Pontiac, Chief of the Ottawa
AMERICAN PROFILES
No one realized how disastrous British expansion across the Appalachians would be for Native American survival better than Pontiac, the principal chief of the Ottawa and the head of a loose confederation of Ottawas, Chippewas, and Potawatomis. Pontiac had been an ally of the French and had fought with them against the British. Finally, Pontiac and his Native American forces had to fight the British on their own.
“The American forest never produced a man more shrewd, politic, and ambitious,” wrote frontier historian Francis Parkman of Chief Pontiac. “Courage, resolution, address, and eloquence” were his “passports to distinction.”
Pontiac was born around 1720, probably near what is now Detroit. His mother was a Chippewa, and his father was an Ottawa chief. From boyhood on, Pontiac had frequent contact with the French trappers and traders who worked the Great Lakes area, and he fought with the French against the British. He is thought to have commanded the Ottawa in a winning battle waged by some 600 Native Americans and 200 Frenchmen against General Braddock in 1755. Pontiac won the respect of all the French officers who fought with him in the French and Indian War.
Soon after the war ended, Pontiac heard the message of a prophet of the Delaware nation. The prophet preached that Native Americans must drive the white settlers out in order to regain the strength and independence that they had lost to the invaders. Pontiac was inspired by this cry for freedom, and he began to unite other Native American nations that were similarly moved.
On April 27, 1763, he secretly assembled a great council on the Detroit River. More than 400 chiefs and warriors from many nations attended. He told them that the prophet had spoken to a spirit that he called the Master of Life, and that the Master was displeased with his people. Pontiac quoted the Master’s words:
This land where ye dwell I have made for you and not for others. Whence comes it that ye permit the whites upon your lands? Drive them out, and make war upon them. I do not like them at all. . . .
What followed was the bloodiest of the frontier wars. Nearly every British fort in the West was taken by the inflamed Native Americans. In the spring of 1764, however, the British mounted a powerful offensive. As the war dragged on, disunity and defections weakened the Native American forces, and in October, Pontiac was forced to sue for peace.
After the defeat, Pontiac’s power among his people waned quickly. Though he had once led eighteen nations from an area extending from Lake Ontario to the Mississippi, most of his followers turned against him. Pontiac died in 1769, assassinated by a young Peoria warrior.
As you read, look for the causes of Pontiac’s Rebellion.
1. What traits enabled Pontiac to unite Native American nations against the British?
2. What was the reason for Pontiac’s Rebellion?
3. Why do you suppose many Native Americans turned against Pontiac, their former leader?