col aborate with the region’s inhabitants. The results of such col aborations
often disappointed most or all of those involved. Ohio indians found that
formal relationships with the anglo- american state could facilitate dispos-
session, rather than prevent it. many colonists failed to obtain the legal land
title they sought, or they soon lost it through litigation or bankruptcy. For
their part, government officials incessantly complained about the unruly
willfulness of even nominal friends and allies. But if such partnerships often
failed to yield desired results, they also profoundly unsettled the Ohio Valley,
ultimately subjecting its peoples to the authority of an increasingly potent
federal state.
These findings point to a new and more nuanced understanding of revo-
lutionary anglo- american colonialism. scholars of the nineteenth- and
twentieth- century trans- mississippi West have long emphasized the central-
ity of state power in that region’s transformations, calling into question deep-
seated popular myths of an individualistic frontier. The eighteenth- century
state, fragmented and unstable as it was, lacked the resources and technolo-
gies that made its successors such effective tools of conquest and disposses-
sion. nonetheless, the story of rugged frontier independence, of colonists
marching west with no regard for political authority, proves as fal acious for
the revolutionary Ohio Valley as it is for montana or california.9 at the same
time, the eventual colonial regime, like emerging states around the world,
grew through a nonlinear and often unplanned process, driven by interne-
cine rivalries as much as by intercultural antagonism. political y influential
speculators pressed governments for western lands. Official initiatives— land
grants, road and fort building, treaties, and wars— as well as competition be-
tween rival claimants, spurred colonists to move west. indian communities,
6
introduction
often at odds with one another, angled to preserve their territory and sover-
eignty by cultivating both native and colonial allies. The resulting pattern of
coalition building alternately facilitated both peacemaking and violence.
governments, meanwhile, pressed their competing territorial claims by arm-
ing the region’s inhabitants, and militant indians and colonists exploited such
support to mobilize for war. The ensuing devastation deepened dependence
on government patronage and bolstered the influence of leaders who could
obtain it. all told, this brand of colonialism reflected the interplay of state
influence and state weakness, of intracultural divisions and intercultural vio-
lence, of individual agency and community dependence. This is a story of
negotiation, accommodation, and coalition building, as well as a story of the
emerging power of a colonial state.10
most of the Ohio Valley’s indian peoples had entered or reentered the region
less than half a century before mcclure’s encounter with the cannonbal s. a
series of seventeenth- century wars had temporarily driven the region’s in-
habitants, including shawnees, to other areas. in the first half of the eigh-
teenth century, many of their descendants moved back to the rich farmland
of the scioto Valley. around the same time, haudenosaunee and delaware
migrants from the east made new homes in the allegheny and muskingum
valleys, while peoples from the north and west, including Wyandots, Odawas,
and miamis, repopulated the maumee and sandusky valleys. many of these
nations— to whom i refer collectively as Ohio indians— had interacted regu-
larly with european colonists since the early 1600s. now they came to Ohio
for its fertile soil, burgeoning deer population, and distance from the grow-
ing seaboard colonies. But distance did not mean disconnection. Though
some spiritual leaders called on their people to reject colonial trade, such
preaching did little to slow the exchange of beaver pelts and deerskins for
european- manufactured textiles, tools, weapons, and rum. living between
French and British colonies allowed indian peoples to leverage imperial ri-
valry for commercial and diplomatic advantage. to many, moving west and
autonomy and prosperity.11
after bidding the packhorses farewel , david mcclure pressed on with
his journey, eager to see the peoples he called “those distant & savage tribes
beyond the Ohio.” a few days later, he learned that Ohio indians were neither
as distant nor as savage as he had imagined. as he traveled west to pittsburgh,
an allegheny seneca leader named guyasuta was journeying east to visit
introduction
7
imperial officials in philadelphia and new york. The seneca impressed the
missionary with his “martial appearance,” but rather than paint and a breech-
clout he wore scarlet and lace. his head likely bore a long, braided scalp lock,
but it was hidden under a “high gold laced hat.” mcclure also praised his
“very sensible countenance & dignity of manners,” as well as his thoughtful
comments on religion and politics. The missionary was not alone in his ad-
miration. colonial newspapers fawningly reported guyasuta’s tours of the
eastern port cities, noting that while pursuing business “of the greatest im-
portance” he also made time to observe public “electrical experiments.”12
This scientifical y curious, scarlet- dressed diplomat had followed a long
and circuitous political and military career. in 1753, he had guided a young
george Washington into the upper Ohio Valley. The Virginians wanted to
drive the French from the region; they failed but, in doing so, started a world
war. For most of the following decade, in a conflict misnamed the seven
years’ War, the forces of Britain, France, and their respective allies clashed
repeatedly around the globe, from saxony to senegal, madras, and havana.
Back in north america, guyasuta switched sides, joining a large Franco-
indian alliance that ambushed and destroyed general edward Braddock’s
army in the Battle of the monongahela, just upstream from present- day pitts-
burgh. Their victory, and the alliance, proved short- lived. French- allied indi-
ans, eager to reverse British colonial expansion, terrorized the outer reaches
of pennsylvania and Virginia, but British and colonial forces retaliated by
burning indian towns and crops. Both sides slaughtered noncombatants in
raids that had more to do with territorial dispossession than imperial alli-
ances. By the late 1750s many nations, including most of guyasuta’s senecas,
had abandoned the French in exchange for concessions from the British, who
subsequently captured the Forks of the Ohio, niagara, and all of French can-
ada. in the eventual treaty, France surrendered all its claims to north amer-
ica. at detroit and elsewhere, French colonists and trading networks
remained, but great lakes and Ohio Valley indians could no longer leverage
interimperial conflict for diplomatic and commercial advantage.13
These momentous changes soon exhausted guyasuta’s hopes for peace
.
Victorious British commanders quickly forgot their promises. They aban-
doned long- standing diplomatic protocols, refused to remove forts and sol-
diers from native land, and showed little interest in curbing colonization. in
1761, guyasuta urged great lakes nations to strike back, likely hoping that
their erstwhile French allies would support them. Few heeded his cal , but
two years later a far- flung alliance of great lakes indians captured nine
8
introduction
British forts, spread hundreds of miles apart. guyasuta personal y helped
capture the allegheny Valley outpost of Venango and later joined an ulti-
mately unsuccessful siege of Fort pitt. The region plunged into a conflict
known as pontiac’s War, after the Odawa leader who led the assault on de-
troit. The reciprocal raids, town burning, and killing of noncombatants re-
sumed, setting a pattern that became all too familiar in years to come. after
two years of fighting, guyasuta led a peace delegation to Fort pitt, where the
heavily indebted British empire welcomed him. he and his allies, having de-
stroyed most of the region’s forts, pledged to stop attacking the ones that re-
mained. The empire, in turn, banned colonization west of the appalachians,
though the six nations tentatively agreed to a future cession of lands south
and east of pittsburgh. many colonists and indians had little use, or respect,
for these concessions, but large- scale fighting nonetheless ground to a halt.
On both sides, the human and economic costs of war had proven too much
to bear.14
guyasuta, accordingly, reinvented himself as an anglophile. a few years
after besieging Fort pitt, he publicly defended the British army’s right to stay
there. in championing first the French and then pontiac’s alliance, he had
defied the more moderate six nations council, including many of his fellow
senecas. now he insisted on the six nations’ political supremacy over his
erstwhile western allies and welcomed the anticipated land cession. during
an autumn 1770 hunting trip, guyasuta learned that his old friend— and
sometime enemy— Washington was journeying down the Ohio. he wel-
comed the Virginian with open arms, presented him with “a Quarter of very
fine Buffalo,” and insisted that his party join the seneca camp. in their ensu-
ing conversations, guyasuta vividly described the rich bottomland west of
the Kanawha river. Washington took copious notes.15 guyasuta had spent
the better part of ten years trying to drive the British out of the Ohio Valley.
now he encouraged them to move in.
at first glance, this reversal might look like cynical opportunism, and
perhaps, in some measure, it was. But in shifting between pro- and anti-
British strategies, guyasuta adhered to a broader goal that guided his long
political and military career: the security and sovereignty of allegheny sene-
cas. in 1753, col aborating with the Virginians promised to bolster his people’s
power against the increasingly aggressive French and their western allies.
