America Almost Lost This War… And Nobody Talks About It

Added: 2026-05-28

[00:00:00]What's up, guys? Welcome back to my channel. And if you're new here, welcome to our little corner of the internet.

[00:00:04]Today, we're going to be watching a video titled The Forgotten War. They don't teach you About. Let's see what this video is about.

[00:00:12]A myth about America's westward expansion. It goes like this. America grew quickly, buying or taking land by force as it pushed towards the Pacific Ocean. While the indigenous people of the land resisted, nothing could stop the new country's march. At least that's how the story goes. But what if I told you that almost didn't happen and that America almost got stopped right here?

[00:00:42]As the US celebrated its independence, a powerful tribal alliance was gathering that would hand the new country one of its most devastating military defeats ever in a powerful act of resistance.

[00:00:57]This is a story of native resistance to defend their land and the true origins of America's expansion.

[00:01:05]>> How do Americans feel about this like this whole this whole, you know, I don't know. It's kind of sad. Oh, just a just a little bit.

[00:01:21]>> Our story starts in September 1783 with the signing of the Treaty of Paris, which officially ended the Revolutionary War. In the agreement, Britain not only recognized American independence, it also handed over vast lands east of the Mississippi River. The only problem, most of that land wasn't actually Britain's to give. It belonged to indigenous peoples who had lived there for thousands of years and whose representatives were conveniently left out of the meeting.

[00:01:54]>> This is of course a world war, right? So it involves lots of other uh nations at the table, but some very important nations were missing. That treaty-m process was to for colonial powers to decide how they would how they envisioned proceeding forward with negotiations with tribal nations with the ultimate goal in mind of carving up lands for themselves.

[00:02:15]>> Many native tribes were appalled by the treaty and they rejected America's claims that indigenous people >> I mean it makes all the sense in the world >> had lost the war. So the same month that the treaty was signed, 35 native nations came up with a new plan on the shore of Lake Erie. Forming a strategic alliance, they agreed to uphold a boundary that was previously set by the 1768 treaty of Fort Stanwick, the Ohio River. They decided that no more land would be seated without their unanimous consent.

[00:02:53]These nations included the Shaunis, Miamiis, Delawarees, Cherokees, Hodoni, and others. Some of the tribes called this area their original homeland.

[00:03:06]Others had been pushed here by European aggression.

[00:03:09]>> This system of alliances um wasn't uh born solely from this period of wars with the Americans or what we call the Bishamsa wars. Um it predates it. Um, but it was a very powerful cultural tool for us to use to help resist American attempts to seize our homelands through force.

[00:03:29]>> With the alliance in Wait, I need to put the arrow conditioning on because this hot and okay, much better place. Native leaders pushed back on a series of American attempts to negotiate for territory. But this didn't stop US representatives from signing treaties with individual and smaller groups of nations. And they sometimes resorted to underhanded tactics to secure their agreements like mistransating treaties or getting them signed under coercion or by unauthorized tribal members.

[00:04:04]>> No, that's nasty.

[00:04:07]That's nasty. Building on the 1783 alliance, 11 nations met three years later at a council by the Detroit River.

[00:04:17]These nations had different cultures and politics, but they came together under a common cause, officially forming the United Nations.

[00:04:29]This multinational alliance committed to defending the Ohio River boundary against encroaching white settlers. They made their intentions clear in a communicate warning the US government that the alliance would not be at fault if conflict ensued and that they would use their united force to defend their rights. Meanwhile, the fledgling US government could hardly control its settlers even if it wanted to. In the mid 1780s, a weak Congress was the only national government. States were constantly bickering with each other about borders and trade. The Continental Army had been disbanded. There was no post office or federal mint and the country was broke. The US owed about $79 million in domestic and foreign war debt and defaulted on its loans from France in 1787. Congress needed to fix its finances quick. So they hatched a scheme. They could sell newly acquired land to speculators or investors. In October, Congress issued an official call for proposals and kicked off a land rush. Bids for millions of acres flooded in from land speculators who are often wealthy lawyers, planters, former continental officers with ties to politicians or were in Congress themselves. But the United States was promising land that wasn't theirs to get.

