Cumberland Allegany Maryland United States
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Virginian explorers recognize the potential of the Ohio region for colonization and have moved to capitalize on it, as well as to block French expansion into the territory.
Thomas Lee and brothers Lawrence and Augustine Washington had organized the Ohio Company in 1748 to represent the prospecting and trading interests of Virginian investors.
In addition to the mandate and investment of Virginia Royal Governor Robert Dinwiddie, other original members include John Hanbury, Colonel Thomas Cresap, George Mercer, John Mercer, and "all of His Majesty's Colony of Virginia."
In that same year, George Mercer had petitioned King George for land in the Ohio country, and in 1749, the British Crown granted the company 500,000 acres in the Ohio Valley between the Kanawha River and the Monongahela.
The grant is in two parts: the first 200,000 acres are promised, and the following 300,000 acres are to be granted if the Ohio Company successfully settles one hundred families within seven years.
Furthermore, the Ohio Company is required to construct a fort and provide a garrison to protect the settlement at their own expense, but the land grant is rent and tax free for ten years to facilitate settlement.
In 1748–1750, the Ohio Company hires Thomas Cresap who had opened a trading fort and founded Oldtown, Maryland (now part of Cumberland) on the foot of the eastern climb up the Cumberland Narrows along what is soon to be called the Nemacolin Trail.
Named for Nemacolin, a hereditary chief of the Delaware Nation who helps Cresap to create the trail, it is one of only three mid-mountain-range crossings of the Appalachian Ridge and Valley system outside the Hudson-Great Lakes route, or southern Georgia-Mississippi-Western Tennessee plains route.
Cresap is given a contract at the behest of the frontiersman Christoper Gist to blaze a small road over the mountains to the Monongahela River, and then to start widening this road into a wagon road.
He hires Nemacolin and his two sons, among others, to complete the task between Will's Creek (a trading post on a tributary of the Potomac River later the site of Fort Cumberland) and ...
During the advance into the Ohio Country, Fry suddenly falls off his horse and dies from his injuries on May 25, 1754, at Fort Cumberland, upon which the command of the regiment falls to Washington.
Washington, newly promoted to colonel of the newly created Virginia Regiment, had set out on April 2, 1754 with a small force of fewer than one hundred and sixty recruits to build a road to, and then defend, Fort Prince George.
Washington had been at Wills Creek in south central Pennsylvania when he received news of the fort's surrender.
He assumes command of the expedition upon the death of Colonel Fry.
Braddock has received important assistance from Benjamin Franklin, who has helped procure wagons and supplies for the expedition.
Among the wagoners are two young men who will later become legends of American history: Daniel Boone and Daniel Morgan.
Other members of the expedition include Ensign William Crawford and Charles Scott.
Among the British are Thomas Gage; Charles Lee, future American president George Washington, and Horatio Gates.
The railroad strike meanwhile spreads to Cumberland, Maryland, stopping freight and passenger traffic.
When Governor John Carroll of Maryland directs the 5th and 6th Regiments of the National Guard to put down the strike, ...