possession of their lands is a central point in many recorded transcriptions of Indigenous leaders.74 The motivation to fight was not born from

French seducement with gifts, but from a desire to remain independent of European encroachment.

The second problem with using a shortage of “Indian goods” to explain Indigenous withdrawal from the war is that the evidence supporting a shortage is decidedly mixed. In

January of 1758, the Comte Maurès de Malartic, an aide-major in the Regiment of Béarn stationed in Canada, reported in his journal that at Fort Duquesne “the savages baulk at going to war as they have not received many presents.”75 While writings like this superficially appear to provide evidence of a detrimental shortage of “Indian goods”, the reality is much more complicated. Eighteenth century military forces, including Indigenous forces, generally adopted

72 White, The Middle Ground, 84, 95, 244. 73 Crouch, Nobility Lost, 225; Ward, “Fighting the ‘Old Women’”, 307; Ward, Breaking the Backcountry, 165. 74 Kakowatchiky, “Speech of Ackowanothio, September 1758,”PA, 3:548-550. 75 Malartic, “January, 18, 1758,” Glories to Useless Heroism, 153. 30 winter quarters and did not campaign during the season. Snow could make mountain passes and forests treacherous, while illness and frostbite added to already high non-combat casualty rates.

Regular army officers from metropolitan France were also notoriously unwilling or unable to understand and adapt to Indigenous martial traditions.76 The metropolitan concept of Native allies was often similar to that of paid mercenaries, when in reality it was closer to “the many

Greek armies assembling to attack Troy.”77 The French occupied a prominent role in the war against the British, but they did not give orders and commands to their allies. Rather, they had to cajole and negotiate acceptable modes of violence in order to reach a shared consensus with diverse Indigenous groups from across the continent. A regular officer like Malartic may have interpreted Indigenous refusal to campaign as due to a lack of payment in “presents”, but it is more feasible that the groups he spoke of would not campaign for the winter anyway and were simply trying to negotiate improved gifts from their French “father” in the spring. The people of the Upper Ohio in particular had motivations that superseded material concerns, as their home was directly entangled in the war via the presence of European armies.

There is also evidence that directly contradicts the idea of material shortages disrupting the French alliance, as Christian Frederick Post recorded on his journey to inform the

Upper Ohio of the peace terms offered at Easton. In the fall of 1758, Post was confronted by numerous groups who continued to be outspoken in favor of the French with some holding the opinion that “The English never give the Indians any powder, and that the French would have given him a horseload, if he would have taken it.”78 Shortages in munitions were certainly never an issue as evidenced by the vast quantities available to destroy Duquesne upon its

76 Christian Ayne Crouch’s Nobility Lost is an excellent treatment of the differing martial traditions of Native Americans, Canadians, and metropolitan French. 77 Crouch, Nobility Lost, 3. 78 Post, “August 25, 1758,” Early Western Travels, 209. 31 abandonment.79 The use of trade good shortages to explain the decision to make a separate peace does not accurately reflect Indigenous war goals or their ability to dictate events in the

Ohio Valley.

V. “Readiness to March at an Hour’s Warning”80: Defeat from the Jaws of Victory

On November 23, 1758 Colonel Henry Bouquet reported that “a very thick smoak” had been observed near Fort Duquesne. Shortly thereafter scouts confirmed the fort’s walls had been mined and destroyed, the outbuildings had been burned down, and the main French force had fled north to Fort Machault.81 Previous historiography has treated this event almost as inevitable, with long-documented supply shortages (especially the sacking of Fort Frontenac) rendering the

French position unsustainable.

Before the destruction of Fort Duquesne, its quartermasters took stock of the supplies in its stores. Nine days-worth of rations were distributed to the garrison dispersing to the north, while eighteen days-worth of rations were distributed to the Illinois militia for their journey down the Ohio River. Over a month’s worth of corn and tobacco was left at the fort to be burned.82 This surplus of provisions was apparently accompanied by “all the Indian Goods burnt in their Stores which seems to have been very considerable.”83 Further “Indian goods” were sent to nearby Native American allies in a diplomatic gesture.84 The primacy of Illinois in supplying the Forks had relegated Fort Frontenac to secondary importance and created a sufficient supply situation that could hardly be described as “a scarcity of provisions.”85

79 For French ammunition surpluses, see Cubbison, The British Defeat of the French in Pennsylvania, 155. 80 George Washington, “Orderly Book, 13 November 1758,” The Papers of George Washington, eds. W. W. Abbot and Dorothy Twohig (Charlottesville: University Press of Virginia, 1988), 123-124. 81 Bouquet to William Allen, November 25, 1758, The Papers of Henry Bouquet Vol. 2, 610. 82 Garaud, Papiers Contrecoeur, 431. 83 Bouquet to William Allen, November 25, 1758, The Papers of Henry Bouquet Vol. 2, 610. 84 Vaudreuil to the Minister of the Marine, January 20, 1759, Wilderness Chronicles, 128. 85 Auth, Ten Years’ War, 51. 32

The fall of Fort Duquesne in 1758 was not the result of operational supply failures. The

French developed redundant systems to ensure that the Upper Ohio remained provisioned, and these systems remained effective through 1759.86 “Indian goods” were consistently available at

Fort Duquesne as well, with new convoys full of “merchandise” arriving shortly before the fort’s fall and a considerable surplus distributed before Lignery fled.87 While logically consistent with the underlying scarcity present in Canada, narratives that contend logistics failures caused the

French loss of the Forks ignore the importance of New France’s western possessions and fail to fully investigate the myriad methods employed by the French to sustain themselves, allies from further afield, and the local Lenape, Shawnee, and Mingos. Instead of blaming French logistics failures for their defeat, it is more constructive to focus on the diplomatic situation on the Upper

Ohio. Unlike their resilient logistics networks, French diplomatic activity in the region left much to be desired and a thorough investigation reveals that they were systematically outdone by

Anglophile Indigenous groups and their own failures.

86 Vaudreuil, “Summary of the Plan of General Operations for the Campaign of 1759, April 1759,” Wilderness Chronicles, 154. 87 Malartic, “September 24, 1758,” Glories to Useless Heroism, 186. 33

Chapter 2. You Have Disturbed Our Peace

The inaccurate assertion that supply shortages dictated the abandonment of Fort

Duquesne is reflective of biases in older scholarship. Early work on the region focused almost entirely on the role of Europeans and marginalized Indigenous agency and power. The release of

Richard White’s The Middle Ground and the renewed emphasis on Indigenous history that accompanied it led to new conclusions about the fall of Fort Duquesne. When White wrote that the local Lenape and Shawnee’s refusal to come to Fort Duquesne’s aid “made the rotten and crumbling post untenable,” he acknowledged the power held by Indigenous groups in the region.88 Subsequent scholarship further expounded on this position, arguing that Fort Duquesne could not be sustained without the help of the Lenape and Shawnee.89

Lenape, Shawnee, and Mingo leaders were acutely informed of the geopolitical balance of power between the French and British in the Ohio Valley. Their appraisal of their own strategic position is present in scattered transcriptions of their words throughout colonial archives. These assessments demonstrate incredible foresight and a remarkable depth of knowledge. In September of 1758, an elderly Shawnee leader from the Ohio named

Kakowatchiky (Ackowanothio) spoke on behalf of his people and others living along the Ohio

River.90 Kakowatchiky had been a leader among the Shawnee in Pennsylvania for decades and had a long history of interaction with Europeans. He articulated why his people continued to side with the French a mere two months before the “Ohio Indians” purportedly accepted the

Treaty of Easton and made peace with the British. He also argued that “your Nation always

88 White, The Middle Ground, 252. 89 Witgen, An Infinity of Nations, 313; Hinderaker, Elusive Empires, 144; Crouch, Nobility Lost, 119; Anderson, Crucible of War, 282-283. 90 McConnell, A Country Between, 300; Paul A.W. Wallace, Indians in Pennsylvania (Darby, PA: Diane Publishing Co., 1964), 125. 34 shewed an eagerness to settle our lands,” and that despite moving west along the Ohio and attempting to reach an accommodation with the impoverished, lower-class Europeans who followed “your covetousness for Land…distrub’d our peace again.” The great masses of the expanding British colonies seemed to constantly multiply and the continued advance of General

Forbes’ army on the Ohio made Kakowatchiky distrustful of any peace overtures. Kakowatchiky understood that the Indigenous people of the Ohio could “drive away the French when we please,” and that the advance of a British army signaled more than a desire to force out the

French.91

Kakowatchiky’s understanding of the situation proved prescient. The British army established a permanent post at Fort Pitt, the French proved to be less powerful than their

Indigenous allies, and neither the Treaty of Easton nor the Proclamation of 1763 would prevent

Europeans from moving west of the Alleghenies. Despite the legitimacy and accuracy of his worries, Kakowatchiky concluded his speech with an assurance to Conrad Weiser that “the

Indians are heartily inclined to make a lasting peace with you.”92 Kakowatchiky’s conclusion leads back to the historiographical problem inherent in many treatments of the “Ohio Indians” and the Treaty of Easton. The numerous protests and well-founded suspicions of Kakowatchiky were seemingly overruled by his desire for peace.93 However, his long list of grievances provided ample reason for conflict and he clearly could not speak for all Indigenous groups on

91 Kakowatchiky, “Speech of Ackowanothio, September 1758,”PA, 3:548-550. 92 Ibid., 550. 93 The use of the word “seemingly” here is deliberate. An Indigenous person from the Ohio would have had to travel far from their home, power base, and allies in order to show up in the Pennsylvania Archives speaking to an official like Conrad Weiser. In September of 1758, this would have meant the delegation Kakowatchiky was a part of was deep in enemy territory on a diplomatic mission. Their responses would have necessarily been calculated and couched to maintain negotiating position and to prevent trouble on their journey home. This does not mean that Kakowatchiky did not have a desire for peace, only that it is important to consider the context and concerns when evaluating sources like his speech. 35 the Ohio. Would Indigenous groups with such an accurate understanding of the situation in the

Ohio Country really abandon the French en masse?

This chapter argues that the “Ohio Indians” did not present a unified response to British peace overtures in late 1758. Instead, some groups among the Lenape, Shawnee, and Mingo accepted the terms of the Treaty of Easton while others continued in their alliance with the

French. Geography, kinship networks, group affiliations, and individual motivations all played a role in determining who accepted the peace and who joined the French in their plans to retake the

Forks of the Ohio following Fort Duquesne’s fall in November of 1758.

I. The Upper Ohio Country Before 1758: Paradise Lost and Found

One hundred years before the start of the Seven Years’ War, the eastern Ohio Valley was a fertile and productive region capable of supporting large numbers of Indigenous communities.

Direct contact with the French in the Upper Ohio was scattered during this period but the impact of European violence and exchange was still felt.94 The most prominent effect was the

Haudenosaunee aggression associated with the “Beaver Wars.” The “Beaver Wars” began as a conflict between the Five Nations and New France. Commercial, demographic, and political concerns led to an extension of the violence throughout the pays d’en haut as the Haudenosaunee increased the range of their attacks and hostilities expanded beyond the original combatants.95

The growth of this violence is often credited with a depopulation of the Ohio Valley by 1680 as inhabitants like the Shawnee fled for safer locations.96 Some of the fleeing groups, originally

94 For limited French contact within the Ohio Country see McConnell, A Country Between, 50-51. 95 Hinderaker, Elusive Empires, 9. After 1722, the Five Nations of the Haudenosaunee would expand to the Six Nations with the inclusion of the Tuscarora. 96 Lakomäki, Gathering Together, 26; Hinderaker, Elusive Empires, 18-19; White, The Middle Ground, 1-5; for doubts about the role Haudenosaunee attacks played in the depopulation of the region see Heidi Bohaker, “’Nindoodemag’: The Significance of Algonquian Kinship Networks in the Eastern Great Lakes Region, 1600- 1701.” The William and Mary Quarterly 63, no. 1 (2006): 23-52. 36 recorded in French documents, would forever vanish from colonial records.97 The memory of this so-called “shatter zone” and the role Europeans played in the carnage doubtless influenced subsequent Shawnee attitudes when conflict once again came to the region. While the exact impact of the “Beaver Wars” remains contested it is clear that by 1700 a significant decline in the population had occurred.

After the blow of the Haudenosaunee assaults many Indigenous peoples used the valley as a vast and rich hunting ground instead of a place of permanent settlement. Haudenosaunee,

Anishinaabe, Lenape, Abenaki, Cherokee, and Creek peoples all traveled long distances to utilize the Ohio Country as a winter hunting preserve.98 French interlopers in the early eighteenth century descended into the region from Lake Erie and described rivers so choked with waterfowl that “one could not get through in a canoe without pushing them aside with the paddle.”99 The area was wealthy in agricultural products, game, and commodifiable furs. However, the changes wrought by prolonged contact with Europeans again brought a demographic shift to the Upper

Ohio. Two generations after the exodus of the “Beaver Wars” the region witnessed a population boom as Indigenous peoples moved into the valley.

The Shawnee and Lenape were the two most prominent groups to move to the Ohio

Valley in the second quarter of the eighteenth century. For the famously diasporic Shawnee, this represented a return to the region after the violence of the “Beaver Wars” and subsequent migrations. They utilized existing networks of kinship and exchange and by 1739 established

97 97 Lakomäki, Gathering Together, 26. 98 Sleeper-Smith, Indigenous Prosperity, 47. 99 Sleeper-Smith, Indigenous Prosperity and American Conquest, 47. The quote is from Jacques-Charles de Sabrevois’ 1718 account. 37 the major town of Sonontio (Lower Shawneetown) at the confluence of the Ohio and Scioto rivers.100

The Lenape had been gradually dispossessed of their homelands among the Delaware

River valleys and their three subdivisions moved further west to escape growing Euro-American populations. By the Seven Years’ War, some Lenape still remained east of the Alleghenies and in the Susquehanna Valley. Those that did venture past the Allegheny mountains to the Upper

Ohio found a bountiful new home shielded from European settlers.101

Figure 4. The pre-European contact homelands of the three subdivisions of the Lenape. In Grimes, Western Delaware Indian Nation, xvii.

100Lakomäki, Gathering Together, 54. 101 White, The Middle Ground, 187-188; Sleeper-Smith, Indigenous Prosperity, 96. 38

Several factors necessitated the decision by Shawnee and Lenape to move to the Upper

Ohio. The land-grabbing of the exponentially expanding British colonists was often fraudulent and was personified by the farcical Walking Purchase of 1737.102 The Walking Purchase was initiated by Pennsylvania’s proprietors and centered on a vague claim to Lenape lands purportedly made in the seventeenth century.103 The Six Nations of the Haudenosaunee pressured the Lenape into accepting the terms of the claim including a stipulation that a day and a half’s walk would determine the boundary of the cession. The Lenape understood the

“Walking” portion of the deal to be the normal pace that a man would travel in a day including breaks for meals. The Penns used trained runners instead and the resultant land grab horrified the Lenape. The British colonial government and the Six Nations backed the claim and many

Lenape were forced to move from the homelands along the Delaware River that they had occupied since pre-Columbian times.104

Even when British people did not outright steal Indigenous land, they quickly depleted local game and natural resources, let their animals forage in Indigenous croplands, and consistently created friction with their Native neighbors. The hegemony of the Haudenosaunee in official dealings with colonial governments further alienated the Shawnee and Lenape as they were robbed of political agency when operating through formal channels. 105 The Six Nations maintained political suzerainty over the Lenape and Shawnee, and diplomatic negotiations or grievances had to first go through Haudenosaunee political channels before they could be brought to the Europeans. The pseudo-vassalage position of the Lenape led to them being termed “women” and resulted in a loss of the right to negotiate directly with Europeans. In spite

102 Grimes, The Western Delaware, 22-23. 103 Ward, Breaking the Backcountry, 25. 104 Ward, Breaking the Backcountry, 25. 105 Grimes, The Western Delaware, 40-42; White, The Middle Ground, 187-188. 39 of this political emasculation, the decision to migrate was not an easy one. Communities and kin groups weighed their options and many (though certainly not all) decided that the best course of action was to move west to the Upper Ohio by the late 1730s.

The Lenape and Shawnee were joined in the region by numerous Haudenosaunee from the Six Nations. Comprised primarily of Senecas and Cayugas, the “Mingos” descended from the Northeast during the 1730s and 1740s.106 They settled in the same towns and villages as the

Lenape and Shawnee and lived in close contact with their new neighbors.107 The Mingos arrived in the Upper Ohio with the professed mission of overseeing the other Ohio groups and ensuring that the Six Nations maintained political authority over them.108 In reality, the excellent hunting prospects and increased distance from European populations probably motivated most individuals. The Haudenosaunee “Half-King” Tanaghrisson attempted to assert Six Nations’ hegemony over the Lenape and Shawnee of the Upper Ohio as conflict broke out in the early

1750s but was largely unsuccessful.109 Tanaghrisson moved east into colonial Pennsylvania and the large numbers of Mingos who remained in the region became aligned more closely with their neighbors on the Ohio than the distant leaders of the Six Nations to the northeast.110 When war came in 1755, many joined the fight against the British colonies despite the official Six Nations’ position of neutrality.

