PowerPoint presentation by Ruth Writer, Western Michigan University

1. 1763:
REVOLUTIONAR
Y GATEWAY
YEAR FOR
CANADA AND
THE U.S.
National Council for the Social Studies
Conference

2. Presenters:
 Stephen Marcotte
 Beaconsfield High School [Montreal,
Quebec]
 rugencourt@hotmail.com
 Ruth Writer
 Western Michigan University [Buchanan,
MI]
 rutha.writer@comcast.net

3. Overview
 Introduction and background
 Treaty of Paris
 Pontiac’s Rebellion
 Proclamation of 1763
 Methods and Materials
 Q and A

4. Background
 Series of wars from late 1600s
 British [Protestant] vs. French and Spanish
[Catholic]
 Final conflict—French and Indian War [Seven
Years War] really lasted 9 years
 The Conquest—Quebec fell in autumn of 1759
 British Colonists proud of victory over New France
 Created new identity as free Britons
 North American colonies hopeful for a time of
 Peace
 Expansion
 Prosperity

5. Timeline of 1763
 February 10—Treaty of Paris
 April 27—Pontiac convenes war council
 May 9—Natives begin siege of Detroit
 May 16-June 22—Natives take Forts Sandusky, St.
Joseph, Miami, Pitt, Michilimackinac, Verango,
LeBoeuf, Presqu’Isle
 June 24—British give smallpox blankets to Natives at
Fr. Pitt
 July 20—British take over St. Augustine
 July 31—British defeated by Natives at Bloody Run
 October 7—Proclamation of 1763 passed by British
 October 30—Natives end siege of Detroit
 December 27—Paxton Boys murder Natives in
Pennsylvania

6. And the rest was history [1763-
1783]

7. Treaty of Paris 1763
 Fall of Quebec City Sept.1759
 Capitulation of Montreal Sept.1760
 Treaty of Paris Feb. 1763
 Royal Proclamation Oct. 1763

8. Capitulation of Montreal--1760

9. New France 1759/Quebec 1763

10. Governor Murray’s task for Quebec
 Assimilate 60,000 French speaking, Catholics
scattered on either side of the St. Lawrence
river on farms with under 3000 English
speaking Protestants.

11. Seigneurial System

13. Francis Parkman said, “half a
continent changed hands at the
scratch of a pen.”

14. Treaty of Paris

15. Pontiac’s Rebellion

16. Why Pontiac Lead Natives to
Rebel
 French soldiers left but fur traders and settlers stayed
 Largest group in some areas for another 6 decades
 Bad British policy
 No gifts
 No gunpowder even though Natives dependent on guns
 Northwest Company changed fur trade
 No more competition
 Lower prices for furs
 Cheating going against Natives
 British wanted control of land
 French and Natives shared land for furs
 British goal involved farming and settling

17. The Man and the Plan
 Pontiac, Ottawa Chief
 Lived near Windsor
 Approximately 40 years old
 No authentic images
 Plan
 Meeting of Ottawa, Potawatomi, Huron [April
1763]
 Proposal to remove British from Detroit and Great
Lakes/Ohio region
 United various tribes and attack British forts
 United, fight, defeat whites

18. Detroit: What went wrong
 Called for meeting with Major Gladwin [May 7, 1763]
 Bring 11 chiefs and 60 warriors—all with robes [sawed off
shotguns]
 Wampum belt to be used as signal
 Natives knew something amiss
 British knew of plan
 French woman heard of plan
 Betrayal by Native woman
 Plot foiled—Natives left
 Pontiac attacks on May 8
 British had 120 inside fort—situation precarious [food, ammo,
etc.]
 Bloody Run [280 British vs. 3000 under Pontiac command] July
31
 Time ran out—fall meant hunting and gathering
 Longest Native siege in American history—153 days—October
30

19. Fort Michilimackinac—Only
Lacrosse Game
 June celebration of King’s birthday
 Chippewa and Sauk to play game of lacrosse
 Players, cheerleaders, spectators
 Charles Langlade and French spared
 Alexander Henry, British survivor, recorded
events but POW

21. Other areas
 Fort Sandusky—May 16
 Fort St. Joseph [four flags]—May 25
 Fort Miami—May 27
 Fort Pitt siege—May 29—blankets sent June 24—
siege ends August 10th
 Fort Venango—June 16
 Fort LeBoeuf—June 18
 Fort Presqu’Isle—June 22
 British defeat at Devil’s Hole Niagara—September
14

