Postmortem by Forbes: Myrmidons
The dying General Forbes dubs the reduced Fort Duquesne as Pittsburgh 1 Dec 1758. After organizing who is staying to guard this area of the Forks and having meetings with the area Indians to maintain the peace, Forbes leaves Monday morning 4 Dec 1758. Most of the month of December is spent making his way back to Philadelphia on the road his "little Army" built. Once there in Philadelphia, he writes a few letters predicting 3 future worries. And they all came to pass. His first 2 concerns address the rivalry between PA and VA and the rapid settlement of the Ohio forks, breaking the agreement with the Indians about not settling there. Those 2 future concerns are discussed in detail here.
It's the 3rd concern that caught our attention. Myrmidons.
The British leaders and its officers and even its rank and file knew Ancient Greek and Roman history. That word comes from that time.
Here's what Forbes wrote in Jan and Feb 1759:
"the Jealousy subsisting betwixt the Virginians & Pensilvanians . . . as both are aiming at engrossing the commerce and Barter with the Indians, and of settling and appropriating the immense tract of fine country" around the Forks;
and
"the private interested views
of William Johnstone [Johnson]
and his Myrmidons."
This appears Forbes distrusted the Superintendent of Indian Affairs in the Northern Department, William Johnson, and his unquestioning followers, his Myrmidons.
This distrust might have resulted from what he observed in the Easton Peace treaty negotiations.
Another person certainly knew he was betrayed by William Johnson and his Iroquois allies (aka the Myrmidons).
It was Teedyuscung and his Delawares.
The Iroquois asserting dominance over the Delaware (Lenape) sold the ground from under them. Technically it is a little more circuitous and involved than that, but selling the ground from under them becomes the bottomline. There's more on that story and the drunkeness and despair of Teedyuscung.
He was getting drunk in front of everyone.
His best ally started pulling back from associating with him. That was Israel Pemberton and his Friendly Association.
All the Pennsylvania leaders were looking for wiggle room from following through on a promise to review the lie in the Walking Purchase.
All the Pennsylvania leaders were looking for wiggle room to keep the Wyoming territory of PA so they can block Connecticut's claim.
All the Pennsylvania leaders were given that wiggle room by Johnson and the Iroquois to buy the Wyoming claim from the Iroquois, when it was really Delaware land.
The other Indians from the Ohio country only agreed if Conrad Weiser would give up an earlier claim to the Ohio Country.
Teedyuscung wanted an area of the Wyoming territory of PA.
He was seeing that slip away.
He was seeing the promise to review the lie in the Walking Purchase slip away.
He also knew he was slipping away with another drink.
Looks like Forbes saw all that from afar.
He saw the Iroquois get paid for something the Delaware had owned.
And Johnson's Myrmidons, his allied Iroquois, were the ones guilty of capturing that shady deal.
See basis for these claims in this section.
This word, Myrmidon,
had a long history but has since fallen in dis-use in the modern age.
Myrmidon comes from a Greek word for ants.
Ants are known for their loyal, unceasing, tireless work for the Queen Ant.
A more modern version of this idea is Robot.
That's it
That's our lead story.
There's always more.
Skip around.
Read bits and pieces.
Compiled, authored by Jim Moyer 12/10/2022, updated 12/13/2022, 12/18/2022
Table of Contents
The name Pittsburgh
Meeting with the Indians
Forbes leaves for Philly
Source of Forbes Quote on Myrmidon
The meaning of Myrmidons
From Wikipedia:
The Myrmidons of Greek myth were known for their loyalty to their leaders, so that in pre-industrial Europe the word "myrmidon" carried many of the same connotations that "robot" does today. "Myrmidon" later came to mean "hired ruffian", according to the Oxford English Dictionary.
Henry Fielding in Tom Jones (1749, Book XV, ch. 5) employs the term in the sense of "hired thugs": "The door flew open, and in came Squire Western, with his parson and a set of myrmidons at his heels."
The Royal Navy has had several ships called HMS Myrmidon.
The United States Navy has had one vessel named USS Myrmidon (ARL-16)
"The Myrmidons" was the name adopted in 1865 by a private dining society in Merton College, Oxford. It is thought to be the oldest continuously active dining society in the University of Oxford. Max Beerbohm was a member, and the club called "The Junta" that features in his Oxford novel Zuleika Dobson is probably modeled on the Myrmidons. Other former members include Lord Randolph Churchill and Andrew Irvine.
