Abstract
In the confusing and complex period after the outbreak of the French and Indian War in 1755, the Susquehanna River acted as an important space that encompassed the competing and overlapping spheres of influence of both the British and the French in Pennsylvania. The confluence of the north and west branches of the river was also the site of the Indian town of Shamokin, where from 1747 through 1755 Moravian missionaries lived alongside Iroquois, Delawares, and Shawnees. Here the Moravians developed warm relations with such influential figures as Shikellamy, the Oneida sachem to the area's Iroquois, as well as with other native peoples who had been displaced from the area around the Chesapeake Bay.
