William Crawford (officer)

Colonel William Crawford

William Crawford (* 1732 in Berkeley County , today West Virginia , † June 11, 1782 ) was an American officer and geometer in the service of George Washington. Crawford fought in the French and Indian War and the American War of Independence . He found death on the stake on his campaign to the Sandusky River towards the end of the war.

Early years

William Crawford was born in what is now Berkeley County, West Virginia. He was the son of farmer William Crawford and his wife Honora Grimes, both of Scottish-Irish descent. After his father's death in 1736, his mother married Richard Stephenson. Crawford had a younger brother named Valentine Crawford and five half-brothers and one half-sister.

In 1749 he met George Washington , who at that time was a geometer and about the same age as Crawford. He accompanied Washington in his work and learned the craft of a surveyor. In 1754 Washington was given command of the militia by the governor , and he hired Crawford to serve him as an ensign in Braddock's campaign . Crawford, like Washington, survived the Battle of Monongahela . In the French and Indian War he fought in Washington's Virginia Regiment on the settlement border against hostile Indians and took part in the conquest of Fort Duquesne , the location of today's Pittsburgh . In the following years he also served in the army and fought in Pontiac's war in 1763 .

Soldier and surveyor

In 1766 he and his wife and three children moved into a house on Braddock Road on the Youghiogheny River in what is now Connellsville, Pennsylvania . Crawford made his living during this period as a farmer and fur trader. The Fort Stanwix Treaty of 1768 with the Iroquois opened up more land for settlement, so Crawford worked as a geometer and surveyed lands for settlers and speculators. The soldiers of the Virginia Regiment had been promised land by Governor Robert Dinwiddie as a reward for their military service in the French and Indian War. For this reason, Washington and Crawford took a trip down the Ohio River in the spring of 1770 to survey land for the veterans at what is now Point Pleasant in West Virginia. In 1773 Crawford and Lord Dunmore, Governor of Virginia, went on a reconnaissance trip to the west of the settlement.

In 1774 the Lord Dunmore's War broke out and Crawford was commissioned to build Fort Fincastle at what is now Wheeling in West Virginia. Crawford led a command that destroyed two Mingo villages near what is now Steubenville , Ohio, in retaliation for attacks by Chief Logan in Virginia. In the course of that military action, Crawford's men freed two white Indian prisoners, killed six, and captured 14 Indians.

Crawford's service to the Virginia Colony in the Dunmores War was controversial in Pennsylvania as the two colonies debated bitterly over their common border in the Fort Pitt area. From 1771 Crawford was Justice of the Peace in Pennsylvania, first for Bedford County and then in 1773 for Westmoreland County . Crawford was removed from office in January 1775 at the behest of Arthur St. Clair . From 1776 he worked again as a geometer and as a judge in Virginias short-lived Yohogania County.

American War of Independence

After the outbreak of the American Revolutionary War, Crawford hurriedly set up a Virginia regiment for the Continental Army . On 11 October 1776 it appointed Continental Congress to Colonel (English: colonel) and commander of the 7th Virginia Regiment. Crawford led the regiment into the Battle of Long Island and back across New Jersey . Together with George Washington he crossed the Delaware River and fought in the Battle of Trenton and Princeton . In the Philadelphia campaign, he commanded a scouting party for Washington's army.

When the war shifted to the western frontier, Crawford was transferred to the western department of the Continental Army. He served at Fort Pitt under General Edward Hand and General Lachlan McIntosh. Crawford was present at the Treaty of Fort Pitt in 1778 and participated in the construction of forts Laurens and McIntosh that same year. In 1780 he went to the Continental Congress to solicit more financial support for the Western Front. In 1781 Crawford asked for his discharge from military service.

Crawford campaign

→ see main article Crawford campaign In
1782, Crawford was reactivated by General William Irvine to lead a campaign against Indian settlements on the Sandusky River. He was accompanied by his son John Crawford and nephew and namesake William Crawford and about 500 volunteers. The expedition led deep into Indian land in the Ohio area with the intention of surprisingly attacking the Indian villages on the Sandusky River. The Indians and their British allies had learned of the advancing American forces beforehand and had time enough to bring about 400 additional warriors to the Sandusky. After a day of fierce fighting, the Indians managed to almost enclose the attackers. Most of the Americans escaped, but Crawford and some companions were captured. In retaliation for the Gnadenhütten massacre in the spring of the same year, in which nearly 100 Indians lost their lives, most of the Americans captured were killed. Crawford's fate was particularly cruel. He was tortured for at least two hours and burned on the stake . His son and nephew also died. The war ended shortly thereafter, but Crawford's death received a lot of coverage in the United States press and further deteriorated American-Indian relations.

Crawford on the torture stake

The place in Wyandot County , where Crawford met his tragic death, was added to the National Register of Historic Places in 1982 ("National Directory of Historic Places"). In 1994, Patriots erected a 2.6-meter-high sandstone monument on this site, while the Ohio Historical Society placed a plaque there. The following counties in the United States were named after William Crawford: Crawford County in Ohio, Crawford County in Pennsylvania, and Crawford County in Indiana. Colonel Crawford High School in North Robinson, Ohio also bears his name.

References and comments

1. ↑ ^{a b c d} Crawford's Expedition against Sandusky
2. ↑ Anderson: Colonel William Crawford , pp. 7-8.

literature

• James H. Anderson: Col. William Crawford . Ohio Archæological and Historical Publications, Columbus 1898. First published in Ohio Archæological and Historical Quarterly .
• Mark Mayo Boatner: Encyclopedia of the American Revolution. McKay, New York 1966. ISBN 0-8117-0578-1 .
• Consul Willshire Butterfield: An Historical Account of the Expedition against Sandusky under Col. William Crawford in 1782 . Clarke, Cincinnati 1873.
• Sarah E. Miller: William Crawford . The Encyclopedia of the American Revolutionary War: A Political, Social, and Military History. ABC-CLIO, Santa Barbara, California 2006. ISBN 1-85109-408-3 .
• James H. O'Donnell: William Crawford . American National Biography. Oxford University Press, New York 1999. ISBN 0-19-512784-6 .

Web links

• Historic plaque in Pennsylvania , near where Crawford built his home on the Youghiogheny River.
• Crawford's expedition against Sandusky