USA > Pennsylvania > Greene County > History of Greene County, Pennsylvania > Part 12
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Returning to Will's Creek, a strong work, designated Fort Cum- berland, was constructed, which should be a rallying point. In the meantime Colonel Fry had died, and Colonel Innes, of North Caro- lina, had been promoted to chief command. The army which came under his orders was composed of the Virginia, North Carolina and Maryland militia, and independent companies of South Carolina, New York and Virginia, under the pay of the King, and officered by soldiers bearing his commission. And now succeeded months of negotiation carried on between London and Paris; but nothing was definitely settled, and in the early spring of 1755. it was decided
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in the British cabinet to prosecute an active campaign against the French in America, with four objects in view; to eject the French from Nova Scotia, to drive them from Crown Point on Lake Cham- plain; to gain possession of Fort Niagara; and to recover the Ohio country. For the accomplishment of these purposes Major-General Edward Braddock, was dispatched to America with two regiments of the line, Forty-fourth and Forty-eighth, commanded by Sir Peter Halket, and Colonel Dunbar, with directions to take the supreme command of all the forces. Two ships of war and several trans- ports were in the Chesapeake. Alexandria was made the rallying point, and here the regulars encamped. Commodore Keppel furn- ished four heavy pieces of ordinance with a detail of tars to man the prolongs in passing the streams and the mountains. Before starting on his campaign, the general held a conference at Alexan- dria with the governors of the several colonies: Shirley of Massachu- setts, Delaney of New York, Sharpe of Maryland, Dinwiddie of Virginia, Dobbs of North Carolina and Morris of Pennsylvania. This conference considered little more than the question of furnish- ing troops and supplies for the expeditions.
The force against Nova Scotia was earliest in the field, and was entirely successful, the country being reduced and placed under mar- tial law, and two French men-of-war were captured by the English Admiral Boscawen. The force destined against the French on the Ohio, to be commanded by General Braddock in person, was slow in moving. Wagons and horses were not in readiness, and could not be procured. Two hundred wagons and two thousand horses must be had, or the general would not move, and when the expedition was on the point of failure for lack of them, Benjamin Franklin, then postmaster of Pennsylvania, appeared and assured the General that he would provide the desired transportation if authorized to do so; that authority was quickly and joyfully given, and the desired horses and wagons were soon forthcoming. It should be observed that Braddock had studied the military art as practiced in the open countries of Europe, where smooth, hard roads everywhere checkered the landscape, and he made his requisitions for baggage, artillery and amunition as though his expedition was to be made over such a country, instead of over one bristling with mountains and torrent. streams, through a trackless wilderness. Had he gone in light marching order with amunition and provisions on pack-horses, he would have been better prepared to meet the obstacles which impeded his way. Instead, the impedimenta of his little force, of less than three thousand men, was greater than was taken by a full army corps of 20,000 men in many of the campaigns of the late war.
Before starting Braddock organized his force in two divisions. The first under Sir Peter Halket, was composed of the 44th regu-
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lars, Peyronie and Waggoner's Virginia companies, Dagworthy's . Maryland company, Rutherford and Gates' New York companies, and Polson's pioneers. The second, under Colonel Thomas Dunbar, con- sisted of the 48th regulars, Dermaries' South Carolinians, Stephens, Hogg, and Cock's Virginians, Dobb's North Carolinians, and Mer- cer's pioneers. The field officers under Halket and Dunbar were. Lieutenant-Colonels Burton and Gage, Majors Chapman and Sparks, Brigade Major, Francis Halket; Quartermaster, John Sinclair; Assistant Quartermaster, General Matthew Leslie; Secretary to the General, Wmn. Shirley, and Aids-de-camp, Orme, Washington, and Morris. Christopher Gist and his son Nathaniel went as guides, and the Indian agents Croghan and Montour, acted as interpreters. Orme's journal, which was about the only record of this ill-starred campaign which escaped destruction, records that the soldiers were required to be provided with "one new spare shirt, one new pair of stockings, and one new pair of shoes; and Osnabrig waist-coats and breeches were provided for them, as the excessive heat would have made the others insupportable; and the commanding officers of com- panies were desired to provide leather or bladders for the men's hats."
