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Episode 8 - The Colonial Frontier w/ special guest Brady Crytzer
349 Plays2 months ago
Following Braddock's defeat in the Battle of the Monongahela in 1755, the British colonial frontier from eastern Pennsylvania to western and southern Virginia becomes an appetizing target for French-allied Indian raids. Join us as we learn from our special guest, author and professor of history Brady Crytzer, about the dynamic nature of the frontier, the life and times of Guyasuta and the Ohio Indians, stark differences in the nature of warfare from European and native perspectives, and more.
I highly encourage our listeners to look up more of Brady's work, whether it is one of his 8 books, his Youtube channel, his podcast Dispatches: The Podcast of the Journal of the American Revolution, or his work on documentaries!
Recommended
Transcript
Introduction and Guest Overview
00:00:11
Speaker
Welcome back to Tales from the French and Indian War. I'm your host, Jackson, joined by my co-host, Matt, as always. And today we have a special guest, the first guest on this podcast. We are joined by professor and author Brady Kreitzer.
00:00:30
Speaker
Hello, Brady. Welcome. Hi, gentlemen. Thank you for having me. Yeah, it's a pleasure. we're ah We're excited to have you as our first expert guests and diving into the French and Indian War.
00:00:44
Speaker
Specifically today, you remember from our last couple episodes, we talked about the main battles of the campaign in 1755.
00:00:54
Speaker
We've covered those, and now we're going to be talking about some of the smaller engagements on the frontier, in more broad strokes, looking at frontier life, what it was like for settlers, what it was like for the Indian tribes living there, some of the specific situations.
Frontier Life and Kreitzer's Book Discussion
00:01:15
Speaker
And we'll be looking at one of Brady's books, which I have next to me, Gaya Suta and the Fall of Indian America. So very excited to dive in.
00:01:27
Speaker
Matt, is there anything ah you'd like to bring up before we begin? ah No, I mean, I think you covered it, Jackson. I think there's kind of ah you know a little bit of a lull in the traditional military action in this period after Braddock's defeat.
00:01:41
Speaker
ah But we're going to see, as you mentioned, that a lot of smaller engagements occur on the frontier. um and I think there's so many that they probably get off or overlooked pretty often in in history books. So I'm glad that we are spending an episode diving into this topic. And I'm very excited that we have Brady here too ah give an actual knowledgeable view of this time period.
00:02:02
Speaker
and so Jackson and I just winging it on a daily basis. So um I'm glad that Brady, thanks again for joining us and I'm looking forward to getting into it. All right. So, yeah, ah one thing before we start asking some questions to our guest supports, know how all of these events are interconnected. You know, not just taking isolated battle, looking at it and then going to the next isolated battle.
00:02:26
Speaker
One of the main factors that leads to such ah frontier warfare that we'll be about to be talking about. is directly because of some of the events like Braddock's defeat in the Battle of the Monongahela.
00:02:40
Speaker
We've been talking so much about the Ohio country in this podcast, but the defeat, the complete route of the British army in the Ohio country leaves the frontier wide open. So this is a lot of these attacks are going to be more or less directly a result from some of the things we've just been talking about.
Kreitzer's Interest in Colonial History
00:02:59
Speaker
Before we get into the weeds, though, ah Brady, I wanted to get a little bit into your background. What interested you in the colonial period, early America? And I've written eight different books, I think. I had a scene on different aspects of the period, some focused on Pennsylvania-specific events, others-so-so.
00:03:20
Speaker
more general. ah So what interested interested you first in this time period and how did you come to be a professor of history and a author? Yeah, well, let me say first, thank you for inviting me.
00:03:34
Speaker
um So I am really, i think, a product of the 250th anniversary of the of the Seven Years' War. Back in 06,
00:03:46
Speaker
you know, 07, all the way through there. There was much much like what we're experiencing right now with the revolution. um There was a big push for new publications and new exhibits, new documentaries about the Seven Years War.
00:04:00
Speaker
And I was just ah an undergraduate at the time. And I was sort of looking for, I guess, my my place in the historical world and living in Pittsburgh. were really you know in one of the major theaters of the other conflict. So it just you know it opened my eyes to all the amazing things that happened around me and places I knew so well growing up.
00:04:22
Speaker
And it made me look at them differently. And it made me realize how much work there was to be done. Frankly, podcasts like this are a big part of that. So I'm glad to see it. um But that kind of set me on the path to studying the Seven Years War specifically and Once i began diving into the frontier and all of the sort of ah moving parts of it and really treated it as a thematic study, that is where I made my career.
00:04:46
Speaker
Oh, that's great. And I can relate to how living near the history can be that spark that really gets you on it because I moved to the Pittsburgh area just five years ago and I had known the basics of the French and Indian War, you know, back from middle or high school or some things like that.
00:05:04
Speaker
But then once, yeah, I'm confronted with all of these local sites that have such a deep connection and deep importance to the beginning, middle and end of the conflict, I'm Then I was like, I just got to learn about this. I got to visit these places. i gotta i want to be an expert in this stuff.
00:05:20
Speaker
but So I can ah can definitely relate to to that. That's great.
Gaya Suta's Historical Significance
00:05:25
Speaker
um So your book that we that I picked up a few weeks ago when I visited the Braddock's Battlefield Museum, Gaya Suta and the Fall of Indian America, I feel like you do explain it pretty well on the on the blurb in the back. But for our audience who's not familiar with the work,
00:05:42
Speaker
Why was Gaya Suta specifically the right individual or the the right fit for this book and examining all of the tumultuous changes that happened to Indian America, to the different tribes, to the frontier, out of all the, some of the main players from the different tribes in this period, what made him such a fascinating figure to use as your base for talking about all of these, these crazy changes that happened?
00:06:12
Speaker
Yeah, so, you know, Gaius Suda is a lot like George Washington um in that, you know, they'll meet four times in their lives at very different stages of their lives, but they both kind of transcend this really dynamic period of history.
00:06:29
Speaker
ah They both kind of come of age in the Seven Years' War, ah remain very relevant in the Revolution, and even lead into what is really America's first war as a nation, the Northwest Indian War.
