series. For the career of John Johnston there is much information scattered through the volumes of the Michigan Pioneer and Historical Society's Collections. Of chief importance are Charles H. Chapman's, "The Historic Johnston Family of the 'Soo,'" XXXII, 305-53; and Henry R. Schoolcraft's, "Memoir of John Johnston," XXXVI, 53-90. On the members of the Cadotte family there is much information in William W. Warren's valuable history of the Chippewa, published in Minnesota Historical Collections, Vol. V. The author was a grandson of Michel Cadotte of La Pointe, and great grandson of Jean Baptiste, the partner of Alexander Henry. Additional material on the Cadottes may be found in the volumes of the Michigan Pioneer and Historical Society Collections, and the Wisconsin Historical Collections.

CHAPTER XIV

WISCONSIN IN THE REVOLUTION

The story of the American Revolution has often been told, and no period of American history is better known, at least in its superficial aspects, to the average American citizen; to the discussion of the events and motives of no other period does he respond so quickly or surely. With the passage of time the men and events of the Revolutionary epoch have come to assume in the public mind a halo which was sadly lacking, oftentimes, from the estimate of contemporary opinion; so that within the year these lines are written the spectacle has been witnessed of the state legislature of Wisconsin, forgetful of the fact that the determination of historic truth transcends the power of legislative fiat, assuming to prescribe what shall be said in our school histories about the Revolutionary fathers.

Until a comparatively recent period the writing of American history was dominated by the New England group of scholars. To them the nation as a whole is greatly indebted, but since no man may escape entirely the influences of his environment it is not surprising that the nation's story was presented through New England eyes and from the viewpoint of New England interests, while men and measures remote from the section to which the writers belong were accorded, oftentimes, but scant and unsympathetic treatment. Until almost the present day the school children of Wisconsin or of California have been carefully instructed in the details of local New England history, ordinarily to the entire exclusion of the equally important and imposing history of their own immediate region. They have carefully learned, for example, the story of the Pequot war, while the infinitely greater, more prolonged, and more important Fox wars have passed without mention; the sad story of the struggles of King Philip has been graven on their plastic minds, but the story of Kiala, at least equally heroic and equally tragic, dealing with their own Wisconsin, passes without notice.

To come to the American Revolution, the older historians have told the story from the point of view of the acts and the reactions of the Atlantic seaboard-more particularly the northern end thereof; with the oratory of erratic James Otis, the street riot known to fame as the "Boston Massacre," even with the eloquence of the preacher who de

livered the prayer at the opening of the Continental Congress, we have been made wearisomely familiar; while the part played by the western country in causing the war, and later in its conduct, has gone unnoticed and unknown. In recent years, however, the investigations of a younger school of historians have tended to present the story of the American Revolution in a broader light, one which does ampler justice to the part played by the western country in the movement which resulted in the birth of the American nation. Briefly summarized, this newer viewpoint represents the Revolution in the light of a natural accompaniment of the solution of the problem of imperial reorganization with which Great Britain was compelled to deal as the consequence of the defeat of France in the Seven Years' War. To Great Britain the victory had brought a vast extent of country in North America, a portion of which was inhabited by Frenchmen, the remainder by savage tribes. The English colonies along the Atlantic seaboard had grown up in more or less haphazard fashion, each jealous of the rest and all in common jealous of the authority of the mother country over them. The Indian, in particular, presented a problem with which the home government must deal in some fashion or other. It could not be avoided, and in the effort to solve it, which covered, broadly speaking, the years from 1761 to 1775, various divergent policies and factions developed. Into the detailed story of this period it is aside from our purpose to enter; it is sufficient to note that whether wise or unwise in themselves, the several solutions advanced represented for the most part sincere attempts on the part of their proponents to cope with a difficult problem in imperial administration, and that a majority of the seaboard colonists, conceiving their interests to be adversely affected by the policies adopted by the government, assumed an attitude of opposition to them. Over the issue thus raised came organized revolt, and in due sequence American independence. Significant is it for dwellers in Wisconsin to note that from the viewpoint of the British ministry it was the question presented by the Mississippi Valley, and its attempted solution, that precipitated this result which had such momentous consequences in the history of the human race.

The inhabitants of Wisconsin in the period we are dealing with belonged to three distinct racial groups; most numerous, of course, were the red men; at Green Bay and Prairie du Chien were small settlements of French origin, the blood of whose members had, with the passage of time, become freely mixed with that of the native race; finally, there was a small and ever-fluctuating number of English traders operating in Wisconsin. The trade on which the prosperity of all these groups was dependent centered at Montreal, and all, remote from and largely ignorant of the course of events in the seaboard colonies, were