In Alaska the influence of Russian sailors, traders and settlers during the period of occupancy was considerable, as was also that of the priests and missionaries of the Greek Church, but much of what was thus imposed upon the aborigines has now been modified or is being submerged by the more recent influences of the English-speaking settlers, miners, &c., and the efforts of the American government to educate and improve them. The influence of the Russians extended even to California, as the name “Russian River” would indicate, and Friederici (Schiffahrt der Indianer, 1907, p. 46) even thinks that to them is due the sporadic occurrence in that region of skin-boats. It was through the Russians that the Alaskan Eskimo received tobacco. Some Russian words have crept into certain of the Indian languages. It has been said that the Russian authorities from time to time transported a few Indians over-sea to Kamchatka, &c.
The general question of the relations of the Europeans in North America with the Indians has been treated by various authors, one of the most recent being Friederici, whose Indianer und Amerikaner (Brunswick, 1900) is perhaps a little too prejudiced.
The contact between the races in North America has had its darker side, seen in the numerous conflicts and “wars” that have marked the conquest of the continent by Indian wars. the whites and the resistance of the weaker people to the inevitable triumph of the stronger. The following sketch of the warlike relations of various Indian stocks with the European colonists and their descendants brings out the principal facts of historic interest.
Eskimoan.—The history of warfare between the European colonists (and their descendants) and the North American aborigines begins with the conflict of Eskimo and Northmen in Greenland, the last phase of which, in the first half of the 15th century, ended in the destruction of the European settlements and the loss of knowledge of the Eskimo to the Old World till they were rediscovered by Frobisher in 1576 and Davis in 1585. Then came a new series of small conflicts in which the whites have been the chief aggressors—whalers, sealers and other adventurers. In the extreme north-west the Aleuts were very harshly treated by the Russians, and one of the most recent deeds of brutality has been the reported extermination, by irresponsible whalers, of the Eskimo of Southampton Island in Hudson’s Bay.
Algonkian and Iroquoian.—Southward, along the Atlantic coast, the period of actual settlement by the whites in large numbers was preceded by numerous conflicts with the Algonkian Indians in which all too often the whites (adventurers, fishermen, &c.) were principally at fault, the natives being sometimes carried off as slaves to Spain and elsewhere in Europe. When Champlain, very shortly after the founding of Quebec, decided to help his Algonkian neighbours against their Iroquoian enemies, an alliance was entered upon which had much to do with the final defeat of France in North America. The battle fought and won by Champlain near Ticonderoga in 1609 made the Iroquois the lasting antagonists of the French, and, since the former held a large portion of what is now the state of New York, the latter were effectually prevented from annihilating or destroying the English colonies to the south. The Iroquois alliance with the English in New York was preceded by one with the Dutch. Another result of the feud between the Iroquois and the French was the destruction of the confederacy of the Hurons, themselves a people of Iroquoian stock, established in the region between Lakes Ontario, Erie and Huron, over a large portion of what is now the province of Ontario, although the antagonism between Hurons and Iroquois had existed even before the coming of Cartier and the inevitable conflict had already begun. As an outcome of Champlain’s visit to the country of the Hurons in 1615 the Jesuit missionaries had established themselves among these Indians and for thirty-five years laboured with a devotion and sacrifice almost unparalleled in the history of the continent. The struggle ended in the campaign of 1648-1649, in which the Iroquois destroyed the Huron settlements and practically exterminated the people, the French priests in many cases having suffered martyrdom in the most cruel fashion at the hands of the savage conquerors. Such of the Hurons as succeeded in escaping took refuge in some of the safer French settlements or found shelter among friendly Indian tribes farther west. Some of these refugees have their descendants among the Hurons of Lorette to-day and among the Wyandots of Oklahoma. The Tionontati (Tobacco Nation) Hurons continued the struggle for some time longer, a battle being fought in 1659 on the Ottawa above Montreal, in which the Iroquois were victorious and the Huron chief slain. As late as 1747-1748 some of the Hurons, who had taken refuge in the west, under Orontony, a wily and unscrupulous chief, who was offended at certain actions of the French, entered into a conspiracy with many Algonkian tribes of the region to destroy the French posts at Detroit, &c., which, however, proved unsuccessful, the plot being revealed through the treachery of a Huron woman. A notable event in the French-Iroquois wars was the attack on Montreal in 1689. After the coming of Frontenac as governor of Canada the wars between the French and English involved some of the Indian tribes more and more, on one side or the other, the Mohawks especially, who took part against the French, being famous for their raids from the region of Ohio to far into New Brunswick. During the French war and the American War of Independence the Algonkian and Iroquoian Indians serving on both sides were in part or wholly responsible for numerous massacres and other acts of barbarity, though the whites sometimes showed themselves fully the equals of the savages they condemned.
In New England the most notable conflicts were “the Pequot war” of 1637-1638 and “King Philip’s war” of 1675-1676, the latter resulting in the overthrow of a powerful confederacy, which at one time threatened the very existence of the colony, and the practical extermination of the Indians concerned, after great havoc had been wrought by them in the white settlements. New England also suffered much from Indian “wars” instigated by the French, and at Caughnawaga and other Iroquois settlements in French Canada there is much white blood resulting from the adoption of captives taken away (e.g. at Marlboro and Deerfield, Mass., in 1703-1704) in raids on New England villages. Celebrated in the annals of war are the Algonkian chiefs Tecumseh (Shawnee), who aided the British in the war of 1812, and Pontiac (Ottawa), whose remarkable conspiracy of 1763 has been studied by Parkman; of noted Iroquoian chiefs and warriors may be mentioned Joseph Brant, who fought for the British in the War of Independence, and Logan, ill-famed for his barbarities perpetrated against the border settlements on the Ohio, 1775-1780, &c.
In Virginia the future of the English colony was not absolutely assured much before 1620. From the founding of Jamestown in 1607 until about 1616 the colony was in more or less danger of extinction by starvation or destruction at the hands of the Indians. The most famous and romantic of the Indian wars of Virginia was that in which Captain John Smith was concerned in the days of Powhatan and Opechancanough, when his rescue by Pocahontas is said to have taken place. Under Opechancanough massacres of the English settlers took place in 1622 and 1644 in particular, while intermittent hostilities continued between these dates, many hundreds of whites being slain by the Powhatan Indians and their confederates of Algonkian stock. As a result of wars with the English and also with other Indian tribes, many of the Algonkian peoples of Virginia, like some of the Iroquoian peoples farther south, were by the end of the 17th century greatly reduced in numbers. In the Carolinian region the Iroquoian Cherokee warred against the English colonists from 1759 until the War of Independence, and continued their struggle then against the Americans until 1794. After their forcible removal west of the Mississippi in 1838-1839 no serious hostilities occurred, with the exception of a conflict between the whites and a portion of the Cherokee, who had earlier moved into eastern Texas while that state was under the Mexican régime. The Tuscarora were in frequent conflict with the English, particularly in the “Tuscarora war” of 1713-14.
Of Algonkian tribes farther west the Cheyenne began conflicts with the whites about 1840, made their first incursion into Mexico in 1853, and between 1860 and 1878-1879, according to Mooney, “they were prominent in border warfare ... and have probably lost more in conflict with the whites than any other tribe of the plains in proportion to their number.” They participated in the “Sitting Bull war” of 1876.
The Chippewa of the north-western United States in the latter half of the 18th century and till the close of the war of 1812 kept up warfare with the border settlements, but have been generally peaceful since 1815, when a treaty was made. The only serious outbreak among the Cree, who have been generally friendly to the whites from the period of first contact, occurred during the Riel “rebellion” of 1885, but was soon settled. In the latter part of the 18th century (up to the treaty of Greenville, 1795) the Delawares took a prominent part in opposing the advance of the whites. The Kickapoos were concerned in the Indian plot to destroy the fort at Detroit in 1712, and a hundred years later they aided the English against the Americans; in 1832 numbers of them helped Black Hawk in his war against the whites. The Micmac were long hostile to the English, being prominent as aids to the French in the New England wars, and it was not until about 1779 or long after the French cession that conflicts between these Indians and the whites came to an end. The Mississaguas fought with the Iroquois against the French about 1750, having soon become friendly with the English and remaining so. The Ottawa were prominent in the wars of the region about Detroit from 1750 till 1815. Pontiac, whose “conspiracy” of 1763 is noted in American history, was an Ottawa chief. The Penobscot, as friends of the French, continued their attacks on the English settlements till about 1750. The Sacs and Foxes appear early in the 18th century as antagonists of the French (a rare thing among Algonkian peoples) and they were the instigators of the nearly successful attack on Detroit in 1712. In the war of 1812 most of these Indians sided with the British. Black Hawk, the chief figure in the “war” of 1831-1832, was a Sac and Fox chief, who endeavoured to engage all the Indian tribes of the region in a general alliance against the whites. The Shawnees were prominent in the border warfare of the Ohio region, and their famous chief Tecumseh fought for the British in the war of 1812.
Athabaskan.—The Athabaskan tribes of the far north, with the exception of occasional disputes with the traders and settlers, have generally been of a peaceful disposition, and “wars” with the whites have not been recorded to any extent. The warlike members of this stock have been the Apache and the Navaho. The Apache from the middle of the 16th century have given evidence of their instinct for raids and depredations on the frontiers of civilization. In recent times the most noteworthy outbreaks were those under Cochise, Victorio, Geronimo, Nana, Nakaidoklini, &c., between 1870 and 1886, in which several hundred whites in Mexico and New Mexico were killed and much property destroyed. As late as 1900 some of the hostile Apaches, who had escaped to the mountains, made a raid on the Mormon settlers in Chihuahua, Mexico. The Navaho, when New Mexico passed into the possession of the United States in 1849, had long been in the habit of committing depredations upon the white settlements and the Pueblos. These “wars” continued till 1863, when “Kit” Carson completely defeated them and the greater part of the tribe were made prisoners. Since their release in 1867 they have thriven in peace, although occasionally serious trouble has threatened, as, e.g., in November 1905.