PRaCTICINg historical Thinking
Identify: What makes this murder especially cruel, according to Henry?
Analyze: With whom does Henry sympathize? Provide evidence from the letter to
support your position.
Evaluate: Compare Henry’s description of the treatment of Native Americans to
descriptions of European interactions with Native Americans in the 1500s and
1600s, as seen in Chapter 1 of this text. Are these descriptions more alike or differ-
ent? Explain. Refer to specific documents to support your response.Document 6.2 a Declaration and remonstrance of
the Distressed and bleeding Frontier
inhabitants of the Province of Pennsylvania
(Paxton boys’ Declaration)
1764In January 1764, after being charged with murder for the massacre of native peoples by
Governor John Penn, around 250 “Paxton Boys” marched from Lancaster to Philadelphia
to charge the colonial government with not protecting them from native attacks. When
a delegation of colonial leaders, led by Benjamin Franklin, agreed to read their “Decla-
ration and Remonstrance” to the colonial legislature, the Paxton Boys disbanded and
returned to their homes.Inasmuch as the killing those Indians at Conestogoe Manor and Lancaster has
been, and may be, the subject of much Conversation, and by invidious [unfair]
Representations of it, which some, we doubt not, will industriously spread, many
unacquainted with the true state of Affairs may be led to pass a Severe Censure
on the Authors of those Facts, and any others of the like nature, which may here-
after happen, than we are persuaded they would if matters were duly understood
and deliberated. We think it, therefore, proper thus openly to declare ourselves,
and render some brief hints of the reasons of our Conduct, which we must, and
frankly do, confess, nothing but necessity itself could induce us to, or justify us
in, as it bears an appearance of flying in the face of Authority, and is attended
with much labour, fatigue, and expence.
Ourselves, then, to a Man, we profess to be loyal Subjects to the best of Kings,
our rightful Sovereign George the third, firmly attached to his Royal Person,
Interest, and Government, & of consequence, equally opposite to the Enemies of
His Throne & Dignity, whether openly avowed, or more dangerously concealed
under a mask of falsely pretended Friendship, and cheerfully willing to offer our
Substance & Lives in his Cause.148 ChaPTER 6 | GrowinG painS | period three 175 4 –18 0 0 ToPIC^ I^ |^ the perils and possibilities of expansion^149
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