WV History

[GunnerJim]

Rumor has it that some EAST Virginian says the first battle of the Revolution occured in Point Pleasant, VA (now WV). I think that the below info clarifies the issue. 




The town is also noted for the October 10, 1774, Battle of Point Pleasant, in which Virginia militiamen led by Colonel Andrew Lewis defeated an Algonquin Confederation of Shawnee and Mingo warriors led by Shawnee Chief Cornstalk. The event is celebrated in Point Pleasant as the first battle of the American Revolutionary War, and in 1908 the US Senate authorized erection of a monument to commemorate Point Pleasant as the site of the first battle of the American Revolution. Most historians, however, regard it not as a battle of the Revolution but instead as a part of Lord Dunmore's War.

Dunmore's War (or Lord Dunmore's War) was a war from 1774 to 1775 between the Colony of Virginia and the Indian nations of the Shawnee and Mingo.

The House of Burgesses was asked by Lord Dunmore, the Governor of Virginia, to declare a state of war with the hostile Indian nations and order up an elite volunteer militia force for the campaign.

The context of the conflict resulted from escalating violence between British colonists who in accordance with previous treaties were exploring and moving into land south of the Ohio River--modern West Virginia and Kentucky--and American Indians who held treaty rights to hunt there.

As a result of successive attacks by Indian hunting and war bands upon the settlers, war was declared "to pacify the hostile Indian war bands". The war ended soon after Virginia's victory in the Battle of Point Pleasant on October 10, 1774.

As a result of this victory, the Indians lost the right to hunt in the area and agreed to recognize the Ohio River as the boundary between Indian lands and the British colonies.

Although the Indian national chieftains signed the treaty, conflict within the Indian nations soon broke out between more radical tribesmen who felt the treaty sold out their claims and tribesmen who felt another war would mean only further losses of territory to the more powerful British colonists.

When war broke out between the British colonists and the British government, the war parties of the Indian nations quickly gained power and mobilized the various Indian nations to attack the British colonists during the Revolutionary War.


As an aside, Point Pleasant is the alleged home the Mothman:
On November 15, 1966, two young, married couples from Point Pleasant, YYYYY and YYYYY YYYYYYY and ZZZZ and ZZZZ ZZZZZZ, were traveling late at night in the Scarberrys' car. They were passing the West Virginia Ordnance Works, an abandoned World War II TNT factory, about seven miles north from Point Pleasant, in the 2,500 acre (10 km²) McClintic Wildlife Station, when they noticed two red lights in the shadows by an old generator plant near the factory gate. They stopped the car, and reportedly discovered that the lights were the glowing red eyes of a large animal, "shaped like a man, but bigger, maybe six and a half or seven feet tall, with big wings folded against its back", according to Roger Scarberry. Terrified, they drove toward Route 62, where the creature supposedly chased them at speeds exceeding 100 miles per hour. However, as quoted in Keel's The Mothman Prophecies, the Scarberrys, despite driving more than 100 miles per hour, claimed to have noticed a dead dog on the side of the road, and in fact made such accurate note of its location that they claimed to have gone back the very next day and looked for it. Explanations for how they were able to make so accurate a mental note at a time of such great distress, or why they would go back to look for the dead dog, are not included in Keel's book.

A plaque on the Mothman statue provides a version of the original legend: "On a chilly, fall night in November 1966, two young couples drove into the TNT area north of Point Pleasant, West Virginia, when they realized they were not alone." Driving down the exit road, they saw the supposed creature standing on a nearby ridge. It spread its wings and flew alongside the vehicle up to the city limits. They drove to the Mason County courthouse to alert Deputy XXXXXXXX, who later said, "I've known these kids all their lives. They'd never been in any trouble and they were really scared that night. I took them seriously." He then followed YYYYYYYYYY's car back to the secret ex-U.S. Federal bomb and missile factory, but found no trace of the strange creature. According to the book Alien Animals, by Janet and Colin Bord, a poltergeist attack on the YYYYYYY home occurred later that night, during which the creature was seen several times. 

[VAshooter]

So it's settled. The first battle of the Revolutionary War was October 10th, 1774 at Point Pleasant WV.

VAshooter

[GunnerJim]

Read it again VAshooter, that was an early battle in Lord Dunsmore's War. Virginian's against the Indians. Just goes to show that the Senate has been consistently wrong for over 100 years!

[The Machine]

First, I want to thank you GJ for taking the time to find this and post it. 

Second, before anyone draws a conclusion one way or another, let's dig up all the facts that we can.

It just so happens both of you guys will be at the April shoot, so we should have enough historical data by then, to discuss. I will defer the data gathering to you GJ, since you are our Historian/Researcher. Anyone else reading this can add whatever they can find.

We also need citations and cross referencing of where any material came from. I'm very critical of so-called "history" myself, since it can easily be manipulated and flawed. So let's try to get our ducks-in-a-row before we enter a big debate on this topic, OK?

Remember, primary mission 1 is to promote and get bodies on the firing line. Number 2 is to get an instructor corps of our own in WV, ASAP. Number 3 is to find out if this darn first battle of the Revolution started in Point Pleasant or not. Wow! I'm getting dizzy just thinking about all the work that lies ahead of us! 

I can see the weekend of April 18-19 will have a lot of campfire talk...

[GunnerJim]

Don't ever forget the most important parts of history. First it's written by the winners, second those that do write it try to inflate the importance of their boss!!

[GunnerJim]

http://www.u-s-history.com/pages/h1035.htmlWars and Battles, 1774
The Virginia frontier's development was impacted by terms of two treaties following the colonial wars with the French:

The Peace of Paris (1763) concluded the Seven Years' War and its North American counterpart, the French and Indian War. Among other things, the British had pledged in this agreement to prohibit future American settlement west of the Appalachian Mountains.

