Embedded Files
The year 1763 saw an end to the Seven Years war in Europe. However, tensions were on the rise in North America between British settlers, French settlers and Amerindians. There were two main issues facing the British Crown. The first issue was what colonial possessions of France would the British acquire in the Treaty of Paris? This problem was quickly solved when “the peace treaty was formally ratified in Paris and passed in the British parliament”[1]in 1763. However, the boundaries of the former colony of New France were never formally defined. The second issue was what the British would do with the Amerindian population and its continued rebellion against British colonial rule under the leadership of Pontiac.
The British Crown needed to move quickly in an attempt to quell the problems within North America before they got out of control. The expediency in which problems were erupting in North America required a quick response from the government in London. However, the issues concerning Amerindian nations required extensive consultation and treaty making. The Proclamation of 1763, therefore, was meant as a temporary measure in order to pacify the Amerindian populations by the Crown until further treaties could be signed. The proclamation also clarified the borders and governing structure of the territories that the British possessed in North America following the Treaty of Paris on a permanent basis. In order to fully understand the reasons as to why issues in British North America required both temporary and permanent solutions, the causes, clauses of the Proclamation of 1763 and the reactions to the proclamation need to be fully investigated.
The causes for the issuance of the Proclamation of 1763 are easier to explain if each factor is isolated individually. One of the main causes was the French defeat following the Seven Years War in Europe and the British Conquest of North America. The French, “in September 1760,… burned their standards, boarded ships and went home.”[2]These French troops left behind French speaking farmers and businessmen that needed to be dealt with. Also, what borders would the former French colony be allowed to keep? Therefore, the solution to this issue was to define the colony’s boundaries and to define how this new British colony was going to be governed. These French troops left behind French speaking farmers and businessmen that needed to be dealt with. Also, what borders would the former French colony be allowed to keep? Therefore, the solution to this issue was to define the colony’s boundaries and to define how this new British colony was going to be governed.
Another problem was the Amerindian reaction to the signing of the Treaty of Paris on the 10th of February 1763 by France. The concern of the Amerindians was made known to the British superintendent general of Indian affairs, Sir. William Johnson,[3]by his deputy, George Croghan, who was stationed at Fort Pitt. Croghan wrote:
By letters I have rec’d from Major Gladwin & Cap’t Campbell (at Detroit) it appears that the Indians in them parts are very uneasy in their minds, since they have heard that so much of the Country is ceded to Great Britain, and indeed Indian Nations hereabouts are full as uneasy, as till now they always expected Canada would be given back to the French on a Peace. They say the French had no Right to give up their Country to the English.[4]
The problem, as George Croghan was noting, was that the Amerindians believed the war was “the concern of the combatants in which they (the Aboriginals) were involved only as fighting allies; they had no conception that their lands were at stake.”[5]Also, the Amerindians pointed out that they had not been conquered, it was the French. Therefore, the Amerindians were questioning how the French were giving Amerindian land to the English without Amerindian permission.
Another issue the Amerindians were concerned about was the westward expansion of American settlement onto, what the Amerindians claimed, to be their lands. Also, the Amerindian allies of the British during the war believed that their people would be receiving better trade deals. These better trade deals did not materialize following the capitulation of the French. Leading Amerindian Historian Olive Patricia Dickason in her book, Canada’s First Nations: A History of Founding Peoples from Earliest Times, outlines the Amerindian problem:
Britain’s Amerindian allies had been led to believe that once the French were driven out, encroaching settlers would also go; but when the French left, more settlers than ever moved into their territories. The allies had been promised that with peace they would be getting better deals in trade; instead, British traders raised their prices, claiming that the had had to sell unprofitably low during the war. During hostilities the British co-operated with Amerindian leaders to limit the liquor trade in order to preserve them as allies, but with peace they displayed much less interest in protecting the Natives from the traffic that was so deleterious to them yet highly profitable to settlers. Traders swarmed into Amerindian territory, where they all to often behaved badly; the Amerindians were powerless to control them, and colonial governments found it inexpedient to do so. The British were aware that such behaviour and malpractices were causing the Amerindians to desert from their alliances.[6]
The Amerindians were agitated that European traders were not being adequately supervised in their business deals with Amerindian nations. The British needed to move quickly to quell the problem before an Amerindian rebellion occurred.
