Pontiac (Obwandiyag) (1720–1769)

AbstractBorn in obscurity and destined to lie in an unmarked grave, Pontiac nonetheless became one of the most famous Indians in the history of North America, though much of his fame was owed to white men writing about him long after his death. A war chief of the Ottawa tribe who inhabited the eastern half of Michigan and parts of Ohio and Ontario, Pontiac fought alongside the French in their wars with Britain between 1744 and 1763. The Ottawa, like most of the Great Lakes Indian tribes, had close relations with the French through the fur trade. David Dixon, author of a study of Pontiac's uprising, believes that it is “entirely possible” that Pontiac led Ottawa warriors in the French and Indian ambush of Braddock's column on the Monongahela in 1755 (Dixon 2006: 62). He was one of the many Western Indian leaders who believed that the war was not over in 1763 but that the French would return to battle on to victory.