Pontiac (c. 1720-1769), chief of the Ottawa Indians and leader in the "Conspiracy of Pontiac" in colonial America in 1763-64, was born about 1720, probably on the Maumee River, in what is now northwestern Ohio. His father was an Ottawa and his mother an Ojibwa.

As the English settled in his tribal area, he became resentful of their encroaching settlements. With the encouragement of the French, Pontiac enlisted the support of practically all the Indian tribes from Lake Superior to the lower Mississippi for a joint move to expel the British. He arranged to have each tribe attack the fort that was closest to their hunting grounds.

In the great wilderness extending from the Pennsylvania frontier to Lake Superior were 14 British posts, of which the most important were Fort Pitt, Detroit, and Mackinaw. The Indians started their attacks in early May of 1763 and captured all but four of the posts, Niagara, Pitt, Ligonier, and Detroit. Mackinaw was taken by a stratagem, and the entire garrison was killed. A plot for the capture of Detroit seems to have been betrayed to the commanding officer by a Indian woman, and failed, but Pontiac at once began a siege that lasted for five months. Reinforcements finally succeeded in entering Detroit; Pontiac's men began to desert him, and the news of the signing of a peace treaty between France and Great Britain removed all hopes of French aid. Pontiac thereupon raised the siege and on August 17, 1765, entered into a formal peace treaty, which he confirmed at Oswego in 1766. Three years later he was murdered by a member of the Illinois tribe.