Fort Mifflin

Admission: Free.

Contact: Torben Jenk, (215) 739-6061, torben.jenk@verizon.net

 

A dozen 230-year old maps, plus first-hand testimony from soldiers’ journals, show that British Redoubt No. 1 stood on the site of the proposed SugarHouse casino. Archaeologists have already retrieved 3,500 year old Native Indian artifacts from the site, yet more investigation is needed.

On December 2, 1777, General Washington wrote to Horatio Gates: “Genl. Howe has withdrawn himself close within his lines, which extend from the upper Ferry upon Schuylkill to Kensington upon Delaware. They consist of a Chain of strong Redoubts, connected by Abattis. We have reconnoitered them well, but find it impossible to attack them while defended by a force fully equal to our own in Continental Troops.” So, Washington and his troops spent the winter in Valley Forge.

 

Redoubt No. 1 was garrisoned by the Queen’s Rangers - a corps raised in America yet loyal to the Crown - who defended the Frankford Road, protecting the food supply from the mill at Frankford and the farms of Bucks County, for the 60,000 residents and soldiers quartered in Philadelphia.

Maps show that Redoubt No. 1 stood on the ancestral embankment, with a moat that flooded before “High Water” and a stockade running down into the Delaware River. Proper archaeology can reveal both Revolutionary War artifacts and inform the current debate over riparian rights.

 

Daniel K. Richter, PhD., Professor of History and the Richard S. Dunn Director of the McNeil Center for Early American Studies, will be the moderator and introduce these presentations:

“Colonial History of Shackamaxon & Kensington, 1664-1777.” - Torben Jenk.

 

“Redoubt No. 1 and the British Occupation of Philadelphia within the context of the American War of Independence.” - Robert A. Selig, PhD., historian and author.

 

“Archaeology and the Revolutionary War in Philadelphia.” - David G. Orr, PhD., F.A.A.R. (Fellow, American Academy in Rome), formerly with the National Park Service, currently in the Department of Anthropology at Temple University, has a long history of archaeological investigations at Valley Forge, Fort Mifflin and other sites in and around Philadelphia.

 

“Riparian rights and the Delaware River: 18th-century maritime law and 21st-century development.” - Hal Schirmer, J.D., Esq., attorney and historian.

 

Refreshments will be served in honor of the birthday of King George III, June 4, 1738.

Generous funding by The Color Guard of the Pennsylvania Society of Sons of the Revolution