While the Proclamation of 1763 was being drafted in London, a rebellion amongst Amerindians erupted. On the 7th of May 1763 Fort Detroit came under siege by Amerindians who were led by an Ottawa War Chief, Pontiac. At Fort Detroit, the British wanted to end the siege before relations with Amerindian tribes further deteriorated. This lead to Sir William Johnson to send out Wampum belts to reconfirm with their Amerindian allies that the British “had no intention to possess or claim Aboriginal territory in the vicinity of Detroit.”[7]The circulation of Wampum belts seemed to work as the siege of Detroit ended in 1763. However, a more likely explanation would be that the Amerindians needed to reach their winter hunting grounds before winter set in.[8]By the end of the uprising, Pontiac had led an Amerindian coalition that would ultimately bring down eight British forts and lay siege to both British forts located at Pittsburgh and Detroit.[9]The British needed to quell the situation in North America through the autumn and winter months if there was any hope of repairing the strained relations between themselves and their Amerindian allies.
While Pontiac’s uprising was raging in North America, British officials in London were drafting new regulations to sort out the British problems in North America. Lord Egremont, the secretary of state for the Southern Department, by May of 1763 had already determined the basic policy and turned over the document to the proper administrative channels in order to secure an official proclamation. Lord Egremont, therefore, turned to the British Board of Trade for assistance.[10]The British Board of Trade called upon their secretary, John Pownall,[11]to edit Lord Egremont’s proposed policies for British North America. Franklin B. Wickwire, in his article “John Pownall and British Colonial Policy,” examines Pownall’s contemplations over the Proclamation in terms of its relations to the problems concerning Amerindian lands and how the proclamation was eventually proclaimed:
Pownall objected to the division of Canada into two parts, although Egremont had suggested it, and the Board did not ever advise partition. The Proclamation adopted as a western boundary for the colonies the geographical line Secretary Pownall proposed. Although the need for establishing such a line had long been agreed upon, its precise location had never been settled. After its second report on August 5 the Board drafted the Proclamation. Attorney General Charles Yorke examined it. Pownall re-examined it and altered some parts, stressing in the document the temporary nature of the policy of limiting westward expansion. The Council then approved the Proclamation and …King [George III] signed it.[12]
With the Proclamation of 1763 outlining the division of lands and how the colonies of North America would be governed proclaimed in England, the process of peacefully implementing the policies in North America needed to be undertaken.
The Proclamation of 1763 was issued in order to solve the many issues in British territories in North America. The first issue that was most pressing was what the new boundaries of the old French colonies would be and how the British intended to govern the new territories. The proclamation of 1763 made the boundaries clear when it says:
The government of Quebec bounded on the Labrador Coast by the River St. John, and from thence by a Line drawn from the Head of that River through the Lake of St. John, to the South end of the Lake Nipissim; from whence the said Line, crossing the River St. Lawrence, and the Lake Champlain, in 45. Degrees of North Latitude, passes along the High Lands which divide the Rivers that empty themselves into the said River St. Lawrence from those which fall into the Sea; and also along the North Coast of the Baye des Chaleurs, and the Coast of the Gulph of St. Lawrence to Cape Rosieres, and from thence crossing the Mouth of the River St. Lawrence by the West End of the Island of Anticosti, terminates at the aforesaid River of St. John.[13]
The boundaries were meant to be a permanent solution for the British government for two purposes. The first purpose was to establish boundaries for how large a colony the new colonial government would control. The second purpose was to clarify the Amerindian issue of boundaries. Historically, the French colonies had claimed a vast territory from today’s Quebec City, along the St. Lawrence to the Great Lakes and south and westward of the Appalachian Mountains to the Gulf of Mexico. Thus, the British wanted to clarify for the Amerindians which lands the new British colony would occupy.
The governance of the former French colony in North America by the British was also explained. The British placed governors in the new colonies to begin implementing British governing institutions. These governors were to create colonial legislatures that were to oversee colonial matters under existing British legislation.
The governance of the former French colony in North America by the British was also explained. The British placed governors in the new colonies to begin implementing British governing institutions. These governors were to create colonial legislatures that were to oversee colonial matters under existing British legislation.[14]The British had successfully outlined on a permanent basis the boundaries and the governance of how the new British colonies acquired from France after the Treaty of Paris.
