Who were the Paxton Boys?

The Paxton Boys were frontiersmen of Scots-Irish origin from along the Susquehanna River in central Pennsylvania. They formed a vigilante group to retaliate in 1763 against local Native Americans (Susquehannock people, also called the Conestoga) in the aftermath of the Seven Years' War (1754–1763) and Pontiac's Rebellion.

Specifically, the Paxton Boys were a vigilante group who killed 21 Susquehannock in events collectively called the Conestoga Massacre. Native Americans who were identified as Conestoga men, women and children were murdered. By slaughtering the remaining members of the Conestoga tribe near the city of Lancaster in December 1763, the uprising known as Pontiac's War was curbed.

Prior to the events of 1763, the Susquehannock tribe had lived on the land which was ceded by William Penn to their ancestors in the 1690s. Many Conestoga were Christian, and they had lived peacefully with their European neighbors for decades. They primarily lived by bartering handicrafts, hunting, and from subsistence food given them by the Pennsylvania government.

After the Conestoga Massacre, the colonial government ultimately held an inquest and determined that the killings were murder. Unfortunately, the attackers were never identified or punished.