Veterans of French and Indian Wars
Organize April 30, 1765
As early as 1764 officers of the First and Second Battalions of Pennsylvania who had served under Colonel Henry Bouquet during the French and Indian War tarried at Bedford on their way home and formed an association. The purpose of this organization was that they be awarded the land to which they were entitled for service rendered.
This association held another and more important meeting at Carlisle, April 30, 1765, when they elected officers and renewed their application to the proprietaries and asked for 24,000 acres of land along the West Branch of the Susquehanna.
In this formal application they stated their object was “to embody themselves on some good land at some distance from the inhabited part of the Province, where by their industry they might procure a comfortable subsistance for themselves and by their arms, union and increase become a powerful barrier to the Province.”
These officers knew that the Proprietaries had not that much land to award them and that they had not yet purchased the West Branch lands from the Indians, but at this meeting they adopted a strong resolution calling upon them to make such a purchase.
Following the French and Indian War the lawless white men had been encroaching upon Indian lands, provoked hostilities and murdered many innocent Indians. The situation became so acute that General Gage offered troops to assist Governor Penn in removing and punishing these intruders.
Governor Penn appealed to the Assembly for help. In the discussion of this important matter it was learned from George Croghan, Sir William Johnson and others that the Indians designed a northern confederacy, and were determined to avenge this intrusion and the murder of the Conestoga Indians at Lancaster.
The Assembly agreed to pass a boundary bill. They also sent a message to the Indians promising to punish those responsible for the Conestoga massacre, and urged a conference at which a boundary line could be established. They also appropriated £3000 as a present to appease the Indians.
During the following spring several conferences were held, the largest being at Fort Pitt, where many chiefs and warriors of the Six Nations were present; in all 1103 men, women and children. The explanations were satisfactory and the presents and cash joyously received.