00:06:40
Speaker
um he has this kind of front row seat for all these important details. You know, I was listening to some of your other episodes and seeing you leave off in 1755, you know, Gaius Suta as a study allows us to understand how Braddock's defeat is just a, an earthquake ah for the entire frontier in terms of ah who's going where and and where they're aligning. I mean, before Braddock's defeat,
00:07:07
Speaker
um you You know, most of the the the the native peoples of the Ohio country are still undecided, Gaiasuda being one of them. ah You know, the warriors at at the Battle of the Monongahela, Braddock's defeat, are almost all Great Lakes warriors.
00:07:22
Speaker
So seeing that victory and seeing the British annihilated really convinces the Ohioans who haven't picked a side that the French are the ticket. And Gaius Suda is a man in his 20s at that time, just like Washington, learning these important lessons. And when you're 25 years old and you see a a victory like that, it makes the choice very easy.
00:07:46
Speaker
Yeah, i can I can definitely believe that. Yeah, no, Gaiusuta was one of those figures that we've mentioned him just a couple times on the podcast because, you know, one of the things we've been trying to do is keep track of some of these main recurring personalities.
00:08:02
Speaker
Yeah, good luck. Well, yeah. Yeah. Yeah, but but honestly, as since we when we started this podcast, I did not know much about him. ah So I was just like, it was more like, I know I should be mentioning this guy when he's present at events. Like we mentioned he joined George Washington to Fort LaBeouf, and I think we mentioned he was present at the Battle of Long Dehela.
00:08:22
Speaker
We didn't go into many more details other than like he was of a Seneca background. Yeah. um So reading your book was really fascinating to kind of dive into his background and how he was weaving in and out of those events.
00:08:38
Speaker
And speaking of his background specifically, um In your book, you dive into the concept of the Ohio Indians as a separate emerging identity, and you draw a really interesting parallel with that going on at the same time as the British colonies are developing their own unique identity away from their imperial center in Britain, just like the Ohio Indians, the Delaware, the Shawnee.
Ohio Indians' Identity Formation
00:09:04
Speaker
the mingo developing their own identity from the iroquois league which had previously dominated them would you mind diving into that a little bit more because i found that so fascinating and i know our our listeners would too So Gaius Suta is just, he's one of these people amongst many that is, is just well suited when you zoom in on him that to let you learn about maybe a a bit about the bigger picture.
00:09:30
Speaker
So Gaius Suta is ah ah Seneca by birth. ah He's born in the Genesee river Valley of Western New York and In the early part of the 18th century, later part of the 17th century, the Iroquois, for which the Seneca are part of, really come to claim the Ohio River Valley as their own.
00:09:53
Speaker
um They don't really have a good claim to that in terms of people living here. They're they're based in upstate New York. ah But one of the ways they'll populate this region and I use this word carefully, is to colonize it.
00:10:07
Speaker
And by that, I mean they'll send Seneca ah members of the of the Iroquois Confederacy to live here amongst the Ohioan tribes. And they have a special kind of pride of place. Gaius Suta is one of these early Seneca colonists, his parents are.
00:10:25
Speaker
um But the thing is, you know, they start to live amongst the Ohioans, the Shawnees, the Lenape's, the Wyandotte's. And, you know, much like the Americans who are very British when they arrive here, um they develop their own identity. And these early Seneca Iroquois colonists,
00:10:43
Speaker
become more part of the, and identify more with the Ohioan fabric of life than their original ancestral fabric of life. And they actually get the name mingkwa or mingo by the Iroquois as a result.
00:10:57
Speaker
And that word mingo actually is in reference to the thorn on a, like on a bush or a tree. Like it's a nuisance, it's obnoxious. um The Iroquois are kind of resentful of these mingos for almost, you know, becoming turncoats.
00:11:11
Speaker
But that's who Gaius Suda is. and And you wouldn't necessarily get to see that unless you're focused on one person. So I think, you know, for any any historians out there, that that notion of kind of a micro history, kind of zooming in to see the big picture is a really helpful tool.
00:11:28
Speaker
yeah So just going off that, Brady, you know like just reading through your book, I was fascinated on how you were able to trace guys through this life. um And I know Jackson and I have kind of ran into some difficulties finding some primary sources from this period, some things like Washington's Journal, and those are pretty easy to come by. But some of the lesser known figures, it's hard to find you know first-hand accounts and stuff like that.
00:11:49
Speaker
um I'm just curious, how were you able to trace his life and and whereabouts so um so descriptively in your book? fascinated to know. It's, you know, it's one of the reasons I'm very proud of that book. It's a different, it's a different um kind of challenge because we look at a person like Washington or Christopher Gist or any of these people who have these just mountains of journals and writings.
00:12:14
Speaker
Gaius Suda probably spoke 12 languages, but none of them had a written component. So we don't have his journals or his diaries or his orders, but we have our Europeans talking about him.
00:12:28
Speaker
So what I had to do for that book is comb through all of these firsthand accounts from really the big people on the frontier, William Trent, George Crowen, George Washington, Christopher Gist, and the like.
00:12:40
Speaker
to try to see, does anyone mention Gaiusuta? And they spell his name about 50 different ways, which makes it even more of a challenge. So you can't, you know, you can't um i Google that because you don't know how they're going to spell his I've run into that quite a bit. I know ah when we were talking about Pikulani, the raid there, just even without talking about different name spellings, there was just completely different, like one, an Indian name for the chief there, Mimeschia, and then the British name for him was Old Britain.
00:13:09
Speaker
And then the French name for him was La Demoiselle. And it's like all referring to the same people, but completely different names. You need to get in there. I mean, no search engine is going to help you with that. um And that's why I know my job is safe from AI for that matter, because it won't make heads or tails of it. But that's I mean, a lot of historians can't either.
00:13:28
Speaker
So that's the challenge. You're trying to build a biography of a man. who he kind of pops into the historical record at specific times then vanishes. But we know he didn't vanish. We know he was out there.
00:13:39
Speaker
So, you know, one of the things I found, which I thought was interesting, was at the end of the of the Seven Years' War, we do we do get an ah not a notation that Gaiusuta sent his son to Philadelphia to learn English.
00:13:53
Speaker
And to me, that tells me he sees the future is a very British future. He wouldn't be on, you know, ah on a journey like that away from his family unless he believed that the future was English speaking.
