Battle of Sideling Hill

In April 1756, Pennsylvania Colonial Militia clashed with a group of Lenape fighters in what became known as the Battle of Sideling Hill, also spelled Sidling Hill. The confrontation arose after the Lenape had struck Fort McCord and carried off several colonial settlers as prisoners. As the warriors made their way back toward their stronghold at Kittanning with those they had seized, the militia sprang an ambush on them. The Lenape, however, managed to repel their attackers once reinforcements arrived, allowing them to break free and continue on. This clash holds historical weight as the first time Pennsylvania Militia saw action following the defeat of Braddock.

Background

William McCord received a land grant from the Penn family in 1753, situated on the western edge of territory that today makes up Franklin County. For generations, the Lenape had prized this ground and its surroundings as hunting territory, erecting temporary shelters there whenever hunting expeditions brought them through. According to accounts passed down, McCord informed them plainly that their presence was no longer welcome and demanded they stay away from the land bordering his home. In response, the Lenape gave their word that neither he nor his neighbors would face any trouble from them, then disregarded his demand entirely. McCord answered by setting fire to their shelters, prompting the Indians to leave the region. It is possible that this earlier clash helped spark the assault that came in 1756.

Early that same year, construction began on Fort McCord, which contemporary sources frequently called "McCord's Fort." It stood in western Pennsylvania near the foot of Kittatinny Mountain, just north of Parnell Knob. Essentially McCord's own farmhouse turned into a defensive position, the structure likely featured a stockade wall enclosing the farm buildings, along with a two-story blockhouse equipped with loopholes that defenders could use to fire upon any attackers.

Attack on Fort McCord

Jean Lowry, sister of William McCord and younger than him, left behind a personal narrative of what happened at the fort and the fighting that followed. According to her telling, the stockade had been nearly emptied that day, since the men had gone off to work their fields, leaving only her husband behind to keep watch. On the first of April, 1756, warriors from the Lenape (Delaware) nation, led by either Captain Jacobs or Shingas, struck the fort. They killed Lowry's husband, set fire to the blockhouse, and left the women and children with no choice but to surrender. Twenty-seven settlers were taken prisoner in the raid, though Lowry's own count puts the number at twenty-one, suggesting several people had died in the attack rather than being captured alive.

The Lenape then marched their prisoners through mountainous terrain for three days before finally halting to rest. On the morning of either April 4th or 5th, a party of Pennsylvania militiamen, among them several people Lowry described as her own friends and neighbors, launched a rescue attempt and succeeded in freeing the captives. Lowry recalled that the skirmish claimed just one Lenape life and left another wounded, which was enough to send the rest of the war party fleeing. That relief proved short-lived, though, for the Lenape circled back only minutes later, cut down a number of the militia, and seized the Fort McCord survivors all over again. One of the captured men, thought to have been a soldier, was later put to death by torture. As for Lowry and the rest of those taken, they were marched onward to Kittanning.

Battle of Sideling Hill

The South Carolina Gazette printed an account on 12 April 1756 drawn from correspondence out of Shippensburg, itself dated that same April day. According to this letter, the morning following the fall of McCord's fort saw thirty-one men set out after the raiding party, led by Capt. Culbertson. At Fort Littleton, Ensign Jemison and nineteen additional men joined the force, bringing the total to fifty. By Saturday evening the group had spotted the enemy's campfire, and just as dawn broke on Sunday they launched their assault, causing the attackers to flee at once. Several captives seized the chance to break away during the confusion, though Mary McCord lost her life when she was struck by gunfire from her own rescuers. The pursuing men freed the remaining prisoners and pulled back to high ground, but the enemy rallied and struck again there. For close to two hours the defenders held their position with considerable courage. Fresh enemy fighters arrived, however, encircling the colonists and inflicting heavy losses, forcing them to break through the ring and flee, a retreat that cost still more lives. The enemy managed to recapture some of the freed prisoners, though five succeeded in reaching Fort Littleton safely. Estimates held that fifteen enemy fighters had fallen, with many convinced that Capt. Jacobs numbered among the dead. On the colonial side, Capt. Culbertson perished along with eighteen others, and thirteen more were wounded, one of whom later died of his injuries.

A different perspective reached Governor Morris on 24 April 1756, when Edward Shippen III wrote to relay what he had learned firsthand from a participant in the fight. Two days earlier, Shippen explained, a Mr. Benjamin Blythe, who had himself taken part in the engagement, shared his version

Location

Historians have never pinpointed exactly where the Battle of Sideling Hill occurred, and as a result, the resting place of the militiamen who died there remains unknown as well. Scholars have put forward three candidate sites, drawing on documents from the period.

One theory centers on Anderson's Grove. In 2003, the Susquehanna River Basin Commission issued a study suggesting the engagement unfolded close to Maddensville, a small community within Springfield Township, Huntingdon County, Pennsylvania. This proposed site sits where Little Aughwick Creek meets Sideling Hill Creek, in an area now called Anderson's Grove.

A second possibility points to Juniata Crossing. Shortly after the fighting ended, Captain Joseph Shippen sent a letter to his father, Edward Shippen III, offering his own account of where the clash took place. He wrote that Captain Culbertson and thirty men had been overwhelmed the previous Sunday near the bend of the Juniata, at the spot where it crosses the New Penn's Road, at the hands of Jacob's band of thirty-six warriors, who had been reinforced by Shingas's party of thirty more. Shippen noted that twenty-four of the militia had made their way back to McDowell's Mill, while eight others reached Fort Lyttleton, with nearly all of them suffering serious wounds. He listed Dr. Lieutenant Jamison and Captain Culbertson among the dead.

A third explanation places the battle near Waterfall. According to this account, the Indians involved may have been heading back toward Kittanning by way of the Raystown Path, a long established Indian route stretching from Clay Township through Bedford, known in earlier times as Ray's Town, all the way to Logstown northwest of Pittsburgh. Under this scenario, the fighting would have occurred within the mountain gap carved out by Sideling Hill Creek, situated between the modern towns of New Grenada and Waterfall along what is now Pennsylvania Route 913.