The Wild Frontier (50 page)
Authors: William M. Osborn
1731: The French with Choctaw allies stormed Natchez strongholds. One thousand were killed, 400 sold as slaves, and many burned at the stake. By the end of the year, the Natchez tribe, which once had more than 5,000 people, had ceased to exist. The survivors obtained refuge with other tribes.
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1732: The Iroquois pressured a band of Delaware to give up their land near Philadelphia and move to where they lived under a minor Iroquois chief.
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Around 1734: The Chippewa fought the Fox and Sioux.
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Around 1740: The Comanche invaded Apache territory.
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1742: The Cherokee fought the Six Nations.
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1749: The Ottawas fought the Mississaugas.
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1750: The Shawnee fought the Chickasaw.
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Around 1750: The Apache invaded the Pimas, the Zuñi, and the Laguna.
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The Chippewa fought the Sioux. The Chippewa took over Sioux territory as far as the prairie.
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Last half of the 1700s: The Sioux and the Cheyenne expelled the Kiowa from the Black Hills.
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The Sioux and the Cheyenne drove the Pawnee south of the Platte River in Nebraska and the Crows from eastern Montana westward.
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1755: The Iroquois simply ordered the Delaware to leave eastern Pennsylvania. This forced the Shawnee to move to Ohio.
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1760s: The settlers obtained Indian help in suppressing the Cherokee. This war lasted 2 years.
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After 1763: Kickapoo territory was invaded by the Sioux from the west and by the Iroquois from the east. They then turned to warfare as a major pursuit and supported Ottawa leader Pontiac.
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1765: Pontiac helped the British (England, Scotland, and Wales had joined to form Great Britain in 1707) subdue Illinois tribes who were being incited by Frenchmen.
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Warriors in one of the Peoria villages decided to kill Pontiac. One of their braves did so in 1769.
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Around 1770: The Sioux and Cheyenne drove the Kiowa out of the Black Hills.
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1770s: The Arikara, or Rees, who had been weakened by 3 successive smallpox epidemics, were driven from their territory by the Sioux.
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1775: Some Kickapoos had been forced out of Wisconsin into Illinois and even farther west by tribes moving into the Great Lakes area. This occurred as early as around 1775. The Kickapoos were defeated in 1811 and 1812 by these tribes.
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After the Kickapoos were displaced by other tribes, they, the Delaware, the Shawnee, and other displaced tribes became mercenary soldiers for the Spanish and protected their settlements from the Chickasaw and later the Osages.
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Around 1776: There was an Iroquois civil war. Mohawk attacked Oneida, and Oneida attacked Mohawk. Iroquois fought Iroquois at the Battle of Bennington and the Battle of Saratoga, both of which were won by the American army. Mohawk leader Joseph Brant’s warriors attacked one another.
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1777: The Comanche and Apache fought. The Spanish governor of New Mexico, Juan Bautista de Anza, who had encouraged the war, gave the Comanche cards to help them keep score.
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During the Revolutionary War, at the Battle of Oriskany, the army of American general Nicholas Herkimer with 60 Indians, mostly Oneida, was ambushed and mauled by the army of British leader Sir John Johnson with Mohawk chief Joseph Brant and a group of Seneca warriors. Five Seneca chiefs were killed.
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1778-79: The Iroquois continued their 70-year war against the Hurons.
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Washington wrote to the commissioners of Indian affairs in 1778. He commented on a congressional resolution giving him authority to hire 400 Indians if they could be “procured upon proper terms.” He stated that “divesting them of the Savage customs exercised in their Wars against each other, I think they may be made of excellent use.”
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1779: General John Sullivan enlisted the aid of the Oneida against the Mohawk, Seneca, and Cayuga. The latter with British regulars and Tories destroyed Oneida settlements.
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1780: The Fox and Sioux were defeated by the Chippewa.
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Before 1790: The Kiowa and the Comanche had fought for many years, but then made peace and fought the Cheyenne and the Osages for 50 more years.
