GO rD hIll 500 Years of Indigenous resistance
by Wayne’s soldiers. Although the confederacy was es-
sentially broken, the Miami would continue armed
resistance up to 1840.
The ‘Indian Wars’ launched by the U.S.
continued for the next 100 years, following
an exterminationist policy that was aimed at
destroying Native nations and securing those
remnants who survived in (what was then be-
lieved) barren and desolate reserves. Once the
People were contained in these Bantustans,
the next step was the destruction of Na-
tive culture under the auspices
of then-emerging governmental
agencies.
As the U.S. moved to a higher
level of war against First Nations,
it also began moving against com-
peting European powers still pres-
ent in the Americas.
In 1812, using the pretext of Native raids along its northern fron-
tier from British territories, U.S. forces attempted to invade British North
America. Here again, Britain’s colonial policies proved effective; an alli-
ance of Native nations (who had their own interests in full implementa-
tion of the 1763 Proclamation) and European settlers succeeded in repuls-
ing the U.S. expansion. Among those who fought against the U.S. invasion
were the Native leaders Tecumseh—a Shawnee chief who worked to form
a Native confederacy against the Europeans (and who argued that no one
individual or grouping could sell the lands, as it belonged to all the Native
peoples); Black Hawk—a leader of the Sauk who would also lead future
Native insurgencies; and Joseph Brant—a leader in the Haudenosaunee
who was rewarded with a large territory by the British and promptly be-
gan selling off partitions to European settlers (in history, he is regarded as
a “hero” by Euro-Americans but a traitor by his people). Tecumseh was
killed in battle in the Battle of Moraviantown in Ontario in 1813.
In 1815, hostilities between Britain and the U.S. were formally ended
in the Treaty of Ghent, though neither the U.S. war on Natives, or Native
resistance, subsided.Tecumseh