routes between Philadelphia PA through the Allegheny Mountains?

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How did they get to the Shenandoah Valley from Pittsburgh PA? Rivers? thoroughfares through the mountains? Was there a lot of commerce between the valley and York and Pittsburgh?
in The Tree House by Amanda Torrey G2G5 (5.3k points)
Hi Amanda, hope all s well with you. What time period are you referring to in your above post?
I'm looking more specifically at the years between 1740 and the Revolutionary War.

I could do my own research, but wow, here I am in research central, so i don't want to reinvent the wheel.
Pittsburgh didn’t really exist until after the Revolutionary War. It was the site of the French Fort Duquesne in the French and Indian War, and that area was controlled by the Iroquois and then Shawnee Indians until about 1780, although it was ceded to Pennsylvania in 1768.  One of the jobs George Washington had in the French and Indian War was road building across the Virginia wilderness to Fort Duquesne.
You have Pittsburgh in the question but it appears you meant Philadelphia.  The answer with link to Great Wagon Road explains a lot, and if you look at a geographic map you will see that the there is a natural route north and east from the Shenandoah, into Pennsylvania.
I DID mean Philadelpia. My brains going really wonky. I feel pretty stupid...ok, now here's the thing

So let's say its 1760 and there's this guy who has a large farm about 600 acres in Augusta County VA, so, how conceivable would it be for his son to move a lot of product back and forth from York fairly regularly through those mountains? Its maybe a little over 150 miles and The French and Indian Wars were still a problem.

I'm looking at maps and can't get a handle on them... Augusta county had a lot of rivers!
Amanda,

Have you ever been to the Shenandoah Valley? Augusta has some rivers, all are small and were never navigable. One could take the Great Wagon Road, which later became Valley Pike and is now Route 11. It is paralleled for all practical purposes by Interstate 81. If you take Interstate 81 or Route 11 north from Augusta Cuonty, you follow the Valley north all the way to Harrisburg, PA and never cross any mountains. In the old days if you were going to Philadelphia you headed east out of Winchester and crossed the Potomac at Harper's Ferry, where the Potomac cuts through the Blue Ridge- so you never had to cross "all those mountains." From Harpers Ferry the old road went to Frederick and from there to Gettysburg and then to York.  An Augusta County farmer would not have shipped bulk produce to Philadelphia, it was at least a two week trip, and he would have wanted to make it worth while. However, he might distill his apples into brandy and haul a couple of kegs of brandy to Philadelphia.  He might grind some wheat into flour and haul some barrels of flour.  Or if he had captured some wildlife and had some deerskin and beaver pelts then that would be worth the trip. There were a few Indian raids in the Valley but it never interrupted back and forth travel between Philadelphia and the Valley. In 1761 a German potter had a pottery wheel and all the equipment shipped from Philadelphia to Winchester, VA and it arrived in perfect condition, and new settlers were arriving during that time.
Probably more York than Philadelphia, but there's a lot of movement. I'll be reading this bit over again and again I'm sure...

OMG, I've never taken a trip to the Shenandoah Valley. That would be amazing. I imagine to the Frontiersmen and their families, i felt like Brigadoon!!!! You did help me see it though. the flour, apple cider, and no mountains...that's so much less...intimidating.  Thank you!!!

Lord I love this G2G!

1 Answer

+7 votes
 
Best answer
Below is a site I used to do some research, and there is a section that covers  some of  what you asked. See if this helps you.

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_Wagon_Road]
by Rodney Long G2G6 Pilot (849k points)
selected by Amanda Torrey
This is EXCELLENT. Thank you Thank you Thank you!

So, there were "ways" between Philadelphia (being a port city), York being a major cross roads for all sorts of business and the growing populations in the Shenandoah Valley.

How much were rivers used?
With the exception of the big rivers like the Ohio or Mississippi, most rivers weren’t navigable by anything except small boats above what’s called the “fall line” where the land goes up from tidal to piedmont - and you had to be able to take that small boat out of the water and carry it around the falls or rapids.  There was lots of traffic on coastal rivers and bays, but farther inland had to wait for canals like the Erie or C and O.
From rather early on, during spring, when water was relatively high, gondolas (long boats) with loads of hides, pig iron, sometimes flour, would leave Port Republic in Rockingham County, and go down the South Fork of the Shenandoah River where it joined the North Fork at Front Royal and flowed on to Harpers Ferry where the produce was sold and the boats dismantled for the lumber, which was sold. There was NO travel up river. Coming of the railroad in 1850s ended the river route as a viable commercial way to transport goods.
I wish I had your experience with the area. I see this land grants and what they did. Like my ancestors son who was a blacksmith that ran a mill at the mouth of the James River. He sold horses to the troops during the Revolution, but died when when he was 30 with property and a family. With some of the descriptions of the old grants, they stop being ancestors and take on an almost mythic quality. It has its own language that doesn't make sense if you don't actually go to the place where the bridge crosses the river by the east branch.

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