II. Imperial Fulcrum

The Lenape and Shawnee migrations to the Upper Ohio were primarily undertaken to escape the depredations of British expansion while many Mingos sought to improve their

106 McConnell, A Country Between, 19-20. 107 Grimes, The Western Delawares, 43-44. 108 Hinderaker, Elusive Empires, 28. 109 Anderson, Crucible of War, 16. 110 White, The Middle Ground, 188. 40 material situation. The movement west did not signify a complete cessation of contact with the

British but it did open new channels of exchange with the French. Both British and French traders were eager to establish trade in the newly repopulated Upper Ohio. Likewise, the new

Indigenous communities in the region were enthusiastic about continuing to trade for arms, ammunition, and manufactured goods. By the mid-1740s the British traders had gained the upper hand and were expanding operations further west among the Miami and encroaching on the French presence in the western Ohio Valley.111

New France responded to the British traders’ advance with aggressive actions and eventually force. The first act was an expedition dispatched in 1749 to renew French authority in the Ohio Country and impress the Indigenous communities in the area.112 Captain Pierre-Joseph de Céleron de Blainville buried lead plates inscribed with French claims along his route in a famously futile effort to establish authority. Traders and surveyors continued to pour over the

Alleghenies and in June of 1752 the French organized an attack on a British trading post at

Pickawillany in modern day western Ohio. The French were junior partners in the attack and vastly outnumbered by their Ojibwe and Ottawa allies, but the French message was clear. The

British traders were taken prisoner or killed and Pickawillany’s Miami headman Memeskia (La

Demoiselle to the French) was consumed in an act of ritual cannibalism. The local Miami leaders sent urgent requests for aid to the governments of Virginia and Pennsylvania but received no help. They reluctantly acquiesced to French presence when it became clear that no British response was forthcoming. British traders abandoned the Ohio Valley en masse and fled east in

111 Hinderaker, Elusive Empires, 39-43. 112 Anderson, Crucible of War, 26. 41 the wake of the startling assault on one of the most prosperous trading posts west of the

Alleghenies.113

The competition escalated as the imperial implications for control of the region became pressing. Rivers served as highways in the interior of the continent and control of the Upper

Ohio meant control of all the transportation and communication downriver to the Mississippi.

The French had to maintain control of the Upper Ohio in order to maintain communications and supply lines with colonial possessions in Illinois and Louisiana. The British needed control of the Upper Ohio to prevent being cordoned off between the Appalachians and Atlantic Ocean with a burgeoning colonial population.114 The vast British settler-colonial apparatus in North

America possessed a vociferous hunger for land and the Ohio River represented an expressway to a some of the most fertile territory on the continent.

In the spring of 1753, the French began construction on a series of forts that descended from Lake Erie down the upper reaches of the Allegheny River. Tananghrisson tried and failed to rally support against the French. Instead Lenape, Shawnee, and Seneca Mingos helped the

French on difficult portage roads as they slowly moved south.115 Fort Presque Isle was built on

Lake Erie and connected to Fort Le Boeuf on French Creek via one such portage road. Fort

Machault was built at the convergence of the Allegheny River and French Creek and crucially collocated with the Lenape town of Venango. The chain culminated in the creation of Fort

Duquesne and expulsion of the last of the British traders at the Forks of the Ohio where the

Monongahela and Allegheny Rivers meet.116 Once Fort Duquesne was completed the French were able to travel by boat and batteaux from the Saint Lawrence to New Orleans with only the

113 Anderson, Crucible of War, 26-29. 114 Anderson, Crucible of War, 17-18. 115 McConnell, A Country Between, 101-102 116 Anderson, Crucible of War, 32. 42 occasional portages requiring overland travel. This strategic success led to British counteractions and ultimately open conflict.

While the British and French attempted to assert imperial control over the Upper Ohio, the actual residents and dominant political and military forces in the region had mixed responses.

The Lenape, Shawnee, and Mingos were far from united even within individual towns and communities. The so-called “Ohio Indians” did not present a unified reaction to European pretensions of dominion over their home. British traders had been welcomed in the region prior to the attack at Pickawillany but the weak Anglo response to the assault forced many Indigenous peoples to reconsider their position. Pennsylvania’s Quaker-dominated Assembly refused to become embroiled in warfare and Virginia saw little reason to support a distant people when its own interests were centered on the Forks of the Ohio. 117 As a result, Indigenous peoples were forced to choose between tolerating a small French presence and risking a fate similar to

Pickawillany. Anglophilia presented few advantages as military aid and trade were not forthcoming.

The complicated situation in the region was reflected by the variety of responses members of the same “tribe” took. Venango was home to many members of the Wolf subdivision of the Lenape, and actively supported the French as they built their chain of forts.

Members of the Turkey and Turtle subdivisions, centered further south, kept their distance. The

Shawnee were similarly divided with villages on the Scioto River antipathetic to the French

“while those at Logg’s Town took a less hostile position.”118 The Six Nations policy of

117 Anderson, Crucible of War, 29. 118 McConnell, A Country Between, 102-103. 43 neutrality and British colonial governments’ continued land claims further alienated the residents of eastern Ohio and western Pennsylvania.119

The new French military presence on the Upper Ohio and the lack of a British or Six

Nations response led many Shawnee, Lenape, and Mingos into an uneasy coexistence with the

French immediately prior to the start of the Seven Years’ War. The longer the Indigenous peoples of the region interacted with the French the more they came to realize that French

“claims” to the Ohio Country meant something very different than British claims. Civilian squatters did not accompany the French military and the soldiers stationed at Fort Duquesne were often miserable with their assignment to the isolated, frequently flooded post at the Forks of the Ohio. Lignery wrote that the fort itself was “ready to tumble down; it is rotten throughout,” and that he feared losing soldiers to desertion.120

Thus, the French presence in the region did not represent an existential threat to their

Lenape, Shawnee, and Mingo neighbors. The famous Lenape war leader Shingas described the position of the French when he told a captive that “if we only Subdue the English first we may do afterwards what we please with the French, for we have them as it were in a Sheep Den and may cut them off any time…we did not give them Liberty to build that Fort in order to make

Improvements but only to fight the English.”121 The French probably posed a larger problem than Shingas gave them credit for, as evidenced by their ability to marshal allies from throughout the pays d’en haut and their previous attack on Pickawillany. However, the essence of his

119 White, The Middle Ground, 232-236. 120 Lignery to Vaudreuil, October 20, 1758, in Alfred P. James, “The Nest of Robbers,” Western Pennsylvania Historical Magazine, Vol. 21 (1936), 177. 121 Daniel Claus to William Johnson, April 5, 1756, The Papers of Sir William Johnson, Vol. 3 (Albany: The University of the State of New York, 1921-1965), 439. 44 discourse was accurate. The French were outnumbered and isolated at the Forks and outside of the grounds of Fort Duquesne there was no European “improvements” of the land.122

The mixed reactions to the French presence at Fort Duquesne would continue until

British regulars arrived in the region under the command of General Edward Braddock. A delegation that included Shingas met with General Braddock at Fort Cumberland in Maryland as he prepared for an expedition to take Fort Duquesne. The delegation articulated that they desired the French ousted from the Ohio and asked Braddock what the British intended to do after the

French has been defeated. Many residents of the Upper Ohio still resented the French presence among them. They wanted a return to the previous status quo, when the Europeans in the region were almost exclusively traders with no military or homesteading presence. Braddock’s arrogant response to Shingas’ inquiries about what the British would do with the Ohio Country once the

French were ousted was that “No Savage Should Inherit the Land.”123 Braddock’s hubris made clear that British plans were completely at odds with Indigenous goals of independence from

Europeans. Shingas carried this message back to the Ohio and as it spread it enraged communities throughout the region. Anyone who desired an Ohio free of European dominion found they had little choice but to align themselves with the French.124

Braddock’s arrogant words damaged relations with the Indigenous peoples of the Upper

Ohio but it was his subsequent disaster on the Monongahela that fully tipped the scales and led to three years of devastating losses in Pennsylvania and Virginia. A small party of Shawnee,

Lenape, and Mingo accompanied the French in the ambush of Braddock’s force, but the majority

122 “Improvements” in this context refers to European-style modification of the environment for agricultural and settlement purposes. The most common example is the raising of fences or walls around fields. “Improving” the land signified ownership over it. Therefore, “unimproved” Indigenous land was often considered free for the taking. 123 Anderson, Crucible of War, 95-96. 124 Anderson, Crucible of War, 96. 45 of the Indigenous combatants were allies from further afield.125 The details of the victory achieved by the combined French and Indigenous force were relayed throughout the region and evidenced by the number of captives and captured supplies the participants acquired. The

Anglophile proponents who advocated adherence to the old Covenant Chain were left diminished. After Pickawillany the British proved unwilling to move against the French. After the Battle of the Monongahela this unwillingness was revealed to be an incapacity.

Unthreatened by the presence of isolated French forts the majority of the Lenape on the Upper

Ohio took another step in asserting their independence from Six Nations’ authority and declared war on the British colonies of Pennsylvania, Maryland, and Virginia. Likewise, many Shawnee, newly reestablished in the region after decades away, joined the Lenape in demonstrating their independence.126 Many Mingos of region subsequently followed the lead of their neighbors and the offensive against the Middle Colonies began.

III. Martial Success: 1755-1758

The defeat of Braddock’s army left the western borders of the Middle Colonies defenseless and for nearly three years the newly formed alliance of the Upper Ohio fought what has been described as a “parallel war” against the British.127 The French, Lenape, Shawnee, and

Mingos utilized the wooded, mountainous terrain of the western borders to conceal their movement and strike at targets of opportunity. British homesteads, blockhouses, and forts alike fell as the offensive depopulated what had been the “frontier” of the British colonies. Thousands were killed or captured and the reminder fled east until the Pennsylvania border was effectively

125 Anderson, Crucible of War, 99. 126 Ian Steele posits that the unjust imprisonment of several Shawnee and the death of one in South Carolina several years prior also contributed to the decision to declare war in “Shawnee Origins of Their Seven Years’ War.” Ethnohistory 53:4 (Fall 2006), 657-687. 127 White, The Middle Ground, 244. 46 rolled back to within 100 miles of Philadelphia. The French outfitted their Indigenous allies with arms and ammunition and often accompanied them on joint expeditions east. However, French presence on these forays was not guaranteed and most of the attacks were Indigenous led and planned.128 Names like Captain Jacobs (Tewea) and Shingas became legendary as the number of their successful sorties into British territory grew.

The ferocity of the joint French-Indigenous offensives ebbed and flowed with the seasons, disease, and availability of supplies but from 1755 to the summer of 1758 they operated with complete freedom of maneuver and were not seriously threatened. The only “success” the

British achieved was a raid on Kittanning in 1756 that resulted in the death of Captain Jacobs before the raiding party beat a hasty retreat. Peace negotiations between the government of

Pennsylvania and the Susquehanna Lenape represented by Teedyuscung were unable to effectively include any residents of the Upper Ohio until late in 1758. This was in large part due to Teedyuscung’s misrepresentation of his own influence to Pennsylvania officials. The Lenape leader could speak for the Susquehanna River Valley Lenape, but his claims to influence among the western Lenape were not based in reality. He negotiated with the British to improve his own status, but he was unable to further British diplomatic efforts west of the Alleghenies.

Isolated Indigenous voices from the Upper Ohio that advocated peace with the British appear in archival sources, but a close reading reveals many of them to be attempts to mitigate retribution for Indigenous violence, equivocations, or measured responses to immediate circumstances. One “Delaware Captain” was asked by his recently captured prisoner if he would make peace with the English. He responded that “they were talking about it when he was in

Philadelphia last Winter, but he went away and left them.”129 The unnamed Lenape leader, in a

128 Ward, Breaking the Backcountry, 47-52. 129 “Richard Baird’s Deposition, York County 15 May 1758,” PA, 3:396-397. 47 position of total dominance over his European counterpart, spoke ambivalently about the prospect of peace. Considering his recent battlefield success, it is easy to understand why futile peace talks in Philadelphia did not cause him any concern.

Other Indigenous leaders frustrated British peace overtures by shifting blame to elusive

“young warriors” that refused to heed the influence of their elders. A Seneca “Chief Man” named Tageghshata reported to Pennsylvania government agents that young Seneca were “in the

French Interest and the chief man had little influence over them…[he] called a council and complained that the young men did not regard him; that he was no more than an old Woman among them; that he saw a great number of his young men going past his door with Hatchets in their Hands, but that he did not know where they were going and he feared this would be the

Cause of Mischief.”130 Claims like Tageghshata’s made it difficult for the British to negotiate any widespread peace. If a “Chief Man” among the Seneca could not exercise control over young Seneca combatants, British negotiators faced a daunting task in convincing a myriad of decentralized groups to agree to peace. While the British did not recognize it, their only hope was to cede control of the peace process to Indigenous actors who could utilize existing networks of diplomacy and exchange to spread the appeal of peace.

The claim that unruly young men were the primary instigators of violence against the

British despite their elder’s advice is found repeatedly in the archives.131 While the claim may have been true given the lack of executive power Indigenous leaders possessed, it also gave them

130 “Report of Chas. Thomson and F. Post, June 7, 1758,” PA, 3:418. 131 For other examples of young men being blamed for the violence and pro-French position, see “A Letter to Mr. Richard Peters from Colonel Mercer, Pittsburgh 1 March 1759,” Colonial Records of Pennsylvania, v. VIII (Harrisburg: T. Fenn & Co., 1831), 305-306; Kakowatchiky, “Speech of Ackowanothio, September 1758,” PA, 3:550; Hugh Mercer, “Col. Mercer to --- Pittsburgh, April 25th, 1759,”PA, 3:624-626; “At a Conference held in the Town of Easton, on 12 October, 1758 PM,” Minutes of the Provincial Council of Pennsylvania (hereafter MPCP), 8:185-186; “18 October 1758,” MPCP, 8:197; “At a Council held at Philadelphia, Thursday the 16th of November, 1758,” MPCP, 8:228. 48 diplomatic flexibility irrespective of the claim’s veracity. Indigenous leaders could maintain good relations with the British by officially advocating for peace while their communities continued to pursue their goals through violence. Indigenous objectives thus had two avenues to success. If violence proved ineffective the leaders could negotiate peace given their longstanding, officially pro-Anglo stance. The young men of lower social status who were blamed for the violence would never be at the negotiating table anyway and the officially pro-

Anglo leaders could profess that they finally reined in their unruly youngsters without exposing them to retribution.

The successful, manipulative tactic of blaming others could be utilized in groups ranging from the smallest familial units to entire nations. When one of Teedyuscung’s sons returned from an intelligence gathering mission beyond the Alleghenies he reported that the Lenape at

Beaver Creek were willing to accept peace and didn’t believe the French but “the Shawnese and the other Nations would continue in War with the English.”132 In this instance, the Beaver Creek

Lenape used other nations in the same role prominent leaders used unruly young men. The group Teedyuscung’s son spoke to maintained their own standing in the eyes of the British while simultaneously articulating that the warfare would not stop (through no fault of their own, of course). These types of Indigenous responses to peace efforts stalled British diplomacy and allowed Indigenous leaders to control the diplomatic arena while they simultaneously dominated the battlefield. In the interim the British could only negotiate with the Six Nations (who had completely lost any semblance of jurisdiction over the Ohio Lenape) and petition Teedyuscung to contact his western compatriots on the Pennsylvania government’s behalf.

132 Jacob Orndt to Gov. Denny, Fort Allen July 24th, 1758, PA, 3:490-491. 49

The arrival of British regular troops in 1758 for a counter-offensive aimed at Fort

Duquesne gave the provincial governments the leverage they desperately needed. Brigadier

General John Forbes commanded the force and understood the critical importance of Indigenous diplomacy.133 In May of 1758 Forbes asked the Friendly Association to contact the Ohio Lenape directly for peace negotiations. The Friendly Association was a group of Pennsylvania Quakers

“dedicated to ending Indian attacks on Pennsylvania’s frontier by addressing native grievances over the loss of Indian lands to colonization.”134 Direct contact with the Ohio Lenape was a significant break with official British “Indian Policy” that respected the hegemony of the Six

Nations. Negotiations with the Upper Ohio Lenape meant bypassing the Six Nations and tacitly admitting the independence of the Upper Ohio communities. Forbes, maintaining no illusions about the power possessed by Indigenous people on the Ohio and wanting to avoid the failures of

General Braddock, pressed ahead anyway.135

Other prominent British officials understood that the military capacity and diplomatic prowess of the communities on the Upper Ohio necessitated serious concessions. Sir William

Johnson, Superintendent for Indian Affairs and the British government’s expert on North

American Indigenous policy, questioned whether force of arms would ever be able to restore peace to Pennsylvania and instead advocated for a diplomatic approach. He recognized that

Indigenous peoples held the key to control of the Ohio Valley and that their acquiescence was required for any European presence. To that end, he recommended assenting to Indigenous demands and emphasized that “neither Speeches, Treaties or Expeditions, will bring them

133 Ward, Breaking the Backcountry, 158. 134 Michael Goode, “A Failed Peace: The Friendly Association and the Pennsylvania Backcountry during the Seven Years’ War,” The Pennsylvania Magazine of History and Biography 136, no. 4 (2012), 472. 135 Grimes, The Western Delaware, 118. 50 heartily over to our views and Interest, without our observing some such plan of conduct.”136

Johnson understood that Indigenous peoples held the balance of power in the region and crucially recognized that they would not be convinced by words alone. The Lenape, Shawnee, and Mingos on the Upper Ohio were far too savvy to be convinced to make peace without concrete evidence that their demands would be met. The Indigenous perceptiveness that necessitated British concessions also made it more difficult to convince communities to end their alliance with the French. Some of the same people who did not trust British words consequently understood the demographic realities of the British colonies that had led to war. The British faced an uphill diplomatic battle and were forced to rely on Upper Ohio residents to promote peace as belts of wampum went unanswered and the fighting continued.137

General Forbes opted for a joint approach with his army slowly making its way to Fort

Duquesne while the civilian administration negotiated with Indigenous groups. The

Pennsylvania government dispatched Christian Frederick Post to the Upper Ohio to open negotiations. Pennsylvania’s actions were due in part to Teedyuscung’s previous efforts to involve the Ohio Lenape in negotiations. Teedyuscung never had the influence over the Ohio

Lenape that he claimed, but his efforts did inspire curiosity among some of the peace-inclined communities along the Upper Ohio. Post’s mission was to convince the Indigenous peoples of the region that British peace overtures were genuine and to secure their attendance at a peace conference later in the year. Earlier missions had not included official government representatives and relied on Indigenous messengers of relatively low status. The French intercepted some of these early attempts and their allies assured them of the ineffectiveness of

136 William Johnson to Governor Denny, Fort Johnson 21 July 1758, PA, 3:486. 137 “Sir William Johnson’s Speech to the Delaware Indians living on the Ohio and those parts, sent this day by Joseph Peppy, A Delaware Indian, Fort Johnson July 21st, 1758,” MPCP, 8:154. 51 the envoys.138 Post’s journey was the first phase of a new effort that was only made possible by a small but influential group of Lenape. Tamaqua, the leader of the group, welcomed this effort and worked hard to ensure its success.

