Paul Thurat (136:32)
So it was far more prevalent and there was more than you needed. And so often they were made. It was being made into alcohol early on. So if you think about the original colonies. Right. They are not the same as the states they are today. They're mostly focused on the east. On the east side of the Appalachians, everything on the west side is Very much still Indian territory, but there was negotiated treaties that were repeatedly broken to, to clear the. To have control of the land on the east side and just the coastal, just partly inland. And so when we talk about Pennsylvania, this is one again, one of the very early colonies founded in 18. In 1681, William Penn, the Royal land grant. There was already people there in that land grant. Includes in the southeast, there was an area called New Sweden. And so this is now the province of Pennsylvania in British America. And Penn was a. Was a bit of an egalitarian. He established an interesting set of laws that was a lot of religious freedom and economic mobility. And he also worked hard with the Lenape Indians in the area to negotiate more land and starts creating some of the early counties, including the Bucks, the Philadelphia and Chester counties, which is roughly where we are today. And those treaties continue literally for decades, largely pushing the Indians further and further west. Right now, the Indian perception of land is not ownership, but use. And so they were more flexible in that because there was other land to lose, it to use. But it becomes, it reaches a certain point where it becomes a crisis. Now, before the Revolution in the. In the 1750s, the American colonies are growing and they're starting to get onto the west side of the. Of the Appalachians. This is where you get the Ohio Company, who's now working with the Iroquois Confederacy, which was a collection of fairly organized native groups all. And this, this is before the Canadian border and all of that sort of stuff exists. And this group decides that they want to build a fort and settlement at the confluence of the Allegheny and the Monongahagan Helen Rivers. This is where Pittsburgh is today. Okay. This is a. There's a. There's a little triangle point where these two rivers come together, become the Ohio River. This scares the French, right, which is. Be the north part, the northern part, above that, which will eventually be Canada. But that point is largely controlled by France. And again, we talked about this when we were talking about Missouri and the, The. The Louisian land purchase where New France stretched all the way from the Gulf of Mexico right up to Hudson's Bay. So the French response was to build other fortifications further up on the Ohio river area that we now know as Erie, Pennsylvania. And that's around the time that the French and Indian War. Lights off. Now, this is also called the Seven Years War, all depending on how you measure it. It's either seven years, nine years, or 20, 23 years, because numbers are hard. In fact, Winston Churchill calls it the first real World War because the conflict is really between Britain and France. And while it may start with the native allies in North America, it also involves a land war in Europe which is the Prussians and the Austrians along with the English and the French. And also in India where there's a conflict between the Moguls and the English and the French there too. And the argument is that the first shots of this world war start in Pennsylvania by a 22 year old George Washington. So Washington came from well to do family and he felt that it was appropriate for him to join the militia. And so as the this conflict over what would become what's known as Fort Duquesne, before the English could build on that site and what would be Pittsburgh, the French pushed them out and they moved out. And then the French built the Fort Duquesne in that location. So Washington put together a force to come and push them back and in the process ended up in a battle called the Battle of Jumonville Glen. Some call it an ambush, may have just been a surprise. The one of the officers was killed in the. In the process. And Washington himself was captured but then later released. And then they were sent back. And these could be called the first shots of the Seven Year War. About a year later in 1755, the British respond by sending General Edward Braddock and a full set of regular troops. Now they perceive the British regulars as infinitely superior to the colonial militias. And so they couldn't actually join as peers. They would all be inferior to any of the regulars. And so Washington who still wants to be involved, manages to get himself to be an aide de camp to the General Edward Braddock. They then head back to the to the same area and Monongahelin Valley about 10 miles from Fort Duquesne. And there's an accidental conflict again. They sort of run into each other by surprise and becomes a bit of a rolling battle. And the general gets hit many. Washington even had a couple of horses shot up from him. There's almost a thousand of the British regulars and colonists that are killed to only about 20 of the French and Indian forces. Washington miraculously is unharmed. They found bullets in his jacket, shrapnel in his hair, but no injuries at all. And he helps organize the retreat and evacuation very wells and is encouraged encouraged by the general to to pull the forces together. He's lauded as the hero of Monongahela. And that's sort of his first mark as a young soldier. At that point I think they make him a colonel and he goes on to continue to be a part of that that conflict. Right in this area of the valley in the western part of Pennsylvania near Pittsburgh, that largely this is over by 1759 when the French realize they've been cut off at Fort Duquesne. So they destroy the fort and retreat and then.
