Volume 4 of the Draper Series.

Lyman Copeland Draper (1815-1891) began research in the late 1830s on frontier days and particularly on the Indian wars of the Ohio River Valley, collecting documents, writing notes, and corresponding with people who had experienced historical events there. He continued his research throughout his life, leaving behind at the Wisconsin Historical Society, which he directed, an enormous volume of materials that are referred to as the ‘Draper Manuscript Collection’.

The Draper Series consists of 5 volumes of documents selected from the Draper Collection, edited by staff of the Wisconsin Historical Society at the beginning of the 20th century. Volume 1 covers Lord Dunmore’s War in 1774, and the remaining four volumes cover the period of the American Revolution.

This volume is a collection of historical documents for the Revolutionary War in the west from May, 1778 to July, 1779, described by editor Louise Kellogg as the most momentous period in that theater of war. Kellogg, an historian at the Wisconsin Historical Society, describes military events during this period in a 28-page introduction. Since there does not appear to be a list of the many documents in the volume, reading the introduction first would be a help in putting the documents into context.