00:14:08
Speaker
So those are kind of challenges we face. Yeah, definitely. And yeah, I can see how that just that one little tidbit, that one fact that he sent his son to Philadelphia to learn English, like that does tell you a lot. Like, you know, if you're, if you're writing a book, you don't just say, and then guys who just sent his son to Philadelphia, moving on. Like you can really expand on that and dive into ah the motives, the reasons, the changing landscape, just from that and a couple other facts.
00:14:36
Speaker
Yeah, and if anyone's interested in reading more, I would recommend Colin Calloway, dart myth. he's He's really a master of that process I was talking about, um kind of extrapolating information from bits and pieces of the native world, but he's fabulous.
00:14:52
Speaker
Okay. call it Sorry, Colin, what was the name? I'll write that down for you. Callaway. And he writes about a book every two years. So it's it's wonderful stuff. Yeah, Colin Callaway.
00:15:02
Speaker
The Brandon Sanderson of historical books with the output there, maybe. But yeah, that's good. Okay.
British-American Frontier Dynamics
00:15:10
Speaker
So we are looking at the time when Braddock has been defeated. the frontier is wide open and different Indian raiding parties with some French accompaniment are going all across the frontier.
00:15:26
Speaker
So to better understand what exactly is the frontier and what does it look like at this time, What would you say? so let me back up a little bit.
00:15:37
Speaker
As I've been reading, I'm kind of getting an idea that there's like three kinds of frontier settlements in British America at this time. There are some that are fully legal where the British and Indians made a fair deal where each side actually knew what was going on, like for land purchases.
00:15:56
Speaker
I don't know the the percentage of how many that would be. Then there's the other category where it might technically be legal, but the Indians got a little ripped off, whether by the British or by their Iroquois overlords. you know Things like the walking purchase or ah yeah like Indians selling the Delaware's land without consulting them, where it's like technically legal, but there's some shenanigans going on and it's not a fair deal.
00:16:21
Speaker
And then there's some other, the third category I'm i'm getting a feeling for is, you know, there's outright illegal like squatters on land. And I know there's been some times where the colonial governments actually go in and burn down cabins of settlers because they're building settlements and lands that they're not supposed to. This Indian hunting ground and stuff like that.
00:16:42
Speaker
So does that seem like an accurate picture? And if you can weigh in how much, like what's the the rough proportion between these three different kinds or how would you expand or qualify that initial understanding of the frontier?
00:16:59
Speaker
I think you're right on the money with that. um Again, you know, whenever whatever we think about the frontier, the easiest way that I introduce this to my students is that, you know, think about how mother nature hems people in place.
00:17:14
Speaker
People only move where they can. So it's why something like a river or ah one of the Great Lakes or a mountain pass it becomes these sort of pinch points of empire and fighting and progress and expansion because there's only so many ways to go. It's also why Braddock's Road was such a big deal.
00:17:33
Speaker
because it created a new avenue into the West that mother nature did not provide. I'm a big infrastructure nut. So, you know, that's why this French and Indian war is so important because all these roads are going to be built that that dramatically change the dynamics of the empire.
00:17:47
Speaker
But I think you had it just right. um There are, There are formally recognized land titles. there are um There are absentee landlords like George Washington, who will later own enormous tracts of land, but not live there.
00:18:03
Speaker
And then there's the people who actually live on the land, albeit illegally. ah So they'll be the ones that clear the land and farm the land, um but they have no actual title to the ah to the region. So it's a very, the frontier is a very dynamic place.
00:18:19
Speaker
You know, there's also lots of frontiers in the French and Indian war that disappear by the revolution, Western New York, um the the ah the Ohio River Valley, then there's the Pai D'Anneau, the Great Lakes region itself, the Illinois country.
00:18:34
Speaker
ah These are all considered frontiers at the time and up for grabs. So that's not a bad way to to to look at it. Who's living there at the time and what are their claims to the region? And I think that's going to be a good start.
00:18:48
Speaker
Okay. Thank you for ah the expansion there on the top. I'm glad the reading I've been doing has has given me a enough of a base level understanding of the situation. That's a good sign that for the podcast. You got it. You're right. You know more than most people, even even but you know professional historians.
00:19:08
Speaker
We're not winging it. we're We're doing it with an educational guess. We're amateurs, but we're trying. Gosh darn it. Yeah, you're way ahead of the game. Way way ahead of the game. Yeah, I think ah for like for this podcast, one of the things that spurred it was just I had read enough to the point where it's like, well, I've got to talk about this with someone and I don't want to bother my wife with this every day. so let me just get my other history loving friend. and and that's That's actually most of my career is my wife doesn't want to hear about this. Maybe there's a book or an article.
00:19:42
Speaker
Yeah, that's great. Okay, so we've got an understanding of what the frontier looked like and the messiness that is inherent within it, especially in Pennsylvania and Virginia, the geographic boundaries, Appalachian Mountains and those coveted waterways like the Ohio River.
00:20:02
Speaker
and know on a side note, I really started to appreciate the importance of navigable waterways when I went whitewater rafting for the first time because I was...
00:20:13
Speaker
I'm from the Cheat River in West Virginia, and i was like, yeah, there's no way that you could move goods and people down this river. like I understand why a ah nice, flat, stable body of water like the Ohio or something like that is crucial for civilization and moving goods and ideas and and everything.
00:20:33
Speaker
Well, listen, I could geek out a little bit on West Virginia rivers compared to Pennsylvania rivers, which you live in Pittsburgh. Please ahead. I appreciate this. If you look at just a geological map of what is today West Virginia, you're going to notice that...
00:20:48
Speaker
the rivers there are very different than the rivers in Pennsylvania in that the vast majority of West Virginia's rivers flow deeper into the state as opposed to out of it. So when you look at say the Delaware river or the, or the Schuylkill river or the Susquehanna or the, the Ohio here and in Pennsylvania, they take you somewhere.
00:21:09
Speaker
If you get into a river in West Virginia, like you mentioned the cheat, it's going to take you deeper into the mountains. So That's why you see a lot of these Scots-Irish settle in West Virginia virginia and it becomes kind of a trap for them.
00:21:21
Speaker
And they stay in one place and they can't really move anywhere. And you get all these, you know, nasty stereotypes out of there that they marry their cousins and they never leave home where they physically can't. The rivers almost like dead ends.