[00:05:57]>> This is like This reminds me of like Okupas in Spain. like they go they go into an apartment that's not theirs, then they either live there or they rent it out and is it was not theirs in the first place. It's kind of crazy. Driven by dreams of unbridled profit margins, speculators bet that even though these lands were contested by native nations, the US government could secure it one way or another. Within a year, Congress sold nearly 35 million acres of unseated land northwest of the Ohio River. These private contract >> Oh my god, that would be so crazy though to buy some land and then and then and then you move there and then suddenly all the people come in like I wonder if that happened. Probably didn't. But still >> northwest of the Ohio River. These private contracts went to investors like the Ohio Company, Sciota Company, and a prominent speculator named William Dur.

[00:06:55]Remember that name. He is going to be important later. By the end of the 1780s, the government had made huge bets promising unseated native land. Yet, land surveyors and frontier settlers in the Northwest Territory constantly skirmished with tribes defending their land. These early Americans demanded protection and were beginning to question their new government's capability and even legitimacy. So, Congress decided they would take the land through bloodshed. In the fall of 1790, President George Washington sent General Josiah Harmar and400 troops to destroy the Miami town of Kikionga in response to Miami >> this is really sad >> raids on settlers. This was the first US battle postrevolutionary war. Warriors of the Alliance ambush Harmmer's troops armed with superior fighting skills and knowledge of the land. Chief Little Turtle of the Miamiis and Chief Blue Jacket of the Shaunies led Miami, Shaunie, and Ottawa forces to a decisive victory. The alliance's win was a wakeup call for the US and successfully stalled surveys and settlements in the area.

[00:08:12]However, this victory came at a cost. As Harmer's trees retreated, they burned five native villages along the Malami River and burned massive amounts of crucial food stores just before winter.

[00:08:26]President Washington hoped the victory was a fluke and quickly sent another contingent the following year, led by General Arthur St. Clair. St. Clair led 1400 troops to the banks of the Wabash River, where they were promptly crushed by native forces. Some estimates say more than half of St. Clair's troops were killed or wounded in the battle, making it one of the worst defeats in US history. Here's how it happened. The Alliance forces were confident after their last win, and they were well supplied with weapons from the British, who still maintained forts in the region. Native scouts, including a young Tecumpsa, who later became a famed Shauny Warchief, easily tracked the US Army's noisy, wagonheavy approach.

[00:09:14]>> The genius of the encircle, the envelopment that the tribal nations had done to Sinclair's uh forces. He they had trapped him in a B.

[00:09:24]>> Have you guys heard of this story before? Cuz I've never heard of this before.

[00:09:28]with a bog land behind them which led to the decimation a true decimation of uh his army.

[00:09:35]>> On the American side, St. Clair was ill almost the whole time and his troops were untrained, barely paid and prone to abandoning the fight. Perhaps the army's biggest weakness, ironically, was thanks to William Der, the land speculator I mentioned earlier. Derer had received a private contract from the government worth $175,000 to supply the new army. Der used $75,000 to pay off his personal debt and gave another 10,000 to his friend, Secretary of War Henry Knox, to speculate land in Maine. Derer had totally sold out the troops. When news of St. Clair's utter defeat hit, it shocked society. In a flurry of newspaper articles and pamphlets, citizens criticized the government and accused it of corruption at the highest levels. One person wrote in the Boston Gazette, "Who stood to profit from the war, "The Indian War was cruel and unjust. The nation already had more land than it could settle for at least a century." For land speculation companies like the Ohio Company, their shares tumbled in value. William Derer went bankrupt after an unrelated financial panic and spent the remaining years of his life in prison for debt.

[00:10:55]Momentum was on the side of the native tribes. War Secretary Henry Knox was terrified that the alliance could grow even stronger with the addition of southern tribes. So in February 1793, President Washington gathered his cabinet to try to make a deal with the tribal alliance. They proposed still taking over the land, but this time they would pay for it. The reply came signed by 16 native nations. They rejected the deal outright, holding firm to the Ohio River boundary. Instead, they suggested the US take the money and use it to deport settlers from their country. The nations of the alliance had asserted their might and sovereignty and had stopped US expansion.

