Outposts Of The War For Empire

The French And English In Western Pennsylvania

Charles Morse Stotz was an architect first and historian second, which makes his history of the frontier forts of Western Pennsylvania particularly valuable. . . . Stotz combines his considerable knowledge of how forts were built to paint a vivid picture of the hardships, logistical nightmares and physical dangers involved in building and maintaining a safe place in the 18th century Western Pennsylvania wilderness. . . . It is 'must' reading for anyone whose interest in Pittsburgh's earliest history goes beyond popular stereotypes and truisms.
Pittsburgh Press

Outposts of the War for Empire is being reissued in hardcover format, reproducing the original 1985 edition, to mark the 250th anniversary of the War for Empire, perhaps better known as the French and Indian War. Much has been written on the events of the fifteen years from 1749 to 1764, a conflict that decided the ownership of most of the North American continent. Some historians have addressed the politics of this great conflict; others have focused on the daily lives of the people on the frontier and the ravages they endured in war. In Outposts of the War for Empire, Charles Stotz brings his specialized knowledge as an architect and architectural historian to tell and show what colonial forts looked like, where they stood, who built them and why, what materials were used in building them, and how they varied in design to fit different military purposes.Stotz describes twenty-two forts built by the French, the English, and the colonists in Maryland, Virginia, and Pennsylvania –from tiny outposts built by the Ohio Company at Wills Creek on the North Branch of the Potomac to the fortresses that guarded the Ohio at Pittsburgh, first the French Fort Duquesne and later the English Fort Pitt. Using mathematically accurate perspective drawings, he shows exactly how the most important of the forts were constructed and documents their twentieth-century reconstruction. Through narrative and illustration, Charles Morse Stotz creates a unique and important perspective on the War for Empire, a world war that had profound and lasting influence on the frontier region of western Pennsylvania.

about the author

Charles Morse Stotz

Charles Morse Stotz, a Fellow of the American Institute of Architects, was author of numerous volumes on the history and architecture of western Pennsylvania.

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Charles Morse Stotz