Fort Pitt Museum Pitt, after William Pitt the Elder. As a result, in 1763 local Delawares and Shawnees took part in Pontiac's Rebellion, an effort to drive the British out of their territory. The Indians' siege of Fort Pitt began on June 22, 1763, but the fort was too strong to be taken by force. In negotiations during the siege, the commander of Fort Pitt gave two Delaware emissaries blankets that had been exposed to smallpox, in hopes of infecting the surrounding Indians and ending the siege. The effectiveness of this attempt is unclear. Outbreaks of smallpox had plagued Native Americans for years
Coshocton, Ohio moved further west to the Sandusky River area, closer to the British Fort Detroit. From there the British and Lenape raided colonial frontier settlements. The Lenape sympathetic to the new United States stayed near Coshocton. Chief Newcomer signed the Fort Pitt Treaty of 1778, by which the Lenape hoped to secure their safety during the War, and he promised scouts and support to the rebel colonists. They also hoped to lay the base for a Native American state in the new nation. In retaliation for frontier raids by hostile Lenape and British, Colonel Daniel Brodhead of the American militia ignored