[Footnote 152: Margry, VI., 758.]
[Footnote 153: Canadian Archives, 1886, clxxii.]
[Footnote 154: Parkman, Montcalm and Wolfe, I., 84.]
[Footnote 155: Minn. Hist. Colls., V., 433. Washington was guided to the
fort along an old trading route by traders; the trail was improved by
the Ohio Company, and was used by Braddock in his march (Sparks,
Washington's Works, II., 302).]
[Footnote 156: Wis. Hist. Colls., V., 117.]
[Footnote 157: _Ibid._, 115.]
[Footnote 158: Parkman, Montcalm and Wolfe, II., 425-6. He was
prominently engaged in other battles; see Wis. Hist. Colls., VII.,
123-187.]
[Footnote 159: Wis. Hist. Colls., V., 117.]
[Footnote 160: Neill, in _Mag. West. Hist._, VII., 17, and Minn. Hist.
Colls., V., 434-436. For other examples see Wis. Hist. Colls., V.,
113-118; Minn. Hist. Colls., V., 430-1.]
THE ENGLISH AND THE NORTHWEST. INFLUENCE OF THE INDIAN TRADE ON
DIPLOMACY.
In the meantime what was the attitude of the English toward the
Northwest? In 1720 Governor Spotswood of Virginia wrote:[161] "The
danger which threatens these, his Maj'ty's Plantations, from this new
Settlement is also very considerable, for by the communication which the
French may maintain between Canada and Mississippi by the conveniency of
the Lakes, they do in a manner surround all the British Plantations.
They have it in their power by these Lakes and the many Rivers running
into them and into the Mississippi to engross all the Trade of the
Indian Nations w'ch are now supplied from hence."
Cadwallader Colden, Surveyor-General of New York, says in 1724: "New
France (as the French now claim) extends from the mouth of the
Mississippi to the mouth of the River St. Lawrence, by which the French
plainly shew their intention of enclosing the British Settlements and
cutting us off from all Commerce with the numerous Nations of Indians
that are everywhere settled over the vast continent of North
America."[162] As time passed, as population increased, and as the
reports of the traders extolled the fertility of the country, both the
English and the French, but particularly the Americans, began to
consider it from the standpoint of colonization as well as from that of
the fur trade.[163] The Ohio Company had both settlement and the fur
trade in mind,[164] and the French Governor, Galissonière, at the same
period urged that France ought to plant a colony in the Ohio
region.[165] After the conquest of New France by England there was still
the question whether she should keep Canada and the Northwest.[166]
Franklin, urging her to do so, offered as one argument the value of the
fur trade, intrinsically and as a means of holding the Indians in check.
Discussing the question whether the interior regions of America would
ever be accessible to English settlement and so to English manufactures,
he pointed out the vastness of our river and lake system, and the fact
that Indian trade already permeated the interior. In interesting
comparison he called their attention to the fact that English commerce
reached along river systems into the remote parts of Europe, and that in
ancient times the Levant had carried on a trade with the distant
interior.[167]
That the value of the fur trade was an important element in inducing the
English to retain Canada is shown by the fact that Great Britain no
sooner came into the possession of the country than she availed herself
of the fields for which she had so long intrigued. Among the western
posts she occupied Green Bay, and with the garrison came traders;[168]
but the fort was abandoned on the outbreak of Pontiac's war.[169] This
war was due to the revolt of the Indians of the Northwest against the
transfer of authority, and was fostered by the French traders.[170] It
concerned Wisconsin but slightly, and at its close we find Green Bay a
little trading community along the Fox, where a few families lived
comfortably[171] under the quasi-patriarchal rule of Langlade.[172] In
1765 trade was re-established at Chequamegon Bay by an English trader
named Henry, and here he found the Chippeways dressed in deerskins, the
wars having deprived them of a trader.[173]
As early as 1766 some Scotch merchants more extensively reopened the fur
trade, using Michillimackinac as the basis of their operations and
employing French voyageurs.[174] By the proclamation of the King in 1763
the Northwest was left without political organization, it being reserved
as crown lands and exempt from purchase or settlement, the design being
to give up to the Indian trade all the lands "westward of the sources of
the rivers which fall into the sea from the West and Northwest as
aforesaid." In a report of the Lords Commissioners for Trade and
Plantations in 1772 we find the attitude of the English government
clearly set forth in these words:[175]
"The great object of colonization upon the continent of North America
has been to improve and extend the commerce and manufactures of this
kingdom.... It does appear to us that the extension of the fur trade
depends entirely upon the Indians being undisturbed in the possession of
their hunting grounds, and that all colonization does in its nature and
must in its consequence operate to the prejudice of that branch of
commerce.... Let the savages enjoy their deserts in quiet. Were they
driven from their forests the peltry trade would decrease."
