Benjamin Martin's raid on Fort Wilderness:
Throughout the film beginning in the opening narration, references are made to Benjamin Martin's actions in the French and Indian War from his opening narration to the South Carolina Assembly to Major Jean Villeneuve's angry responses to Martin's authority. Benjamin refused to answer his son Thomas when questioned about it. Later in the film, Benjamin is finally ready to tell Gabriel what happened at Fort Wilderness:
"The French and Cherokee had raided along the Blue Ridge. The English settlers had sought refuge at Fort Charles. By the time we got there, the fort was abandoned. They'd left about a week before. But what we found was... They'd killed all the settlers, the men. With the women and some of the children they had... We buried them all, what was left of them.
"We caught up with them at Fort Wilderness. We took our time. We cut them apart slowly, piece by piece. I can see their faces. I can still hear their screams. All but two. We let them live. We placed the heads on a pallet and sent them back with the two that lived to Fort Ambercon. The eyes, tongues, fingers, we put in baskets; sent them down the Asheulot to the Cherokee. Soon after, the Cherokee broke their treaty with the French. That's how we justified it. We were heroes."
FICTIONS:
1. The only Fort Wilderness to have existed is at Disney World.
2. Fort Charles is actually in Port Royal, Kingston, Jamaica.
3. Fort Ambercon never existed.
4. The Asheulot River is in New Hampshire.
FACTS:
In 1759, tensions between the British and their Cherokee Indian allies boiled over and the Indians began attacking frontier settlements in the Blue Ridge region of Virginia and in the Carolinas. In early 1760, they began a siege of Fort Loudoun (located in what is now Tennessee), which ended in a massacre of British soldiers when the British did not keep the agreed terms of surrender. The South Carolina militia responded with a campaign in which Francis Marion participated. They mainly destroyed Indian villages and burned crops to starve the Cherokees into surrendering.
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