Major funding for Resolved to Live and Die provided by Virginia 250 and Pulaski County, Virginia.

Additional funding provided by... ♪ ♪ ♪ We assure you, gentlemen and all our countrymen, that we are a people whose hearts overflow with love and duty to our lawful sovereign George III.

[banging] There are a lot of reasons why somebody was a patriot or why somebody was a loyalist.

Some of them have to do with politics.

Some of them had to do with land.

Some of them probably had to do with, I just don't like you.

You were mean to my brother.

And so if you're on one side, I'm going to be on the other.

You know, good old Appalachian feud.

NARRATOR: At the dawn of a new nation, more than 250 years ago, southwest Virginia and a county by the name of Fincastle stretched to the Mississippi River.

It was a rich land, full of opportunity and promise for some -- and heartbreak for others.

We are heartily grieved at the differences which now subsists between the parent state and the colonies, and most ardently wish to have harmony restored.

A lot of folks in modern times tend to look at our American Civil War as the war of brother versus brother.

But during the Revolutionary War, it was much more so.

We had here in western Virginia neighbors that threatened neighbors.

They burned each other's fields and their barns.

They were at each other's throats in a way that a lot of modern folks really don't have much appreciation for.

These are real, though unpolished sentiments of liberty and loyalty.

And in them we are resolved to live and die.

[banging] NARRATOR: In the backcountry of Virginia, in 1775, a few short months before the start of the Revolutionary War, 15 men would put their lives on the line with a document called the Fincastle Resolutions, declaring their thoughts about relations between Great Britain and the colonies.

But the story of the United States of America and Virginia begins more than a century and a half before, with the first permanent English settlement in North America Jamestown in 1607, on the banks of the James River.

Just 12 years later, a bold experiment in self-government took root.

The House of Burgesses, the first elected legislative assembly, gathered, giving settlers a voice in their own affairs.

It was made up of representatives from the colony meeting alongside the colonial governor and his council.

Though still under English authority, the House of Burgesses laid the groundwork for representative government in America.

But 1619 was not only a year of political beginnings.

That same year, the first enslaved Africans were brought to Virginia's shores, forced into a life of bondage that would cast a long and painful shadow over the colony and the nation to come.

By the late 17th century.

12 more British colonies had been founded in North America.

Yet it was Virginia with its early institutions, agricultural wealth, and frontier spirit that made it a central player in the birth of a new nation.

The French and Indian War, fought from 1754 to 1763, was the North American front of a global struggle between Britain and France.

At stake was control of the Ohio Valley, land that both empires and their native allies claimed as their own.

Though victory gave Britain control of vast new territories, it also left the empire deeply in debt.

To recover costs, Britain imposed new taxes on the colonies, including Virginia, laying the groundwork for the American Revolution.

In the years following the French and Indian War, waves of settlers began migrating south from Pennsylvania, traveling the Great Wagon Road in search of a better life.

They brought with them strong traditions, a spirit of independence and a desire to claim their own piece of the American Dream.

There are these road systems where people are moving south, and as places like Pennsylvania become more populated, people are looking for cheaper land and larger tracts of land to move into.

So that's why the wagon road becomes such an important mode of migration or emigration, as it were.

In a modern context of the Virginia backcountry, it's basically what we know as west of the Blue Ridge.

So the backcountry of Virginia actually does start in Winchester and comes down the borders of West Virginia on the Tennessee.

But that includes the Shenandoah Valley and Southwest Virginia.

The vast majority of women that you see coming down the Great Wagon Road, they are not strangers to North America.

They're not strangers to the colonies.

You do have women who, you know, were raised in what at the time had been backcountry Pennsylvania, or had been backcountry Virginia or backcountry Maryland, and then are moving south along the wagon road and then kind of spreading out along the river valleys from there into the Greenbrier Valley, into the New River valley.

Ideas of stubbornness.

Self-reliance.

Using nature for your medical needs.

Being able to live on your own.

Build your log cabin.

Use the mud to daub it.

Not having to rely on any institution, any government.

You see that same family trait being expressed by the men and being expressed by the women.

And being something that's kind of generationally handed down as a matter of stubborn pride, a matter of good self-reliance, and a matter of true American independence.

NARRATOR: As settlers pushed deeper into Virginia, the Scots-Irish, German and English settlers forged a patchwork of languages, customs, and beliefs.

Many settlers brought with them enslaved Africans.

Their traditions, expressed through music, food, faith and craftsmanship, merged with those of the European settlers, creating a unique and enduring Appalachian identity.

There's just so much that comes with these cultures that we just assume as modern day Americans that has always been here, but it actually came during this period and blended.

Let's say, the Scots-Irish.

What comes with them is music.

Their food ways.

They bring sheep, the barley crops they bring with them, the ways of their farming, the ways of their building, the Presbyterian Church.

The Germans and the Swiss, they bring artwork.

There's so many of these artisan crafts that come through with all these, but the Germans are really strong with that.

