Natchez uprising

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Natchez, site of the French Fort Rosalie, destroyed in 1729 (photograph from the late 19th century)

The Natchez uprising (English Natchez Rebellion , Natchez Uprising , also Natchez War ) was an uprising of the Natchez Indians against French colonial rule in Louisiana in 1729 . The uprising, in the course of which the entire French settlement in Fort Rosalie in Natchez was destroyed, resulted in long-lasting armed conflicts between the French and Indians, which were finally settled in 1763.

course

In November 1729, the French commander Sieur de Chépart ordered the Natchez to evacuate the village of White Apple because the area was to be used to build a tobacco plantation. The Natchez were unwilling to peacefully accept this affront, preceded by countless similar ones, and the leaders of the White Apple began talks with potential allies, including the Yazoo , Koroa , Illinois , Chickasaw, and Choctaw . As allies for an uprising against the French, they also sought to win over the African slaves kept on neighboring French plantations .

The attack took place on November 28, 1729. By the evening of that day, the Natchez and their allies had destroyed the entire French colony at Fort Rosalie, killed more than 200 colonists - including the entire adult male population - and captured more than 300 women, children and slaves. According to the clergyman Philibert, 138 men, 35 women and 56 children died on the French side. The Indians lost an estimated twelve men.

Natchez War

In January 1730 the French tried to besiege the main fort of the Natchez but were driven out. Two days later the fort was attacked again, but this time by a group of around 500 Choctaw Indians who killed more than 100 Natchez and freed around 50 French and at least as many African slaves. The French were pleased, but also surprised, that the Choctaw only wanted to surrender the prisoners for ransom.

The war continued until January 1731 when the French finally captured a Natchez fort west of the Mississippi . At least 75 Natchez escaped and found refuge with the Chickasaw. About 100 - including the great Natchez chief Great Sun - were captured, gradually enslaved, and shipped to French plantations in the Caribbean .

Chickasaw and other Indian wars

The Natchez Uprising gave rise to a widespread conflict in the region with multiple effects. The Yazoo and Koroa, who allied with the Natchez, suffered the same fate as them. The tunica had initially hesitated to take sides in the dispute. When a large Natchez group sought refuge with them in the summer of 1730, this was granted. However, the following night the Natchez attacked their hosts, killing 20 of them, and ransacking the place. After this incident, the tunica made repeated attacks against the Natchez in the 1730s and 1740s.

The Chickasaw tried to remain neutral, but when Natchez took refuge with them in 1730, they also turned against the French. By 1731, many Natchez had found safety with the Chickasaw. When the French asked for their extradition that year, the Chickasaw steadfastly refused. Relations between the French and Chickasaw quickly deteriorated - a development that culminated in the Chickasaw Wars in 1739 . Some of the Natchez leaders who had found refuge with the Chickasaw accompanied them on the campaigns against the French. For the French, the Natchez and Chickasaw Wars were not least about gaining free access to the Mississippi River area. During a campaign against the Chickasaw in 1736, the French again demanded the extradition of Natchez. The Chickasaw, now seeking a compromise, extradited some Natchez as well as some French prisoners of war. The Chicksaw Wars didn't end until Louisiana fell to the British in 1763.

In the 1730s and 1740s, when the war between the French and Natchez became a war between the French and Chickasaw, the Choctaw fell into an internal rift in which the pro-French and pro-British factions began violent, civil war-like clashes .

The role of the Africans involved

Many African slaves also participated in the Natchez uprising. In January 1730, a group of Africans repulsed an attack by the Choctaw, allowing the Natchez to reorganize their forts. However, the majority of African slaves and some free blacks fought on the side of the French. One of the aftermaths of the Natchez insurrection was that free blacks became permanent members of the Louisiana militia - a capacity to which African-Americans in most of the other southern colonies had no access.

Individual evidence

  1. ^ Kathleen DuVal, Interconnectedness and Diversity in French Louisiana ; in: Gregory A. Waselkov (ed.): Powhatan's Mantle: Indians in the Colonial Southeast , University of Nebraska Press, 2006, ISBN 0-8032-9861-7
  2. ^ Charles F. Lawson: Archaeological Examination of Electromagnetic Features: An Example from the French Dwelling Site, a Late Eighteenth Century Plantation Site in Natchez, Adams County, Mississippi , 7.
  3. ↑ James F. Barnett: The Natchez Indians: A History to 1735 . University Press of Mississippi, 2007, ISBN 978-1-60473-309-9 , pp. 105 (English, 205 p., Limited preview in Google Book Search).
  4. ^ A b DuVal, Interconnectedness and Diversity in French Louisiana
  5. ^ Karl G. Lorenz: The Natchez of Southwest Mississippi ; in: Bonnie G. McEwan (ed.): Indians of the Greater Southeast: Historical Archeology and Ethnohistory , University Press of Florida, 2000, ISBN 0-8130-1778-5 , pp. 162-163
  6. ^ A b DuVal, Interconnectedness and Diversity in French Louisiana .

literature

  • James F. Barnett, Jr .: The Natchez Indians: A History to 1735 , University Press of Mississippi, 2007, ISBN 1-57806-988-2
  • HB Cushman, Angie Debo: History of the Choctaw, Chickasaw and Natchez Indians , University of Oklahoma Press, 1999, ISBN 0-8061-3127-6

Web links

All the web links listed are in English: