Colonial Conflicts: Native Americans
1st Anglo-Powhatan War / Dates: 1610-1614 / Location: Jamestown-RichmondCause(s):
· Tensions over land, English expansion N & W
· Food shortage for natives (harvest) & English
· Killings on both sides
· Absence of John Smith
· Arrival of Lord de la Warr / Course:
· Offensive war by English, killing & razing homes
· Ambushes by natives
· Capture of Pocahontas = cease-fire
· Peace treaty in 1614 sealed by Rolfe-Pocahontas / Consequence(s):
· English expanded up to Richmond on both sides of James River
· Forts & “cities” established throughout
· Natives pay tribute while making in confederacy
· Indian Massacre of 1622 = 10 yrs on/off fighting
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2nd Anglo-Powhatan War / Dates: 1644-1646 / Location:
Cause(s):
· English clearly not going to stop expanding
· Powhatan confederacy last ditch effort to win
· Opechancanough attack kills 400, no follow-up / Course:
· English counterattacks both sides of James & NC
· Gov. Berkeley led raid to capture Opechancanough
· Adult males to Tangiers; Ope killed (100+ age)
· 4 major new forts to hold English gains / Consequence(s):
· P. Confederacy destroyed
· Peace treaty makes tribes tributaries to King of England
· Most of Hampton Roads up to Richmond for English only; natives on other side
· 30 years of peace until Bacon’s Rebellion in 1676
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Tuscarora War / Dates: 1711-1715 / Location:
Cause(s):
· 50+ years of peace in NC
· Natives enslaved
· Land taken by Europeans
· Chiefs Blunt & Hancock attack to stop Euro abuses / Course:
· Tuscarora tribes coordinate attack at many points at same time
· NC/SC militia counterattack, killing 300+
· English bribe Blunt to turn on Hancock / Consequence(s):
· Majority of Tuscarora migrate to NY
· Treaty gives 56K acres in Bertie NC
· 1st “reservation” to contain natives
· 30 years of follow-up war vs. Catawba nation in revenge
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Yamasee War / Dates: 1715-1717 / Location: South Carolina
Cause(s):
*anger over loss in Tuscarora War
*territorial intrusion continues
*Indians kill several colonists, including “Indian agent” for colonial gov’t / Course:
*English thought Fr/Sp urged attacks
*Creeks, Choctaws & other tribes banded together
*English played Creeks vs. Cherokees / Consequence(s):
*lasting feud b/w Creeks & Cherokees
*increased bitterness between colonists, Indians, French & Spanish
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Pequot War / Dates: 1636-1638 / Location: Massachusetts
Cause(s):
· Religious conflict/bias – Puritanism v. native beliefs (animistic)
· 1636 – settlers in Mass. Accuse a Pequot (Algonquian tribe) of murdering a colonist – take revenge by setting fire to a Pequot village on the Mystic River – as Indians fled their burning huts, Puritans shot them – militia commander “Thus the Lord was pleased to smite our Enemies… and give us their land for an Inheritance.” / Course:
· Sassacus, the Pequot chief, organized the survivors among his followers and attacked the English
· Mass militia joins with Narragansett allies (another Algonquian tribe) and killed hundreds of Pequots in their village near West Mystic, in the Connecticut River valley
· Puritan minister Cotton Mather – described the slaughter as a “sweet sacrifice” and “gave the praise therof to God.” / Consequence(s):
· English colonists captured most of the surviving Pequots and sold them into slavery in Bermuda
· Treaty of Hartford (1638) – dissolved the Pequot nation – ushers in era of uneasy peace
· R. Williams – warned that the lust for land would become “as great a God with us English as God Gold was with the Spanish.”
· Pequot survivor recognized English motives, saying “we see plainly that their chiefest desire is to deprive us of their privilege of our land, and drive us to our utter ruin”
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King Philip’s War (or Metacomet’s War) / Dates: 1675-1676 / Location: Massachusetts
Cause(s):
· Tribal leaders, especially the chief of the Wampanoags, Metacomet (King Philip) resented English efforts to convert Indians to Christianity
· Praying towns - Mid-1600s, Puritans, led by John Eliot, “Apostle to the Indians,” began an aggressive campaign to convert
o Efforts were aggressive
o Natives forced to abandon their beliefs/practices
o Forced to adopt English names, cut their hair short, and take up farm work and domestic chores
o By 1674, 1,100 Indians in praying towns – most resist –“why should we convert to English ways when our corn is as good as yours, and we take more pleasure than you?”