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1793: During Little Turtle’s War between the Shawnee and other tribes and the new American army, a group of Ottawas and other Indians robbed and raped Shawnee women farmers in several villages.
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1794: At the Battle of Fallen Timbers, the army of American general Anthony Wayne included a few Chickasaw and Choctaw scouts. It attacked the army of Miami chief Little Turtle, which had numbered 2,000 Shawnee, Miami, Creeks, Cherokee, and others before Indian defections occurred. At the time of the battle, no more than 1,300 were left. Little Turtle was defeated.
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1795: The Creeks invaded Chickasaw territory.
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1798: The Missouri tribe fought the Sac and the Fox. The Missouri were almost destroyed.
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End of the 1700s: The Kickapoos nearly exterminated the Illinois and other tribes in their area and then established villages in the conquered territory.
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Early 1800s: The Missouri fought with the Osages. This time the Missouri were destroyed. Survivors went to live with the Otoe and the Iowa tribes.
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Early 1800s: The Puncahs were at war with the Sioux, the Pawnee, the Osages, and the Konzas.
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The Cheyenne fought the Mandan.
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Kiowa, Crows, and Pawnee were attacked by the Sioux.
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1800: The Sioux held the west bank of the Mississippi against Iroquois aggression as late as this date.
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1800: The Hidatsa attacked the Shoshoni.
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Around 1800: The Sioux became more warlike and made war on the Crows, the Pawnee, “and every other western tribe they met.”
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The Winnebagos fought the Chippewa, Fox, Sac, and others.
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The Comanche were fighting the Apache.
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The Cheyenne carried on “almost unceasing war” with the Pawnee and Blackfeet.
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Most of the 1800s: The Comanche fought the Pawnee and the Osages.
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1803 or before: The Kaskaskia Indians in Illinois were mentioned in Jefferson’s message to Congress. He said they were friendly and had never had a difference with the government, but they had been “reduced by the wars” to a few individuals and were “unable to defend themselves against the neighboring tribes.”
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1804: The Hidatsa fought the Blackfeet.
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The Tetons fought the Omaha.
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The Sioux and Arikara attacked the Mandan.
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Early 1800s: The Winnebagos fought the Chippewa.
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Before 1806: The Flatheads fought the Blackfeet.
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1811: General William Henry Harrison with an army of 1,000 men and some Delaware and Miami scouts was in battle with the Shawnee near the Tippecanoe River in Indiana. About 50 were killed on each side.
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1812: William Wells, an Indian agent in Indiana, left Chicago (Fort Dearborn) with 30 Miami. The Potawatomis attacked the party, killing Wells and many others.
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1813: The Creeks had a civil war. The Lower Creeks, or White Sticks, wanted to cooperate with the settlers, but the Upper Creeks, or Red Sticks, wanted to drive them out.
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After Red Stick attacks upon settlers, an army was authorized by the Tennessee legislature. Led by General Jackson and strengthened by White Sticks, Choctaw, and Cherokee, it made 3 attacks on the Red Stick towns. The Red Stick people were nearly wiped out.
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Jackson learned that some friendly Indians were besieged by the main force of Creeks. He went to their relief. The Creeks lost 290 dead.
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1813-14: The Chickasaw and the Americans fought the Creek Red Sticks.
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1814: The Sioux drove the Kiowa out of the Black Hills and drove the Crow from the Powder River country a few years later. The Pawnee also were attacked by the Sioux.
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1814: General Jackson and his army defeated the Creeks. He required them to sign a treaty ceding nearly all their land in Alabama and some in Georgia. He then recruited about 1,000 Creek and Choctaw warriors for his campaign against the Florida tribes. William T. Hagan said that “the Indian capacity for self-destruction seemed limitless.”
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Around 1820: The Delaware fought the Osages.
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The Sioux conquered the Arikara, the Mandan, and other tribes.
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1821: Crows stole horses from the Cheyenne, Arapaho, Comanche, and Kiowa and used them to fight.
