Our Savage Neighbors Review

Written by Peter Silver in 2008, Our Savage Neighbors: How Indian War Transformed

Early America offers a unique picture into the early part of U.S. history. The book explores the

question of how conflict between early European colonials and the Native American tribes

influenced the development of a new American state and national identity. Silver starts his work

by giving a portrait of the diverse yet chaotic world on the eastern North American coast, shared

by newly settled colonials of various nationalities and religious denominations and Native

Americans. Early colonial America was a period marked by distrust and fear between the

colonials and Native Americans and also among the colonists themselves. Silver particularly

points out the religious diversity among the various European colonists and the fears that it

engendered, with various denominations calling for a tightening of orthodoxy among its

followers and separation from non-believers. This same dynamic played out in the relationship

between Native Americans and colonists, with the former advocating restoration movements

and advocating complete separation from the foreigners on their shores.

This tense situation was exacerbated by Indian attacks of the Seven Years War in the mid

18th century that struck various American settlements. According to Silver, the countless Indian

raids, combined with significant loss of colonial life and inability to counter them, created a

sense of collective helplessness and fear among the colonists. The result was the creation of a

shared experience among American colonists, who saw themselves as victims of an unrelenting

assault by savages. These feelings were utilized by various colonial agitators, writers,

pamphleteers, politicians, and religious leaders to whip up fear and hatred against the Native

Americans.

This rhetoric led to the creation of a new sense of pan-European unity among the diverse

yet beleaguered colonists and gave birth to a new identity of a white people to distinguish
themselves from the marauding Indians. Such a development was vital to rallying public support

during the American Revolutionary War and in the subsequent creation of the United States as

an independent political entity. Silver asserts that these shared feelings of unity against a

common enemy also stimulated the growth of democracy within colonial society, as local

governments were forced to tend to the needs and fears of a scared yet enraged population crying

for vengeance and action against native attacks.

In the process, a grassroots campaign of demonization and violence was enacted against

the Native American tribes along the eastern American seaboard, as colonial settlements sought

to avenge for the attacks on their peoples. Furthermore, Silver adds nuance to this argument by

noting that the propaganda effort against Native Americans created persecution and suspicion

against those colonial groups deemed too friendly to the native Indians, such as the Quaker

religious denominations. He also argues that the Indian attacks and the rhetorical responses

against them exacerbated existing ethnic tensions within colonial society, as different groups

such as German colonists accused one another of failing to appreciate the threat of the natives or

worse, being in league with them.

In order to make his argument in a convincing manner, Silver relies heavily on primary

sources for his supporting evidence. In fact, the book is noteworthy for using a wide variety of

period sources of the 18th century, from articles and editorials written in colonial era newspapers

to pamphlets calling the public to action on facing the Indian threat. Silver integrates these

primary sources within the greater narrative, using them as windows to show a glimpse of

colonial era and revolutionary society in the American colonies. At the same time, they

demonstrate potent evidence of the use of Indian attacks by various colonial actors in order to

drum up a sense of unity among the various disparate colonial peoples.

 This use of primary sources is further strengthened by Silvers exploration of the

historical sources and mechanisms behind some of the anti-Indian rhetoric, such as their use of

dead bodies and its origins in royal funeral customs of France. The result is a convincing case

that is both well-supported and easily understood not as an abstract theory, but as a historical

process with grave consequences. At the same time, Silver does not neglect the subtle nuances

that exist within the overall historical process that he is describing. For instance, he noted how

the same process of demonizing Indians was transferred towards a similar propaganda effort

against the British to drum up colonial public support during the American Revolutionary War.

In placing as the background the Seven Years Wars and the Indian attacks on colonial

settlements, Silver treads on familiar ground. Historians such as Armstrong Starkey and his 1998

work, European and Native American Warfare: 1675 1815 have written on the subject of

conflicts between Indians and colonials, later extending to Americans. A few of these works,

such as Alfred A. Caves 1996 book The Pequot War, do touch on how colonial narratives

shaped perception of both the Indians and their attacks upon settlements. On a similar note,

Silvers book does its part to explore the cultural roots of anti-Indian rhetoric that emerged

during the late 18th century in the American colonies. At the same time, Our Savage Neighbors

distinguishes itself by arguing that this rhetoric and the cultural narratives that it incorporated

were a central part of creating a unified American identity.

While well argued, Silvers unique look into colonial America and its tumultuous

relations with Native Americans is not without its flaws. For one, the book focuses solely on the

colonial populations on the Middle American states. While Silvers research in that area is

comprehensive and well-supportive of his thesis, more studies in other parts of the American

colonies such as the southern states and in the Northeast could better help flesh out and
strengthen his thesis. In addition, the author fails to put much discussion, if any, on the mindset

or emotions of the Indians that were attacking the colonists. While such discussion may not

affect the overall argument of his work, its inclusion would help to give a more nuanced and

comprehensive picture of the atmosphere of fear reigning in colonial America between colonist

and Indian. Overall, though, Silver presents a unique and well-supported argument that can

potentially open new ways of looking at American history and that of its development of national

culture.