From the late 1680s to the early 1760s, northeastern North America became the stage of bitter conflicts between the French and the British to assert their authority over a vast region extending from the Atlantic coast to the trans-Mississippi West. While the ultimate goals of European Empire builders threatened indigenous sovereignty, Native Americans often became embroiled in these wars, bearing in some cases the brunt of the fighting. The purpose of this course is to study various facets of the indigenous participation in these wars. The class will focus on the following questions: Why did Native Americans choose to get involved in conflicts such as King William’s War? How did the goals of empire builders and those of their indigenous allies align and/or differ? How did cultural differences affect operations on the battlefield and diplomatic relations? What long-term and short-term repercussions did these wars have in Indian country? How did they impact relations between colonial governments, European settlers, and their indigenous neighbors? Besides imparting knowledge about the subject matter, this course will also allow students to hone their skills in historical research and writing.
This guide is designed with links, resources, and historical and player aids to help students in HIST 350 to study and prepare for the RTTP game Forest Diplomacy.
Nicolas W. Proctor, Forest Diplomacy: Cultures in Conflict on the Pennsylvania Frontier, 1757 (W.W. Norton and Company, 2018).
Jane T. Merritt, At the Crossroads: Indians and Empires on a Mid-Atlantic Frontier, 1700-1763(Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 2003)
Fred Anderson, The War that Made America (New York: Penguin, 2006).
Additionally assigned documents and articles that are not taken from the required texts are available from OAKS
or through the databases at the Addlestone Library.
Assigned Readings Bibliography Listed per Class Session
INTER-POLITY RELATIONS
INDIGENOUS NORTH AMERICA TO EARLY CONTACT
Jan. 13: Trends in Indigenous History before Contact
Daniel K. Richter, “War and Culture: The Iroquois Experience,” William and Mary Quarterly 40:4 (1983), 528-37 (online).
Amy C. Shutt, “Communities and Kin,” Peoples of the River Valleys: The Odyssey of the Delaware Indians, 1-30 (on OAKS).
Jan. 20: Diplomacy in Pre-Contact North America
Matthew Dennis, “Deganawidah and the Cultivation of Peace: Iroquois Ideology, Political Culture, and Representation,” in Cultivating a Landscape of Peace, 76-118 (on OAKS).
Great Law of the Iroquois League,” in Reacting to the Past: Forest Diplomacy, 135-146.
Seth Mallios, The Deadly Politics of Giving, 25-36 (on OAKS).
NATIVE AMERICANS AND EUROPEAN EMPIRE BUILDERS
Jan. 25: European expansion in Colonial North America
Jay Gitlin, “Empires of Trade, Hinterlands of Settlement,” in The Oxford History of the American West, 79-114 (on OAKS).
Harry M. Ward, Colonial America, 1607-1763, 56-70 (On OAKS).
Jan. 27: Roots of Cooperation between Native Americans and European settlers
Daniel K. Richter, “War and Culture: The Iroquois Experience,” William and Mary Quarterly 40:4 (1983), 537-51 (Online).
Richard L. Haan, “Covenant and Consensus: Iroquois and English, 1676–1760” in Beyond the Covenant Chain: The Iroquois and Their Neighbors in Indian North America, 1600–1800, edited by Daniel K. Richter, and James H. Merrell, 41-57 (On OAKS).
Feb. 1: Building and Nurturing Inter-cultural Alliances
Gilles Havard, “Alliances and Strategies in the late 17th century” in The Great Peace of Montreal, 27-45 (On OAKS)
THE CAULDRON OF WAR:
IMPERIAL CONFLICTS IN NORTH AMERICA
Feb. 3: King William’s War (1689-1699) in Indian Country
John Ferling, Struggle for a Continent (Arlington Height, Ill.: Harlan Davidson, 1993), 61-79 (on OAKS).
Jenny Hale Pulsipher, “‘Dark Cloud Rising from the East’: Indian Sovereignty and the Coming of King William's War in New England,” New England Quarterly 80:4 (Dec. 2007), 588-613 (online).
Feb. 8: Intensification of Warfare
John Ferling, Struggle for a Continent (Arlington Height, Ill.: Harlan Davidson, 1993), 79-100 and 131-142 (on OAKS).
Daniel K. Richter, “War and Culture: The Iroquois Experience,” William and Mary Quarterly 40:4 (1983), 551-59 (online).
Richard Aquila, “Down the Warrior’s Path: The Causes of the Southern Wars of the Iroquois,” American Indian Quarterly 4:3 (August 1978), 211-221 (online).
BREWING STORM IN THE OHIO VALLEY
Feb. 15: The Roots of the French and Indian War
Fred Anderson, The War that Made America: A Short History of the French and Indian War, 3-54.
Feb. 17: New France on the offensive: From Braddock’s Defeat to the Fall of William Henry
Anderson, The War that Made America, 55-118.
PENNSYLVANIANS, IROQUOIS, AND DELAWARE
IN THE AGE OF IMPERIAL RIVALRIES
Feb. 22: William Penn and the Delawares
Merritt, At the Crossroads, 1-47.
“Philadelphia Treaty of 1742” in Reacting to the Past: Forest Diplomacy, 67-70.
Feb. 24: Adjusting to colonization
Merritt, At the Crossroads, 89-166.
“Treaty of Lancaster” in Reacting to the Past: Forest Diplomacy, 70-92.
Mar. 28: The Delawares at the Beginning of the French and Indian War
Merritt, At the Crossroads, 169-197
“The Coming of Miquon,” in Reacting to the Past: Forest Diplomacy, 102-106.
“Delawares and the Allegheny River Valley,” in Reacting to the Past: Forest Diplomacy, 107-109.
HISTORICAL IMMERSION
FOREST DIPLOMACY: CULTURES IN CONFLICT
ON THE PENNSYLVANIA FRONTIER, 1757.
Mar. 1: Getting Ready for the Game, Part 1
Merritt, At the Crossroads, 198-231.
“Carlisle Treaty of 1753,” in Reacting to the Past: Forest Diplomacy, 92-102.
Mar 3: Getting Ready for the Game, Part 2 /
Reacting to the Past: Forest Diplomacy, Parts 1, 2, 3, and 4.
Mar. 15: Getting Ready for the Game, Part 3
Timothy Shannon, “The Method of Doing Business,” Iroquois Diplomacy on the Early American Frontier, 79-102 (on OAKS).
Richard R. Beeman, “The Paradox of Popular and Oligarchic Political Behavior in Colonial Pennsylvania,” Varieties of Political Experience in Eighteenth-Century America, 204-242 (on OAKS).
Mar. 17: “Reacting to the Past: Prelude”
Francis Jennings, "’Pennsylvania Indians’ and the Iroquois” in Beyond the Covenant Chain The Iroquois and Their Neighbors in Indian North America, 1600–1800, edited by Daniel K. Richter, and James H. Merrell, 75-92 (on OAKS).
TOWARDS A NEW COLONIAL ORDER
Apr. 12: The Turning of the Tide
Anderson, The War that Made America, 119-173.
Apr. 14: The Collapse of New France
Anderson, The War that Made America, 179-251.
Apr. 19: Native Americans and the Treaty of Paris
Merritt, At the Crossroads, 235-308.
The Seven Years War was a global war, fought on five continents and known in America as the "French & Indian War."
Relations between the early English colonists and the native people they encountered in the New World.