The second purpose of the Proclamation of 1763 was to appease the Amerindian nations in their concerns about British trade and settlement west of the Appalachian Mountains on a temporary basis. The setting of boundaries on a temporary basis by the British was meant to limit British colonial expansion until a firm peace treaty could be negotiated between the British and Amerindian nations.[15]This meant that the British, “acknowledged the existence of aboriginal [land] title and established the Crown as protector of that title.”[16]To further strengthen relations with Amerindians, the proclamation said that only representatives of the British Crown in London could negotiate and accept transfers of lands from Amerindian control to British colonial control. This clause of the proclamation was intended, as historian Arthur Ray notes, “to protect Indians from unscrupulous land speculators and…[to] minimize the risk of alienating”[17]the Amerindian nations any further. Therefore, the Amerindian nations would be appeased that they would only have to deal with appointed officers of the British Crown and not the many unscrupulous land companies or settlers looking to acquire land cheaply.
The proclamation also outlined what the British believed Amerindian lands were left. Olive Patricia Dickason in her book, Canada’s First Nations: A History of Founding Peoples from Earliest Times, wrote that in practice “this meant lands beyond the Appalachian Mountains and the western borders of Quebec, about a third of the North American interior…”[18]were believed to still be under Amerindian control.[19]The Amerindian nations would benefit from these clauses of the proclamation because the Amerindians could now see what land possessions the British were claiming and what the British saw as being aboriginal territory.
The proclamation, as Dr. Dickason also points out, had some faults with it as well. For example, the proclamation “did not apply to Rupert’s land, whatever its boundaries were, deemed to be under the jurisdiction of the HBC [(Hudson Bay Company)]; neither was it operative in the Arctic, which in any event had a different land-use pattern.”[20]This lack of clarity in terms of the Arctic and Rupert’s land can easily be explained because Amerindian resistance to British settlement had not originated from these areas in this time period. In fact, these areas of North America saw the British owned Hudson Bay Company and Amerindians peacefully trading with each other during this time period. Where the main problems of Amerindian resistance to British colonial expansion had occurred was south of the Great Lakes and west of the Appalachian Mountains. Thus, the Proclamation of 1763 was only intended to temporarily deal with the areas of contention between British settlers and Amerindian nations until further negotiations could be held.
The proclamation also explained the British Crown’s position on existing settlers and which British subjects were allowed on the new Amerindian Territory. All settlers, under the proclamation, that currently inhabited territory outside of the British land claim were to be removed. Also, only licensed traders by the British Crown and members of the British military were allowed to enter Amerindian territory. These clauses were meant to appease the Amerindian nations by removing any British settlers from Amerindian lands and trying to ensure only British controlled traders could engage in business with the Amerindian population.
The reaction, the consequences and the problems of the Proclamation of 1763 took time to be noticed and acknowledged by the officials of the British Crown and the Amerindian nations. The American colonial response, however, came quickly. George Washington, the future first president of the United States, believed the Proclamation of 1763 was a positive piece of British policy. Washington wrote that “I can never look upon that Proclamation in any other light…then as a temporary expedient to quiet the Minds of the Indians and must fall of course in a few years especially when those Indians are consenting to our Occupying the Lands.”[21]Thus, the American colonial leaders believed that the Proclamation of 1763 was a mere temporary measure before a more permanent solution could be negotiated with Amerindian nations.
The American colonial governments chose to support the proclamation on land settlement on the basis that the proclamation was temporary in nature. Thus, when the Loyal Land Company called on the governor of Virginia and the House of Burgesses for a renewal of its land grants west of the Appalachian mountains, both refused. The Loyal Land Company, recognizing the ruling colonial government’s authority, only settled the 200,000 acres of the company’s land grants on the east side of the proclamation line by 1768.[22]The Loyal Land Company and other companies would have to wait for the signing of the Treaty of Fort Stanwix before being allowed to settle land west of the Appalachian Mountains.