IV. Complicated Politics on the Upper Ohio and Christian Frederick Post

Christian Frederick Post arrived at the Kuskusky towns on August 12th, 1758. The cluster of villages at the confluence of the Beaver and Mahoning Rivers was the most important

Lenape settlement in the Upper Ohio and home to some of the most prominent members of the

Turkey subdivision of the Lenape.139 The Wolf, Turkey, and Turtle subdivisions were “totemic and hierarchically ranked,” but members intermarried and all considered themselves

“Lenape.”140 After the migration west of the Alleghenies, the Turtle and Turkey subdivisions

“took on a stationary character as peacemakers” and settled together while the Wolf subdivision

(Munsee) was geographically isolated and served as “a bulwark for the protection” of their two sister subdivisions.141

The brothers Tamaqua, Shingas, Nenatchehan (Delaware George), and Pisquetomen often resided at Kuskusky and were influential leaders within the Turkey subdivision. The four brothers were nephews of Sassoonan, a “King” of the Turtle subdivision who often represented the Lenape in their affairs with the Pennsylvania government from roughly 1715 until his death

138 Vaudreuil to the Minister of the Marine, 28 July, 1758, Archives Nationales, C11A, 103/fol. 114-117. 139 The exact ethnological genesis of the Turtle, Turkey, and Wolf subdivisions of the Lenape remains debated. However, along the Upper Ohio in 1758 and 1759 these subdivisions were used by their members to describe their own affiliations and are useful within that context. For a brief overview of the scholarship on the three subdivisions, see Grimes, Western Delaware Indian Nation, XXV-XXVI, particularly footnotes 13 and 14; see also Duane Champagne, “The Delaware Revitalization Movement of the Early 1760s: A Suggested Reinterpretation.” American Indian Quarterly 12, no. 2 (1988): 107-126. For a detailed account of the sources utilized in determining the genesis of the three divisions, see William A. Hunter, “Documented Subdivisions of the Delaware Indians.” Bulletin of the Archaeological Society of New Jersey No. 35 (1978), 20-40. 140 Grimes, The Western Delaware, xvi. 141 Grimes, The Western Delaware, 45. 52 in 1747.142 Sassoonan had chosen Pisquetomen as his successor, but the latter’s strong will and opposition to the Walking Purchase led Pennsylvania and the Six Nations to contest his ascent to principal representative of the Lenape.143 Pennsylvania and the Six Nation’s rejection of

Pisquetomen prompted the brothers to move west of the Alleghenies to Kittanning but they remained “high in authority among the Delawares of the West.”144

Figure 5. Map of Lenape migration west of the Alleghenies. From Grimes, Western Delaware Indian Nation, 48.

142 Grimes, The Western Delaware, 69. 143 Grimes, The Western Delaware, 70. 144 Gibson, ”An Account of the Captivity of Hugh Gibson,” Collections of the Massachusetts Historical Society, 142. 53

Post’s arrival was marked by the presence of all four brothers when Pisquetomen (the eldest) introduced him to the villages. Tamaqua, the political leader of the family and wider

Turkey subdivision, was thrilled with the arrival of Post.145 He summoned members of his community and told them to “see your brethren, the English, with your own eyes,” and expressed his joy at seeing Post again.146 Tamaqua’s excitement was shared by his brother Nenatchehan, who told the Moravian missionary that he had been unable to sleep all night on account of his exhilaration at Post’s arrival.147 Tamaqua immediately sent out messengers to neighboring towns and summoned their leaders to Kuskusky to hear the message from Pennsylvania. The

British peace effort, already reliant on Indigenous support in order to reach the Upper Ohio, now completely relied on a few pro-Anglo leaders for its propagation and effectiveness.

The warm reception Post received from the brothers at Kuskusky was not universal. All the brothers but Tamaqua had been active participants in offensives against the British and their pivot to a policy of peace was not replicated by the entirety of their community.148 Within a day of Post’s arrival, it was clear even within the Turkey subdivision that there were competing ideas about which political course of action the Lenape should take. Many who had previously known

Frederick Post expressed joy at seeing him, but others used his arrival to express their own political views by bragging that “they get a great deal of goods from the French; and that the

French cloath the Indians every year, men women and children, and give them as much powder

145 Tamaqua is often referred to as a “king” of the Lenape, but his status was closer to that of a prominent, influential political leader than that of an absolute monarch. 146 Post, “August 12, 1758,” Early Western Travels, 193. 147 Post, “August 14, 1758,” Ibid., 195. 148 Shingas was a famous leader during the war and a sizeable bounty was posted as a reward for his death. Pisquetomen and Nenatchehan’s participation did not achieve Shingas’ level of notoriety but was noted nonetheless. For examples of Nenatchehan and Shingas’ involvement, see Charles Stuart, “The Captivity of Charles Stuart, 1755- 57,” The Mississippi Valley Historical Review, Vol. 13, No. 1. ed. Beverly W. Bond Jr. (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1926), 58-81; For Pisquetomen, see Grimes, Western Delaware, 83 and Gibson, ”An Account of the Captivity of Hugh Gibson,” Collections of the Massachusetts Historical Society. For Tamaqua’s longstanding pro- Anglo stance, see “Carlisle Council with Governor Morris, Jan. 13, 1756,” MPCP, 6:781-782. 54 and lead as they want.”149 The divided nature of the community was further established on

August 16th when Tamaqua and other “captains” convened a private meeting with Post to discuss and edit the message Post would relay to the wider community. The Pennsylvania Government had dispatched Post with an abstract of the summer conferences, several important speeches, and belts and strings of wampum in order to prove the Pennsylvania government’s dedication to peace.150 Post was originally resolved to “conceal nothing” but Tamaqua and his compatriots advised him to leave out a portion of the speeches that they argued was fabricated by

Teedyuscung. The passage in question implied the Ohio Lenape had been the ones to suggest peace with the English and had also advised “turning the hatchet” against the French.151

Teedyuscung’s claim is not supported by any other evidence and was almost certainly untrue, but the secretive nature of the meeting, the desire to avoid upsetting the French, and the Anglophile

Lenape’s success in shaping Post’s message are significant. They reveal that despite Tamaqua and his family’s desire to achieve peace with the English, success was far from guaranteed. The

French retained enough support in the region to warrant secrecy and the Turkey leaders had to control the message that Post delivered in order to achieve their goals. Far from the negotiating tables at Philadelphia and Easton, the peace process was already being controlled by Lenape leaders as they shaped the Pennsylvania government’s message to the wider region.

The exact composition of Tamaqua’s peace “faction” is difficult to ascertain with precision. The evidence of Post’s reception at Kuskuski makes clear that significant proportions of Tamaqua’s community did not share his pro-Anglo stance. The fact that the four brothers of

149 Post, “ August 14, 1758,” Early Western Travels, 195. 150 “At a Council held at Philadelphia, Friday, the 14th of July, 1758,” Colonial Record of Pennsylvania, 8:147. 151 Post, “August 16, 1758,” Early Western Travels, , 195-196. 55 the Turkey subdivision were joined by other “captains” in shaping Post’s message equally indicates that some prominent members of the community at Kuskuski did share their position.

Discerning the disposition of various communities along the Ohio is complicated by a dearth of

Indigenous documentary records, Euro-American confusion, and the intertwined nature of these communities. Contemporary French and British officials often failed to understand their own standing in these communities as Indigenous leaders maintained diplomatic flexibility and manipulated proceedings. In 1749, Captain Pierre-Joseph de Céleron de Blainville was struck by the diversity in the multiethnic villages along the Ohio and had tremendous difficulty determining their loyalty. The migrations and changes of the Seven Years’ War only made the region more complicated for Euro-Americans to understand. The French resorted to referring to the people in the region as “a ’republic’ or ‘Ohio’ Indians, for lack of an adequate means of capturing their precise loyalties and tribal identities,” and these nonspecific terms continue to characterize descriptions of the towns and communities on the Upper Ohio.152

Hugh Gibson’s captivity narrative offers a tantalizingly close look at the status the brothers possessed and allows some insight into their ability to shape events in the region even if it does not describe the larger diplomatic situation. Gibson was captured by a son of Tamaqua and gifted to Pisquetomen in 1756. His narrative is primarily concerned with his personal relationships and isolated events of violence, but in the process of recounting his experience he offers details into the power afforded to individuals who possessed nebulous, obscure titles like

“chief” or “influential headman” on the Upper Ohio.

152 Stephen Warren, The Worlds the Shawnees Made: Migration and Violence in Early America (Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 2014), 203. 56

The extent and limits of Pisquetomen’s influence were illustrated when Gibson was allegedly framed for an escape attempt.153 After receiving word of Gibson’s perfidy,

Pisquetomen angrily confronted him. Gibson professed his innocence and another captive corroborated his story. Afterwards, Pisquetomen told him that “I find the Indians want to kill you. We will go away from them—we will not live with them any more.”154 Gibson’s story should not necessarily be taken at face value. He was naturally interested in preserving his own reputation when recounting his captivity and the short time he had spent among the Lenape left him vulnerable to misunderstandings. Indeed, Pisquetomen’s decision to “go away” from

Gibson’s accusers seems more like a cursory response to a minor slight than an attempt to save his ward from a life-threatening situation. While this episode was probably milder than Gibson realized, it did show that Pisquetomen was an equal member in his community and that he could not unilaterally issue dictates. Instead, he mitigated potential conflict and moved his family to avoid intra-community disagreements.

While the attempted framing of Gibson lends insight into the limits of the power of the brothers, there are other examples of Pisquetomen’s status and power within his community. At one point Pisquetomen “gave orders to the Indians to take Gibson away, and burn him.”155

When Gibson managed to talk his way out of being burned, the “Indians” apologized and told

Gibson that Pisquetomen “was a great man; and that they must do whatever he commanded.”156

There is certainly a measure of equivocation in this response but it nevertheless demonstrated the direct application of power an Indigenous leader could muster.

153 Gibson, ”Captivity of Hugh Gibson,” 144. 154 Ibid., 144-145. 155 Ibid., 146. 156 Ibid., 146. 57

Later in his captivity, Gibson wanted to join expeditions east that attacked Pennsylvania.

Pisquetomen forbid him from joining these offensives, and the response of the community serves as a microcosm to demonstrate the limits and extent of a Lenape leader’s power. One of his adopted cousins told Gibson to spend a few days hunting and then sneak off and join the expedition. When Gibson joined the party as they headed to Fort Duquesne to be outfitted, the majority of the group told him to stay behind as Pisquetomen ordered. Gibson eventually ran into Shingas, who scolded him and sent him to a neighboring town to relay information about casualties from a recent attack.157 A leader like Pisquetomen relied more on the influence of his position than any sort of dominion. Some in his community creatively defied his orders without direct confrontation while others accepted his guidance and carried out his wishes. The influence of the pro-Anglo faction within the Turkey subdivision was bolstered by the four brothers’ close familial links with Sassoonan and subsequent status, Pisquetomen’s position as his designated heir, Shingas’ success in war, and Tamaqua’s longstanding links with the British.

The ability to influence others, whether Euro-American or Indigenous, created a power of its own in a region riven by diverse interests.

The brothers and their supporters’ primary objective in securing peace with the British was independence for the people living on the Upper Ohio. The Six Nations had repeatedly betrayed their interests in negotiations with the British, and the provincial governments had conducted outright fraud to steal their land. Individual Euro-American homesteaders continuously stole Indigenous property and constantly encroached on their territory. When the

French successfully repulsed the British and Braddock demonstrated his antagonistic arrogance, many in the region (including all of the brothers save Tamaqua) saw allegiance with the French

157 Ibid., 147-148. 58 as the only way to guarantee independence. When they received word that the British were actively pursuing peace and willing to negotiate concessions, Tamaqua’s formerly diminutive pro-Anglo stance received immediate legitimacy. Tamaqua’s faction advocated for independence through peace with the British while other Indigenous groups sought independence through continued violence. Tamaqua’s position saw the growing strength of British arms and its demographic power as a reason to make peace and secure independence while his community still possessed leverage. It found particular resonance among the Turkey and Turtle subdivisions at their shared geographic location near Fort Duquesne. Advocates of violence saw these same facts as reasons to continue siding with the French while they still had a European ally to help them combat continued British movement west. They were most prominent among the Wolf subdivision along the Upper Allegheny.

Tamaqua’s faction continued to shape European actions after Christian Frederick Post’s initial arrival when Tamaqua invited both Post and a French officer to dinner. After they sat down to the meal Tamaqua said that “the Indians were very proud to see one of their brothers, the English, among them” at which point the French officer’s spirits were dampened and he lost his appetite.158 This act of political theater orchestrated by Tamaqua is especially important given the rude reception Post received from two war captains earlier in the day who did not

“want to hear of the peace made at Easton…they had hitherto been at war with the English and had never expected to be at peace with them again.”159 The anti-Anglo position of the two war captains emphasized the divided support for the two European powers among Indigenous communities. Tamaqua worked to empower his own pro-Anglo position by leveraging his status into a ploy that influenced both the French and the British. His standing in the community

158 Post, “August 17, 1758,” Early Western Travels, 197. 159 Ibid., 198. 59 afforded him the ability to host the two European guests at dinner. There, he was able to manipulate the French officer by demonstrating support for the British. The events from earlier in the day show that this support was not especially prevalent, but the French officer reporting back to his superiors at Fort Duquesne did not have the luxury of this wider context. Instead, his report would likely express that a paramount chief at Kuskuski was openly supporting the

British. This news would send shockwaves through an isolated post like Fort Duquesne that relied on Indigenous military power for survival. Any reactionary high-handedness or escalation on the part of the French would play into Tamaqua’s hands by causing friction in Franco-

Indigenous relationships and creating openings for Tamaqua’s faction to influence opinion.

Post was also influenced by the posturing at dinner. Tamaqua reduced his French guest to the role of a dejected bystander. Whereas the French officer saw a dangerous expansion of

British influence, Post witnessed the power of Indigenous peoples on the Upper Ohio and an influential faction that supported his peace efforts. Later, it would become clear that this influence was limited and contingent, but after three years of battlefield losses Tamaqua’s open repudiation of the French seemed to reveal a path to peace that had previously been obscured.

The next several days continued the alternating cycle of hostility and hospitality. Post traveled to Saucunk and was “roughly received…they went so far as to say I should not live long.”160 At Logstown three days later he was reunited with several Shawnee he had met previously and was treated “very kindly.”161 The brothers of the Turkey subdivision made clear to Post that they were not capable of establishing a peace on their own and that such a decision would require a consensus.162 However, on August 25th messengers arrived from the Shawnee

160 Ibid., Entry for 20 August 1758, 200. 161 Ibid., Entry for 23 August 1758, 201. 162Post, “August 18, 1758,” Early Western Travels, 199. 60 indicating that they would “agree to contracts the Delaware made with the English,” and when the French demanded Post be turned over, no one moved to comply.163 While Tamaqua and his brothers could not compel other groups to adopt their position, they were clearly capable of influencing opinions.

One potential indicator of Tamaqua’s success occurred on August 26th when the French, in a panic over their perceived loss of support, allegedly attempted to convince their Odawa allies to kill several Lenape chiefs that were “wavering.”164 French sources involving Post’s visit do not mention this attempted mass assassination and it is difficult to discern if the French actually proposed such an action.165 Earlier in the day, Post had delivered his message of peace to a large body of Lenape, Mingos, and Shawnee assembled near Fort Duquesne and was favorably received, with the Shawnee delegation promising to “now send belts to all the Indians, and in twelve days [we] would meet again.”166 Even though French efforts to capture Post and stop the propagation of his message were repeatedly unsuccessful, a gross overreaction like targeting Lenape leaders would have had obvious negative consequences for the French. The

Lenape who leaked the information may have been trying to ingratiate himself to the British, and

Post had a vested interest in portraying the French as treacherous to their Indigenous allies. In the unlikely event the French did try to murder Lenape leaders, the effectiveness of Tamaqua and his allies in disrupting the alliance so shortly after Post’s arrival is remarkable. However, it is more likely that the attempted murders were fabrications, given the obvious diplomatic damage the French would suffer and the current strength of their alliance. The mere existence of such

163Post, “August 25, 1758,”Early Western Travels, 203; Post, “August 24, 1758,” Early Western Travels, 203. 164 Post, “August 26, 1758,” Early Western Travels, 209. 165 For the French account of Post’s visit and the delivery of his message near Fort Duquesne, see Vaudreuil to the Minister of the Marine, Montréal, October 15, 1758, A, “The Marquis De Vaudreuil to the Minister, Montreal October 15, 1758,” Archives Nationales, C11A, 103/fol. 223. 166Post, “August 28, 1758,” Early Western Travels, 208. 61 inventions does demonstrate another method that Tamaqua’s faction could use to sow discord and wrest their kin away from the French alliance. The story of the attempted murder and its questionable accuracy helped cast doubt on French motivations. When combined with

Tamaqua’s dinner theatrics, the assassination story undoubtedly helped create misgivings among

Indigenous communities and muddled France’s diplomatic standing.

