Glatthaar and Martin' Forgotten Allies analyzes the intricacies of Anglo-Amerindian and Native-Colonial alliances during the American Revolution. So often, the war is depicted as an ideological war for independence, rather than as a complex conflict for social and economic control. Furthermore, Native American nations and communities are often discussed a a single, monolithic entity.
Forgotten Allies challenges these narratives by examining the Iroquois Confederation as a shatterbelt, with four of the six confederation tribes (like the Mohawk and Seneca) supporting the British and two tribes supporting the Revolutionaries. Of those two tribes, the book focuses on the Oneida, the more powerful of the two confederate Iroquois tribes.
By examining the social and political environment and the assessing the risks attached to the Oneida's alliances, the authors paint the picture of a group of stakeholders that made choices based on the future impact of their diplomacy, not based on good-guy/ bad-guy narratives. The book, goes into the prospective implications of those decisions and then examines how those relationships actually played out. ( )

I picked up this book at the Oneida Nation Cultural Center on the nation south of Oneida, NY. The cultural center is quite interesting, giving a look at their history and traditions. The Oneidas were long forgotten until their land claims in the 1980's and 1990's attracted much media attention and legal action. (As did their casino and resort). The Oneida's claimed that land ceded to them after the Revolutionary War was expropriated illegally. Their claim was upheld by the courts. This caused much angst among locals who thought they owned their land, but didn't have clear title. (It also brought out the "haters" among the local citizens whose reactions were ugly; you know that they are always there just below the surface of civility.) In the end a settlement was reached and the legal tumult seems to have gone away.

The book gives the history of the Oneida's support for the rebel side in the war. At first determined to be neutral they were drawn into the conflict, largely due to their location in the path of the opposing armies. Their engagement in the defense of Fort Schuyler (now Fort Stanwix) and at the Battle of Oriskany is recounted in the book as is their support of the Continental Army at Valley Forge. The book points out the division of loyalties that emerged among the Six Nations of the Iroquois Confederacy as some supported the British (the Seneca's, Cayuga's and Mohawk's) while others were pro-American (Oneidas and Tuscaroras') or mixed (Onondaga's). ( )

MAN, the Iroqouis got screwed, didn't they?