The Forgotten War They Don’t Teach You About
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After the Revolutionary War, the U.S. was drowning in debt. To pay it off, it sold Native land it didn’t control. This is the story of how a powerful Native alliance fought back, slowing America’s westward expansion in a war forgotten by history.
00:00 – Intro
1:00 – Treaty of Paris
1:54 – Forming the Alliance
04:15 – U.S. War Debt & Land Speculation
6:23 – Harmar’s Defeat
7:20 – St. Clair’s Defeat
10:34 – Battle of Fallen Timbers
11:59 – Treaty of Greenville
12:54 – Aftermath & Conclusion
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Want to learn more? Check out these resources:
https://aacimotaatiiyankwi.org/2014/01/10/the-mihsi-maalhsa-wars-part-1/
Speculation Nation: Land Mania in the Revolutionary American Republic by Michael A. Blaakman
The Victory with No Name: The Native American Defeat of the First American Army by Colin G. Calloway
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This episode of In The Margins is part of PBS’ America@250 collection, celebrating the country’s 250th anniversary. Democracy is built on participation. Get involved at https://vote.org/pbs
In The Margins is a series that covers the history they didn’t teach in school, exploring obscure, yet captivating tales that offer unique insights into their time and place.
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@kakhipudhi
December 24, 2025 at 9:58 am
Kalamazoo native, bronson park fountain showing the native Potawatomi forced from the Kalamazoo Valley. I did not know the larger story. Learning history is not shaming anyone, but it is our only way to avoid repeating those mistakes.
@GottaWannaDance
December 24, 2025 at 9:58 am
Who is 'they’ and wasn’t there info from different sources. 60’s and 70’s I spent much time in libraries … thankfully
@carlyar5281
December 24, 2025 at 9:58 am
Manifest Destiny is a myth cooked up by greedy men 13:27. That was the case in the late 1700s and 1800s, not just with the westward expansion, but also with the invasion of Canada in 1812. That same myth has recently been resurrected in the past 12 months to justify invading Greenland and annexing Canada. It’s an emotional appeal used by greedy men to manipulate the public into supporting wars based on their greed. Wars that bring suffering to everyone except the wealthy people who see it as justified so they can have more land and resources.
@richardjustinamericantatem5758
December 24, 2025 at 9:58 am
This is exactly why PBS got defunded by the government. This one-sided propaganda story leaves out so much about how Indian tribes fought amongst each other about how they conquered each other for each other's lands from millennia before the Europeans arrived.
This is like the rehash of slavery. It's over, it's done, we're not going back.Make the best of it, somebody won. And somebody lost in a war. and that's the way it's been since the beginning of human history.
@spidermonkey02021970
December 24, 2025 at 9:58 am
Interesting historical facts couched in failed revisionist propaganda… A primary British objective during the War of 1812 in the region that included the Ohio Valley was to create a large, "neutral" Native American buffer state that would cover much of the Ohio, Indiana, Michigan, Illinois, Wisconsin, and parts of Minnesota areas. I believe that the British actually wanted to retake some or most of those areas that they ceded in the aforementioned 1783 Treaty. There was never any doubt that the indians would lose in the face of expanding American population and technological superiority.
@michaelboucher1023
December 24, 2025 at 9:58 am
Re: what surprised me – i didn’t make the connection between enormous debts and westward expansion.
@joemama-mz2ei
December 24, 2025 at 9:58 am
this is about ai
@showze21
December 24, 2025 at 9:58 am
simplistic and biased, as is usual for pbs. its true that indigenous people resisted the colonies and later the usa for 300 years. the indigenous peoples never had a sovereign gov, and they never owned land in a modern sense. st clair troops captured tortured over 3 days and burned to death. the indigenous lifestyle was not economically viable, tribal reservations have been 100% subsidized by the us gov for 150 years.
@johnpollard744
December 24, 2025 at 9:58 am
So we are so awesome that we beat all the tribes united to take this country. The US is amazing.
@cypresswyvern
December 24, 2025 at 9:58 am
It was war after war after war, when the six nations treaty fell apart it was all downhill from there
@jbli5593
December 24, 2025 at 9:58 am
Thats how our family came to Michigan. Our great grand father of that time fought in the militias.
@Mrblueridgeman
December 24, 2025 at 9:58 am
Listening to her makes me happy PBS got defunded
@DittoK18
December 24, 2025 at 9:58 am
I didn't know native tribes fought and held off American troops successfully for a longer amount of time. I didn't know that it was land speculators that were controlling the narrative of the sale of land.