However, before the Treaty of Fort Stanwix was signed by Sir William Johnson and the Amerindian nations, other treaties were signed between Johnson’s department of Indian Affairs and Amerindian nations. Johnson received a copy of the proclamation in December of 1763 and “immediately made plans to convene a great council meeting at Niagara.”[23]On the 31 of July 1764, “Johnson reaffirmed the Covenant Chain with delegates from the western nations, who represented the people of the Upper Great Lakes region.”[24]However, the meeting did not discuss territorial issues and Pontiac, the leader of the uprising against the British, was not present. Pontiac’s absence would be rectified when Johnson dispatches two separate treaty-signing parties to Fort Detroit in 1765.[25]
Perhaps the reasons territorial issues were not discussed was because Sir William Johnson did not want the Amerindian nations to know about the land dealings within his department and the British military stationed in North America that were contrary to the clauses laid out in the Proclamation of 1763. Victor Lytwyn and Dean Jacobs provide several key examples of British officials flagrantly disregarding the Proclamation of 1763:
For example, Lieutenant-Colonel Campbell witnessed a deed on 3 September 1765 involving a tract of land on the south side of the Detroit River granted by Pontiac to George MacDougall,….Colonel Croghan, also witnessed that deed, as well as at least four other deeds in the days and weeks to follow.[26]
These land dealings became so rampant that in 1771 Major-General Thomas Gage issued a warning to officers based at Fort Detroit to end the private land deals. However, the land deals did not end there because in 1774 Commander-in-Chief Fredrick Haldimand was forced to send a copy of the Proclamation of 1763 to Fort Detroit in order to remind his officers of British land policy. The land dealings had become so rampant that negotiations between the Sir William Johnson and the Amerindian nations needed to be held soon.
Johnson convened a meeting at Fort Stanwix in 1768. The negotiations at Fort Stanwix were to complete negotiations between the British Crown and Amerindians on further British settlement west of the Appalachian Mountains. Thus, the Treaty at Fort Stanwix was meant to remove the temporary restrictions in a peaceful manner. As Canadian historians Margaret Conrad, Alvin Finkel and Cornelius Jaenen note in their book, History of the Canadian Peoples: Beginnings to 1867, the Treaty of Fort Stanwix did not result in peace:
More than three thousand Natives, mostly Iroquois and their allies, met with Johnson at Fort Stanwix in 1768 to establish a permanent boundary between white settlers and Indian hunting grounds. The Iroquois abandoned much of the Ohio country to white settlement. Since neither the Iroquois nor the British could control the people they claimed to bargain for, the new boundary line was widely ignored. As independent traders and settlers clashed Native communities, the Anglo-American frontier dissolved into Chaos.[27]
The Treaty of Fort Stanwix failed to peacefully end the fraudulent land deals that had been occurring amongst British officials in North America. The treaty only inflamed relations between British settlers and local Amerindian tribes. The treaty failed because the Iroquois nations had signed over lands that belonged to Shawnees, Delaware and Cherokee tribes.[28]Thus, conflict began to erupt as the British settlers came into contact with the Amerindian nations in the form of Lord Dunmore’s war of 1774. However, this was not the only action by British officials that caused conflict in British colonies of North America.
In the former French colony of Quebec, the British Crown were attempting to anglicize the population via immigration from the British Isles and by introducing British institutions. However, by 1772, Sir Guy Carleton, the Governor of Quebec, believed that “’barring a catastrophe shocking to think (Carelton probably meant smallpox), this country must, to the end of time, be peopled by the Canadian race’…[and] must be governed by institutions and practices familiar to them.”[29]The Quebec Act of 1774 would allow Carleton’s beliefs to become reality. The Quebec Act set forth the right for the Catholic Church to collect tithes and the colony was allowed to use French civil law again. However, in order to prevent the new English merchants in Montreal from rebelling, the fur trade to the west was reopened to Quebec merchants in 1774.[30]The Quebec Act was only meant to appease the French population and not to supersede the boundaries or governing structure set out in the Proclamation of 1763. However, the Quebec Act was meant to ensure the Quebec colony did not join the thirteen American colonies in rebellion.
The Proclamation of 1763 was proposed by the British Crown in order to settle the remaining issues in British North America. The Proclamation solved the problem of boundaries and governance in the former French colony of Quebec on a permanent basis. Also the Quebec Act further satisfied the former French colonists by further strengthening the Catholic Church through tithes and re-introducing Civil Law. The proclamation also solved the Amerindians concerns over the French signing of the Treaty of Paris and British settlers by declaring the boundaries for settlement until further negotiations could occur and the eventual signing of the Treaty of Fort Stanwix in 1768. The Proclamation of 1763 was meant as both a permanent solution to some issues while being a temporary solution on others.