On the 9th of April, Sir Peter Halket, with six companies of the Forty-fourth, moved by way of Winchester for Fort Cumberland, at Will's Creek, leaving Lient. Col. Gage with four companies to escort the artillery. By the advice of Sir John Sinclair, who had been sent forward in advance to Winchester and Fort Cumberland, to prepare the way for the march, the second division under Col. Dunbar, accompanied with the artillery and heavy trains, moved by way of Frederick, Maryland. But though the roads were better approach- ing Frederick than by Winchester, there were absolutely none beyond there crossing the Alleghany Mountains, and accordingly this wing was obliged to recross the Potomac and gain the Winchester road. They now marched on with all the "pride and circumstance" of glorious war. "At high noon," says the chronicler, "on the 10th of May, while Halket's command was encamped at the common desti- nation, the Forty-eighth was startled by the passage of Braddock and his staff through their ranks, with a body of light horse, one gallop- ing on each side of his traveling chariot, in haste to reach Fort Cum- berland. The troops saluted, the drums rolled out the Grenadier's March, and the cortege passed by. An hour later they heard the booming of artillery which welcomed the General's arrival at Fort Cumberland, and a little later themselves encamped on the hillsides about the post." In place of this vain display, Braddock should by this time have been knocking at the gates of Fort Du Quesne.
But arrived at Fort Cumberland, he sat down one whole month of the very best campaigning season, preparing for the exeention of
Jean Louis Guillaume Mestrezar
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his plans after the methods of European warfare. His utter lack of appreciation of the kind of warfare he was to wage, is given in the Autobiography of Franklin: "In conversation with him one day, he was giving me some account of his intended progress. . After taking Fort Du Quesne,' said he. ' I am to proceed to Niagara; and, having taken that, to Frontenac, if the season will allow time: and I suppose it will, for Du Quesne can hardly detain me above three or four days; and then I can see nothing that ean obstruct my march to Niagara.' Having before resolved in my mind," continues Franklin, "the long line his army must make in their march by a very narrow road, to be cut for them through the woods and bushes. and also of what I had heard of a former defeat of fifteen hundred French, who invaded the Illinois country. I had conceived some doubts and some fears for the event of the campaign; but I ventured only to say, 'To be sure, sir, if you arrive well before Du Quesne with these fine troops, so well provided with artillery, the fort though completely fortified, and assisted with a very strong garrison, can probably make but a short resistance. The only danger I apprehend of obstruction to your march is from the ambuscades of the Indians, who by constant practice, are dexterous in laying and executing them; and the slender line, nearly four miles long, which your army must make may expose it to be attacked by surprise on its flanks. and to be cut like thread into several pieces, which, from their dis- tanee, cannot come up in time to support one another.'
" He smiled at my ignorance, and replied: 'These savages may indeed be a formidable enemy to raw American militia, but upon the King's regular and disciplined troops, sir, it is impossibe they should make an impression!' I was conscious of an impropriety in my dis- puting with a military man in matters of his profession.'
It was June before the army was ready to set forward. The wagons and artillery were a great hindrance in crossing the moun- tains, and it was soon found necessary to send them back, especially the King's wagons which were very heavy. The horses became weakened by incessant pulling over rough and untraveled roads, and many died. The Little Meadows was not reached until the 18th of the month. Through the advice of Washington, the General decided to change the order of march, and with a force of his picked men, with as little incumbrance of trains as possible, to push forward. Accordingly, with a force of twelve hundred men. Braddock set out, leaving Colonel Dunbar with the balance of the command to bring on the heavy artillery and trains. At the camp, near the crossing of Castleman's River, on the 19th, Washington was taken violently ill. "Braddock," he said, in relating the eireumstance afterward, " was both my General and my physician. I was attacked with a dangerous fever on the march, and he left a sergeant to take care of me, and
7
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James' fever powders, with the directions how to give them, and a wagon to bring me on when I would be able, which was only the day before the defeat."
The army was attended on its march by a small body of Indians under command of Croghan. They had come into camp at Fort Cumberland, attended by their squaws. " These," says Irving, " were even fonder than the men of loitering about the British camp. They were not destitute of attractions; for the young squaws resemble the gypsies, having seductive forms, small hands and feet, and soft voices. Among those who visited the camp was one who no doubt passed for an Indian princess. She was the daughter of the Sachem, White Thunder, and bore the dazling name of Bright Lightning. The charms of these wild-wood beauties were soon ac- knowledged." "The squaws," writes Secretary Peters, " bring in money plenty; the officers are scandalously fond of them! The jealousy of the warriors was aroused; some of them became furious. To prevent discord, the squaws were forbidden to come into the British camp. Finally it became necessary to send Bright Lightning with all the women and children back to Aughquick."
Washington was disappointed by the manner in which Braddock acted upon his advice to move rapidly with his best troops, and leave the heavy portion of the impedimenta to be moved more leisurely. Washington had given up his own horse for the uses of the trains, and traveled with his baggage half filling a portmanteau. But the officers of the line could not bring themselves to this simplicity. " Brought up," says Irving, " many of them in fashionable and luxurious life, or the loitering indulgence of country quarters, they were so encumbered with what they considered indispen- sable necessaries, that out of two hundred and twelve horses gen- erally appropriated to their use, not more than a dozen could be spared by them for the public service." Nor was the progress even with these drawbacks at all in consonance with the wishes of Wash- ington. " I found," he says, " that instead of pushing on with vigor, without regarding a little rough road, they were halting to level every mole-hill, and to erect bridges over every brook, by which means we were four days in getting twelve miles." He had been about a month in marching a hundred miles. Indeed, his move- ments were so sluggish as to cause impatience by his friends in Europe. "The Duke of Brunswick," who had planned the cam- paign, writes Horace Walpole, " is much dissatisfied at the slowness of General Braddock, who does not march as if he was at all impatient to be scalped."
Though still weak, Washington had come up with the advance; but on the 23d of June, at the great crossings of the Yonghiogheny. he was unable to proceed. Here the General interposed his
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authority and forbade his young aid to go further, assigned him a guard, placed him under the care of his surgeon, Dr. Craig, with directions not to move until the surgeon should consider him suf- ficiently recovered to resume the march with safety, at the same time assuring him that he should be kept informed of the progress of the column, and the portents of a battle. He was, however, impatient at the restraint, and regarded with distress the departure of the army leaving him behind, fearful lest he might not be up in time for the impending battle, which, he assured his brother aid-de-camp, "he would not miss for five hundred pounds."
Indications of the presence of a hostile force of French and Indians hovering upon the flanks of the column hourly multiplied. On the 24th a deserted Indian camp of 170 braves was passed, where the trees had been stripped of bark, and taunting words in the French language, and scurrilous figures were painted thereon. On the following morning three men venturing beyond the sentinels were shot and scalped. These hostile parties were often seen, but they always managed to elnde the parties sent out to cap- ture them. In passing over a mountain quite steep and precipitous, the carriages had to be raised and lowered by means of halyards and pulleys by the assistance of the sailors. Such was the nature of the hurried march with his best troops which Braddock had consented to make. On the 26th, only four miles were marched, and the half was at another Indian camp, which the warriors had but just left, the brands of their camp-fire still burning. " It had a spring in the middle, and stood at the termination of the Indian path to the Mo- nongahela. % The French had inscribed their names on some of the trees with insulting bravadoes, and the Indians had designated in triumph the scalps they had taken two days previously. A party was sent out with guides, to follow their tracks and fall on them in the night, but without success. In fact, it was the Indian boast, that throughout this march of Braddock, they saw him every day from the mountains, and expected to be able to shoot down his soldiers ' like pigeons.'"
Still the column went toiling on, in one whole day making barely two miles, men and officers alike all nneonscious of the fact that a pitfall was being prepared for them into which they would plunge to destruction, and laying no adequate plans to guard and shield them- selves from such a fate.
