Captain Thomas Cresap (1703-1790) - PLAQUE
Lower Windsor Township, York County, Pennsylvania
Marker Inscription
A Marylander. Settled on these Indian lands of Conejohela in 1730 and held them for Lord Baltimore against the Penn Proprietors until 1736, when in the Border War he was burned out of his log house or fort near this marker toward the river - on his plantation "Pleasant Garden" - and carried prisoner to Philadelphia.
Erected by Pennsylvania Historical and Museum Commission
The Story
When Thomas Cresap settled here in 1730, the border between Pennsylvania and Maryland was undrawn and hotly contested, and he claimed these lands for Lord Baltimore against the heirs of William Penn. His stubborn defense made him a flashpoint of "Cresap's War," the frontier feud over the disputed boundary. In 1736 Pennsylvania forces burned him out of his fortified log house and hauled him off a prisoner to Philadelphia.
Why it matters
This border war helped drive the surveying of the Mason-Dixon Line, one of the most consequential boundaries in American history.
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Related people
- · Thomas Cresap
- · Lord Baltimore
Related events
- · Cresap's War
- · Conojocular War
Themes & tags
Nearby & related markers
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Marcus A. Reno, whose farm lay near here, is remembered for one of the most scrutinized moments in American military history. As a major in the 7th U.S. Cavalry, he led a battalion at the Battle of the Little Bighorn in June 1876; while George Armstrong Custer and the men with him were annihilated, Reno and most of his command dug in and survived. Earlier, during the Civil War, he had helped defend this stretch of Pennsylvania against Confederate incursions.
Cresap's Fort
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About 1730 the frontiersman Thomas Cresap settled along the Susquehanna on land that Maryland's Lord Baltimore claimed against Pennsylvania, making his fortified home a flashpoint in the bitter boundary dispute between the two colonies. In 1736 Penn's agents forcibly evicted him and burned his "fort," and Cresap moved west into Maryland, where he remained a restless figure in frontier affairs until his death around 1790. His stand gave the border quarrel one of its most colorful episodes.
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