Peter Chartier


Peter Chartier was a fur trader of French and Shawnee parentage who became a tribal chief and was an early advocate for Native American civil rights, speaking out against the sale of alcohol in indigenous communities in Pennsylvania. He first attempted to limit the sale of rum in Shawnee communities in the Province of Pennsylvania, then launched a movement to prohibit it altogether. Conflict with the colonial government motivated him to lead his community of over 400 Pekowi Shawnees on a four-year odyssey through Ohio, Kentucky, Alabama and Indiana, eventually resettling in Illinois. He later fought on the side of the French during the French and Indian War.
Two communities, several rivers including Chartiers Creek, Chartiers Run and Chartiers Run, and two school districts are named after him.

Parentage and early life

Peter Chartier was born Pierre Chartier and was the son of Martin Chartier, a glovemaker and carpenter born in St-Jean-de-Montierneuf, Poitiers, Vienne, Poitou-Charentes, France. Martin Chartier arrived in Quebec with his brother and sister and his father René in 1667. He accompanied Louis Jolliet on his 1674 journey to the Illinois Territory, where he first met Peter's mother. They were married in a Shawnee ceremony in 1675 and Peter's older sister was born the following year. Martin later went with La Salle on his 1679-1680 journey to Lake Erie, Lake Huron and Lake Michigan. He assisted in the construction of Fort Miami and Fort Crèvecoeur where, on 16 April 1680 he and six other men mutinied, looted and burned the fort, and fled. Martin spent the next several years traveling with a group of Shawnee and Susquehannock Indians.
Peter Chartier's mother was Sewatha Straight Tail daughter of Straight Tail Meaurroway Opessa of the Pekowi Shawnee.
Peter Chartier was born at French Lick on the Cumberland River in northeastern Tennessee, near the present-day site of Nashville, Tennessee, where his father ran a trading post for a short time. His Shawnee name was Wacanackshina which means "White one who reclines". Around 1697 he moved with his family to Pequea Creek in Lancaster County, Pennsylvania. Chartier married his first cousin, Blanceneige-Wapakonee Opessa, about 1710. They had three children: Francois "Pale Croucher", René "Pale Stalker", and Anna.
In 1717, Governor William Penn granted his father Martin a 300-acre tract of land along the Conestoga River in Lancaster County, Pennsylvania. Together they established a trading post in Conestoga Town. In 1718 they moved to Dekanoagah on the Yellow Breeches Creek near the Susquehanna River where his father died in April of that year.
Peter Chartier's father's funeral was attended by James Logan, the future Mayor of Philadelphia. Immediately afterwards, Logan seized Martin Chartier's 250-acre estate on the grounds that Martin owed him a debt of 108 pounds, 19 shillings and 3 and 3/4 pence. He had Peter and his family evicted, and expelled a community of Conestoga Indians who were also living on the property. He later sold the property to Stephen Atkinson for 30 pounds. Logan permitted Peter to maintain his trading post on the land as a tenant, and eventually Peter opened another post at Paxtang on the Susquehanna River. Although Peter Chartier eventually became a wealthy landowner, this experience with Logan embittered him, and was one of several factors causing him to turn against the Provincial Government.

Early career as a trader

On 3 November 1730 Peter Chartier was licensed by the English court in Lancaster County to trade with the Indians in the south-western Pennsylvania area. By 1732 Chartier had become well known as a negotiator between the Shawnees and the traders who came to sell them goods. The Quaker trader Edmund Cartlidge wrote to Governor Patrick Gordon on 14 May 1732:
I find Peter Chartiere well inclined, and stands firm by the interest of Pennsylvania, and very ready on all accounts to do all the service he can. And as he has the Shawnise Tongue very perfect, and well looked upon among them, he may do a great deal of good.

In September and October 1732, Chartier and Cartlidge served as interpreters during a conference in Philadelphia attended by Opakethwa and Opakeita, two Shawnee chiefs, with Thomas Penn, Governor Gordon and the 72-member Pennsylvania Provincial Council. With Chartier and the two chiefs was Quassenung, son of the Shawnee chief Kakowatcheky. The minutes of the conference record that both Opakethwa and Quassenung died of smallpox during their visit to Philadelphia.