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Around 1825-50: The Cheyenne fought the Ute, the Delaware, and other tribes.
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1829: The Sac and the Fox under Chief Black Hawk had been defeated by an army under General Winfield Scott. The Indians unsuccessfully tried to retreat by several routes. Finally they decided to try to cross the Mississippi into Sioux country. Soldiers and a gunboat killed many of them. Two hundred warriors who reached the west bank were killed or captured by the Sioux.
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1820s-30s: The Kiowa launched raids on the Caddos, Navajo, Ute, Apache (except the Kiowa-Apache band), Arapaho, Cheyenne, and Osages. Peace accords were reached in the 1830s.
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1830s: The Shoshoni with the Bannocks fought the Blackfeet and the Crows.
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1831: The Nez Perce and the Blackfeet fought.
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Ironically, the arrival of traders into an area sometimes brought about fighting among tribes. They would move to be nearer the traders, thus bringing them into conflict with the tribes already there.
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1832: Sioux fought the Sac and the Fox at the end of the Black Hawk War.
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1833: Several removed tribes were attacked by other tribes. The Pawnee removed and were attacked by Sioux, Cheyenne, and Arapaho.
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The Sioux attacked the removed Otoes, Missouri, and Omaha.
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The removed Potawatomis, Ottawas, Chippewa, Winnebagos, Delaware, and Sac and Fox were attacked by other Indians.
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1837: The army hired Shawnee, Delaware, Kickapoos, Sac and Fox, and Choctaw to fight against the Seminoles.
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1838: The Kiowa, Comanche, and Apache fought the Cheyenne and Arapaho at the Battle of Wolf Creek.
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1839: The Apache attacked a large Comanche village at Spring Creek in Texas.
They killed a number of people in the village, including 5 settlers who had been captured by the Comanche.
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Before 1840: The Arapaho made war with the Shoshoni, Crows, and Sioux.
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Around 1840: The Kickapoos accepted the invitation of the Creeks to settle with them to provide protection from “the wild tribes.”
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1840s: The Kiowa, Comanche, Cheyenne, and Wichitas made war on the Cherokee, Chickasaw, Choctaw, Creeks, and Seminoles. The latter were known as the Five Civilized Nations.
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1847: The Pawnee were attacked by the Sioux, who killed 23. Other Sioux warriors raided the same year. As a result, the Pawnee moved.
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1848: Because the buffalo were being exterminated, tribes encroached on one another for food. Catholic priest P. J. De Smet wrote that the Plains Indians’ subsistence needs forced them into small bands who, “like hungry wolves,” poached on their neighbors:
The Sioux must necessarily encroach on the lands of the Arickaras, Crows, Assiniboins, Cheyennes and Pawnees—the Crows and Assiniboins on the Blackfeet and vice versa, and thus endless struggles, and murderous and cruel wars daily perpetrated and multiplied.
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1848: The Cheyenne and Arapaho fought their old enemies the Ute.
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Before 1850: The Shoshoni fought the Blackfeet and Crows, sometimes in alliance with the Bannocks.
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1800s: The Cheyenne were driven from their eastern homes by the Cree and the Sioux.
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1850s: The Shoshoni fought the Blackfeet, the Cheyenne, and the Sioux.
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1850s: A Fox war party attacked a Menominee camp because the Menominees had killed several Fox chiefs.
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In the First Seminole War, Jackson’s army, joined by a large number of Creeks, attacked the Seminoles.
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By 1850: The Sioux themselves had been driven westward by the Cree.
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1851: During the meetings at Fort Laramie, Sioux chief Black Hawk acknowledged the fights between the Sioux on the one hand and the Kiowa and the Crows on the other. He said, “These lands once belonged to the Kiowas and the Crows, but we whipped these nations out of them, and in this we did what the white men do when they want the lands of the Indians.”
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The Cheyenne and Arapaho again fought the Ute.
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1855: Comanche fought a group of their old enemies, the Apache.
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1857: The Sioux fought the Pawnee.
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