Settlers v. Natives: the Conestoga Massacre of 1763

As we've already seen, memories were long and reprisals harsh on the frontier, where fighting between Colonial powers and local militias was compounded by the use of Native auxiliaries on both sides.  Today, we'll look at another example: the Conestoga or Paxton Boys Massacre of 1763.

As the French and Indian War wrapped up in 1762, thousands of acres of backcountry remained unsettled.  Royal officials envisioned this land as a Native buffer zone and the Proclamation of 1763 forbid settlement beyond the Appalachian Mountains.  The Susquehannock or Conestoga people had an agreement earlier than that with William Penn, the founder of Pennsylvania, guaranteeing their use of the land near present-day Millersville since the 1690's.  The Susquehannock or Conestoga were an Iroquoian-speaking people who, when Whites encountered them in the early 17th century, could hold their own with the Iroquois tribes of New York, or the local Lenape/Delaware.  Incessant warfare and disease had taken their toll such that, by Penn's time, they were dependent on local Swedish traders to exchange goods for the beaver and other skins in order to survive.  Given the land by Penn, many of them became Christian and turned to farming.  During the French and Indian War, they had remained neutral.

This neutrality didn't satisfy John Elder, the parson at the town of Paxtang or Paxton.  Known as a fighting parson, he kept a loaded rifle in his pulpit during Sunday sermons.  Following the French and Indian War, his congregation grew as Scotch-Irish and other settlers poured into the backcountry in violation of the Proclamation of 1763.  In Elder's mind, neutral Natives were just as dangerous as those under arms, because they could pass on information to warring tribes.  Though there had been no Native attacks in the area in recent memory, Elder blamed assimilated Natives such as the Susquehannock for the continued unrest after the French and Indian War that would later lead into Pontiac's Rebellion.  Just in case there were any attacks, Elder determined to be ready and organized his congregation into a militia to deal with any local Native unrest. 

This armed mob with no fighting to do turned its attention on Natives living in Conestoga Town, at present-day Millersville.  On December 4, 1763, unknown men murdered six Susquehannock and burned their cabins.  Shocked and worried, authorities in Philadelphia, led by Benjamin Franklin, deemed their actions murder and demanded an inquest and trial.  A coroner's inquest ruled that the killings were murder and a reward was offered for the capture of the suspects.  Meanwhile, the Governor of Pennsylvania placed the remaining Susquehannock in protective custody in the jail at Lancaster, Pennsylvania.  Furious, the vigilantes, known as the Paxton Boys, stormed the jail on the night of December 27, 1763.  They killed and scalped six adults and eight children, some of whom were known to the local townspeople as being peaceable and law-abiding.  Despite several eyewitnesses to the attack and an increased reward, no one responsible was identified or brought to trial.  Parson Elder wrote the Governor a lecturing letter, blaming the Natives for presuming to live among White people.  If the government had removed the Natives, according to Elder, such atrocities would have been avoided.

The Paxton vigilantes weren't done yet.  As the few remaining Susquehannock fled to larger tribes such as the Shawnee, Delaware and Mingo for protection, the Paxton Boys marched on Philadelphia to demand the right to settle the backcountry and that the government remove all Natives currently residing there, peaceful or not.  The vigilantes were met by Franklin, who accepted a list of grievances which he promised to have read before the Pennsylvania Legislature.  With that, the mob disbursed.  Franklin was furious, and penned a memorial of his own saying that the Natives would have been safe anywhere in Pennsylvania had it not been for the savages from Paxton and Donegal. 

Repercussions did come, though many years later.  One of the Paxton Boys' leaders, Lazarus Stewart, was killed at the Battle of Wyoming, discussed earlier.  Loyalist militias with Native auxiliaries also carried out attacks on isolated farms and settlements along the North Branch Susquehanna River.  These attacks brought the Sullivan Expedition of 1779, which destroyed the Iroquois tribes in New York, forcing them to flee to Canada while any Natives still remaining in the backcountry left for the Ohio Valley.  The Susquehannock or Conestoga are extinct as a tribe, though descendants may remain in the Shawnee or Delaware bands of today.