28 The Winning of the West 



the enemy. They were explicitly bidden by those in 

 supreme command to push back the frontier, to 

 expel the settlers from the country. Hamilton him- 

 self had been ordered by his immediate official su- 

 perior to assail the borders of Pennsylvania and 

 Virginia with his savages, to destroy the crops and 

 buildings of the settlers who had advanced beyond 

 the mountains, and to give to his Indian allies, 

 the Hurons, Shawnees, and other tribes, all the 

 land of which they thus took possession. 9 With 

 such allies as Hamilton had this order was tan- 

 tamount to proclaiming a war of extermination, 

 waged with appalling and horrible cruelty against 

 the settlers, of all ages and sexes. It brings out in 

 bold relief the fact that in the West the war of the 

 Revolution was an effort on the part of Great Brit- 

 ain to stop the Westward growth of the English 

 race in America, and to keep the region beyond the 

 Alleghanies as a region where only savages should 

 dwell. 



All through the winter of '76-' 77 the Northwest- 

 ern Indians were preparing to take up the toma- 

 hawk. Runners were sent through the leafless, 

 frozen woods from one to another of their winter 

 camps. In each bleak, frail village, each snow-hid- 

 den cluster of bark wigwams, the painted, half- 

 naked warriors danced the war dance, and sang 

 the war song, beating the ground with their war 

 clubs and keeping time with their feet to the 

 rhythmic chant as they moved in rings round the 



9 Haldimand MSS. Haldimand to Hamilton, August 6, 1778. 



