WI: A Deadlier Pontiac's Rebellion (for the British)?

ben0628

Banned
How much deadlier can Pontiac's Rebellion get for the British in 1763-1764? In these two years, Native American tribes from Canada, the Ohio River Valley, and Michigan all rose up against the British who had just won the Seven Years War, and waged a brutal frontier war against the British and American Colonists. In this two year span, almost a dozen British forts in the frontier fell to the Native Americans, a few small expeditionary forces to relieve besieged forts were slaughtered, while thousands of colonists along the frontier were either massacred or displaced. My question is, how much more damage can the Native Americans inflict on the British and American colonists?

The first the that comes to mind is Fort Detroit and Fort Pitt. Both fortresses had significant sized garrisons yet were under siege for the majority of the war and were on the verge of falling, yet they were relieved at the last minute. However, what if they both fall? Fort Detroit almost fell at the very beginning of the war through deceit (which was thwarted when the fort commander's Native American mistress warned him of a trap) while Fort Pitt's garrison was on the verge of collapse until Henry Bouquet and his British relief column barely managed to defeat the the Native American besiegers at Bushy Run (they were almost massacred on the second day, but the British won due to Bouquet's ingenuity).

If Henry Bouquet's force was annihilated at Bushy Run and if the Native American mistress didn't warn the commander of Fort Detroit, causing both Detroit and Pitt to fall, how would this affect the war? If I am not mistaken, at this point the British forces in North American mainland had shrunk considerably due to the later part of the Seven Years War being fought in the Caribbean as well as due to the fact that the Seven Years War was over. If Bouquet's forces were destroyed at Bushy Run, would the British be able to restore order on the Pennsylvanian frontier anytime soon? Would a larger Native American victory in the Pennsylvania frontier lead to a larger Paxton Boys Rebellion (which almost lead to a armed mob of frontiersmen occupying Philadelphia in otl)? And if Pontiac had managed to conquer Fort Detroit in the very beginning of the war, would this have freed up his men to partake in other campaigns against the British, most notably the fighting that was taking place around Fort Niagara and Levitstown between the British and the Senecas?

Could this having any effect on the peace process? Could it lead to a stricter Proclamation of 1763?
 

ben0628

Banned
Bumping one last time. Is no one interested or do people just not know enough about Pontiac's Rebellion to have a discussion?
 
I'm afraid that I don't really know enough about this rebellion, although I really should.

With what I do know, a deadlier Pontiac's rebellion will drive a very deep wedge between the colonists, who due to the scenarios you've described above will largely be responsible for protecting themselves, and the British authorities who failed to come to their aid and continue to demand taxes (especially if they beef up military presence in the rebellion's wake). The aftermath of the rebellion may see white revolts against the British authorities. Depending on how the British handle these revolts, the American revolution could occur earlier ITTL. Whether its successful or not is another matter-if the main focus of the revolt is the demands of backwoods frontiersmen, you might get a scenario where the elites of places like Virginia and New York fully side with the British, dooming the rebellion.

Pontiac's Rebellion ITTL might succeed in stopping the advancement of the frontier for a few decades by basically causing a war between white Americans.
 
Keep in mind that this is in the age of sail. By the time British authorities outside of New England and the associated colonies hear about this war, month will have passed. At that point, at best the units who currently have no pressing issue to handle could be sent over. Instead of a rebellion, there might be impetus to turn the elite of the colonial militia into regular troops. Of course, that could make the American colonists more capable of rebelling in the future.
 
If the Pontiac and his forces remain a big enough threat then that stops any revolution from coalescing due to fear of said threat.
 
More pogroms and massacres against smaller and more-assimilated Native American groups in the east, probably.

You mention the Paxton Boys, I note, but not how they got their start (wiping out the last Susquehannock communities) or the major demand of the march on Philly (a subsidy on Indian scalps).

For the war overall, it will alter a lot and very little. Smallpox will be through again in a couple years, so most of the people in the Midwest will be dead in a decade's time either way. In the short term, though, there could be a surprisingly equitable treaty or treaties with the Midwestern peoples, and that could easily have knock-on effects that echo down the centuries in terms of indigenous rights.
 
Medium term, the British will be blamed less for the Indian Boundary if they militarily failed to push beyond it. Having strong enemies prevent expansion and having the government do it are very different things, politically.

I wouldn't expect it to avert the impulse to Revolution, though. Most of the causative forces for that were in London, and will be little impacted so far as I can figure.