@frankbauer5575
December 24, 2025 at 9:58 am
You forget a simple truth, that of technological superiority was on the European side. The ultimate outcome was not morality but whose rule of the territory prevailed.
@josephbelisle5792
December 24, 2025 at 9:58 am
The US has a long history of genocide. It was founded on the genocide of the peoples of turtle island. Pre and post revolutionary war leaders, like Lord Jeffrey Amherst and the governer of New York, gave small pox infected blankets to the peoples with the express intention of genocide. Burning crops and wiping out food sources are forms of genocide. And it has never stopped. From the earliest weeks of Europeans landing on these shores, there has been the intention of genocide. From Columbus to Trump.
@iamjames8403
December 24, 2025 at 9:58 am
I used to live near Mccollum's leap, beneath the statue is a train tunnel with a bridge to nowhere somewhere on he middle of he tunnel the tunnel is collapsed which caused the graveyard to sink.
@longcycler8832
December 24, 2025 at 9:58 am
You cant fight and defeat a force armed with steel firesticks and cannons by cavemen using bow and arrows and rock throwing. For all the thousands of year they lived in north America, they never upgraded in any tech way. The Ingins never understood the concept of a better mouse trap, or the wheel.
@Trevilianband
December 24, 2025 at 9:58 am
That host is the most attractive person I’ve ever seen.
@curtrapp5291
December 24, 2025 at 9:58 am
Under the Trump administration this video would be suppressed as anti-American which speaks volumes about Trump and his sycophants.
@rebeccawinter472
December 24, 2025 at 9:58 am
Original sin.
@JohnnysMapsApps-u5f
December 24, 2025 at 9:58 am
I'd love to see an alternative history where the Native Americans managed to halt colonization at the Mississippi River, at the ABSOLUTELY farthest West.
@jacobbarber-t6v
December 24, 2025 at 9:58 am
i love the history videos keep it up
@jamesotto9530
December 24, 2025 at 9:58 am
I'm a white man,and I said there should of been a native as president,a long time of go,something is'nt right in America,to this day in year 2025
@jamesotto9530
December 24, 2025 at 9:58 am
This is why I like to see them on the white house,why are they left out,they were hear firste I don't think the first settlers were good ,they only took,and control what they wanted,this needs to change now in 2028,vote😊
@adelaferreira4575
December 24, 2025 at 9:58 am
Nothing surprise me about the abusive take over the land,half of the US land was taken from Mexico in another abusive non provoked war ,west of the Mississippi it was all Mexico’s land !
@Pauliesr
December 24, 2025 at 9:58 am
Since the beginning of human civilization To the Victor goes the Soils! Way before Europeans come to the Americas ( north and south) the Native people were constantly at war, slaughtering each other! The notion of peaceful one with land is just BULLSHIT!
@JR-tr1df
December 24, 2025 at 9:58 am
…so. back in the 1700s when people walked everywhere it took 9 years and a troop of, in the end, about 4,000 troop to defeat the Indian tribes once the tribes lost British support?
@Liz-ard2024
December 24, 2025 at 9:58 am
Our founding fathers were very much like our present Orange Michelin Man: Canada? Venezuela? Greenland? Who else has insulted his majesty? I learned late in my life that I have great grandmother and another grandmother who lived during the Trail of Tears era. I’m proud of that.
@commonsense6873
December 24, 2025 at 9:58 am
Thank you!
@MiaUSMC
December 24, 2025 at 9:58 am
I wished the Natives would have won, they were already an advanced civilization working with nature.
@PaulTemple-z6v
December 24, 2025 at 9:58 am
What the Colonial Government did was engage in the Same Colonialism that Other Countries in Europe Did. So really they were no different than the Spanish Conquistadores, English King George the 2nd, Napoleon Bonaparte, etc. . So what is it like to be Colonized by People from Another Part of the World.? Well, if you know what comes out of a Human Colon, then you just might understand it.
@charlesstone4480
December 24, 2025 at 9:58 am
Love history. I've been fortunate to have visited Fort Recovery, the battlefield of Fallen Timbers and numerous other westward expansion sites from Ohio through Montana. When PBS writes "they don't teach you about." PBS is indicting the public education system of the various states and the federal Department of Education. I don't think many people in the US find that indictment any more surprising than an early Congress, federal employees, and contractors were corrupt and would as soon as see the members of their military slaughtered to make a little more money. The biggest surprise for me is that anyone responsible was actually put in jail. In the end, the maxim: lose the battle but win the war, still seems to be true. All conflicts are full of examples of superior leaders and warriors being undermined by superior resources and logistics. Every place I go has a story of the people who once lived there and the people who live there now. I find it personally valuable to learn those stories and hopefully it makes me a better person and just a little less ignorant than the day before.
