Fort Miami (Miamis) was a

British British may refer to: Peoples, culture, and language * British people, nationals or natives of the United Kingdom, British Overseas Territories and Crown Dependencies. * British national identity, the characteristics of British people and culture ...

fort built in spring 1794 on the

Maumee River The Maumee River (pronounced ) (; ) is a river running in the Midwestern United States from northeastern Indiana into northwestern Ohio and Lake Erie. It is formed at the confluence of the St. Joseph River (Maumee River), St. Joseph and St. Mar ...

in what was at the time territory claimed by the

United States The United States of America (USA), also known as the United States (U.S.) or America, is a country primarily located in North America. It is a federal republic of 50 U.S. state, states and a federal capital district, Washington, D.C. The 48 ...

, and designated by the federal government as the

Northwest Territory The Northwest Territory, also known as the Old Northwest and formally known as the Territory Northwest of the River Ohio, was formed from part of the unorganized western territory of the United States after the American Revolution. Established ...

. The fort was located at the eastern edge of present-day

Maumee, Ohio Maumee ( ) is a city in Lucas County, Ohio, United States. Located along the Maumee River, it is a suburb about southwest of Toledo, Ohio, Toledo. The population was 13,896 at the 2020 United States census, 2020 census. Maumee was declared an Al ...

, southwest of Toledo. The British built the fort to forestall a putative assault on Fort Detroit by Gen. "Mad" Anthony Wayne's army, then advancing northward in southwestern Ohio.

Background

Under the terms of the

Treaty of Paris (1783) The Treaty of Paris, signed in Paris by representatives of King George III of Kingdom of Great Britain, Great Britain and representatives of the United States on September 3, 1783, officially ended the American Revolutionary War and recognized ...

that ended the

American Revolutionary War The American Revolutionary War (April 19, 1775 – September 3, 1783), also known as the Revolutionary War or American War of Independence, was the armed conflict that comprised the final eight years of the broader American Revolution, in which Am ...

the region south of the

Great Lakes The Great Lakes, also called the Great Lakes of North America, are a series of large interconnected freshwater lakes spanning the Canada–United States border. The five lakes are Lake Superior, Superior, Lake Michigan, Michigan, Lake Huron, H ...

and between the

Ohio Ohio ( ) is a U.S. state, state in the Midwestern United States, Midwestern region of the United States. It borders Lake Erie to the north, Pennsylvania to the east, West Virginia to the southeast, Kentucky to the southwest, Indiana to the ...

and

Mississippi Mississippi ( ) is a U.S. state, state in the Southeastern United States, Southeastern and Deep South regions of the United States. It borders Tennessee to the north, Alabama to the east, the Gulf of Mexico to the south, Louisiana to the s ...

Rivers was assigned to the United States. The British, however, refused to evacuate their troops from their forts in the region, claiming that the U.S. had not complied with portions of the treatypre-Revolution debts owed to British merchants and subjects had not been paid, and confiscation of

Loyalist Loyalism, in the United Kingdom, its overseas territories and its former colonies, refers to the allegiance to the British crown or the United Kingdom. In North America, the most common usage of the term refers to loyalty to the British Cr ...

properties continued. In the early 1790s, the Lieutenant Governor of Upper Canada,

John Graves Simcoe Lieutenant-General (United Kingdom), Lieutenant-General John Graves Simcoe (25 February 1752 – 26 October 1806) was a British army officer, politician and colonial administrator who served as the lieutenant governor of Upper Canada from 1791 u ...

, made an aggressive effort to aid the "

Western Confederacy The Northwestern Confederacy, or Northwestern Indian Confederacy, was a loose confederacy of Native Americans in the Great Lakes region of the United States created after the American Revolutionary War. Formally, the confederacy referred to it ...

" of Native American tribes (the

Shawnee The Shawnee ( ) are a Native American people of the Northeastern Woodlands. Their language, Shawnee, is an Algonquian language. Their precontact homeland was likely centered in southern Ohio. In the 17th century, they dispersed through Ohi ...

Miami Miami is a East Coast of the United States, coastal city in the U.S. state of Florida and the county seat of Miami-Dade County, Florida, Miami-Dade County in South Florida. It is the core of the Miami metropolitan area, which, with a populat ...

, Wyandot, and others) in the Maumee and

Wabash River The Wabash River () is a U.S. Geological Survey. National Hydrography Dataset high-resolution flowline dataThe National Map accessed May 13, 2011 river that drains most of the state of Indiana, and a significant part of Illinois, in the United ...

watersheds in their ongoing war with American settlers. His ultimate goal was the establishment of an Indian barrier state in the region, as a way to protect Britain's

North American fur trade The North American fur trade is the (typically) historical Fur trade, commercial trade of furs and other goods in North America, beginning in the eastern provinces of French Canada and the northeastern Thirteen Colonies, American colonies (soon- ...

ventures, and to block anticipated American attacks upon their remaining North American possessions.

Fort history

In spring 1794 the British built Fort Miami to forestall U.S. Gen.

Anthony Wayne Anthony Wayne (January 1, 1745 – December 15, 1796) was an American soldier, officer, statesman, and a Founding Father of the United States. He adopted a military career at the outset of the American Revolutionary War, where his military expl ...