It's an interesting question what more successful trans-Appalachian groups would do faced with the falling out between the colonies and Britain. Their calculations would certainly be different.
 

ben0628

Banned
Keep in mind that this is in the age of sail. By the time British authorities outside of New England and the associated colonies hear about this war, month will have passed. At that point, at best the units who currently have no pressing issue to handle could be sent over. Instead of a rebellion, there might be impetus to turn the elite of the colonial militia into regular troops. Of course, that could make the American colonists more capable of rebelling in the future.

My problem with that is that Pontiac's War was already looking bad for the British in otl, but they still didn't send massive amounts of troops back into North America. I think they'd actually go with diplomacy instead.

More pogroms and massacres against smaller and more-assimilated Native American groups in the east, probably.

You mention the Paxton Boys, I note, but not how they got their start (wiping out the last Susquehannock communities) or the major demand of the march on Philly (a subsidy on Indian scalps).

For the war overall, it will alter a lot and very little. Smallpox will be through again in a couple years, so most of the people in the Midwest will be dead in a decade's time either way. In the short term, though, there could be a surprisingly equitable treaty or treaties with the Midwestern peoples, and that could easily have knock-on effects that echo down the centuries in terms of indigenous rights.

How bad could the Paxton Boy rebellion could have gotten? In otl they did march on Philadelphia but they were persuaded by Ben Franklin in Germantown to go home. If the frontier posts like Fort Pitt and Ligonier fell, would this have caused greater outrage among the Paxton Boys or were they already as mad as possible? In Philadelphia was occupied, could the crown have the pretext to take Pennsylvania away from the Penn family and turn it into a royal colony?

You are correct about smallpox so the Native Americans east of the Mississippi are going to have their populations decimated either way. However, I am curious to what effect a stronger Native American victory would have on the Iroquois, Cherokee, and Creek tribes. Would they see an oppoortunity and become more agressive as well? The Cherokee did rebel in 1761-62 but were eventually decimated so theyprobably have some bad blood with the British.

Medium term, the British will be blamed less for the Indian Boundary if they militarily failed to push beyond it. Having strong enemies prevent expansion and having the government do it are very different things, politically.

I wouldn't expect it to avert the impulse to Revolution, though. Most of the causative forces for that were in London, and will be little impacted so far as I can figure.

It's an interesting question what more successful trans-Appalachian groups would do faced with the falling out between the colonies and Britain. Their calculations would certainly be different.

The proclamation of 1763 was actually written before Pontiac's Rebellion.
 
My problem with that is that Pontiac's War was already looking bad for the British in otl, but they still didn't send massive amounts of troops back into North America. I think they'd actually go with diplomacy instead.

Agreed.

How bad could the Paxton Boy rebellion could have gotten? In otl they did march on Philadelphia but they were persuaded by Ben Franklin in Germantown to go home. If the frontier posts like Fort Pitt and Ligonier fell, would this have caused greater outrage among the Paxton Boys or were they already as mad as possible? In Philadelphia was occupied, could the crown have the pretext to take Pennsylvania away from the Penn family and turn it into a royal colony?

Well first of all, can they afford to throw the party at all? To send most of the armed men in western PA on a protest march away from the vicious savages on the doorstep?

In OTL, Fort Pitt was a choke point defending the western approaches to the province; its fall probably increases Indian raids into Pennsylvania. Certainly that would be the expectation of the habitually xenophobic Scotch-Irish settlers who dominated the frontier.

If anything, in these circumstances the march/movement might be smaller, yet viewed with more sympathy east of the Susquehanna. Or perhaps panicked efforts at mutual defense keep them too busy to do more than murder the neighbors.

That's not to say the Penn's aren't at risk. The peace party would be dealt a blow, and the Quakers' political enemies were eager to remove them from their leadership role in the colony. But it might be more likely to come from the top or from politics on the Delaware, than to result from a bunch of angry Ulstermen seizing the city.

You are correct about smallpox so the Native Americans east of the Mississippi are going to have their populations decimated either way. However, I am curious to what effect a stronger Native American victory would have on the Iroquois, Cherokee, and Creek tribes. Would they see an oppoortunity and become more agressive as well? The Cherokee did rebel in 1761-62 but were eventually decimated so theyprobably have some bad blood with the British.

Should be feasible to predict their short-term reactions, but it would be case by case based on tribal politics in the moment.

The proclamation of 1763 was actually written before Pontiac's Rebellion.

Good catch. So little impact there, though maybe slightly less resentment in the decade following.
 

ben0628

Banned
As for the Paxton Boys, I believed they marched on Philadelphia in the winter of 63. Native American tribes temporarily stopped fighting during the winter because they needed to complete the annual winter hunt to gather food for home. The fighting didn't start back up until Spring. If Fort Pitt falls (Bushy Run was in autumn), the Native Americans will still have to partake in the winter hunt, which still allows the Paxton Boys Rebellion to occur
 
What I'd like to see is some scenario wherein a substantial number of Native tribes gain treaty rights vis a vis the British system.

