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A reoccurring theme in American history is the poor treatment of the natives. I found this last chapter of American Colonies to be really interesting because I had never known of the Russian involvement in the continent or the Spanish taking of California. However, the Indians were cruelly treated and forced out of the land that was rightfully theirs, just as the Spanish and English had done on the east coast.
To begin Taylor goes into the Russians and their takeover in Siberia and Alaska. The Russians may have been the most ruthless of all ethnic groups as they forced the natives to provide them with furs in order to make a profit. The Russians didn’t use trade as they easily could have. Instead they chose the route of holding woman and children at gunpoint and coercing the Aleut men to bring furs back as ransom (451). Obviously, this aggravated the Aleuts and they rebelled, and the Russians quickly countered by burning villages and murdering the natives by the hundreds (452)
The Spanish were very similar with their treatment of the Indians in California. The Spanish showed no equality to the natives as they came in and just took land that they wanted with no remorse. Their move caused Russians to prepare defense in case of a Spanish attack on their new claimed lands, but Taylor states that the Spanish was “preoccupied with trying to control the immense native population” and they did so through “plundering, beating, and raping Indians.” (458) I noticed that my classmate Jake Newton spoke on how the Spanish was going to colonize in the west because of the other countries involvement in the west (http://sites.davidson.edu/his141/spanish-brutality-in-the-west/). I definitely agree with that reason, but I also feel that a big influence on the Spanish colonization in California was the need to protect their settlements in Mexico (454).
One thing I disagree with from Taylors writings is the way he makes the levels or harshness vary from ethnic groups. Although there does have to be some group that it the worst in their actions towards the natives, Taylor makes it seem like the French were good guys, English were bad at times and good at times, and the Spanish and Russians just ran over natives at all times. In reality all of these groups used natives to their own advantage and none are innocent when the history is actually analyzed.