THE BRITISH POLICIES

—The British reluctant to surrender the control of the Northwest—their tampering with the Indian tribes.

The seventh article of the definitive treaty of peace between the United States and Great Britain in 1783, provided that "His Britannic Majesty," should, with all convenient speed, "withdraw all his armies, garrisons, and fleets from the said United States, and from every port, place and harbour within the same," but when demand was made upon General Frederick Haldimand, the British governor of Canada, for the important posts of Niagara, Oswego, Michillimacinac and Detroit, he refused to surrender them up, alleging that he had no explicit orders so to do, and that until he had received such commands, he conceived it to be his duty as a soldier to take no step in that direction. This action of Haldimand was cool and deliberate and received the full and entire approbation of the British cabinet. Tories, and apologists for Great Britain, have written much about a justification for this action, but there is no real justification. Lord Carmarthen, the British secretary of state, afterwards said to John Adams that English creditors had met with unlawful impediments in the collection of their debts, but the real reason why England violated her treaty he did not state. She retained the posts to control the tribes. She looked with covetous eye on the lucrative fur-trade of the northwest territory upon which the commerce of Canada was in great measure dependent, and sooner than resist the entreaties of her merchants and traders, she was willing to embroil a people of her own race and blood, in a series of long and merciless wars with murderous savages. For the fact remains, that if England had promptly surrendered up the posts; had not interfered with our negotiations for peace with the Indian tribes; had refused to encourage any confederacy, and had instructed her commanders to keep their spies and agents out of American territory, the murders on the Ohio, the slaughter of innocents, and the long, costly and bloody campaigns in the Indian country might have been avoided.

Nothing can ever extenuate the conduct of England in keeping in her employ and service such men as Alexander McKee, Matthew Elliott and Simon Girty. The chief rendezvous of the tribes after the revolution was at Detroit. Here were located a British garrison and a British Indian agency. This agency, while guarding the trade in peltries, also kept its eye on the fleets that descended the Ohio, on the growing settlements of Kentucky, and warned the Indians against American encroachment. In 1778, and while the revolution was in progress, the missionary John Heckewelder, noted the arrival at Goschochking on the Muskingum, of three renegades and fugitives from Pittsburg. They were McKee, Elliott and Girty. McKee and Elliott had both been traders among the Indians and understood their language. All three had deserted the American cause and were flying into the arms of the British. They told the Delawares and Wyandots, "That it was the determination of the American people to kill and destroy the whole Indian race, be they friends or foes, and possess themselves of their country; and that, at this time, while they were embodying themselves for the purpose, they were preparing fine sounding speeches to deceive them, that they might with more safety fall upon and murder them. That now was the time, and the only time, for all nations to rise, and turn out to a man against these intruders, and not even suffer them to cross the Ohio, but fall upon them where they should find them; which if not done without delay, their country would be lost to them forever." The same men were now inculcating the same doctrines at Detroit. They pointed out to the Indians that the Americans were bent on extinguishing all their council fires with the best blood of the nations; that despite all their fair promises and pretensions, the Americans cared nothing for the tribes, but only for their lands. That England by her treaty had not ceded a foot of the Indian territory to the United States. That all the treaties thus far concluded with the tribes by the Americans, were one-sided and unfair, made at the American forts, and at the cannon's mouth.

A powerful figure now arose among the savages of the north. Joseph Brant was a principal chief of the Mohawk tribe of the Six Nations of New York. His sister Molly was the acknowledged wife of the famous British Indian superintendent, Sir William Johnson. In his youth he had been sent by Johnson to Doctor Wheelock's charity school at Lebanon, Connecticut, where he learned to speak and write English and acquired some knowledge of history and literature. In the war of the revolution the Mohawks sided with England, and Brant was given a colonel's commission. He remained after the war a pensioner of the British government, and General Arthur St. Clair is authority for the statement that he received an annual stipend of four hundred pounds sterling.

The Mohawks had been terribly shattered and broken by the revolution, but they still retained that ascendency among the tribes that resulted from their former bravery and prowess. In the mind of Brant there now dawned the grand scheme of forming a confederacy of all the northwestern tribes to oppose the advance of the American settlements. The first arbitrary assumptions of the continental congress gave him a great leverage. They had assumed to exercise an unlimited power of disposal over the Indian lands. The surveyors of the government were advancing west of the Pennsylvania line and staking off the first ranges. Now was the opportune time to fan the flame of savage jealousy, and stand with united front against the foe.

