The Old Wabash River

The old Wabash River channel played a key role in the Battle of the Wabash. Major General Arthur St. Clair's U.S. military main encampment of over 900 people stood east of the river, while 300 Kentucky militiamen camped across the river to the west. Northwest of the Kentucky militia, the American Indian alliance deliberately and silently assembled in a crescent formation to rapidly surround the enemy. When the middle of the crescent, 700 Miami, Shawnee, and Delaware troops, attacked the Kentucky militia, the militiamen ran chaotically across the river back into St. Clair's main camp. The full 1,400-member American Indian alliance quickly surrounded the main encampment, using the landscape to pin the U.S. troops within the triangle of land formed by the meandering Wabash River and Buck Run. The American Indians overtook the southern end of the main encampment, using trees, underbrush, and firearm smoke as cover, and quickly moved into the center of camp. Soldiers from the northern end of camp pushed the warriors back with a bayonet charge, but were quickly surrounded again. With almost all officers targeted and killed, many soldiers abandoned their positions and formed random groups. St. Clair recognized that retreat was the only option and ordered a bayonet charge east through the American Indian lines. What remained of the army fled down the road created the previous day, and American Indian warriors pursued the remnants for a few miles as they fled south more than 20 miles back to Fort Jefferson. The battle ended in an overwhelming victory for the American Indians, with between 30 and 80 warriors killed and 800 to 900 of St. Clair's army and camp followers killed.

Fort Recovery, Ohio · United States