Obviously, the West African bring in a huge amount to our culture in the backcountry and our culture across America.

All these cultures brought their own traditions.

Musical instruments is a big thing.

Banjo.

Fiddle.

Dulcimer.

Scots-Irish, German and African.

And so that melting pot of cultures here on the southwest Virginia frontier, we still have it today.

NARRATOR: Some of the first to arrive were Welsh miners, drawn by the newly discovered lead deposits near present day Austinville in Wythe County, founded in 1756 by Colonel John Chiswell.

The mines faced early financial struggles, but eventually became vital to the patriot cause.

John Chiswell went over to Bristol, England.

He got William Herbert and his family, who were established Welsh miners, to bring over.

1761, the first letter written out of modern day Wythe County, was Captain William Herbert basically stating that the enslaved arrived safe and well.

They would get moving to get the lead.

They started mining lead successfully.

They were shipping lead to the Moravian settlements in North Carolina.

They were using that on their pottery.

The lead would eventually become a huge deal with the Virginia Continentals during the American Revolution and militias.

NARRATOR: Following the French and Indian War.

Great Britain faced challenges managing the vast frontier.

King George III issued the Proclamation of 1763, which drew a line along the Appalachian Mountains forbidding colonists from settling west of it.

That land, the king declared, was to be reserved for Native American tribes, but for many settlers, the Proclamation felt like a betrayal.

They had fought alongside British troops and now expected to claim land in the newly won territories.

What was meant to bring peace instead sowed resentment, deepening the divide between Britain and its colonies.

Despite the Proclamation, settlers continued arriving in the backcountry.

William Preston, who was destined to be a signer of the 1775 Fincastle Resolutions, had his sights set westward.

First living with his new bride at Greenfield in modern day Botetourt County, before eventually heading further west to build Smithfield plantation.

The English government had declared in 1763 that no English settlers could go west of the Eastern Divide.

Now the Eastern Divide runs between Christiansburg, Blacksburg and Preston was very busy surveying land miles into what was forbidden territory.

Most of the elite in Virginia were equally guilty of violating the Proclamation of 1763, because there was millions of acres of good land, free for the taking, and they weren't going to let some mandate from Parliament or the King get in the way of their getting rich.

NARRATOR: As settlers expanded their reach westward, the natives in the area were being pushed out or forced to assimilate.

They had their own language and they had their own names.

They didn't call themselves Cherokee, Creek, or Choctaw, but as far as the names like Cherokee, they called themselves Tsalagi.

They look at things differently.

They live off the land.

Father God the creator gave them the land.

And they share.

And there's enough for everybody.

The European way of thinking when they get to this land is like, okay, I've got this fenced in, this is my stuff.

I paid for this stuff.

I got a land grant or whatever.

That's your stuff over there on that side.

Don't touch my stuff in my fence.

That's real hard for Native Americans to conceive because that's not how they look at things.

NARRATOR: The treaty of hard labor between the British and the Cherokee Nation in 1768 established new boundaries, further shrinking Cherokee territory.

So in the case of the Treaty of Hard Labor, you're talking about treaties where boundaries were being pushed, these boundaries retracting to another area.

So the Cherokee people were losing even more land, and then the Europeans were gaining more land.

So you're talking about more shrinking of land and less opportunity for the Cherokee to be able to sustain themselves.

NARRATOR: Establishing his foothold in the New River Valley, William Preston began construction on Smithfield Plantation in 1772.

That same year, Fincastle County was carved from Botetourt County.

It would last four short years.

Fincastle County basically went to the Mississippi from what is today modern Botetourt County, and included all of Kentucky.

And then that was actually named after Lord Dunmore's son.

And so after Lord Dunmore's War, and then the powder incident of 1775, they didn't like that name Fincastle really.

So they made that county obsolete.

NARRATOR: Settlers continued moving into the newly formed Fincastle County via the Great Wagon Road.

This important colonial migration route stretched across Virginia into the Carolinas and Georgia.

Among those families were the Drapers, the Cloyds, the Campbells, the Christians, and the Preston family.

William Preston emigrated from what we would now call Northern Ireland at the age of eight.

William Preston was the son of John Preston, who was a ship's carpenter.

He decided not to follow in his father's footsteps, but decided to follow the career of his mother's brother.

James Patton was a land speculator and he was also a surveyor, so knowing that James Patton had done very well for himself in that role, William Preston decided that he would follow in his maternal uncle's career footsteps.

And so that is what brought him out to western Virginia.

I think the thing to keep in mind about southwest Virginia is that it was very much a class divided society, and in a lot of ways, their religious experience and their religious affiliations represent that class divide.

The William Christians, the Cummings, the Prestons, the Drapers, primarily a Presbyterian background, a polity that focused very much on individual rights, individual property.

By and large, these people were land holders.

By and large, they were slaveholders.

At the same time that the American Revolution was beginning, Methodism was beginning to take root in its earliest stages.

