Colonial American Newspapers
The news in America's newspapers in the first six months of 1754 was not good. England's long-time enemy and challenger for control of North
America, France, had, with the assistance of Native American allies, scored a series of victories over English colonial troops from the backcountry of
Virginia through New England. Fear that France would soon make a move to drive all the English out of North America seemed ready to become reality.
A distraught Virginia Governor Robert Dinwiddie had warned the colony's assemblymen that the very "Welfare of all the Colonies on this Continent" was in jeopardy from the French and their Native American friends. To make sure the House of Burgesses members truly understood the implications of the threat, the governor painted this bloody portrait of what awaited all the English if the French and their allies were not stopped:
Think you see the Infant torn from the unavailing Struggles of the distracted Mother, the Daughters ravished before the Eyes of their wretched Parents; and then, with Cruelty and insult, butcherd and scalped. Suppose the horrid Scene compleated, and the whole Family, Man, Wife, and Children (as they were) murdered and scalped . . . and then torn in Pieces, and in Part devoured by wild Beasts, for whom they were left a Prey by their more brutal Enemies.1
Dinwiddie concluded by telling those in the Assembly that the "Season for entering upon Action" was at hand.
The words of Governor Dinwiddie and the actions of the French and
Indians echoed through the pages of America's newspapers in 1754. The news of the war continued unabated in America's press until the French officially relinquished land claims in North America in 1763, and the vast majority of Native Americans east of the Mississippi River either died fighting, succumbed to peace treaties with the English settlers, or moved westward. This research looks at newspaper
America, France, had, with the assistance of Native American allies, scored a series of victories over English colonial troops from the backcountry of
Virginia through New England. Fear that France would soon make a move to drive all the English out of North America seemed ready to become reality.
A distraught Virginia Governor Robert Dinwiddie had warned the colony's assemblymen that the very "Welfare of all the Colonies on this Continent" was in jeopardy from the French and their Native American friends. To make sure the House of Burgesses members truly understood the implications of the threat, the governor painted this bloody portrait of what awaited all the English if the French and their allies were not stopped:
Think you see the Infant torn from the unavailing Struggles of the distracted Mother, the Daughters ravished before the Eyes of their wretched Parents; and then, with Cruelty and insult, butcherd and scalped. Suppose the horrid Scene compleated, and the whole Family, Man, Wife, and Children (as they were) murdered and scalped . . . and then torn in Pieces, and in Part devoured by wild Beasts, for whom they were left a Prey by their more brutal Enemies.1
Dinwiddie concluded by telling those in the Assembly that the "Season for entering upon Action" was at hand.
The words of Governor Dinwiddie and the actions of the French and
Indians echoed through the pages of America's newspapers in 1754. The news of the war continued unabated in America's press until the French officially relinquished land claims in North America in 1763, and the vast majority of Native Americans east of the Mississippi River either died fighting, succumbed to peace treaties with the English settlers, or moved westward. This research looks at newspaper