After Post delivered the Pennsylvania government’s message outside Fort Duquesne, he

“passed through three Shawnee towns” and returned to Saucunk. Here he was greeted by

Koquethagechton (Captain White Eyes) and Bemino (John Killbuck Sr.). Both of these individuals had treated Post “so uncivilly” when he had first journeyed from Kuskuski to

Saucunk, but now they “apologized for their former rude behavior” and urged Post to succeed in his peace mission on “behalf of the people of Sawcunk.”167 Koquethagechton and Bemino’s change in disposition towards Post is significant because of their prominent positions within

Turtle subdivision of the Lenape. Koquethagechton was born into the Turkey subdivision but served as a chief counsellor to Netawatwes (head of the Turtle subdivision) and Bemino was

Netawatwes’ son.168 Post’s account of their apology reflects either his own embellishment or the

Indigenous leaders’ diplomatic guile when they reportedly state that “We are but little and poor, and therefore cannot do much. You are rich, and must go on and be strong. We have done all in our power towards bringing about a peace.”169

The veracity of Koquethagechton and Bemino’s statement is impossible to know exactly, but it is doubtful that they had done everything in their power to advance a policy of peace with the British. Their first interaction with Post had been on August 17th when they arrived in

167 Post, “August 27, 1758,” Early Western Travels, 210. 168 Ibid., 210-211 footnote 11. 169 Ibid., 211. 62

Kuskusky with a French captain, fifteen French soldiers, and belts of wampum. They attempted to bring Post to Fort Duquesne to ostensibly deliver his “good news,” but they treated him rudely and angered his hosts.170 Bemino and Koquethagechton’s intentions may have been genuine;

Post did end up delivering his message to a large group assembled outside Fort Duquesne within earshot of the French. However, their disrespect, the presence of French soldiers, and later

French attempts to capture Post certainly cast doubt on their stated objective.

Bemino and Koquethagechton were also anything but “little and poor.”

Koquethagechton would later serve as a leader of the Lenape in their interactions with the young

United States and was succeeded by Bemino’s son Gelelemend.171 Both men’s close association with Netawatwes was an early indicator of their influence. Their first row with Post indicates that the men were not in line with Tamaqua and his faction at Kuskusky. However, their second interaction is indicative of an openness to peace if not genuine alignment with Tamaqua’s pro-

Anglo position. The reception of Post’s message outside Fort Duquesne and the alleged French overreaction and attempted murder changed the equation for both men. Their proximity to the center of power within the Turtle subdivision makes this change a critical development in the diplomatic actions surrounding the fall of Fort Duquesne. By the end of Post’s first trip as an envoy to the Upper Ohio, the pro-Anglo faction had successfully leveraged Post’s presence into significant diplomatic gains. Tamaqua had long advocated for peace with the British even as his brothers gained prestigious reputations in warfare. When Post first arrived, Tamaqua had convinced his brothers that peace was a viable path forward but his own community at Kuskuski

170 Post, “August 17, 1758,” Early Western Travels, 197. 171 A.G. Roeber, Ethnographies and Exchanges: Native Americans, Moravians, and Catholics in Early North America (University Park, PA: PSU Press, 2008), 34. 63 remained split. When Post departed, influential leaders from another subdivision had changed their position and were open to peace with the British.

Before Christian Frederick Post departed for Pennsylvania, the brothers and other influential individuals at Kuskuski gathered to send a message to the British. First, they told the governor to “send two or three white men, at least, to confirm the thing.”172 The Indigenous leaders understood what it would take to convince their compatriots to make peace and the presence of more Anglos would lend credence to the professed British peace overtures. The peace effort continued to rely on the diplomatic skill of Indigenous leaders in the face of British ignorance. Second, the leaders questioned Post as to why the British came to the Ohio to fight the French. They argued that if the British made peace with them, they would send the French home.173 Post could only urge the leaders to make their concerns known at a council in

Pennsylvania and halfheartedly argue that without the French, the British would never have come to the Ohio. Post’s argument was a common one utilized whenever British envoys sought to ease Indigenous concerns about their designs on the Ohio Country. The British attempted to explain their military presence as a simple counter to French imperialism that would be withdrawn once their European rivals were forced out of the region. The pro-Anglo faction was not fooled by Post’s response, in part due to their own military strength relative to the smaller

French presence. British arms were not needed to rid the Ohio of the French. However,

Tamaqua’s group understood that in the British colonies “there are always a great number of people that want to get rich; they never have enough.”174 The existence of these reservations, even within the most Anglophilic group in the region, demonstrates the fragility and contingent

172 Post, “August 29, 1758,” Early Western Travels, 212. 173 Ibid., 214. 174 Ibid., 215. 64 nature of the British peace. Indigenous peoples in the region held no illusions about the British even when they sought an end to the war. They understood that British homesteaders would infringe on their sovereignty and that the British military would treat them heavy-handedly if they did not secure their peace terms from a position of strength. Indigenous leaders were wary of Euro-American mendacity and brought their accumulated experience of British treachery to negotiations.

The Indigenous leaders sent Post off with a speech signed by several prominent individuals expressing their desire for peace and purporting to speak for “us at Allegheny.”175

The names listed included familiar ones like Tamaqua and his brothers, Koquethagechton,

Bemino, and Tasucamin (a signer of the Walking Purchase). Several others appear only sporadically in the historical record or solely as signatories to this speech. Conclusions based on the signatories should be made cautiously given the uncertainty about many of the individuals, but they do provide insight into groups that were not included. All the signatories are included in

John Heckewelder’s 1834 work that translates Lenape place names and the names of prominent

Lenape individuals.176 Heckewelder first traveled to the Ohio Country in 1762 and interacted with both Christian Frederick Post and Tamaqua. The inclusion of the signatories in his translations closely implies that they were Lenape, given that the translation of Lenape names was the intent of his work. The Shawnee and Mingos were thus not directly represented in the official Indigenous response to Post’s mission. Nenatchehan, speaking after the speech was delivered, claimed that all three Lenape nations were represented at the final meeting before

175 Post, “September 3, 1758,” Early Western Travels, 220. 176 John Heckewelder and Peter S. Du Ponceau, “Names Which the Lenni Lenape or Delaware Indians, Who Once Inhabited This Country, Had Given to Rivers, Streams, Places, &c. within the Now States of Pennsylvania, New Jersey, Maryland and Virginia: And Also Names of Chieftains and Distinguished Men of That Nation; With the Significations of Those Names, and Biographical Sketches of Some of Those Men.” Transactions of the American Philosophical Society (Philadelphia: American Philosophical Society, 1834), Vol. 4, 351-396. All the names signed to the speech were translated into English in Heckewelder’s work. 65

Post’s departure. However, the names that can be positively identified are all from prominent members of the Turkey or Turtle subdivisions. The Wolf subdivision, centered further up the

Allegheny at Venango and considered “the most warlike” of the Lenape were not represented by their leader Custaloga or any of his close associates.177 Nenatchehan’s vested interest in presenting the Lenape as unified in their desire for peace made successful negotiations more likely because the British preferred working with a single individual rather than diverse groups.178 The message Post carried back to Philadelphia was from “us at Allegheny,” but the

“us” encompassed a limited group compared to the total population of the Upper Ohio.179 The skillful manipulation orchestrated by Tamaqua helped move the region towards peace by spreading a pro-Anglo message and by making the pro-Anglo position appear larger than it was to both the French and the British. The French were losing their grasp on their Indigenous relationships while the British became more convinced than ever that peace was attainable.

Many groups (i.e. The Lenape at Venango) remained certain that the French represented their best chance at independence, but their voices were not heard in the diplomatic channels that Post operated in.

Christian Frederick Post did not leave Kuskuski under Pisquetomen’s protection until

September 8th. The delay caused Post great consternation and he believed that he was kept in

Kuskuski “by the instigation of the French…for they were afraid I should get back too soon, and

177 For the traditional role ascribed to the Wolf subdivision, see John Heckwelder, History, Manners, and Customs of the Indian Nations Who Once Inhabited Pennsylvania and the Neighbouring States (Philadelphia: Historical Society of Pennsylvania, 1881), 52. Heckwelder’s work contains familiar biases and prejudices that characterize older scholarship. However, given his interaction with prominent Lenape in 1762 some of his observations hold historical value. 178For an example of British attempts to appoint “kings” and “headmen” in order to facilitate diplomacy with Indigenous groups see Grimes, The Western Delaware Indian Nation, 68-69. The Lenape political tradition did not provide for a supreme ruler over all Lenape. British insistence on negotiating with a single leader when issues arose forced adaptations and provided an opportunity for certain individuals. Tamaqua would take advantage of this as his long-standing pro-Anglo stance naturally appealed to the British.

66 give information to the general.”180 Post feared for his life and his paranoia is difficult to evaluate. The French certainly wanted to capture him, but Tamaqua and his faction had demonstrated their dedication to Post’s safety throughout his visit.

Whatever the reason for the delay, it did demonstrate how Indigenous actors continued to direct the course of events. Their control was reiterated again right before Post left when a group interrogated him about the contents of his report to Pennsylvania. Post was notably upset that his hosts threatened to keep him at Kuskuski if he reported anything regarding English prisoners in

Indigenous possession.181 The final Indigenous censoring of Post’s report was an important one, as the return of captives was a nonstarter for peace negotiations among even the more

Anglophile residents of the Upper Ohio. Captives earned in war were valuable sources of labor, prestige, and population replacement through adoption. Ceding captives in a peace negotiation would have been a significant concession, and given the balance of power in the region,

Tamaqua’s faction viewed it as unnecessary. An end to the war with Pennsylvania would only come on Indigenous terms.

French sources related to Post’s visit are limited, but those that exist depict the

Moravian’s visit as a trivial occurrence. Comte Maurès de Malartic, a regular French Army officer recovering from wounds in Montréal during the fall of 1758, kept a meticulous journal that included news from the Belle-Rivière. On September 25th he received news from Fort

Duquesne “where all is tranquil.” He recorded that “The English have sent wampum collars out with an envoy to the Loups [Lenape] to engage their neutrality. The Loups took these collars to

M. de Lignery, commandant of Fort Duquesne.”182 The news Malartic received did not reflect

180 Post, “September 7, 1758,” Early Western Travels, 225. 181 Post, “September, 8, 1758,” Early Western Travels, 226. 182 Malartic, “September 25, 1758,” Glories to Useless Heroism, 187. 67 the panicked and disheartened attitude Post attributed to the French after the delivery of his message. The cession of the English wampum belts reinforces the conclusions drawn from

Post’s journal about the diffusion of Tamaqua’s Anglophile views. While some groups supported peace, others did not and went so far as to give their newly received peace belts to the

French in an act of loyalty.183

The relatively benign impact which Malartic ascribed to Post was echoed by reports from

Governor-General Vaudreuil to the metropole. While the Governor-General did not impute a great deal of significance to the envoy, he did recognize that Post’s presence required vigilance on the part of the French. Vaudreuil wrote two letters dated October 15th that detail events on the

Upper Ohio. In the first letter he reports that Lignery killed 12 “Flat Heads” and expresses hope that the “Flat Heads” may be tiring of their English alliance and can be brought into the French orbit.184 Concern over Post’s visit was tempered by optimism about expanding French diplomatic efforts.

Vaudreuil’s second letter dealt with Post’s visit more directly. He described Post’s appearance near Fort Duquesne as well as Lignery’s efforts to capture the Moravian. The local

Lenape refused to give up Post, but their refusal did not constitute a rejection of the French.

Vaudreuil mentions ongoing diplomatic exchanges and details Lignery’s continued efforts to keep French officers stationed in Indigenous communities for diplomacy and intelligence gathering.185 The French perspective provided in Vaudreuil’s letters and Malartic’s journal is notably more mixed than the impression Post gives in his journal upon leaving the Upper Ohio

183 Turning in British peace belts could also have been a calculated act to remain on good terms with the French while exploring peace overtures. Given Indigenous participation in attacks on Forbes’ army after Post’s visit, however, it appears that many who turned in their peace belts did so genuinely. 184 Marquis De Vaudreuil to the Minister of the Marine, Montreal October 15, 1758, Archives Nationales, C11A 103/f. 223. The “Flat Heads” Vaudreuil refers to are most likely Catawba. The Catawba had renewed attacks on the region with British encouragement and were also sometimes referred to as “Flat Heads” by the Haudenosaunee. 185 Ibid. 68 for Easton. Part of this is due to Indigenous manipulation and the success of Tamaqua’s faction in shaping French and British perspectives in the region. An equal part, though, is due to the ineffectiveness of the French. While British sources often mention individual Indigenous leaders, French sources seldom provide detail beyond “chiefs” or “Delawares.” Sometimes this is because the intended audience (in Vaudreuil’s case, the Minister of the Marine) did not need minute details of events unfolding on the Upper Ohio. However, Lignery’s later letters to

Vaudreuil would be an appropriate place to mention individual machinations particularly as

Post’s message started within a small group in a single Lenape subdivision. Lignery groups the local Indigenous communities by tribal affiliations without acknowledging their diversity and differing levels of support. This reflects a lack of understanding regarding his long-time allies and would eventually have disastrous consequences.

The peace conference that convened on October 8th at Easton, Pennsylvania represented only a small subset of the inhabitants of the Upper Ohio. The participants included representatives of the Pennsylvania provincial government, the Six Nations, Susquehannah

Lenape under Teedyuscung, and Pisquetomen. Tagashata, a Seneca leader, claimed that the Six

Nations “told all these [Ohio nations] that they must lay down the French Hatchet, and be reconciled to their Brethern, the English.”186 Tagashata’s claim attempted to conceal the diminished authority the Six Nations held over their former clients and disguised the complicated and evolving diplomatic situation in the region. Post’s journey demonstrated the political diversity among the Lenape on the Upper Ohio, and the presence of large numbers of Shawnee and Mingos in the region further complicated the political picture outside the scope of Post or

186 “At a Conference held at Easton, on the 12th of October, 1758,” MPCP, 182. 69

Gibson’s accounts. The Six Nations did not possess the authority through force or diplomacy to compel these diverse groups to comply with their orders.

Pisquetomen delivered the Anglophile faction’s speech on October 13th expressing the openness of the “Ohio Indians” to peace.187 Over the next week, Indigenous grievances were aired (including the Walking Purchase), the return of Euro-American prisoners was discussed, and Governor Denny officially invited the “Delawares, Shawanese…[and] the Six Nation

Indians,” on the Ohio to rejoin the chain of friendship.188 Pisquetomen was dispatched with a small party to relay the Pennsylvania government’s truce proposal with an additional request to

“sit still and keep out of the Way” as General Forbes army approached Fort Duquesne.189 The recorded minutes of the provincial council do not afford much attention to Pisquetomen’s actions at Easton and other than the delivery of the speech he does not speak in the colonial record.

However, it is clear from the minutes of the proceedings that Six Nation claims of suzerainty over the Ohio were vastly overstated and that the provincial government treated Pisquetomen as a representative of the region as a whole. The fact that the “Ohio Indians” were invited to directly negotiate with the provincial government demonstrates that Pennsylvania realized the

Six Nations could not exercise control over their western “cousins.” The Lenape, Shawnee, and

Mingo’s military prowess and their independent course in the Seven Years’ War ensured their sovereignty over the Upper Ohio and compelled a break from Six Nations’ authority that would never be regained

The message Pisquetomen carried west is notable because it was addressed to all the inhabitants of the Upper Ohio. As observed in Post’s journal however, Pisquetomen and his

187 “At a Conference with the Indians held at Easton, October the 13th, 1758,” MPCP, 188-189. 188 Ibid., 198-208. 189 Ibid., 208. 70 compatriots’ Anglophile influence had only recently begun to spread among the Lenape Turkey subdivision and the nearby Turtle subdivision. The Pennsylvania government’s urgent request for the Upper Ohio to stand down as Forbes advanced thus faced dual obstacles. First was the issue of proliferation and the time it would take to physically spread a message across a wide region. Second was the need to persuade the recipients to accept the request. Considering the fact that Post never made it to Venango and did not mention meeting with Mingo or Shawnee leaders, the delivery of Pennsylvania’s ceasefire request faced powerful obstacles. Forbes’ slow advance and the approach of winter (and end of the campaigning season) meant that Tamaqua’s faction would have to quickly sway their neighbors in order stave off a significant British military disaster.

While Pisquetomen participated in the council at Easton, the Anglophile Lenape continued their efforts to shore up support for the British. No English-language records exist that provide direct insight into the region during this period, but three letters written by Fort

Duquesne’s commandant to the Marquis De Vaudreuil offer a French perspective on events unfolding on the Upper Ohio.190 The letters lack specific information on Indigenous diplomacy beyond the vague actions of “Delawares and Shawnee” but offer one of the few descriptions of the region between Christian Frederick Post’s first and second visits. In the first letter, François-

Marie Le Marchand de Lignery describes an attack on British forces at Loyalhanna by “440

French and 130 Delawares and Shawnee; it was impossible for me to assemble more of them.”191

The second half of Lignery’s statement strongly implies that he wanted more Indigenous forces to join in the attack but was unable to rally them. The disproportionately high number of French

190 Vaudreuil’s October 15th letters, while written during the same time period as Lignery’s, reflected information from August and September due to the time required for information to reach Canada. As a result, his letters do not reflect events on the Upper Ohio that were contemporary with the council at Easton. 191 Lignery to Vaudreuil, 18 October 1758, “Extract of Three Letters,” 176. 71 combatants compared to Indigenous combatants was certainly an outlier in a conflict that had been carried out primarily by Indigenous fighters. However, any attempt to connect low

Indigenous turnout at Loyalhannon to a change in diplomatic stances after Post’s visit would be pure conjecture. What is clear is that a significant number of Indigenous fighters continued to side with the French and were rewarded with captured horses and cattle.

The attack on Loyalhanna was a success that severely hampered Forbes’ army and lowered the morale of the British forces.192 Lignery wrote that “The Delawares and Shawnee have promised me that they will soon return into the war; never have I seen them better disposed; they have fought with an unusual courage…The savages have left here since then for their villages, intending to return in a few days.”193 The number of Indigenous combatants Lignery was able to muster for the attack had been underwhelming, but clearly in its aftermath he felt that his allies remained committed to alliance with the French. The disruptive effect of Post’s visit was forgotten and the highest-ranking Frenchman in the region, whose very survival depended on Indigenous alliances, appeared confident that his allies would continue to support Fort

Duquesne. Despite Lignery’s optimism, his first letter does reveal potential shortcomings in the

French understanding of their own diplomatic position. He refers to his allies only as

“Delawares” and “Shawnee” without any nuance regarding the various Lenape subdivisions or community affiliations. The exact composition of the allies that participated in the attack on

Loyalhanna is important in gauging whether Tamaqua and his allies were succeeding in propagating their message. If the attack force contained no Turtle and Turkey subdivision members or Shawnee from Saukunk, the French would have reason to worry that Tamaqua’s message had deeply taken root and solidified among those groups. If the attack force was

192Bouquet to Forbes, October 15, 1758, Papers, 560. 193 Lignery to Vaudreuil, October 18,1758, “Extract of Three Letters,” 176. 72 diverse, however, it would serve as an indicator that support for the French remained widespread throughout the groups in the region.

