Native Americans of the French and Indian War

Date: [unknown] [unknown]
Location: [unknown]
Surnames/tags: French and Indian War Native Americans

French and Indian War Project

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The issue of trade with Native Americans, furs and land acquisition were primary causes of the French and Indian War (last of the colonial wars). When the French claimed territory near the Great Lakes and built trading posts, the English also were interested in acquiring more land for the growth of tobacco.

map of location of Native Americans nations.

French major, Marquis de Vaudreuil-Cavagnal enhanced France's ties with Native Americans as allies by learning the languages, dressing himself as one of them, constructing a network of forts from the Great Lakes to the Ohio valley, and giving them free reign to attack the British settlements and obtain free weapons.When the Native Americans wanted to take both British and American prisoners, causing disagreements. The French forbade them to loot. After the capture of Fort William Henry, the Native Americans killed hundreds of surrendered British soldiers and civilians.

Allies of the French

Iroquois Confederacy Catawba Cherokee (b The Algonquians, (Allies of the French)

Algonquin couple.

All tribes spoke the Algonquian languages. Colonized New France along the Mississippi and Ohio rivers.

Examples:

Shawnee

Illiniwek

Kickapoo

Menominee

Miami

Sauk and Fox, later known as the Meskwaki. These people lived in what is currently called New England, Quebec and the Maritimes who were dependable to the French and felt threatened the British and British colonists expanding onto their land. An example is known as Father Rale.

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Abanaki - (Allies of the French) The Abenaki peoples were right in middle of the French and Indian War. They were used by both the French and the British in encounters, the French converted many to Catholicism. Then The British formed the Alliance with their enemies, the Iroquois confederacy. Some of the Western Abanaki moved their families to wilderness area. They saw how the British tended to seize other tribes' homelands for farms. Colonized wilderness of Vermont and Canada.

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Ottowa - (Allies of the French)

chief Pontiac led Indian war against Europeans.

The Ottowa and Chief Pontiac had made agreements with the French, but the British were not agreeable for trading goods with his nation. The British felt the land was theirs to expand, and did not ask permission to build their farms or forts. "Chief Pontiac was upset. The tribe launched Pontiac's Rebellion in 1763. These people were of (present day SW Michigan).

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Delaware (Allies of the French)

Tish-Co-Han.

Delaware tribes could be found in present day New Jersey, E Pennsylvania, the Delaware Valley, the north shore of Delaware, and Hudson Valley of S New York, as well as New York Harbor. These Iroquoian-speaking Native Americans were traditional Lenape enemies. English fraud dispossessed the Delaware.

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Wabanaki peoples — (Allies of the French are located in Acadia. It is now most of Maine, Nova Scotia and New Brunswick, plus some of Quebec south of the St. Lawrence River.

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Huron - (Allies of the French) could be found in Ontario.

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Shawnee - (Allies of the French)

This tribe could be found in present day Ohio, Virginia, West Virginia, W. Maryland, Kentucky, Indiana, and Pennsylvania.

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Ojibwas or Chippewa, Allies of the French, also known as the "The Far Indians" - (meaning further west than this war occurred). These people were known as "Three Fires" and could be found in present day Michigan, N. Wisconsin, and Minnesota.'

Allies of the British

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The Iroquois or Iroquois Confederacy- sided with the British during this war. Before 1722 these people were referred to as "Five Nations"by the English and later as "Six nations".

Mohawk

Onondaga

Oneida

Cayuga

Seneca

Tuscarora peoples. "The French during this time would have called them them as "Iroquois League," and later as the "Iroquois Confederacy,"

Native Americans and French.

Iroquois in trade.

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Allies of THE British - Mohawk - The British needed the Mohawk support in the French and Indian War. To secure the Mohawk as allies, a meeting known as "The Albany Congress of 1754" was held. This was to repair poor relations by the British in the past. The relationship between Mohawks and British were also strengthened by Sir William Johnson of New York for the British and additionally Conrad Weiser for the Pennsylvania colony together with Hendrick Theyanoguin (Mohawk)The Albany Congress of 1754 was called in June, to discuss with the Iroquois chiefs andto repair earlier damaged diplomatic relationship between the British and the Mohawk, along with securing their cooperation and support in fighting the French. The Mohawks, which were the easternmost of the Iroquois tribes, were in closest contact.

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Allies of THE British - Erie, Susquehannock, Huron (Wendat) and Wyandot Confederacy spoke the Iroquoian languages, but were enemies of the Iroquois during this time. These peoples sided with the British against the French and their allies during this French and Indian War.

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Cherokees - (Allies of British)

Cherokee and the British were allies in the Tuscarora War 1711-15 and were allies at the beginning of the French and Indian War. 700 Cherokee and Cataba warriors joined the attack on Fort Duquense but many had deserted before the battle. There was a Cherokee incident, 1758 and the English Fort Loudon garrison killed by Cherokees. All was not perfect..

1755 the British sought Cherokee assistance against the French and Indian allies. These British had information the French intended to build forts in Cherokee territory, such as Great Salt Lick on Cumberland, Ft. Toulouse, of Alabama territory, Ft. Rosalie at Natchez, Mississippi, Ft. St. Pierre and Ft. TomBeckbe on the Tombigbee River. The Cherokee agreed, the British built forts in the Cherokee land such as Ft. Prince George in South Carolina colony, and Ft. Loudoun on Tellico River. The Cherokee did take part in the Ft Duquesne second battle.

Returning home, they took some horses they felt were theirs. Virginians thus killed 30-40 Cherokees as a result, but claimed the scalps to be of Shawnees.

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Allies of the American Colonists

May, 1754 Chief Tanaghrisson guided Major George Washington to the location of 35 French soldiers and Canadian Militiamen who were camped in the hollow.^[1]

Chief Tanaghrisson

1755 - the Choctaws, Chickasaws, Creeks and Cherokees had received munitions from British traders based at Fort Augusta. The British Navy’ placed a blockade of France, rendering it impossible to supply pro-French Native American army in the Southeast.

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Capt Snow's Sketch of Indian Traders map

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SOURCES:

1. ↑ The History Reader.com

• Abanaki Vermont Historical Society
• Access Genealogy.com - A brief history of the French and Indian War
• Ohio History Central.org - Algonquian Indians
• Ohio History Central.org - Iroquois Indians
• Ohio History Central.org - Seneca_Indians
• Ohio History Central.org - Mingo Indians
• The History Reader.com -
• Ohio History Central
• French and Indian War
• Native languages.org - Maryland
• History net.com - Chief Pontiac
• Teaching History.org -

See also:

• Francis Jennings, Empire of Fortune: Crowns, Colonies, and Tribes in the Seven Years War in America (New York: W. W. Norton, 1988), 217-8.

• Richard White, The Middle Ground: Indians, Empires, and Republics in the Great Lakes Region, 1650-1815 (Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press, 1991), 188, 241-2, 245.

• Eric Hinderaker, "Declaring Independence: The Ohio Indians and the Seven Years' War," in Warren R Hofstra, ed., Cultures in Conflict: The Seven Years' War in America (Lanham, Md.: Rowman & Littlefied, 2007), 106.

• Fred Anderson, Crucible of War: The Seven Years' War and the Fate of Empire in British North America, 1754-1766 (New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 2000), 404, 406-7.

• James H. Merrell, Into the American Woods: Negotiators on the Pennsylvania Frontier (New York: W. W. Norton, 1999), 209.

• Michael N. McConnell, A Country Between: The Upper Ohio Valley and Its Peoples, 1724-1774 (Lincoln, Neb.: University of Nebraska Press, 1992).