22. October of 1763
 Siege of Detroit ends on October 30
 Natives merely drifted away
 Families and winter became #1 priority
 Pontiac and Sir Wm. Johnson created peace in 1766
 Natives asserted power
 Natives did get some concessions
 British got rights of free passage and right to take control of
forts
 Pontiac later killed by Native
 Great Lakes/Ohio remained in hands of Natives, fur
traders, French
 British stayed only to keep peace

23. American Colonies in 1763
 Not a world of cities
 Native villages
 Six Nations of Iroquois—reduced dramaticallyto
9,000
 Cities did exist—really “overgrown villages”
 Philadelphia—population 23,000
 New York—18,000
 Boston—16,000
 Quebec—down from 4750 to 3500
 St. Louis did not yet exist

24. Backcountry
 Interior of North America, looking East [back]
 After 1763, looked West to fortune and future
 Interior vastly unknown
 French settlements—i.e. Detroit with less than
1,000
 Seasonal
 Fort with surrounding long lots
 Huron in area 250
 Others [Three Fires confederacy]—less than 750
 Fur traders
 Spanish—in south

25. Movement West
 Trade networks
 Roads and trading paths into the hinterland
 Lived in shadow of death
 Diphtheria, typhus, influenza, Scarlet fever, yellow
fever, dysentery, fractures, STDs, and the list goes
on…
 Smallpox—1763 was year of smallpox
 5% of Philly died
 Native rate higher
 Sickness never far away—reality without
knowledge
 No standards of hygiene, med schools

26. New lifestyles
 Speech patterns
 Family ways
 Folkways
 Clan loyalty and rivalry
 Gender roles
 Fighting farmers
 Looked “more like Indians”

27. Settlers’ War
 Mid-1700s to 1783
 Mary Jemison captured in 1758
 Paxton Boys—Scots-Irish farmers took matters
into own hands
 Monrovian Christian Natives blamed for unrest
 Governor John Penn stated they “got it into their
heads that one Indians should not be suffered to
live amongst us.”
 Second attack Conestoga Natives who were
killed while praying

28. Goals Differed
 Government imposed
 Order
 Control
 Limits
 Colonists desire
 More freedom and opportunities
 Expansion of territory
 Regulate
 Protect the new empire from foreign and Native
 Pay for protection

29. Room for expansion—yet
contested
 Natives fear of British troops lead to rebellion wanted pre
European lifestyle—i.e. Mohawk
 England needed new territory with peace
 Timber
 Fur trade
 Sir William Johnson—Superintendent of Indian Affairs
 Colonists desire for fruits of victory over French
 Land speculators—Washington
 Flood of people pouring into hinterland
 German immigration [10-30% of colonies]
 Scots-Irish immigration
 Profit vs. Peace—”The challenge… was how to make
profitable ‘an immense waste of savage country.’” ~Galloway

30. Proclamation of 1763
 Appalachian Mountains—boundary
 British settlement
 Native lands
 Segregation not interaction
 Prevent colonies from growth
 Prevent colonies from becoming ungovernable
 Seen by some as regulation not elimination
 Drafted in less than a week
 Described as the Native’s “Bill of Rights”

32. Native Bill of Rights
 Commitment made in Articles of Capitulation
 France’s Native allies had lands inhabited
protected

33. Quebec and Florida
 Not impacted by Proclamation Line
 Could authorized land grants to populate new
colonies
 Veterans of the last war entitled to FREE land

34. Methods and Materials

35.  “Different people experience the same events,
the same year, in different ways.” ~Galloway
 Look at November 22, 1963
 September 11, 2001
 ACA
 Dissimilar people viewed North America in
1763 very differently in their own way.

36. Points of View
 Native—diversity of views for Natives, also
 British
 French
 Spanish
 New France
 British Colonists [soon to be known as
AMERICANS]
 Fur Traders
 Land Speculators
Examine and discuss the points of view of the
stakeholders following each of the major events of
1763.

37. BTW
 Thought locally not globally nor in unison
 Not all people looking east from Indian
Country in 1763 were Natives.
 Not all Natives lived in Indian Country.
 Some Natives lived in small towns and
seaports.
 Some Natives worked as indentured servants
in households.
 Some Natives studied in colonial schools, i.e.
Molly Brant

38. Additional Activities
 Investigate how the Treaty of Paris (1763)
“dismembered” New France in the following
manners: politically, militarily, economically,
socially, and culturally.
 Historians have long debated whether Amherst
ordered the distribution of blankets invested
with smallpox. The discussion of germ warfare
persists even 250 years later. Discuss the
morality of the trading of smallpox invested
blankets during the mid-1700s.

