Edmunds opens Tecumseh and the Quest for Indian Leadership by describing a scene along the Ohio River in October 1774. Cornstalk, a Shawnee warrior, surveys the encampment of a group of soldiers from the British colony of Virginia. Although Cornstalk has been on good terms with the Virginians for much of his lifetime, he must now fight them.

After introducing Cornstalk, Edmunds provides a capsular history of the Shawnee people. The Shawnee are descended from the Fort Ancient Aspect, “a culture that had dominated the central Ohio valley” from about 1200 until 1650 AD (1-2). Following the dispersal of the Fort Ancient Aspect, the Shawnee migrated to several nearby regions, including parts of Kentucky, Tennessee, Illinois, and Georgia.

Allied with the British, a large segment of the Shawnee subsequently moves into Pennsylvania to escape the expansion of the rival Iroquois around the Ohio Valley. Along with the Delaware tribe, the British consider the Shawnee “subjects of the Six Nations,” that is, the Iroquois Confederacy (4). This humiliating arrangement leads to a gradual decline in Shawnee-British relations throughout the first half of the 18th century. Pressured by increased European settlement in Pennsylvania, the Shawnee eventually return to the Ohio Valley, their original homeland.