00:21:33
Speaker
Whereas these other great rivers like the Ohio take you to the world. So that's an aside. no that's That is fascinating. Yeah, I do love the geographical look into things like this. As much as I like geography, I constantly am reminded how little I know about like other major waterways outside of the the ones I usually run into. But yeah, that is that is fascinating. I'm sure that as still continues to have present day effects, just the the simple facts of all the hills and all the rivers that don't go where you need and they aren't easy to navigate for that region.
00:22:11
Speaker
Fascinating. Okay. um So we've got an understanding frontier, the geography, the situation
Perceptions of Warfare: European vs Native American
00:22:18
Speaker
of the Ohio Indians. They've now thrown in their lot with the French.
00:22:22
Speaker
Frontier is wide open. Could you give us in understanding full of the the differences between the European concept of warfare at this time and what's a fair or what's a strategic target?
00:22:38
Speaker
And then the Native American, at least the Ohio Indian, concept of what is the main strategy and what is a fair target in times of war? Because clearly there's a clash here that we see throughout the war when you got people like, you know, the Fort William Henry massacre where the Monc column and the French have clear differences about what can be done after a victory as the massive coalition of tribes that are working with them. And that results into some tragedy.
00:23:09
Speaker
So what what are the main differences in the just worldview and mindset for warfare? And how does that play out on the frontier? I wanted to piggyback off Jackson really quick to just go off that question.
00:23:21
Speaker
I'd also be interested to know, Brady, like what the European um what the reaction is, both on the French and the British side to this type of warfare, because, I mean, I think in Europe, it's a pretty isolated or one dimensional type of warfare and they they exercise the same sort of doctrine.
00:23:40
Speaker
um So I'm assuming the French and British probably has similar ah similar reactions, even though that they're the Native American warfare was probably favoring one side. So it's a that's a lot. Do what you can. with back So I always begin this um by clarifying something because, you know, this is a delicate topic.
00:24:01
Speaker
how You know, people use the word savage a lot in this field. And what I would argue is, you know, people are not savage, but war is savage.
00:24:12
Speaker
And i would i would challenge you to show me a war that was not by any side anywhere. um So that's important. it's when you It's when your vision of warfare doesn't sync up with someone else's that you have this discrepancy.
00:24:26
Speaker
You know, um European warfare is the result of 10,000 years of of experimentation, trial and error. European warfare in the 18th century, and this is true in France or Britain or Germany or Spain, gets tied directly to the aristocracy, honor, knighthood, these sorts of things.
00:24:46
Speaker
The Indian way of war developed also over 10,000 years, but they never met till 1492. So these are completely, i mean, this, this is like the equivalent of space aliens coming to earth until that moment we have developed completely separate from one another.
00:25:03
Speaker
And the vision of native warfare or just the vision of warfare is one of the big differences that Europeans always have a hard time contending with. So European warfare by its very nature is a team sport. There's a commander, there's a command structure.
00:25:20
Speaker
There's always someone to give you orders. um That's discipline. That's how it operates. But the the Indian world is is ah very much an individualized experience.
00:25:31
Speaker
um You fight as a group, but you're fighting as individuals. um there There are leaders on the battlefield, but they they always lead by example and from the front. And that's really important.
00:25:43
Speaker
So when the battle begins, um it's, I don't want to say every man for himself, but it's a lot closer to that than anything else. And as a result of that, you know, you'll see generally attack formations that are perfectly suited to disrupt the European army.
00:25:59
Speaker
Native peoples love the half moon crescent shaped attack, especially in the wilderness, because the Europeans do this crazy thing to them. Yeah. Where they line up in formation shoulder to shoulder for volley fire.
00:26:13
Speaker
And that's a very tight, compact position. Well, that's perfect for being engulfed in a half moon shape and then eventually completely encircled and destroyed. I mean, it's why you see so rarely European armies victorious against natives.
00:26:26
Speaker
Um, so it's very easy for them. It's fish in a barrel for them at that point. But when it comes to the aftermath of the fighting, you know, to get to your question, um, it's a grisly affair because the way that, that Europeans celebrate victories or by making, you know, medals and awards, but for native peoples, it's, it's taking trophies. It's physically showing,
00:26:49
Speaker
how much effect I had. And that may be in the form of scalps that may be in the form of fingers, tongues, um, you know, genitalia, it's really brutal stuff.
00:27:00
Speaker
Uh, but again, that is, that is a way of showing how effective one is on the battlefield. And then that's, it's tough to see and it's tough to write about. And in in my career, yeah,
00:27:11
Speaker
I don't, you know some people will sanitize that. I have no interest in that. I mean, they these these details are recorded so we know about them. And I don't make, you know, I don't sensationalize anything, but I also don't censor anything because even though it's hard to read about, I mean, imagine living through it.
00:27:30
Speaker
auto yeah That's there for a reason. So that's what I would say is the big disconnect is just radically different conceptions of what warfare looks like. Yeah, they're my friend and I were talking about this recently, going off what you're saying near the end, of just some of the great brutality in warfare in general, but especially in some of these ah frontier raids and all of the ah scalping, dismemberment, you stuff like that.
00:28:02
Speaker
how uh like warfare inherently is a horrifying like awful awful thing but somehow like for a lot of people especially men like there's still some kind of inherent fascination with learning about it you know like ah every guy it feels like has like a world war ii phase when they're growing up or they're really into ancient rome or for us you know it's french and indian war we have a um you know, just diving into that period, playing games set in that period.
00:28:30
Speaker
But at the heart of it, it is some of the things happening is just inherently brutal, but yet we still have a, such a fascination with it. It's kind of odd, but I don't, I don't really know how to explain it.
00:28:43
Speaker
right it It is. um yeah That's history. I mean, what you're saying to me is you're interested in history. um That's all, that's all I hear from that. So, um you know, I'll, I do all of my work. yeah I'm an imperial historian. I do all of my work on the North American frontier, which is really a study of multiple empires.
00:29:01
Speaker
I'll be in Rome in January and I'll be taking pictures and I'll be walking through the forum and I'll be geeking out over that too, because it's just, it's something that grabs you. You know, it's, it's not, that's not work for me like this is, but I, it's what you're talking about. iss very normal, I think.
