sign in sign up
<<
Home , Fort Pitt (Pennsylvania), Shingas, Westsylvania

Daniel P. Barr. A Colony Sprung from Hell: and the Struggle for Authority on the Western Frontier, 1744-1794. Kent: Kent State University Press, 2014. 344 pp. $65.00, cloth, ISBN 978-1-60635-190-1.

Reviewed by Jessica L. Wallace

Published on H-War (November, 2016)

Commissioned by Margaret Sankey (Air University)

In A Colony Sprung from Hell: Pittsburgh and region, as the French increasingly moved into the the Struggle for Authority on the Western Penn‐ region and Native American groups sought to ei‐ sylvania Frontier, 1744-1794, Daniel P. Barr situ‐ ther remove colonists or exploit their presence for ates the Pittsburgh area in the center of debates their own political ends. From the forward, on expansion, political control, and military pow‐ charter claims to land were trumped by actual er in the mid-to-late eighteenth century. Barr or‐ military presence and economic power in the re‐ ganizes his book chronologically, from the decade gion. prior to the Seven Years’ War to the Whiskey Re‐ Part 2 deals with British attempts to limit and bellion. Throughout these fve decades, he traces control western expansion through the Proclama‐ the various attempts of , Pennsylvania, tion Line of 1763 and the creation of , British imperial ofcials, and the new American which Indians, Virginians, and Pennsylvanians government to establish authority in western alike objected to, believing it was a sign of more Pennsylvania, highlighting the inability of out‐ British authority and control to come. Part 3 cov‐ siders to efectively exert control over the region, ers the through the Whiskey which began as a borderland between colonial Rebellion, tracing how the Revolution afected the settlements and Indian country and in the nine‐ western struggle for authority. Barr analyzes the teenth century became an important industrial shift to local government as colonial and imperial center. powers were consumed with the war, creating a In the frst section, Barr analyzes the land pattern of local governance that was very difcult speculation and expansionist policies that both to change after independence. Thus, Barr argues Virginia and Pennsylvania advanced, along with convincingly, the was the logi‐ the resulting clashes over the lands at the forks of cal outcome of the decades-long political culture the River. That competition destabilized the of local authority, distrust of oversight, and strug‐ H-Net Reviews gle for control of the fron‐ sylvania and Virginia take center stage. He ac‐ tier. knowledges how the Delaware in particular used Throughout his book, Barr emphasizes that the Seven Years’ War to leverage British colonists the and the surrounding re‐ into recognizing their own case for autonomy, pri‐ gion was one consumed by local interests and bat‐ marily through targeted attacks on the backcoun‐ tles between competing parties to validate claims try. Indian policy was another source of division to political authority in the region. This intense re‐ among colonists, who could not decide how to re‐ gionalism meant that local concerns outweighed spond to attacks—or who should fnance them. colonial, national, or imperial ones. In the Ameri‐ Acts of violence against Native Americans—from can Revolution, for instance, the rhetoric of liber‐ the Paxton Boys to the massacre of Christian Dela‐ ty and equality was not as infuential in garnering ware Indians at Gnadenhutten in 1782—demon‐ support among colonists in the region as were the strated the deep-seated belief among the region’s immediate local concerns of security and stability. white inhabitants that violence was the proper re‐ sponse to their problems, long ignored by eastern Another major theme is the competition be‐ leaders. tween Virginia and Pennsylvania for control of the region. Before the Seven Years’ War, both Barr uses western Pennsylvania as a case colonies’ charters gave them access to the lands at study for issues of western expansion, Indian con‐ the forks of the , though Virginia—pri‐ fict, and the tensions between local and larger marily through its —was more ag‐ concerns. From its beginning, he asserts, Fort Pitt gressive in asserting its land claims, arguing that was a “virtual cross-section of colonial society” if Pennsylvania’s Quaker-dominated assembly (p. 2), a situation that changed little through the could not efectively defend the region against the Seven Years’ War and the American Revolution. French, their land claims should be invalidated. He argues that colonists were initially drawn to Once the border was decided in favor of Pennsyl‐ the region because of its opportunities for person‐ vania, thousands of former Virginians refused to al and economic growth, but what kept people in accept the change, moving instead to the newly the region was “an attachment to local autonomy opened lands in . In 1783, a petition with and personal liberty” (pp. 271-272). Ultimately, twenty thousand signatures even reached Con‐ Barr makes a strong argument for the importance gress, proposing the creation of a new state of of authority and control in shaping western Penn‐ Westsylvania; Pennsylvania objected on the sylvania in the eighteenth century, demonstrating grounds that advocating the creation of a new that colonists, Native Americans, and imperial of‐ state in its present borders was treasonous. In ex‐ fcials alike were highly motivated to increase plaining the intense competition between the two their own share of political power in the region. colonies, Barr highlights the roles that prominent While Barr clearly elucidates the problems fgures of the eighteenth century played in the residents of the Pittsburgh frontier faced, he is fght for power, including Pennsylvanians Conrad weaker on acknowledging that many of these Weiser and George Croghan; Virginians Robert problems were not Pennsylvania-specifc: the in‐ Dinwiddie, Christopher Gist, , ternal fghting between eastern and western con‐ and ; and Delaware Indian stituents, local interests versus colonial, imperial, leaders and Teedyuscung. or state policies, and competitions between multi‐ Barr takes care to include Native American ple colonies for land all happened on the southern considerations in his account of the struggle for frontier during the eighteenth century as well. In‐ authority, though the competing interests of Penn‐ deed, while Virginia was competing with Pennsyl‐

2 H-Net Reviews vania for the Ohio River lands, it was also jockey‐ ing with South Carolina for greater trade access and military alliance with the Cherokee in what is now eastern Tennessee. Barr could have usefully gone to greater lengths to explain that the Penn‐ sylvania example serves as one model of frontier problems. Finally, in his last paragraph of the book, he argues that what happened near Pitts‐ burgh is an embodiment of the American frontier. This is a large, important argument—one that cer‐ tainly deserves more discussion than a single paragraph. An epilogue or a longer conclusion to the fnal chapter would have enabled him to more clearly and thoroughly address these issues of the western Pennsylvania frontier being an example of both typical and unique features of the frontier and American expansion. In all, Barr’s book presents a clear and com‐ pelling argument for the importance of the Penn‐ sylvania frontier, and his connections between events of the Seven Years’ War, the American Rev‐ olution, and the early Republic will make this book of use to scholars of military, social, political, and Native American history.

If there is additional discussion of this review, you may access it through the network, at https://networks.h-net.org/h-war

Citation: Jessica L. Wallace. Review of Barr, Daniel P. A Colony Sprung from Hell: Pittsburgh and the Struggle for Authority on the Western Pennsylvania Frontier, 1744-1794. H-War, H-Net Reviews. November, 2016.

URL: https://www.h-net.org/reviews/showrev.php?id=44531

This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-No Derivative Works 3.0 License.

3