11“A Traveller”: News-Writers’ Nonsense, 20 May 1765 (Franklin Papers)
beginning with “making” and ending with “Lakes.” The report of a whale fishery in the Great Lakes (cited by Crane as from the
12Gottfried Achenwall: Some Observations on North America from Information of Dr. Franklin, [July 1766] (Franklin Papers)
...by other streams, and because of waterfalls, here and there partly by land several English miles, on to Oswego on Lake Ontario. Here the fairs for Indian trade are held. Lake Ontario is connected by water through the greater lakes lying inland with the
13To Benjamin Franklin from [Samuel Wharton], 2 December 1768 (Franklin Papers)
...frontier Settlements On the Ohio, In case of a Rupture, the War can be readily and at a little expence carried into the Indian Villages and They thereby be compelled to seek a Retreat, To the Westward of the great Lakes.
14From John Adams to George Washington, 6 January 1776 (Adams Papers)
...is in it, in the Progress of this War, as it is the Nexus of the Northern and Southern Colonies, as a Kind of Key to the whole Continent, as it is a Passage to Canada to the Great Lakes and to all the Indians Nations. No Effort to secure it ought to be omitted.
15To George Washington from John Adams, 6 January 1776 (Washington Papers)
...is in it, in the Progress of this War, as it is the Nexus of the Northern and Southern Colonies, as a Kind of Key to the whole Continent, as it is a Passage to Canada to the Great Lakes and to all the Indians Nations. No Effort to secure it ought to be omitted.
16From John Adams to James Warren, 16 June 1776 (Adams Papers)
will have nothing to interrupt their Communication, with Niagara, Detroit, Michilimachinac, they will have the Navigation of the five great Lakes quite as far as the Mississipi River, they will have a free Communication with all the numerous Tribes of Indians, extending along the Frontiers of all the Colonies, and by their Trinketts and Bribes will induce them to...
17To George Washington from Brigadier General Lachlan McIntosh, 3 April 1779 (Washington Papers)
...all the Nations held at sandusky, the result of which I am now informed is that the Wyandots are inclined to make peace with us. which I Judged would be the Case, or that they would remove over the Great Lakes.
18To George Washington from Brigadier General Lachlan McIntosh, 27 April 1779 (Washington Papers)
...in Concert with the other Army. and I should apprehend the Same would be necessary up the Susquahana as far as Tioga, which I think must Undoubtedly Remove the Northern as well as the Western Tribes over the great Lakes, or bring them to Terms, as they cannot otherwise think of planting so near our Garrisons, & Shew them we Mean to retaliate their Injurys by keeping possession of their...
19From George Washington to Thomas Jefferson, 10 July 1779 (Washington Papers)
...a French Canadian trader who served as a British scout and militia captain. Captured at Vincennes in late winter 1779, he remained a prisoner in Virginia until exchanged in 1781. After the war, La Mothe remained in the Great Lakes region and served as an Indian interpreter (see
20Motion Regarding the Western Lands, [6 September] 1780 (Madison Papers)
...or at least to the Mississippi River. South of the Ohio River, these jurisdictions of Virginia, the Carolinas, and Georgia did not seriously overlap, but between that stream and the Great Lakes and from the poorly defined western boundary of Pennsylvania to the Mississippi, Virginia claimed all, and New York, Massachusetts, and Connecticut claimed some, of the area. The alleged legality of...