The Proclamation of 1763 also came to be a flash point for future relations between North American settlers and Amerindians. The limits to British settlement that were part of the Proclamation of 1763 and the Treaty of Fort Stanwix only further American aspirations towards rebellion and eventually signing the Declaration of Independence on the 4th of July 1776. The Proclamation of 1763 would also become a problem for Amerindian nations trying to make land claims. For example:
in 1973, Frank Calder, founder and president of British Columbia’s Nisg’a Tribal Council (1955-1974), went to court to establish his people’s right to their traditional lands, which they had neither ceded by treaty or lost in a war. He lost, but on a technicality. Although the judges disagreed on whether the Royal Proclamation of 1763 applied to British Columbia, all but one agreed that aboriginal title existed in law independently of any treaty, executive order, or legislative enactment…But they did affirm that aboriginal rights existed, at least in principle.[31]
Further court cases and protests over Amerindian land claims have been made in Canada and the United States under clauses in the Proclamation of 1763. Thus, the British attempt to solve tensions between British, French and Amerindians following the Seven Years War seems to have failed since tensions between these linguistic groups in still exist in North America today.
Appendix A
The Royal Proclamation - October 7, 1763[32]
BY THE KlNG. A PROCLAMATION GEORGE R.
Whereas We have taken into Our Royal Consideration the extensive and valuable Acquisitions in America, secured to our Crown by the late Definitive Treaty of Peace, concluded at Paris. the 10th Day of February last; and being desirous that all Our loving Subjects, as well of our Kingdom as of our Colonies in America, may avail themselves with all convenient Speed, of the great Benefits and Advantages which must accrue therefrom to their Commerce, Manufactures, and Navigation, We have thought fit, with the Advice of our Privy Council. to issue this our Royal Proclamation, hereby to publish and declare to all our loving Subjects, that we have, with the Advice of our Said Privy Council, granted our Letters Patent, under our Great Seal of Great Britain, to erect, within the Countries and Islands ceded and confirmed to Us by the said Treaty, Four distinct and separate Governments, styled and called by the names of Quebec, East Florida, West Florida and Grenada, and limited and bounded as follows, viz.
First--The Government of Quebec bounded on the Labrador Coast by the River St. John, and from thence by a Line drawn from the Head of that River through the Lake St. John, to the South end of the Lake Nipissim; from whence the said Line, crossing the River St. Lawrence, and the Lake Champlain, in 45. Degrees of North Latitude, passes along the High Lands which divide the Rivers that empty themselves into the said River St. Lawrence from those which fall into the Sea; and also along the North Coast of the Baye des Chaleurs, and the Coast of the Gulph of St. Lawrence to Cape Rosieres, and from thence crossing the Mouth of the River St. Lawrence by the West End of the Island of Anticosti, terminates at the aforesaid River of St. John.
Secondly--The Government of East Florida. bounded to the Westward by the Gulph of Mexico and the Apalachicola River; to the Northward by a Line drawn from that part of the said River where the Chatahouchee and Flint Rivers meet, to the source of St. Mary's River. and by the course of the said River to the Atlantic Ocean; and to the Eastward and Southward by the Atlantic Ocean and the Gulph of Florida, including all Islands within Six Leagues of the Sea Coast.
Thirdly--The Government of West Florida. bounded to the Southward by the Gulph of Mexico. including all Islands within Six Leagues of the Coast. from the River Apalachicola to Lake Pontchartrain; to the Westward by the said Lake, the Lake Maurepas, and the River Mississippi; to the Northward by a Line drawn due East from that part of the River Mississippi which lies in 31 Degrees North Latitude. to the River Apalachicola or Chatahouchee; and to the Eastward by the said River.
Fourthly--The Government of Grenada, comprehending the Island of that name, together with the Grenadines, and the Islands of Dominico, St. Vincent's and Tobago. And to the end that the open and free Fishery of our Subjects may be extended to and carried on upon the Coast of Labrador, and the adjacent Islands. We have thought fit. with the advice of our said Privy Council to put all that Coast, from the River St. John's to Hudson's Streights, together with the Islands of Anticosti and Madelaine, and all other smaller Islands Iying upon the said Coast, under the care and Inspection of our Governor of Newfoundland.
