Battle of Tippecanoe

Overview

The Battle of Tippecanoe was fought on November 7, 1811, in Battle Ground, Indiana, between American forces led by then Governor William Henry Harrison of the Indiana Territory and tribal forces associated with Shawnee leader Tecumseh and his brother Tenskwatawa, leaders of a confederacy of various tribes who opposed European-American settlement of the American frontier. As tensions and violence increased, Governor Harrison marched with an army of about 1,000 men to attack the confederacy's headquarters at Prophetstown, near the confluence of the Tippecanoe River and the Wabash River.

Overview adapted from Wikipedia, licensed under CC BY-SA 4.0.

Significance

The Battle of Tippecanoe was fought on November 7, 1811, between American forces under Indiana Territory Governor William Henry Harrison and tribal forces associated with the confederacy led by Tecumseh and his brother Tenskwatawa. Harrison marched roughly 1,000 men toward Prophetstown, the confederacy's headquarters near the confluence of the Tippecanoe and Wabash Rivers, as tensions over European-American settlement of the frontier escalated into open conflict. The engagement struck directly at the organizational center of a multi-tribe confederacy that had been actively resisting American expansion. American forces sustained approximately 120 casualties in the fighting, reflecting the intensity of the tribal resistance. The battle became a defining early episode of Tecumseh's War, weakening but not destroying the confederacy's capacity to resist further settlement and setting the terms for continued conflict along the frontier in the years that followed.

Forces & casualties

Commanders (3)