Unfortunately, Lignery gives no indication of the composition of the participating allies beyond their larger national affiliations. However, his initial disappointment in the overall

Indigenous turnout and the contents of his third letter provide hints at the changing diplomatic realities in the region. Lignery’s third letter was written only five days after his first, but the optimism that marked the end of his original dispatch had evaporated in that short timespan.

Lignery reported that, “The larger part of the savages are descending the Ohio in spite of the promises they made me. Some however are preparing themselves, as I have been assured, for going to war, but I think that they will be few in number.”194 A crucial difference between the first and third letter is that the small amount of detail Lignery initially provided (regarding

“Delawares and Shawnee”) has been replaced by an even more abstract designation (“savages”).

The generalization of the Indigenous allies and the fact of their departure makes it unlikely that the “savages” Lignery referred to were Upper Ohio Lenape, Shawnee, and Mingos. These groups were settled in the region, had been referred to specifically in Lignery’s earlier letter (by

European standards at least), and were committed to preserving Indigenous dominion over the

Upper Ohio.195

The groups that descended the Ohio were most likely allies from western Ohio, the pays d’en haut, or the Illinois Country.196 The traditional campaigning seasons was near its end (a

194Lignery to Vaudreuil, October 23,1758, “Extract of Three Letters,” 178. 195 The Shawnee did have numerous settlements downriver, including the major town of Chillicothe (Lower Shawneetown). It is possible that some of the “savages” Lignery referred to were Shawnee, but the departure of “the larger part” of the Shawnee in the Upper Ohio would have been a significant exodus that is not reflected elsewhere in the historical record. 196 Anderson mentions Ottawa, Wyandot, and “other warriors from the pays d’en haut” returning home during this time period in Crucible of War, 281. It is likely that other allies such as the Potawatomi and Miami were also among their number given the distance and direction of their nations relative to Fort Duquesne. 73 fact that weighed heavily on General Forbes, particularly after the Battle of Loyalhanna) and

Indigenous allies from far afield faced long journeys home before the onset of winter and the freezing of waterways.197 The victory at Loyalhanna presented an opportunity to return home with honor and prizes at a convenient time. The departure represented a typical pattern of campaigning rather than a diplomatic shift.

Lignery’s letters do not contain any groundbreaking revelations about the Upper Ohio, but they do allow for a reconstruction of the diplomatic situation in the two months after Post’s departure. Ultimately, not much had changed since the missionary proceeded to Pennsylvania with Pisquetomen. The French were still able to muster a significant number of Lenape and

Shawnee allies for their defense and these allies fought valiantly and effectively as evidenced by

Lignery’s report. However, the overall number of Lenape and Shawnee that fought at

Loyalhanna was less than the French hoped for and reflected the impact of Tamaqua’s machinations. Members of the Turkey and Turtle subdivisions were open to peace negotiations with the British and this manifested itself in lowered enthusiasm for offensives. There was not a mass exodus of French-aligned groups, but the seasonal departure of distant allies did make the

French even more reliant on groups that lived on the Upper Ohio just as their support among these peoples was being seriously corroded.

The Council of Easton marked an important step in the establishment of an Anglo-

Indigenous peace on the Upper Ohio, but as the various negotiating groups left the council fire the prospects for a ceasefire remained complicated. Over 140 Lenape and Shawnee had participated in a successful assault at Loyalhanna during the council and the French military

197 For examples of the cyclical nature of distant allies’ participation in campaigns on the Ohio, see J.C. Bonnefons, Voyage,, 88; James Smith, An Account of the Remarkable Occurrences in the Life and Travels of Colonel James Smith: During his Captivity with the Indians, in the Years 1755-1759 (Lexington: John Bradford, 1799), 103. 74 position at the Forks of the Ohio seemed as strong as ever. Tamaqua and his brothers had succeeded in disseminating an Anglophile stance among the Turkey and Turtle subdivisions of the Lenape, but the “Ohio Indians” were by no means united in that position. In the north the

Wolf subdivision of the Lenape continued to maintain a Francophile stance while Shawnee and

Mingos consistently joined French attacks. The concessions Pisquetomen had been gifted at

Easton held promise, but total peace in the region would depend on the ability of Tamaqua’s faction to further expand their diplomatic coalition.

75

Chapter 3. The Upper Ohio in the Balance

The 1758 Council of Easton has frequently been considered a pivotal moment on the

Ohio front of the Seven Years’ War. British openness to concessions and general war weariness purportedly swayed the remaining Francophile “Ohioans” to accept a truce and leave the French position in the region dangerously weakened. However, close examination of the diplomatic and political maneuverings in the area reveals that prior to Easton, Indigenous openness to a British peace was decidedly mixed. Contrary to the conclusions of teleological narratives concerning the struggle for the Forks, the mixed reception to peace continued after both Easton and the French evacuation from Fort Duquesne. Groups living higher up the Allegheny like the Wolf subdivision of the Lenape remained strongly pro-French and continued to join attacks on British supply lines and preparations for an offensive to retake the Forks. Given the continued French presence at Fort Machault near Venango, the enduring Francophile stance in the area is perhaps unsurprising. More unexpected is that even groups living in close proximity to the newly christened Fort Pitt maintained support for the French. The French were allowed to store arms at

Kuskusky, and French attacks on British supply lines as far as Fort Loyalhanna were only possible with the tacit support of groups that lived in the immediate area.198 The Council of

Easton and abandonment of Fort Duquesne were important events, but they did not signify widespread change in the military and diplomatic realities of the Upper Ohio. The efforts of

Tamaqua’s faction prevented a concentrated Indigenous effort to oust the British, but many groups continued to support the French or maneuvered between the two European powers as they pursued their own goals.

198 “Meeting between Tamaqua and Colonel Bouquet, 5 December 1758,” PA, 3:573-574; for French arms stored at Kuskusky, see Colonel Mercer to Governor Denny, Pittsburgh, January 8, 1759, MPCP, 8:292. 76

This chapter continues the examination of Indigenous political and diplomatic actions on the Upper Ohio that was initiated in Chapter Two. The purpose of this examination remains the same: to refute the traditional narrative that Indigenous “Ohioans” made peace with the British and thus forced the French to abandon Fort Duquesne. While Chapter Two demonstrated the complex and multipolar situation in the region as the British struggled to negotiate a separate peace, Chapter Three demonstrates that even after the Council of Easton and fall of Fort

Duquesne, substantial populations of Indigenous people living along the Ohio continued to support the French diplomatically and militarily. The loss of Fort Duquesne and final expulsion of the French from the Ohio Valley in the summer of 1759 was not due to a lack of Indigenous support. Rather, French failures to understand and utilize the Indigenous support they did possess led to their final defeat and retreat in the region. Indigenous allies among the Lenape,

Shawnee, and Mingos gave the French a critical advantage that would have turned back Forbes’ advance or overwhelmed a newly constructed Fort Pitt, but the French failed to operate effectively with their allies.

Examining French and Indigenous interactions on the Upper Ohio after the fall of Fort

Duquesne provides new perspectives on both powers. The French were unable to effectively work with their allies and did not understand the divisions among the surrounding Indigenous populations. When faced with British pressure, these latent issues were exposed. Indigenous groups that continued supporting the French are liberated from the condescension of posterity when their actions are investigated instead of concealed. These groups believed that an alliance with the French represented the best way to maintain an independent Ohio free from the Six

Nations or Europeans. Members of the Wolf subdivision of the Lenape, Mingos along the

Allegheny, and well-traveled Shawnee have been ignored in the historiography and this failure to

77 account for their perspective weakens our understanding of subsequent events like Pontiac’s

Rebellion. For these groups, Pontiac’s Rebellion was a continuation of their long-standing strategy for independence and more than a reaction to new contacts with British homesteaders and military officials. Their long struggle for independence demonstrates the military and political power of Indigenous groups in the region and their ability to control the actions of

European powers. French blunders at Fort Duquesne and La Belle-Famille negatively impacted their Indigenous allies’ strategy for achieving an independent Ohio. However, the same military prowess and diplomatic skill that led to Anglo concessions at Easton would also provide leverage in subsequent negotiations and conflicts.

I. “Peace” after Easton

The Council of Easton set parameters for peace and demonstrated British willingness to pursue reconciliation with Indigenous groups on the Ohio. Its conclusion did not, however, signify a paradigm shift in the region. On October 22nd the council received news of a

“great Loss” suffered by the French at Loyalhanna, but the situation remained critical for the

British while the French-Indigenous alliance maintained the initiative.199 Privately British officers admitted that Loyalhanna was a “humiliating” defeat. Their attempt to depict it as otherwise to Indigenous leaders reflects Anglo desperation as the campaign for the Forks foundered.200 Even the diplomatic optimism engendered by negotiations at Easton represented little more than hopefulness. John Bull and William Hays, two envoys tasked with accompanying Christian Frederick Post and Pisquetomen after the council, were instructed to

“Find out the true character of the Indians…persuade any of them, ingratiate yourself with them

199 “October 22nd, 1758,” MPCP¸ 8:212. 200 Bouquet to Forbes, October 15, 1758, Papers, 560. 78 by all the means in your power, & endeavour to gain their affections.”201 Post and Pisquetomen joined together on a second trip to the Upper Ohio in order to deliver the news of Easton and persuade Francophile groups to accept a ceasefire with the British. However, the directions given to Bull and Hayes provide evidence that the negotiations at Easton were not considered guarantors of peace. The Pennsylvania government did not assume that Pisquetomen and the signees of his speech represented the entirety of the Upper Ohio and the instructions to their agents reflects Anglo trepidation. During their joint journey to the Upper Ohio, Christian

Frederick Post further advised the two men to “be careful how they argued with the Indians; and be sure to say nothing, that might affront them; for it may prove to our disadvantage, when we come amongst them.”202 The British understood that groups on the Upper Ohio were unlikely to switch allegiances en masse. British diplomatic goals were not reached by the negotiations at

Easton alone and from an Anglo perspective the French maintained distinct diplomatic and military advantages on the Upper Ohio.

The British position remained precarious when Christian Frederick Post and Pisquetomen reunited and formed a small party on October 27th. The entire campaign hinged on their ability to quickly return to the Upper Ohio and provide further support to Tamaqua’s faction and their attempts to convince groups to abandon the French. As their small party progressed, their interactions revealed that the council had left many issues unresolved. The Indigenous members insisted that Post ignore questions of prisoners and refrain from speaking to any prisoners when they arrived at Kuskusky. They also recommended against sending messengers ahead to

Logstown and Fort Duquesne to summon groups for a council at Kuskusky.203

201 “Instructions to John Bull Esq., and Mr. William Hayes, Easton 21 October 1758,” PA, 3:557. 202 Post, “November 3, 1758,”, Early Western Travels, 240. 203 Post, “November 12, 1758,” and “November 9, 1758,” Early Western Travels, 245-247. 79

Both positions were Indigenous attempts to control a delicate situation and maintain the precarious Anglophile position. Prisoner returns remained a nonstarter for many Indigenous groups, who maintained complicated and diverse relationships with captured Europeans.

Pisquetomen and his compatriots understood that bringing up the return of these individuals would endanger any initial peace effort. They also knew that the perceived sincerity of British peace overtures would rely on the status of its Indigenous advocates as well as the presence of

European envoys and their accompanying diplomatic articles like wampum and official letters.

On November 9th, Post proposed sending messengers ahead to Logstown and Fort Duquesne so that important individuals could travel to Kuskusky and be prepared to negotiate as soon as the

Pennsylvania delegation arrived. Post’s Indigenous companions “all agreed it would not be good, as they were but messengers; it must be done by their chief men.” 204 Messengers of insufficient status would weaken the supposed authenticity of the British peace offer, a misstep the British could ill-afford. Prior to Easton, the Turkey and Turtle subdivisions of the Lenape had demonstrated some support for peace, but many among the Wolf subdivision, Shawnee, and

Mingo groups remained skeptical that Forbes’ advancing army did not represent designs on their land. Random Indigenous messengers would have been a poor replacement for an envoy like

Post and a leader with the status of Pisquetomen.

The careful strategizing that Pisquetomen engaged in with Post as they traveled west demonstrated that the fate of the proposed peace remained uncertain. Pisquetomen had to continue shaping and tweaking Post’s message to ensure it appealed to the skeptical majority in the region. Without the preparation of individuals like Pisquetomen and Tamaqua, the peace negotiated at Easton would have found a doubtful and apprehensive audience on the Upper Ohio.

204 Post, “November 9, 1758,” Early Western Travels, 245. 80

As Pisquetomen and Post approached Kuskusky, the difficulty of their task was further underpinned when they received word that “one hundred and sixty, from that town, were gone to war against our party,” and found that the town was almost completely devoid of fighting-age men.205 The next day it was revealed that the party from Kuskusky had succeeded in intercepting part of Post’s party that had split off and killed several of them, including Lieutenant

Hays.206

The deliberate attack on the British envoys (allegedly at the instigation of the French) perpetrated by a Kuskusky-based group is a telling example of the diplomatic situation at the

Forks of the Ohio a week before Fort Duquesne’s fall. Kuskusky was the base of Tamaqua and his brothers as well as the home of many members of the Turkey and Turtle subdivisions. These groups had been the most Anglophilic during Post’s first visit and represented the best opportunity the British had at achieving peace with Indigenous groups. The large-scale participation of individuals from Kuskusky in an attack on diplomatic envoys reveals that hostility towards the British remained remarkably high even in the towns that had previously indicated enthusiasm for Post’s peace propositions. These individuals would have been aware of the purpose of Post’s first visit and would have also continuously interacted with the staunchly

Anglophile Tamaqua and his brothers. Their contribution in an attack on a British envoy a mere week before the fall of Fort Duquesne provides a blunt rebuttal to any notion that the Upper Ohio was eager for British peace.

The reality of the situation Post found at Kuskusky demonstrated the limited impact of what Governor Denny referred to as “a general Peace” with “Deputies from the Six Nations and

205 Post, “November 16, 1758,” Early Western Travels, 249. 206 Post, “November 17, 1758,” Early Western Travels, 250. 81 other Tribes” following the negotiations at Easton.207 The hollowness of the Six Nations’ claims to suzerainty over the peoples of the Upper Ohio were laid bare by the fact that they were powerless to stop Lenape, Shawnee, and especially Mingo groups in the region from pursuing independent military action against the British. Post laid much of the blame for the continued defiance at the feet of the French. After the attack on Lieutenant Hays’ group, he claimed that the French found letters on the British envoy’s body and they “had infused bad notions into the

Indians, by means of the letters…which they falsely interpreted.”208 Post’s account repeated

Indigenous stereotypes when he wrote that older and wiser “Indians” were skeptical of the

French but that some younger men believed them and were left enraged at the falsified contents of the letter.

Post’s account of French subterfuge is reminiscent of his earlier report of a French attempt to murder Lenape leaders in that it underestimates Indigenous understanding and intelligence while misrepresenting the French. Indigenous combatants repeatedly demonstrated that they understood the European conflict over the Upper Ohio while deftly playing the two powers off each other. They recognized that the Europeans were ultimately acting in service to their own best interests and showed through numerous dialogues that they did not trust either power to respect Indigenous possession of the region. Literate captives and Indigenous translators both could have provided different interpretations of the letter and certainly would have been utilized to inform Indigenous responses.

207 “16 November, 1758,” MPCP, 8:228. 208 Post, “November 19, 1758,” Early Western Travels, 252-253. One French letter mentions the attack on Lieutenant Hays’ group, but leaves out any mention of false translations. The letter, written by Governor-General Vaudreuil to the Minister of the Marine, was a summary of several months’ activity in the region for high-ranking metropolitan officials. The false translation attempt may have been deemed unimportant enough for inclusion. For the letter, Vaudreuil to the Minister of the Marine, Montréal, 20 January, 1759, Archives Nationales, C11A 104/fol. 13. 82

The prejudicial stereotype of easily deceived “Indians” was typical of Post’s time and has been widely discredited, but it continues to tacitly permeate some of the historiography.

However, his depiction of the French as wily and persuasive diplomats endures much more openly. Even proponents of a “Middle Ground” cast the French as at least diplomatic equals in the region within the mutual misunderstandings that shaped alliances and changing political stances. A close reading of the situation surrounding Hays’ captured letters contradicts both these interpretations just as the alleged attempted murders of the Lenape leaders did. If Post’s account of events is assumed to be completely reliable, the French were actively conducting terrible diplomacy in the region prior to Fort Duquesne’s fall. In the more likely instance that his account cannot be taken completely at face value, the French were at the very least bumbling and ineffectual diplomats as their days at the Forks grew numbered. The earlier attempted murders would clearly have sabotaged the French diplomatic position, but the false translation of the envoy’s letter would also have had obvious negative consequences.

The attempt to fool groups that had demonstrated considerable diplomatic savvy through a ruse as transparent as a falsely translated letter was unlikely to succeed. Close contact over the previous several years had bred familiarity and Indigenous groups that interacted with the French had no doubt heard French talking points about the dangers of a British victory frequently. Their repetition once again in a captured message would have been expected and claims of British treachery would fail to shock anyone. More damning was the fact that numerous translators were present in the region who could translate the letter. Post told the “young men” to bring the letter to one such translator at Kuskusky.209 The French would have been forced to turn over the letter for translation, keep it and implicitly admit to their deception, or attempt to falsify a new

209 Ibid. 83 letter and further extend their web of falsifications. In attempting to fabricate British duplicity, the French instead demonstrated their own potential for perfidy.