Methodism was profoundly anti-slavery.

From what I can tell, reading their letters, their diaries, reading about them, many of them understood at some level that slavery was wrong.

They absolutely knew that the people they were enslaving were human beings.

I mean, legally, they were property under the law of Virginia, under English law, they were property with absolutely no rights as human beings.

But any person, any slave owner who worked daily with these people knew that they were human.

NARRATOR: As 1773 drew to a close, an event far from the mountains of Virginia took place that pushed the colonies closer to war against the Crown, the Boston Tea Party.

The leaders in Boston worried, okay, our people are thrifty.

If they have a choice between buying smuggled tea that doesn't have a tax but costs more, or East India Company tea that has a tax, but is still cheaper, they're going to buy the cheaper tea, and Parliament is going to take that as a concession on our part that they can tax us.

And that's why they threw the tea in the harbor.

The Boston Tea Party was an effort to prevent Americans buying cheap tea.

That so infuriated Parliament that they -- up until now, all they've been talking about is taxes.

Now they took explicit action to punish the colony of Massachusetts for its activity.

NARRATOR: Meanwhile, in the backcountry of Virginia, families continued to build their lives and homes.

In 1774, construction on Smithfield Plantation, located in modern day Blacksburg, Virginia, was completed.

William Preston in 1774 moved his wife, Susanna Smith Preston.

Now you know how the plantation got its name.

When she moved into this house, she was very pregnant with her eighth child.

She had seven little ones in tow, and she had adopted previously a teenage girl and two teenage boys.

So William Preston had a very large family.

We are descendants of Thomas Fraction, who is the son of John Fraction, who is the son of Jack Fraction, who we referred to as Baba.

He was one of the 16 originally enslaved people brought by William Preston in 1759 from the slave ship the True Blue.

They were brought to Southwest Virginia, and they would build what we now known today as the Smithfield Plantation, and contributed to all the things that are the legacy of the Preston family.

True Blue was one of the slave ships is actually pretty well documented.

If we look at the coast of Angola, that means it is likely that Baba was either Igbo, Yoruba, somewhere within the modern day Nigeria up to Ghana is likely where he came from.

If we go by the legacy of why we have the last name Fraction, which is synonymous with the term "fractious," back in the 18th century, which meant likely to quarrel or likely to fight, that aligns with the legacy of the Igbo people during the experience of enslavement.

NARRATOR: Southwest of Smithfield Plantation on the west bank of the New River, was the place where residents and travelers alike shopped before and during the period of the revolution.

One of the first stops on the Great Road after people crossed the river at Ingles Ferry, was a community over here in what became known as Dunkard's Bottom, and there was a store there, the McCorkle store.

In 1774, in that store ledger from McCorkle, over 20 types of British fabric base linen, silk, wool.

They had Dellftware, they had queensware, they had basically anything that somebody could get in Williamsburg, Virginia at that time.

The McCorkle store even has toothbrushes.

You can just read this book and see exactly what everybody is buying at the time.

And, with that, you can see all these important figures at this store.

William Preston, William Campbell, Patrick Henry's son was coming.

His three brother-in-laws visited the store.

William Christian.

Basically, it's a who's who of southwest Virginia at that time.

NARRATOR: In the years leading up to the American Revolution, another conflict was unfolding on the western frontier.

Lord Dunmore's War, named after Virginia's royal governor, and beginning in spring 1774, it pitted colonial militias against the Shawnee and Mingo tribes in the Ohio Valley to drive native resistance out of the region.

There was other tension building in the backcountry as well.

There actually would have been a couple of possible causes of, if not conflict, at least tension.

Roughly a third of the population was German, and most of them were Lutheran, and then another third, many of them were Scots-Irish who were Presbyterian, and so there was some religious tension among them.

But the real problem was over land.

Owning land in Virginia was very complicated.

Settlers to this area, what they had to do was, first of all, find a piece of land that was not occupied and then survey it.

Then you actually had to go back east to Williamsburg, to the land office, to purchase what were called treasury rights.

That was a pain.

And so many settlers didn't bother.

Well, the elite were often members of land companies, well-connected Virginians who from the government got grants of upwards of 100,000 acres of land.

And the requirement was they had to get other people to live on that land.

So these men had legal title to the land.

They'd go out and discover people living on land that they thought was theirs.

This intense, almost battle at times between squatters who claimed they owned the land because they had invested in it, they had cleared it.

They had put blood, sweat and tears into occupying this land versus some person they'd never seen before who shows up and just says, this is my land.

You have to either pay me rent or get out of here.

NARRATOR: On the eastern side of Virginia, rebellion was brewing in Williamsburg.

In defiance of the royal governor, the first Virginia Convention convened in August of 1774.

At the meeting, they laid out their grievances and selected a slate of seven delegates to represent the colony at the First Continental Congress.

There was still a royal governor, but every time he would convene the House of Burgesses to pass legislation, the House of Burgesses wanted to do things to show their support for Bostonians, and so he kept just dissolving the house of Burgess, sending them all home.

