Category Archives: Western Frontier
Down the Rabbit Hole with Three Captains Johnny
On the afternoon of June 4, 1782 in the grasslands of western Ohio, a Pennsylvania volunteer named Francis Dunlavy spent a portion of his time trying to shoot a Native American he later called “Big Captain Johnny.” For his part, the … Continue reading
Review: Tecumseh and the Prophet: The Shawnee Brothers Who Defied a Nation by Peter Cozzens
Life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness made their way into the American revolutionary project most explicitly in the second paragraph of the Declaration of Independence. So, I hope you’ll forgive my taking of liberties in reviewing a book that starts … Continue reading
Posted in Book Review, Native American, Personalities, War of 1812, Western Frontier
Tagged Peter Cozzens, Shawnee, Tecumseh, Tenskwatawa, The Prophet, War of 1812
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Review: Russell Mahan, The Kentucky Kidnappings and Death March: The Revolutionary War at Ruddell’s Fort and Martin’s Station, Kindle ed. (West Haven, UT: Historical Enterprises, 2020).
In the summer of 1780, Captain Henry Bird crossed the Ohio River with some 800 Native Americans from various British-allied tribes and two companies of soldiers from Detroit (roughly 50 Canadians and Tories and a mixed group of regulars from … Continue reading
Poet in a Patriot Prison
CONFINEMENT hail! in honour’s justest cause. True to our King, our Country, and our Laws; Opposing anarchy, sedition, strife, And every other bane of social life. These Colonies of British freedom tir’d, Are by the frenzy of distraction fir’d; Rushing … Continue reading
Posted in Civilian, Personalities, Social History, Uncategorized, Western Frontier
Tagged Connolly Plot, Frederick, Imprisonment, John Connolly, John Smyth, Loyalists, Maryland, Pittsburgh, Poetry, Prison, Tory
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Augustin Mottin De La Balme’s Disastrous Detroit Campaign, Autumn 1780
The Revolutionary War has more than its share of adventurers, rogues, soldiers-of-fortune, and risk-takers. Augustin Mottin De La Balme combined all these characteristics in his person. In November 1780, they brought the Frenchman and his soldiers to a horrible end outside the … Continue reading
Posted in Battles, Campaigns, Native American, Personalities, Uncategorized, Western Frontier
Tagged Augustin Mottin De La Balme, DePeyster, Detroit, Fort Wayne, France, French Canadians, French Volunteers, Haldimand, Illinois Country, Kaskaskia, Kekionga, La Balme Massacre, Little Turtle, Miami Indians
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Stumbling Upon Daniel Boone
Recently I had the chance to travel through Lexington, Kentucky en route to western Kentucky and to see the sites associated with the Fort Donelson campaign in the American Civil War. In Frankfurt, Kentucky, Simon Bolivar Buckner, the Confederate general … Continue reading
“Rev War Roundtable with ERW” Looks West….
The majority of the study of the American Revolution centers on the main theaters of the war, chiefly east of the Appalachian Mountains and on the high seas. Obviously. Yet, what is considered today the Midwest or Great Lakes region … Continue reading
Posted in Emerging Revolutionary War, Memory, Revolutionary War, Western Frontier
Tagged 8th Virginia Continental, American Independence, American Revolution, American Revolutionary War, Emerging Revolutionary War, Gabriel Neville, George Rogers Clark, George Rogers Clark National Historical Park, Great Lakes, National Park Service, Rev War Revelry, Rev War Roundtable with ERW
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Captain James Willing’s Mississippi Raid, Part 2
Willing’s next target was the town of Manchack upon which he descended “so rapidly that they reached the Settlements without being discovered.”[1] On the 23rd, Willing’s advance parties captured the 250-ton British sloop Rebecca, with sixteen 4-pounders and six swivels.[2] … Continue reading
Captain James Willing’s Mississippi Raid, Part 1
In 1778, Captain James Willing and his crew sailed and rowed the bateaux Rattletrap down the Ohio River to the Mississippi. A “left” turn of sorts then took them down the Mississippi all the way to the Gulf of … Continue reading
The Journal of Nicholas Cresswell, Part 2
An Englishman on the Frontier Part 1 click here. Nicholas Cresswell left Alexandria for the Illinois Country on March 16, 1775, his correspondence as yet unknown to the local Committee of Safety. The Ohio River served as a highway to … Continue reading
