The French & Indian War, or the Seven Years' War
I have always been drawn to the first world war, the one that began in a remote glen in southwestern Pennsylvania in 1753 and by its end changed the look of the world in 1763. It sets up the American War of Independence, the decades of war between Britain and France -- in many ways, the modern age itself. For many years I have attended as a vendor the annual seminar of the Braddock Road Preservation Association at Jumonville, very nearby where George Washington ambushed a patrol of French soldiers on May 28, 1753 and sparked the world war that followed. On this page I will offer new books and classics, dvds and audiobooks, and any other worthy items of the 18th century that relate to the "wilderness war."
Massacre of the Conestogas: On the Trail of the Paxton Boys in Lancaster County
Massacre of the Conestogas: On the Trail of the Paxton Boys in Lancaster County
On two chilly December days in 1763, bands of armed men raged through camps of peaceful Conestoga Indians. They killed twenty women, children and men, effectively wiping out the tribe. These murderous rampages by Lancaster County's Paxton Boys were the culminating tragedies in a series of traded atrocities between European settlers and native tribes. Lancaster journalist Jack Brubaker gives a blow-by-blow account of the massacres, examines their aftermath and investigates how the Paxton Boys got away with murder. Join Brubaker as he follows the bloody trail left by the killers through the Pennsylvania countryside.