Theyebdabegea,
called Joseph Brant by the whites, was a Mohawk leader who sided with
the British during the Revolutionary War. Joseph Brant took his first
scalp at thirteen. He was educated in white schools. He was a protégé
of Sir William Johnson, and learned Latin and Greek. He translated the
new Testament into his native language. Sir William Johnson, the
Indian commissioner, married Joseph's sister Molly. Joseph visited
England in 1776, and was received at the Kings court. His grandfather
was one of the Mohawk Chiefs sent to England by the British to meet
Queen Anne.
The Indians found themselves in the middle of the tensions mounted
between the Americans and the British. The six nations of the
Haudenosaunee (Iroquois) Confederacy, including the
Delawares and Shawnees in the
west, wanted no part of the fight. Chief Cornstalk of the Shawnee,
carried a message of peace to the Americans in 1775. President
Washington authorized Indians in the American Army, a breach of the
promise given the Haudenosaunee tribes at Pittsburgh. The Iroquois
tribe was neutral.
Joseph or Theyebdabegea, the Mohawk chief, returned from England to
travel among the six Indian nations with his message not to stay
neutral. He thought the colonies would overrun the Indians and their
only hope was to side with the British before the colonists dominated
the continent. He told the Iroquois their only hope was to fight with
England. The Oneidas and Tuscaroras wanted to ally with the Americans.
They later helped George Washington at valley forge. The other
Iroquois and the Senacas met the British in 1777 to decide if they
should join their forces. Joseph Brant argued for the British. The
Shawnee leader Cornstalk tried to prevent his people from joining the
fighting by going to Fort Pleasant. The colonists captured him and his
son and later shot them and murdered the other Shawnee who were with
them. This resulted in the Shawnee joining the British.
Joseph Brant led the Iroquois warriors who fought with the British
troops against the Oneida and the American militiamen in August 6,
1777. The Onondagas, the one Iroquois nation still neutral, was
attacked by Washington's troops and their women captured. Many of
their warriors then joined the British. Washington sent Major General
John Sullivan against the pro British Iroquois to destroy their homes.
In retaliation Joseph destroyed the Oneidas and Tuscaroras villages.
When winter arrived many Indians on both sides starved for lack of
crops that were destroyed. In 1783 the British recognized the new
United States and as Chief Cornstalk had warned the Indians gained
nothing from thier fighting. Joseph Brant, his Mohawk followers, and
other pro British Iroquois, were forced from their lands after being
deserted by the British and moved to Canada.
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