's advance on Britain's

Fort Detroit A fortification (also called a fort, fortress, fastness, or stronghold) is a military construction designed for the defense of territories in warfare, and is used to establish rule in a region during peacetime. The term is derived from Lati ...

, and to encourage the confederated tribes in their war of resistance. The fort was a log stockade, which had four bastions, each capable of mounting four cannon, a river battery, barracks, officers' quarters, supply buildings, and various shops. A defensive ditch, 20 to 25 feet deep, ran along the land side of the fort. In July 1794 General Wayne and his troops marched northward toward Fort Miami from Fort Recovery. Just south of Fort Miami, encountering a barricade erected by the Native Americans and a small party of Canadian militia, he ordered a charge and dispersed his adversaries in the

Battle of Fallen Timbers The Battle of Fallen Timbers (20 August 1794) was the final battle of the Northwest Indian War, a struggle between Indigenous peoples of North America, Native American tribes affiliated with the Northwestern Confederacy and their Kingdom of Gre ...

. The Native Americans fled to the fort, but the commander shut them out. Beaten and disillusioned, the Native Americans dispersed and one year later their tribal elders gathered at Fort Greenville to negotiate with Wayne. The

Treaty of Greenville The Treaty of Greenville, also known to Americans as the Treaty with the Wyandots, etc., but formally titled ''A treaty of peace between the United States of America, and the tribes of Indians called the Wyandots, Delawares, Shawanees, Ottawas ...

opened most of the present State of Ohio and part of Indiana to United States settlement. In 1796, under the terms of the

Jay Treaty The Treaty of Amity, Commerce, and Navigation, Between His Britannic Majesty and the United States of America, commonly known as the Jay Treaty, and also as Jay's Treaty, was a 1794 treaty between the United States and Great Britain that averted ...

(1794), the British abandoned Fort Miamialong with their other forts on American soil. Wayne occupied and garrisoned it, but about 1799 it was abandoned. The British again occupied the site during the

War of 1812 The War of 1812 was fought by the United States and its allies against the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland, United Kingdom and its allies in North America. It began when the United States United States declaration of war on the Uni ...

, which at the time was opposite the American Fort Meigs. During the War, Tecumseh, the Shawnee chief, and British officials maintained headquarters at the fort, from where they moved against Gen.

William Henry Harrison William Henry Harrison (February 9, 1773April 4, 1841) was the ninth president of the United States, serving from March 4 to April 4, 1841, the shortest presidency in U.S. history. He was also the first U.S. president to die in office, causin ...

at Fort Meigs. Abandoned again in 1814, the fort was eventually demolished. Afterward, the site reverted to agricultural and, later, public park use.

Present-day site

Today, the site of Fort Miami sits as a small

enclave An enclave is a territory that is entirely surrounded by the territory of only one other state or entity. An enclave can be an independent territory or part of a larger one. Enclaves may also exist within territorial waters. ''Enclave'' is so ...

within a residential development. Nothing remains of the original structure except parts of the earthworks. In 1942 several Ohio civic and patriotic organizations acquired a part of the fort site. In 1953 the Ohio State Archaeological and Historical Society conducted preliminary excavations, and in 1957 the Historical Society of Northwestern Ohio placed a marker at the site, which remains undeveloped. In 1975, the site of the fort was added to the

National Register of Historic Places The National Register of Historic Places (NRHP) is the Federal government of the United States, United States federal government's official United States National Register of Historic Places listings, list of sites, buildings, structures, Hist ...

. The site of the fort was incorporated with the Fallen Timbers Battlefield into Fallen Timbers Battlefield and Fort Miamis National Historic Site in 1999, under . The site is managed by the Metropolitan Park District of the Toledo Area (Metroparks), in partnership with the Ohio Historical Society, and is an affiliated area of the National Park System. A state memorial has been created at the site. Ft. Miami Elementary School of the Maumee City School District is five blocks away and named after the fort.

Gallery

File:Fort Miami, looking toward Fort Meigs, Maumee, Ohio - DPLA - d589edfce6b6aef21ea23e905e00c168 (page 1).jpg, alt=Fort Miami, looking toward Fort Meigs, Maumee, Ohio, Fort Miami, looking toward Fort Meigs, Maumee, Ohio File:Fort Miami on the Maumee River above Toledo, Ohio - DPLA - 3113f316731190ecb3d0594a1043c25a (page 1).jpg, alt=Fort Miami on the Maumee River above Toledo, Ohio, Fort Miami on the Maumee River above Toledo, Ohio File:Fort Miami, Maumee, Ohio - DPLA - b92543ab76c4d3145403bbc2658ea016 (page 1).jpg, alt=Fort Miami, Maumee, Ohio, Fort Miami, Maumee, Ohio

References

External links

Fallen Timbers Battlefield & Fort Miamis
Metroparks Toledo site

National Park Service site

information about Fort Miamis from the City of Maumee

Survey of Historic Sites and Buildings, Founders and Frontiersmen, National Park Service * {{Toledo 1794 establishments in the British Empire Protected areas established in 1999 1999 establishments in Ohio Military installations established in 1794 18th-century fortifications

Protected areas of Lucas County, Ohio National Register of Historic Places in Lucas County, Ohio Northwest Indian War

History of Ohio French-American culture in Ohio British-American culture in Ohio

Metroparks Toledo