| In 1757, in order to protect their communication lines and supply routes to forts on the upper Ohio, the French ordered a party to scout the area adjacent to the mouth of the Tennessee River and to build a suitable fortification. Under the authority of Captain Charles Phillipe Aubry the French erected a fort and named it Fort Ascension. The fort was strengthened in 1759 and renamed Fort Massiac in honor of a minister of the French Marine. The French held the fort until 1765 when it was surrendered to the British under the terms of the treaty of 1763. While the British had plans to occupy the fort this was not carried out, and on June 28, 1778, George Rogers Clark, the older brother of William Clark, came with a command of 160 men, and landed at the mouth of Massac Creek a few hundred yards east of the fort. Clark and his men were on their way to capture the British garrison at Vincennes. In 1794 President George Washington ordered General "Mad" Anthony Wayne to fortify and rebuild Fort Massiac. A detail of men under Captain Thomas Doyle arrived at Fort Massiac on June 12, 1794, and by October 20, 1794, they had erected a fort, which was named Massac, an anglicized version of Massiac. By 1797 Fort Massac became a major port of entry for settlers coming down the Ohio and entering the Illinois country. Fort Massac was placed under direct control of Alexander Hamilton in 1799. Plans to garrison 1,000 men at the fort as a response to a French threat were abandoned in favor of a new fort down river at Grand Chain. In 1802 a garrison was established under the command of Captain Daniel Bissell. In 1804, a detachment of troops from Fort Massac occupied New Madrid in present-day Missouri. Reference |  |