Governor Dunmore, having received word early in May 1774 that fighting had begun at Yellow Creek and other points on the Ohio, had requested the legislature to authorize general militia forces and fund a volunteer expedition into the Ohio River valley.

With the new forces, the Governor advances toward the Ohio where he split his force into two groups: one will move down the Ohio from Fort Pitt (now Pittsburgh, PA), seventeen hundred men led by him, and another body of eight hundred troops under Colonel Andrew Lewis will travel from Camp Union (now Lewisburg, WV) with the two forces rendezvousing at the mouth of the Great Kanawha River.

Under this general plan, the Governor travels to Fort Pitt and duly proceeds with his forces down the Ohio.

On September 30, he arrives at Fort Fincastle (later Fort Henry), recently built at Zanesburg at his direction.