‘All This Is Occasioned By Our Attachment to You:’

The Demise of the Iroquois Confederacy

The Iroquois Confederacy was torn apart by intertribal violence for the first time in its history during the United States’ War of Independence. This paper is an exploration of the external forces that precipitated the brutal and bloody fracture. It describes the social and geographic setting of the period in detail and proceeds to show how various individuals from both sides acted within this setting to manipulate the Iroquois to their advantage. It is a history that is notable for its strong personalities, including an exceptionally influential Iroquois woman, a politically motivated reverend, and a racist military general desperate to win the loyalty of the ‘savages.’ Ultimately, the British were more competent and more resourceful, while the Americans – especially after a heavy-handed and disastrous campaign to force the remaining neutral tribes to join their ranks – lost most of their Iroquois allies by the time the war ended.

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