The final months of Fort Duquesne’s existence makes it clear that a lack of foresight and an implicit dismissal of Indigenous intelligence marked French diplomatic endeavors in the region. If Post’s accounts are to be believed, the French acted against their own interests to an almost unbelievable degree. In the more likely scenario that his work was embellished or inaccurate, the French still lacked any discernable understanding and respect for the diverse groups they depended on for their continued existence in the region. Whether Hays’ diplomatic dispatches were blatantly falsified or the French simply failed to create a coherent counter- argument, their diplomatic efforts failed to account for their allies’ motivations.

II. The Fall of Fort Duquesne

The fate of both General Forbes’ army and Fort Duquesne hung in the balance following the death of William Hays. Beginning on November 20th, Post spent a “precarious” several days confined to his lodging at Kuskusky as the recently returned war party was “possessed with a murdering spirit.”210 The war party and their French allies had participated in a successful attack on the British at Loyalhanna and their spirits were high after they had once again demonstrated their military superiority over Forbes’ army. An envoy like Post provided a convenient target for anti-Anglo sentiment present in the wake of the victory and his death would have provided a striking conclusion to another successful campaigning season. Post’s account of this time understandably contains little insight into events occurring in Kuskusky as he focused on his faith and said that “As God hath stopped the mouth of the lions, that they could not devour

Daniel, so he will preserve us from their fury and bring us through.”211 The agents of his

210 Post, “November 20, 1758,” Early Western Travels, 254-255. 211 Ibid., 255. 84 eventual deliverance were most likely the same Anglophile individuals that had first supported the missionary on his earlier trip to the region. The specific actions taken by Tamaqua and his brothers is unknown, but after several days they succeeded in summoning sixteen “captains and counsellors” to hear Post’s message.212

Post’s confinement apparently had little impact on the ability of his Indigenous advocates to gather leaders and mollify the large body that had participated in the attack on Hays. Once again, British diplomatic efforts were revealed to be completely reliant on Indigenous support.

Without the Anglophile factions on the Upper Ohio, the great majority of Indigenous people in the region would have remained unconvinced or unaware of the potential for peace with the

British. Post’s Indigenous supporters played a far larger role in the proceedings than the

Moravian missionary himself. Indeed, a close reading of Post’s account demonstrates that his most important function was mainly symbolic. The presence of a British envoy demonstrated the sincerity of the Pennsylvania government’s purported peace overtures. Most of the actual diplomatic work conducted by Tamaqua’s faction went unrecorded, but its results manifested themselves when Post finally emerged from his lodging to deliver the message from Easton. The sixteen “captains and counsellors” assembled at Kuskusky received Post’s message with “great pleasure.”213 Curiously, the questions and concerns that had often been presented to Post on his prior visit were not raised. Queries regarding the return of prisoners and British designs on

Indigenous land were conspicuously absent. The short interaction leaves the distinct impression that the leaders who gathered to see Post had either been strongly pro-peace before the meeting or that Anglophile Indigenous factions had already alleviated any concerns their peers may have had. Tamaqua’s faction and other Anglophile groups had successfully swayed some of their

212 Ibid. 213 Ibid. 85 neighbors to consider peace and by carefully shaping Post’s message they ensured that the news of Easton would match their own accounts and be well-received.

After Post delivered his message, a French officer arrived with wampum and a call to arms against General Forbes’ approaching army. Historians frequently cite this as the primary evidence that the nations of the Upper Ohio had left the French alliance and accepted peace with the British.214 Post recounts a dramatic scene in his journal, as the assembled “captains” rebuff the French officer and kick the wampum around “as if it was a snake.” The allegedly mortified

French officer was left “pale as death” and sent messengers back to Fort Duquesne to inform

Lignery of the development.215 While Post’s account seems to clearly indicate that a diplomatic shift had finally occurred in the region, it actually generates more questions than it answers.

Who were the sixteen “captains and counsellors” Post delivered his message to? If they were residents of Kuskusky or had signed the speech that Pisquetomen carried to Easton, their keen acceptance of the peace revealed little about the overall disposition of the surrounding region.

These leaders demonstrated their desire for peace on Post’s first visit and their acceptance of

Post’s message on his second visit did not signify anything more than a confirmation of their previous position. Post provides no evidence that new leaders from Francophile groups further afield (i.e. the Wolf subdivision of the Lenape or any significant Shawnee leaders) were converted by the terms offered at Easton. What happened to the significant number of men

(~160) from Kuskusky who only days earlier participated in an attack on a British envoy and forced Post into a pseudo-house arrest? Even if these men were not counted among the ranks of

214 For Lenape refusal of French war belts at Kuskusky see Anderson, Crucible of War, 282-283; Ward, Breaking the Backcountry, 183; McConnell, A Country Between, 133-134; Jennings, Empire of Fortune, 409; Crouch, Nobility Lost, 118; Parmenter, “The Iroquois and Native American Struggle”, 110; Richard S. Grimes, The Western Delaware Indian Nation, 125. 215 Post, “November 20, 1758,” Early Western Travels, 256. 86 influential “captains,” young men had often acted independently of elder leaders who proved unable or unwilling to moderate their violence.216 Finally, what was the response to the French rallying cry in the other settlements along the Upper Ohio? The villages at Kuskusky constituted the largest settlement in the region, but numerous other towns from Venango to Saucunk contained substantial populations of fighting age males. The influence of Tamaqua and the

Turkey subdivision at Kuskusky had demonstrated its limits on Post’s first visit and even with their hard work they could not dictate the course of action for other Lenape subdivisions, much less other Native nations like the Shawnee.

The answer to these questions can be found within the context of broader French diplomatic failure in the region. On the day after Post delivered his message, General Forbes closed to within twenty miles of Fort Duquesne and Post advised the leaders at Kuskusky to withdraw their people from the fort to prevent any accidental conflict with the British Army. He also begged them to deliver his message to “the Shawnese at Logstown” to prevent them from joining the French.217 Post’s preoccupation with Logstown reveals much about the wider region on the eve of Fort Duquesne’s fall. First, it implies that the “chief men” who approved of his message the previous day did not include any leaders from the substantial Shawnee settlement near Fort Duquesne. Extrapolating Kuskusky’s rejection of the French officer to the broader region would therefore be inaccurate. The despoilment of French wampum did not represent a wider reaction to Easton because most of the region had still not received word of the peace council and were not bound by it.

The French either did not recognize the diplomatic opportunities still available to them or chose not to pursue them. In one of Governor-General Vaudreuil’s last letters concerning Fort

216 For an exploration of this phenomenon refer to pages 46-47. 217 Post, “November 20, 1758,” Early Western Travels, 257. 87

Duquesne before it fell, he wrote optimistically that French efforts regarding the Shawnee and

Lenape “have strengthened these nations in their attachment to the French.”218 Vaudreuil’s appraisal of the diplomatic situation was typical of French correspondence regarding the region’s

Indigenous peoples. Lignery’s October letters to Vaudreuil also mention unquantifiable strengthening and weakening of alliances without mentioning any specific leaders, settlements, or details beyond large tribal designations. Their dispatches sometimes seem more like the observations of removed onlookers than active participants. In regards to specific actions taken in the face of Forbes’ advance, Vaudreuil’s account mentions only a single messenger sent to

Kuskusky. In a far less dramatic version of Post’s narrative, Vaudreuil writes that “the interpreter, sent by M. de Ligneris to the Loups, returned from the forks and told him that almost the whole village was deserted; the savages had fled to the woods with their families, and no one dared come to Fort Duquêne because the enemy was too numerous for M. de Ligneris to make any stand against them.”219 In Vaudreuil’s account, France’s Indigenous allies in the region were intimidated by British numerical superiority and any possibility of French diplomatic failure is omitted.

Vaudreuil’s letter is telling in light of the perspective offered by Christian Frederick Post and the broader context of New France. The Governor-General had a vested interest in convincing the Minister of the Marine that Fort Duquesne had not been unduly abandoned as the result of French missteps. The political conflict between Vaudreuil and Montcalm had reached a fever pitch by 1759, with deputies of both men arguing for their respective patrons in the metropole. The abandonment of the Ohio had to be justified or Vaudreuil risked losing his

218 Vaudreuil to the Minister of the Marine, Montréal, November 28, 1758, Archives Nationales, C11A 104/fol. 127- 133. Translation is my own. 219 Vaudreuil to the Minister of the Marine, January 20, 1758, Wilderness Chronicles, 128. 88 position.220 Naturally, admitting that the Ohio had been lost because of diplomatic outmaneuvering would have been out of the question. Even in light of this, it is still illuminating that Lignery and Vaudreuil only mentioned Kuskusky when they discussed summoning their allies. Christian Frederick Post was worried that the Shawnee at Logstown would come to

Lignery’s aid, but there is no evidence that the French even attempted to rally allies there or at

Francophile settlements higher up the Allegheny.

Figure 6. Major Indigenous towns and European forts on the Upper Ohio. Fort Machault’s colocation with the Wolf subdivision-majority town of Venango was crucial as the French reconsolidated their forces after the abandonment of Fort Duquesne. Map is my own.

220 Vaudreuil would lose the political contest with Montcalm and be imprisoned in the Bastille for a brief period after the war. He stood trial and was eventually exonerated. The political contest with Montcalm appears throughout Crouch’s Nobility Lost. For a brief summary of Vaudreuil’s imprisonment and trial specifically, see Crouch, Nobility Lost, 128-136. 89

Kuskusky was a major seat of Lenape power in the region and the largest settlement, but it was not a European-style political capital. Logstown and Saucunk were downriver from Fort

Duquesne and significantly closer than Kuskusky. Messengers from the fort could have easily made it to both towns in the days before Forbes army arrived. More significantly, Venango was also within range of French messengers and was the seat of a large proportion of Wolf subdivision Lenape and Mingos. A French prisoner captured in 1757 estimated that it was a three-day journey by batteaux from Venango to Fort Duquesne when he traveled with a large body of French and Canadians in June of 1756.221 Given that Lignery had knowledge of Forbes’ continued advance as early as November 9th and that Indigenous war parties were capable of quicker travel times than large French contingents, the unpreparedness of the French to summon their northern allies at quick notice appears to be a major oversight. The most likely explanation for this mistake is that the French did not understand the diversity of political stances occupied by their allies. If the French viewed the Lenape as a unified tribe, the large population at

Kuskusky made reinforcements from Venango redundant. They failed to account for the fact that Turkey subdivision members might withdraw from the alliance while members of the Wolf subdivision remained allies.

The half-hearted attempt to gather allies at Kuskusky is emblematic of French failures.

They did not understand the differing dispositions within their allied groups and as a result they were unprepared to utilize their most ardent support when Anglophile groups withdrew. They also failed to acknowledge that their position at the Forks of the Ohio was only made possible by the assent of the Indigenous groups that lived there. Both the French and their allies from the pays d’en haut were incapable of remaining in the region by force given the strength of the

221 “Further Examination of Michael La Chauvignerie, June 1757,” PA, 3:306. 90

Lenape, Shawnee, and Mingos in the region. The French had been able to accept limits on their imperial aspirations by negotiating and engaging in diplomacy with Indigenous North

Americans, but admitting to secondary status and acting accordingly proved to be impossible.

The abandonment of Fort Duquesne on November 24th was the result of diplomacy by

Anglophile Indigenous groups like Tamaqua and his brothers as well as French failures in marshalling their most dedicated allies. The French retreated to the fringes of the region in an effort to build strength and retake the Forks in the next campaigning season. Despite their greatly reduced position in the region, the French would continue to maintain extensive support among their neighbors. Ongoing attacks, diplomatic overtures, and the assembly of a large

French-Lenape-Shawnee-Mingo joint force at Fort Machault all provided evidence that groups in the region continued to support the French and remained convinced that they represented the best path to an independent Ohio.

III. Retreat

The fall of Fort Duquesne heralded a new era of diplomacy on the Ohio front of the

Seven Years’ War. The British had won their long-sought after prize, but now had to endure tenuous supply lines and an inevitable French counterattack. They also faced new diplomatic challenges as they dealt directly with Indigenous groups that had previously been contacted through intermediaries. When the French occupied the Forks, the British message could be manipulated and shaped by certain Indigenous actors to make it more palatable for wider

Indigenous audiences. Once Fort Pitt was established, however, Indigenous groups received the opportunity to speak directly with their new neighbors and were often left unimpressed.

Meanwhile, the French retreat to Fort Machault placed them squarely amongst the most

Francophile groups in the entire region. The loss of Fort Duquesne was lamentable, but French

91 diplomatic shortcomings were less detrimental among the Wolf subdivision on the Upper

Allegheny and Custaloga’s town at Venango.

The triumph of the British victory was short-lived as the reality of their position at the

Forks set in. General Forbes was gravely ill and quickly had to retire back to Pennsylvania while the “peace” that allegedly made Fort Duquesne indefensible was revealed to be far more limited than the exposed British officers hoped. A letter from the French commander provides insight into events at the Forks immediately following the French withdrawal and demonstrates the insecure position the British found themselves in.222 The British pleaded with the assembled

Indigenous leaders to accept peace while attempting to convince them that New France was nearly defeated.223 The Indigenous response was less affirmative than the British had hoped.

The Lenape spoke about the geographic difficulties of spreading the peace, while reiterating that unless the British withdrew to the other side of the mountains “we will never make an alliance with you.”224 The lack of a positive response on November 26th forced the British to turn to their old advocate in desperation. Tamaqua and his brothers were summoned by an “Iroquois chief”

(likely Saghogsoniont, an Oneida leader present at the Easton conference) who was working with the British at the Forks.225 The lurking French presence, the relatively weak British force, and the independence of neighboring Indigenous groups once again forced the British to depend on

222 The letter, from a collection edited by H.R. Casgrain, was not signed. He concludes that its contents indicate it was likely written by Lignery. The French maintained a presence at Kuskusky after the British victory in the form of an officer who lived among the cluster of towns and attempted to promote French interests. He would have been able to gather the intelligence reported in this letter. For Casgrain’s note, see Guerre du Canada: Relations et Journaux de différentes expeditions faites Durant les années 1755-60, ed. H.R. Casgrain (Québec: L.J. Demers & Frére, 1895), 175. The translations of Casgrain’s collection are my own. 223“Nouvelles Sauvages, Novembre et Décembre 1758,” Guerre du Canada, 176. 224 Ibid., 177. The letter does not mention any individual names or Lenape subdivisions, but given the location the “Lenape” mentioned were likely leaders of the Turkey and Turtle subdivisions. 225 Ibid., 178. Christian Frederick Post’s journal corroborates the events described in the French letter with additional personal and ceremonial details. Post reports that Saghogsoniont (Thomas King) was the individual who summoned Tamaqua to Fort Duquesne but the French report does not mention the “Iroquois chief” by name. For Post’s mention of “Thomas King”, see Post, “November 29, 1758,” Post, “November 20, 1758,” Early Western Travels, 279. 92

Indigenous diplomacy.226 The British could not ensure their continued presence in the region without the acquiescence of Indigenous groups. By summoning Tamaqua, they tacitly admitted their weakness and acknowledged that their unwelcome presence in the region could only be sustained via Indigenous actors. Tamaqua, already an influential and important leader among the

Turkey subdivision, saw his status raised further by his association with the British. His important position as a conduit between the British and surrounding Indigenous groups granted him greater influence and was the fruition of his long-held Anglophile position.

The account of events immediately following the fall of Fort Duquesne reveals a diplomatic dynamism on the part of the British that the French failed to match. After only a week at the Forks, the British accepted their inability to achieve a lasting peace on their own and pivoted to direct engagement with their most notable Indigenous advocates. The pivot was forced because of their diplomatic and military weakness and would not have occurred if the

British possessed the means to act unilaterally. However, when faced with a similar predicament, the French failed spectacularly. Their position at the Forks in 1758 was also only made possible by the acquiescence of neighboring Indigenous groups. Instead of utilizing

Francophile Indigenous leaders and relying on their diplomatic prowess to further French goals, the French failed to muster support and were forced to leave the Forks without a fight. The

French had been in the region for years but declined to find or utilize an allied leader analogous to Tamaqua. When the British met resistance to their goals, they immediately sent for their closest ally in the region. When the French needed allies to defend the Forks, they did not call on Custaloga or other sympathetic leaders. Instead, they went directly to the hotbed of

226 The British army that marched on Fort Duquesne was numerically superior to French forces in the region, but supply considerations forced General Forbes to disperse his troops among the forts lining Forbes’ road shortly after Fort Duquesne was seized. The small garrison at the newly-christened Fort Pitt were left dangerously exposed as a result. 93

Anglophile sentiment in the region and were spurned. They would have done well to emulate the British and rely on Indigenous networks, but their years without direct European diplomatic competition in the region contributed to a generalized and ineffective response.

Despite the diplomatic failings of the French command on the Upper Ohio, they maintained support throughout the region. On December 8th, Lignery sent a collier de wampum to try and “raise a party.”227 While the wampum itself was returned, the attempt provided valuable information about the disposition of Indigenous groups at the Forks. The recipients of the collier de wampum responded that “as soon as the French walked roughly they would follow them; that they couldn’t go to war alone…that as soon as they saw the French army appear they would be ready.”228 The Indigenous response, even if it is not taken at face value, was encouraging for the French. The response to the last-ditch effort to recruit allies at Kuskusky was open scorn, whereas the response to the collier de wampum was contingent and open. The rejoinder to Lignery’s diplomatic overtures in early December was a marked improvement to the desecration of the war belts at Kuskusky two weeks prior. Indigenous dispositions had not drastically changed in this time, but the audience for the French message did, once again revealing the broad political differences between Native nations and subgroups.

The concerns voiced by the recipients of Lignery’s collier de wampum, primarily that the

French had not been shouldering their fair share of the fighting, mark another failure of the

French in their dealings with their allies. When the war belts at Kuskusky were rejected, the assembled war captains also decried the disproportionate amount of fighting they were burdened with compared to the French. Similarly, in Governor-General Vaudreuil’s letter describing the

227 “Nouvelles Sauvages,” Guerre du Canada, 179. French collier de wampum fulfilled the same role as British belts. They served as tangible symbols of diplomatic relationships and reinforced bonds beyond words alone. 228 Ibid. 94 fall of Fort Duquesne he wrote that “in order to win the savages” French and Canadian soldiers needed to eagerly participate in combat in order to “revive the good will of those who may have cooled toward us.”229 The generalized, vague diplomacy the French engaged in was rendered even more ineffective by the negative martial reputation they cultivated as they stagnated at the

Forks. Vaudreuil’s recognition that their reputation had suffered was significant but painfully late.