Conflict with the colonial government

Alcohol abuse and Native Americans in Pennsylvania

Beginning around 1675 traders had been selling rum in Shawnee communities which had resulted in several violent deaths. In October 1701 the Pennsylvania Assembly had prohibited the sale of rum to the Indians, however as the law was poorly enforced and the penalty was light—a fine of ten pounds and confiscation of any illegal supplies—rum continued to be used to barter for furs. Traders soon began selling rum on credit in order to extort furs and skins and labor out of the Shawnees.
By the early 1700s the effects of alcohol abuse were damaging Shawnee communities. Rum as well as brandy and other distilled beverages had become important trade items and essential elements in diplomatic councils, treaty negotiations, and political transactions and had become part of Native American gift-giving rituals. The result was the erosion of civility, an increase in violence and widespread health problems. Alcohol made men less reliable hunters and allies, destabilized village economics and contributed to a rise in poverty. The minutes of the Provincial Council of Pennsylvania for 16 May 1704 record a complaint submitted by Chief Ortiagh of the Conestoga Indians:
Great quantities of rum continually brought to their town, insomuch as they ruined by it, having nothing left but have laid out all, even their clothes, for rum, and may now, when threatened with war, be surprised by their enemies when beside themselves with drink, and so be utterly destroyed.

Attempts to control the sale of alcohol to the Shawnee

On 24 April 1733 the Shawnee chiefs at "Allegania" sent a petition to Governor Gordon complaining that "There is yearly and monthly some new upstart of a trader without license, who comes amongst us and brings with him nothing but rum..." and asking permission to destroy the casks of rum: "We therefore beg thou would take it into consideration, and send us two firm orders, one for Peter Chartier, the other for us, to break in pieces all the so brought."
On 1 May 1734 this was followed by another letter dictated by several Shawnee chiefs to a trader, probably Jonah Davenport, listing the names of some fifteen traders who either had no license or had exhibited undesirable behavior such as frequent disputes or violence. Another seven, including Chartier, were named as being in good standing, and these would be permitted to bring up to 60 gallons of rum a year, as long as they could show a license. Chartier was described as "one of us, and he is welcome to come as long as he pleases... to bring what quantity he pleases..." The letter concludes, "And for our parts, if we see any other traders than those we desire amongst us, we will stave their and seize their goods." The Shawnee evidently felt that control over the sale of rum would reduce problems resulting from its abuse.

The prohibition of rum in Shawnee communities

By 1737 Chartier had become chief of the Pekowi Turtle Clan, with whom he was living. He apparently made the decision to prohibit the sale of rum in Shawnee communities in his area, and persuaded other chiefs to do the same. In a letter of 20 March 1738, addressed to Thomas Penn and Acting Governor James Logan, three Shawnee chiefs stated:
All our people being gathered together, we held a council together, to leave off drinking for the space of four years, and we all in general agreed to it, taking into consideration the ill consequences that attend it and what disturbance it makes, and that two of our brothers, the Mingoes, lost their lives in our towns by rum, and that we would live in peace and quietness and become another people... The proposal of stopping the rum and all strong liquors was made to the rest in the winter, and they were all willing. As soon as it was concluded of, all the rum that was in the Towns was all staved and spilled, belonging both to Indians and white people, which in quantity consisted of about forty gallons, that was thrown in the street, and we have appointed four men to stave all the rum or strong liquors that is brought to the Towns hereafter, either by Indians or white men, during the four years. We would be glad if our brothers would send strict orders that we might prevent the rum coming to the hunting cabins or to the neighboring towns. We have sent wampum to the French, to the Five Nations, to the Delaware... to tell them not to bring any rum to our towns, for we want none... so we would be glad if our brothers would inform the traders not bring any for we are sorry, after they have brought it a great way, for them to have it broke, and when they're once warned they will take care.

This letter was accompanied by a pledge, signed by ninety-eight Shawnees and by Chartier, agreeing that all rum should be spilled, and four men should be appointed for every town to see that no rum or strong liquor should be brought into their towns for the term of four years. Governor Patrick Gordon sent Chartier a reprimand, and traders continued to bring rum into Shawnee communities, including several traders who the Shawnees had requested be barred from their territory.
For several years the French government had been trying to win the support of indigenous communities for a war against the British, and in 1740 the Governor of New France, Charles de la Boische, Marquis de Beauharnois, attempted to persuade Chartier and other Shawnee leaders to meet in Montreal to discuss relocating to Detroit and forming an alliance. In a letter of 25 June 1740 Chartier declined, promising to visit Montreal the following year.
Tensions with the Pennsylvania government escalated in 1743 when on 6 June three traders appeared before the Pennsylvania Provincial Council saying that two others had been murdered and that they had been advised by the Shawnees to leave or they too would be killed. The governor regarded this as an act of provocation to violence, and sent a letter to the Pennsylvania Assembly alleging that Chartier's Native American heritage inclined him to have a "brutish disposition... and it is not to be doubted that a person of his savage temper will do us all the mischief he can."
In 1743 Chartier moved to Shannopin's Town, and established a trading post on the Allegheny River about twenty miles upstream from the forks of the Ohio near the mouth of Chartiers Run at what is now Tarentum, a place which later became known as Chartier's Old Town. Several Shawnee communities from the Chalahgawtha, Pekowi and Mekoche bands later resettled near Chartier's Old Town.

Chartier's flight from Pennsylvania

His efforts to protect his people from the influence of British traders having been frustrated, in April 1745 Chartier accepted a military commission from the French. Chartier had decided to lead his people away from the influence of rum-peddling traders, cutting off the lucrative supply of furs that the British received from the Shawnee in exchange for rum.
In July 1745 two traders, James Dunning and Peter Tostee appeared in Philadelphia claiming that they had been robbed on 18 April:
... as they were returning up the Allegheny River in canoes, from a trading trip, with a considerable quantity of furs and skins, Peter Chartier, late an Indian Trader, with about 400 Shawnese Indians, armed with guns, pistols and cutlasses, suddenly took them prisoners, having, as he said, a captain's commission from the King of France; and plundered them of all their effects to the value of sixteen hundred pounds.

The Pennsylvania provincial council issued an indictment of "Peter Chartier of Lancaster County... Labourer , being moved and seduced by the instigation of the Devil... falsely, traitorously, unlawfully and treasonably did compass, imagine and intend open war, insurrection and rebellion against our said Lord the King." Chartier's landholdings in Pennsylvania, totaling some 600 acres, were seized and turned over to Thomas Lawrence, a business partner of Edward Shippen, III.
Chartier led his Shawnee band to Lower Shawneetown on the Ohio River where they took refuge for a few weeks. Chartier and his people recognized that, by defying the Provincial Governor and accepting French patronage, they were now compelled to leave Pennsylvania. A French trader in Lower Shawneetown witnessed Chartier's Shawnees performing a two-day "Death Feast," a ceremony conducted before abandoning a village.
ic Shawnee band. From the History of the Indian Tribes of North America.Fortunately, the Shawnees were accustomed to relocating—Peter's father Martin had traveled with them from Illinois to Maryland in the early 1690s. The group now proceeded to Kentucky to establish a new community called Eskippakithiki. Fighting with Iroquois and Chickasaw, as well as a smallpox epidemic, led them to move south to the Coosa River in 1748, where they established the village of Chalakagay near what is now Sylacauga, Alabama. The warrior and chieftain Black Hoof, then a child, was a member of this Shawnee band and recalled it in later years.
In 1747 Chartier appeared in Detroit to meet with Roland-Michel Barrin de La Galissonière and explain why his Shawnees had chosen not to move to Detroit. The French had hoped to lure large numbers of Shawnees and other tribes away from British influence, but Chartier was the only leader to accept French patronage. His band preferred to settle on the Wabash, which is where they had been living when Martin Chartier first encountered them in 1674. After leaving Detroit, Chartier visited Terre Haute, Indiana and in 1749 he met Captain Pierre Joseph Céloron de Blainville at the forks of the Ohio, during the Colonel's "lead plate expedition". Céloron also reported passing through the abandoned ruins of Chartier's Old Town.
Chartier's Shawnee band split several times; many returned to Pennsylvania to join the British during the French and Indian war. Chartier and about 190 Shawnees eventually settled in Old Shawneetown, Illinois, however tensions immediately developed between them and the established tribes, the Illinois Confederation, the Piankashaw, the Kickapoos and the Mascoutin. Fighting ensued until Chartier signed a treaty brokered by the Marquis de Vaudreuil in Mobile, Alabama on 24 June 1750.
Chartier encouraged Vaudreuil to consider the Shawnees a unified nation, and reaffirmed Shawnee loyalty to the French: "is entire nation was entirely devoted to us ," the Marquis later wrote. "t is well to show this nation certain considerations in view of the fact that it has always been strongly attached to us." This was significant as the French tried to garner Native American loyalty in preparation for war.

