Brief Overview of Fort Jefferson, 1780-1781

Brief Overview of Fort Jefferson, 1780-1781. . The contruction of George Rogers Clark's Fort Jefferson was first proposed during a Council of War meeting between Clark and his junior officers at the Falls of the Ohio (Louisville) November 16, 1779, following Clark's succesful capture of British-held Kaskaskia July 4, 1778 (near Chester, Ill.), and British-held Ft. Sackville (Vincennes, Ind.) on February 25, 1779. Both Virginia governors, Patrick Henry, and then Thomas Jefferson, approved Clark's plans, making Fort Jefferson and its Town of Clarksville the only Virginian settlements built in Kentucky sanctioned by the Commonwealth of Virginia., By January 1780 Clark had surveyed the Confluence area of the Ohio and Mississippi rivers and settled on a location for the fort and town five miles south of the Confluence on the east side of the Mississippi River and Island No. 1. The island was separated from the "Virginia" shore by a shallow streams that could be crossed easily during the dry season., Clark, and most of his soldiers, civilians, and families, arrived on April 19, 1780, the 5-year anniversary of the Battle of Lexington and Concord. By May 1780, the Ohio-Mississippi rivers flood waters had receded leaving a "field of grasses", hence the two names given to "May Field Creek" and "Liberty Creek" (See Wm. Clark map of Fort Jefferson)., Soldiers and civilians began building the fort, named after VA governor Thomas Jefferson, and the adjacent civilian town, named after Clark (Clarksville), as well as their own cabins, and breaking ground to farm 47 acres (17 acres on Island One, and 30 to the east of the town near the present paper-mill). The fort was enclosed with a stockade by the first week of June 1780., Within the 100 ft. square fort were quarters and a mess hall for officers, a well with windlass, a semi-subterranean munitions structure, at least two quartermaster stores, including one with a cellar or basement, a small parade ground, a whipping post, a flagpole, bake oven, a 2-room framed privy with clapboard siding, a guard house, 8 wooden camps or huts for the soldiers, and a blackmith's shop. Whether the buildings in the fort were 'stand alone' or built into the walls of the stockade will not be known until all professional archeological studies of the site have been completed., The fort had three gates facing the south, east, and west. It also had two raised cannons: an iron 4-, and a bronze 6-pounder (the 6-pounder was an older French cannon with ornate dolphins - see photo on next panel of a similar canon from Fort de Chartres near Prairie de Rocher, Ilinois). The fort also had two raised bastions in its NE and SW angles where the cannons were positioned to protect the town and blockhouses. , Outside the fort were other military and civilian structures, including 3 triangle-shaped blockhouses that protected the fort from elevated areas to the NW and NE, and the lower lying community from the southern end of the Town of Clarksville. Blockhouses were outfitted with a total of seven 1- and 2-pounder swivel guns (small cannon), and masket and rifle fire. Regular soldiers and the town's militia manned the blockhouses., To the east and south of the fort was the "Town of Clarksville" (see Clark map). The town consisted of 101 house lots occupied by at least 41 civilian families and an unknown number of officers and their families. Civilian families averaged 7 members per household. Cabins were often shared by 2 or more related families and featured horizontal log construction with split hickory shakes for roofing and wattle and dad (clay) with logs for chimneys. Civilians and soldiers of French descent preferred vertically set logs for building. , Demographics About Fort Jefferson , Archival records for FJ include more than 550 named persons including 220 soldiers representing 8 different companies under the command of Col. George Rogers Clark., Fort Jefferson itself was commanded by Clack's distant cousin, Capt. Robert George. Military companies included those of artillery, infantry, and horse (dragoons). A retinue of support staff included commissary, medical, blacksmiths quartermasters, and Indian Affairs Dep't, as were Clark's spies, experesses (messengers), artificers (engineers), and other military and civilian support staff that included both face and enslaved African American soldiers and civilians. African American soldiers and artificers were paid at the same rate as their white counterparts, and in this regard, Clark, a slave owner himself, adopted the French Code Noir from the Mississippi Valley French when it came to African Americans to under his military command, as opposed to the Virginian model of slavery that was more regimented and harsher. Still, Clark and many fellow officers owned slaves., The Clarksville civilians maintained a milita of 40 men and teenage boys commanded by Capt. George Owens. The militia was represenced by fathers, sons, brothers, and uncles from various civilian households in the town., Allied to the Americans and sometimes present at Fort Jefferson were 65 Kaskaskia Natives, who contrary to popular belief, fought against British-armed Chickasaw Natives on behalf of the American colonies. Like the Chickasaw, the Kaskaskia were armed with swords, scalping knives, muskets and rifles., The civilian families of Clarksville farmed 47 aces consisting of corn, flax, turnips, and pumpkins. A few cattle were kept for working the fields, hauling timber, and milking. Wild foods supplemented the diet of soldiers and civilians frequently during the spring of 1781. Ironically, no archival records have been found that describe soldiers or civilians "fowling" during the winner of 1780-81, alhough one 'punt' gun was known to be owned by Capt. James Piggott, a civilian militiaman. The irony is that the Mississippi 'flyway' maintains one of the greatest potentials for easily obtainable food. Other hunting emphasized buffalo, black bear, deer and small mammals. Fishing with homemade nets occurred frequently during the spring of 1781., Civilian men, women, and children assisted the soldiers by sowing their uniforms, supplying foodstuffs, and participating in a quartermaster-(guild) trademarket system., Structures built outside FJ included a 2-man saw pit, loading docks along the north bank of "May Field" Creek, civilian and soldier cabins, and three triangular-shaped blockhouses. Eleven of the flat-bottom boats were dismantled to make various structures within and town, and the 2-man pitsaw (see below) produce 2,100 feet of cherry boards for flooring., Mill stones were present at FJ, but it is unknown if a mill was built, or only planned to be built, along May Field Creek. One small Cemetery was built inside the fort for use during a tax by British-allied Natives. A large Cemetery was located NE of the fort. More than 60 persons died at FJ for which we have a record, and at least 38 of those burials had coffins. A Virginian-allied Kaskaskian Native was given a blue burial shroud for his deceased son. Lastly, a slight majority of the Fort Jefferson deaths occurred from malaria, not warfare., (Captions) , Young George Rogers Clark by artist John Buxton. , Reconstruction of Ft. Jefferson by artist Rick Mjos, based on archival records from the fort (view to southwest). , Clark's cousin, William's 1780 "Clarksville" the Town" map used to sell lots next to the fort - (Draper Ms.). , Caesar was an artificer (engineer) who helped build Clark's Ft. Jefferson. Caesar had been part of Capt. Robert George's Co., who helped Clark take Vincennes from the british. Photo of Antoine Randolph Watts taken by Jeff Bross. Used with permission. , Example of a Two-man Saw Pit. (Drawing and Noah Bradley adopted from Diderpot.)