The Revolutionary War and Indigenous Peoples of Massachusetts

• Pamela A. Ellis, Esq. (Hassanamisco Nipmuc)
• April 6, 2024
• Re-examining the Revolution: Understanding the American Revolution through Multiple Lenses
• Essex National Heritage Commission
• St. Johns Prep, Danvers, MA

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Pam’s Positionality:�My Lens

• Enrolled member of the Hassanamisco Nipmuc Indian Tribe who fought with the United States during the American Revolution
• Descendant of Nipmuc men who fought in colonial wars
• I believe that the US is still working to realize the aspirational values of the Revolution for everyone.

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Thoughts on language …

Josiah Speen (Indian) of Natick in Capt Samuel Wright’s Co 1725

Documenting my ancestors who fought in colonial wars. Josiah Speen fought in the conflict known as Dummer’s War or the 4^th Anglo-Abenaki War, also known as Greylock’s War and the Three Years War.

John Chowen�Minute Man from Lancaster, Bolton, and Natick, 1775-1780

• He was a minute man from Lancaster who marched on the Alarm of 19 April 1775, in the company of Capt. Benjamin Houghton in Col. John Whetcomb’s regiment. He joined the eight month’s service from Lancaster on 26 April 1775, in the company of Capt. Benjamin Hastings in Col. Asa Whitcomb’s regiment. He is also listed on the 1 August roll, on an August receipt for wages, and on a 6 October 1775 roll ‘dated Camp at Prospect Hill.’^II Shortly after he deserted. A newspaper printed a wanted description:^III
• Deserted from Prospect Hill, late of Bolton, in the county of Worcester, … John Chewen, of Capt. Hill’s company, in Col. Phinney’s regiment, in the new establishment, but of Capt. Hasting’s company, in Col. Whitcomb’s regiment, in the old … John Chewen is a molatto, but calls himself Indian, about 5 feet 5 inches high, had on a dark coloured-coat, and a pair of breeches something lighter; has a wife at Holden, a proper Indian squaw; he loves a good deal of rum...In 1776 he served at Hull (MA), probably as a coastal observer, in the company of Capt. William Warner in Col. Josiah Whitney’s regiment.^IV
• In 1777 he was a member of the militia from Bolton, in Capt. Jonathan Houghton’s company in Col. Josiah Whitney’s regiment. From this unit he transferred into the Continental Army for three years, in the company of Capt. Moses Brewer in Col. Samuel Brewer’s regiment.^V
• He was married, as is stated above, to an Indian woman whose name is unknown.

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Indian Tribes as Sovereign Nations

• Pre-Existence: Indian tribes existed before the colonies and the United States. Indian tribes were the first governmental, political and diplomatic entities in what is now called the United States. The Haudenausonee Confederacy (also known as the Iroquois Confederacy) served as a basis for the government of the United States.

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• Treaties: In dealing with Indian tribes, the British Crown and the United States negotiated treaties, in a one to one government to government relationship, one sovereign government to another sovereign government.

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• Introduction of dependent nation status: Prior to the Revolutionary War and formation of the United States, Indian tribes were sovereign nations, not “sovereign dependent nations.” The dependency idea was introduced in one of the US Supreme Court’s earliest Indian law decisions, Cherokee Nation v. Georgia in 1831.

Indigenous Positions during the Revolutionary War: British, American, or Neutral?

• Alliance with the British:
• Cherokee
• Chickasaw
• Mohawk
• Alliance with the Americans:
• Oneida
• Stockbridge
• Nipmuc
• Wampanoag
• Neutrality: Shawnee, Deleware, Oneida (att

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Increasing Historical Emphasis:�Disposition of Indigenous Lands West of the Appalachians

• Tying together Seven Years War, aka French and Indian War
• After a long and expensive war and to preserve its fragile Indigenous alliances, Britain needed to raise revenue to pay for the expenses of the war that it had just fought and to pay for the garrison of soldiers that it was forced to leave behind to halt the expansion of settlement of lndigenous lands.
• Stamp Act: Taxes raised through the Stamp Act were to be used to pay the expense of the garrison which the British had left behind to halt colonial settlement on Indian lands west of the Appalachians, to preserve fragile alliances with tribal nations.
• American Revolution: Increasingly settler hostility to Britain’s halting of westward expansion into Indigenous lands.

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Alliances with the British

• Protection of lands west of the Appalachians from the expansion of settlement
• Act of 1763 to prevent further settlement west of the Appalachaians angered English colonists
• Tribes had experience violent conflicts with settlers over colonial expansion, especially into the Ohio River Valley

Why did Nipmucs fight with the Americans?

• 1. Britain had not protected Indigenous lands in the eastern part of what is now called Massachusetts. It had undermined Indigenous sovereignty in the interest of colonial settlement and expansion.
• 2. Protection of traditions and homelands.
• 3. Fighting against the oppressive rule of the British.
• 4. Important alternative to the farming work of the mission towns
• 5. Fighting for equality, freedom and independence and the “power of good minds”

Indigenous Peoples and the Aftermath of the Revolutionary War

• In 1783 Treaty of Paris, the British made no provisions for the tribal nations that had fought along with them. Indian nations allied to the British were left to find their way diplomatically with the United States.
• The Stockbridge Indians were forced from their homelands in western Massachusetts and eventually settled in Wisconsin where their reservation resides.
• Despite fighting to create the new country, Indigenous men and women were not citizens.
• State law: 1870 Enfranchisement Act and Federal law: 1924 Indian Citizenship Act.

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