Christian Frederick Post’s account from the same chaotic period reinforces the fact that

French shortcomings were not irredeemable. Tamaqua deftly utilized the Six Nations to bolster his position while making it clear that he had “not made [himself] a king.”230 The Six Nations did support peace with the British and technically claimed suzerainty over the Ohio, but the war had proved that Tamaqua’s “uncles” had little practical control over the groups inhabiting the region. By emphasizing the Six Nations’ role in the peace process and status as the Lenape’s

“uncles,” Tamaqua was able to bolster his own Anglophile position with the added influence of the Six Nations. He understood that even if he was technically obeying the wishes of the Six

Nations, their inability to affect any actual control meant he could maintain Lenape independence while improving his own influence and working to achieve his own vision for the future.

Tamaqua’s careful cooption of the Six Nations’ authority was put to use in Kuskusky as he worked with Post and Six Nations’ envoys to convince leaders to follow the peace deal. Even with British possession of the Forks and the presence of Six Nations’ representatives, the process went forward slowly. Tamaqua spoke about the difficulty of getting the “three tribes” to agree amongst themselves and each other and constantly went among groups with Post to reread the

229 Vaudreuil to the Minister of the Marine, January 20, 1759, Wilderness Chronicles, 130. 230 Post, “November 28, 1758,” Early Western Travels, 273. 95 official message from the British government.231 It is unclear if the “three tribes” Tamaqua spoke of refers to the three subdivisions of the Lenape or other tribal designations entirely, but the lack of certainty reinforces the difficulty of establishing a broadly observable peace.

Independent towns and groups were not beholden to negotiations at Kuskusky. The French had recognized the political diversity of the Upper Ohio since Céleron’s voyage in 1749 but their inability to work within the politically diverse circumstances of the region condemned Fort

Duquesne.232 Several individuals arrived from Saucunk midway through the deliberations “to see what the English were about.”233 The fact that the nearby townspeople were forced to make a six—hour journey to scout amongst their neighbors and garner information about the diplomatic situation hints at the impact geographic factors had on diplomacy. Saucunk was relatively close to Kuskusky (roughly 36 miles on foot) and its location downriver on the Beaver meant that messengers could quickly cover the distance by boat.234 The slow spread of information between these two close towns was the product of political and diplomatic factors rather than geographic constraints. If Post’s message had not managed to spread or leak out such a manageable distance in five days, towns further afield with longer travel times to Kuskusky would have received Post’s message and Tamaqua’s persuasive efforts even later.

The slow spread of information presented an unseized opportunity for the French to marshal support in spite of their diplomatic failures. If their Indigenous allies could not receive news of the peace proposal (and the subsequent wrangling over its sincerity) before Forbes arrived the French would maintain a distinct advantage in negotiations with Indigenous groups.

By focusing their efforts on Kuskusky instead of more sympathetic towns, the French

231 Post, “November 27, 1758,” Early Western Travels, 271. 232 Warren, The Worlds the Shawnees Made, 203. 233 Post, “November 27, 1758,” Early Western Travels, 272. 234 Gibson, “Captivity of Hugh Gibson,” 148. 96 surrendered their geographic advantage and faced the most influential Anglophile group in the region from a position of extreme weakness.

The French decision to focus on Kuskusky for help in their last days at the Forks may have been born from three years of established procedure. It was the largest town in the region and home to important war leaders like Shingas. However, even if ritualized patterns of negotiation required the French to travel to Kuskusky when they needed military support, no individual or group in the town had ever been able to exert direct control over other groups in the region. The French squandered the geographic advantages that slowed the spread of information when they did not gather allies from a multiplicity of towns and villages.

The French retreat from the Forks of the Ohio was the result of diplomatic failures and an inaccurate understanding of their own position in a complicated political environment. In the weeks after the retreat, Tamaqua and his kin continued to champion peace with the British.

However, their message spread slowly and the vast majority of Indigenous groups remained hesitant to fully commit to either European power. The British seemed to enjoy success with the establishment of Fort Pitt and their continued presence in the region, but the work of Tamaqua and his allies concealed lingering support for the French as well as a pervasive anti-European sentiment. The new center of French power at Fort Machault brought them closer to the most

Francophile groups in the region and allowed them to build strength in relative safety. The destruction of Fort Duquesne, seemingly the pivotal event in the Ohio front of the Seven Years’

War, actually represented a reorganization of the region more than a final battle. In some ways the French were left stronger after the loss of the fort because they were forced to reckon with their diplomatic failures. Meanwhile, the British were left exposed and vulnerable with far less

Indigenous support than they needed to survive.

97

IV. Reorganization and Resistance

The British presence at the Forks of the Ohio was tenuous throughout the winter of 1758.

Tamaqua advised Colonel Bouquet, the highest-ranking British officer in the area after General

Forbes’ hasty departure, to make sure “that none of your people straggle out in the woods, as a few Indians may come here and take a scalp without our knowledge.”235 This warning from the closest British ally in the area illustrates the precariousness of the British position. Huddled in the hastily built stockade of Fort Pitt, the British garrison relied entirely on the goodwill of the surrounding Indigenous groups and Tamaqua’s diplomatic skill to ensure their survival. Their efforts to expand their moderate diplomatic successes north along the Allegheny led to

Custaloga’s appearance at Fort Pitt in early January of 1759. When Custaloga returned from his meeting with Colonel Bouquet, he recounted that “during the four days we were among them, we did not hear a single word which did not tend toward good.”236 Bouquet’s flattery and careful language reveal that he was acutely aware of the precariousness of his position. His assurances that the British would leave the Forks when the French were defeated and his supplications to

“the common good” would not be repeated when British numbers rose in the next campaigning season.237 For the time being, however, his conscientious words reflected his weak position.

Custaloga’s trip to Fort Pitt revealed that the Upper Allegheny remained relatively untouched by the Easton negotiations that had provided ample support to Tamaqua’s efforts.

Part of this was due to the disposition of the northern groups. The Wolf subdivision had long been Francophile and was the largest group, but numerous Mingos and Shawnee also appear in the records. The Shawnee found scattered in accounts regarding this area are particularly

235 “Tamaqua to Colonel Bouquet, 5 December 1758,” PA, 3:574. 236 “Custaloga’s Report, 4 January 1759,” Wilderness Chronicles, 137. 237 Ibid., 136. 98 interesting because of their geographic distance from other major Shawnee settlements in the region like Logstown.238 Logstown represented a rough northern extreme of Shawnee settlement along the Ohio that was centered at Lower Shawneetown. The presence of Shawnee as far north as Venango and distant from their well-known population centers suggests a strong Francophile stance that saw them “follow” Lignery north to Fort Machault following the abandonment of

Fort Duquesne.239

Geography also continued to play a role in the disposition of Indigenous peoples. On

February 13th, a delegation from “Bowlunce” arrived at Philadelphia and gained an audience with Governor Denny. Bowlunce was a small collection of towns approximately ninety miles upriver from Venango but its inhabitants still considered themselves to “live on the Ohio.”240

The delegation had traveled from their homes to Venango, Fort Duquesne, and finally

Philadelphia to find out for themselves what had transpired at Easton because “this is a matter of vast importance for us to know with truth and certainty, as the French are our near Neighbours, surrounding us on all sides, and urging us to join them.”241 The appearance of the group is remarkable for both their long journey and their inability to receive a satisfactory answer. When they departed Philadelphia on February 19th they “neither [knew] what will be done by the army, nor what is desired of the Indians,” and they worried that the vague answers given in

Philadelphia would lead to negative consequences on the Upper Ohio.242

238 For references to Shawnee at Venango, see “February 9, 1759,” MPCP, 8:266; “August 5, 1759 Pittsburgh,” MPCP, 8:393; Malartic, “May 11, 1759,” Glories to Useless Heroism, 207; George Croghan to Gov. Denny, Pittsburgh, July 15, 1759, PA, 3:672 239 Malartic, “January 10, 1759,” Glories to Useless Heroism, 195. Matthew Ward argues that the Shawnee as a whole “were even more Anglophobic than the Delawares,” in Breaking the Backcountry, 165. 240 “February 8, 1759,” MPCP, 8:264. Within the MPCP this group is at times referred to as “the Canawaago Indians” and “the Indians from Canawaago.” Their leader is also called “Canawaago, the Chief of the Indian Deputies near Bowlunce.” To avoid confusion between the individual, the town, and the people this work uses the term “Bowlunce delegation” to refer to the group that traveled from Bowlunce to Philadelphia. 241 Ibid., 8:265. 242 “19 February, 1759,” MPCP, 8:270. 99

The Bowlunce delegation’s odyssey demonstrates several important realities of the continued struggle for the Ohio. First, geography isolated Indigenous communities and hindered the rapid dissemination of information like complicated peace negotiations. Second, the French maintained advantages over the British that they struggled to utilize. The lukewarm answers the

Bowlunce group received at Philadelphia demonstrated that the British were not particularly gifted Ohio diplomats without Indigenous assistance. The Bowlunce delegation knew that the

British message would cause conflict. They immediately saw the contradiction inherent in the

British position and were left unsettled by the unsatisfactory response they received. If the

British did not intend to settle west of the Alleghenies, why did they maintain a sizable force at

Fort Duquesne? The French were a known quantity in the region and despite their flaws it was clear that the French military presence at the Forks was not a prelude to civilian homesteaders.

Tamaqua and Pisquetomen had previously been able to mediate messages like this before their widespread propagation. Now that the British had established direct contact with various

Indigenous groups on the Ohio, however, they lost the Indigenous filter that had previously smoothed over potential disagreements before they could occur. Andrew Montour, a métis officer in service to Pennsylvania, attempted to act as a mediating force by serving as an intermediary between the Bowlunce group and the Pennsylvania government. Unsurprisingly, at the heart of colonial British power the Europeans were far less amenable to Indigenous concerns than they were at their weak periphery. Montour could only ask in exasperation “Is there no one else to do the King’s business?” as the British failed to properly assure the Bowlunce delegation.243

243 Ibid. 100

The geography of the region and British struggles presented ideal opportunities for the

French to regain the initiative in the region and prepare for a counterattack. After their earlier failures, they were cognizant of the need to rededicate themselves to their relationships with allies even if they continued to struggle to effectively utilize those relationships. In a letter written on February 15th, Governor-General Vaudreuil wrote in desperation that he had “he had full reason to fear that they [the British] will succeed in winning them [the Lenape] over.”244

While Vaudreuil’s fear was well-founded, his appraisal of the root of the problem demonstrated that the French still did not understand the diplomatic situation they faced. Vaudreuil wrote that the British envoys were well received among the Lenape because they were supported by chiefs from the Six Nations.245 In reality, it was factions within the Lenape that were the largest drivers of the peace effort. Tamaqua and his brothers utilized the authority of the Six Nations to support their goals, but the course of the entire war had proved the Six Nations could not force terms upon the diverse groups on the Upper Ohio. The French blamed outside groups for their diplomatic setbacks and demonstrated an utter inability to understand the composition and motivations of their long-time neighbors. Their failures were doomed to continue because they could not combat something that they did not understand.

Vaudreuil concluded his letter with a copy of his instructions to Lignery. The Governor-

General ordered his subordinate commander to “make every effort to secure the good will of the savages of the Belle Riviere” and to “employ every means to induce the savages to attack the

English with renewed vigor.”246 These basic, generalized instructions reiterate the simple and hopeless nature of French diplomacy in a region riven by subdivisions and competing visions of

244 Vaudreuil to the Minister of the Marine, February 15, 1759, Wilderness Chronicles, 131. 245 Ibid., 132. 246 Ibid., 133. 101 the future. The final order was to establish small posts near Loyalhanna to harass British lines of communication and cut off supplies. Both sets of orders required a dynamic, aggressive commander who could also perform nuanced diplomacy. Lignery had been exactly this type of commander during his time in command at the Forks, but by the winter of 1758 Vaudreuil’s expectations were probably unrealistic. Lignery had expressed his desire to leave the Ohio

Country in October of 1758 and another year spent campaigning to retake the fort and wintering in the region surely did not motivate him.247 He also had a negative reputation as a drunkard among some metropolitan army officers.248 It is easy to imagine Lignery feeling every bit of his fifty-five years after so much time spent at a far-flung outpost, surrounded by people he thought of as “savages” and far from his Montréal home. French diplomatic issues with Indigenous allies pervaded beyond the Ohio, but human factors also contributed to the particular problems present in the region.

V. Counterattack

The diplomatic advantages the French possessed and the precariousness of the British position was abundantly clear in the first half of 1759. While the French gathered strength for a counterattack to retake the Forks, the British struggled to negotiate with their Indigenous neighbors and dealt with attacks on their tenuous supply lines. On February 24th Tamaqua and

Nenatchehan (Delaware George) met with Colonel Mercer at Pittsburgh.249 Tamaqua sought to ease British concerns about the disposition of the disparate groups in the region while also gently taking Mercer to task for the insufficient volume of trade goods at the fort.250 Interestingly,

247 Lignery to Vaudreuil, Octobre 20, 1758, “Extract of Three Letters,” 177. 248 Bougainville, “April 12, 1758,” Adventures, 201. Bougainville wrote that Lignery was “a man who drinks too much and under him drunkards and fools.” Bougainville’s account of Lignery should be taken with a grain of salt given his well-documented contempt for Canadians and their conduct during the war. 249 Mercer was left in command of Fort Pitt after Colonel Bouquet and General Forbes returned to Pennsylvania. 250 “Minutes of Conferences held with Indians at Pittsburgh, 24 February, 1759,” MPCP, 8:306-307. 102

Tamaqua is recorded as the “King of the Delaware Indians” in the minutes of their meeting.251

This title reflected wishful thinking on the part of the British, who were slowly realizing that

Tamaqua’s extreme Anglophile position was an outlier. As the year progressed the disconnect between the perceived political situation after the Council of Easton and the reality on the Upper

Ohio grew more apparent and both the British and Indigenous groups struggled to reach common ground as the French built up their forces near Venango.

Beyond the walls of Fort Pitt, the intelligence the British gathered painted an even bleaker picture. The French still had “many friends among the Delawares and Shawnees” and the Six Nations worried that the body of “Over Lake Indians” assembling at Venango would form a Confederacy with local groups and form a new political force.252 Mercer was more concerned that “A Train of Artillery and Considerable reinforcement from Niagara” had crossed

Lake Erie over the winter and signaled French intent to reduce Fort Pitt in the coming campaign season.253 He also noted that among the Lenape “the Old thinking part of the Tribe incline to us, while the young Villains…have still some French Poison lurking in their Veins, that might perhaps break out at a Convenient Opportunity.”254 Other reports further warned that the French had magazines with stores at Kuskusky and surrounding towns to serve as supply posts in the campaign to retake the Forks.255

Despite Mercer’s dismal appraisal of the British position, the French were not overly optimistic about their own situation. Vaudreuil wrote that the Lenape, Shawnee, and Mingos continuously urged Lignery to evacuate Fort Machault and leave the Ohio Country and correctly

251 Ibid., 306. 252 Colonel Mercer to Governor Denny, Pittsburg, January 8, 1759,” MPCP, 292. 253 Colonel Mercer to Mr. Richard Peters, Pittsburgh, March 1, 1759,” MPCP, 8:305-306. 254 Ibid., 8:306. 255 Governor Denny to General Amherst, Philadelphia, March 8, 1759,” MPCP, 8:284. For another British intelligence report on their situation, see “Intelligence Received March 17, 1759 at Pittsburgh,” MPCP, 8:312-313. 103 ascertained that the Indigenous inhabitants of the region “wish that there were neither French nor

English on the Belle Riviere.”256 However, the increasingly brusque approach the British began to take in their diplomatic parleys provided reason for measured optimism.257 Vaudreuil also expressed confidence that a strong French offensive would convince undecided groups to side with the French and expel the British from the Forks.258 The French were correct in their assessment that they maintained Indigenous support and possessed the means to further increase their Indigenous backing. However, they still did not appreciate that Indigenous actors were their largest diplomatic obstacle. Malartic’s assessment on April 7th that “The savages…still seem attached to us” is another example of the generalized French approach to dealing with their

Indigenous allies.259 Their real opponent in swaying political allegiances was Tamaqua and his ilk, not the isolated, undersupplied British at Fort Pitt. Tamaqua’s new British title of “king” expanded his influence even if it did not bestow the type of power typically associated with

European monarchs. The French understood the importance of Indigenous alliances and the practical usage of colliers de wampum, but they did not look beyond the veil of “savages” and tribes to understand the complex political dynamics within Indigenous communities.

Decentralized power structures made this a difficult task that the British were only able to navigate by outsourcing the work to well-disposed Native groups. Later events would prove that this successful navigation was due to Tamaqua and the Turkey subdivision rather than any

British affinity for Indigenous diplomacy. In short, any European diplomatic successes in the

Ohio Valley from 1758-1759 were actually the work of Native actors.

256 Vaudreuil to the Minister, March 30, 1759,”Wilderness Chronicles, 140. 257 Ibid., 142. 258 Ibid., 141. 259 Malartic, “April 7, 1759,” Glories to Useless Heroism, 203. 104

The diplomatic situation grew more frantic for all parties as the spring of 1759 began and the imminent French campaign to regain the Forks drew closer. In one remarkable event in

March, Shawnee messengers appeared at a council of the Six Nations held near Onondaga to discuss allegiances in the ongoing war. In a dramatic scene, the messenger arrived in the middle of the debate and said “you know we have declar’d never to be at peace with the English, and all we desire to know is, whether you look upon them as Friends and Brothers.”260 The assembled leaders asked the messenger to stay to receive their answer but the Shawnee impudently replied that “he had no such order, and if they had any answer to make they might send a messenger.”261

The exchange is extraordinary for the brashness of the Shawnee messenger and its wider implications. In numerous diplomatic discussions between Indigenous groups and Europeans the

Shawnee were often treated as an afterthought and the “little children” of the Lenape who follow the political course plotted by their “parent.”262 Before the war, the Lenape themselves had been characterized as “women” under the suzerainty of the Six Nations.263 That the “little children” of the Lenape “women” would boldly assert themselves and issue a thinly veiled threat to the Six

Nations in a council at Onondaga is perhaps the greatest example of how little control the

Haudenosaunee polity had over its presumed clients on the Upper Ohio. The course of the war had revealed the Six Nations’ claims of authority over the region to be a façade, but the rebelliousness of the Shawnee messenger at Onondaga punctuated their decline.

