Frontier Arms Race: Historical and Archaeological Analysis of an Assemblage of Eighteenth-Century Cannon Recovered from the Detroit River and Lake Erie

Abstract

An assemblage of six iron 4-pounder guns, recovered from the Detroit River between 1984 and 2011, is contextualized against the military history of the Great Lakes between the founding of Detroit (1701) and the outbreak of the War of 1812 The guns, their condition, and their deployment are used as indexes of the increasing militarization of the region, as French, Native American, British, and American forces contested the control of economic resources and strategic waterways.