The Battle of Fort Necessity (also called the Battle of the Great Meadows) took place on July 3, 1754, in what is now the mountaintop hamlet of Farmington in Fayette County, Pennsylvania. The engagement was one of the first battles of the French and Indian War and George Washington's only military surrender. The battle, along with the May 28 Battle of Jumonville Glen, contributed to a series of military escalations that resulted in the global Seven Years' War.
Washington built Fort Necessity on an alpine meadow west of the summit of a pass through the Allegheny Mountains. Another pass nearby leads to Confluence, Pennsylvania; to the west, Nemacolin's Trail begins its descent to Uniontown, Pennsylvania, and other parts of Fayette County along the relatively low altitudes of the Allegheny Plateau.
Background
Throughout the 1740s and early 1750s, British and French traders had increasingly come into contact in the Ohio Country, including the upper watershed of the Ohio River in what is now western Pennsylvania. Authorities in New France became more aggressive in their efforts to expel British traders and colonists from this area, and in 1753 began construction of a series of fortifications in the area. In previous wars, the Québecois had more than held their own against the English colonials.
Fort Necessity National Battlefield is a National Battlefield Site in Fayette County, Pennsylvania, United States, which preserves the site of the Battle of Fort Necessity. The battle, which took place on July 3, 1754, was an early battle of the French and Indian War, and resulted in the surrender of British colonial forces under Colonel George Washington, to the French and Indians, under Louis Coulon de Villiers.
The site also includes the Mount Washington Tavern, once one of the inns along the National Road, and in two separate units the grave of the British General Edward Braddock, killed in 1755, and the site of the Battle of Jumonville Glen.
Battle of Fort Necessity (1754)
After returning to the great meadows in what is now Fayette County, Pennsylvania, George Washington decided it prudent to reinforce his position. Supposedly named by Washington as Fort Necessity or Fort of Necessity, the soldiers constructed a storehouse for supplies such as gunpowder, rum, and flour. The crude palisade they erected was built more to defend supplies in the fort's storehouse from Washington's own men, whom he described as "loose and idle", than as a planned defense against a hostile enemy. The sutler of Washington's force was John Fraser, who earlier had been second-in-command at Fort Prince George. Later he served as Chief Scout to General Edward Braddock and then Chief Teamster to the Forbes Expedition.