[00:11:44]This is obviously not how the story ends. So what happened? In March 1792, Congress had passed an act expanding the president's power to draft militia forces. I love how when we watch history videos like this is supposed to be a reaction channel but I'm so fascinated that I just go cuz I just I have never heard of this.

[00:12:06]It's so interesting to hear into a standing army named the Legion of the United States. A year after the Naval Alliance rejected the US's deal in 1794, the Army returned to the Ohio region with 2,200 infantry and500 Kentucky militia men led by General Mad Anthony Wade. Around this time, Chief Little Turtle began pushing to negotiate peace with the Americans, fearing that their forces had grown too strong. But he could not convince the council, and so the fighting continued. Although the Alliance held its ground, its strength was starting to weaken. The sheer number of native forces, crop destruction by the hands of the Americans, and bad weather had put a strain on food supplies. The alliance had also lost Britain support. It was busy fighting a war against France and would soon leave their force in the region to ease tensions with the US. Finally, the alliance's bond suffered from growing rifts between tribes and American attempts to seow distrust. On August 20th, 1794, the US won decisively at the Battle of Fallen Timbers. Following the battle, US forces once again burned villages and fields. The next year, the alliance signed the Treaty of Greenville after months of negotiation. The treaty seated twothirds of Ohio land, portions of Indiana, and the future city of Chicago. But it >> I also wonder when they were selling the land and this land as well, how do they choose it? Cuz there's just random blobs like every it's not like one mass. It >> also allowed native people to hunt and move through these seated territories in contrast to the treaties that would later follow.

[00:13:50]>> It's a document that really lays out how we're going to um live at peace with each other. Um, and it in the end it doesn't endure, right? Many leaders on the US side as even as they're signing this treaty, they know there's going to be future treaties and they already have in their minds the notion that indigenous people will either disappear um or be assimilated into um the US society that the future is not to be as neighbors. But I think many indigenous people really did believe this document was going to lay out a way for us to live um as >> Oh my god, this the way they explain it is so freaking sad. I can't help but my heart I'm not laughing because it's funny cuz it's not funny. But I'm laughing because I'm overwhelmed by emotion right now and I don't want to cry >> neighbors with each other.

[00:14:38]>> Although the alliance's victories were short-lived, these wins were historic.

[00:14:44]Through coalition building, they tapped into incredible strength that pose a real threat to the growing US empire. A number of the alliance's native warriors continued the fight and went west with leaders like Tecumpsa, who continued to resist US expansion. Ultimately, American colonizers pushed many native tribes from the Ohio area into reservations where many nations live alongside one another today. So, what can we learn from this moment in history? Let's go back to the myth of America's founding. The country's westward expansion wasn't predestined.

[00:15:20]It didn't simply unfold like the opening of a map. Instead, our earliest expansion was driven by two things. The need to pay off more debt and the greed of wealthy land speculators ready to turn a profit. Both coming at the cost of native lives and land stewardship. By turning land into a financial asset to be bought and sold, the American government founded the republic on a radically different relationship to the land. For native tribes resisting expansion, they weren't just defending their ancestral homelands. They were defending their sovereignty and way of life. And they're still fighting today.

[00:16:00]>> Tribal nations are alive and well. We don't exist solely on the pages of history books. Despite all pressures and all forces, to the contrary, we yet remain.

[00:16:11]>> What do you think about this turning point in American history? Did anything surprise you? Let us know in the comments. Thanks for watching. Before you go, we want to hear your feedback.

[00:16:22]Every year, PBS Digital Studios sends out an audience survey, which we use to help understand what you enjoy on YouTube.

[00:16:29]>> I love their setup. It's so beautiful. I guess the last part is >> well represented in the polls.

[00:16:37]>> Yeah, that was a very interesting one.

[00:16:39]I've never heard about this story before. Have you guys heard about it?

[00:16:42]Someone let me know. Someone let me know. Let me know your thoughts in the comments below, guys. Thank you for joining me for this one. Please leave a like, subscribe if you haven't yet, and I'll see you guys in the next video.

[00:16:54]Bye.