A Most Pernicious Thing: Gun Trading and Native Warfare in the Early Contact Period

David Calderley is a Ph.D. candidate in history at the University of
Ottawa.

This book takes issue with the belief that Native peoples became
dependent on European firearms during the early contact period. The
author bases his argument on two assumptions: (i) the gun trade was
limited during this period; and (ii) the guns that were
traded—primarily matchlocks—were militarily inferior to existing
Native projectile weapons and therefore not desired by Natives.

Given argues the first part of his thesis persuasively. Prior to the
1670s, colonists were reluctant to trade weapons because of what Given
terms the “myth of control.” Colonists’ belief in the superiority
of their firearms gave them a sense of security in a new land where
their survival depended on the tolerance and goodwill of Native
peoples—hence their unwillingness to trade the one thing that appeared
to guarantee their security. Second, the limited number of firearms in
the colonies precluded an extensive gun trade.

Less convincing is the second part of Given’s thesis. The argument
that European firearms provided little military advantage to Amerindians
is countered by two facts: first, as noted by European observers,
firearms gave the Iroquois a military advantage over the Huron; and
second, Natives clearly wanted European firearms as a trade item. Given
does not adequately address this latter point, and his belief in the
inferiority of matchlocks is precariously grounded in his personal
testing of these weapons. What have such tests to do with the weaponry
preferences of a 17th-century Mohawk warrior? Although Given is
persuasive in his argument that Amerindians did not become instantly
dependent on European firearms, his book fails to explain why they came
to want them.