Fort Bedford - Military History

Military History

Fort Bedford has been described as the "Grand Central Station of the Forbes campaign" during the French and Indian War. It was used as a staging ground and central storage area for the British Army's push westward towards the French garrisons. Colonel Bouquet and General Forbes used it as their headquarters for portions of the campaign. After the bulk of the army moved westward, the fort was garrisoned by about 800 men. The fort saw little action during the war and was used mainly as a forward supply base.

As the French and Indian War wound down in the frontier, the fort's garrison was moved to other forts. Captain Lewis Ourry, in command of the fort at the outbreak of Pontiac's Rebellion, listed just twelve Royal Americans on his roster to guard the fort and more than 90 local families. Despite the weakness of the garrison, the fort was not directly attacked by native warriors. Instead they raided several local settlements and attacked supply trains bound for the fort, apparently hoping to starve out the garrison. The arrival of reinforcements under Colonel Bouquet in July 1763 ended most of the local raiding.

Details of the fort during the inter-war years are sketchy and controversial. The British Army abandoned the fort sometime during this period. According to the autobiography of James Smith, leader of a colonial movement known as the "Black Boys", he and his men captured the fort in 1769. This incident is documented only in Smith's autobiography, so it may be a tall tale, although historian Gregory Evans Dowd (War Under Heaven: Pontiac, the Indian Nations, & the British Empire, 2002) notes that there is some corroborating evidence, and that some other historians believe the tale to be true. Smith called this the first British fort to fall in the era of the American Revolution. The incident was portrayed in the 1939 Hollywood film Allegheny Uprising, starring John Wayne as James Smith.

The fort was garrisoned by the Patriot-sympathizing Bedford County militia during the Revolutionary War. The fort guarded the frontier settlers against raids by British-allied native bands.