00:29:16
Speaker
Yeah. yeah it's just, it's odd, but very, well, I guess odd and normal at the same time. What is that called? a ah Oxymoron, I guess. But yeah.
French and British Reactions to Native Warfare
00:29:28
Speaker
um Matt, I know your question was specific about European reactions to this kind of warfare.
00:29:35
Speaker
Brady, do you have any comment on how that, especially I want to, if you know any insights on France, I have a little bit of knowledge on new France's reactions and to ah some of this warfare, but you know For European France and Britain, how were they reacting to ah this kind of frontier backwoods, Indian-style fighting?
00:29:54
Speaker
Well, the French will be and react inherently differently to it. um they and i and it's you know It's economic and it's religious, and you'll get different answers from different people about this.
00:30:07
Speaker
the The vision of empire between these two powers, France and Britain, were very different. ah France was really only interested in ah business, trade, travel, and interaction. They weren't like the British, clearing land, building plantations. The British had a clear and hold land strategy where they, you know, their greatest weapon were surveyors and and and ah and deeds.
00:30:32
Speaker
Whereas the French, they they wanted to travel as far and fast as they could. That's why the British, you know, by the time they reached the Appalachian Mountains, the French have reached the Rocky Mountains. um It's because one is building very permanently,
00:30:45
Speaker
almost through conquest, if you want to say that, and the other is through interaction. The other side of that is that the French were Catholics, and you cannot take religion out of this war. It is a central tenet of the war, because the British always viewed the Catholics as a threat.
00:31:01
Speaker
um You know, this idea of this global empire, this papacy, this pseudo-empire. um So for the French, the other part of that is that the Catholic Church promotes missionary activity. It promotes active recruitment of new souls, which a lot of these native peoples were to the French.
00:31:19
Speaker
The British, the Church of England, they don't want any new people. They are what they are. They don't they don't invite you into their church. So it was very easy for the British to call these native savages and sort of outsiders because they made no efforts to really bring them into the fold, whereas the French had a ah had ah and an economic incentive to bring them close, but also a religious obligation to convert them to Catholicism.
00:31:45
Speaker
So i think I think that religious angle is a really big part of that. The British never get close in the way the French do, and I think those are the reasons. That's really interesting. I think Jackson and I have focused a lot on this podcast just about the the general manpower difference between the French and the British and why the that might have led the French to having more ah sympathies or tolerance towards the natives just because they needed the ah simple manpower.
00:32:11
Speaker
We haven't really explored the religious side too much, but that's no that's fascinating to know about. and I know ah in terms of New France and their viewpoint some of these raids, I had been reading in, i don't know if it Crucible of War or La Guerre de Sétain, but...
00:32:31
Speaker
ah The author was talking about some of the disagreements in the between Vaudray and Montcalm as they had this kind of like dual leadership role and their view of using these kind of skirmish tactics, Indian raids, militia raids versus more traditional European warfare.
00:32:49
Speaker
As I was beginning to to read into the history, ah was you know thinking, I'll have to confess, I'm ah kind of a France sympathizer here. I've got a lot of French Canadian ancestry.
00:33:01
Speaker
But in the beginning of reading into the period, I was like, ah, Vaudreuil was right. You know, you really got to rely on your strengths. You got to use the natives. You got to use the militia and these kind of like hit and run raids.
00:33:13
Speaker
And then as I read on and read some of the descriptions Vaudreuil, how it actually looks in real life when someone's living through a frontier raid rather than just, you know, strategy on a map, then it's like, okay, yeah, some of this is a little tough to swallow. I can see why people like Montcalm and the the more European bred leaders would have had trouble, i guess that you could say stooping to that level, even though it's just a different kind
Could French, British, and Natives Coexist Peacefully?
00:33:41
Speaker
of warfare. But yeah, I ended up getting more sympathy for the, uh, for the more European style view after reading some of the accounts.
00:33:52
Speaker
Well, you know, I think there is, um there's there's another, do I want to say? There's another level to this that that we haven't touched on. And I think it's really important, especially on the French side of the war.
00:34:08
Speaker
It's that, you know, here in North America, we always describe these early movements, 1753, Washington's mission, 1754, Fort Necessity. We always say it's ah it's a battle between the British and the French.
00:34:21
Speaker
But it's really not. It's really Americans versus Americans. I mean, um i believe Vaudreuil was born in America. Yeah, was the first Canadian governor, new France governor, who was born and in America.
00:34:36
Speaker
So, and Montcalm was not. um right George Washington, born in third generation American. You know, when when George Washington visits ah Fort Leboeuf in 1753, he meets the commander Saint-Pierre. Saint-Pierre is also third generation American.
00:34:53
Speaker
So this is, you know, it's an angle a lot of people don't take, but I think it's our inherent British bias. These are people are all virtually Americans living and growing up amongst native peoples.
00:35:09
Speaker
They it's not it's not, you know, um a novelty to them. It's part of life. So I think in the in the debate you mentioned there between Vaudrillard and Montcalm, you see that difference really apparently.
00:35:21
Speaker
Yeah, that is that is a very good point. Yeah, American born and bred versus European. ah Yeah, that's not not something i ah didn't clock that with Vaudray until you just said that right now. But yeah, that makes sense, again, as to the difference in approach to the war, to strategy, among among many other things.
00:35:41
Speaker
ah So I guess this kind of leads us into our next question, too, just talking about the differences between the British and French strategies and how they treat natives. Brady, this is a question Jackson and always talk about, but do you think there ever could have been a way for like the the French and the British ah to have lived in quote unquote peace in in North America along with all the native tribes? Or do you think a conflict like this, and I mean, there were several before, but do you think conflict was inevitable that it would turn violent?
00:36:13
Speaker
Or do you think there was ever a turning point where it could have been like, oh, you know, these two colonial powers can have their carved out portions and everybody can ride into the sunset, so to speak?
00:36:26
Speaker
um That's a really great question. i think, yeah, well, I believe, i believe, how do want to say this? um I do believe there was a way because the situation on the ground didn't change much after the seven years war.
00:36:42
Speaker
And what I mean by that is you still have the Acadians um moving south to Louisiana. You have, you know, the French there. ah You have thousands of French people living in Quebec after the seven years war as British citizens, but they're still functionally ah French in the way they live and the way they operate. As you just mentioned, Jackson, you have French, you know, they're still there.
