Fort Laurens, Ohio

                                                                                                                                                                         

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Fort Laurens was a Revolutionary garrison located on the banks of the Tuscarawas River in Ohio. In 1778, 176 militia on orders from the Continental Congress to destroy a few Native American villages lived in the fort, near what is now Bolivar, Ohio. Of course, the natives didn’t take to kindly to this invasion and ambushed the soldiers.

An estimated 21 bodies were buried in its cemetery, 13 of which were said to have been killed and scalped by the Native Americans while foraging for firewood.

In 1989 a study of the slaughtered remains was completed. 15 individuals were excavated. 13 were buried in a cluster and 2 were in an extended burial. According to the study, the 13 individuals in the cluster were the victims of the ambush.

Most of the remains were incomplete due to decay and animal scavenging. Some had bones of the hands and feet included, but others only had the larger bones. All of the bones were put under a macroscopic lens and all the traumatic lesions were recorded. And all bones were examined for blunt force, sharp force and gunshot wounds.

                       RESULTS

All but one of the crania was complete enough to be examined and 90% of them displayed at least one traumatic lesion. 9 of the skulls exhibited more than one lesion. One lesion suggested that the victim received a blow with so much force that it broke through the occipital bone, passed through the brain and produced a lesion on the right parietal bone.

Only one lesion was found on any of the postcranial skeletons, located on the second cervical vertebra.

All lesions seem to be blunt force or sharp force, none displayed a gunshot wound.

Multiple ‘fine’ lesions were found on all of the crania. The conclusion is that the weapons used for this varied from small knives to tomahawks and hatchets.

These patterns of fine lesions are all indicating of scalping. They were found on the frontal bones of the crania and also on the temporal regions.

This, along with the fact that each skull exhibited multiple perimortem wounds indicates that this was not just any conflict between the Europeans and the Indians. This was a massacre with the intent of revenge.