The War of 1812 Could Have Been the War of Indian Independence
By ICTMN StaffJune 18, 2012
Image courtesy Library of Congress
This print shows Col. R.M. Johnson using a pistol to kill
Tecumseh during the War of 1812, at the battle of the Thames in
Ontario, Canada.
Today marks the 200th anniversary of the War of 1812, a war
all but forgotten in American history books. But what did that
war mean for this country’s Indigenous Peoples?
The War of 1812 formally began on June 18, 1812 when
President James Madison signed the Declaration of War against
the United Kingdom. The war was fought for a number of reasons
including trade restrictions, the impressment of American
merchant sailors into the Royal Navy, the United States trying
to annex
Canada, but also because the British were supporting Native
Americans in their fight against American expansion.
Let’s face it, many history books miss the main point of the
War of 1812 and some even have said the most important thing to
come out of the War of 1812 was “The Star Spangled Banner.” The
war was in fact a major turning point for Native Americans who
were struggling to stop white settlers from encroaching on their
land.
In Lies My Teacher Told Me: Everything Your American
History Textbook Got Wrong, James W. Loewen says “The
American Adventure excels, pointing out, ‘The American
Indians were the only real losers in the war.’”
After the War of 1812, the United States negotiated more than
200 treaties with Indian nations that involved ceding land, 99
of those resulted in the creation of reservations west of the
Mississippi River, reports PBS.org. The Treaty of Ghent—signed
on December 24, 1814—ended the war and returned things between
the United States and Britain to the way they were before the
war.
Loewen also says most history books miss the key outcome of
the War of 1812, that in exchange for the United States leaving
Canada alone, Britain stopped supporting the American Indians in
its fight against the encroaching settlers. “Without was
materiel and other aid from European allies, future Indian wars
were transformed from major international conflicts to domestic
mopping-up operations,” Loewen says.
This isn’t to say Native Americans didn’t win any battles at
all after the War of 1812 this was just a major turning point in
favor of the United States. The biggest tipping point was
Tecumseh, a Shawnee leader who brought Native nations
together to fight against encroachment. He brought the nations
together around his brother’s teachings. Tenskwatawa—also known
as the Prophet—believed the nations had angered the Master of
Life and they needed to go back to the traditional Shawnee way
of life.
“What Tecumseh is fighting for is the ability of Indian
people east of the Mississippi to hold onto their homelands.
Their lands are under siege in the period after the American
Revolution. The white frontier is moving into the Ohio Valley,
it’s also moving onto the gulf plains in the south.” R. David
Edmund, a historian, says in We Shall Remain. “Tecumseh
says this has got to stop, we have to stand and all realize that
we’re in this together… he was a very inspirational man that was
able to bring out the very best in those people who supported
him and to see beyond any particular tribal affiliation and to
realize that this was a struggle that was of greater magnitude.”
In a letter to U.S. General William Henry Harrison in 1810,
Tecumseh says: “the only way to stop this evil [white settlement
of the Indians’ land], is for all the red men to unite in
claiming a common and equal right in the land as it was at
first, and should be now – for it never was divided, but belongs
to all… Sell a country! Why not sell the air, the clouds and the
great sea, as well as the earth? Did not the Great Spirit
[Master of Life] make them all for the use of his children?”
By 1811, there were some two dozen Indian nations following
Tecumseh, but to have any chance of protecting their lands
against the U.S. an alliance with Britain was needed. That need
became even more evident after the Battle of Tippecanoe when
Harrison destroyed Tecumseh’s home base of
Prophetstown in Indiana Territory, that same year.
Tecumseh’s Confederacy then fought alongside the British to
protect Canada from the onslaught of American forces during the
War of 1812. Had they not, Canada could look very different
today.
“In early August [1812], Shawnee warriors from the Ohio
Valley under the great war chief, Tecumseh, fought and won a
number of battles with American troops around Fort Detroit,”
says The Globe and Mail. “Ontario, and probably a good
part of the rest of present day Canada, would now be part of the
United States were it not for the native warriors who
overwhelmingly came to the defence of the British Crown in the
first year of the War of 1812-1814.”
But Tecumseh’s defeat at the Battle of Thames in Canada in
1813 was the beginning of the end for Native nations. Tecumseh
was mortally wounded and with his death his confederacy fell
apart, as did his vision of driving back the white settlers.
“He had a vision to make sure that Indian way of life was
going to continue at whatever cost,” Andrew Warrior, Absentee
Shawnee, says in We Shall Remain.
But the tides had turned dramatically for the Native
Americans. Many wonder what could have been had Tecumseh not
been defeated.
“He and his brother were trying to get the Shawnee people
back to their roots and trying to keep their lands from being
taken. He was a visionary,” Kevin Williams, Absentee Shawnee,
says in We Shall Remain. “And I think today what would
have happened if he had succeeded in his plan, it would have
changed history.”
And in a way history was changed, by the way it has been
presented for so many years. Loewen says the War of 1812 took
away part of our history. “As historian Bruce Johansen puts it,
‘A century of learning [from Native Americans] was coming to a
close. A century and more of forgetting—of calling history into
service to rationalize conquest—was beginning.’ After 1815
American Indians could no longer play what sociologists call the
role of conflict partner—an important other who must be taken
into account—so Americans forgot that Natives had ever been
significant in our history. Even terminology changed: Until 1815
the word Americans had generally been used to refer to
Native Americans; after 1815 it meant European Americans.”
We Shall Remain, Episode 2: Tecumseh’s Vision, Part 1: