The cutting edge of culture: British soldiers encounter Native Americans in the French and Indian war

Abstract

This chapter reveals relations between the British army and Native Americans during the French and Indian war. The war brought the British into closer contact with Native Americans, causing conflict over concerns of land ownership and equitable trade, and contributing to the construction of enduring racial stereotypes. The French and Indian war was implicitly fought over who would control North America’s wealth, and British soldiers were the means to this end. Indians were intimately involved in the conflict, fighting to maintain, at the least, the status quo ante. While British soldiers, like colonists before them, made a relatively painless adoption of scalping, they had greater difficulties dealing with Indians’ ritual torture and cannibalism. Social interaction with Indians was more worrisome to commanders, as it could lead to drunkenness, dereliction of duty and physical conflict. Whether they understood each other or not, soldiers and warriors seemed to desire to socialize with one another.