Jackson Johonnet

Who is Jackson Johonnet?

"Jackson Johonnet" was the pseudonymous author of a spurious Indian captivity narrative that enjoyed much popularity in the mid-1790s and was thereafter incorporated into the “canonical” body of accounts of white imprisonments, tortures and sufferings due to Native Americans.

The narrative tells the story of a young man of 17 who leaves his family’s farm in Falmouth, Massachusetts, to seek his fortune in Boston. Unable to get work, he falls prey to the wiles of an army recruiter, enlists, and is despatched to the “West” to serve with the army. He is almost immediately captured by Indians, taken to their villages on the upper Miami River, and witnesses the torture and death of fellow captives. He escapes with an associate and makes his way back to the army in time to participate in the notorious and disastrous battle known variously as the Battle of the Wabash or St. Clair's Defeat. Numerous points in the narrative contradict established facts in the history of the 1791 campaign, and other events seem to be embellishments supplied by someone unfamiliar with the western geography or actualities of Indian warfare.

The work was first published in Beers's Almanac and Ephemera ... for 1793. It proved exceedingly popular, and had at least eight reprint editions in the following two years. Its publication followed two years of unsuccessful military campaigns against a coalition of Native Americans in Ohio, led by Little Turtle and Blue Jacket, that included Miami, Shawnee, Kickapoo, Piankashaw, Wea, and Delaware tribes. The Northwest Territory was rendered unsafe for settlement, and President George Washington and Congress were endeavoring to increase the standing army and provide for defense of the frontier. The “Johonnet” narrative packed much action and adventure in a relatively short space, and its portrayal of the Indians served to justify the efforts for the military conquest of their territories then under preparation.