It is probable that Brant took part in the grand council held at Coshocton in 1785, and reported to Captain John Doughty by Alexander McCormick. The account of McCormick relates that there "were present the chiefs of many nations," and that "the object of this council was to unite themselves against the white people." There was an excited activity on the part of McKee, Elliott, Caldwell and Girty and they were endeavoring to keep the tribes away from the American treaties. The newspapers of London in speaking of Brant's arrival in England in the latter part of the same year, gave accounts of his lately having presided over a "grand congress of confederate chiefs of the Indian nations in America," and said that Brant had been appointed to the chief command in the war which the Indians meditated against the United States.

In the month of December, 1785, the distinguished warrior arrived at the British capital. In an age of less duplicity his coming might have excited some feeling of compassion. He had journeyed three thousand miles across the seas, to see what the great English king could do to restore the broken fortunes of his people. The beautiful valley of the Mohawk was theirs no longer. Their ancient castles and villages had been destroyed, or were in the hands of strangers. All had been lost in the service of the great "father" across the waters. What would that "father" now do for his ruined and sorrowing children? He reminded Lord Sidney of the colonial department, that in every war of England with her enemies the Iroquois had fought on her side; that they were struck with astonishment at hearing that they had been entirely forgotten in the treaty of peace, and that they could not believe it possible that they could be so neglected by a nation whom they had served with so much zeal and fidelity. The Americans were surveying the lands north of the Ohio, and Brant now desired to know whether the tribes were still to be regarded as "His Majesty's faithful allies" and whether they were to have that support and countenance such as old and true friends might expect. In other words, the blunt savage wanted to know whether England would now support the Indian tribes in beginning hostilities against the United States.

The conduct of the British was characteristic. The lands in controversy had just been ceded by solemn treaty to the new republic. To openly espouse the cause of Brant was to declare war. A little finesse must be resorted to in order to evade the leading question, and at the same time hold the tribes. They therefore wined and dined the American chief, and presented him to the king and queen, but promised him nothing. Lord Sidney rained platitudes. He said the king was always ready to attend to the future welfare of the tribes, and upon every occasion wherein their happiness might be concerned he was ready to give further testimony of his royal favor. He hoped that they might remain united and that their measures might be conducted with temper and moderation. In the meantime, the arts of diplomacy must be employed. The barbarian chief must be bribed with a pension, and covertly used as a tool and instrument of British design.

The great chief then and afterwards entertained misgivings, but he proceeded to play the dupe. In November and December, 1786, he was back in America, and a great council of the northwestern tribes was convened at the Huron village, near the mouth of the Detroit river. Present were the Five Nations, the Hurons or Wyandots, the Delawares, Shawnees, Ottawas, Potawatomi, Miamis, and some scattering bands of the Cherokees. A letter was here formulated and addressed to the congress of the United States, which at once marks Joseph Brant and the British agents back of him as the originators of the idea that all the Indian lands were held in common by all the tribes, and that no single tribe had the right to alienate. In answer to the treaties of Fort Stanwix and Fort McIntosh, they alleged that congress had hitherto managed everything in their own way, and had kindled council fires where they thought proper; that they had insisted on holding separate treaties with distinct tribes, and had entirely neglected the Indian plan of a general conference. They held it to be "indispensably necessary" that any cession of Indian lands should be made in the most public manner, "and by the united voice of the confederacy;" all partial treaties were void and of no effect. They urged a full meeting and treaty with all the tribes; warned the United States to keep their surveyors and other people from crossing the Ohio, and closed with these words: "Brothers: It shall not be our fault if the plans which we have suggested to you should not be carried into execution. In that case the event will be very precarious, and if farther ruptures ensue, we hope to be able to exculpate ourselves and shall most assuredly, with our united force, be obliged to defend those rights and privileges which have been transmitted to us by our ancestors; and if we should be thereby reduced to misfortune, the world will pity us when they think of the amicable proposals which we now make to prevent the unnecessary effusion of blood. These are our thoughts and firm resolves, and we earnestly desire that you transmit to us, as soon as possible, your answer, be it what it may."