The (first) Treaty of Fort Stanwix (1768) was an agreement between the British and the Iroquois nation for the latter to surrender their claims to the lands south and east of the Ohio River. The Shawnee, Mingo and Delaware were not parties to the treaty and had not surrendered their claims to those areas.
White settlers, many from Virginia, ignored the treaties from the beginning. Thousands crossed the Appalachians and lesser numbers pushed beyond the Ohio. Clashes between the races became increasingly frequent. In May 1774, eleven Mingos were killed in a confrontation near present-day Steubenville, Ohio; included among the dead were the father, brother and sister of Logan, a Mingo chief. Many natives in the area wanted full-scale war against the white intruders, but the Shawnee chieftain Cornstalk resisted.
Logan sought out the perpetrators of the killings and led an attack into western Pennsylvania. Thirteen whites were killed during the foray, prompting the British commander at Fort Pitt to stage counterattacks against a series of Mingo villages.

The governor of Virginia at this time was John Murray, the fourth earl of Dunmore. He had served in the House of Lords prior to a brief stint as governor of New York. Dunmore was a staunch supporter of the Crown and on three occasions closed down the Virginia legislature as a means to dampen patriot enthusiasm.

Dunmore's decision to inject himself into frontier warfare has been the subject of considerable speculation. Some have argued that he was concerned about the growing number of Pennsylvanians crossing the mountains into the west and wanted to advance the claims of Virginians. Others have maintained that Dunmore was totally self-serving and was simply trying to open the west for his own speculative ventures.

The governor prepared a two-pronged offensive, one directed against the natives in the Kentucky (present-day West Virginia) area; the other, led by Dunmore himself, marched toward Fort Pitt in Pennsylvania.

The defining event of the campaign occurred under the leadership of Andrew Lewis, who led his force into the Little Kanawha valley. The presence of a British force in native lands convinced Cornstalk that he should discard his moderation and form a large war party. In the Battle of Point Pleasant (October 10, 1774), the Shawnee were defeated and forced northward to the villages across the Ohio River.

The Shawnee, Mingo and Delaware later signed the Treaty of Camp Charlotte (near present-day Chillicothe, Ohio), in which they pledged to allow free navigation on the Ohio River, to return all captives and release their claims to the lands south and east of the Ohio (the first time that the actual residents of the area had made such an agreement).

http://www.ohiohistorycentral.org/entry.php?rec=514
In August 1774, Pennsylvania militia entered the Ohio Country and quickly destroyed seven Mingo villages, which the Indians had abandoned as the soldiers approached. At the same time, Lord Dunmore sent one thousand men to the Kanawha River in modern-day West Virginia to build a fort and to attack the Shawnees. Cornstalk, who had experienced a change of heart toward the white colonists as the soldiers invaded the Ohio Country, sent nearly one thousand warriors to drive Dunmore's force from the region. The forces met on October 10, 1774, at what became known as the Battle of Point Pleasant. After several hours of intense fighting, the English drove Cornstalk's followers north of the Ohio River. Dunmore, with a large force of his own, quickly followed the Shawnees across the river into the Ohio Country. Upon nearing the Shawnee villages on the Pickaway Plains north of modern-day Chillicothe, Ohio, and near what is now Circleville, Ohio, Dunmore stopped. From his encampment named Camp Charlotte, Dunmore  requested that the Shawnees come to him and discuss a peace treaty. The Shawnees agreed, but while negotiations were under way, Colonel Andrew Lewis and a detachment of Virginia militia that Dunmore had left behind at Point Pleasant crossed the Ohio River and destroyed several Shawnee villages. Fearing that Dunmore intended to destroy them, the Shawnees immediately agreed to terms before more blood was shed.


Also take a look at History of the Battle of Point Pleasant by Virgil A. Lewis, State Historian of West Virginia, written in 1909.
http://books.google.com/books?id=oMjxD8yfrcEC&dq=lord+dunmore's+war&printsec=frontcover&source=bl&ots=cysiweHW1Y&sig=xlj-vGOiX2xwBaXkGFhejmgvCV0&hl=en&ei=8gLLSbqtEZbrlQfh9rnvCQ&sa=X&oi=book_result&resnum=9&ct=result

Mr. Lewis states, in the last paragraph of the preface, "...that they will thus cease to perpetuate the errors of statements long current, regarding Lord Dunmore's War and it's chief event - the Battle of Point Pleasant."
To ice the cake, Mr. Lewis' home town was Point Pleasant, WV.

[slim]

I found a good link for the battle - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_Point_Pleasant

I posted a summary in the Stinson AAR before I saw this thread. Regardless of what really happened, or why it's rememebered this way or that, there's a place for the story at all events in WV. It should be told!

[GunnerJim]

Yes Slim, it should be told, as should the hundreds of other historical stories of West Virginia riflemen contributions to our nation.

Besides Point Pleasant, there were historic moments at Clendenin's Settlement (now Charleston), Ft. Savannah (Lewisburg), Ft. Donnally in Greenbrier County, Ft. Henry (Wheeling), and other's. WV riflemen of note not only included frontiersmen in buckskins with Kentucky Long Rifles, but at least two women (Anne Bailey and Betty Zane) and one slave (Dick Pointer).

[The Machine]

GJ, you already have a wealth of state-specific historical information under your belt, and I assume you won't have trouble with the "3 strikes", so we just need to get that Rifleman score out of you next month to anoint our first WV IIT. Man, I bet you can't wait to get on the firing line to make it happen. 

I can see it now...My prediction is that we'll have our first 2-3 IITs on Patriot's Day, and then I can schedule that IBC for June.  <