APPENDIX B. 



CAUSES OF THE INDIAN WAR. 



Extract from a Letter — Sir W. Johnson to the Board of Trade, 

 November 13, 1768. (Chap. VII. Vol. I. p. 171.) 



. . . The French, in order to reconcile them [the Indians] to their 

 encroachments, loaded them with favors, and employed the most intelli- 

 gent Agents of good influence, as well as artful Jesuits among the several 

 Western and other Nations, who, by degrees, prevailed on them to admit 

 of Forts, under the Notion of Trading houses, in their Country ; and 

 knowing that these posts could never be maintained contrary to the inch- 

 nations of the Indians, they supplied them thereat witii ammunition and 

 other necessaries in abundance, as also called them to frequent congresses, 

 and dismissed them with handsome presents, by which they enjoyed an 

 extensive commerce, obtained the assistance of these Indians, and pos- 

 sessed their frontiers in safety ; and as without these measures the Indians 

 would never have suffered them in their Country, so they expect that 

 whatever European power possesses the same, they shall in some meas- 

 ure reap the like advantages. Now, as these advantages ceased on the 

 Posts being possessed by the English, and especially as it was not thought 

 prudent to indulge them with ammunition, they immediately concluded 

 that we had designs against their liberties, which opinion had been first 

 instilled into them by the French, and since promoted by Traders of that 

 nation and others who retired among them on the surrender of Canada 

 and are still there, as well as by Belts of Wampum and other exhortations, 

 which I am confidently assured have been sent among them from the 

 Illinois, Louisiana, and even Canada for that purpose. The Shawanese 

 and Delawares about the Ohio, who were never warmly attached to us 

 since our neglects to defend them against the encroachments of the 

 French, and refusing to erect a post at the Ohio, or assist them and the 

 Six Nations with men or ammunition, when they requested both of us, as 

 well as irritated at the loss of several of their people killed upon the com- 



