Some Lenape warriors first rebelled against the Dutch in 1641, when settlers’ livestock destroyed some cornfields of the Raritan Indians, a band living on Staten Island at the mouth of the Hudson River. Willem Kieft, governor-general of New Netherland at the time, placed a bounty on Raritan heads and scalps, making it profitable for Dutch settlers to kill local Indians.
An incident called the Pavonia Massacre occurred two years later: Dutch soldiers tortured and murdered a band of Wappinger who sought protection among the Dutch from the MOHAWK. After the incident, many Algonquians of the region, Lenape and Wappinger alike, began raiding outlying settlements. By attacking and burning Indian villages, Kieft’s armies crushed the uprising in a year.
The Lenape and Wappinger also battled the Dutch under Peter Stuyvesant, the next governor-general, in the
Lenni Lenape drumsticks
So-called Peach Wars, starting in 1655, when an Indian woman was killed by a farmer for picking peaches from his orchard. After warriors had taken revenge against the farmer, Stuyvesant not only raided Lenape and Wap-pinger villages and burned their homes and crops, but also took children hostages, threatening to kill them so that their fathers would not fight.
In later conflicts, the western Lenape sided with the French in the French and Indian wars of 1689—1763. They again fought the British in Pontiac’s Rebellion of 1763—64. A shaman known as Delaware Prophet played an important role in the conflict. In 1762, he began preaching to the Indians of the Old Northwest, urging them to make peace among themselves, to give up alcohol, and to live pure lives according to traditional Indian ways. His message helped inspire and unite the tribes who fought together against the British under the OTTAWA Pontiac the following year. Some Lenape later sided with the British in the American Revolution of 1775—83. They also supported the MIAMI and SHAWNEE in Little Turtle’s War of 1790—94 and Tecumseh’s Rebellion of 1809-11.
World History