00:37:06
Speaker
ah yeah yeah You know, the the Quebec, that they don't always get along so well. They're unique in Canada, but they're there. um The French remain in Illinois well into the American Revolution and even in the aftermath.
00:37:18
Speaker
So there there is a way there, but that British land system of possessing land. See, the French were never big land possessors. They had New Orleans, they had Quebec, they had Montreal, they had Trois-Rivières, these just little pockets of, abi a I guess, property.
00:37:39
Speaker
um They weren't the They weren't the plantation builders that the, you know, the the British put such a value on owning and controlling land. That is the problem. But honestly, until the 1790s, you know, they're all still there.
00:37:54
Speaker
ah Their flag may have changed, but they're culturally still very, very unique. So I think, yes, I think there could have been a way. And that certainly would be a very fascinating what if to occupy the evening with a bottle of something and just think, oh, what would North America look like if they ah had found some kind of way to to work together, coexist, know, however.
00:38:19
Speaker
I mean, really, Canada could have happened yesterday is not that far off from what you're talking about. You have a decidedly French section. You have, ah you know for a lack of better term, of a more British section. And you still have First Nations peoples there.
00:38:33
Speaker
And they are coexisting. um So it's not it's not out of the realm of possibility that could have happened everywhere. Gambit is the evidence for me. Guess you just have to have one top dog who's playing fair and letting the other two. Well, that's the wildlife. Who's going to be the top dog?
00:38:53
Speaker
and then fight. Okay. Yeah. That's good.
Native Tribes' Adoption Practices
00:38:58
Speaker
Going a little bit back into the different kinds of warfare, different mindset and objectives when it comes to that, I wanted to as follow up on one more thing, and that is the practice by many of the native tribes of kidnapping and then adopting the captives into the tribe.
00:39:18
Speaker
I think we've mentioned maybe on the podcast that you know the population of a lot of these tribes was pretty low. Warfare lowered it even more. So this was a way to basically outside of birth to grow the the strength of the tribe. But I know there's a lot more wrapped up in that practice or how it played out.
00:39:37
Speaker
How many people, especially at the end of Pontiac's war, left captivity and went back to their normal lives and how many people actually ended up staying and wanting to stay in the native lives.
00:39:49
Speaker
So do you have any more, like what's some critical knowledge that people need to know about this kind of practice and the the reasoning and behind it? Yes.
00:39:59
Speaker
um We know that captive taking is one of those, as I mentioned earlier, those kind of elements where European warfare doesn't match 10,000 years of native history.
00:40:11
Speaker
um For most of you know native history, your tribal groups are small. You are in desperate need of new DNA in the gene pool. Yeah. Part of warfare was taking captives for that very reason.
00:40:25
Speaker
ah You have, you know, your, your pride can vanish. It's happened many times before tribes just absolutely either disappear, die out or become assimilated because they don't have the numbers to continue.
00:40:37
Speaker
um so So that's something that happened all the time. what's What's compelling, I think, is that race is never a factor in that in the Indian world. it is you know the Even the notion of a unified kind of Indian is not really in place till the end of the American Revolution. you know The Iroquois viewed every nation as separate, whether they be American British, Shawnee, Potawatomi, what have you, there was never this sense of all whites versus all Indians, even the notion of whiteness is relatively new idea in American history.
00:41:11
Speaker
So, you know, what what I think is jarring for colonists is seeing white women or white children like Simon Gertie, for example, raising, being raised amongst the natives and being part of them.
00:41:24
Speaker
Um, Race is what complicated that because the Europeans were very fixated on the us versus then dynamic, but the natives just did not see it that way. I mean, by by the 1820s, I think about a third of the Cherokee down south are African-American. They're the, or at least part African-American because of, you know, enslaved people to run away and be adopted by the Cherokee. So That is a very, very common thing that we ah that we see there.
00:41:53
Speaker
But I think the other side of that is that you never really truly left your home if you were captive. I mean, it was very common to see people with a foot in both worlds.
00:42:04
Speaker
um People like Alexander McKee, Andrew Montour, Simon Gertie, they were always popping up in in British settlements. Seeing family sometimes even, you know, there there was this foot in two worlds dynamic there that I don't think enough people pay attention to. They were they were gone, but not, they weren't vanished. They just were living elsewhere in some cases.
00:42:28
Speaker
I'm going to wager a bet that this McKee you're talking about, not familiar personally, but I'm going to bet that McKee's Rocks is probably named after that McKee. Alexander, yeah, i look him up. He'll be a very big deal in the in the revolution and in the aftermath of the revolution in the Northwest Indian War.
00:42:47
Speaker
He's a very powerful British agent you know of a mixed race background. um But you would be right. Now, McKees Rocks, that may have been his father or grandfather that that was named after.
00:43:00
Speaker
um But there is ah he is tied to that specific region. He just comes up just about a generation later. Okay. Yeah. That's one thing as, as we've been doing this podcast and I've been deepening my knowledge, I've realized, you know, there's a lot of names that like authors will mention or will come up as, and I have a basic knowledge that, Oh, this person was important in the American revolution.
00:43:23
Speaker
But at this point, like I've dived, dove so deep into the French and Indian war and I still have just a very basic, mostly school level knowledge of the American revolution. It's kind of funny, the imbalance sometimes where I read about some very minor French and Indian war personality. I'm like, Oh, wow, that's so awesome.
00:43:43
Speaker
And I still don't know some of the main players on either side of the ah American revolution. have Yeah. Well, can ask what part of Pittsburgh you live in just generally? I'm actually just like five, 10 minutes from RMU. I'm in ah the moon area school district.
00:43:56
Speaker
Okay, so Montour Run. ah There's the Montour Trail. This is now for you locals, you'll appreciate this, but that's named after Andrew Montour. He's one of these prominent mixed race ah kind of agents of empire that lived in the area. So these are all over the place.
00:44:11
Speaker
Mm hmm. Yeah, I know I recently learned in the last year why Manaka is named Manaka after Manaka Tootha, a.k.a. Scarwadi. So yeah, these names are everywhere and it's fun to finally like decipher them as you learn the little tidbit of history that unlocks it.
00:44:28
Speaker
Absolutely, yeah. We have the Battle of Fallen Tempers in Toledo. that's That's my art claim to fame up here is the War of 1812. Listen, i'm I'm writing a book on that right now for 2027. So I'm knee deep in all in timbers.
