Governor Robert Dinwiddie of Virginia cared deeply about British success in the Ohio Valley. The governor sought assistance from all the other colonies and also hoped to utilize Indians to help the British forces drive the French from the forest.1 For financial reasons as much as patriotic ones, Dinwiddie's concerns were bound up with the goals of the Ohio Company of Virginia. In the summer of 1752, the English told the Indians of their desire to establish a settlement on the southeast side of the Ohio River, and to become good neighbors with them. They also argued that it was the French who wanted to steal Indian land.2 This settlement was the one desired by the Ohio Company.

The Ohio Company was chartered in 1749 by King George II. Five hundred thousand acres of land was granted to a group of wealthy planters from Maryland and Virginia and powerful London merchants on three conditions: no less than one hundred families would have to live there within seven years, a fort had to be built on the land, and a garrison had to maintain it, with the expenses born by the Company.3 In addition to Governor Dinwiddie, stockholders eventually included Lawrence Washington, George Washington's older half-brother; George Mason; Thomas Lee; and William Fairfax.4 Unfortunately for the British, the plan to establish the settlement did not succeed. The English system of trade was, according to the famous Sir William Johnson, Northern Superintendent for Indian Affairs, a failure. The system encouraged "low, selfish agents" to become traders, which helped to ruin the trade system.5 In addition, the Logstown Treaty of 1752, which secured for the Ohio Company vast Indian hunting grounds, turned many Ohio tribes against the British.6

The goals of the Ohio Company could not be achieved unless the British were to control the Ohio Valley. During the 1740s and 1750s, both British and French activities in the Ohio Valley had intensified. In 1752 Ange de Mennville, Marquis de Duquesne, governor of Canada, began a plan of extensive French expansion into the Valley. He authorized the establishment of a series of forts throughout the frontier. By 1753, the British crown sent Dinwiddie instructions to prepare for military actions against the French.7

It would be very difficult to wrest control of the Valley if Indian aid were not secured. While both the British and the French sought to dominate the area, the American Indians controlled the balance of power.8 James Adair, the famous Indian trader wrote that "The Indians are of a copper or red-clay colour - and they delight in every thing, which they imagine may promote and increase it; accordingly, they paint their faces with vermilion, as the best and most beautiful ingredient."9 He added that "[t]hey are ingenious, witty, cunning, and deceitful; very faithful indeed to their own tribes, but privately dishonest, and mischievous to the Europeans and christians."10 These were the most common opinions of the Indians held by Washington's contemporaries. Washington's views of the Indians could not have helped but be influenced by them.

The natives of North America had a completely different set of beliefs than the Europeans. This made it hard for the Europeans to comprehend exactly what the Indians desired from them. Part of the reason that the British and French had such contempt for the Indians was the most trouble was their concept of land. The Indians felt a kind of religious identification with the land on which they lived. Unlike the Europeans, Indians had no conception of private ownership of land. A treaty did not mean the same thing to the Indians as it did to the Europeans. They could easily give a person an item of personal property, but their lands, in the words of Benjamin Hawkins, an official of the United States in the 1790s, "...should not be touched."11 Adair stated that "their darling passion is liberty." While the Judeo-Christian ethic was one of laboring for six days out of every week, toiling for food, "Indians felt God in their food, but not in their sweat. Food was there to be taken, respectfully and thankfully; why labor?"12 Nevertheless, the aid of the Indians was absolutely necessary to best the French. The British and Washington had to treat the Indians with respect and kindness in order to secure their assistance. This was very difficult for them, as they, for the most part, looked down upon the Indians as ignorant savages.13

Henry Bouquet, second-in-command to General John Forbes, who was to become commander of the British forces in America, asserted that the Indian, if hunger did not force him to hunt, could be completely idle, yet "...exercise makes him strong, active and bold,... and fits him for war, in which he uses the same stratagems and cruelty as against the wild beasts; making no scruple to employ treachery and perfidy to vanquish his enemy." Bouquet, who understood the Indians more than most, stated that the Indians were extremely jealous of their independence and property, and they "will not suffer the least encroachment on either...."14 He asserted that the Indians were every bit as brave and fearless as the best British troops, and he felt that under the present system of warfare, the British could not successfully best the Indians. Bouquet recommend that British troops remove much of what they carried, so as to become lighter, and a better match for the Indians.15 Edmond Atkin, an important Indian interpreter, once remarked that no people comprehended and followed their own interests better than the Indians.16