In a word, the English government attempted to adopt the western policy
of the French. From one point of view it was a successful policy. The
French traders took service under the English, and in the Revolutionary
war Charles de Langlade led the Wisconsin Indians to the aid of Hamilton
against George Rogers Clark,[176] as he had before against the British,
and in the War of 1812 the British trader Robert Dickson repeated this
movement.[177] As in the days of Begon, "the savages took the part of
those with whom they traded." The secret proposition of Vergennes, in
the negotiations preceding the treaty of 1783, to limit the United
States by the Alleghanies and to give the Northwest to England, while
reserving the rest of the region between the mountains and the
Mississippi as Indian territory under Spanish protection,[178] would
have given the fur trade to these nations.[179] In the extensive
discussions over the diplomacy whereby the Northwest was included within
the limits of the United States, it has been asserted that we won our
case by the chartered claims of the colonies and by George Rogers
Clark's conquest of the Illinois country. It appears, however, that in
fact Franklin, who had been a prominent member and champion of the Ohio
Company, and who knew the West from personal acquaintance, had persuaded
Shelburne to cede it to us as a part of a liberal peace that should
effect a reconciliation between the two countries. Shelburne himself
looked upon the region from the point of view of the fur trade simply,
and was more willing to make this concession than he was some others. In
the discussion over the treaty in Parliament in 1783, the Northwestern
boundary was treated almost solely from the point of view of the fur
trade and of the desertion of the Indians. The question was one of
profit and loss in this traffic. One member attacked Shelburne on the
ground that, "not thinking the naked independence a sufficient proof of
his liberality to the United States, he had clothed it with the warm
covering of our fur trade." Shelburne defended his cession "on the fair
rule of the value of the district ceded,"[180] and comparing exports and
imports and the cost of administration, he concluded that the fur trade
of the Northwest was not of sufficient value to warrant continuing the
war. The most valuable trade, he argued, was north of the line, and the
treaty merely applied sound economic principles and gave America "a
share in the trade." The retention of her Northwestern posts by Great
Britain at the close of the war, in contravention of the treaty, has an
obvious relation to the fur trade. In his negotiations with Hammond, the
British ambassador in 1791, Secretary of State Jefferson said: "By these
proceedings we have been intercepted entirely from the commerce of furs
with the Indian nations to the northward--a commerce which had ever been
of great importance to the United States, not only for its intrinsic
value, but as it was the means of cherishing peace with these Indians,
and of superseding the necessity of that expensive warfare which we have
been obliged to carry on with them during the time that these posts have
been in other hands."[181]
In discussing the evacuation of the posts in 1794 Jay was met by a
demand that complete freedom of the Northwestern Indian trade should be
granted to British subjects. It was furthermore proposed by Lord
Grenville[182] that, "Whereas it is now understood that the river
Mississippi would at no point thereof be intersected by such westward
line as is described in the said treaty [1783]; and whereas it was
stipulated in the said treaty that the navigation of the Mississippi
should be free to both parties"--one of two new propositions should be
accepted regarding the northwestern boundary. The maps in American State
Papers, Foreign Relations, I., 492, show that both these proposals
extended Great Britain's territory so as to embrace the Grand Portage
and the lake region of northern Minnesota, one of the best of the
Northwest Company's fur-trading regions south of the line, and in
connection by the Red river with the Canadian river systems.[183] They
were rejected by Jay. Secretary Randolph urged him to hasten the removal
of the British, stating that the delay asked for, to allow the traders
to collect their Indian debts, etc., would have a bad effect upon the
Indians, and protesting that free communication for the British would
strike deep into our Indian trade.[184] The definitive treaty included
the following provisions:[185] The posts were to be evacuated before
June 1, 1796. "All settlers and traders, within the precincts or
jurisdiction of the said posts, shall continue to enjoy, unmolested, all
their property of every kind, and shall be protected therein. They shall
be at full liberty to remain there, or to remove with all or any part of
their effects; and it shall also be free to them to sell their lands,
houses, or effects, or to retain the property thereof, at their
discretion; such of them as shall continue to reside within the said
boundary lines shall not be compelled to become citizens of the United
States, or to take any oath of allegiance to the government thereof; but
they shall be at full liberty to do so if they think proper, and they
shall make and declare their election within one year after the
evacuation aforesaid. And all persons who shall continue there after the
expiration of the said year without having declared their intention of
remaining subjects of his British Majesty shall be considered as having
elected to become citizens of the United States." "It is agreed that it
shall at all times be free to His Majesty's subjects, and to the Indians
dwelling on either side of the said boundary line, freely to pass and
repass by land or inland navigation into the respective territories and
countries of the two parties on the continent of America (the country
within the limits of the Hudson's Bay Company only excepted), and to
navigate all the lakes, rivers and waters thereof, and freely to carry
on trade and commerce with each other."