@bradsworld565
December 24, 2025 at 9:58 am
Tecumseh was taught about in the schools, the battles are in the history books. PBS does not need to lie about this. One should likely not expect the depth in grade schoo to be as great as that of the university.
@MicroMacroActual
December 24, 2025 at 9:58 am
America hid so much shit from the history books. Acting so patriotic in the veil of total disgrace.
@MichaelMorrissey-to7xi
December 24, 2025 at 9:58 am
What was the American Indian doing before Europeans arrived?
@susanrhodes9079
December 24, 2025 at 9:58 am
Ironically, one of my maternal white ancestors fought under General Custer at his infamous last stand. He was killed in that battle. My maternal great grandfather participated in the Cherokee Strip Run in Oklahoma and staked out some land there. His family were one of the original pioneer families who settled Lawrence, KS. Per my Grandma, he sold the land eventually and stayed in Lawrence. My Grandma always felt she had been a Native American in her previous life. She had a small museum in one of her bedrooms. She also made jewelry. Tumbled her own stones found by rock hunting. She was an outstanding maker of Hopi kachinas. The year she died, she told me that Hemis was peeking in her bedroom windows. Note: She had macular degeneration and couldn't see anything with her eyes. I felt it was a sign that her time was near because she "saw" him looking in her window. She also had black out curtains. Perhaps she truly was a reincarnated Native American as she thought. She did have a strong affinity for Native American people and culture. American history has always been deficient when it comes to the history of anyone who is not a white male. White males have frequently taken credit for discoveries, ideas and inventions that were not their own. Thank you for an interesting and informative video.
@BonnieNickle-xf1jm
December 24, 2025 at 9:58 am
Our history! Disgusting, disgraceful, created terrible karma
@MunuM77
December 24, 2025 at 9:58 am
Wtf is this … "empire" and "colonialism". I was with you until the end. Why do you hate America?
@TheGeekyHippie
December 24, 2025 at 9:58 am
let us be clear, if they are "indigenous" then they would have been there longer than 1000s of years,, they would have arisen, evolved there. They did not. The more accurate term is "First Nation" or to sure "First Colonizers" cuz that is exactly what they did.
@johncleary1851
December 24, 2025 at 9:58 am
It was inevitable.. USA Expanded anyway
@TheJourney1Goes
December 24, 2025 at 9:58 am
What can we learn from this? 🤔
Greed is a sickness that cannot honor its own word. I love your videos. Thank u.
To hear history from every angle is important. In this "USA" it is especially important to hear the native version of history. The European version has done enough damage.
@babebabe4156
December 24, 2025 at 9:58 am
There is a clear and obvious bias in the history presented here and it's disappointing to say the least.
The "myth" stated at the beginning of the video appears to be completely true, and nothing in the video contradicts it. Clearly, Colonial influence from coast to coast was indeed inevitable if even a fledgling US government managed to secure all that land from many indigenous nations allied against them.
Makes you wonder why the video creators felt the need to present the "myth" in the first place. Or why they say nothing about the Iroquois Nations "defending" land they had previously taken from other indigenous peoples through brutality and genocide. All actions of indigenous nations is portrayed as noble, in defense of sovereignty, etc. even as they wiped out the beaver population in much of the Great Lakes region (after slaughtering the indigenous peoples there).
Do you think the Iroquois would have stopped their expansion through North America if they were left alone? These are the types of thought provoking questions you'll never get here, because that doesn't suit the agenda in play. But hey, at least you interviewed a guy in his car.
@jackbaskin371
December 24, 2025 at 9:58 am
My 5th Great Grandfather, a Lt. in the Ma Militia and Minuteman at Bunker (Breed's) Hill and later a Capt.in the Continental Army was recruited by a large land owner to come to the NW Territories in 1796 because he had combat experience and was to help fight the Indian raids in what is now known as Ohio, around what is now Athens. He helped start the community of Ames, Ohio and the "Coonskin Library" A family member took animal hides to Boston to buy books for the library, which is now behind the school in Ames, It is small but interesting.
@jk-kr8jt
December 24, 2025 at 9:58 am
Who the F do you think the Indians took land from? Humans have been warring since time began. But many races are just professional victims. Red and black are all victims. Deal with it.
Comments are closed.