Mackinac Island's strategic location in the Great Lakes made it a frequent site of conflict long before and after Europeans arrived in North America. Odawa historian Andrew Blackbird related that the island was once inhabited by a tribe allied with the Odawa of neighboring Manitoulin Island, and that during a winter raid Iroquois warriors from New York attacked this tribe and left only two survivors; according to Blackbird, the Odawa named the island in memory of their fallen allies, the Mishimackinong. Between 1640 and 1701, the Iroquois launched a massive offensive against western Great Lakes tribes, first targeting the Huron, who fled west around 1650. The Huron and Odawa settled on Mackinac Island but were later pushed as far west as Minnesota. By 1670, Odawa and Ojibway war parties had regained control of the Straits of Mackinac and driven the Iroquois east, and by the late 1690s they were attacking Iroquois villages in New York. In 1701, the Great Peace Treaty of Montreal, involving the Odawa, Ojibway, the French, and several other tribes, ended the conflict. A century later, during the War of 1812, Native warriors fighting alongside their British allies captured the island at the beginning of the war. Shingwaukonse, the Little Pine, an Ojibway war chief from Bowating, Sault Ste. Marie, was the principal leader of Anishnaabek warriors in the bloodless capture of Fort Mackinac on July 17, 1812. Native warriors were again decisive in August 1814, helping defeat an American attempt to recapture the island. Fifteen years after the War of 1812 ended, the Anishnaabek entered a different struggle, resisting the removal policy of the 1830s.