Pontiac's Rebellion: First Major Attempt by Native Americans to Stop the Growing Incursion of Europeans.

Michael Streich

January 29, 2010

Pontiac’s War came out of French defeat during the Seven Years’ War or French and Indian War as it came to be called in America. Often referred to as an “uprising” or “rebellion,” the war was led by the Ottawa war chief Pontiac, a proud and vindictive leader whom historian Dale Van Every called the “Indian Hannibal.” Pontiac’s War claimed the lives of thousands of frontier settlers, prompting, in part, the Parliamentary “Proclamation Line” in 1763. Although Indian grievances were never fully addressed, the war demonstrated the vulnerability of the frontier and the colonists’ unwillingness to protect themselves.

 

Causes of Pontiac’s War

 

The defeat and withdrawal of the French presented a serious threat to the western Indians living around the Great Lakes and in the adjacent Northeast. French traders had supplied Indians with ammunition and gunpowder as well as clothing, blankets, and cooking utensils. Lt. General, Sir Jeffrey Amherst, British commander in America, curtailed the sale of power and guns making it difficult for Indians to hunt and trap. Amherst hated Indians, referring to them as “savages” and “disgusting creatures.”

 

Even after French capitulation at Quebec, French Governor Pierre de Vaudreuil sent secret communiqués to commanders of distant forts like Detroit to encourage Indian resistance and spread rumors that the French would shortly be returning. Pontiac had been close to the Marquis de Montcalm and took his death at Montreal personally. Finally, greater numbers of English settlers were moving west, taking traditional Indian lands. The overall population of the English in North America outnumbered the various Indian nations ten to one.

 

The War Begins

 

The British were ill-prepared for the Indian war. With the exception of Niagara, Fort Pitt (Pittsburg), and Detroit, frontier outposts were crude, poorly constructed, and weakly garrisoned. Pontiac had no difficulty destroying many of these forts and massacring the inhabitants. Both Fort Pitt and Detroit, commanded by the French-speaking Captain Campbell of the 60^th Regiment, Royal Americans, held out against overwhelming odds, eventually being resupplied by sea from Niagara.

 

Although the war continued into early 1674, Parliament – already in debt from the Seven Years’ War, was reluctant to fund armies. Sir Jeffrey Amherst had to rely on hastily recruited colonial militias, men he disdained as much as he loathed Indians. This would not change until he was recalled and replaced by Major General Thomas Gage, who took a more proactive stance in seeking a peaceful solution.

 

Additionally, the efforts of Indian Agent Sir William Johnson and his first deputy George Croghan cannot be ignored. Johnson, an adopted member of the Iroquois, played a key role in dividing the Indians, turning the Five Nations against Pontiac. Croghan did the same with the Delaware and Shawnee after painstaking and lengthy conferences.

 

Pontiac Agrees to Peace

 

After a failed attempt by the Senecas to overrun Niagara and the resupply and strengthening of Detroit, Pontiac withdrew into the wildness, hoping to entice Indians of the Illinois Confederacy to join his cause. From Philadelphia, Henry Bouquet led a second relief column to Fort Pitt, complaining bitterly in his letters that the local population refused to participate in their own protection.

 

The success of officers like Brigadier Bouquet and Major Henry Gladwin, commanding Detroit in the last phase of the war, was due, in part, to their frontier experience. Gladwin had been with General Edward Braddock during the ill-fated march to take Fort Duquesne in 1755. In the spring of 1765 the war was finally over after Pontiac met with George Croghan and smoked the pipe of peace. The frontier was pacified, but only temporarily.

 

References:

 

Allan W. Eckert, The Conquerors (Little, Brown and Company, 1970)

Dale Van Every, Forth to the Wilderness: The First American Frontier 1754-1774 (New American Library, 1961)

Copyright Michael Streich; Reprints require written permission.