THE PENNSYLVANIA MAGAZINE OF HISTORY AND BIOGRAPHY VOLUME CXXXVII July 2013 NO. 3 WE “NOW HAVE TAKEN UP THE HATCHET AGAINST THEM”: BRADDOCK’S DEFEAT AND THE MARTIAL LIBERATION OF THE WESTERN DELAWARES Richard S. Grimes 227 “FAITHFULLY DRAWN FROM REAL LIFE”: AUTOBIOGRAPHICAL ELEMENTS IN FRANK J. WEBB’S THE GARIES AND THEIR FRIENDS Mary Maillard 261 OUTSIDE IN AND INSIDE OUT:CIVIC ACTIVISM,HELEN OAKES, AND THE PHILADELPHIA PUBLIC SCHOOLS, 1960–1989 William W. Cutler III 301 BOOK REVIEWS 325 BOOK REVIEWS HAEFELI, New Netherland and the Dutch Origins of American Religious Liberty, by Christopher S. Grenda 325 ERBEN, A Harmony of the Spirits: Translation and the Language of Community in Early Pennsylvania, by Rosalind J. Beiler 326 MEYERS, ed., Knowing Nature: Art and Science in Philadelphia, 1740–1840, by Anne Verplanck 328 SEYMOUR, The Pennsylvania Associators, 1747–1777, by John G. McCurdy 329 BUCKLEY, ed., Dear Friend: Letters and Essays of Elias Hicks, by Dan McKanan 330 LEWIS, A Democracy of Facts: Natural History in the Early Republic, by Emily Pawley 332 DIAMOND, Mrs. Goodfellow: The Story of America’s First Cooking School, by Cathy K. Kaufman 333 ROBERTS, America’s First Great Depression: Economic Crisis and Political Disorder after the Panic of 1837, by Sean Patrick Adams 334 QUIST and BIRKNER, eds., James Buchanan and the Coming of the Civil War, by Thomas J. Balcerski 336 SAUERS and TOMASAK, The Fishing Creek Confederacy: A Story of Civil War Draft Resistance, by Jonathan W. White 337 COVER ILLUSTRATION: Color cover of The Garies and Their Friends (London, 1857). Courtesy of The Bodleian Library, University of Oxford, Shelf mark 249 v. 258. In this issue, Mary Maillard examines the parallels between the lives of the characters in this African American novel and those of the members of author Frank J. Webb’s extended family in her article, “‘Faithfully Drawn from Real Life’: Autobiographical Elements in Frank J. Webb’s The Garies and Their Friends.” Editorial Advisory Committee BETH BAILEY WALTER LICHT Temple University University of Pennsylvania DANIEL B. BARR SALLY MCMURRY Robert Morris Univeristy Pennsylvania State University SETH C. BRUGGEMAN RANDALL MILLER Temple University St. Joseph’s University ERICA ARMSTRONG DUNBAR CARLA MULFORD University of Delaware Pennsylvania State University CAROL FAULKNER EDWARD MULLER Syracuse University University of Pittsburgh JOHN FEA JUDITH RIDNER Messiah College Mississippi State University JUDITH GIESBERG FRANCIS RYAN Villanova University Rutgers University ANN N. GREENE DAVID SCHUYLER University of Pennsylvania Franklin & Marshall College LISA LEVENSTEIN ANDREW SHANKMAN University of North Carolina, Rutgers University, Camden Greensboro Editor TAMARA GASKELL Assistant Editor RACHEL MOLOSHOK THE PENNSYLVANIA MAGAZINE OF HISTORY AND BIOGRAPHY (ISSN 0031-4587, print; ISSN 2169-8546, online) is published each quarter in January, April, July, and October by THE HISTORICAL SOCIETY OF PENNSYLVANIA, 1300 Locust Street, Philadelphia, PA 19107-5699. Periodicals postage paid at Philadelphia, PA and additional mailing offices. Postmaster: send address changes to PMHB, Historical Society of Pennsylvania, 1300 Locust Street, Philadelphia, PA 19107-5699. AAuthorizationuthorization for academic photocopying: For permission to reuse material, please access http://www.copyright.com or contact the Copyright Clearance Center, Inc. (CCC), 222 Rosewood Drive, Danvers, MA 01923, 978-750-8400. CCC is a nonprofit organization that pro- vides licenses and registration for a variety of uses. Submissions: All communications should be addressed to the editor. E-mail may be sent to [email protected]. Manuscripts should conform to The Chicago Manual of Style. Electronic submissions are welcome. For submission guidelines, visit the PMHB web page (http://hsp.org/publications/pennsylvania-magazine-of-history-biography). The editor does not assume responsibility for statements of fact or of opinion made by the contributors. Contributors WILLIAM W. CUTLER III is professor of history, emeritus, at Temple University, where he taught from 1968 to 2011. A specialist in the his- tory of American education, he has written often about the relation- ship between public schools and their constituents. His publications include Parents and Schools: The 150-Year Struggle for Control in American Education (2000). In retirement he serves as the historiog- rapher of the Episcopal Diocese of Pennsylvania and associate editor of the Encyclopedia of Greater Philadelphia. RICHARD S. GRIMES teaches early American history for La Roche College, the Community College of Allegheny County, and the Community College at Beaver County. His manuscript on the history of the western Delaware Indians and their experiences during the