While We Remember Little Bighorn, That Wasn’t the Battle That Led to the First Congressional Investigation in U.S. History.
In less than three hours on November 4, 1791, American Indians destroyed the United States Army, inflicting more than 900 casualties on a force of some 1,400 men. Proportionately it was the biggest military disaster the United States ever suffered. It was also the biggest victory American Indians ever won. Yet it was quickly consigned to the footnotes of history.
Unlike the much more famous Battle of the Little Bighorn in 1876, when American Indians annihilated George Armstrong Custer’s command, there was nothing epic or heroic in the disaster of 1791. The American troops proved no match for Indian warriors executing a coordinated battle plan and after three hours of ineffective resistance they broke and fled, abandoning arms, equipment, and wounded comrades to the enemy.
Some Americans see no point in remembering an event that didn’t change the course of history and that reflects little credit on their country. But the Indian victory mattered a great deal in 1791. The new Republic had hostile powers on its borders and few national loyalties binding Western settlers. The future of the United States was not secure—and that battle in Ohio had lasting consequences. We miss a lot if we ignore those three hours of American history.
In 1791, settlers and land speculators were eager to get their hands on the rich lands of Ohio but were meeting resistance from American Indians. So President Washington dispatched General Arthur St. Clair and some 2,000 men to the center of that resistance, a group of villages on the Maumee River in northwestern Ohio.
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