Even though the skills of the Indians were respected by many Englishmen, the English, as a general rule, ridiculed them. Governor James Glen of South Carolina (who wielded considerable power with the Catawba Nation), often advocated a certain amount of justice to the Catawba Indians over whom he presided, counting himself among the friends of that nation. Their extremely fierce reputation led Glen to believe that the Catawbas were "the bravest Fellows on the Continent of America."17 However, he privately commented that Indians, "whatever is said of them and of their native Simplicity and honesty [they] are a savage, cruel, perfidious, revengefull sett of Men." His own assembly declared that "all Indians are of a Nature. . . inconstant and slippery."18 Most white people of the time thought that the Indians were untrustworthy, vicious, and fiercely jealous of their freedoms.19 In Present State of Virginia, written in 1724, Hugh Jones stated that the average Virginian thought all Indians to be "savage, idolatrous, unbelieving, numerous, monstrous, idle and delighting in war and cruelty."20 A group of ten Cherokee warriors under the chief Little Carpenter was secured by General John Forbes in 1758, who said that he had "brought [the Indians] to reason by treating them as they always ought to be, with the greatest signs of scorning indifference and disdain, that I could decently employ."21 The Indians themselves responded as might be expected towards the white hatred of them. Many of them believed that the whites were "covetous" and mercenary. The European custom of selling ranks appalled the Indians as they thought that titles should be reserved for only those worthy of them.22

Europeans discovered that gifts were the best way to secure Indian help when dealing with tribes of Indians. Presents were a better means of conversation and diplomacy than words. Unfortunately, presents meant different things to each side. To the Indians, presents connoted signs of friendship, a means of establishing good relations between equals. To the mind of the colonists and English officials, presents were little more than a method of buying the loyalty of the Indians. A disgusted military captain once commented, "Indians are a comodity that are to be bought and sold.... The highest Bidder carries them off."23 Adair compared the Indians to fire when he stated, "it is safe and useful, cherished at proper distance; but if too near us, it becomes dangerous, and will scorch if not consume us."24 The important Creek Indian chief Alexander McGillivray in 1789 explained that "... it is impossible to Convince an Indian that it is a Criminal action in him to receive a present from any one."25 The main purpose of the British in giving gifts was to make the Indians dependent on the them.26

In the period preceding the War, from the Treaty of Lancaster in 1744 to 1754, competition between France and Great Britain for Indian allies increased dramatically. The British spent literally thousands of pounds on gifts for the Indians. The French also gave expensive presents, very often to the same Indians.27 Indians were sometimes literally overwhelmed with gifts.28 The southern colonies, as an example of the great value put upon the skills of the Indians, endeavored greatly to win the alliance of the Catawba Indians. South Carolina once reminded the Catawbas that "we [South Carolina] have always been your constant Protectors and have treated you like Children of the same Household, with ourselves." North Carolina called the tribe "our particular friends," and Virginia promised that it would "on every Occasion endeavour to shew you the Respect due to great Warriors and faithful Friends."29

Of all the gifts presented to the Indians, one of the most important was wampum. Between the Indians it was a common means of exchange, often having definite values in terms of beaver pelts, deerskins, or even English money. However, it had mystical qualities for the Indians which the Europeans never fully came to understand. Wampum was made out of the various sea shells along the Eastern seaboard. White wampum came from the inside of the conch shell, the dark wampum, which ranged from purple to black, came from the quahog, a thick-shelled clam.30 Food was also an effective gift. The Indians, who by the time of the French and Indian War had lost much of their hunting grounds, often needed meat, bread, corn, and flour. As well as giving food to the Indians in times of famine, the Europeans discovered that Indian warriors at a conference, and their families and elders at home, had to be fed. Consequently, many lists of Indian gifts included great amounts of rice, beef, pork, fruit, sugar, butter, tea, loaves of bread, and liquor.31

Rum (along with wine and brandy) was the most popular Indian gift. The British were able to supply rum extensively in the forest since they almost had a monopoly on it. "[D]esigning traders" could get almost anything they wanted from the Indians, since they felt that inebriated Indians totally lost control of themselves. The French thought that rum actually drove Indians crazy, but this did not stop them from generously handing out brandy. Often, a conference with the Indians was held up until the Indians were sober. Some traders used the effects of alcohol on Indians to their advantage. They often tricked the inebriated Indians into selling their lands for cheap baubles. Most of the respected commissioners and interpreters used rum in their discussions, but moderation was their watch word. They disapproved of the traders who secretly gave huge amounts of rum to the Indians. The individual colonies and the Departments of Indian Affairs (organized by the British in the 1750's) tried to restrain this situation by passing very strict laws against giving and selling rum to the natives, but the trade persisted. Often the Indians themselves protested "this plague that decimated their population." The bodies of dead warriors often carried the aroma of liquor, which "betrayed death by reason of intoxication." However, the Indians could not seem to resist the rum and brandy given to them by the Europeans.32 Adair described the Indians as "commonly temperate in eating but excessively immoderate in drinking. - They often transform themselves by liquor into the likeness of mad foaming bears."33

Food, liquor, and clothes were not the only utilitarian items presented to the natives. Arms and ammunition were also given. The Catawba Nation received powder, lead, flints, and bullets almost annually, although the amount each year varied.34 During the period of the four colonial wars, the British spent great amounts on Indian goods.35 By the French and Indian War, 2,250 beads of white wampum cost £2:11:0, while 2000 black beads cost £3.36 Food and liquor were a constant drain on British finance. Rum was by far the most expensive item. In addition, the British often had to expend cash to win back the allegiance of key Indians who had turned to the French.37