Henry Hamilton (governor) - American War of Independence

American War of Independence

In 1775, Hamilton was appointed Lieutenant Governor and Superintendent of Indian Affairs at Fort Detroit, one of five newly created lieutenant governorships in the recently expanded Province of Quebec. The American Revolutionary War was already underway by the time Hamilton arrived at Detroit to assume his duties. Hamilton was in a difficult position: as a civil official, Hamilton had few regular troops at his command, and the natives of the region—French Canadians and American Indians—were not all supporters of the British regime. Normand Macleod, a local fur trader, acted as "town major" before Hamilton's arrival.

Hamilton became adept at diplomacy with American Indians, establishing good relations with local Indian leaders. Hamilton, an amateur artist, sketched portraits of many Native Americans while in Detroit, leaving what has been called the "earliest and largest collection of life portraits of Native Americans of the Upper Great Lakes." When the war began, British officials initially determined not to enlist Indians as allies in the war effort, but in 1777 Hamilton received instructions to encourage Indian raids against the American frontier settlements of Virginia and Pennsylvania. This was a controversial policy because it was realised that civilian colonists would inevitably be killed in these raids. Hamilton attempted to limit civilian casualties by sending British officers and French-Canadian militia with the American Indian war parties. Nevertheless, hundreds of settlers in Kentucky and western Pennsylvania were killed and scalped by raiding parties during the war. In Detroit, Hamilton is alleged to have paid bounties for prisoners and scalps brought in by the Indians. He became hated by American settlers, who dubbed him the "Hair-buyer General".

In 1778, Virginia forces under Colonel George Rogers Clark captured several undermanned British posts in the Illinois country, including Fort Sackville at Vincennes. Hamilton set out from Detroit on 7 October 1778 to recapture the post, 600 miles away. His small force gathered Native American allies along the way, and entered Vincennes on 17 December 1778, capturing Fort Sackville and the American commandant, Captain Leonard Helm. In February 1779, however, Colonel Clark returned to Vincennes in a surprise march, recapturing the outpost and taking Hamilton prisoner.

Because of his support of the Indian raids, the Virginians regarded Hamilton as a war criminal rather than a conventional prisoner of war. Clark sent Hamilton to Williamsburg, Virginia, where he was jailed and often kept in irons by Governor Thomas Jefferson. Jefferson finally granted Hamilton parole at the instructions of General George Washington. In early 1781, Hamilton was exchanged and travelled to London.