400 000 to 500 000 Figure Not to sound like Dr David Henige but where do the authors get their numbers from We can see a map drawn by Thomas Hutchins with the emplacement of Native American camps that Hutchins visited on his 1762 expedition whose account we find here Further we have somewhat of a rough census of the Delaware populations by Croghan 1759 Bouquet 1764 Hutchins 1768 and Dodge 1779 in the Virginia Library system found here No contemporaneous report direct or inferred suggests such astronomical figures for even the Eastern Seaboard When we have source accounts of populations we don t really need experts like Dr David Stannard and Ward Churchill inflating numbers simply look at the map and the numbers given by the people sent to count them and look for corroborating disputing sources I checked the presently cited sources following the 400 K 500 K sentence I m not finding that figure in the sources and one of the sources doesn t even exist as described If I m missing something in those cited sources please clarify here Of course we need experts to sift through information contemporaneous reports and source accounts for us because as Wikipedia editors we know that we are required to avoid novel interpretations of primary sources All analyses and interpretive or synthetic claims about primary sources must be referenced to a secondary source and must not be an original analysis of the primary source material by Wikipedia editors Resolving Issues with Article General The controversial issue with this article is the cause and effect to wit we have the eyewitness artifacts to the cause Trent Ecuyer McKee and eyewitnesses to the effect Turtleheart Trent McCullough Hicks Hutchins Jameson et al The point isn t to disagree with the people who were there and took the time to report what happened but to convey the circumstance as accurately as possible In short the attempt to deliver smallpox was made but the attempt was unsuccessful Unless more information comes to light that contradicts this causality we have a duty to anyone reading this to be honest and refrain from critical theory or any other biases we should simply stick to the facts wherever they may fall Special Apparently we have proponents of Critical Race Theory CRT contributing on the page to engage in CRT s key elements of storytelling and revisionism to highlight social injustices specifically white supremacy or white privilege and acquire some degree of empathic fallacy This would be fine if the CRT proponents could cite documented evidence that the effort was successful The problem with the CRT narrative is that we have documented evidence that the recipients and the deliverers of the sundries did not die of smallpox at least not within the next five years The door is always open to present contradictory evidence and this article can always be modified to reflect that evidence Resolution Being that the article was flagged POV and disputed by an anonymous flagger in what appears to be a hit and run attempt and that this article has a long history of sabotage as far away as Punjab Province Pakistan I am going to give considerable response time then flag this issue resolved Consensus Can we agree on two key points that an attempt to deliver the infected sundry items was made and that the attempt was apparently unsuccessful If so please indicate by writing Agreed and signing below Agreed Disagree with both key points as worded As we know from reliable sources there was not just an attempt infected items were indeed delivered to Native peoples As for the attempt was apparently unsucces