Gazette of the State
of Georgia, Aug. 5, 1784, May 25, June 1, Nov. 2, Nov. 30, 1786.]
The more far-sighted and resolute among all the Indians, northern and
southern, began to strive for a general union against the Americans.
[Footnote: _Do_., No. 20, pp. 321 and 459; No. 18, p. 140; No. 12, vol.
ii., June 30. 1786.] In 1786 the northwestern Indians almost formed such
a union. Two thousand warriors gathered at the Shawnee towns and agreed
to take up the hatchet against the Americans; British agents were
present at the council; and even before the council was held, war
parties were bringing into the Shawnee towns the scalps of American
settlers, and prisoners, both men and women, who were burned at the
stake. [Footnote: _Do_., No. 60, p. 277, Sept. 13, 1786.] But the
jealousy and irresolution of the tribes prevented the actual formation
of a league.
The Federal Government still feebly hoped for peace; and in the vain
endeavors to avoid irritating the Indians forbade all hostile
expeditions into the Indian country--though these expeditions offered
the one hope of subduing the savages and preventing their inroads. By
1786 the settlers generally, including all their leaders, such as Clark,
[Footnote: _Do_.
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