WYOMING VALLEY, a valley on the north branch of the Susquehanna river, in Luzerne county, Pennsylvania, U.S.A. The valley, properly speaking, is about 31m. wide and about 25m. long, but the term is sometimes used historically to include all of the territory in the north-east of the State once in dispute between Pennsylvania and Connecticut. In Connecticut the Sus quehanna Land Company was formed in 1753 to colonize the valley, and the Delaware Land Company was formed in 1754 for the region immediately west of the Delaware river. The rights of the Six Nations to all this territory were purchased at Albany (N. Y.), by the Susquehanna Company in but the work of colonization was delayed by the Seven Years' war. A few colonists settled at Mill Creek in 1763, but were attacked on Oct. 15 and driven away by the Indians. The five original towns of Wilkes-Barre (q.v.), Kingston, (q.v.), Pittston (q.v.), Hanover and Plymouth were founded by the company early in 1769.
In the meantime the Six Nations (in 1768) had repudiated their sale of the region to the Susquehanna Company and had sold it to the Penns. Settlers from Pennsylvania had arrived and taken possession of the block-house and huts at Mill Creek in Jan. 1768. The conflict which followed between the Pennsylvania and the Connecticut settlers is known as the first Pennamite Yankee War. Although defeated in the early stages of the con flict, the Yankees finally gained the ascendancy and terminated the war in the battle of "Rampart Rocks" on Dec. 25, 1775. The General Assembly of Connecticut, in Oct. 1776, gave the valley the status of a county (Westmoreland county).
As the War of Independence came to a close the old trouble with Pennsylvania was revived. A court of arbitration appointed by the Continental Congress met in Trenton (N.J.), in 1782, and on Dec. 3o gave a unanimous decision in favour of Pennsylvania. The refusal of the Pennsylvania Government to confirm the pri vate land titles of the settlers, and the arbitrary conduct of her agent, Alexander Patterson, resulted in 1784 in the outbreak of the second Pennamite-Yankee War. Treachery and harsh treatment by the Pennsylvania officers created a strong public opinion in favour of the Yankees, and the Government was compelled to adopt a milder policy. Patterson was withdrawn, the disputed territory was erected into the new county of Luzerne (1785), the land titles were confirmed (1787), and Col. Timothy Pickering (q.v.) was commissioned to organize the new county and to effect a reconciliation. The trouble was again revived by the repeal in 1790 of the confirming act of 1787 and by a subsequent decision of the U.S. circuit court, unfavourable to the Yankees, in the case of Van Horn v. Dorrance. All of the claims were finally confirmed by a series of statutes passed in 1790, 1802 and 1807. Since 1808, mainly through the development of its coal mines (see PITTSTON, PA.), the valley has made remarkable progress both in wealth and in population.
For a thorough study of the early history of Wyoming Valley, see 0. J. Harvey, A History of