On the 8th of July, Washington found himself sufficiently recov- ered to join the advance of the army, at its camp about two miles from the Monongahela and fifteen from Fort Dn Quesne. Though they were now on the same side of the river as the fort, yet not far in advance, a precipitous bluff extended down close in upon the river bank, leaving little room for the march, and where a column would
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be exposed for a distance of two miles to sudden attack from the heights. Accordingly, it was determined to cross to the left bank of the river by a ford, move down five miles, recross to the right bank, and then move on to the attack of the fort. According to orders, Gage, with two companies of grenadiers, the company of Capt. Gates, and two six pounders, before daylight on the morning of the 9th, crossed and recrossed the river, as planned, and took up a position favorable for covering the moving of the remainder of the column. A party of some fifty Indians rushed out upon them but were soon put to Hight. Knowing the nature of the ground upon which they had now come, and realizing the hazards from a covert attack to which they were exposed, having come in such close proximity to the enemy, and doubtless recalling the buzz of the bullets and buck-shot about his ears in his fight at Fort Necessity, Washington ventured to sug- gest, that as the Virginia rangers were accustomed to Indian warfare that they be given the advance. But the proposition was received with a sharp rebuke by the General, believing, no doubt, that the young provincial aid was ignorant of the principles of high art in warfare, and indignant that any subordinate should pretend to advise him.
Braddock was now near enough to the fort to anticipate the battle at any moment. He accordingly prepared to make a fine show. At sunrise the main body under his immediate command, turned out in full uniform. Their arms had been brightened the night before, and at the beating of the general were charged with fresh cartridges. At the crossings of the stream, where it was supposed that the enemy would be on the watch to observe them, in order that they might make the greatest show of power and strength, they moved with fixed bayonets, colors gayly given to the breeze, the trumpet. sounding, and the fife and drum marking the measured tread. " Washington," says Irving, " with his keen and youthful relish for military affairs, was delighted with their perfeet order and equipment. so different from the rough bush-fighters to which he had been acens- tomed. Roused to new life, he forgot his recent ailments, and broke forth in expressions of enjoyment and admiration, as he rode in company with his fellow aids-de-camp, Orme and Morris. Often in after life, he used to speak of the effect upon him of the first sight of a well-disciplined European army marching in high confidence and bright array, on the eve of a battle."
Having now all crossed to the right bank, and being, as was sup- posed, within nine miles of the fort, the column was put in battle order, Gage, with his force preceded by the engineers and guides, and six light horsemen leading; St. Clair, with the working party flanked with soldiers, and the wagons and two six-pounders following; then the General with the main body, and the provincial troops bringing
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up the rear. Along the track they were to pursue was a plain for some distance, then rising ground flanked on either side by wooded ravines. At two o'clock the advance under Gage having crossed this plain was ascending the rise, the General himself having given the order to the main body to march, and being now under way, suddenly a heavy firing was heard at the head of the column, accompanied by nnearthly yells. Colonel Burton was immediately ordered forward to the support of Gage, who had been attacked by an unseen foe lurking in ambush, but drawn out in most advantageous order for extending their attack upon the flanks of the advancing English. They were commanded by a Frenchman, Beanjen, attired in a " gayly fringed hunting shirt," who led them on and directed the fight. The Indians observed no order, but, extending rapidly down the ravine on the flank of the column, poured in a murderons fire upon the regulars and pioneers, who stood out boldly presenting themselves as targets for the concealed foe, who used their rifles with deadly effect. The firing on both sides was brisk. The Indian was accustomed to see his foe dodge behind trees and seek cover wherever he could. He had never seen such fine sport before, where his victim stood up boldly, giving a fair chance to shoot him down. The Indian war-whoop was something appalling, and the regulars seemed to dread it more than the bullets. Gage ordered his men to fix bayonets and form for a charge up a hill whence was the heaviest fire; but all to no purpose. They were being surrounded by an un- seen foe, which erept stealthily along the hills and ravines, keeping up a most deadly fire. A panie seized the pioneers and many of the soldiers. Braddock and his officers behaved in the most gallant man- ner, exposing themselves to the fire of their dusky foes in their