[History] Ohio History: The Battle of Fallen Timbers

[Tacticalwithdrawal]

Author: vizi
Original Thread: Ohio History: The Battle of Fallen Timbers

Ohio History: The Battle of Fallen Timbers

Part 2 of Ohio History.



The Battle of Fallen Timbers, August 20, 1794.

One of the strongest Indian confederacies known to date had achieved major victories over the United States in 1790 and 1791 alarming President George Washington. In 1792 President Washignton pulled General "Mad" Anthony Wayne out of private life to fight the Indian Confederacy.

General "Mad" Anthony Wayne was a proven general in the Revolutionary War. He was a colonel of the Fourth Regiment of the Pennsylvania militia and took part in the unsuccessful invasion of Canada. He commanded the distress US forces at fort Ticonderoga. After that battle he recieved a promotion to brigadier-general. The highlight of the Revolutionary War for Wayne was his victory at Stoney Point where he lead a nighttime bayonets only assualt on British fortifications. In a stroke of genius he ordered the men to leave their weapons unloaded so that a shot wouldn't destroy their element of suprise and had white paper pinned to his soldiers hats so that they would be able to tell each other apart from the British. This battle earned him the moniker "Mad" Anthony Wayne.

In the summer of 1793 Wayne believing the previous expeditions failed due to poor training and discipline began to make rigorous preparations. Luck would have it that peace talks were taking place in the summer of 1793 which gave Wayne plenty of time to prepare his troops.

The USA was trying to confirm rights to the land north of the Ohio River that they had won during the Revolutionary War. Americans had already moved into this land and the indians had formed a confederacy to prevent the US settlers from taking their lands. War was inevitable.

However, Shawnee war chief Blue Jacket and Delaware leader Buckongahelas, encouraged by their recent victories over the United States and the hope of continued British sponsorship, pressed for the Ohio River boundary line established by the Treaty of Fort Stanwix in 1768; they rejected subsequent treaties that had ceded lands north of the Ohio River to the United States.

Wayne's new army, the Legion of the United States, marched north from Fort Washington in 1793, building a line of forts along the way. Wayne's army consisted of about 3,000 men, including some Indians serving as scouts.

Blue Jacket's army took a defensive stand along the Maumee River (Maumee, Ohio, my present city of residence), near a number of uprooted trees that had been knocked down by a heavy storm. They Indians believed that the trees would hinder the advance of the army. The Indian army, about 1,500 strong, consisted of Blue Jacket's Shawnees and Buckongahelas's Delawares, Miamis led by Little Turtle, Wyandots, Ojibwas, Ottawas, Potawatomis, Mingos, and even a few Canadian militiamen.

The battle did not last long. The Indians greatly outnumbered and many were getting provisions from the nearby British outpost, Fort Miamis (now a popular sledding hill) when the battle began. They were outflanked by American cavalry and quickly routed. The Indians fell back to Fort Miamis, only to find the gates closed. The British commander was not authorized to start a war with the Americans and refused to give shelter to the Indians. The American troops decimated Indian villages and crops in the area, and then withdrew. Each side lost about 40 men.

The defeat of the Indians led to the signing of the Treaty of Greenville in 1795, which ceded much of present-day Ohio to the United States, paving the way for the creation of that state in 1803. One veteran of Fallen Timbers who did not sign the Greenville treaty was a young Shawnee war leader named Tecumseh, who would renew Indian resistance in the years ahead.


A statue commerorating the battle. Obviously taken on a cold and snowy day.