Fort McIntosh 1776 The Frontier

In the early years of the American Revolution, while British and American armies battled along the east coast, the western frontier was relatively quiet. Sporadic raids by both whites and Indians had climaxed in Lord Dunmore's War in 1774, when Shawnees were defeated at Point Pleasant at the mouth of the Kanawha River, forcing the release of many settlers held prisoner by the Indians. This portion of the frontier was bordered by the Iroquois on the north, and the Delaware, Ottawa, Wyandot, Shawnee, Chippewa, and various groups of Mingos to the north and west. Congress attempted to keep these nations neutral through a series of treaties made at Fort Pitt and by promising that the Ohio River would forever be the boundary between the whites and the Indians. By 1776, while the British were not yet ready for all-out war, that promise was put to the test. In the west, the British at Fort Detroit began to enlist the Indians for a war on the white settlements by paying for scalps. Raids by the British and their Indian allies increased, reached within the old boundaries of the Ohio River, and left many settlers killed or taken prisoner. As these raids increased, it became apparent that the Revolutionary War would have to be won in the west as well as in the east.

Beaver, Pennsylvania · United States