Red Dreams, White Nightmares : Pan-Indian Alliances in the Anglo-American Mind, 1763-1815

317 Pages·2015·21.81 MB·English

by  Owens

to slave rebellion in general. The growing From the end of Pontiac’s War in 1763
Red Dreams,
American nation needed and utilized a through the War of 1812, fear—even
OWENS
“Robert M. Owens locates the explosion of Indian-hating on the part of
rhetorical threat from the other to justify white paranoia—drove Anglo-American Indian
Anglo-American officials and settlers, and their anxiety over a possible
the uglier aspects of empire building—a policies. In Red Dreams, White Nightmares,
R
general war with Native peoples in trans-Appalachian North America, in an
phenomenon that Owens tracks through a vast e nightmares Robert M. Owens views conflicts between
all-consuming psychology of fear. In this provocative and powerful telling, d
array of primary sources. whites and Natives in this era—invariably
American expansion was less about civilization, destiny, or dominance than
Drawing on eighteen different archives, D treated as discrete, regional affairs—as the
about an overwhelming obsession with security.”
covering four nations and eleven states, and on r Pan-Indian Alliances in the inextricably related struggles they were.
e
ANDREW CAYTON
more than six-dozen period newspapers—and As this book makes clear, the Indian wars
a Anglo-American Mind, 1763–1815
coauthor (with Fred Anderson) of The Dominion of War: Empire and Liberty in North America, 1500–1800 m
incorporating the views of British and Spanish north of the Ohio River make sense only within
authorities as well as their American rivals— s the context of Indians’ efforts to recruit their
, .
Red Dreams, White Nightmares is the most “With compelling prose, Robert M. Owens surveys pan-Indian movements, w ROBERT M OWENS southern cousins to their cause. The massive
comprehensive account ever written of how fear, Indian alliances with European empires, slave rebellions, and the responses threat such alliances posed, recognized by
h
oftentimes resulting in “Indian-hating,” directly such coalitions generated among British colonists and American citizens in the contemporary whites from all walks of life,
i
t
influenced national policy in early America. Revolutionary and early national eras. One empire’s alliance with Indians, one prompted a terror that proved a major factor
e
tribal nation’s coalition with another, and one renegade European’s collusion in the formulation of Indian and military policy

Robert M. Owens is Associate Professor n
with slaves became in Anglo-American chambers a conspiratorial act of war. in North America. Indian unity, especially in
of History at Wichita State University and i
Red Dreams, White Nightmares illuminates the unsettling nature of early g the form of military alliance, was the most
author of Mr. Jefferson’s Hammer: William
h
American frontiers. By the time of the War of 1812, fear became a defining consistent, universal fear of Anglo-Americans
Henry Harrison and the Origins of American
t
feature of the early American relationship with independent in the late colonial, Revolutionary, and early
Indian Policy. m
Indian peoples, and the fear lasted for decades.” national periods. This fear was so pervasive—
a
On the front: “I Have Something to Say,” by Robert
GREGORY EVANS DOWD r and so useful for unifying whites—that
Griffing. Courtesy Paramount Press, Inc.
author of War under Heaven: Pontiac, the Indian Nations, and the British Empire e Americans exploited it long after the threat of a
s
general Indian alliance had passed.
As the nineteenth century wore on, and as
slavery became more pervasive and crucial to
the American South, fears shifted to Indian
alliances with former slaves, and eventually
(continued on back flap)
RED DREAMS, WHITE NIGHTMARES

Red Dreams, White Nightmares
Pan-Indian Alliances in the
Anglo-American Mind, 1763–1815
ROBERT M. OWENS
university of oklahoma press : norman
Also by Robert M. Owens
Mr. Jefferson’s Hammer: William Henry Harrison and the Origins of American
Indian Policy (Norman, Okla., 2007)
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Owens, Robert M. (Robert Martin), 1974–
Red dreams, white nightmares : pan-Indian alliances in the Anglo-American
mind, 1763–1815 / Robert M. Owens. — First edition.
pages cm.
Includes bibliographical references and index.
ISBN 978-0-8061-4646-1 (hardcover : alk. paper)
1. Indians of North America—Wars‚ 1815. 2. Indians of North America—
Government relations. 3. Indians of North America—Ethnic identity. I. Title.
II. Title: Pan-Indian alliances in the Anglo-American mind, 1763–1815.
E81.O84 2015
323.1197— dc23 2014029839
The paper in this book meets the guidelines for permanence and durability of
the Committee on Production Guidelines for Book Longevity of the Council on
Library Resources, Inc. ∞
Copyright © 2015 by the University of Oklahoma Press, Norman, Publishing
Division of the University. Manufactured in the U.S.A.
All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a
retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means, electronic, mechan-
ical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise—except as permitted under Section
107 or 108 of the United States Copyright Act—without the prior permission of
the University of Oklahoma Press.
1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10
To my parents

Contents
List of Illustrations ix
Acknowledgments xi
Introduction 3
Part I Tenuous Empire 17
1. Pontiac and Pan-Indianism 19
2. Dueling Diplomacies 31
3. Stuart Besieged 43
4. Dunmore’s Fleeting Victory 49
5. Revolution and Realignment 59
Part II Pan-Indianism and Policy 71
6. Britain’s Pan-Indian Gamble 73
7. A New Nation with Old Fears 85
8. The Talented Mr. McGillivray 99
9. Ohio Confederates Triumphant 107
10. Henry Knox’s Nightmare 117
11. Bowles, Part One 137
12. Pan-Indianism Crests 149
13. The Fear Remains the Same 165
Part III Paternalism vs. Pan-Indianism 173
14. Bowles, Part Two 175
15. Indians and the Jeffersonian Mind 181
vii
viii contents
16. Fear’s Resurgence 191
17. Death by the River’s Side 201
18. Bleeding Pan-Indianism 215
19. Mistimed Alliance 223
Epilogue: A Second Tecumseh? 235
Notes 245
Bibliography 281
Index 297
Illustrations
FIGURES
1. Sir William Johnson 129
2. William Augustus Bowles 130
3. Henry Knox 131
4. Tecumseh 132
5. Horseshoe Bend 133
6. William Weatherford Surrendering to Andrew Jackson 134
7. Black Hawk 135
8. Osceola 136
MAP
Key peoples, towns, and battles, 1763–1815 15
ix