Participation in the French and Indian War

In June 1754 Chartier was present with his Shawnee warriors and his two sons, Francois and René, at the death of Captain Joseph Coulon de Jumonville at the Battle of Jumonville Glen. In July 1754 he and his sons participated in the French victory over George Washington at the Battle of Fort Necessity. Both of Chartier's sons fought against the British in numerous engagements during the French and Indian War. René may have been killed with Cornstalk when he was detained at Fort Randolph in November 1777.

Death

Peter Chartier was last seen in 1758 in a village on the Wabash River, however he is mentioned later in a 1760 letter from Governor-General Vaudreuil-Cavagnial:
"In the last days of the month of June of , five Chaouoinons of 's band came...to ask him for a piece of ground, as theirs was not good. M. de MacCarty sent some provisions to those Indians, whom he placed near Fort Massac. They were more useful and less dangerous there than when collected together at Sonyote .

There is evidence that Chartier died in an outbreak of smallpox that had originated in 1757 in Quebec and later spread to Native American communities across North America.

Chartier's legacy

Historian Richard White characterizes Chartier's rise to power as unique among the Shawnee:
Chartier was a political chameleon whose changes in coloring reflected opportunities rather than convictions, but it is the scope of his transformation that is most revealing. Chartier's switch from a British to a French partisan is perhaps less significant than his metamorphosis from métis trader to Shawnee factional leader. Originally he was an important but marginal political figure, a man who acted through the chiefs, tying them to him through debts or gifts. Eventually he became a man who challenged chiefs, and ultimately, he acted like a chief himself...By 1750 he had legitimized his position.

Regulation of the sale of alcohol in Native American communities

Chartier's decision to join the French and to lead his community out of Pennsylvania sparked fears that French influence over Native Americans would motivate them to attack British settlements. Accordingly, the Pennsylvania provincial government took measures to comply with the repeated requests of Shawnee leaders to control the practice of trading rum for furs. On 7 May 1745, shortly after Chartier had announced his defection to the French, Lieutenant-Governor George Thomas issued a proclamation stating:
Whereas frequent complaints have been made by the Indians, and of late earnestly renewed, that divers gross irregularities and abuses have been committed in the Indian countries, and that many of their people have been cheated and inflamed to such a degree by means of strong liquors being brought and sold amongst them contrary to the said laws, as to endanger their own lives and the lives of others... I do hereby strictly enjoin the magistrates of the several counties within this province, and especially those of the county of Lancaster, where these abuses are mostly carried on, to be very vigilant.

Thomas strengthened the law against the sale of rum in indigenous communities, doubled the fine to twenty pounds, required a surety bond of one hundred pounds from anyone applying for a license to trade furs with Native Americans, required that the goods of traders traveling to indigenous communities be searched, and gave
...full power and authority to any Indian or Indians to whom rum or other strong liquors shall be hereafter offered for sale contrary to the said laws, to stave and break to pieces the cask or vessel in which such rum or other strong liquor is contained.

Although this was the most severe proclamation yet implemented to control the distribution of alcohol to Native Americans, it was also not strictly enforced and alcohol abuse continued to be an increasing problem in indigenous communities.

Native American self-determination

Historian Stephen Warren describes Peter Chartier as an "audacious example of independence infuriated Englishmen and Frenchmen alike," saying that Chartier
...encouraged Pan-Indian expressions of unity... He discovered valuable lessons in movement and reinvention and... turned Shawnee histories of migration and violence toward adoption of a new racial consciousness for Indian peoples in the eastern half of North America.

Warren argues that both Peter and his father Martin Chartier influenced the Shawnee attitudes towards their neighbors and rivals, both European and Native American:
The Shawnees... modeled themselves after men such as Martin and Peter Chartier, who moved between regions and empires in a single lifetime. Like the Chartiers, the Shawnees refused to acquiesce to French, English, or Iroquois "overlords." Frustratingly independent, Shawnee migrants made deliberate choices based on the realities of Indian slavery, intertribal warfare, and access to European trade goods.