The straightforward result is that either Loyalist Indians in combination with British forces defeat the eventual Revolution (near certain to happen pretty soon after the destruction of New France IMHO) and we have an ongoing BNA evolving as a patchwork of white settlement and substantial Native protectorates, or Britain loses the American Revolution more or less as OTL and the Native peoples go down with the British--much as OTL.

But what I'm really aiming for is a very tricky bank shot whereby substantial numbers of Native peoples wind up committed to supporting a victorious American Revolution, as allies of the Patriots, and in return the scattered and diverse Native peoples are politically organized into a continental confederation given status equivalent to a US State in the eventual Constitution. That is, instead of trying to move all Native peoples to some "convenient" location "out of the way" or privileging some particular tribes with state status (no Native American individual tribe, not even the Navajo or Cherokee, ever numbered enough to qualify as a US state) a system develops whereby tribes accept the US supremacy, but are given fairly substantial reservation lands they control more or less where they have been traditionally living lately, and these dozens or hundreds of separate tribes, mostly quite tiny by US population standards, all are grouped together politically into this state-equivalent national confederation, which politically and legally holds all the scattered reservation lands within the territories and eventual states formed around them. The Confederation would have the same rights and privileges an individual US state has, and send two Senators (perhaps with a different name, but the same powers and function, elected on the same staggered schedule (initially appointed by the Confederation legislative body or governor of course, as Senators generally were in the 19th century) to the Senate, and a proportional number of Congress Representatives to the House. The internal organization would obviously be quite different from normal states, wth various small tribes (most tribes being far less populous than a typical US county, though comparable or bigger in area) having considerable autonomy. Nor do I forget that many tribes have a deep and long-lasting antipathy for others--one wonders whether the Comanche for instance would ever be able to play well within this system! So that's a complication; perhaps instead of geographical representation, the House seats should group various tribes based on groups that can see themselves as more or less allied, forming a sort of checkerboard pattern on the map. And the Confederal councils evolve to carefully balance power and limit and channel intertribal conflicts. The fact that all groups would surely have to endure shrunken territorial ranges, and then suffer further demographic collapse as the various Eurasian plagues decimate them all would tend to pull them out of confrontation with each other, and focus all on securing their status versus the white majority.

So in this context, I'd wonder whether a British diplomatic solution might result in establishment of definite and substantial tribal territories, and although I suppose most Native polities thus organized would align with the Loyalists against the Patriot/Rebels, might a substantial number of tribes, led by leaders who foresee the inevitable dominance of the white invaders, side with the Patriots, and recognizing the need for Indian unity in view of their small numbers and scattered situation, parley any appreciation for their support of the USA into inclusion in the US political system via this confederal model? Eventually the hostile tribes who had sided with Britain would be included after suitable treaties submitting to US power, and an ATL model of US incorporation of Native peoples becomes the norm.

It is of course an incredible long shot, in view of the simpler option of white supremacy steamrollering Native peoples all too vulnerable to destruction. The Civil war would be another major crisis, but if this long shot could happen at all I suspect the Confederation would be robust enough by then to survive and reassimilate tribes who sided with the secessionists during Reconstruction.

I'm interested in any options for getting this ball rolling because I think it would be pretty cool if the modern Union included this entity. At maximum its combined modern population could put it among the larger states, with dozens of Representatives and a hefty Presidential electoral vote, because in the ATL I think that Native populations would not decline quite so much, bottoming out sooner and recovering more rapidly, and a huge factor would be cultural. I assume that Native tribes (surely they'd call themselves "Indians" in the ATL) would have individual control over who they count as members (subject to scrutiny and regulation by the Confederation as well as some Federally imposed rules, but less stringent than the unilaterally imposed Federal rules of OTL), and lots of people excluded from claiming tribal status would be counted as Indians in the ATL, which would be another multiplier. Certainly if Alaskan and Hawaiian natives were to be included, the numbers would be pretty high!

The WI here seems most likely to set up the Native people for even more sweeping destruction if we assume an American Revolution is destined for success, or to make them agents of the defeat of such a revolution (and thus perhaps a British version of this Confederation that so fascinates me, but more likely Divide and Rule would prevail--various Native reservations might in time come to ally as a collective group informally within the politics of the British system, but the imperial system will not go out of their way to ease this outcome!)
 
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