First Battle of the Revolution Was in Virginia
 
From: bernhard1848@att.net
 
It is ironic that the people of the Shenandoah Valley sent food and relief to Boston in 1774, yet it was New Englanders who financed and armed the fanatic John Brown and later helped lay the Valley to waste and devastation—to starve the Virginians. And Governor Dunmore would not only seek Indians to fight against American independence in 1775, but also black slaves as he issued his own emancipation proclamation.
 
Bernhard Thuersam, Director
Cape Fear Historical Institute
www.cfhi.net  

First Battle of the Revolution Was in Virginia:
 
“The first battle of the Revolution was not in New England but at Point Pleasant, Virginia. There seems to be no doubt but that [Royal] Governor Dunmore in this war sought to hamstring the colonies and win the Indians to the side of Great Britain in the oncoming maelstrom. The battle was fought October 10, 1774, and the battle of Lexington, considered the opening conflict of the struggle, was fought less than six months thereafter, on April 19, 1775. General Andrew Lewis of the Shenandoah Valley commanded the patriots, all of whom were Virginians, at the Point, the junction of the Kanawha with the Ohio. The majority of them perhaps were from the Shenandoah Valley. The men of one Valley company were all over six feet tall.
 
These soldiers reached home in November and they found their fellow citizens assembling food to send to the relief of Boston which port had been closed by the British government. Things were happening fast…on July 2nd, Washington arrived in Boston; on August 7th, Morgan with his squirrel tails arrived, the first to arrive from the South. This gladdened the heart of Washington for he knew these men could be trusted and could shoot straight. He lived with and fought with them in the French and Indian wars. 
 
They left Winchester July 14, 1775, and in three weeks arrived in Boston. These were Shenandoah Valley men wearing hunting coats and bucktails. Some one has said: “The war may have been lost had it not been for the men behind the Blue Ridge.” The history of Morgan reads like a fairy tale. He was the Stonewall Jackson of the Revolution.”
 
(A Short History of Page County, Virginia, Harry M. Strickler, C.J. Carrier, 1974, page 11)