So they finally decided, well, we have to have a government.

We're just going to meet on our own.

And so they began a series of what were called state conventions that were a de facto, but illegal government of Virginia.

They began passing edicts, proclamations.

They began having each county establish a committee of safety that operated as, again, an illegal county government.

In 1774, the Virginia Convention asked every county to tell us what matters to you.

So there was this ask.

So that's why you get the Pittsylvania County Resolution.

That's why you get the Fairfax Resolves.

They're answering how people are feeling about how other colonies are being treated in response to the acts of Boston Harbor being closed off.

All the things, all the action points that were already happening.

NARRATOR: The committees of safety were composed of ordinary citizens and prominent local leaders who quietly took control of government function.

They collected intelligence, organized local militias, and ensured loyalty to the patriot cause.

They also created resolutions and resolves to give their communities a voice.

In Fincastle County, Virginia, their resolutions would come soon with the new year of 1775.

In William Preston's capacity as a member of the Committee of Safety that drafted the Fincastle Resolutions, one of the things that he was chiefly concerned with were the boycotts that were instituted in retaliation for the so-called Intolerable Acts that the British passed in retaliation for actions that colonists took, such as the Boston Tea Party.

NARRATOR: In October 1774, the short lived Lord Dunmore's War came to a head at the Battle of Point Pleasant.

Forces, led by Colonel Andrew Lewis, clashed with Shawnee warriors near the Ohio River.

Though the Virginians emerged victorious, the war exposed the growing unrest between native nations and colonial expansion.

As 1774 wound down in December, tension with Britain was on the rise, leading to a remarkable declaration.

After the conclusion of Lord Dunmore's War, Virginia militiamen gathered at Fort Gower, near the present day Ohio-West Virginia border.

Though they had just fought under the banner of the British Crown, these soldiers issued a bold statement of principle.

The Fort Gower Resolves.

Their words expressed loyalty to King George III, but made it clear that their true allegiance lay with the cause of liberty and the rights of America.

Fincastle County stood as a vast frontier in the backcountry of Virginia.

In January 1775, the county's leaders declared their support for the American cause in what became known as the Fincastle Resolutions, an extraordinary statement of resistance that predated the Declaration of Independence.

The Fincastle Resolutions pledged unwavering loyalty to King George III, but only as long as the Crown respected the rights and liberties of the American colonists.

In a striking tone of defiance, the men declared their willingness to take up arms in defense of those liberties.

Standing in full support of the Continental Congress and its efforts to resist British oppression, these men, farmers, soldiers, and statesmen boldly aligned themselves with the growing revolution, stating they were resolved to live and die for the defense of their liberties.

Yes, sir.

That was the first time that men from this area, of course, the freeholders, the Committee of Safety, they had gotten together since coming back from Lord Dunmore's War, and there had been a call the Continental Congress and the Virginia folks that represent the Continental Congress, they were trying to get a feel.

I think there was a little bit of that, just trying to see what people sentiments were.

These western counties took a little bit longer.

And in January 20th of the 1775, they finally make their statement.

When I say that we are willing to defend... The Fincastle Resolutions are actually among the last of these resolutions to be submitted to the Colony of Virginia.

But what makes them interesting is they not only talked about the rights of Englishmen, protection from arbitrary taxation, protection from arbitrary government in general.

They also, having just come back from fighting the Indians, emphasized that we have shed our blood to make this territory English, and we will shed our blood to keep our liberties.

They still were not declaring independence.

We should take our time and consider carefully the actions that we are taking.

So they say, yes, we are good Englishmen.

We will remain good Englishmen.

But there are certain things that we have some grievances with and they list them out.

Some of it's their grievances against Parliament and what Parliament's been doing.

Some of it's their grievance about, they've been kind of a buffer out here between the Native Americans and the wars that were going on here.

They want their rights.

They want to be able to live as a true Englishman.

But if not, there's the "but if not," they are then going to resolve to live and die defending those abilities to have their liberties and their rights.

This is still just before Lexington and Concord.

There is no fighting going on at this point, but the residents of Fincastle at least, were prepared to say if it comes to it, we will do that.

They're putting that out there.

They're saying, this is what we want.

But if we don't get that, this is what we'll do.

And that's pretty powerful.

Liberties are secured by God and the Crown.

So it is not free... It's a little up for discussion as to where they were signed.

Some people think that it was signed over at the courthouse, which was situated at the lead mines in modern Austinville, Virginia.

Some people think that it was signed at James McGavock's Tavern, which is what we know now as Fort Chiswell, with men coming from modern day Botetourt, Roanoke, Blacksburg.

Men coming from modern day Marion, Abingdon, Bristol, they're all traveling the great routes, they have to meet in the McGavock Tavern right there at modern day Fort Chiswell.

If they're going to pass it, why would they pass that up?

