Chapter 10

THE FRENCH AND INDIAN WARS

1763

The Final Battle of Detroit and Defeat of Chief Pontiac

(Author's Note) Before starting this final chapter of the segment of Part II that relates to the French and Indian Wars, I wanted to clarify some of the confusion about the Treaty of Paris 1763 which formally ended the French and Indian Wars.

The first source of confusion is that there were two Treaties of Paris. The first one was called the Treaty of Paris 1763 and it formally ended the French and Indian Wars and the second one was the Treaty of Paris 1783 and it formally ended the American Revolution.

The second area of overlap is the fact that the first Treaty of Paris 1763 actually ended two wars, not only the French and Indian War in the New World but also the Seven Year's Wars in Europe and in colonies around the world.

The following is a response that I sent to a kind reader who drew my attention to the lack of clarity about the status of the SPANISH involvement in the larger scope of the "Seven Year's War" that was equally as important on a global basis to the smaller but bloody and violent "French and Indian War".

(Thank you for the comments. You are absolutely correct about the status of SPAIN in both the French and Indian Wars and in the Seven Years Wars. I am sorry to have given the impression that it was on the side of England in the French and Indian Wars. I will be putting in a correction in the next chapter to clarify their position as in support of France and not in support of England. The fact that they received a boon at the Treaty of Paris of 1763 was due entirely to the lack of English objection to their receiving the Port of New Orleans and the lands west of the Mississippi because it added further insult to the French who they and the newly rising Americans didn't fully trust because of their devious attitudes. (Refer to the "Treaty of Fontainebleau" They also were restored to their dominance in both Havana and Manila and given some of the sugar islands as well as France to take some of the sting out of total defeat. The handover of the Open lands west of the Mississippi was sort of a "pig in a poke" because the Indians still held full sway in the wilderness and settlers were taking an extreme risk to push into that open territory. I was reluctant to get too deep into the Treaty of Paris 1763 because the details are confusing and sometimes misleading. I think that the loss of Florida to the Spanish exploration and settlement was much more important than gaining Indian lands west of the Mississippi. Thanks for bringing my attention to this mischaracterization.)

(This cessation of land deal between the British, French and the Spanish was further complicated by the "Treaty of Fontainebleau" which took place in 1762 and which secretly transferred control of New Orleans and the lands west of the Mississippi to Spain)

This connection between the French and Indian Wars and the Seven Years Wars was a prime example of how the infighting between the European Colonial Empires shaped the development of the New World and impacted the underlying conflict between the European Settlers and the American Indian Tribes. It was one of the reasons why I made the short span of time for the French and Indian Wars and the American Revolution as one of the three parts that made up the time frame of "The 400 Year War" which is the timeline scope of this story. In terms of sheer casualties, the Seven Years War accounted for almost two million deaths and the French and Indian Wars are estimated in worst terms at only about two hundred thousand total casualties. Even when the total casualties of the American Revolution are added in, the total deaths in the New World are still only a fraction of the numbers killed globally in the Seven Years Wars. The loss of life to the European Settlers in the New World was more than offset by the flood of new settlers that rushed to the newly established American Colonies after the Revolution.

The final chapter of the French and Indian War is devoted to the Final Battle of Detroit and the Insurgency of Chief Pontiac – (An Ottawa leader who became famous for his role in Pontiac's Rebellion (1763-1776), an American Indian struggle against the British and American Militia military occupation of the Great Lakes region following the British victory in the French and Indian War. Historians tend to disagree about Chief Pontiac's importance in the war that bears his name. Some accounts written in the nineteenth century portray him as the strategist and leader of the Indian revolt, while more recent reports show him to be only a local leader with minimal overall influence.

He fought against the British and American settlers in that northern region at the fringe of the settled areas of the North American Continent. The population figures are sparse in that area but the fighting was intense and the outcome insured that the French remained in Canada and not encroaching on the lands of current "Lower 48" in current day North America.

The last battle of the French and Indian Wars for control of the Great Lakes region was ironically a fight between the British rulers of Fort Detroit taken in the French and Indian Wars from the French and the American Indian Tribes under the leadership of Chief Pontiac who had assembled a confederation of Ottawas, Ojibwas, Potawatomis, and Hurons to follow him in seizing Fort Detroit and driving the British and American Militia out of the Great Lakes region.

Initially, Chief Pontiac entered the fort supposedly to sign a "Peace Treaty" with about 300 men at his back. He planned to take the fort by surprise and massacre all of the occupants. The British forces drove him out of the fort and he was unsuccessful. He surrounded the fort and began to lay siege to it in May of 1763.

A large number of British regulars and American settlers were captured outside the fort and tortured and killed in full view of the defenders inside who were powerless to act. The French settlers were not attacked but they did not support the Indian raiders because in their minds the war was already a lost cause. The Indian forces began to swell with new arrivals of warriors from the surrounding areas. There was at one point in excess of one thousand Indians surrounding the fort. Late in May, a relief column made it almost all the way to the fort but was ambushed by overwhelming numbers of Indians with the result of capture of almost one hundred soldiers. Some survivors managed to make it back to Fort Niagara to report the incident. The captured soldiers were taken to Fort Detroit and displayed to the defenders as they were systematically tortured and dismembered. Their bodies were thrown into the river and allowed to slowly float by the fort to the despair of the defenders.

A second relief effort was made in late July 1763 as almost three hundred soldiers arrived outside Fort Detroit. They attacked the Indian camps and were overwhelmed with the numbers of Indians waiting in ambush for them. This battle was known as the "Battle of Bloody Run" There was no survivors of this bloody battle. The siege was still a standoff and eventually the Indian warriors started to leave for their homes losing patience with the long wait. Some of the smaller tribes made peace with the British leaders still undefeated in the area hoping to avoid retaliation.

Chief Pontiac kept at the siege until late October 1763 when he realized the French had no interest of becoming involved in another war with the English. He lifted the siege and went into the forest where he continued his rebellion against the English settlers.

In the years after this final confrontation that pitted the last remnant of the Indian Tribes supporting the French in their war against the English Colonists there were sporadic outbreaks in remote areas but the general sense on the frontier was that the combatants were the slow moving tide of settlement versus the way of nature and the open society of the American Indian Tribes. The Indians who were aligned on both sides in the French and Indian Wars suffered great losses not only from the opposing forces but by disease, migration, and inter-tribal warfare.

The next three chapters, Chapters 11 – 13 will address the conflict during the time frame of the American Revolution against the British Crown. It was only slightly less than a decade out of the four centuries of the conflict but it was a crisis point in the struggle between the American Indian Tribes and the European Settlers.