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In his massive two-volume "History of Beaver County" published in 1904, the eminent historian Dr. Joseph H. Bausman of Rochester referred to the Treaty of Fort McIntosh, which was situated at what is now the Borough of Beaver, as an agreement between the then-young United States and the Indian tribes for the purchase of Indian lands. Dr. Bausman thus repeated the contention of earlier historians concerning the purpose of the treaty.
Dr. Bausman, in addition to serving as a professor at Washington and Jefferson College in Washington, PA, was pastor of the Congregational Church in Rochester. After the congregation was dissolved following his death, the church building was converted to a businessmen's private club and later became the Rochester American Legion Home. The building, on Adams Street, is still owned and occupied by the veterans organization.
The tribes involved in the Fort McIntosh Treaty were the Delaware, Ottawa, Wyandott and Chippewa. Actually, the intent and purpose of that conference was for representatives of the United States to inform the tribes gathered, 400 strong, at the fort in 1784-1785 of the new developments in the policy of the new nation towards the Indians and their lands. They were to be notified to remove themselves from the land upon which they lived and claimed as their own, land which now belonged to the United States on the strength of the treaty with England that terminated the hostilities between the two nations.
The commissioners further lectured the Indian chiefs that the Peace Treaty not only ended the five-year warfare, but most importantly, brought forth the new nation, the United States. It was to the United States that the king and government of England had surrendered the thirteen colonies and all the land which lay between the eastern shores of the Atlantic Ocean and westward to the Mississippi River.
To the chiefs this claim was incomprehensible. They kept insisting that the land was theirs and the British king and his government had no right to give it away. The real or pretended ignorance of the chiefs concerning the changed conditions brought about by the successful Revolution against England did not alter the fact that the United States had come into legal possession of those lands on the strength of its arms. The United Colonies had defeated England on the field of battle.
Surely, the Indians knew that the rules of war prevailed here as in Europe. The Six Nations had practiced those rules long before the clash between England and the Americans. The English had always claimed all the territory to the Mississippi River and the Indians had known about it. Certainly they were aware of the reasons why the British were fighting the French in the entire Northwest.
Prior to the Revolution, the. colonies of Virginia, Georgia, New York, Massachusetts and Connecticut had extensive claims to the lands north, northwest and southwest of the Ohio River. England, by the Act of Quebec of 1774, abrogated most of these claims by attaching all these lands to the newly-created Province of Quebec. This act was most objectionable to the Americans even before the Revolution. During the Revolution, those colonies, now States, re-asserted their claims. By March 1, 178 1, through the efforts of the Continental Congress, all of these states surrendered their claims to the United States of America. The Indian chiefs certainly were not ignorant of these facts.
When the discussions began at the Conference of Fort McIntosh, no price was ever offered or discussed; no deals were made. The request of the Commissioners representing the United States was for the Indian chiefs to sign their names to a treaty as a matter of formality, giving up forever their title and claim to the land, thus making the United States the undisputed owner. The "right of conquest" was the battering ram in the hands of the Commissioners and they used it to drive home their demands.
The language of the Commissioners was clear and definite; no money exchanged hands; no customary bargaining was conducted or allowed; no compensation was given. There was a complete absence of a buyer-seller practice spirit. There was no atmosphere of equality between the conferees; only victors outlining their demands to the vanquished.
The $2,000 distributed to the Indians by the Commissioners in the form of clothing, food and other necessities, was provided by Pennsylvania alone. This was in keeping with the Treaty of Fort Stanwix of 1768, a treaty which, incidentally, had been negotiated between the Six Nations of the Iroquois and England, eight years prior to the Revolution and which was concerned with lands within Pennsylvania.
Pennsylvania's claims constituted the first part of the deliberations of the Fort McIntosh Conference. When the chiefs signed the deed and had finished with this Pennsylvania problem, the discussions moved to the demand of the Continental Congress for the lands north and west of the Ohio River, namely, two thirds of the present state of Ohio. The chiefs present at the conference claimed those lands as belonging to them. It was those lands which the United States demanded and received through the Fort McIntosh Treaty of 1785.
The term "treaty" was, of course, used in continuation of the traditions and practices of the British administration in its relations with the tribes. It was the only formality the Indians knew and understood. The new rulers also used the same designation. The Fort McIntosh Treaty was truly misnamed. The Indian chiefs simply signed a quittance to the lands of the Ohio Valley to which they claimed ownership.
For that matter, all of the other "treaties" which followed were all similar in nature, content and spirit, such as those concluded at Fort Finney, Fort Harmar and Fort Greenville, the last one by Gen. Anthony Wayne after the defeat of the Indians at Fallen Timbers. After the Peace Treaty with England, in 1783, the United States discontinued purchasing Indian lands.
However, the overall policy of the Congress towards the Indians in general at that time was one of benevolence and understanding of their plight. Often there was a "bending backward" attitude to accommodate them, giving in to them on minor issues, making concessions when such concessions were not in conflict with the basic principles of the newly acquired national independence.
Much of that policy was exercised by the Commissioners at Fort McIntosh. The British armed power was still present in the Northwest along the length of the Great Lakes, with eight military posts. A very substantial number of armed tribes were yet to be reckoned with. The hope that the nation might be able to separate the Indians from the British influence had to be kept alive. That posture, however, was being gradually and ' methodically abandoned in favor of asserting unmistakably the goals of the young nation.
This policy was directed not only to the tribes gathered in Fort McIntosh, but also to all the tribes west of the mountains for the first time since the signing of the Peace Treaty with England. The Fort McIntosh Treaty had a far-reaching national importance because, for the first time, it embodied the new policy toward all the tribes and their lands. The treaties signed at Fort Finney, Fort Harmar, Fort Greenville and those negotiated by Gen. Arthur St. Clair were copies of the one concluded at Fort McIntosh. Only the location of the lands and the names of the tribes were different. Acceptance and ratification of the McIntosh documents was made a precondition for further talks with the chiefs,
A letter from Fort McIntosh, written by Col. Josiah Harmar, commander of the First American Regiment, to John Dickinson, Esq., Supreme Executive Council of the Continental Congress, dated Jan. 15, 1785, conveyed the spirit that prevailed at the Conference of Fort McIntosh. Col. Harmar was in attendance at the conference.
"Only levity and generosity," were offered to the Indians, he wrote and liberal "Humane views of the Congress" were added. Enclaves were offered within which to "live and hunt" and even "trading posts" were promised. But the United States was to have the hegemony and the undisputed ownership of everything within its boundaries.
Thus, the soil of Beaver County provided the platform from which this most crucial policy of our country was first announced and implemented.