at- tempts to reform the shattered ranks and advance them to the attack. Washington suggested that the Indian mode of skulking be resorted to. But Braddock would listen to no advice, being reported to have said upon the occasion, " What! a Virginia colonel teach a British general how to fight!" But that young Virginian counselled wisely in this dire necessity. For three long hours Braddock saw the work of slaughter go on, while he attempted to form his troops in platoons, in the open ground, and advance them upon the concealed foe. The provincial troops, in spite of the General, shielded themselves behind trees and did greater execution upon the foe than all the firing of the regulars. The latter were thrown into great confusion by this sav- age style of warfare, where no foe could be seen, and where they were only guided in directing their fire by the flashes and smoke from the rifles of the skulking enemy. They huddled together and fired at random, sometimes shooting down their own friends. The carnage on the part of the English was terrible, nearly one-half of all those who had marched forth in faultless uniforms, and whose bright
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armour had reflected the morning sunlight, before night-fall lay stark and stiff in death, or were suffering from ghastly wounds. The foe was largely made up of Indians, and only about half the number of the English, who were utterly defeated. Finally, General Brad- dock himself was mortally wounded, and immediately gave orders for the troops to fall back. Fortunately the Indians fell to plunder- ing, and neglected to pursue the retreating army.
General Braddock had five horses shot under him before receiving his death wound. It has been enrrently reported that he was shot by Thomas Faucett, one of the independent rangers. Braddock had given orders that none of his soldiers should take shelter behind trees or cover. Faucett's brother had sheltered himself, when Brad- dock to enforce his order struck the refractory soldier to the earth with his sword. Seeing his brother fall, Faucett shot the General in the back, and thereafter the provincials fought as they pleased and did good execution. Sir Peter Halket was instantly killed, Shirley was shot through the head, Col. Burton, Sir John St. Clair, Col. Gage, Col. Orme, Major Sparks and Major Halket were wounded. Five captains were killed, and five wounded; fifteen lientenants were killed and twenty-two wounded. The killed and wounded of the privates amounted to seven hundred and fourteen. Over four hun- dred were supposed to have been killed. The very large and unu- snal number killed outright can only be accounted for on the supposition that the badly wounded who were unable to get away were murdered by the Indians when they came upon the field, as all were stripped and scalped.
When the two aids, Orme and Sparks, were wounded all orders upon the field had to be carried by Washington, who was conspicu- ons upon every part, behaving in the most gallant manner. He had two horses shot under him and four bullet holes through his coat. In a letter to his brother he said: " As I have heard, since my ar- rival at this place, a circumstantial account of my death and dying speech, I take this opportunity of contradicting the first and of assuring you that I have not composed the latter. By the all-pow- erful dispensations of Providence I have been protected beyond all human probability or expectation; for I had four bullets through my coat, and two horses shot under me, and escaped unhurt, although death was leveling my companions on every side of me." Many of the remarkable stories told of eminent men are of doubtful anthen- ticity; but the following is unquestionably true. Dr. Craig, the in- timate friend of Washington, who had attended him in his sickness and was present in this battle, relates that some fifteen years after- ward, " while traveling with Washington near the junction of the Great Kanawha and Ohio Rivers in exploring wild lands, they were met by a party of Indians with an interpreter, headed by a venera-
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ble chief. The old Sachem said he had come a long way to see Colo- nel Washington, for in the battle of the Monongahela he had singled him out as a conspicuous object, had fired his rifle at him fifteen times, and directed his young warriors to do the same, but not one conld hit him. A superstitious dread seized him, and he was satis- fied that the Great Spirit protected the young hero, and ceased firing at him." It is a singular circumstance that in all his campaignings Washington was never wounded.
Of the conduct of the regulars in this battle some diversity of opinion exists. Washington, in a letter to his mother, which he never suspected would be made public, and in which he would be expected to tell his real sentiments, says: " In short, the dastardly behavior of those they call regulars, exposed all others who were in- clined to do their duty to almost certain death; and at last, in despite of all the efforts of the officers to the contrary, they ran as sheep pursned by dogs, and it was impossible to rally them."
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