280 



PONTIAC POOSCOOSTEKALE 



[b. a. e. 



in s. w. South Carolina. — Hawkins (1799), 

 Sketch, 61, 1848. 



Pontiac. An Ottawa chief, born about 

 1720, probably on Maumee r.,Ohio, about 

 the mouth of the Auglaize. Though his 

 paternity is not positively established, it 

 is most likely that his father was an Ot- 

 tawa chief and his mother a Chippewa 

 woman. J. Wimer ( Events in Ind. Hist. , 

 155, 1842) says that as early as 1746 he 

 commanded the Indians— mostly Ot- 

 tawa — who defended Detroit against the 

 attack of the northern tribes. It is sup- 

 posed he led the Ottawa and Chippewa 

 warriors at Braddock's defeat. He first 

 appears prominently in history at his 

 meeting with Maj. Robert Rogers, in 1760, 

 at the place where Cleveland, Ohio, now 

 stands. This officer had been dispatched 

 to take possession of Detroit on behalf of 

 the British. Pontiac objected to the 

 further invasion of the territory, but, 

 learning that the French had been de- 

 feated in Canada, consented to the sur- 

 render of Detroit to the British, and was 

 the means of preventing an attack on the 

 latter by a body of Indians at the mouth 

 of the strait. That which gives him most 

 prominence in history and forms the chief 

 episode of his life is the plan he devised 

 for a p;eneral uprising of the Indians and 

 the destruction of the forts and settle- 

 ments of the British. He was for a time 

 disposed to be on terms of friendship with 

 the British and consented to acknowl- 

 edge King George, but only as an "uncle," 

 not as a superior. Failing to receive the 

 recognition he considered his due as a 

 great sovereign, and being deceived by 

 the rumor that the French were prepar- 

 ing for the reconquest of their American 

 possessions, he resolved to put his scheme 

 into operation. Having brought to his 

 aid most of the tribes n. w. of the Ohio, 

 his plan was to make a sudden attack on 

 all the British posts on the lakes at once 

 — at St Joseph, Ouiatenon, Micliilimack- 

 inac, and Detroit — as well as on the 

 Miami and Sandusky, and also attack the 

 forts at Niagara, Presque Isle, Le Boeuf, 

 Venango, and Pitt (Du Quesne). The 

 taking of Detroit was to be his special 

 task. The end of May 1763 was the ap- 

 pointed time when each tribe was to 

 attack the nearest fort and, after killing 

 the garrison, to fall on the adjacent set- 

 tlements. It was not long before the 

 posts at Sandusky, St Joseph, Miami (Ft 

 Wayne), Ouiatenon, Michilimackinac, 

 Presque Isle, Le Boeuf, and Venango were 

 taken and the garrison in most cases 

 massacred; but the main points, Detroit 

 and Ft Pitt, were successfully <lefended 

 and the Indians forced to raise the siege. 

 This was a severe IjIow to Pontiac, but 

 his hopes were finally crushed by the re- 

 ceipt of a letter from M. Neyon, com- 

 mander of Ft Chartres, advising him to 



desist from further warfare, as peace had 

 been concluded between Franceand Great 

 Britain. However, unwilling to abandon 

 entirely his hope of driving back the 

 British, he made an attempt to incite 

 the tribes along the Mississippi to join in 

 another effort. Being unsuccessful in this 

 attempt, he finally made peace at Detroit, 

 Aug. 17, 1765. In 1769 he attended a 

 drinking carousal at Cahokia, 111., where 

 he was murdered by a Kaskaskia Indian. 

 Pontiac, if not fully the equal of Tecum- 

 seh, stands closely second to him in 

 strength of mind and breadth of compre- 

 hension. 



Consult Parkman, Conspiracy of Pon- 

 tiac; Randall, Pontiac' s Conspiracy, in 

 Ohio Archasol. and Hist. Quar., Oct. 1903; 

 Hough, Diary of the Siege of Detroit in 

 the War with Pontiac, 1860. (c. t.) 



Pontotoc. A former Chickasaw settle- 

 ment in N. Mississippi, apparently at or 

 near the site of the present Pontotoc, 

 Pontotoc CO. 



Ponyinumbu {Po-nyi Nu7n-hu.) . Avery 

 ancient pueblo of the Tewa, the ruins of 

 which are in the vicinity of the Mexican 

 settlement of Santa Cruz, in n. Santa Fe 

 CO., N. Mex. — Bandelier in Arch. Inst. Pa- 

 pers, IV, 83, 1892. 



Ponyipakuen {P' o-nyi Fa-kuen) . A for- 

 mer puel)lo of the Tewa in the vicinity 

 of Ojo Caliente and El Rito, about the 

 boundary of Taos and Rio Arriba cos., N. 

 Mex. — Bandelier in Arch. Inst. Papers, 

 IV, 83, 1892. 



Poodatook (Mohegan: Powntucluck, 

 'country about the falls.' — Trumbull). 

 A former village, subject to the Paugus- 

 set, on Housatonic r. , near Newtown, 

 Fairfield co.. Conn. About 1660 it con- 

 tained about 250 inhabitants, who after- 

 ward decreased and joined the Scati- 

 cook farther up the river. In 1761 only 

 2 or 3 families remained in Newtown. 

 Ruttenber calls it a Stockbridge village. 

 The Moravians had a mission there. 

 Poodatook.— Birdsey (1761) in Mass. Hist. Soc.Coll., 

 1st s., X, 111, 1809. Potatik.— Ruttenber, Tribes 

 Hudson R., S6, 1872. Potatuck.— Trumbull, Ind. 

 Names Conn., 56, 1881. Totatik.— Ruttenber, op. 

 eit., 197 (misprint). 



Pooquaw. A name used on the island 

 of Nantucket for the round clam ( ]^enus 

 mercenaria). As its earlier form pequa- 

 ock indicates, this word is a reduction of 

 the Indian name of tliis shellfish in the 

 Algonquian dialects of New England, the 

 Narraganset poquadhock or the Massa- 

 chuset poqiiahoc signifying literally 

 'thick or tightly closed shell', frompo- 

 quau, 'thick or tightly closed', and -/iOcZ;, 

 'that which covers.' Roger Williams 

 (1643) calls the Narraganset pooguaMoc^ 

 a horsefish. (a. f. c.) 



Pooacoostekale (probably Puskus Takali, 

 'hanging child.' — Halbert). A former 

 Choctaw town, mentioned by Romans as 

 having been deserted in 1771. It was 



