Battle of Fort Necessity

Significance

The Battle of Fort Necessity, fought on July 3, 1754, near present-day Farmington in Fayette County, Pennsylvania, was one of the opening engagements of the French and Indian War. Together with the earlier skirmish at Jumonville Glen on May 28, 1754, it constituted the first military combat experience for George Washington, then a Virginia colonial officer under Great Britain. Washington would later be selected by the Second Continental Congress as commander of the Continental Army during the American Revolutionary War, making these engagements a formative episode in his military development. The battle is also known as the Battle of the Great Meadows and involved French forces under Louis Coulon alongside British colonial forces under Washington and James Mackay.

Commanders (3)