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The last years of the Revolutionary War on the western Pennsylvania frontier were the most chaotic and contentious. The continued inability of either the local population or the Continental Army to bring stability to the war-torn settlements around Pittsburgh remained a critical point of contention in 1780.It was this failure that brought the relationship between Colonel Daniel Brodhead and the local population to the breaking point, although there were abundant factors that further strained their already antagonistic dealings. Among these the continuing westward spread of settlement provided a serious dilemma. Despite devastating Indian raids along the western Pennsylvania frontier,new settlers had continued to pour into the region during the revolution. Some came to escape the ravages of the war in the east, but most came seeking land and opportunity. Legally they were all squatters, because land patents could not be obtained during the war. “Their design of securing land is so great,” Lachlan McIntosh had noted in 1779, “[that] notwithstanding the danger of this country,they will go.”The continued emigration during the war placed additional difficulties on the army commanders at Fort.Pitt.Most of the newcomers were destitute and seriously drained the region’s already strained infrastructure. Few, if any, were experienced frontier fighters, and their presence at times only complicated the difficulties of defense . Worst of all, the new settlers fanned out and occupied lands wherever they could find them, regardless of existing property claims. Brodhead tried in vain to restrict the new settlers from crossing the Ohio River, but he repeatedly had to send soldiers to evict squatters from lands claimed by the Delawares and other Ohio Indians.1· 221 · Nine Mutual Distrust and Jealousy 222 a colony sprung from hell By trying to restrict access to land, Brodhead won the scorn of new and old settlers alike. He recognized that newcomers squatting on Indian land might severely impede efforts to induce the Ohio Indians to give up the war, but such considerations mattered little to the local population. Most settlers in the region had long resented any attempts to curb settlement, and now they came to see Brodhead’s unpopular policies as simply a new incarnation of the British regulations that had restricted their access to land in the years prior to the revolution. In the eyes of the settlers, the Continental Army was no better than the British troops that had tried to force them from their lands in the 1760s; both represented distant governments that appeared all too willing to let the local population suffer and die in order to protect Indian land rights.The colonel claimed his actions would bring security to the region,and although the locals desired the protection and peace that Brodhead promised, they refused to surrender their access to land or their local autonomy in return for security. If that formula followed the British model, which most settlers believed it would, then security would mean restrictions and regulations that would impinge on the liberty of the local population to live where they would and govern themselves as they saw fit.To the locals,autonomy was just as important as security, making Brodhead and the Continental Congress look more like enemies than friends. Material considerations provided another source of contention.The scarcity of provisions and supplies scuttled many of Brodhead’s plans, forcing him to abandon numerous proposed military operations because of supply shortages. Food was the critical issue. Local farmers managed to grow plenty of food during the war, but convincing them to sell their produce to the army proved almost impossible. Local suppliers refused to provide Brodhead with exclusive rights to purchase their crops and instead sold their wares to whomever they chose. The new immigrants created one source of conflict between Brodhead and local suppliers. “The consumption of multitudes of emigrants arrived and expected in this district (chiefly to avoid military duty and taxes),”Brodhead informed the Pennsylvania government, “will scarcely leave a pound of flour for the regular and other troops which it may be necessary to employ, offensively or defensively, for the defense of this part of the frontier settlements.”The fickle and even antagonistic decisions made by local farmers in selling grain produced additional tension. For example, the Virginia farmers settled along the Monongahela River readily supplied George Rogers Clark and other Virginia military leaders who passed through the region but consistently refused to supply Brodhead and the Continental Army. The Pennsylvania settlers were no better; they [13.59.136...

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