In his elaborate defence of Jay's treaty, Alexander Hamilton paid much
attention to the question of the fur trade. Defending Jay for permitting
so long a delay in evacuation and for granting right of entry into our
fields, he minimized the value of the trade. So far from being worth
$800,000 annually, he asserted the trade within our limits would not be
worth $100,000, seven-eighths of the traffic being north of the line.
This estimate of the value of the northwestern trade was too low. In the
course of his paper he made this observation:[186]
"In proportion as the article is viewed on an enlarged plan and
permanent scale, its importance to us magnifies. Who can say how far
British colonization may spread southward and down the west side of the
Mississippi, northward and westward into the vast interior regions
towards the Pacific ocean?... In this large view of the subject, the fur
trade, which has made a very prominent figure in the discussion, becomes
a point scarcely visible. Objects of great variety and magnitude start
up in perspective, eclipsing the little atoms of the day, and promising
to grow and mature with time."
Such was not the attitude of Great Britain. To her the Northwest was
desirable on account of its Indian commerce. By a statement of the
Province of Upper Canada, sent with the approbation of
Lieutenant-General Hunter to the Duke of Kent, Commander-in-Chief of
British North America, in the year 1800, we are enabled to see the
situation through Canadian eyes:[187]
"The Indians, who had loudly and Justly complained of a treaty [1783] in
which they were sacrificed by a cession of their country contrary to
repeated promises, were with difficulty appeased, however finding the
Posts retained and some Assurances given they ceased to murmur and
resolved to defend their country extending from the Ohio Northward to
the Great Lakes and westward to the Mississippi, an immense tract, in
which they found the deer, the bear, the wild wolf, game of all sorts in
profusion. They employed the Tomahawk and Scalping Knife against such
deluded settlers who on the faith of the treaty to which they did not
consent, ventured to cross the Ohio, secretly encouraged by the Agents
of Government, supplied with Arms, Ammunition, and provisions they
maintained an obstinate & destructive war against the States, cut off
two Corps sent against them.... The American Government, discouraged by
these disasters were desirous of peace on any terms, their deputies were
sent to Detroit, they offered to confine their Pretensions within
certain limits far South of the Lakes. if this offer had been accepted
the Indian Country would have been for ages an impassible Barrier
between us. twas unfortunately perhaps wantonly rejected, and the war
continued."
Acting under the privileges accorded to them by Jay's treaty, the
British traders were in almost as complete possession of Wisconsin until
after the war of 1812 as if Great Britain still owned it. When the war
broke out the keys of the region, Detroit and Michillimackinac, fell
into the British hands. Green Bay and Prairie du Chien were settlements
of French-British traders and voyageurs. Their leader was Robert
Dickson, who had traded at the latter settlement. Writing in 1814 from
his camp at Winnebago Lake, he says: "I think that Bony [Bonaparte]
must be knocked up as all Europe are now in Arms. The crisis is not far
off when I trust in God that the Tyrant will be humbled, & the Scoundrel
American Democrats be obliged to go down on their knees to
Britain."[188] Under him most of the Wisconsin traders of importance
received British commissions. In the spring of 1814 the Americans took
Prairie du Chien, at the mouth of the Wisconsin river, whereupon Col.
M'Douall, the British commandant at Michillimackinac, wrote to General
Drummond:[189] ... "I saw at once the imperious necessity which existed
of endeavoring by every means to dislodge the American Genl from his new
conquest, and make him relinquish the immense tract of country he had
seized upon in consequence & which brought him into the very heart of
that occupied by our friendly Indians, There was no alternative it must
either be done or there was an end to our connection with the Indians
for if allowed to settle themselves by dint of threats bribes & sowing
divisions among them, tribe after tribe would be gained over or subdued,
& thus would be destroyed the only barrier which protects the great
trading establishments of the North West and the Hudson's Bay Companys.
Nothing could then prevent the enemy from gaining the source of the
Mississippi, gradually extending themselves by the Red river to Lake
Winnipic, from whense the descent of Nelsons river to York Fort would in
time be easy."
The British traders, voyageurs and Indians[190] dislodged the Americans,
and at the close of the war England was practically in possession of the
Indian country of the Northwest.
In the negotiations at Ghent the British commissioners asserted the
sovereignty of the Indians over their lands, and their independence in
relation to the United States, and demanded that a barrier of Indian
territory should be established between the two countries, free to the
traffic of both nations but not open to purchase by either.[191] The
line of the Grenville treaty was suggested as a basis for determining
this Indian region. The proposition would have removed from the
sovereignty of the United States the territory of the Northwest with the
exception of about two-thirds of Ohio,[192] and given it over to the
British fur traders. The Americans declined to grant the terms, and the
United States was finally left in possession of the Northwest.