260 Levi Trump to Gov. Denny, Fort Augusta April 8, 1759, PA, 3:582. 261 Ibid. 262 For the Shawnee as “little children” of the Lenape, see” Custaloga’s Report, January 4, 1759,” Wilderness Chronicles, 137. 263 The Lenape’s status as “women” was usually (but not always) pejorative and differences between Indigenous and European gender roles complicated its meaning to European actors. It symbolized the role of the Lenape as diplomats and brokers as well as their inability to wage war without the consent of the Six Nations. For a detailed discussion of the Lenape’s status as “women” and eventual refusal of the moniker, see Richard S. Grimes, “We ‘Now Have Taken up the Hatchet against Them’: Braddock’s Defeat and the Martial Liberation of the Western Delawares,” The Pennsylvania Magazine of History and Biography 137, no. 3 (2013): 227-259. 105

The messenger did not speak for all Shawnee nor did he take an explicitly Francophile stance. Nevertheless, his professed animosity to the British revealed that the French still had much in common with some of the groups in the region. The naked hostility the Shawnee messenger displayed once again makes the French decision to gather allies from Kuskusky on the eve of Fort Duquesne’s fall inexplicable. The French failed to recognize the groups that were most closely aligned with their own interests.

The agitated diplomatic situation manifested itself in open attacks on the British in April and May of 1759. Colonel Mercer was aided by prominent members of the Turtle and Turkey subdivisions as he attempted to stem the attacks through diplomatic means. Nenatchehan

(Delaware George) sent wampum belts to Custaloga in an attempt to weaken the Wolf subdivision’s bonds with the French while Bemino (Killbuck) traveled to Kuskusky and

Venango.264 Bemino returned with optimistic news that the Wolf subdivision, Mingos on the upper Allegheny, and Custaloga had been convinced to abandon the French, but this did not manifest itself in any meaningful way and a substantial Lenape population remained at

Venango.265 Further, Tamaqua’s brother Nenatchehan expressed exasperation at his inability “to bring over all the Delawares to the British Interest” and resolved to move back to the

Susquehanna if he found “any further difficulty in keeping them from the French.”266 The frustration of the Anglophile factions on the diplomatic front was magnified by the continued participation of Indigenous groups in military actions against the British. On May 11th “the

Chouanons (Shawnee) and the Loups (Lenape) routed the vanguard of a corps which marched on

Fort Machault…and complain about the betrayals of the English.”267 The “corps” was likely

264 Col. Mercer to ---- Pittsburgh 25 April 1759, PA, 3: 624-625. 265 Ibid., 625. 266 Ibid., 626. 267 Malartic, “May 11, 1759,” Glories to Useless Heroism, 207. 106 nothing more than a small reconnaissance and raiding party given the defensive posture of

Colonel Mercer at Fort Pitt, but the participation of Shawnee and Lenape combatants in its defeat demonstrated that the French maintained more than verbal support. Their allies in the region were still willing to fight with them five months after they abandoned Fort Duquesne in spite of their diplomatic missteps.

The French continued to strengthen their position with additional reinforcements and allies into the summer of 1759. Loyalhanna, a frequent target of French aggression during

Forbes’ offensive, again found itself the subject of combined Franco-Indigenous attacks.268 The targeting of Loyalhanna was significant because it served as a crucial supply base for Fort Pitt and it was located a considerable distance from Fort Machault. The British, isolated at Fort Pitt and smaller supply forts along Forbes’ road, were incapable of preventing French freedom of maneuver within the woods and rivers of the Upper Ohio. Indigenous forces, however, were more than capable of blocking French overland travel through their land. The French and their allies were not stopped because most Native groups in the region maintained sympathetic or neutral postures towards the French. A long journey from Fort Machault to Loyalhanna was only possible with the tacit consent of numerous Indigenous groups. Even after the loss of Fort

Duquesne, the French were still capable of mounting aggressive, far-ranging assaults with

Indigenous support.

Anecdotal accounts of the disposition of Indigenous groups in the region also support the sentiment that the French alliance was enjoying renewed vigor after its supposed end in

November of 1758. One captivity narrative recorded that the Lenape “in conversation said the

268 Adam Stephen to Brig. Gen. Stanwix, Ft. Ligonier 7 July 1759, PA,3:668-669. For more examples of attacks on British supply lines, see Mercer to Bouquet, April 24, 1759, Papers, 251 ; Stephen to Stanwix, May 25, 1759, Papers 318-319; Curry to Bouquet, May 27, 1759, Papers, 329-330; Mercer to Bouquet, March 1, 1759, Papers, 164-165. 107

English were fatening at Pitsburg, and wou’d be fat by and by, and they wou’d kil them.”269 The renewed attacks on British supply lines and circumstantial evidence provided by captivity narratives corroborate the general Anglophile pessimism that had marked Nenatchehan’s latest diplomatic effort. Despite their earlier diplomatic failures, the French had managed to regain the initiative in their struggle with the British. This was due primarily to the continued support of their local Indigenous allies. The French did not radically change their diplomatic approach between the autumn of 1758 and the summer of 1759, and their support among local Indigenous groups was also devoid of any drastic transformation. Rather, their changed circumstances

(particularly their relocation among the Wolf subdivision at Fort Machault and the inherently contradictory British justification for their presence at the Forks) helped prevent French diplomatic shortcomings from harming the French war effort. At Fort Machault and Venango, the French were surrounded by Wolf subdivision Lenape, Anglophobic Shawnee, and numerous

Mingo groups. They also enjoyed short lines of communication to these allies. More importantly, Tamaqua’s Anglophile faction did not enjoy the same level of influence on the

Upper Allegheny that they did among their own Turkey subdivision at Kuskusky. Given that

Tamaqua and his allies were the primary architects of the British peace, their inability to sway the Wolf subdivision, northern Shawnee, and resident Mingos meant that the British possessed no means to weaken French alliances with those communities.

In early July of 1759, George Croghan wrote a letter from Pittsburg that gave a detailed description of the impressive force assembled by the Franco-Indigenous alliance on the cusp of its assault to retake the Forks. Croghan wrote that the French had seven hundred soldiers, an

269 “Examination of Barbara Liningaree and Mary Roy, 1759,” PA, 3:633-634. 108 artillery train, and nearly a thousand Indigenous allies.270 While a large portion of the

Indigenous allies were from the pays d’en haut or similarly far afield, local Shawnee, Mingo, and

Lenape were also counted amongst the “twelve different Nations.”271 The force represented an existential threat to Fort Pitt, and the real possibility that more local groups would join the

French as Lignery moved south made it a danger to the entire system of forts that Forbes and his army had worked hard to establish.

VI. End of an Era

The massive force Lignery assembled at Venango would never march south to retake the

Forks of the Ohio. Instead, it received emergency summons to help relieve the siege of Fort

Niagara. On July 12th, Lignery got word that the French garrison at Niagara had been surrounded by a British force commanded by John Prideaux and William Johnson. He immediately rushed north with the majority of his force. On the final approach to the fort,

Lignery and his column ran into a wooden breastwork and abatis the British had constructed across the portage road. The French suffered grievous losses in the ensuing ambush while the

British escaped relatively unscathed.272 Both European powers’ Indigenous allies suffered minimal losses after taking steps to avoid combat with each other. Lignery himself was mortally wounded in the struggle and would die several days later. As one of the heroes of the Battle of the Monongahela and the longtime, successful commander of Fort Duquesne, his death at La

Belle-Famille served as a symbolic end to French aspirations on the Ohio.

After the events at La Belle-Famille, the French lost Fort Niagara and were subsequently forced to evacuate their remaining small posts on the Upper Ohio. The entirety of the pays d’en

270 George Croghan to Gov. Denny, Pittsburgh July 15, 1759, PA, 3:671-672. Some sources list the number of French as high as 2,500 soldiers. See Anderson, Crucible of War, 335. 271 George Croghan to Gov. Denny, Pittsburgh July 15, 1759, PA, 3:672. 272 Anderson, Crucible of War, 337. 109 haut was left cut off from Canada in a dramatic strategic reversal. In early July, the French had been poised to take Fort Pitt and once more expose the Middle Colonies to open warfare. By

August, New France was effectively confined to Canada proper, with possession of the Forks of the Ohio an abandoned dream. The British wasted no time in asserting their suddenly burgeoning confidence in the wake of the French defeat. Colonel Mercer wrote that with the defeat of the French, “We can now talk to our new Allies in a proper Stile, as their Services are not Necessary.”273 Mercer was referring to the Anglophile groups like Tamaqua’s faction that had been instrumental in establishing the British presence at the Forks. His attitude was the result of a grave miscalculation that the British no longer required Indigenous actors to help convince communities to ally with the British. He did not understand that even without their

French allies, anti-British communities would maintain their Anglophobic stance. With the

French out of the picture, the British were confident that they could enforce their will on the

Upper Ohio in an increasingly unilateral fashion. The return of captives, the establishment of a permanent military presence, and the migration of European homesteaders would be backed up with military force that the British believed the Lenape, Shawnee, and Mingos could not match.

They ignored the fact that Indigenous actors had created the British toehold in the region, and that substantial populations of Indigenous communities remained supportive of the French in spite of Fort Duquesne’s fall and French diplomatic blunders. The Wolf subdivision Lenape,

Upper Allegheny Mingos, and Shawnee who remained in the region presciently understood that the British represented a much graver threat to an independent Upper Ohio than the French and their small military outposts. Had the French proved more capable diplomats, these groups would have been utilized to prevent the Forks from ever falling into British hands. Instead, the

273 Colonel Mercer to Gov. Denny, Pittsburgh, August 12, 1759, MPCP, 8:394. 110 formerly Francophile groups would be forced to attempt to retake the Forks several years later without the benefit of French gunpowder and artillery. British expansion and duplicity between

1759 and 1763 undisputedly contributed to Pontiac’s Rebellion. However, many of the

Francophile groups in the region never trusted British promises to retire east of the Alleghenies when the French left. For them, Pontiac’s Rebellion was a continuation of their longstanding political stance rather than a new diplomatic paradigm.

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Conclusion

In the summer of 1763, as Pontiac’s Rebellion overwhelmed isolated British outposts, some victorious Indigenous combatants had an interesting response to the successful offensive.

Upon seizing British forts, they “raised the drapeau blanc and appealed to French officials to support them.”274 They petitioned the French “father,” absent since New France’s capitulation in

1760, to return to the Ohio and the pays d’en haut. Their request was born from harsh treatment at the hands of the British, who found it “impossible to keep friendship with them,” continued to expand into Indigenous lands, and blatantly considered Indigenous people inferior.275 Given many historians’ prior assessments that Indigenous groups’ abandonment of the French alliance forced them from the Upper Ohio, calls for a return to that alliance present an interesting contradiction. Why would Lenape, Shawnee, and Mingo fighters, who five years earlier compelled the French to leave the region via a separate peace, call for the return of their former ally?

The answer, of course, is that many individuals never committed to a separate peace and believed that the French represented the best opportunity for an independent Ohio. The French had struck a good balance in the region from an Indigenous perspective. They had been weak enough that they couldn’t act unilaterally, but they had been strong enough to make a crucial difference in the defense of the region from British encroachment. The Wolf subdivision of the

Lenape, centered at Venango, supported the French long after the supposed “peace” of Easton and it was no surprise that the British fort nearby was quickly destroyed at the start of Pontiac’s

Rebellion. Likewise, the other British forts on the Upper Allegheny suffered disastrous fates in

274 Gregory Evans Dowd, War Under Heaven: Pontiac, the Indian Nations, and the British Empire (Baltimore: The Johns Hopkins University Press, 2002), 1. 275 “Journal and Report of Thomas Hutchins,” in Papers of Sir William Johnson v. 10, 529. 112 an area that had been the heart of French support in the region. Mingos and Shawnee both participated in the razing of Fort La Boeuf and Fort Presque Isle, with the latter falling despite the construction of significant fortifications.276

The policies of the British after the French defeat clearly contributed to Pontiac’s

Rebellion, but historians’ continued disregard of sustained Francophile sentiment dangerously simplifies Indigenous motivations. The revelation that the French lost on the Ohio despite continued, widespread Indigenous support and sufficient logistics has important implications for both study of the Seven Years’ War and Native History. Their failure was twofold: they both failed to grasp the true nature of their relationship with their Indigenous allies and they were outmaneuvered by Tamaqua and his associates. On the Upper Ohio, the French were in a position of absolute weakness compared to neighboring Indigenous groups. The former had fewer available fighters, longer supply lines, and were less effective in combat. However, they still failed to treat their Indigenous allies intellectually as equals. They observed the ceremonial modes of diplomacy and did not issue brusque dictates, but their awkward attempts to fabricate

British diplomatic duplicity and their cursory, often contradictory evaluations of the “savages’” sentiments reveal that the French did not really believe that the Lenape, Shawnee, and Mingo shared their status within the alliance. The support the French continued to enjoy after the fall of

Fort Duquesne was due to their allies’ perceptive understanding of the larger geopolitical situation. Instead of treating their allies like simple children who needed to be convinced by emotional perfidy and grandiose examples of British treachery, the French would have been better served by approaching leaders like Tamaqua as equals capable of rational decision-making who understood the wider situation. The French had been in the region for years, and only

276 Ibid., 124-127. 113 maintained small forts without civilian settlements. The Lenape, Shawnee, and Mingos of the

Upper Ohio all had firsthand experience with British expansionism and knew that they had to keep them out of the region to have any chance at independence.277

The diplomatic success of Tamaqua, his brothers, and their associates is the most important deduction stemming from the revelation that the French maintained Indigenous support beyond the loss of Fort Duquesne. Tamaqua’s steadfast belief in peace with the British left him isolated in 1756 as the war raged and the Middle Colonies buckled under successful offensives. However, he never swayed from his position and when given a sliver of an opportunity, he was able to conjure a peace that completely wrongfooted the French. He forced them to abandon Fort Duquesne without a fight because he was able to create the impression of a larger peace when in reality his faction was still struggling to convert others to their perspective.

Fort Duquesne was not lost because the French ran out of food or because local Lenape and

Shawnee abandoned their alliance. Fort Duquesne was lost because an Indigenous group made up of kin and close relations smuggled a British envoy behind enemy lines, crafted a palatable message of peace with the envoy as a figurehead, disseminated the message as broadly as possible, and then managed to obfuscate how broadly the peace had been accepted to the point the French fled without a fight. It was a remarkable accomplishment that has been almost completely ignored in favor of simpler, teleological explanations.

French failures do not mean that the British were diplomatically and militarily successful on the Ohio front. The British didn’t succeed in taking the Forks of the Ohio; they simply reaped the benefits of their allies’ hard work. The British were forced to rely on Indigenous actors

277 Jeffery Ostler argues that Indigenous inhabitants of the Ohio Valley also feared European genocide in this time period. Examining their actions in this light offers new perspectives on their actions and decisions. See, Jeffery Ostler, “’To Extirpate the Indians’: An Indigenous Consciousness of Genocide in the Ohio Valley and Lower Great Lakes, 1750s-1810.” The William and Mary Quarterly 72, no. 4 (2015). 114 because they were in a position of weakness, much as New France was forced to rely on

Indigenous actors throughout its history. Once the French were expelled, British hubris was unencumbered by strategic weakness and they began acting unilaterally with disastrous consequences.

The broader implications of this thesis’ findings are significant for our understanding of the Seven Years’ War in North America and especially Native History. If a small Indigenous group was responsible for the loss of Fort Duquesne, how many more untold narratives of

Indigenous participation in the war exist that fundamentally change our understanding of the course of events? There are histories of the war from the French perspective, the British perspective, and individual colonies’ perspectives. But Indigenous nations have not been historicized in the same way. What might we learn if the Potawatomi experience in the conflict is investigated as thoroughly as British and French military campaigns? What previously accepted European narratives were actually driven by Indigenous actors, working on the periphery of the documentary sources while the Europeans lumbered about, struggling to gain the upper hand over their foe?

The expansion of the movement spearheaded by scholars like Witgen, DuVal, and

Rushforth is a natural next step for further research. This thesis attempted to apply their perspective to a very narrowly defined place and time, but other, more capable scholars can write histories that historicize Native nations with the same detail and level of investigation traditionally granted to the settler-colonial powers. The research is difficult and fragmentary given the biases inherent in the archives, but it is incredibly rewarding. The most obvious benefit is to our understanding of Indigenous peoples, but as evidenced by the investigation of the French in this thesis, long-held claims about European powers are not above reproach.

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If Tamaqua had not succeeded at the Forks of the Ohio in 1758, the French and their

Lenape, Shawnee, and Mingo allies stood an excellent chance of rebuffing the British advance.

General Forbes had already called a halt to the campaign once, and he only restarted it because of the intelligence provided by a captured prisoner. When faced with a show of force that directly contradicted that prisoner’s information, its is unlikely that he would have risked his whole force with winter approaching. Fort Duquesne would have lived to fight another year, and the British would be faced with the difficult task of reequipping and supplying another campaign in the face of recalcitrant colonial assemblies. The reinforcements sent from Canada to Fort

Machault in early 1759 could have been kept for the defense of Québec, and the British assault on Fort Niagara would have been a much riskier undertaking with the Upper Ohio still under

French control. Tamaqua’s efforts and French failures to utilize the allies who continued to support them had a tremendous ripple effect that echoed far beyond the banks of the Ohio River.

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