Page:Historic highways of America (Volume 12).djvu/100

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96
PIONEER ROADS

liams (Rome). When Fort Niagara was captured in 1759 by Sir William Johnson, the French were driven from the Lakes; Johnson's route to Niagara was by Lake Ontario from Oswego. It has been suggested that a volume of this series of monographs should be given to the campaigns of the English against Fort Niagara. These campaigns were made largely on waterways; they left no roads which became of any real importance in our national development. Certain campaigns of the Old French War left highways which have become of utmost significance; only of these routes and their story should this series be expected to treat. Despite the two wars which had created busy scenes in the Mohawk Valley, no landward route connected it with Niagara River and Lake Erie except the Iroquois Trail.[1] No military road was built through the "Long House of the Iroquois." To gain the key of the western situation—Niagara—the common route was to Oswego. There were local roads along the lake shore, and these were used

  1. Historic Highways of America, vol. ii, pp. 76–85.