Fort Dewart on the Forbes Road
Written by April Frantz in the A Place in Time category and the Winter 2021 issue Topics in this article: Bedford County, British, Forbes expedition, Forbes Road, Fort Bedford, Fort Dewart, Fort Duquesne, French, French and Indian War, John Forbes, Montgomerie’s Highlanders, National Register of Historic Places, Pontiac's War, Rhor’s Gap, Somerset County
The monument at Fort Dewart is one in a series installed in 1930 marking different points along Forbes Road.
Pennsylvania State Historic Preservation Office
Fort Dewart, which straddles the border of Bedford and Somerset counties in southern Pennsylvania, was a British military redoubt built in August 1758 during the French and Indian War, the North American conflict in the global Seven Years’ War (1756–63) between Great Britain and France. The small fortification was part of a chain of defensive forts and supply stops built by the troops of Gen. John Forbes (1707–59) during the second British campaign to repel the French from Fort Duquesne (in present-day Pittsburgh). Fort Dewart was constructed by three Scottish companies of the 77th Regiment of Foot, Montgomerie’s Highlanders. Forbes’ successful expedition claimed Fort Duquesne for the British on November 25, 1758, and led to the expansion of the British Empire westward to the Mississippi River.
Fort Dewart is located along the road that Forbes proposed as a strategic alternative to the Braddock Road, the route of an earlier, failed British campaign. The Forbes Road, as it was called, extended west from Fort Bedford to the French army’s Fort Duquesne, which after capture by the British army was rebuilt and renamed Fort Pitt. The 60-by-60-foot Fort Dewart was a type known as a redoubt, a fort that is fully enclosed by logs and possibly other materials above earthworks to protect soldiers and supplies traveling or stationed outside the military’s main defensive lines.
The four-sided design of Fort Dewart was the standard plan used during the war. The star-shaped remains of the fort are apparently the most intact of any from the Forbes Expedition. Continued study of Fort Dewart will reveal information about the construction and use of such forts. Although the upper portion of the fort’s walls no longer exist, the landscape, earthworks and artifacts within and surrounding the fort are important evidence of the army’s movement west at a particularly challenging location.
The earthen breastwork outline of Fort Dewart with the 1930 monument in the center.
Pennsylvania State Historic Preservation Office
Ascending the Allegheny Ridge was the most daunting aspect of constructing the Forbes Road and the reason Col. George Washington predicted Forbes would fail. Choosing Rohr’s Gap as the spot for the British army to climb the ridge, while daunting, was perhaps a key decision in the campaign’s success. Archival records such as letters, briefings and journals refer to the construction of Fort Dewart, the difficulties of the climb, and the occupation of Forbes himself for five days between October 24 and 29, 1758, when rains and muddy roads stalled his progress.
After the troops ascended Rhor’s Gap and reached Fort Dewart, the fort’s blacksmiths would repair the damage to the wagons and equipment incurred during the climb. Fort Dewart continued to provide logistical support for British troops and supplies crossing the Allegheny Ridge after the capture of Fort Duquesne until the end of Pontiac’s War in 1763.
A drone image shows the star-shaped outline of Fort Dewart.
Pennsylvania State Historic Preservation Office / Photo, Isaac Fisher, Dimensions
The Forbes Road continued to be used by settlers moving west, and eventually parts of the road became the course of several current state highways. The portion of the Forbes Road adjacent to Fort Dewart was left largely intact following an 1817 alignment cut that bypassed Rohr’s Gap. In 1930 the Pennsylvania Historical Commission (predecessor of the Pennsylvania Historical & Museum Commission) placed a stone monument with a bronze plaque in the center of the fort as part of an effort to commemorate sites of the Forbes campaign. Fort Dewart and the Rhor’s Gap remnant of the Forbes Road are within a community park, owned by the private Folmont residential area, that is not currently open to the general public. Folmont residents have been careful stewards of the site, dedicated to preserving this piece of history within their midst.
Fort Dewart will be listed in the National Register of Historic Places in winter 2020–21.
Recent listings in the National Register of Historic Places include Ambridge Commercial Historic District, Beaver County; Crawford Grill No. 2, Pittsburgh, Allegheny County; Ohringer Building, Braddock, Allegheny County; and John Wagner and Family Farmstead, Lower Saucon Township, Northampton County.
April E. Frantz is a historic preservation specialist who reviews National Register nominations in PHMC’s State Historic Preservation Office.
