The Nutmeg's Curse: Parables for a Planet in Crisis

by Amitav Ghosh

On June 24, 1763, in the thick of the Indian uprising known as Pontiac’s Rebellion, two Lenape emissaries were in Fort Pitt, Pennsylvania, for a parlay. When it came time for them to leave they were given some parting gifts that had been issued and signed for by the fort’s commanding officer. Later, a British trader called William Trent would note in his journal, “We gave them two Blankets and an Handkerchief out of the Small Pox Hospital. I hope it will have the desired effect.” And so it did: an epidemic broke out in Ohio, coinciding “closely with the distribution of infected articles by individuals at Fort Pitt.”42