THE OHIO VALLEY-GREAT LAKES ETHNOHISTORY
ARCHIVES: THE MIAMI COLLECTION
It is noted that the following work from the Miami Archives should be read and
considered within the historical context in which it was composed and printed.
The opinions expressed and the language used do not reflect the opinions or
standards of the Glenn A. Black Laboratory of Archaeology, but are, rather,
indicative of thought in that historical moment during which the document was
published.
Governor Robert Dinwiddie
to the Board of Trade
(Williamsburg, Oct. 6, 1752)
Dinwiddie, Robert, Gov. in: A. T. Goodman,
A Journal of Captain William Trent. . .,
1752, Cincinnati: Robert Clarke
&
Co., 1871, pp. 69-72.
|
Williamsburg, Virginia, October 6, 1752. |
My Lords: By this ship I transmit to your Lordships a duplicate of the laws
passed here last Assembly, for His Majesty's approbation; as also, the other
papers, agreeable to my instructions, which I wish safe to your hands. And in
that box I also send the copy of report of the commissioners1
that delivered His Majesty's present to the several nations of Indians, at
Logstown,2 on the Ohio, to which I beg to be
referred. I beg leave to observe that the Twightwees, a large nation (page 70) of Indians to the
westward of the river Ohio, have taken up the hatchet (as they term it) against
the French and the Indians in amity with them; that is, that they have declared
war against the French and their allies, and that they solicited the friendship
of the English and the nations of Indians on the Ohio; as this application was
made before His Majesty's present was divided, the commissioners (I think)
prudently laid aside part of the present for the Twightwees, which was much
approved of by the other nations of Indians then at Logstown, and they sent two
gentlemen with that present, to be delivered to the chiefs in the name of His
Majesty, the King of Great Britain. This nation of Indians lie a great way west
of the Ohio, upon the Lake Erie; they and their allies can bring into the
field, as I am informed, at least 10,0003 men, and
are much more numerous than the Six Nations and all their allies. It's in the
power of the Twightwees to stop, and prevent the French having any intercourse
between the Mississippi and Canada.4 They have
towns on the northwest and southwest of the Lake Erie, where the (page
71) French are obliged to pass in their going
from Canada to the Southward. The gentlemen that carried the present are not
yet returned; when they do, I shall write you more fully on this subject. At
present I will do all in my power to make a confirmed peace with that nation of
Indians, but that must be done by presents; and as they are now at war with the
French they will be the easier prevailed on to come into amity with the British
nation. I am endeavoring to procure a true account of all the nations of
Indians to the west of our settlements, and their number, which, when I have obtained,
shall transmit the same to you. . .
______________________________
1 (**, p. 69) These were Colonel Joshua Fry, Colonel Lunsford Lomax, and Colonel James Patten.
2 (*, p. 69) Logstown was on the north bank of the Ohio, fourteen miles northwest of Pittsburg. It has long been a trading point of importance. Many important councils with the Ohio Indians were held there.
3 (*, p. 70) A mistake- the Miamis could then muster about one thousand warriors.
4 (**, p. 70) The French had a road from Detroit to Fort Miami, at the junction of the Maumee and St. Joseph; thence to the Lower Shawnees town on the Ohio, at the mouth of the Scioto. There was also a trail from Fort Miami to Fort Ouiatenon on the Wabash. The country through which these roads passed was within the boundaries of the Miami territory.
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