Pittsburgh in the Revolutionary War was not a battlefield in any conventional sense. No major engagement between Continental and British regulars took place at the Forks of the Ohio. What happened there was something more sustained and in some respects more consequential: for eight years, Fort Pitt served as the linchpin of the entire American western strategy, the supply base from which Continental forces reached into the Ohio Valley, and the one fixed point that kept the western frontier from collapsing entirely.
PEOPLE
Edward Hand
Continental Army Brigadier General, Fort Pitt Commandant, Irish-Born Physician
George Rogers Clark
Virginia Militia General, Illinois Country Campaigner, Western Theater Commander
Daniel Brodhead
Continental Army Colonel, Fort Pitt Commandant, Western Department Commander
Lachlan McIntosh
Continental Army Brigadier General, Fort Pitt Commandant, Scottish-Born Georgian
KEY EVENTS
George Rogers Clark Stages Illinois Campaign Through Pittsburgh
Jan 1778
Crawford Expedition Defeated at Sandusky
Jun 1782
Treaty of Paris Confirms Ohio Valley Claims
Sep 1783
Gnadenhutten Massacre
Mar 1782
Continental Army Assumes Control of Fort Pitt
Aug 1775
Brodhead Expedition up the Allegheny River
Aug 1779
STORIES
MODERN VOICE
Why the Rivers Mattered
When people think about the Revolutionary War in western Pennsylvania, they tend to think about battles that didn't really happen here, or they think about famous names — Clark, Crawford — without qui...
HISTORICAL VOICE
The Cost of the Western War
William Crawford did not want to command the Sandusky expedition. That is one of the few unambiguous facts in a story that has been told and retold for two centuries, accumulating layers of heroism an...