Over time, the Iroquois had become as dependent on European goods, like guns, rum, and clothing, as had the Europeans on Iroquois beaver fur. While they wanted to trade with Europeans, they did not want white settlement in the valley. The Iroquois wanted to maintain their traditional lands in the Ohio River Valley, along with their lifestyles and control of their future. The Indians involved in the French and Indian War included the Haudenosaunee, also known as the Iroquois Nation, who allied with the British and lived in the Ohio Valley and the “far Indians”-the tribes who lived around the Great Lakes and who were allied with the French. Why were the Indians fighting in a European Conflict? The French and Indian War was the last of the four colonial wars fought between the French, British, and their Native American allies. The French formally surrendered in the Americas in September 1760, but the war dragged on in Europe for three more years, culminating in England’s declaration of war against Spain and its subsequent defeat News of the battle reached London simultaneously with news of a similar victory in India, where English forces had reduced French outposts. The French and Indian War climaxed in 1759 with the most significant battle occurring at Québec where the British devastated the French ranks, ending French power in North America. Read some newspaper coverage of the French and Indian War. We supposed the Indians had stumbled over him in the dark, and supposed him dead, and taken off his scalp.” The man recovered. One man, Stephen Cross, wrote on May 25th that “one of our soldiers came in from the edge of the woods, where it seems he had lain all night having been out on the evening the day before and got drunk and could not get in, and not being missed, but on seeing him found he had lost his scalp, but he could not tell how nor when, having no others around.
For example, in May 1756 French allied Indians near Fort Oswego, New York, attempted to kill British colonists who ventured outside the fort. In theory, only the dead were scalped but several people survived the experience. Although the French paid Indians less, their Indian allies also scalped enemies during the war. On June 12, 1755, the governor of Massachusetts declared that the colony would pay ₤40 for male Indian scalps and ₤20 for female Indian scalps. Although scalping existed prior to the war, the British encouraged it as a war tactic by paying Indians bounties for their enemy’s scalps.