· Fall 1674 – John Sassamon, a “praying Indian” who had graduated from Harvard College, warned the English that Metacomet and Wampanoags were preparing for war – a few months later Sassamon was found dead under the ice of a frozen pond – colonial authorities convicted three Wampanoags of murder and hanged them / Course:
·
· See causes
· June 20 1675 - Enraged Wampanoag warriors attacked and burned Puritan farms --- 3 days later an Englishmen shot an Indian and the Wampanoags retaliated by ambushing and beheading a group of Puritans
· Bands of Wampanoag warriors (and some ally tribes) assaulted fifty towns --- natives were threatening Boston within a year
· Situation for English colonists became so desperate that they instituted America’s first conscription laws, drafting all males between 16 and 60 into the colonial militia
· Shortages of food and ammunition combined with staggering causalities rates wore down the Indians
· Metacomet’s wife and son were captured and sold into slavery in Bermuda
· Those who remained were forced to resettle in villages supervised by white settlers
· Metacomet initially escaped, only to be hunted down add killed in 1676 --- the victorious colonists marched his severed head to Plymouth, where it sat atop a pole for twenty years, a gruesome reminder of the British determination to control the Indians / Consequence(s):
· Both sides suffer incredible losses
· Fighting killed more people and caused more destruction in New England in proportion to the population than any American conflict since
· King Philip’s War devastated the native American culture in New England
· Combat deaths, deportations, and flight cut the region’s Indian population in half
· Military victory enabled Puritan authorities to increase control over the 9,000 Indians who remained
· Slowed English colonists rush into the frontier --- temporarily
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Colonial Conflicts: Internal Conflicts
Cause(s):
· Simmering tensions – depressed tobacco prices, rising taxes, roaming livestock, and crowds of freed servants greedily eyeing Indian lands
· Festering hatred for the domineering colonial governor, William Berkeley (VA) – he catered to the wealthiest planters, granting them most of the frontier land and pubic offices – he despised commoners
· The large, wealthy planters that dominated the assembly (H of B) levied high taxes to finance Berkeley’s regime – which in turn supported their interests at the expense of the small farmers and servants
· Newly freed indentured servants were forced to migrate westward in their quest for farmland – their lust for land led them to displace Indians
· Gov. Berkeley failed to support their land goals and the newly freed men rebelled
· Berkeley expected it --- he remarked that most Virginians were “poore, endebted, discontented and armed.”
· 1675 – petty squabble between a frontier planter and Indians on the Potomac River led to the murder of the planter’s herdsman and, in turn, to retaliation by frontier militiamen, who killed two dozen Indians – violence spread – a force of Virginia and Maryland militiamen murdered 5 Indian chieftains who sought to negotiate – enraged Indians took their revenge on frontier settlements – scattered attacks continued down to the James River, where National Bacon’s overseer was killed / Course:
· Events of 1675 (see causes)
· Most Indians pull back – what followed was more about a state of hysteria than war
· Gov. Berkeley proposed that the assembly erect a series of forts along the frontier – but that would not slake the English thirst for revenge – nor would it open new lands to settlement – besides, it would be expensive, some thinking Berkeley was out to preserve a profitable fur trade for himself
· 1676 – Bacon defied Gov. Berkeley’s authority by assuming command of a group of frontier vigilantes
· Bacon – 29 year old – graduate of Cambridge university – in VA for only 2 years, but had been well set up by English father relieved to get his ambitious hot tempered son out of the country --- interesting that a rich squire’s spoiled son with a talent for trouble became “the torchbearer of the revolution” and leader of the 1st struggle of common folk versus aristocrats in America --- his assault against peaceful Indians and greed for power/land rather than commitment to democratic principles that sparked his conflict with Berkeley
· Bacon despised Indians and resolved to kill ‘em all
· Berkeley opposed Bacon’s genocidal plan to protect deerskin trade with Indians
· Bacon ordered the governor arrested
· Berkeley’s forces resisted – but only feebly – and Bacon’s men burned Jamestown
· Bacon, however, could not savor the victory long; he fell ill and died a month later / Consequence(s):
· Berkeley regained control, hanged 23 rebels, and confiscated several estates – when his men captured one of Bacon’s lieutenants, Berkeley exclaimed: “I am more glad to see you than any man in VA. Mr. Drummond, you shall be hanged in half an hour.”
· For such severity, the king denounced Berkeley as a fool and recalled him to England, where he died within a year – a royal commission made peace treaties with the remaining Indians, about 1,500 of whose descendants still live in VA on tiny reservations guaranteed them by the king in 1677.
· Result of Bacon’s Rebellion was that new lands were opened to the colonists, and the wealthy planters became more cooperative with the small farmers
· Wealthy planters also became suspicious of rising power/influence of new freemen and former indentured servants --- thus the rise of the use of slaves
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Leisler’s Rebellion / Dates: 1689-1691 / Location: New York
Cause(s):
· Backlash/protest from colonists over the Dominion of New England (New England – NJ and NY)
· 1689 - Boston revolts from Dominion of NE
· 1688-1689 Glorious Revolution – William III ascending to the throne / Course:
· An armed mob seized Fort James and installed Jacob Leisler, an immigrant from Germany and militia leader, as the head of the new government
· Leisler enjoyed popular support because he established a legislative assembly that was not dominated by wealthy merchants & landowners / Consequence(s):
· Leisler’s successes were short lived
· 1691 – William III sends a new governor to NY
· May 1691 - Leisler convicted of treason and executed
· Revolt left the colony divided --- democratic (Leislerians) vs. aristocratic (Anti-Leislerians)
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New York Slave Rebellion / Dates: 1712 and 1741 / Location: New York
Cause(s):
· by 1740, NYC was 2nd only to Charleston in number of slaves in an American city – as the number of slaves increased in the congested city, racial fears and tensions rose as well
· 1741 – racial tensions heightened after a series of suspicious fires across the city, including one at the governor’s house – “slave conspiracy is suspected – NYC’s version of the Salem witch trials – self-promoting prosecutor adept at eliciting confessions, gets just that from 16 year old Mary Burton, an indentured servant, that confirms it was a conspiracy among slaves and poor whites to “burn the whole town” and kill the white men / Course:
· 1712 – several dozen slaves revolted; they started fires and then used swords, axes, and guns to kill several whites as they fought the fires
· Militia captured 27 slaves as they restored order – 6 committed suicide, and the rest were executed; some were burned alive
· 1741 – the plotters – “seducers of the slaves” – were supposedly led by John Hughson, a white trafficker in stolen goods who owned the tavern where Mary Burton worked --- his wife, two slaves, and a prostitute were changed as co-conspirators and, despite their denials, all were convicted and hanged
· Mary Burton implicated several others (including John Ury, whom she claimed was a Spanish spy) --- in the end, 21 people were hanged (17 slaves and 4 whites) – 72 were deported / Consequence(s):
· 1712 consequence --- NY officials passed a series of ordinances – a black code – strictly regulating slave behavior – any slave caught with a weapon, for example, would be whipped, and owners could punish their slaves as they saw fit, as long as they did not kill them
· 1741 --- such organized resistance to the abuses and indignities of slavery was rare – in large part because the likelihood of success was so small and punishments so severe
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Stono Rebellion / Dates: 1739 (September, 9 1739) / Location: South Carolina
Cause(s):
· Slavery… duh
· Unclear exactly what caused the rebellion
· Spain was offering ‘freedom’ to slaves escaping from S.C. to St. Augustine (Spanish Florida)
· Most likely, the impending Security Act was the cause
· Security Act (1739) - response to the white's fears of insurrection, the act required that all white men carry firearms to church on Sundays, a time when whites usually didn't carry weapons and slaves were allowed to work for themselves. Anyone who didn't comply with the new law by September 29 would be subjected to a fine / Course:
· Sept. 9 (Sunday) – 20 slaves gather near Stono River in Saint Paul’s Parish (20 miles from Charleston)
· The slaves went to a shop that sold firearms and ammunition, armed themselves, then killed the two shopkeepers
· the band walked to the house of a Mr. Godfrey, where they burned the house and killed Godfrey and his son and daughter. They headed south.
· It was not yet dawn when they reached Wallace's Tavern. Because the innkeeper at the tavern was kind to his slaves, his life was spared.