Just to go eight miles further south to the lead mines and then James McGavock himself was a signer of the Fincastle Resolution.

So that's kind of one of those areas of history where you can get all the facts and details and you can come to your own conclusion.

We must let it be known where we stand.

Where does Fincastle stand in this debate?

We must send this document.

[cheering and applause] It gets published, of course, in the Gazette in Williamsburg, and it shows up in a few other places.

Other counties were kind of following a similar vein.

Again, it wasn't like the Fincastle fellows out here were making up this grand statement that nobody else was linking to.

You had the Fort Gower Resolves that kind of reflect that.

And there were some of the people that were at Fort Gower that were also with the Fincastle folks.

So these ideas were percolating throughout the colonies and throughout Virginia.

The following gentlemen were nominated... NARRATOR: The 15 signers of the Fincastle Resolutions were leaders and militia officers from the frontier region.

Its men, such as, you know, Colonel William Christian Colonel William Preston, Ingles, the Campbells, Reverend Cummings.

Oh my gosh, there's so many freeholders of power and influence who get together to write this document, and they do have the influence and the connections to the East Coast, too, with the relations to Patrick Henry, which is also very important to remember.

Again, they're not out here by themselves, with beards, eating raw meat.

They were connected to the overall society.

NARRATOR: William Christian's connection was being the brother-in-law of Patrick Henry, having married Henry's sister Anne.

In February of 1775, William Christian, brother-in-law to Patrick Henry, was staying at Scotchtown with Patrick Henry.

Obviously at that time they would have been discussing politics because there was unrest in the colonies.

And so one month later, after William Christian is gone from Scotchtown, Patrick Henry pretty much echoes the same sentiments as "resolved to live and die," the last sentence in the Fincastle Resolutions, with "give me liberty or give me death."

Can we say that Patrick Henry was influenced by the Fincastle Resolutions?

No.

Can we make a strong argument that they're very similar?

Yes.

NARRATOR: Among the signers of the Fincastle Resolutions was William Preston, who, in the years leading up to the revolution was a member of the House of Burgesses.

He was a militia officer.

He was a county lieutenant.

And then on top of all of this, he directed the wars against the Shawnee and the Cherokee in 1774 and 1776, respectively, and then, during the years of the Revolution, was responsible for the defenses of the lead and saltpeter mines in southwestern Virginia.

Finally, he directed the surveying efforts in the opening of Kentucky County after 1776.

He was target number one for the common folk.

He was the county surveyor.

The advantage of being a surveyor was you got first dibs on the best land.

And so Preston owned thousands of acres, much of which he hoped to then sell to other people.

And so to many of the squatters in the area, William Preston was the enemy.

It's actually part of the reason why, early in the revolution, he was accused of being a loyalist because as county surveyor, his boss was the royal governor of Virginia.

And so Preston was trying to satisfy both the royal governor and the emerging patriot government and at times just ticked off everybody.

And so at one point he was accused of being a loyalist and then he had to defend himself before the Committee of Safety.

The Prestons call themselves the most influential family that no one has ever heard of, and I am inclined to agree.

Especially when it comes to the Revolutionary War, because they are in the room, they are part of the process for the founding fathers that we know the best.

If the Prestons are in the room and part of that process, who did they take with them?

It's us.

What does a conversation about the purpose of the Revolutionary War look like amongst enslaved people?

When you're in the room, and your hearing conversations about ideals of independence, of freedom, of the pursuit of happiness, and you understand those concepts because you understand English just fine.

So for people who have no concept of freedom, because your parents didn't have it and you didn't have it, you're getting to see it built out in detail for a nation.

So you go back to each other and you have conversations about what that will look like for you.

NARRATOR: Another participant in the creation of the Fincastle Resolutions was the Reverend Charles Cummings, known as the Fighting Parson.

He served Presbyterian congregations near Ebbing Spring near the Holston River and Sinking Springs in Abingdon, Virginia.

A man of both scripture and steel, Cummings was said to lead his congregations with a Bible in one hand and a musket never far from reach.

If you look at the signers of the Fincastle Resolution, every single one of those people were Scotch Presbyterians.

In fact, there was a Scotch Presbyterian minister, Mr.

Cummings, on the list of those who had signed.

NARRATOR: Two other well-known participants in the Fincastle Resolution were William Campbell and William Ingles.

Campbell was born in Augusta County and later settled in southwestern Virginia, near present day Abingdon.

He would go on to lead Virginia militiamen in key Revolutionary War battles, including the pivotal victory at King's Mountain.

A veteran of the Battle of Point Pleasant, William Ingles originally hailed from Dublin, Ireland, and settled in Virginia, running a ferry that crossed the New River.

Ingles knew the perils of frontier life firsthand, especially after the dramatic abduction and eventual return of his wife, Mary Draper Ingles, following a brutal Shawnee raid.