39.  Select one of the interior areas, determine the
stake holders, and create a scenario for
peaceful transfer of power in 1763. Then
research the actual events which occurred.
 The national sport of Canada is not hockey but
actually lacrosse. Have students research the
battle of Michilimackinac during Pontiac’s
Rebellion and re-act the celebration of the
King’s birthday.
 Discuss the how the events of 1763 lead to
turmoil, a civil war and eventual revolution
NOT peace.

40. Washington Post—November 8,
2013

41. General Resources
 Colin G. Calloway. The Scratch of a Pen: 1763 and the
Transformation of North America. New York: Oxford University Press,
2006.
 Willis Dunbar and George S. May. Michigan: A History of the
Wolverine State. Grand Rapids: Wm. B. Eerdmans Publishing Co.,
1995.
 Alvin Josephy. The Patriot Chiefs: A Chronicle of American Indian
Resistance. New York: Penguin Books. 1993.
 http://faculty.marianopolis.edu/c.belanger/quebechistory/readings/royal.
htm [Quebec History]
 http://www.gilderlehrman.org/collections
 www.thecanadianencyclopedia.com
 http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/govbeat/wp/2013/11/08/which-of-
the-11-american-nations-do-you-live-in

42. Resources related to the Treaty
of Paris (1763)
 Yale Law School - The Avalon Project:
Documents in Law, History & Diplomacy
provides translation of the Treaty of Paris
(1763) which was originally written in French.
http://avalon.law.yale.edu/18th_century/paris763.asp
 There are excellent maps, primary source
documents and historical information about
France in America on the Library of Congress
website at:
http://www.loc.gov/teachers/classroommaterials/connections/france-
america/history4.html

43.  This webpage shows, at a glance, the
worldwide scope of the Treaty of Paris (1763):
http://www.u-s-history.com/pages/h754.html
 The U.S. Department of State – Office of the
Historian is a great site to introduce students
to for additional background information and
access to primary sources:
http://history.state.gov/milestones/1750-1775/TreatyofParis

44. Resources for Pontiac’s
Rebellion
 A video of Pontiac’s Rebellion is on YouTube at:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MtxmbrBfoLU
explains the viewpoint of the interior tribes as well as the events of
the rebellion and the use of germ warfare.
 The Dictionary of Canadian Biography provides a
biographical sketch of Chief Pontiac online at:
http://www.biographi.ca/009004-119.01-e.php?&id_nbr=1597
 A biography about James Murray:
http://www.biographi.ca/009004-119.01-e.php?&id_nbr=2085
 The Wisconsin Historical Society offers lesson plans
on the topic as part of its “Turning Points” resources:
http://www.wisconsinhistory.org/turningpoints/lessonplans/search.asp?i
d=71

45.  David Armour, ed. Attack at Michilimackinac: Alexander
Henry’s Travels and Adventures in Canada and the Indian
Territories between the years 1760 and 1764. Mackinac
Island: Mackinac State Historic Parks, 2009. [graphic
recounting of the attack by survivor]
 The War Chief of the Ottawas: A Chronicle of the Pontiac War
is an audio book.
 Chapter 8 is of particular interest
www.youtube.com/watch?v=S_AviBqg4rs
 Chapter 4 about the Siege of Detroit at:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Qm881lxLKyE
 Sir William Johnson’s papers are found at
http://archive.org/details/papersofsirwilli01johnuoft] but it may
take some time to find reference to his relationship with his
Native wife Molly Brant. His biography can be found at
www.biographi.ca/009004-119.01-e.php?BioId=36096

46. Resources related to Proclamation
of 1763
 The full text of King George III’s proclamation
is on the Government of Canada’s website:
http://www.collectionscanada.gc.ca/015/002/015002-2010-e.html
 The Gilder Lehrman Institute of American
History provides significant learning materials.
 https://www.gilderlehrman.org/community/user/register [Please note that
K-12 educators and students must access all online information via free subscription.
Create your account…]

47.  The Royal Proclamation as interpreted by
Indigenous people can be found at:
http://indigenousfoundations.arts.ubc.ca/home/government-
policy/royal-proclamation-1763.html
 An investigation of the issue of language rights as
a result of the 1763 Royal Proclamation can be
found at:
http://www.slmc.uottawa.ca/?q=royal_proclamation_1763
 High School History Lesson Plans: The
Proclamation of 1763 (Gr. 9-12) at Bright Hub
Education:
http://www.brighthubeducation.com/history-lessons-grades-9-
12/50407-the-proclamation-of-1763/

48. Your Thoughts Questions and
Answers

49. Presenters:
 Stephen Marcotte
 Beaconsfield High School [Montreal,
Quebec]
 rugencourt@hotmail.com
 Ruth Writer
 Western Michigan University [Buchanan,
MI]
 ruth.writer@wmich.edu or
rutha.writer@comcast.net