We have also, with the advice of our Privy Council, thought fit to annex the Islands of St. John's and Cape Breton, or Isle Royale, with the lesser Islands adjacent thereto, to our Government of Nova Scotia.
We have also, with the advice of our Privy Council aforesaid, annexed to our Province of Georgia all the Lands Iying between the Rivers Alatamaha and St. Mary's.
And whereas it will greatly contribute to the speedy settling of our said new Governments, that our loving Subjects should be informed of our Paternal care, for the security of the Liberties and Properties of those who are and shall become Inhabitants thereof, We have thought fit to publish and declare, by this Our Proclamation, that We have, in the Letters Patent under our Great Seal of Great Britain, by which the said Governments are constituted. given express Power and Direction to our Governors of our Said Colonies respectively, that so soon as the state and circumstances of the said Colonies will admit thereof, they shall, with the Advice and Consent of the Members of our Council, summon and call General Assemblies within the said Governments respectively, in such Manner and Form as is used and directed in those Colonies and Provinces in America which are under our immediate Government: And We have also given Power to the said Governors, with the consent of our Said Councils, and the Representatives of.
We have also thought fit, with the advice of our Privy Council as aforesaid, to give unto the Governors and Councils of our said Three new Colonies, upon the Continent full Power and Authority to settle and agree with the Inhabitants of our said new Colonies or with any other Persons who shall resort thereto, for such Lands. Tenements and Hereditaments, as are now or hereafter shall be in our Power to dispose of; and them to grant to any such Person or Persons upon such Terms, and under such moderate Quit-Rents, Services and Acknowledgments, as have been appointed and settled in our other Colonies, and under such other Conditions as shall appear to us to be necessary and expedient for the Advantage of the Grantees, and the Improvement and settlement of our said Colonies.
And Whereas, We are desirous, upon all occasions, to testify our Royal Sense and Approbation of the Conduct and bravery of the Officers and Soldiers of our Armies, and to reward the same, We do hereby command and impower our Governors of our said Three new Colonies, and all other our Governors of our several Provinces on the Continent of North America, to grant without Fee or Reward, to such reduced Officers as have served in North America during the late War, and to such Private Soldiers as have been or shall be disbanded in America, and are actually residing there, and shall personally apply for the same, the following Quantities of Lands, subject, at the Expiration of Ten Years, to the same Quit-Rents as other Lands are subject to in the Province within which they are granted, as also subject to the same Conditions of Cultivation and Improvement; viz.
To every Person having the Rank of a Field Officer--5,000 Acres.
To every Captain--3,000 Acres.
To every Subaltern or Staff Officer,--2,000 Acres.
To every Non-Commission Officer,--200 Acres .
To every Private Man--50 Acres.
We do likewise authorize and require the Governors and Commanders in Chief of all our said Colonies upon the Continent of North America to grant the like Quantities of Land, and upon the same conditions, to such reduced Officers of our Navy of like Rank as served on board our Ships of War in North America at the times of the Reduction of Louisbourg and Quebec in the late War, and who shall personally apply to our respective Governors for such Grants.
And whereas it is just and reasonable, and essential to our Interest, and the Security of our Colonies, that the several Nations or Tribes of Indians with whom We are connected, and who live under our Protection, should not be molested or disturbed in the Possession of such Parts of Our Dominions and Territories as, not having been ceded to or purchased by Us, are reserved to them. or any of them, as their Hunting Grounds.--We do therefore, with the Advice of our Privy Council, declare it to be our Royal Will and Pleasure. that no Governor or Commander in Chief in any of our Colonies of Quebec, East Florida. or West Florida, do presume, upon any Pretence whatever, to grant Warrants of Survey, or pass any Patents for Lands beyond the Bounds of their respective Governments. as described in their Commissions: as also that no Governor or Commander in Chief in any of our other Colonies or Plantations in America do presume for the present, and until our further Pleasure be known, to grant Warrants of Survey, or pa
And We do further declare it to be Our Royal Will and Pleasure, for the present as aforesaid, to reserve under our Sovereignty, Protection, and Dominion, for the use of the said Indians, all the Lands and Territories not included within the Limits of Our said Three new Governments, or within the Limits of the Territory granted to the Hudson's Bay Company, as also all the Lands and Territories lying to the Westward of the Sources of the Rivers which fall into the Sea from the West and North West as aforesaid.
