Pontiac's Rebellion

The Mount Vernon paper pretty accurately sums up what Pontiac's Rebellion was about. After the French and Indian War ended (essentially in 1760, with treaty signed in 1763, the British administration under General Amhearst cut aid to the Native American tribes (especially those that had sided with France during the just-completed war). The Natives had become so dependent upon white goods (cloth, blankets, muskets, powder and ball to name a few) that cut-backs on these items seriously threatened Native American culture and lives. What was amazing was that one charismatic Native American leader, Pontiac of the Ottawa tribe, was able to unite various tribes (many of which considered many of the other tribes enemies), including many from the far western areas that are now Wisconsin and Minnesota, and coordinate their actions so that all targets were struck at once. Only three British forts (including Fort Pitt, now at Point State Park in Pittsburgh) survived the surprise attacks, and they barely held out. Gen Amhearst assigned Col Henri Bouquet (a Swiss officer serving in the British Army) of the 60th (Royal American) Regiment to assemble an expedition to march from Philadelphia to relieve Fort Pitt. He assembled survivors of two Highland regiments (77th and 42nd) and men from his own regiment, plus Pennsylvania provincial troops, and marched off along the 1758 Forbes Road (now U.S. Hwy 30). When his troops were about 30 miles from Fort Pitt, they were attacked by Native American forces and surrounded on a hilltop near Bushy Run Creek (now Jeannette, PA). Since Braddock's Defeat in 1755, the British Army (and Col Bouquet in particular) had learned a lot about frontier warfare and Bouquet's troops were well-trained as to what to do. On the first day, the British troops held their own but were on the defensive. The British forces had "treed" (fighting in pairs - so there was always a loaded musket - from behind the big old-growth trees. Fighting was at the range of a flintlock smoothbore musket - often fifty yards or less. On the morning of the second day, by a brilliant tactical deception, Bouquet enticed the Native Americans to break cover and attack, whereupon they were taken in flank by Highland troops and scattered. The expedition then moved on and Fort Pitt was relieved, the Natives having departed for points west. The Native American confederation had come within an ace of pushing the colonists back to the coastal plain, but they ultimately failed. Col Bouquet then held a meeting with Native American leaders and dictated terms to them to end the war. Pontiac was killed by another Native American a few years later. Meanwhile, American settlers continued moving west. They had suffered terribly at the hands of attacking Native Americans and their hate for the Natives influenced how Britain (and later the United States) handled Indian affairs. For more information, read Matt Wulff's book "Henry Bouquet's Destiny: The March to Bushy Run," self-published, 2014. For those of you living in the central Atlantic area, Fort Ligonier, Bushy Run Battlefield, and the Fort Pitt museum in Pittsburgh are accessible and very interesting.