The Ottawa, also known as the Odawa, are Algonquian-speaking Native American tribe who originally lived on the East Coast & migrated into Michigan, Ohio & southern Canada. Their name is from the Indian word “adawe” meaning “traders” because they had long been known as intertribal traders & barterers. They called themselves Nishnaabe meaning “original people." After migrating from the East Coast in ancient times, they settled on Manitoulin Island, in Lake Huron, Michigan’s Upper Peninsula, & on the Bruce Peninsula in Ontario, Canada.
The Ottawa were part of a long-term alliance, called the Council of Three Fires, with the Ojibwe & Potawatomi, who had common or similar language, manners, & customs. These 3 tribes fought the Iroquois Confederacy & the Dakota people. They were also enemies with the Wyandot because of their ties to the Iroquois. In 1615, they had contact with French explorer Samuel de Champlain near the mouth of the French River. Of the Ottawa, Champlain wrote: “Their arms consisted only of a bow & arrows, a buckler of boiled leather & the club. They wore no breechclouts, their bodies were tattooed in many fashions & designs, their faces painted & their noses pierced.”
From the start of the colony of New France (Canada), the Ottawa became important to the French in the fur trade business. In 1701 the French colonists built Fort Detroit in Michigan & established a trading post there. Many Ottawa moved there & soon began to spread out to the south of the Great Lakes into the Midwest. Over the years, competition in the fur trade caused disputes between the Ottawa & other tribes. In the mid-17C, they were allied with other Algonquian tribes around the Great Lakes against the powerful Mohawk who had moved westward from New York. The traditional balance of power in the region had been destroyed by the European introduction of firearms, producing disastrous consequences. All of the Indians on both sides were disrupted & some, such as the Iroquoian Erie, were exterminated. In addition to the wars, the tribes were severely affected by infectious diseases brought by the Europeans.
In the mid-18C, the Ottawa allied with their French trading partners against the British in the French & Indian War (1754-1763), making raids against British American colonists. Immediately after the Treaty of Paris brought the war to a close, Ottawa Chief Pontiac began to organize a group of native American tribes against the British. With the land previously controlled by the French now under British control. The tribes in Ohio, Illinois, & the Great Lakes region feared the loss of their French allies & the influx of colonists from east of the Appalachian Mountains settling on their land. Pontiac determined to fight the British & started what is referred to as Pontiac’s Rebellion (1763-1766). The united tribes included the Ottawa, Ojibwa, Potawatomi, Huron, Miami, Wea, Kickapoo, Mascouten, Piankashaw, Delaware, Shawnee, & the Seneca.
The Ottawa attacked Fort Detroit in May 1763, beginning the rebellion. Soon, the Shawnee, Wyandot, Seneca, & Delaware people also raided British settlements in the Ohio Country & in western Pennsylvania. It is estimated that by late fall of 1763, Pontiac’s forces had killed or captured more than 600 people. Britain’s only garrisoned fort in Ohio, Fort Sandusky, fell to the Ottawa that same year. In the end, the tribes destroyed nine out of eleven British forts in the Great Lakes region. In the autumn of 1764, the British military took the offensive against Pontiac’s forces & launched invasions into Ohio & many of the tribes, including the Ottawa, surrendered, effectively ending the rebellion. However, Chief Pontiac did not formally surrender until July 1766.
During the American Revolution, the Ottawa allied with the British, hoping to stop the influx of the Americans into their territory. But, it would never end. Following the Revolutionary War, the Shawnee began to forge a confederacy to oppose U.S. occupation of the land ceded by the British in what became called the Northwest Territory (now Midwest of the United States). The Northwest Indian War began in 1785, just 2 years after the American Revolution ended. Hoping to repulse the American pioneers from settling west of the Appalachian Mountains, the regional tribes, including the Council of Three Fires, Wyandot, Lenape, & Mingo joined with the Shawnee & fought a series of battles against the United States. These efforts were clandestinely supported by the British, who had refused to abandon Fort Detroit & Fort Mackinac as called for in the 1783 peace treaty with the United States. In 1794, General Anthony Wayne built a string of forts in the region & fought several hundred members of the Indian confederacy at the Battle of Fallen Timbers in August 1794 near the present-day site of Maumee, Ohio. The defeated tribes were forced to cede much of present-day Ohio, in the Treaty of Greenville in 1795.
In 1807, the Detroit Ottawa joined with the Ojibwe, Potawatomi & Wyandot people, in signing the Treaty of Detroit under pressure from the United States. The agreement gave the United States a large portion of today’s Southeastern Michigan & a section of northwest Ohio. Many of the Ottawa band then moved into northern Michigan. After the passage of the Indian Removal Act of 1830, the US government arranged for the Ottawa to cede all of their reserves in 1831. In 1833, the United States forced the Ottawa to give up their few remaining lands in Ohio. In 1837, they were removed to west of the Mississippi River, first to Iowa, then to Kansas. Within 5 years of moving to Kansas, nearly half of the Ottawa had died. In 1862, the Ottawa were allotted 74,000 acres of land that would be used & sold to raise money to build a Baptist school for the education of whites & Indians in the area. This school later became the University of Ottawa. In 1867, the Ottawa sold their land in Kansas & moved into Indian Territory in Oklahoma. By this time most of the Ottawa had died & only about 200 were left. In Oklahoma, they entered into a contract with the Shawnee tribe to purchase approximately 14,863 acres & formed a reservation.