As the revolution progressed, he was appointed colonel of the militia in the newly formed Montgomery County in 1777, and despite that, at one point he was accused of being a Tory, Mary Draper Ingles, she lived a tough life, but a middle class life down at Ingles Ferry after returning, of course, from the Shawnee raid from the French and Indian period.

But Mary Draper Ingles is still important during the Revolutionary War because she's married to Colonel William Ingles, who is brought up as a Tory.

He is one who was fined 100,000 pounds.

That was a complete, anomalous charge.

He never paid it.

NARRATOR: Putting one's name on something like the Fincastle Resolutions was not a decision to be made lightly.

It was a move that could have serious consequences.

...sovereign George III.

These men were risking their lives and their families lives.

Even though it was going to the Virginia delegates, the Continental Congress, Continental Congress was trying to figure out what to do with Great Britain at that time.

A lot of Americans were trying to balance.

We're talking about treason.

This is a hanging offense.

And so Preston and others, as long as it looked like there might be a peaceful resolution... [banging] The king will maybe step in finally and tell Parliament to behave themselves.

And we will continue under Lord Dunmore, under our royal governor.

So you don't want to tick him off too much.

But on the other hand, right now, neither he nor the British government is respecting what we think of as our liberty.

And so we're going to take steps.

We're not committing treason, but we are considering our alternatives.

And in them we are resolved to live and die.

Their families would have lost all their fortunes, all their land, all of their houses, and it would have been a very, very difficult life.

Actually, some Americans never did decide, but many Americans eventually felt, okay.

I've got to pick one side or the other.

And again, in this area, a great many ultimately chose the king.

NARRATOR: In April 1775, just a few short months after the creation of the Fincastle Resolutions, the American colonies were no longer simply protesting British rule.

The war for independence was underway.

To the north in Massachusetts, the Battles of Lexington and Concord had already drawn blood.

In Virginia, Royal Governor Lord Dunmore attempted to suppress the patriot movement when he sees the colonies' gunpowder supplies from the Williamsburg magazine, fueling anger and mistrust.

And in June, the fierce clash at Bunker Hill proved the colonists were willing to fight and die for their rights.

During the Revolutionary War, you had the cause of the patriots and you had the cause of the Crown.

There were tribal members who were fighting on behalf of the Crown, and there were tribal members who were fighting on behalf of the patriots.

NARRATOR: The conflict also pulled native nations into its orbit, most notably the Cherokee, who saw the expanding frontier settlements as a direct threat to their lands and way of life.

As the case of what became the Six Nations to the north of us, that literally broke that nation in half.

Some of the tribal people felt like we need to fight on behalf of the patriots, and the others did not.

In the case of my history, I do have an ancestor that fought on behalf of the patriot cause, it's well documented, his pension, but in the case of a lot of the Native Americans throughout what was becoming a new country when they fought on behalf of the patriots, they did not receive everything that they said they were going to get, which is a shame.

And then later on, there was the forcible removal.

NARRATOR: As the colonies were gripped by the fires of revolution in the summer of 1776, an unprecedented document emerged that would forever change the course of history.

On July 4th, the Second Continental Congress meeting in Philadelphia formally adopted the Declaration of Independence, a powerful statement authored primarily by a Virginian, Thomas Jefferson.

The Declaration laid out the colonists' grievances against King George III, accusing him of tyranny and justifying the break from England.

But more than a list of complaints, it was a declaration of universal principles that all men are created equal and endowed with unalienable rights to life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness.

While the American colonies were declaring independence from Britain, another fierce conflict erupted.

The Cherokee War of 1776 was sparked when the Cherokee Nation aligned with the British in hopes of driving settlers out of the Appalachian frontier.

Cherokee war parties launched coordinated attacks across Virginia, North Carolina, South Carolina, and Georgia.

In response, colonial militias from Virginia and the Carolinas mounted a brutal counteroffensive.

By late 1776, the Cherokee were forced to sue for peace, ceding large swaths of their ancestral land.

Though overshadowed by Revolutionary War battles, the Cherokee War of 1776 was a critical moment, further opening the frontier to American expansion.

The Cherokee people would have encompassed what is now ten states, including East Tennessee, East Kentucky, Southwest Virginia, and the western part of North Carolina, going down into South Carolina.

The northern part of Georgia and the Cherokee Nation was huge when the European settlement took place.

Right around that time in 1776, you're talking about 120,000 square miles of land that was given over to, you know, the patriots or the Europeans at that time.

This idea of then kind of political spheres, separating into political spheres, us versus them, or patriot versus loyalist.

It could create an issue, it could create a problem.

And so people did have to choose and choose wisely.

NARRATOR: After five grueling years as the American Revolution continued, it was still difficult to choose sides.

You will see families changing sides throughout the war depending on a variety of situations.

Some of those situations could be whether or not their neighbors supported a patriot cause or whether their neighbors were loyalists.

And so you see women kind of making those choices as well.

And we see women who will often and did sometimes make choices that were on the other side of what their fathers or their brothers or even their husbands.

