"After the success of Bradstreet and Bouquet [see PONTIAC'S WAR], there was no difficulty in concluding a treaty with all the Western Indians; and late in April, 1765, Sir William Johnson, at the German Flats, held a conference with the various nations, and settled a definite peace. At this meeting two propositions were made; the one to fix some boundary line, west of which the Europeans should not go; and the savages named, as this line, the Ohio or Alleghany and Susquehannah; but no definite agreement was made, Johnson not being empowered to act. The other proposal was, that the Indians should grant to the traders, who had suffered in 1763, a tract of land in compensation for the injuries then done them, and to this the red men agreed. … During the very year that succeeded the treaty of German Flats, settlers crossed the mountains and took possession of lands in western Virginia and along the Monongahela. The Indians, having received no pay for these lands, murmured, and once more a border war was feared. … And not only were frontier men thus passing the line tacitly agreed on, but Sir William himself was even then meditating a step which would have produced, had it been taken, a general Indian war again. This was the purchase and settlement of an immense tract south of the Ohio River, where an independent colony was to be formed. How early this plan was conceived we do not learn, but, from Franklin's letters, we find that it was in contemplation in the spring of 1766. At that time Franklin was in London, and was written to by his son, Governor Franklin of New Jersey, with regard to the proposed colony. The plan seems to have been to buy of the Six Nations the lands south of the Ohio, a purchase which it was not doubted Sir William might make, and then to procure from the King a grant of as much territory as the Company which it was intended to form would require. Governor Franklin, accordingly, forwarded to his father an application for a grant, together with a letter from Sir William, recommending the plan to the ministry; all of which was duly communicated to the proper department. But at that time there were various interests bearing upon this plan of Franklin. The old Ohio Company [see OHIO (VALLEY): A. D. 1748-1754] was still suing, through its agent, Colonel George Mercer, for a perfection of the original grant. … {3192} General Lyman, from Connecticut we believe, was soliciting a new grant similar to that now asked by Franklin; and the ministers themselves were divided as to the policy and propriety of establishing any settlements so far in the interior,—Shelburne being in favor of the new colony, Hillsborough opposed to it. The Company was organized, however, and the nominally leading man therein being Mr. Thomas' Walpole, a London banker of eminence, it was known as the Walpole Company.