 Presque Isle passed from British to American control after the American Revolutionary War , and the Iroquois sold their rights to the land containing the peninsula to the United States at the second Treaty of Fort Stanwix in 1784 . Pennsylvania did not acquire an undisputed title to the land until it purchased the Erie Triangle from the Federal government on April 3 , 1792 . In 1795 General Anthony Wayne built a new , American " Fort Presque Isle " , and on April 18 of that year the town of " Presqu ' Ile " , since renamed Erie , was laid out near it . Wayne died at the fort on December 15 , 1796 , and was originally buried there . 
