The Pioneers: The Heroic Story of the Settlers Who Brought the American Ideal West

While McCullough depicts the Northwest Territory as an untamed “wilderness,” it had already been home for countless years to many Indigenous peoples. In the very early days of the settlement at Marietta, Indigenous people from several different tribes were present and relations were friendly. The Shawnee and Miami tribes, however, were concerned about the presence of the pioneers. In the winter of 1788-1789, those tribes slaughtered all the game in the surrounding forests of Marietta in hopes of starving out the settlers and sending them back east. When the settlers branched out of Marietta, in surveying parties and in establishing new communities, relations with all Indigenous tribes deteriorated.

In the summer of 1789, a surveying party was attacked, with nine settlers killed. At this point, Putnam wrote to President Washington asking the US government to bring war into the “enemy’s territory” (87). The characterization of the Indigenous peoples as “enemies” is telling. In early January, a group of settlers who had made camp at Big Bottom, 30 miles upstream of Marietta, was attacked. Fourteen people, including a woman and child, were killed, and several victims were scalped. This attack terrified the settlers in Marietta, who took refuge in the stockade of Camp Martius. Relations got worse, with scouts killed in the spring and an elderly settler gunned down and killed in June. The victim’s son then killed and beheaded an Indigenous person in revenge. Suffice to say, the Indigenous peoples and settlers were at war.

Congress authorized Governor St. Clair to raise a force of 2,000 soldiers to confront Indigenous forces in their own territory. St. Clair led the mission, but neither he nor his soldiers were up to the task. Most were drawn from eastern cities and signed up for the money or whiskey. They openly signaled that they would run at the first sign of trouble. The military expedition set out in October 1791 only to be met with a total defeat. In a surprise attack, Indigenous forces killed 1,094 soldiers and camp followers and confiscated the weaponry at the campsite. St. Clair and other survivors managed to escape back to Cincinnati. President Washington capitalized on the defeat to convince Congress to increase military pay and the size of the army. Naming a new commander, Washington sent a disciplined force to wage war on Indigenous peoples. This time, federal troops scored an overwhelming victory in August 1794. The victory paved the way for the Treaty of Greenville, which confined Indigenous peoples to the north and west and opened southern and eastern Ohio to white settlers.

The pioneers’ way of life was thus in direct conflict with that of Indigenous peoples. Ultimately, the pioneers, with the help of the US army, forced Indigenous tribes deeper into the west. There was some fear of a revival of conflict during the War of 1812, but US government victories prevented any problems in the settlements. As more and more settlers came to Ohio and beyond, a bill to remove all Indigenous persons from Ohio was passed in 1830. They were transported to reservations in the west. Travelers from abroad, such as Charles Dickens, commented on the cruelty of this policy, and Hildreth acknowledged the loss of the wilderness and its Indigenous population in an address in Cleveland. The victories of the settlers therefore came at the expense of Indigenous peoples, revealing a gulf between the purported ideals of the pioneers and the effects of their colonization.