Source:
Mythical origins of the Myrmidons
Myrmidons; People from ants for King Aeacus. Engraving by Virgil Solis for Ovid's Metamorphoses Book VII, 622-642. ( Public Domain )
In one account, the Myrmidons are said to have originally been humble worker ants from the island of Aegina that were transformed into humans.
After Zeus seduced Aegina, daughter of the river god Asopus, the island of Aegina was named after her.
In a jealous rage, Hera sent a plague to wipe out the inhabitants of the island.
After the plague,
the only inhabitants of the island were Aeacus, the king of Aegina, and his sons Peleus and Telamon.
Aeacus prayed to Zeus that the island would be repopulated so that he could have people to govern. That night, after Aeacus made his prayer to Zeus, he dreamed that he saw a line of ants on a tree and the ants were transformed into human beings.
The next morning, Aeacus and his sons were greeted by a group of people who claimed that Aeacus was their ruler. These people are said to have been industrious, thrifty, and tenacious, unwilling to give up easily on a task. Aeacus called his new subjects Myrmidons, referencing their myrmecological origins.
Source:
The name Pittsburgh
A quote from Cubbison's book on the Forbes Expedition:
On December 1 [1758],
Forbes issued those orders that remain today as his most enduring legacy in North America. Specifically, he named the posts upon which he had expended so much labor and effort:
"General Forbes is please to name the different Posts as follows & all Officers serving in the Army are desired to give them their several appelations either in Writing or otherwise;
Late Fort Duquesne = Pittsburgh
Loyal Hannon = Fort Ligonier
Ray's Town = Fort Bedford "
Source:
Page 179, The British Defeat of the French in Pennsylvania, 1758: A Military History of the Forbes Campaign Against Fort Duquesne: by Douglas R. Cubbison. More on this author here. And a review here.
The letters by all the top officers --
all refer to Reastown (Raystown) and to Loyalhanna -- not Fort Bedford, not Fort Ligonier until after the French abandoned Fort Duquesne
Meeting with the Indians
Cubbison in his book on the Forbes Expedition writes:
Immediate feelers out to area Indians
Immediately upon capturing Fort Duqesne [Forbes] sent out feelers to the various Indian communities and leaders, requesting that a council be held at the first opportunity at the point of the three rivers. Unfortunately Forbes' health was so precarious, and the living conditions in the field so austere, that he could not remain until the Indians were able to reach him. Instead he deputized Bouquet to remain in his stead to confer with the Indians upon their arrival.
The Opening of the Talks
On December 4, Bouquet met with various Delaware chiefs in the camp. The council followed the traditional mores of such events, with the presentations of presents, in this case, gunpowder and lead, from Bouquet to the Indians to validate his earnestness. Once the presents were dispensed with, the conference continued with various greetings, lengthy oratory, and the exchange of strings or belts of wampum to serve as a record of the discussions, Bouquet told the Indians that the English had come merely to expel the French from the country, they would only maintain a small garrison to protect a trading post that they would erect at the point, and they intended to immeidately begin active trading with the Delawares.
At this point the British government and army had made no firm decision to construct a massive fortification at the Forks of the Ohio, so possibly Bouquet even believed that he was telling the truth.
Indians' feelings
The Delaware attested to their intent to abide by the provisions of the Treaty of Easton, and promised to assist the British garrison at the point, but stated they could not guarantee their safety. The Delaware also promised to meet with other Indian nations regarding recent events in the Ohio country.
Apparently Bouquet impressed the Indians, for one noted,
"[W]e were taken to the commander's house; officers marched before us to keep back the crowd . . . We found a fine man, who, after the most agreeable of receptions, remained standing as he spoke to us . . . during the four days we were among them, we did not hear a single word which did not tend toward good."
The council was never intended to do anything more than open a dialogue between the British and the Natives living west of the Alleghenies, and it succeeded admirably in this regard.
The modern concept of civil-military affairs did not then exist, nor had the great Prussian General Von Clausewitz yet written,"War Does Not Consist of a Single Short Blow."
GOALS OF FORBES
GARRISON
Yet, Forbes clearly comprehended that simply conquering Fort Duquesne would accomplish litte, and that only the lodgement of a secure garrison at the site of the French fort would ensure possession of the Ohio country.
PEACE WITH INDIANS
And Forbes realized that for the English garrison to retain such possession, they would have to first establish and maintain healthy relationships with tNative inhabitants who had until a short time previously been their armed and hostile opponents, and who great outnumbered them. . . . . .
Hiring the Indians and supporting their families:
The English garrison provided warriors with employment throughout the winter by paying them liberally for fresh meat they brought into the fort; helped the Natives' families survive the harsh northeastern winter by issuing the Indians with provisions; and earned their respect by requesting their assistance in monitoring the French. . . . .
Why it goes bad again
Later, after the English had constructed a massive fortification at this site without the Natives' permission, and permitted a settlement to grow upon the slopes of the hill fertilized by Grant's dead, this relationship would again disintegrate into conflict. . . . .
More Indian Talks
. . . another council was held between Lieutenant Colonel Hugh Mercer and nine chiefs of the Delawares, Shawnees, and Six Nations (Mingos) early in January.
Source:
Page 177-179, The British Defeat of the French in Pennsylvania, 1758: A Military History of the Forbes Campaign Against Fort Duquesne: by Douglas R. Cubbison. More on this author here. And a review here.
To Benjamin Franklin from Israel Pemberton, 11 December 1758
From Israel Pemberton9 ms not found; reprinted from extract in [Charles Thomson], An Enquiry into the Causes of the Alienation of the Delaware and Shawanese Indians from the British Interest, … (London, 1759), pp. 183–4.
At the late Treaty Teedyuscung confirmed the Purchase of 1749;* his Motives for this Confirmation, were to engage the Six Nations to confirm the Wyoming Lands to him and his People;2 but such Measures were pursued, by our proprietary Managers, to prevent it, and to set the Indians at variance with each other, that all our Arguments, Persuasions and Presents were scarce sufficient to keep them from an open Rupture.
The Business was shamefully delayed from Day to Day, which the Minutes are calculated to screen; but it well known to us who attended, that the Time was spent in attempting Teedyuscung’s Downfal, and silencing or contradicting the Complaints he had made; but he is really more of a politician than any of his Opponents, whether in or out of our proprietary Council; and if he could be kept sober, might probably soon become Emperor of all the neighbouring Nations.
His old Secretary not being present, when the Treaty began,3 he did not demand the Right of having one, and thought it unnecessary, as he was determined rather to be a Spectator than active in public Business, so that we are imposed on in some Minutes of Consequence.4 General Forbes’s proceeding with so much Caution has furnished Occasion for many imprudent Reflections; but I believe he pursued the only Method, in which he could have succeeded.5 Whether he is a Soldier or not I cannot judge, nor is it my Business; but I am certain he is a considerate understanding Man; and it is a Happiness to these Provinces, that he prudently determined from the entrance on the Command here, to make use of every rational Method of conciliating the Friendship of the Indians, and drawing them off from the French;6 so that since we had his Countenance and Directions, our pacific Negotiations have been carried on with some Spirit, and have had the desired Effect.
The Express left the General at Fort Duquesne (now Pitt’sburgh)7 on the 30th ult. and says he would stay to meet the Indians, of whom he expected five hundred in a Day or two, having heard they were near him on the other Side the River.8 He will, no doubt, provide for divers Matters shamefully neglected at Easton, where our proprietary Agents wisely releas’d to the Indians all the Lands westward of the Mountains,9 without so much as stipulating for the keeping a trading House in any Part of that extensive Country.
This Neglect is now much noticed; and as we are assur’d there will be a great Want of Goods there this Winter, I am fitting out two Waggons with about £5 or 600 worth of Strouds,1 Blankets, Matchcoats, &c. which shall be sent to the General either to be sold or given away in such Manner, as may most effectually promote the public Interest: The Weather being pleasant and mild, and the Roads good, I am in hopes they will be conveyed to Ray’s-Town in a few Days. Our Friendly Association have, out of their Fund, expended upwards of £2000 but the Cost of these Goods must be paid (if they are given away) out of the Contributions of the Menonists and Swengfelders, who put about £1500 into my Hands for these Purposes.2 I am, &c. [Note numbering follows the Franklin Papers source.]
9. For the identification of the author and addressee of the letter from which this extract was taken and the circumstances of its first printing, see headnote to the document immediately above.
1. By the purchase of 1749, the Proprietors acquired title to a rectangular area bounded on the south by the Kittatinny Hills, on the west by the Susquehanna River, on the east by the Delaware River, and on the north by a line drawn “from Mahoniahy Creek on Susquehannah to Leheighwochter Creek on Delaware.” “Benjamin Chew’s Journal of a Journey to Easton, 1758,” Van Doren and Boyd, Indian Treaties, p. 317. This note was probably written by bf. Toward the end of the Easton Treaty Teedyuscung admitted that this had been a legitimate sale. Ibid., p. 237.
2. Teedyuscung wished to settle his people permanently in the Wyoming Valley. See above, vii, 282 n.
3. Charles Thomson arrived, however, no later than October 11. Chew’s Journal, p. 313.
4. Thomson had also complained of the untrustworthiness of the official minutes; see the preceding document.
5. Gen. John Forbes’s army captured its objective, Ft. Duquesne, on Nov. 25, 1758.
6. For Forbes’s assiduous efforts to conciliate the friendship of the Indians, see esp. Alfred P. James, ed., Writings of General John Forbes (Menasha, Wis., 1938), pp. 81–2, 109, 127, 137, 180–1.
7. “I have used the freedom of giving your name to Fort DuQuesne, as I hope it was in some measure the being actuated by your spirits that now makes us Masters of the place.” Forbes to William Pitt, Nov. 27, 1758, James, ed., Writings of Forbes, p. 269.
8. The express reached Philadelphia on or a little before December 11. Forbes enclosed a letter to Denny, dated November 26, in which he announced his intentions of conferring with the Indians. The General “also sent word to Philadelphia describing the need of goods” with which to supply the Indians. Pa. Col. Recs., viii, 232–4; Theodore Thayer, Israel Pemberton (Phila., 1943), p. 171.
9. See the preceding document.
1. Coarse warm cloth.
2. Although Pemberton dispatched the two wagons from Philadelphia on December 13, they did not reach Pittsburgh until April 30, 1759. While the goods were in transit, the trustees of the Friendly Association objected to his use of the Mennonite and Schwenkfelder funds; so he returned the money to the Friendly Association, paid for the goods himself, and traded them to Indians at Pittsburgh. Thayer, Pemberton, pp. 171–4; John W. Jordan, ed., “James Kenny’s ‘Journal to the Westward,’ 1758–59,” PMHB, xxxvii (1913), 395–449. Authorial notes
[The following note(s) appeared in the margins or otherwise outside the text flow in the original source, and have been moved here for purposes of the digital edition.]
º *This was a Purchase made by the Proprietors from the Six Nations, of Lands claimed by the Delawares.1
Source:
Forbes leaves for Philly
Cubbison in his book on the Forbes Expedition writes:
" . . .on December 3 the return march began. By this time Forbes was almost certainly terminally ill, and our friend Sergeant Lindenmuth recorded:
"As General Forbes was a sickly man, he did not stay long, but immediately gave orders to build barracks, most of the sick sent to Raystown [still not calling Fort Bedford yet], as most of the teamsters were going back there. December the [2nd] Captain Morgan received orders to take a command of 40 men to march on the [3rd] one day ahead of the General to build a schonsten [the precise meaning of this term is uncertain; presumably it meant a "lean-to" or section of a wall with chimney] to put up his tent against them because of the cold weather where it was necessary, under which command I was included."
Sometim early in the morning of Monday, December 4, 1758, Brigadier General John Forbes departed his newly named Pittsburgh.
The look back:
He headed east into the rising sun whose glowing rays warmed his emaciated body, and offered him hope that he might yet survive to see the rugged green shores of his native land. Just to the east of the forks, as he ascended the first pinnacle that would soon swell and join with its brothers to become the endless ridges of the Allegheny Mountains, Forbes had his litter stopped and turned around. He gazed for the last time upon a crude encampment that was already being transformed into a substantial fortification. Forbes had just written Pitt of his earnest belief that "these dreary deserts will soon be the richest and most fertile of any possessed by the British in North America." It was his reward, and Forbes heart must have swelled. He now knew that he had conquered.
Source:
Page 180, The British Defeat of the French in Pennsylvania, 1758: A Military History of the Forbes Campaign Against Fort Duquesne: by Douglas R. Cubbison. More on this author here. And a review here.
Source of Forbes Quote on Myrmidon
Source:
Fred Anderson' last page of the Chapter: Indian Diplomacy and the Fall of Fort Duquesne in his book, Crucible of War: The Seven Years' War and the Fate of Empire in British North America, 1754-1766, hardcover, published originally Feb 16, 2000 Third Printing March 2000 by Alfred a Knopf NY, page 284.
Fred Anderson footnote cites:
Quotations from Forbes to Amherst, 26 Jan and 7 Feb 1759, Writings of Forbes 283, 289. See also Forbes to Amherst, 18 Jan 1759, pages 282-3.
Teedyuscung
Pack the Room
The western Delaware delegation was the most important one (because it represented the Ohio forks country), but it was also one of the smallest consisting of only Pisquetomen and his counselors. The eastern Delawares far outnumbered them, for Teedyuscung brought along approximatelely sixty supporters; but even that group was drwarfed by the numbers of Indians from the Iroquois League. Each of the Six Nations had sent official representatives and the Onondaga Council had encourage many of the mmmall nation that lived under its protection - Nanticokes, Tuteloes, Chugnuts, Minisinks, Mahicans, adnd Wappingers-- to send observers. The large number of Iroquois gave the first indication that this congress would differ from its predecessor, for the Grand Council had decided that the time had come to reassert its claim to preeminence over its tributary peoples.
Reassert Dominance
Onandago had therefore sent no fewer than three powerful chiefs -- the great Oneida orator Thomas King, the Seneca sachem Tagashata, and the Mohawk chief Nichas (Crogan's father-in-law) -- with the express intent of silencing Teedyuscung and quelling the tendency he represented toward independent action.
[ Jim Moyer blog note: This may have been what Forbes observed from those reporting to him, that Crogan worked for William Johnson and so they orchestrated the Iroquois to act, and therefore Forbes looked at the iroquois as William Johnson's Myrmidons.]
Teedyuscung losing before it started
Teedyuscung saw this from the start and realized that the gains he had made at the 1757 conference -- the promise of an inquiry into the validity of the Walking Purchase and the promise of a permanent Delaware reservation in the Wyoming Valley -- could all be lost if the Iroquois successfully reasserted their claim to power over himself and his people. But he knew that, having already concluded a peace between this own eastern band and the English, and having helped to bring the western Delawares to this peace table, he had become dispensable. With nothing left to offer as a mediator, he had lost his power to make demands. Teedyuscung's impotence helps to explain his behavior at Easton, for before the sessions began and frequently thereafter, he was loudly, belligerently, disruptively drunk. Whatever emotional reasons he may have had to drink, he gained nothing by it and ade such a nuisance of himself that the Iroquois spokemen scarcely even needed to argue that he was unfit to speak for his people. Once again, by virtue of adroit displomacy if not the reality of control, the Iroquois reasserted their claims to hegemony over the eastern Delawares.
The White side calcuations
This was possible because both Denny and his cosponsor, Governor Francis Bernard of New Jersey, were coming to see Teedyuscung more as a liability than an asset. If the promises previously made to inquire into the Walking Purchase could be permanently deflected, and if the Wyoming Valley could be left under the control of the pliant Iroquois rather than be deeded to Teedyuscung's upstart Delaware band, they reasoned, so much the better. Such a solution suited the proprietor's men who wished neither to see the Walking Purchase invalidated nor have two and a half million acres of superb land removed from their master's control. Once it was clear that the Iroquois delegates at the conference would be speaking, as it were, in a chorus of agreement -- and that the chorus was harmonized by George Croghan and his father-in-law, Nichas -- Teedyuscung was, for all practical purposes isolated. Since the welfare of this man and his people was of no driving concern to the commissioners who represented the assembly, his sole remaining support came from Israwel Pemberton. But Pembertion was present only as an unofficial observer and, addest of all for Teedyuscung, he was not about to squander the chance for regaining peace by defending the claims of a drunk and frequently abusive chief.
Teedyuscung's Last Play
Thus between the rum that robbed him of his wits and the dynamics of power and peace that robbied him of his influence, Teedyuscung found himself abandoned at Easton; and before the conference ended, he sobered up and made the best accommodation he could with his, and his people's plight.
It was on October 20 that Teedyuscung formally submitted to Iroquois control in a moving plea for a Wyoming Valley homeland.
"Uncles," he said, addressing the Iroquois chiefs,
" You may remember that you have placed the [Delawares] at Wyomink and Shamokin, Places where Indians have lived before. Now I hear since, that you have sold that land to our Brethren the English; let the matter now be cleared up, in the presence of our Brethren the English. "
"I sit thee as a Bird on a Bough; I look about, and do not know where to go; let me therefore come down upon the Ground, and make that my own by a good Deed, and I shall then have a Home forever; for if you my Uncles, Or I die, our Brethren the English will say, they have bought it from you, and so wrong my Posterity out of it."
The Response from the Iroquois
The Oneida spokesman Thomas King replied loftily that, for the time being, Teedyuscung could "make use of those Lands in Conjunction with our People, and all the rest of our Relations." As for the good Deed that Teedyuscung wanted, that was the concern of the sachems of the Iroquois at Onondage; King would not presume to speak for them, but he would pass along the request.
The White response
The proprietors men rejoiced. Now they were prepared to make two carefully rehearsed concessions, the net effect of which would be simultaneously to hamstring Teedyuscung, seal the peace with western Delawares, and reestablish the Iroquois hegemony that was invaluable to the Penn family.
Details of the Deal
Wyoming area of PA
When Teedyuscung said in the speech that had heard the Iroquois had "sold that Land [at Wyoming] to our Brethern the English" he alluded to the cession at the Albany Congresss in which Conrad Weiser, acting as agent for the Penn family, had secured from the Iroquois title to all the land in Pennsulvania that lay west of the Susquehana River between 41 degrees 31 minutes latitude and the Maryland border. Weiser had intended to preempt the Wyoming Valley land purchase that his competitor, John Henry Lydius, was attempting to negotiate for the Susquehanna Company of Connecticut: hence Teedyuscung's anxiety to obtain a "good Deed" to Wyoming.
Ohio Forks
But Weiser's enormous purchase had also included all Iroquois clais to the region around the Forks of the Ohio, and thus the Albany purchase also went to the heart of Pisquetomen's concerns. Everyone at Easton realized that the Ohio Indians would never make peace with the English unless they were satisfied that the Ohio Country would remain theirs once the war was over. Thus as soon as Teedyuscung had acknowledge his submission to Iroquois authority, Conrad Weiser, acting as the agent of the Penn family, formally returned to the Iroquis all the land from the Albany purchase that lay west of the of the Allegheny Mountains.
Sources:
Fred Anderson's Chapter: Indian Diplomacy and the Fall of Fort Duquesne in his book, Crucible of War: The Seven Years' War and the Fate of Empire in British North America, 1754-1766, hardcover, published originally Feb 16, 2000 Third Printing March 2000 by Alfred a Knopf NY, pages 275-277.
Forbes on the future of the Indians
Albany Conference 1754
Easton Peace Treaty 1758
Coin from previous Easton Peace Treaty 1757
Notes to develop later
Table of Contents
Fred Anderson on the Easton Peace Treaty
Teedyuscung Statues in Wissahocken
Fred Anderson on the Easton Peace Treaty
The formal conclusteion of the Treaty of Easton came on October 25 and 26, 1758, with feasting and the distribution of gifts. It had been the most important Indian congress in Pennsylvania's history, and its significance was by no means limited to the restoration of peace with Ohio tribes. By subtle and compliant diplomacy, the Iroquois had regained pre-dominance over the easter Delawares and had reestablished their claim to the Ohio Country, an asset of far greater importance to the Confederacy than the one they obstensibly surrendered -- the ablility to speak for the western Delawares. The Penn family's representatives had staved off a considerable threat to the propritary interest and had cemented anew the propretor's ties to the Six Nations. If the Penn's enemies in the Pennsylvania Assembly and the Friendly Association were compelled to concede those gains to the proprietary interest, they could at least look forward to an end of bloodshed in the backcountry. Forbes could now
