What was Dunmore's War?

Dunmore's War (or Lord Dunmore's War) was a war from 1773 to 1774 between the Colony of Virginia and the Indian nations of the Shawnee and Mingo. The Colonial legislature was asked by Lord Dunmore, the British Royal Governor of Virginia, to declare a state of war with the hostile Indian nations and order up an elite volunteer militia force for the campaign.

The context of the conflict resulted from escalating violence between British colonists who in accordance with previous treaties were exploring and moving into land south of the Ohio River—modern West Virginia and Kentucky—and American Indians who held treaty rights to hunt there. As a result of successive attacks by Indian hunting and war bands upon the settlers, war was declared to pacify the hostile Indian war bands. The war ended soon after Virginia's victory in the Battle of Point Pleasant on October 10, 1774. As a result of this victory, the Indians lost the right to hunt in the area and agreed to recognize the Ohio River as the boundary between Indian lands and the British colonies. Although the Indian national chieftains signed the treaty, conflict within the Indian nations soon broke out between more radical tribesmen who felt the treaty sold out their claims and tribesmen who felt another war would mean only further losses of territory to the more powerful British colonists. When war broke out between the British colonists and the British government, the war parties of the Indian nations quickly gained power and mobilized the various Indian nations to attack the British colonists during the Revolutionary War.