22 Facts About Kekewepelethy

Kekewepelethy, known as Captain Johnny, was the principal civil chief of the Shawnees in the Ohio Country during the Northwest Indian War.

Kekewepelethy first came to prominence during the American Revolutionary War, in which he, like most of his fellow Mekoche Shawnees, initially sought to remain neutral.

Kekewepelethy joined the war against the United States around 1780, moving to Wakatomika, a Shawnee town known for its militant defense of the Ohio Country.

Kekewepelethy supported the formation of a confederation of Native people to resist US expansion.

Kekewepelethy refused to sign, and instead retreated to the Detroit region, then still under British control, where he unsuccessfully tried to revive the war effort.

Kekewepelethy was frequently referred to by English speakers as "Captain Johnny" or "Captain John," but before historian John Sugden's work on the Shawnees in the 1990s, it was not widely recognized by writers that Kekewepelethy and Captain Johnny were the same person.

Kekewepelethy first appears in historical documents at the outset of the American Revolutionary War, which in the Ohio Country was fought between American settlers and Natives, with Natives getting support from their British allies in Detroit.

Kekewepelethy initially followed the path of neutrality, even after Cornstalk's murder in 1777 by American militiamen.

Around 1780, Kekewepelethy joined the Native war effort against the United States, moving further west to Wakatomika, a Shawnee town on the Mad River near present-day Zanesfield, Ohio.

Kekewepelethy refused to acknowledge that the Shawnees were a conquered people.

Kekewepelethy supported the formation of a pan-tribal coalition, the Northwestern Confederacy, which put forth a doctrine that Native lands were held in common by all tribes, and so no further land should be ceded to the United States without the consent of all the tribes.

In 1786 Kekewepelethy was among the Shawnees who met with American commissioners at Fort Finney.

The Americans demanded that the Shawnees sign a treaty relinquishing lands north of the Ohio River, but Kekewepelethy objected, insisting that Ohio River was the only acceptable boundary.

Kekewepelethy presented the commissioners with a belt of black wampum, indicating that he would go to war rather than submit.

Kekewepelethy soon emerged as Moluntha's successor as principal civil chief.

Kekewepelethy responded by trying to reinvigorate the Northwestern Confederacy, recruiting Miamis and Lenapes to aid the Shawnees in resisting American occupation.

Kekewepelethy instead served as a diplomat and spokesman, consulting with other Native leaders and obtaining aid from the British at Detroit.

Kekewepelethy flatly disagreed, insisting that the Ohio River was the only acceptable boundary.

Kekewepelethy tried to recruit additional warriors to continue the war, to no avail.

Meanwhile, when nearby Fort Miami was turned over to the Americans by the British, Kekewepelethy moved to Bois Blanc Island and then Grosse Ile, which were still under British control.

Kekewepelethy is sometimes confused with other Natives called "Captain Johnny," including a younger Shawnee sometimes known as "Big Captain Johnny," who served with Captain Logan as a scout for the Americans in the War of 1812.

Kekewepelethy had at least one son, Othowakasica, who signed the Treaty of Greenville and the Treaty of Fort Meigs, and in the 1830s moved to Kansas with other Shawnees.