eighteenth century in the Ohio Country is currently being reviewed for publication by an academic press. MARY MAILLARD is a documentary editor living in Vancouver, British Columbia. She is currently working on a project related to her work on Frank J. Webb, a documentary edition of letters between Louisa Jacobs, daughter of slave-narrative author Harriet Jacobs, and Eugenie Webb, niece of Frank J. Webb. The full run of the Pennsylvania Magazine of History and Biography is available in electronic format on JSTOR (http://www.jstor.org). Information on both print and electronic sub- scriptions can be found at http://shop.hsp.org/catalog/publications/pmhb/subscription. Both sites can also be accessed from the journal’s website at http://www.hsp.org/node/2876. We “Now Have Taken up the Hatchet against Them”: Braddock’s Defeat and the Martial Liberation of the Western Delawares N 1755 WESTERN PENNSYLVANIA became the setting for a series of transforming events that resonated throughout the colonial world of INorth America. On July 9, on the banks of the Monongahela River— seven miles from the French stronghold of Fort Duquesne—two regi- ments of the British army, together with over five companies of colonial militia, suffered a historic mauling at the hands of a smaller force of French marines, Canadian militia, and Great Lakes Indians. With nearly one thousand casualties, the defeat of General Edward Braddock’s com- mand signified the breakdown of British presence on the northern Appalachian frontier. This rout of British-American forces also had an immense effect on the future of Indians in the Ohio Country, particularly the peoples of western Pennsylvania referred to as the Delawares. I would like to thank the anonymous readers and my teachers and trusted colleagues, Dr. Holly Mayer of Duquesne University and Dr. Mary Lou Lustig, emeritus West Virginia University, for their constructive criticisms and helpful suggestions as I worked through the revision process for this article. THE PENNSYLVANIA MAGAZINE OF HISTORY AND BIOGRAPHY Vol. CXXXVII, No. 3 ( July 2013) 228 RICHARD S. GRIMES July From late October 1755 through the spring of 1756, Delaware war parties departing from their principal western Pennsylvania town of Kittanning and from the east in the Susquehanna region converged on the American backcountry. There they inflicted tremendous loss of life and cataclysmic destruction of property on the settlements of Pennsylvania and Virginia. In November, Governor Robert Morris of Pennsylvania commented that the “unhappy defeat” of Braddock had “brought an Indian War upon this [Pennsylvania] and the neighbouring provinces.”1 Morris added that to his “great Surprise,” the Delawares and Shawnees of the Ohio “have taken up the Hatchet against us, & with uncommon Rage and Fury carried on a most Barbarous & Cruel War, Burning & Destroying all before them.”2 In answer to questions as to why the Delawares, once the favored Indian people of William Penn and the subsequent proprietors, launched such destruction against Pennsylvania, three provincial officials, Robert Strettell, Joseph Turner, and Thomas Cadwalader, delivered a report to the governor. Their account offered a revealing explanation for the cir- cumstances that led the Delawares to the warpath against a colony that had once sustained peaceful relations with its Indian population. According to the three: They [the Delawares] attributed their Defection wholly to the Defeat of General Braddock, and the increase of Strength and reputation gained on that Victory by the French, & their intimidating those Indians and using all means by promises and Threats, to seduce and fix them in their Interest; and to the seeming weakness & want of Union in the English.3 Strettel, Turner, and Cadwalader not only attributed the “seeming weakness” of the British military and the failure of the American colonies to unite at Albany in the summer of 1754 as determining reasons for the recent violence, they concluded that the attacks were also due to the lack 1 Governor Robert Hunter Morris to Sir William Johnson, Philadelphia, Nov. 15, 1755, in Pennsylvania Archives, ed. Samuel Hazard et al. (Philadelphia and Harrisburg, 1852–1935), 4th ser., 2:528. 2 Governor Robert Hunter Morris to William Shirley, Philadelphia, Dec. 3, 1755, in The Papers of Sir William Johnson, ed. James Sullivan et al., 14 vols. (Albany, NY, 1921–65), 2:368. 3 Report of Robert Strettell, Joseph Turner, and Thomas Cadwalader to Governor Robert Morris, Philadelphia, Nov. 22, 1755, in Minutes of the Provincial Council of Pennsylvania, from the Organization to the Termination of the Proprietary Government, in Colonial Records of Pennsylvania, ed. Samuel Hazard (Harrisburg, 1838–53), 6:724–28. 2013 MARTIAL LIBERATION OF THE