Because we wanted to get to Fort Recovery in Western Ohio, today was one of our longest driving days, although it was still far from grueling. Along the way, we spotted license plates from New York, Pennsylvania, Washington, Ohio, Florida, Michigan, Arizona, Illinois, South Carolina, Wisconsin, Indiana, Tennesee, Maine, Texas, Virginia, Massachusetts, Georgia, Connecticut, Kansas, Missouri, Louisiana, Colorado, Maryland, Mississippi, West Virginia, Rhode Island, Iowa, Oklahoma, Minnesota, Alberta, and Ontario.
Fort Recovery is the site of a battle known as St. Clair’s Defeat or The Battle of the Wabash. It was here that St. Clair lost much of the (very ill-prepared) American army. It could also be called Little Turtle’s Victory, but it had long been labeled St. Clair’s Defeat by English speaking people.
I learned three new things during the visit. The first was that St. Clair, who was suffering from gout, was asleep when the scouts came in and reported that there were a large number of Native Americans on the nearby ridge. His second in command, who did not like him much, did not tell him they were there. Whether St. Clair could have adequately prepared them to defend themselves is questionable, but he did not know the Native Americans were there.
The second thing I learned is that this was the event that made the country decide that they needed a standing army and that they needed to work together as a nation, rather than separately as individual colonies, to defend themselves. Some people believe that the United States would have remained a confederation of separately governed states if it had not been for this event.
The third is that the inquiry into the event was the first-ever congressional inquiry. Washington did not want Congress to perform an inquiry, but they voted to do it, setting the precedence for Congressional inquiries. Then, after they exonerated St. Clair and said that the nation had not provided an adequate army or supplied them properly Washington refused to allow it to be published, which set precedents for executive privilege.