You're listening to an airwave media podcast. Hello and thank you for joining the American Revolution.

Today, episode 19, Suppressing the Indians.

Throughout the summer of 1763, in what became known as Pontiac's war, Indian tribes all across the northwest rose up to destroy British forts and settlements.

Warriors launched attacks all across Western New York, Pennsylvania, Maryland, and what is today

Ohio, Michigan, and Indiana. The British were ignoring promises to keep settlers east of the Allegheny

mountains. Without the French to act as a counterweight, the Indians realized they needed to go

to war if they wanted to protect their lands.

Last week I went over all the major attacks over the course of the summer,

where Indians were often killing and mutilating without mercy, taking no prisoners, and wiping out soldiers and

civilians alike.

While their ferocity destroyed settlements and spread fear, the Indians never seemed able to sustain a war over time.

Warriors needed to return home to feed their families.

Pontiac and his allies had hoped to encourage the French to rejoin the fight once they saw the Indians

in a full-scale war against the British. But the few French garrisons still along the Mississippi

River were already planning to leave.

Alone and without European power to provide arms and ammunition, even United tribes could

not sustain a war footing. They could not remain in battle for more than a few months and as summer turned to fall

and the fighting season ended many warriors simply returned home. With the

coming of winter in late 1763, the Indian threat in Pennsylvania

had been neutralized, yet Indian animus among the colonists flourished. In December, a mob from Paxton, Pennsylvania rated a nearby village

of Christianized Indians who had played no role in the uprising. Some from Paxton accused

them of providing aid to Indians who had participated in earlier raids.

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