The Great Wagon Road: From Philadelphia to the South (Paperback)

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Editorial Reviews

Product Description

The Great Wagon Road from Philadelphia to the South was first publishedd by McGraw Hill as part of its "Great American Trails" series, edited by A. B. Gutherie, Jr. It was instantly recognized for its insight into the birth of the American South from the early 1700's until the Civil War. Historian Carl Bridenbaugh wrote that "In the last sixteen years of the colonial era, southbound traffic along the Great Philadelphia Wagon Road was numbered in tens of thousands; it was the most heavily travelled road in all America..." and Joshua Fry and Peter Jefferson marked its route on their map of Virginia in 1754 as "the great Wagon Road from the Yadkin River through Virginia to Philadelphia distant 435 miles."

Over the years the Road led countless Scotch-Irish, Germanic, and English settlers southward from Philadelphia to settle the Appalachian uplands from Pennsylvania to Georgia. Over the Road went the progenitors of John Sevier of Tennessee, John Caldwell Calhoun of South Carolina, Sam Houston of Texas, Cyrus McCormick of Virginia, and other Americans.

Countless cities and towns from Philadelphia to Augusta, Georgia, owe their beginning to early camp sites along the Road that grew into tavern locations, then into county seats, and then into centers of agriculture and industry. Today such Wagon Road towns as Lancaster, York, and Gettysburg, Pennsylvania; Harper's Ferry, West Virginia; Winchester, Newmarket, Harrisonburg, Staunton, Lexington, and Rocky Mount, Virginia; Winston-Salem, Salisbury, and Charlotte, North Carolina; and Newberry and Camden, South Carolina have grown along the onetime settler's trail.

The Great Wagon Road also tells of Daniel Boone's pioneering from Big Lick, Virginia-now Roanoke-into the territory of Kentucky. Boone Expedited western settlement by cutting a trail across Cumberland Gap on Virginia's frontier to lead settlers in Revolutionary years into dangerous Indian country.

Product Details

• Paperback: 300 pages
• Publisher: Dietz Press (October 30, 1992)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 087517065X
• ISBN-13: 978-0875170657
• Product Dimensions: 8.8 x 6 x 0.8 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.2 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 3.8 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (4 customer reviews)
• Amazon.com Sales Rank: #218,649 in Books (See Bestsellers in Books)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

57 of 58 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars The Great Wagon Road: From Philadelphia to the South, September 15, 2000

By	Karen K. Lewis "Antique Cars" (west chester, pa USA) - See all my reviews (REAL NAME)

This book is great for those interested in genealogy and tracing their ancestry from the early 1700's in the PA/MD/DE area to the Carolinas. I often wondered why they took the route they did from the eastern seaboard into South Carolina. Now I know. I was especially interested in the Scotch-Irish emigration since it was the lineage of my ancestry. The book is well written and makes history come alive.

26 of 31 people found the following review helpful:

2.0 out of 5 stars America's First Great Migration!, January 2, 2004

By	Michael E. Fitzgerald (Kingwood, Texas USA) - See all my reviews (REAL NAME)

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This work is so poorly written, repeats itself and wanders away from its subject so often that it is more like a collage written by a high school student than a serious history. It is a cluttered hodgepodge. Yet it is an important work, one that should be read.

It is only recently that I realized Philadelphia was to the continental colonies what Ellis Island was to the later United States. I wonder how many Southerners will be surprised to find out that their ancestors migrated from the North. While the concept is amusing in a wry sort of way, it also helps explain the developing sense of colonial identity. Those people up North or down South were not strangers. They were Aunt Mary, Cousin John, or Grandpa!

The growth of Great Britain's American colonies was constrained by 2 facts of 16th and 17th century life: the Appalachian Mountains and King George II. It was a horrendous task to cross the mountains and their sovereign forbid it.

Founded on religious freedom, Pennsylvania became a haven for all sorts of people fleeing Europe. So for years, as population concentrations grew in and around Philadelphia, and because westward migration was out of the question, a natural migration southward occurred along an ancient Indian trading and warring path which connected the entire northern and southern east coast. This path was acquired from the Indians over time and became known as The Great Wagon Road, so labeled on a map drawn by Thomas Jefferson's father, Peter. It is over this settlers' path from Philadelphia that the western portions of Virginia, North and South Carolina and Georgia were originally peopled. This migration was vast, lasting 50 to 60 years and numbering in the tens of thousands of people. And many of the original overnight camping spots grew to become American cities such as Winston-Salem, Augusta, Winchester and Gettysburg to name a few. After the American Revolution this floodtide turned westward into Tennessee and Kentucky along Daniel Boone's Wilderness Road

This is the story of an almost unreported mass migration that occurred during Britain's colonial period, a movement that peopled major portions of what was to become the United States. Quietly, very quietly, the record shows that we really were one people long before the American Revolution occurred.

7 of 7 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Good Research Material, December 29, 2006

By	E. Weightman "Ellie" (NJ USA) - See all my reviews (REAL NAME)

I do a lot of genealogy research and I knew for a fact that my ancestors migrated from the Philadelphia area down to North Carolina via the Great Wagon Road. They came into America via the Port of Phila in 1738 and were in North Carolina sometime in the mid to late 1750s to early 1760s. The book was a real learning lesson, I never knew there was such a "road" on the eastern seaboard states like there was out west. It was really good at informing you of the trials and tribulations our ancestors faced with the countryside, the indians, the British and the French. I highly recommend this book, it opens your eyes to just how many moved from the North to the South and the way they went. Although near the end of the book it did jump around, it nevertheless held my attention. Great source material for those of you researching your roots in these areas.