George Rogers Clark and William Croghan: A Story of the Revolution, Settlement, and Early Life at Locust Grove

George Rogers Clark and William Croghan: A Story of the Revolution, Settlement, and Early Life at Locust Grove

by Gwynne Tuell Potts
George Rogers Clark and William Croghan: A Story of the Revolution, Settlement, and Early Life at Locust Grove

George Rogers Clark and William Croghan: A Story of the Revolution, Settlement, and Early Life at Locust Grove

by Gwynne Tuell Potts

Hardcover

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Overview

This dual biography focuses on the lives of two very different men who fought for and settled the American West and whose vision secured the old Northwest Territory for the new nation.
The two represented contrasting American experiences: famed military leader George Rogers Clark was from the Virginia planter class. William Croghan was an Irish immigrant with tight family ties to the British in America. Yet their lives would intersect in ways that would make independence and western settlement possible.

The war experiences of Clark and Croghan epitomize the American course of the Revolution. Croghan fought in the Revolutionary War at Trenton and spent the winter of 1777–1778 at Valley Forge with George Washington and LaFayette before being taken prisoner at Charleston. Clark, known as the "Hannibal of the West," was famous for his victorious Illinois campaign against the British and as an Indian fighter. Following the war, Croghan became Clark's deputy surveyor of military lands for the Virginia State Line, enabling him to acquire some 54,000 acres on the edge of the American frontier. Croghan's marriage to Lucy Clark, George Rogers Clark's sister, solidified his position in society. Clark, however, was regularly called by Virginia and the federal government to secure peace in the Ohio River Valley, leading to his financial ruin and emotional decline. Croghan remained at Clark's side throughout it all, even as he prospered in the new world they had fought to create, while Clark languished. These men nevertheless worked and eventually lived together, bound by the familial connections they shared and a political ideology honed by the Revolution.


Product Details

ISBN-13: 9780813178677
Publisher: University Press of Kentucky
Publication date: 01/20/2020
Pages: 320
Product dimensions: 5.90(w) x 9.00(h) x 1.00(d)
Age Range: 18 Years

About the Author

Gwynne Tuell Potts was the executive director and president of Historic Locust Grove, Inc. She is coauthor of George Rogers Clark and Locust Grove.

Table of Contents

George Croghan: The Buck
Land Mad
George Rogers Clark: Nature's Favorite
William Croghan: Immigrant
The Illinois
Washington's Soldier
Detroit
Frontier Wars
End of Glory
Wilkinson
French Major General
Country Houses
The Expedition
Burr
Clark's Death
William and Lucy Clark Croghan
Emancipation
Epilogue

What People are Saying About This

Susan Reigler

"With her talent as a storyteller and her commitment to scholarly detail, Gwynne Potts has restored a chapter in American history that was too long overlooked. Clark and Croghan made essential contributions to the establishment of our country, which this book so richly recounts."

From the Publisher

"With her talent as a storyteller and her commitment to scholarly detail, Gwynne Potts has restored a chapter in American history that was too long overlooked. Clark and Croghan made essential contributions to the establishment of our country, which this book so richly recounts." — Susan Reigler, author of author o f The Complete Guide to Kentucky State Parks


"The American Revolution in the East and West are enduring areas of historical interest and produced many a loyal soldier who did their duty in creating a new nation. Some, like George Rogers Clark, became famous — the Conqueror of the Northwest. Others, like William Croghan, a loyal soldier of the Virginia Line who went west after the war, did not. In George Rogers Clark and William Croghan: A Story of the Revolution, Settlement, and Early Life at Locust Grove, Gwynne Tuell Potts vividly and thoroughly tells the story of both men and how their lives intersected in fighting a war for independence and in frontier Kentucky." — James J. Holmberg, Curator of Collections, The Filson Historical Society

James J. Holmberg

"The American Revolution in the East and West are enduring areas of historical interest and produced many a loyal soldier who did their duty in creating a new nation. Some, like George Rogers Clark, became famous—the Conqueror of the Northwest. Others, like William Croghan, a loyal soldier of the Virginia Line who went west after the war, did not. In George Rogers Clark and William Croghan: A Story of the Revolution, Settlement, and Early Life at Locust Grove, Gwynne Tuell Potts vividly and thoroughly tells the story of both men and how their lives intersected in fighting a war for independence and in frontier Kentucky."

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