13 August 2015

The Benedict Arnold Of Western Pennsylvania



A Picture From Western Pennsylvania

John Connolly was also known as A Tory of the Revolution....in the Proceedings of the American Antiquarian Society...:

John Connolly was born at Wright's Ferry, York County, Pennsylvania. His mother, Susanna Howard, was married three times. Her first husband was James Patterson an Indian trader...in 1741 [she] married John Connolly an Irishman who had been an officer in the British service.

Here Dr. John Connolly was referred to as the Benedict Arnold of Western Pennsylvania.  For an explanation of this characterization see Dunmore, Connolly, and Loyalism at Fort Pitt.


[Connolly] once had a virtual appointment as commandant over the post at Detroit where he intended to effect a union of the British forces and the Indians, but he never filled the position. Connolly, a friend of Washington's and a relative of Colonel Croghan and Alexander McKee, was nevertheless one of the most troublesome characters produced in that class of men known as Tories. [Source]

See A Narrative of the Transactions, Imprisonment and Sufferings of John Connolly..., for his perspective.


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