And We do hereby strictly forbid, on Pain of our Displeasure, all our loving Subjects from making any Purchases or Settlements whatever, or taking Possession of any of the Lands above reserved. without our especial leave and Licence for that Purpose first obtained.
And. We do further strictly enjoin and require all Persons whatever who have either wilfully or inadvertently seated themselves upon any Lands within the Countries above described. or upon any other Lands which, not having been ceded to or purchased by Us, are still reserved to the said Indians as aforesaid, forthwith to remove themselves from such Settlements.
And whereas great Frauds and Abuses have been committed in purchasing Lands of the Indians, to the great Prejudice of our Interests. and to the great Dissatisfaction of the said Indians: In order, therefore, to prevent such Irregularities for the future, and to the end that the Indians may be convinced of our Justice and determined Resolution to remove all reasonable Cause of Discontent, We do. with the Advice of our Privy Council strictly enjoin and require. that no private Person do presume to make any purchase from the said Indians of any Lands reserved to the said Indians, within those parts of our Colonies where, We have thought proper to allow Settlement: but that. if at any Time any of the Said Indians should be inclined to dispose of the said Lands, the same shall be Purchased only for Us, in our Name, at some public Meeting or Assembly of the said Indians, to be held for that Purpose by the Governor or Commander in Chief of our Colony respectively within which they shall lie: and in case they shall.
And we do hereby authorize, enjoin, and require the Governors and Commanders in Chief of all our Colonies respectively, as well those under Our immediate Government as those under the Government and Direction of Proprietaries, to grant such Licences without Fee or Reward, taking especial Care to insert therein a Condition, that such Licence shall be void, and the Security forfeited in case the Person to whom the same is granted shall refuse or neglect to observe such Regulations as We shall think proper to prescribc as aforesaid.
And we do further expressly conjoin and require all Officers whatever, as well Military as those Employed in the Management and Direction of Indian Affairs, within the Territories reserved as aforesaid for the use of the said Indians, to seize and apprehend all Persons whatever. who standing charged with Treason. Misprisions of Treason. Murders, or other Felonies or Misdemeanors. shall fly from Justice and take Refuge in the said Territory. and to send them under a proper guard to the Colony where the Crime was committed of which they, stand accused. in order to take their Trial for the same.
Given at our Court at St. James's the 7th Day of October 1763. in the Third Year of our Reign.
GOD SAVE THE KING
Appendix B
Map of Eastern North America following the Proclamation of 1763
Source: “Indians of North America -- The Native American Experience: 1750-1800.” California State University, Long Beach. Online. Internet. 24 March 2002. Available: http://www.csulb.edu/projects/ais/nae/ chapter_1/001_002_1.55.gif
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Morton, Desmond. A Short History of Canada. 5th ed. Toronto: McClelland & Stewart Ltd., 2001.
Otis, Ghislain. “ Opposing Aboriginality to Modernity: The Doctrine of Aboriginal Rights in Canada.” British Journal of Canadian Studies. Vol. 12, No. 2 (1997): 182-194.
Ray, Arthur. “When Two Worlds Met.” The Illustrated History of Canada. Ed. Craig Brown. Toronto: Key Porter Books, 2000: 17-104.
Wickwire, Franklin B. “John Pownall and British Colonial Policy.” William and Mary Quarterly. Vol. 20, No. 4 (1963): 543-554.
[1]Don Gillmor and Pierre Turgeon. Canada: A People’s History. Vol. 1. (Toronto: McClelland & Stewart Ltd., 2000): 135.
[2] Desmond Morton. A Short History of Canada. 5th ed. (Toronto: McClelland & Stewart Ltd., 2001): 25.
[3]For more on Sir William Johnson and British Amerindian policies following this time period read: Robert S. Allen. His Majesty’s Indian Allies: British Indian Policy in The Defence of Canada, 1774-1815. Toronto: Dundurn Press Limited, 1993.
