Customer Reviews

The Border Wars of the Upper Ohio Valley: 1769-1794

5 star:		(3)
4 star:		(0)
3 star:		(2)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

William Hintzen has presented historical figures and events as they really were. No glorified, glamorized fiction is used to enthrall the reader; he writes it as it was, with references to support the history. This has been an invaluable resource in my teaching and education of early Ohio, and a pleasure to read(all four times!).

You will love this book. Hintzen has done what must have been and exhaustive amount of research including diaries, correspondences and memoirs. In some instances he illustrates that these may sometimes conflict with one another, and attempts to make sense of it all. I believe his assessment of both whites and indians to be fair and balanced. He underscores the basic understanding of all border wars - that no one group wears "white hats" or "black hats". He also winds up this tome with the always tragic but logical conclusion of all true border wars, that they only end when once side utterly conquers the other, by whatever means.
Hintzen's writing style walks the tightrope of exhaustive research work balacing itself against a lively read that keeps things moving.

The tightrope walk was successful, and in my opinion, he did a thoroughly impressive job with both.

This is a truly accurate and unbiased account of the dark and bloody history of the Ohio River Valley during the Revolutionary War. Hintzen makes it very clear that there were atrocities committed by both sides in this conflict and sums it up by saying that it was a war of extermination. Had the Native Americans and their British backers succeeded in exterminating the colonial frontiersman trying to eke out an existence in Kentucky and western Virginia, history would have been different.

Hintzen clears up alot of myths regarding Lewis Wetzel which make him appear to be a psychopathic, bloodthirsty monster. While Wetzel may have hated his adversaries, he was no worse than many of his Native American counterparts.

Hintzen neither romanticizes the frontiersmen the way many nineteenth century historians have done nor does he try to be politically "correct". Hintzen tells it like it really was. Frontier life was a harsh life for survival. The bitter conflict between the frontiersmen and Native Americans was a fight for survival, nothing more, nothing less.

The author has spent a lot of time researching for this book. I agree that there is not enough information about Girt and others. Girt did take part in frontier raids. However he did have advanced rheumatism that made a difference in his participation. No war is civilized and certainly not on the frontiers. Hintzen manages to keep his book moving. If you are interested in history this is a book for you. By Ruth Thompson Author of "The Bluegrass Dream" and "Natchez Above The River"

This is a rather decent account of the bloody conflict that raged in the Ohio River Valley during the last half of the 18th century. Hintzen examines the many larger than life characters of the eastern frontier like Daniel Boone, Simon Kenton, Lewis Wetzel, and their like, as well as the many interesting but terrible battles, skirmishes, murders, etc. that made up the history of this Dark and Bloody Ground. I could not help but notice that the author harbors no love for the Indians in his somewhat unbalanced account of what was, in fact, an invasion of their land. He tries to argue that since the Ohio indians had signed numerous treaties supposedly giving away all claims to the lands south of the Ohio River, that their attacks on the Kentucky and Virginia settlements during this period were murderous aggressive actions against peaceful white settlers who were only trying to hack their existence out of a hostile wilderness. Unfortunately, I remain unconvinced of his views on this. The flagrant disregard the Americans showed toward these same treaties seems to negate his argument. He does, however, examine a number of the different views and interpretations of several charaters who have been mythicized over the centuries, namely Simon Girty and Lewis Wetzel. This is a subject that few others have addressed in their studies of the same timeperiod. Girty has undergone transformation in many minds from the ruthless white renegade of 18th and 19th century propaganda to the "peaceful man of the woods" image popular today. Hintzen feels that this modern romanticized view belies his true nature as man who did indeed revel in killing his former white neighbors. Girty, he feels, lies somwhere between the murdering monster and the just indian-savior. In that he may be right. Unfortunately, there is not yet a difinitive Girty biography to fully investigate the true nature of this undoubtedly fascianting frontiersman. Wetzel, on the other hand, has gone from being viewed as a frontier hero to a psychopathic indian killer. Though Hintzen tries to argue otherwise, I think that the true facts known about Wetzel show that he enjoyed the cold-blooded killing of any and all who were part of a race he felt needed to be exterminated. While this kind of mindset was applauded during the 18th and 19th centuries, I think Wetzel and men like him, at least as viewed from a 21st century standpoint, have become more of a cultural embarrassment. Overall not a bad book but I had some issues with it.

The author obviously has a great dislike for Native Americans. He portrays the Natives as being mindless blood thirsty savages that love killing helpless victims. Although many atrocities were commited on both Native and White sides, the author makes little mention of the latter. Ever hear of the "Squaw Campaign"?