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Pontiac, Ottawa war leader, probably was born at the Ottawa village on the Detroit River about 1714. His life before 1763 is obscure. He was a war leader of the Ottawa as early as 1747 and a strong supporter of New France, both then, when the Huron Nicholas Orontony agitated against the French, and during the Seven Years War.
Pontiac's reputation rests upon his part in the Indian war of 1763, but historians have disagreed about his significance. Francis Parkman's picture of Pontiac as the controlling genius of the revolt has been justly criticized, but attempts to reduce him to the status of a local villain whose influence beyond Detroit was at best of no great significance underestimate his importance. He was neither the originator nor the strategist of the rebellion, but he kindled it by daring to act, and his early successes, ambition and determination won him a temporary prominence not enjoyed by any of the other American Indian leaders.
The uprising was rooted in the discontent among American Indians adjusting to a Britain emerging victorious from the Seven Years War. This and other grievances, including the British monarchy's attempts to confine trade to army posts and prohibit the liquor traffic, left the American Indians feeling threatened, debased and inconvenienced and fed a rising militancy that eventually enabled war leaders to overcome the voices for peace.
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