Thread 17945373

What would you say is the most decisive battle in the entire American-Indian Wars? The battle which, after it's completion, made western expansion to the Pacific inevitable?

For me I'd say it has to be one of these four, and more likely one of the first two. No subsequent Native confederacies ever even approached the sizes of the Northwestern and Tecumseh confederacies, and they never again received any real foreign power support.

I’d give the edge to Fallen Timbers, Tecumseh never saw the success that Blue Jacket and Little Turtle had, and the failures of the preceding Harmar and St. Clair expeditions put serious pressure on the Washington Administration. Plus, British support was more difficult for Tecumseh because the Jay Treaty (with the accompanying handover of Detroit) was negotiated and ratified around the same time as Greenville.

I would say Tippecanoe because it marked a turning point for both sides. The Yanks effectively blunted Tecumseh’s plan of uniting one big happy Indian Confederacy to stand up against the US.

>>17945373 (OP)
>What would you say is the most decisive battle in the entire American-Indian Wars?

The American Civil War, Natives never had the demographics or industrial base to realistically stand up on their own. But the Confederate States winning the Civil War would have most definitely thrown a wrench into Western expansion and possibly allowed at least the Plains Indians to force terms with the United States that would have been more in their favor.