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Digital Paxton: Digital Collection, Critical Edition, and Teaching Platform

Murder on the Frontier: The Paxton Massacres

This unit is one of the Gilder Lehrman Institute's Teaching Literacy through History™ resources, designed to align to the Common Core State Standards. The lessons can also be modified to conform to the C3 Framework. These units were developed to enable students to understand, summarize, and evaluate original documents of historical significance. Students will learn and practice the skills that will help them analyze, assess, and develop knowledgeable and well-reasoned viewpoints on these source materials.

The title of this unit refers to a little-known massacre in colonial Pennsylvania. Over the course of three lessons, students will attempt to understand how a vigilante group justified its role in murdering twenty Native Americans. The primary source evidence will allow students to analyze questions related to claims about colonization, peace and war, race and ethnicity, masculinity and civility, the use of violence as a political weapon, and religious association. Most of the primary sources referenced here are available in Digital Paxton.

Ultimately, students will demonstrate what they have learned through an analysis of the various primary source materials by writing a response to essential questions posed for the unit, participating in whole-class and small-group discussions, and engaging in a news conference simulation.

Objectives

Analyze both primary and secondary source documents using close-reading strategies
Interpret, analyze, and demonstrate understanding of visual materials
Draw logical inferences and summarize the essential message of a work of art
Compose summaries of the major points in written primary sources
Compare and contrast the viewpoints and perspectives of different writers

Essential Questions

To what extent did fear of Native Americans develop into racial hatred in colonial Pennsylvania?
To what extent can the rhetoric of fear incite a population to violence?
To what extent did fear and racism shape colonial perceptions of neighboring Native Americans?
How did the living conditions on the frontier contribute to confrontation and conflict between Native Americans and colonists?
To what extent did the actions of the Paxton Boys disrupt or destroy William Penn's Peaceable Kingdom?

Number of Class Periods: 4

Grade Level: Grades 7-12

Common Core Standards

CCSS.ELA-Literacy.RH.11-12.2: Determine the central ideas or information of a primary or secondary source; provide an accurate summary that makes clear the relationships among the key details and ideas.
CCSS.ELA-Literacy.RH.11-12.6: Evaluate authors' differing points of view on the same historical event or issue by assessing the authors' claims, reasoning, and evidence.
CCSS.ELA-Literacy.SL.11-12.1: Initiate and participate effectively in a range of collaborative discussions (one-on-one, in groups, and teacher-led) with diverse partners on . . . topics, texts, and issues, building on others' ideas and expressing their own clearly and persuasively.
CCSS.ELA-Literacy.W.11-12.1: Write arguments to support claims in an analysis of substantive topics or texts, using valid reasoning and relevant and sufficient evidence.
CCSS.ELA-LITERACY.RI.9-10.6: Determine an author's point of view or purpose in a text and analyze how an author uses rhetoric to advance that point of view or purpose.

This unit was created for the 2019 Gilder Lehrman Institute of American History Teacher Seminar, "Native Peoples, Settlers, and European Empires in North America, 1600-1840" (July 28-August 3, 2019). You may also download a printable version of the entire unit.

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Massacre of the Conestogas (1841) Events in Indian history: beginning with an account of the origin of the American Indians, and early settlements in North America, and embracing concise biographies of the principal chiefs and head-sachems of the different Indian tribes, with narratives and captivities ... also an appendix containing the statistics of the population of the U. States, and an Indian vocabulary. Illustrated with eight fine engravings.
Penn's Treaty with the Indians (1771-72) Commissioned by Thomas Penn, son of Pennsylvania's founder, this painting depicts a legendary meeting between William Penn and members of the Lennie Lenape tribe at Shackamaxon on the Delaware River. Honoring his patron's and his own Quaker heritage, West employed a Neoclassical style to suggest both visual and political harmony. By depicting the three factions that shaped Pennsylvania for most of the eighteenth century - Native Americans, Quakers, and merchants - united in the act of settlement, West created a powerful symbol of peace. Although the scene is allegorical rather than historical, the image has become an icon of American history.Benjamin West was the first American-born artist to earn acclaim outside his homeland. West was born in Springfield (now Swarthmore), Pennsylvania, and his early artistic promise encouraged Philadelphia's leading citizens to finance his training in Rome. Subsequently, in 1763 West traveled to London and never returned to the Colonies. His acclaim as a painter of historical scenes attracted the attention of King George III. West was appointed official history painter to the king and was a founder and later was elected president of the Royal Academy. Well aware that, as an American, he was a novelty, West used this mystique to his advantage, claiming that he had learned color mixing from Native Americans. He greatly contributed to American art in his role as teacher and advisor to the many early American artists who came to London to study with him.