NARRATOR: Far from Williamsburg and the political fervor of the eastern cities among frontier settlers, many remained steadfast in their allegiance to King George III.

These loyalists, known as Tories, often saw the rebellion as reckless and dangerous.

While their patriot neighbors were proponents for the revolution, Tories in the region worked to support the Crown, passing along intelligence, hiding arms and at times clashing with those they once called friends.

Loyalty became a deeply personal and often perilous choice.

Southwest Virginia was a real hotbed for Tory support and for people who were in opposition to the landed elite.

The William Christians of the world, the Prestons of the world, and how this opposition is sort of written into the DNA of this part of the world.

During the war, one of William Preston's friends wrote to him and expressed concern that there were so many Tories, there were so many loyalists in western Virginia.

As a matter of fact, that friend wrote to William Preston, "You live in a very rascally county, and it has been my experience that a lot of rascals in a given area tend to make that area rascally."

We do know that Preston and Campbell and the rest of them all sort of knew where there were pockets of Tories that were actively doing things.

There were pockets of Tories along Pea Creek.

There are pockets of Tories along Walker Creek.

There were pockets of Tories on Ring Creek and Cripple Creek and Blacklick.

That rebel scum William Preston, we'll capture him first.

When Tories or loyalists were conspiring against Colonel William Preston and trying to take the lead lines and hand them over to the British Army, these loyalists were meeting in modern Pulaski County on Pea Creek at a tavern, and eventually they got caught.

[loud commotion] The patriots in that realm in the area were able to come break them up and hold those people accountable.

Gentlemen, I call this trial to order.

Tory trials were not just one event.

There were several big waves of Tory insurrection or Tory threat in southwest Virginia.

One of the first ones in 1777.

The bigger one was the one where they round up 55 of them in 1780.

...raid the mines and take them for their cause.

It was estimated by William Preston that he was largely outnumbered by those who favored loyalty to the Crown.

A lot of folks in modern times tend to look at our American Civil War as the war of brother versus brother, but during the Revolutionary War, it was much more so.

NARRATOR: In the backcountry of 18th century Virginia, where formal courts were few and distant, frontier justice sometimes took matters into its own hands.

Colonel Charles Lynch, a prominent planter and magistrate in Bedford County, gave rise to what would become known as Lynch Law.

Lynch and his self-appointed committee began conducting informal trials, followed by swift and oftentimes harsh punishment.

Though controversial, these extralegal measures were accepted on the frontier as necessary to maintain order and protect the rebellion.

There's a story about Colonel William Campbell and kind of a ruthless man towards loyalists at that time.

He was that one day and came across a man who was suspected of being a Tory and put in Lynch Law.

No trial, nothing, and hang the man on the spot just for being loyal to the King.

At that time, the Lynch Law was perfectly legal.

In the context of the summer of 1780, Lynch's Law referred to summary judgment, extralegal punishment, and the presence of a tree.

But by the year 1800 the term had metamorphosed to take on the concept of racial violence.

That was not the case in 1780.

NARRATOR: As the war waged on, fall 1780 would find the over mountain men of Virginia heading to a ridge on the North Carolina - South Carolina border.

Before leaving for King's Mountain, Colonel William Campbell put out a call to meet in what's Abingdon, Virginia.

He asked for any able bodied men to come and march south with him to put down Patrick Ferguson and his band of loyalists that were under British command of General Cornwallis.

Show up with all your gear.

Show up with your own rations and powder and shot and rifles and let's go get them.

No one is going to stop the British but us.

It is going to be up to us Virginians to leave our homes to defend our homes.

- Hip, hip!

- Ha!

NARRATOR: The McCorkle store was a stop for those heading to join Campbell.

That became the place where the militia from this part of the world was provisioned and began to assemble for the over mountain march.

They gathered their materials there, their supplies there.

They originally got about 200 Virginians, and then Arthur Campbell, his cousin, actually showed up with more Virginians.

All total about 400 Virginians.

NARRATOR: On October 7th, the frontier militia surprised the loyalist troops, killing Ferguson.

The pivotal Battle of Kings Mountain, a win for the patriots, would turn the tide of the war in the South and was fought almost entirely by American patriots and American Loyalists.

Basically, Patrick Ferguson was coming to wipe out patriot militias and patriot supporters in the backcountry, and they didn't like that.

They were able to find Patrick Ferguson and William Campbell said, surround the bottom and go up and give them Indian play.

Indian play basically is a form of guerrilla warfare.

They would hide behind trees, bushes and fire on the British, where the British were actually marching down the mountain in a straight line, just like they would do in an open field.

And that was a tactical mistake.

The vast majority of Ferguson's army were Carolinians.

They were Americans who had joined the British Army to fight for the King.

This was not Americans killing redcoats.

This was Americans killing other Americans.

NARRATOR: Accompanying William Campbell was John Broddy, a slave.

Their relationship began as young children.

He was on the mountain during the time of the battle.

