Disposession and Diaspora

By the early 1700s, some Lenape were being pressured to leave the colony of New Jersey to find new homes in the west while others assimilated into European culture. Those that stayed in New Jersey resented the colonization of their homeland and raided European settlements during the French and Indian War (1754-1763).

​William Trent, the youngest son of the founder of Trenton, organized a militia to defend British interests in the northwest territory known as the Ohio country. Accounts of his interactions with the native people of the area are included in two books by Jason Cherry, “Pittsburgh’s Lost Outpost: Captain Trent’s Fort” (2016) and “William Trent: Factor of Ambition” (2024). He had a  role in giving Native people blankets from smallpox victims during the French and Indian War and a reputation for effective communication in his “frame of speech to the Indians, in their style.”

In 1756, a colonial commission on Indian affairs was created with the goal of resolving conflicts. In 1758, a peace conference was held and some Lenape were paid for their land while even more Lenape groups made the difficult choice to leave their homes to go westward.

​The colonial New Jersey government also created the first Indian reservation in 1758. Some of the Lenape were relocated to the Brotherton reservation, located in what is now Indian Mills in Burlington County, New Jersey. The reservation failed as the land was not productive and the Lenape continued to be harassed by colonists.