00:44:44
Speaker
Fantastic. ah So another fun kind of what if for
Strategic Decisions in the French and Indian War
00:44:49
Speaker
you. So ah this was a question Jackson I had thought of too. So if you were in this period, if you were a leader of France, the Iroquois League or Britain,
00:45:00
Speaker
What different decisions do you think you would have made um with the retrospective that that you have as a historian and and looking to this period? Oh my gosh.
00:45:13
Speaker
You can just pick one. You don't have to do all of them. Yeah. i mean, we can we can add another hour to this episode if you want. But yeah, you can just pick one. Are you asking me how I'm trying to win the war faster? Am I trying to avoid a war? Yeah, I think that's such a layered question.
00:45:29
Speaker
Yeah. You can take it however you want. If you're taking the more martial path, war is here. What am I doing differently? Or if you want to take the more early 1750s, what am I doing to prevent war or to secure the position before shots are fired?
00:45:44
Speaker
Yeah. So here's what i'll i'll I'll take the British perspective on this. 1753, 1754, the British Empire, you know, they view this war a certain way, which I don't think serves them.
00:45:59
Speaker
in terms of making it shorter or, or easier to win. And they, they really try to be cheap about winning. That's, that's the thing that I take away is, you know, if there's a corner to cut to save money, ah I don't think war is the time to do it.
00:46:13
Speaker
So for example, what I mean by that is you have this Ohio river, that's the gateway to the West. It's the key to the continent. That's the future of the continent. rather than committing regular troops immediately, they basically, you know, signal to the Virginians, Hey, you guys are the richest and most powerful colony. You deal with this.
00:46:33
Speaker
Um, and that's where you get into all the kind of missteps, you know, George Washington's, uh, just a colonial militiaman. And he, you know, has these things that happen.
00:46:44
Speaker
Um, and, You know, is that different if you have a real British commander there, even when they send Braddock in 1755, the colonies have to pay for that.
00:46:56
Speaker
The empire does not pay for that. They send Braddock and Braddock has this meeting in Virginia with all the colonies and the meetings. Basically, we all need to put our money into a pot to pay for this expedition.
00:47:08
Speaker
So they're being cheap and, it changes things. It really, when you look at how disastrous Braddock's defeat is, which I think is the inevitable kind of end of that policy in a lot of ways.
00:47:20
Speaker
um They gave for France the the the frontier for years. You know, when Fort Duquesne was built, the French held that till 1758. It unified ah Canada to New Orleans with a waterway passage. That's the same distance as Paris to Moscow. You would never see ah European power give up that kind of land. But for me, it was the British cutting corners trying to do it on on the on the cheap that got them into that position.
00:47:47
Speaker
that's Again, that's the benefit of hindsight, though. We we never have that until it's too late. like, oh man, what are these guys thinking? Don't they know how this is going to turn out? You can answer that a million ways though, for sure. Oh, absolutely.
00:48:01
Speaker
um so I know every time I start a new book on the period, as I'm reading through the beginning, somehow some flicker of hope like goes in my, my heart of like, oh, maybe this time it'll turn out differently as if it was not.
Reflections on Lost Potential in Battles
00:48:16
Speaker
Oh, wait. Yeah.
00:48:19
Speaker
Well, people always say, you know, history repeats itself. I do not believe that as a historian. it I mean, there's similar circumstances and you learn a lot about human nature, but there's always off ramp.
00:48:31
Speaker
There's always a choice. um If history, you know, repeats itself, that's the benefit of looking back. I don't think history repeats itself, but I think people behave in similar ways in similar circumstances.
00:48:43
Speaker
Yeah. I know I've heard like a variation of that quote where it's like history doesn't repeat, but it rhymes. And I feel like that's a little bit. That's a good way. security Yeah. and Yeah. um So just a couple last questions here. Also more on the fun side.
00:48:59
Speaker
So I don't know if if you had listened to a couple of our episodes, like you had mentioned, you've probably heard me try to bring up some kind of obscure family connection, like ancestral connection. yeah and I didn't hear that. Yeah.
00:49:12
Speaker
Yeah, I try to, like usually every episode I'll try to you squeeze something. Like Jumonville, I have a very, very weak not blood tie to him. It's like my great whatever grandfather's. It's like.
00:49:27
Speaker
My great aunt's granddaughter like married his brother or half-brother. It's you know something ridiculously weak, but I like to try to find these ah little connections.
00:49:39
Speaker
Are you aware of any familial or ancestral connections to any of the players on either side of this war? um i know I really don't do a lot of genealogy. um My uncle does that.
00:49:53
Speaker
I've recently learned that, and this almost sounds like ah like a Simpsons character, but my very first relative to come to America was in 1753 from Switzerland, and his name was Johann Heinrich Kreitzer.
00:50:07
Speaker
um That's like Jebediah Springfield to me. um I can't believe it's it's that obvious, but my you know that's on my dad's side, my mom's side. We are... um um from Eastern Europe, some eastern Eastern European Jews in our family.
00:50:20
Speaker
ah So we don't really have a tie to this. I would say, if I could speak to the kind of national family a little bit, um listening to your episode on Braddock's Defeat, you know, I think about the men who fought at Braddock's Defeat.
00:50:35
Speaker
George Washington, Thomas Gage, you know, Daniel Boone was there as a teamster, Horatio Gates. These are going to be enormous figures in American history. um But then I think about like the opportunity cost of who actually dies at the Battle of the Monongahela, Braddock's defeat.
00:50:53
Speaker
And you could say that about any war, truly, but I mean, there probably would have been future presidents that that didn't leave that battlefield. there There could have been certainly future revolutionary generals on both sides who died that day. It was such a terrible catastrophe.
00:51:06
Speaker
um So I think about, you know, i don't do a lot of what ifs, but... that Who knows how history is different if that battle does not does not go the way it goes. I mean, who knows? yeah Washington was lucky to survive, but who wasn't lucky?
00:51:20
Speaker
Who were the unlucky ones? Yeah, I've thought the same exact thing. like Some of these people we we try to keep track of and bring up, it's mostly just because they survived throughout the war and were in... yeah a few engagements, but yeah, what other like leading officers or generals or presidents or whoever would there have been, but they just died in the the first battle of the war, like, or like Beaujolais. I mean, what if there was a war that beats Washington and luckily he dies, right? I mean, who knows? Maybe we don't have a country if that happens.