He was in charge of Colonel Campbell's horse and his military jacket.

And during the course of the battle, John had concerns about Colonel Campbell, so he runs off into the battle searching for Colonel Campbell, finally sees Colonel Campbell, and he retreats back to where he was instructed to go once he was satisfied Colonel Campbell was still alive and still involved.

It wasn't that long afterwards that the battle ended.

Colonel Campbell did write his final will that said, because of your service to the country and your involvement with me, my intentions are to give you your freedom.

NARRATOR: A week after King's Mountain on October 14th, the patriots had another victory, this time at the Battle of Shallow Ford on the bank of the Yadkin River in North Carolina.

Though small in scale, it helped stall the loyalist advance.

At the battle were men from Southwest Virginia.

They didn't get to the muster for the King's Mountain campaign, but they were actively in the field.

Major Joseph Cloyd, who did such a fantastic job trying to catch up and get down there and then does his stand at Shallow Ford, and he's also got with him in his command George Pearis.

Pearisburg is named after him.

So that's why people know him.

He's wounded in the shoulder in that battle.

NARRATOR: March 1781 found Virginia patriots on their way to another key battle, where American General Nathan Greene was to face off with British General Cornwallis.

Along the way, an engagement broke out at Wetzell's Mill in North Carolina.

Although Patriot leaders such as General Andrew Lewis encouraged Preston to stay behind his desk, he did lead troops into combat on one occasion.

He organized the militia and led them down into North Carolina for the Battle of Guilford Courthouse.

In the early phases of that battle, a light engagement broke out.

In the process, William Preston was thrown from his horse and into a mill pond.

Thinking very quickly, William Preston's good friend Joseph Cloyd was able to extricate him from the pond.

And William Preston managed to ride away to safety and to avoid being gobbled up by the redcoats.

NARRATOR: Through the years of tension and unrest, the war took its toll on those left behind and the backcountry.

With the militias being called up with men, you know, kind of deciding that they not only needed, but it was their duty to go off and to fight for whichever cause, whichever side that they believed in.

Many of the men did not return home, so husbands didn't return home, brothers didn't return home, fathers, sons.

And that would leave then women with the need then to continue to carry on.

They're all dealing with that individuality of the reality of a war.

The stress of that war on all these people was very important.

Women didn't have agency.

As most people know, women weren't considered full citizens, didn't have voting rights.

You're kind of a shadow citizen, but you're still being impacted.

It's kind of a muted thing, but they're feeling the pain.

[solemn marching beat] NARRATOR: The last major land engagement of the war came to a conclusion in 1781 with the surrender of British General Cornwallis to General George Washington at Yorktown, Virginia.

Then, in September 1783, after eight long years of bloodshed, sacrifice, and resilience, the American Revolution officially came to an end with the signing of the Treaty of Paris.

Gathered in the capital of the British Empire, American diplomats negotiated terms with Great Britain that recognized the United States of America as a free and independent nation.

It was the beginning of a new, uncertain future, one that the people of Virginia's backcountry had an active role in.

The American Revolution was very much a civil war.

Thousands of Americans were forced into exile because of the revolution for picking the wrong side.

Thousands had their property seized.

Most Americans think of the revolution as all the Americans were loyal, and they got up and fought these nasty British, all of whom had redcoats on.

And it was easy to tell who the bad guys were.

And it's not at all like that.

You know, it was it was very much neighbor against neighbor, family member against family member at times.

No place anywhere can be separated from the deep, deep social conflicts that have forged it.

And Southwest Virginia is like any other place in the world.

This land was riven with social conflict.

They were aspiring for freedom, but they had skin in the game.

They had an economic stake in what was happening, and that economic stake was in land and in people.

I think Southwest Virginia has a lot more history to be found, a lot more stories to be told, and even the stories that you already have.

I would implore you to take the opportunity to look at it again from the viewpoint of the other people that were in the community.

So you have the enslaved community, and what do some of your historical interpretations look like?

If you also looked at it from the viewpoint of the indigenous people that was still there, and that gives you a well-rounded view in history of how America came to be.

The sense of freedom means that we've got to be very honest and be able to have a conversation where we can acknowledge the things that happened in the past and say, okay, cool, it's history.

We can't change history, but we want to be able to move forward so our kids can do better.

And all of our children in the United States of America can have a better life.

We start our journey with the Fincastle Resolutions.

Sitting there, wherever that gathering of men may have taken on January 20th of 1775.

Their collective decision to write that document, that was the pivotal moment that kind of got the rest of the future of Southwest Virginia going.

It's just crazy to think that America actually won that war.

So you know these people in the back of their head were thinking, oh my gosh, we are sealing our fate right now.

But they did it.

And we're glad they did.

These are real, though unpolished sentiments of liberty and loyalty.

And in them we are resolved to live and die.

[cheering] ♪ ♪ ♪ Major funding for Resolve to Live and Die provided by Virginia 250 and Pulaski County, Virginia.

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