"Offers readers interesting snapshots of life at these five frontier forts, all of them hotly contested places in the mid-eighteenth century... Ingram makes a powerful case for the local nature of the British frontier."--"Journal of American Ethnic History"""" ""Provides uncommon depth and detail in demonstrating Indian influence at these five forts within the localized world of each community."--"Journal of American History"" ""Ingram demonstrates the importance of forts not only for military and imperial history but also for shaping the history and culture of the societies in their regions. His well-written, thoroughly researched book adds considerably to our knowledge of the North American frontier."--"Journal of Interdisciplinary History" "The uneasy symbiosis of military and native communities at these sites, the ways in which they cooperated in trade and survival, and the reasons why they fought and grew apart are expertly reconstructed in these pages."--"Pennsylvania Magazine of History and Biography" "By showing the influence of Indians on places that were often designed to impose military and diplomatic power, Ingram complicates the early American experience. If they shaped British policy there, perhaps they shaped it everywhere."--Andrew K. Frank, coauthor of "Selling War in a Media Age"