00:51:51
Speaker
What if Washington dies and one of the British officers survive and he becomes the man that defeats the revolutionaries? You could go, guess I said, a million ways with it, but... I like to sleep at night, so I tend not to do the one at the end.
00:52:04
Speaker
Wise answer. Well, before we wrap up, I've just got two more questions. One is a real simple one.
00:52:15
Speaker
What is your favorite early American history fun fact? you know If you're going to a cocktail party, you got to wow someone or just something you just find so fascinating or fun, just like a little little tidbit.
00:52:30
Speaker
You know, I would say one of the things I love, and this is my, you know, this is this is when it gets weird, but I love how many roads that we use today.
00:52:41
Speaker
ah Major highways ah that either began as Native American trails or colonial roads and really haven't changed much. I'm a real road fanatic. I have a new book. coming out in April called the National Road, George Washington and America's First Highway West. That's coming out this April. But I love roads. But the thing is, like, we travel roads every day. We don't even think about it. we We pay it no attention unless there's a pothole or if it's closed.
00:53:06
Speaker
But those are real passages of history and memory that connect us to 1756 and And i just think that's so neat. Yeah, definitely something taken for granted in the but last century, but some real brown groundbreaking achievements in centuries past.
Kreitzer's Upcoming Projects
00:53:26
Speaker
but that that ah That led perfectly into my last question, which was for the listeners, what next books or projects are you working on? but i will to Listen, I'll run you through them.
00:53:37
Speaker
I have a new series coming out on Fox Nation, focused on the revolution. It doesn't have a name yet, but it'll be out the spring. I'm in a new documentary. called the whiskey rebellion, which will be on PBS. That'll be coming out in the summertime.
00:53:52
Speaker
I have my next book, which is going to be in April, the national road will be released. So if I could, you know, the whole first third of that book is, is the French and Indian war. It's about George Washington as a road builder in the, in, in the French and Indian war.
00:54:07
Speaker
So that's on the horizon too. And my gosh, You know, i have a YouTube channel I'm always working on, ah historian Brady Kreitzer. just ah just ah And my weekly podcast, Dispatch the podcast of the Journal of the American Revolution.
00:54:23
Speaker
That's every Sunday night. So we've got a lot going on. Wow. Yeah, definitely keeping busy. I love it. I'm going to have to, I didn't know you had a podcast on the YouTube channel. ah We have i have over subscribe over a million downloads, over a million downloads on the podcast. 300 episodes, you'll really dive into that. wow And my my YouTube channel has over 100 videos and they're pretty sizable videos, usually 30 to 45 minutes. so so Jackson, I think we might have just lost all of our listeners to Bray's podcast. They're like, oh, wait. know There's a reason that we're not doing an American Revolution podcast.
00:54:58
Speaker
Yeah, right, right. Well, they know they tie together for sure. Well, no, that's good. I just talked about how I'm fairly ignorant overall about the American Revolution, so that can be my outlet to learning more.
00:55:10
Speaker
That was great. The thing with me is... I'm the guy, and I'll take this to my grave. The revolution begins the second the French and Indian War ends. You do not have one without the other.
00:55:22
Speaker
It is the chicken and the eggs. um All of my books, that they make fun of me because all of my books start in 1763. They all began to you know when the Peace of Paris was signed because it all sets it the rest of it off.
00:55:34
Speaker
um like immediately yeah immediately immediately so i'm the guy that never lets anyone forget about the french and indian war i remember i told jackson one of my first introductions to the french and indian war i was listening to i think it was just the american revolution podcast and i can't remember who does that one but um i know he has like probably thousands of episodes out now he's been doing it for decades but his like first 30 or 40 episodes were just about the french and indian war um for that for that reason the same reason you mentioned brady is like you can't have one without the other so um yeah no that's that's definitely fascinating yeah it's in my dna at this point i just you don't have 1776 without
00:56:17
Speaker
Yeah, I know. I read in, think it was French and Indian War by Walter Bornman. At the end, he mentions how because of the French and Indian War, that would have he like estimated it sped up the revolution by like 30, 40 years or something like that because of all the things that precipitated the immediate crises that follow the taxation and all that.
00:56:39
Speaker
um Like if that had not happened or if like gaining all of new France had not happened, then it could have been much longer before revolution. If ever, if ever. Yeah. Sure. That's a what if we don't time for that, but everyone at the end of that world. Last question. What if?
00:56:59
Speaker
yeah Well, that's great. ah Really glad that you were able to join, Brady. I have really enjoyed this conversation. i Learned a lot of new stuff. I know our listeners will have as well.
00:57:12
Speaker
um Is there anything else you want to add or anything you were dying to say that we didn't cover? or ah yeah so Shall we wrap this up that That's, you know, all I would say again is we're in the 250th of the revolution.
00:57:27
Speaker
That is just another reason to talk about the French and Indian war. It's not a reason to forget it. That's a great message for this podcast episode to end on.
00:57:38
Speaker
Thank you everybody for listening to tales from the French and Indian war. Thank you to Brady Kreitzer, our guests. ah Make sure you check out his YouTube channel and podcast. And if you're interested in any of his books, particularly the one that I was diving into Suta and the fall of Indian America, you can find those in a number of places. i think,
00:58:01
Speaker
both on publishers' websites and on just general Amazon. Is that correct, Brady? Everywhere, yep. Yep. Anywhere books are sold, you can find his very fascinating and educational writings.
00:58:15
Speaker
um Make sure you give our Facebook page a like every once in a while. I will post a great French and Indian War meme on there. I think on my last status, we got three likes. So that's big. That was very big.
00:58:29
Speaker
Yeah. We thank you guys for tuning in. think our next episode probably coming in two or three weeks and we will be taking a look at, I think. what will be going on in Europe as we finally get to an actual declaration of war.
00:58:46
Speaker
I know we've, we've mentioned over and over it for the last three, all this has been happening and there still isn't an actual declaration of war, but ah that's probably what we'll be focusing on in the next episode. And we'll get into 1756, but yeah, thank you all and have a great evening.