Background
John Armstrong was born on April 20, 1755 in Camden, New Jersey, United States, the son of Thomas and Jane Armstrong.
John Armstrong was born on April 20, 1755 in Camden, New Jersey, United States, the son of Thomas and Jane Armstrong.
As an officer of the 12th and 3rd Pennsylvania regiments in the Revolution he won distinction by his abilities and bravery, and immediately afterward (1783-1784) was an officer under the state in its conflict with the Connecticut claimants at Wyoming. The active part he took there is by most writers confused with that taken by Maj. John Armstrong, author of the Newburgh Addresses.
He was commandant at Fort Pitt, 1785-1786, and in the latter year was transferred to the remote frontier. The hero of several thrilling episodes in border history, incident to his duties in the army, he at the same time, with uncommon faith in the early and rapid settlement of the regions north of the Ohio, voluntarily assumed duties looking to the future welfare of the pioneers.
Col. Francis Johnston, receiver general of the land office at Philadelphia, wrote him (1790): "Your passion for improving the Ground by planting fruit Trees of various kinds & making Gardens where ever you go will redound much to your credit, & I will add to the real emolument of mankind. "
In 1790, when the government had determined to attempt a secret exploration into the Spanish territory, and up the Missouri River, Armstrong was entrusted with the hazardous enterprise. Such profound secrecy veiled this undertaking, the forerunner of the Lewis and Clark expedition, that little is known of it beyond the guarded letters that passed between Gen. Harmar, Gov. St. Clair, and Knox, the Secretary of War, and a few memoranda made by Armstrong himself.
A biographical sketch (1844) by his son, William Goforth Armstrong, who was intimately familiar with his father's career, states that "he proceeded up the Missouri some distance above St. Louis, not with an escort, but entirely alone! It was his intention to examine the country of the upper Missouri and cross the Rocky Mountains, " but owing to intertribal Indian wars he was obliged to abandon the undertaking.
He was then detailed to explore the Wabash River and its communications with Lake Erie, and, although it was the very eve of a war with the savages, he made this exploration through the heart of the Indian country with only two friendly Indians as companions.
In Harmar's expedition, in October 1790, the first organized effort of the Federal Government to drive the Indians back from the frontier, Armstrong commanded the only regulars engaged in the initial encounter of that campaign, and with them, when deserted by the militia, stood his ground until all but seven of his men were slain. His escape from the field forms a remarkable chapter in the history of western adventure and woodsmanship.
He served also in St. Clair's campaign (1791), and as commandant of Fort Hamilton, which was built chiefly under his direction. Resigning from the army in 1793, soon after his marriage to a daughter of Judge William Goforth, one of the most influential men in the formation of the Ohio commonwealth and champion of popular education, Armstrong settled at Columbia, near Cincinnati.
From 1796 to the close of the territorial period he servd as treasurer of the Northwest Territory, besides holding local offices. He removed, in 1814, to Armstrong's Station, on the Ohio, which he had founded in 1796, one of the first American settlements on Indiana soil. There he died on February 4, 1816.
In 1793 he married a daughter of Judge William Goforth, by whom he had three children.