Over the next two years, Washington’s and Braddock’s defeats shattered Brit-
ish credibility. allegheny senecas rational y embraced the seemingly victori-
ous French, then abandoned them as the fortunes of war turned: a series of
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9
maneuvers that mirrored the ever- shifting alliances of eighteenth- century
europe. after the war, a string of British outposts directly threatened guyasu-
ta’s people. When Britain refused to evacuate them, he helped build a new
alliance that leveled all but Fort pitt. That garrison’s survival, however, dic-
tated a new approach. By befriending Britain— for the third time— guyasuta
ensured seneca access to pittsburgh trade and imperial patronage. in 1771,
when his people faced food shortages, he persuaded British agent george
croghan to give them “two hundred Bushels of corn.” meanwhile, he seized
the opportunity to divert colonists westward down the Ohio, away from the
seneca towns on the allegheny.16
along the way, guyasuta crafted the genteel persona that so impressed
mcclure. The patronage of prominent colonists, he recognized, could help
win commercial and political concessions: hence his courtship of Washing-
ton. colonists and imperial officials came to see him as the “head” of the
western haudenosaunee, an essential intermediary who wielded “great influ-
ence” over the troublingly independent Ohio indians. By the time of his
meeting with mcclure, he had won the confidence of William Johnson, Brit-
ain’s top frontier diplomat, who shared his eagerness to strengthen six na-
tions authority. during his trip east, guyasuta insisted on meeting personal y
with commander- in- chief Thomas gage, to assure him that “the true situa-
tion of affairs” in Ohio was “quiet and peaceable.” as he cultivated these con-
nections, guyasuta increasingly emulated the appearance, demeanor, and
language of British officers. in his meetings with mcclure and gage, he still
spoke through an interpreter, but by 1775 he translated for colonial emissaries
himself.17
guyasuta was an outlier: few traveled, or hobnobbed, so widely. But his
cultural flexibility, his penchant for coalition building, and his shifting polit-
ical strategies exemplified common characteristics of the Ohio Valley’s di-
verse native peoples. These were nations in flux, adapting to new and often
changing external pressures, most notably colonial demands for land, while
also constantly negotiating political divisions among and within their com-
munities. europeans and colonists who knew of indians only slightly, includ-
ing mcclure himself, tended to categorize them either as friendly or
antagonistic, and behave accordingly, but many, like guyasuta, moved back
and forth between peacemaking and militancy, and any number of points in
between, as ever- shifting circumstances warranted.
When he crossed the Ohio, mcclure found a forest “clear from under-
brush,” contrasting sharply with the dense thickets east of the river. in this
10
introduction
open woodland, he found it easier to hunt and gather food: deer, turkeys,
geese, pigeons, fruit, nuts, and berries. Ohio indians had created this cornu-
copia. mcclure described how they periodical y burned the ground cover,
“that they may have the advantage of seeing game at a distance among the
trees.” in doing so, the burners also controlled insect pests, promoted the
growth of edible plants, and created a favorable environment for deer and
turkey. a similar landscape had once flourished east of the river, but it had
reverted to an overgrown tangle after indians fled west during the midcen-
tury wars. now, as eastern game populations fel , colonial hunters from
pennsylvania to the carolinas ventured farther into indian lands. By the early
1770s, delawares complained that “game grew scarce”; in gekelemuk-
pechünk, a visiting missionary noted that “no meat could be had here for
love or money.” not long after singing the praises of the managed open wood-
land, mcclure feared for h
is safety because of delaware hunters’ “extreme
resentment at the encroachments of the white people.”18 The region’s growing
human population took a heavy toll on its deer and bison, setting the stage
for greater subsistence crises to come.
as the missionary moved west, the upper Ohio Valley’s steep ridges gave
way to rolling terrain and lush farmland. at gekelemukpechünk, mcclure
found hundreds of delaware people living in a mix of bark wigwams, log
cabins, and english- style homes made of “hewed logs, with stone chimnies.”
across the river, delaware women planted “a large corn field, in rich low
ground,” in which each matrilineal household worked its own plot. Other
Ohio indians lived in similar towns, clustered in the region’s sinuous river
valleys, surrounded by fields, orchards, and managed forests. in contrast to
scattered colonial homesteads, they general y lived in larger communities
and farmed collectively. many colonists overlooked or denigrated indian ag-
riculture, partly because they discounted the labor of indian women, but
even the most chauvinistic visitors praised their prolific harvests. By the
1770s, many Ohio indians had diversified their economies further. gekele-
mukpechünk impressed mcclure with its “regular & thrifty peach orchard.”
The shawnee town of Wockachaali raised fine herds of horses and cattle. The
prosperity of anipassicowa, a shawnee woman, impressed visiting colonists,
who noted that she kept and milked cattle to complement traditional maize-
based agriculture. Once or twice in each generation, as soils grew depleted,
Ohio indians moved their towns and fields to new sites, but they continued
using the surrounding woodlands and streams for hunting, fishing, and other
subsistence activities.19
introduction
11
Ohio indian women also played a pivotal role in intercultural trade. since
the mid- seventeenth century, indigenous peoples across north america had
exchanged animal skins and other commodities for european manufactures