[4]Victor Lytwyn and Dean Jacobs. “‘For Good Will and Affection.’: The Detroit Deeds and British Land Policy, 1760-1827.” Ontario History. Vol. 92, No. 1 (2000): 12.
[5]Olive Patricia Dickason. Canada’s First Nations: A History of Founding Peoples from Earliest Tiems. 3rd ed. (Don Mills, Ontario: Oxford University Press, 2002): 157.
[6]Dickason, Canada’s First Nations: A History of Founding Peoples from Earliest Times.: 157.
[7]Lytwyn and Jacobs 12.
[8]Ibid. 12.
[9]Paul S. Boyer, Clifford E. Clark, Jr., Sandra McNair Hawley, Joseph F. Kett, Neal Salisbury, Harvard Sitkoff and Nancy Woloch. The Enduring Vision: A History of the American People. Concise 4th ed. (New York: Houghton Mifflin Company, 2002): 85.
[10]Franklin B. Wickwire. “John Pownall and British Colonial Policy.” William and Mary Quarterly. Vol. 20, No. 4 (1963): 546.
[11]Read the following article for more on John Pownall and how he rose through the ranks of the British government and the British Board of Trade:
Franklin B. Wickwire. “John Pownall and British Colonial Policy.” William and Mary Quarterly. Vol. 20, No. 4 (1963): 543-554.
[12]Wickwire 546.
[13]“The Royal Proclamation – October 7, 1763.” The Avalon Project at the Yale Law School. 1997. Online. Internet. 17 March 2002. Available: www.yale.edu/lawweb/avalon/proc1763.htm
Also, see Appendix B for a map with the new Quebec boundary lines.
[14] “The Royal Proclamation – October 7, 1763.” The Avalon Project at the Yale Law School. 1997. Online. Internet. 17 March 2002. Available: www.yale.edu/lawweb/avalon/proc1763.htm
[15]Dickason, Canada’s First Nations: A History of Founding Peoples from Earliest Times.: 163.
[16]Arthur Ray. “When Two World’s Met.” The Illustrated History of Canada. Ed. Craig Brown. (Toronto: Key Porter Books, 2000): 102.
[17]Ray 102.
[18]Dickason, Canada’s First Nations: A History of Founding Peoples from Earliest Times.: 163.
[19]See Appendix B for a map outlining the lands of the Proclamation of 1763.
[20]Dickason, Canada’s First Nations: A History of Founding Peoples from Earliest Times.: 163.
[21]Eugene M. Del Papa. “The Royal Proclamation of 1763: Its Effect Upon Virginia Land Companies.” Virginia Magazine of History and Biography. Vol. 83 No. 4 (1975): 406.
[22]Ibid. 410.
[23]Lytwyn and Jacobs 14.
[24]Ibid. 14.
[25]According to the Lytwyn and Jacobs article, Johnson was forced to send two parties after the first party, lead by Colonel John Bradstreet had fraudulently made the Chiefs of the Ojibwa and Ottawa sign a treaty that made them subjects of the British Crown. This subjugation was later denied by the Chiefs. This lead to Johson dispatching Lieutenant-Colonel John Campbell, who was the commanding officer at Fort Detroit and Johnson’s deputy, George Croghan to sign a treaty with Pontiac and the chiefs of the Ottawa, Ptawatomi and Wyondat nations. For more on this subject see:
Victor Lytwyn and Dean Jacobs. “‘For Good Will and Affection.’: The Detroit Deeds and British Land Policy, 1760-1827.” Ontario History. Vol. 92, No. 1 (2000): 9-29.
[26]Lytwyn and Jacobs 15-16.
[27] Margaret Conrad, Alvin Finkel and Cornelius Jaenen. History of the Canadian Peoples: Beginnings to 1867. Vol. 1. 2nd ed. (Don Mills, Ontario: Copp Clark Ltd., 1998): 163.
[28]Boyer et al 97.
[29]Morton 26.
[30]Ibid. 26.
[31]Olive Patricia Dickason. “Making Claim.” Beaver. Vol. 80 No. 1 (2000): 38.
[32] “The Royal Proclamation – October 7, 1763.” The Avalon Project at the Yale Law School. 1997. Online. Internet. 17 March 2002. Available: www.yale.edu/lawweb/avalon/proc1763.htm
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