USA > Pennsylvania > Greene County > History of Greene County, Pennsylvania > Part 14
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On the day before a party of twenty-four Indians had been sent out from Kittanning as the advance force that was to have followed, to destroy Fort Shirley, Croghan's fort on the Juniata. This scout- ing party fell in with a party of Armstrong's men, under Lieutenant Hogg, who had been left in charge of the horses and baggage, and a sharp skirmish ensued causing loss on both sides, but in which the savages were eventually put to flight. Lieutenant Hogg was mortally wounded.
Though there was not so much accomplished as could have been desired, owing to the ignorance of the guides, and the difficulty of approaching so alert and wily a foc, yet it must be regarded as a signal success, brought about by a display of bravery and skill rarely excelled in conducting campaigns against Indians. The place had to be found by ways entirely unknown to them; the log-houses were well provided with port-holes, from which the occupants could fire upon the troops approaching without exposing themselves, and the corn field gave cover to the skulking manner of savage warfare. In the face of these difficulties Armstrong boldly advanced till he found the town, skillfully posted his little force so as to cut off retreat, and after a stubborn fight put the savages to the sword, burned their town, destroyed their supplies of ammunition and French goods, and brought off his force with but the loss of seventeen killed, thirteen wounded, and nineteen missing. The loss of the Indians was un- known, " but on a moderate computation, it is generally believed that there cannot be less than thirty or forty killed or mortally wounded." The blow was sorely felt by the Indians. It called a halt in their ravages, and reminded them that there were blows to take as well as
Jacob
Hatfield MQ
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give. It caused them to ask themselves what they were gaining by their warfare upon the English, and what they were really receiving from the French beyond ammunition and guns with which to prose- cute the war. They found themselves pushed forward to do the fighting while the French could lay back in their seeure fortifications, and reap the advantages of their temerity.
Great was the rejoicing in Philadelphia at the result of this ex- pedition; the couneils voted thanks for the success attending the enterprise, and the sum of £150, for the purchase of presents for the officers and for the relief of the families of the killed. On the com- mander was bestowed a medal bearing on one side the words, " Kit- tanning destroyed by Colonel Armstrong, September, 1756," and on the other, " The gift of the corporation of Philadelphia."
The campaign of 1757 in America, was conducted on the part of the English with little judgment or vigor. The dilatory, brainless Lord Loudoun was in supreme command in America, and confined his principal operation to an attack upon Louisburg. But when ar- rived with a strong land force and a powerful fleet, being told that the enemy outnumbered him, he abandoned the enterprise and re- turned to New York without even showing a hostile front. In the meantime, the French under Montcalm, had struck a blow at Fort William Henry in northern New York, and compelled the garrison to surrender, three thousand strong. In marching off with the honors of war accorded them by Montcalm, the enraged Indians, not accus- tomed to see an enemy escape in that way, fell upon the retreating English and made a great slaughter, plundered their baggage, and pursued them to their shelter.
At this juncture of disgrace (29th of June, 1757,) William Pitt was called to the head of the British ministry. Mortified by the failures of his country, he planned to proseente the war in America in his peerless way. The heartless Lord Loudoun was recalled and General Abererombie was placed in command of the land, and Ad- miral Boscawen of a strong naval force. Twelve thousand additional regulars were dispatched to America, and the colonies were asked to raise twenty thousand more, Pitt promising in the name of Parlia- ment to furnish arms and provisions, and to reimburse all the money expended in raising and clothing them. The word of Pitt was magi- cal, fifteen thousand volunteering from New England alone. Lonis- burg, Ticonderoga, and Fort Du Quesne, were to be the points of at- tack in the campaign of 1758. Admiral Boscawen arrived at Halifax in May with forty vessels of war and twelve thousand men, under Generals Amherst and Wolfe. Louisburg was invested, and though a vigor- ons defence for fifty days was maintained, it was compelled to sur- render with a loss of five thousand prisoners, a large quantity of 8
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munitions of war, and the destruction of all the shipping in the harbor.
But not so well fared the advance upon Ticonderoga, which was made by General Abercrombie and the young Lord Howe. With seven thousand regulars, nine thousand provincials, and a heavy artillery train, an advance was made upon the fort defended by Mont- calm with scarcely four thousand French. The attack was vigorously made, but Lord Howe was killed in a skirmish with a scouting party, and after four hours of severe fighting and the loss of two thousand , men, Abercrombie, finding the work stronger than he had anticipated, fell back discomforted, and after sending out a force under Colonel Bradstreet, who captured Fort Frontenac, and subsequently built Fort Stanwix, where Rome, New York, now stands, and garrisoned Fort George, he retired with the main body to Albany. The fall of Frontenac, with the loss of a thousand prisoners, ten armed vessels, fifty serviceable cannon, sixteen mortars, a large quantity of ammu- nition and stores, and valuable magazines of goods designed for trade with the Indians, was a heavy blow to the French, as it de- prived them of their great store-house for supplies.
The campaign against Fort Du Quesne was entrusted to General John Forbes, with about nine thousand men, including the Virginia militia under Washington, stationed at Fort Cumberland. Forbes was a sick man, and was detained on that account in Philadelphia, while Boquet, who was second, moved forward with his forces. Washington favored an advance by Braddock's road, but Boquet cliose a line more direct, and further north. The labor of cutting an entirely new road through the trackless forest and over craggy steeps was toilsome.
In the meantime, that the Indians, who had thus far fought des- perately for the French, might be weakened in their adherence, a messenger was sent to visit the tribes upon the Ohio, to show these dusky men of the forest how they were being used by their masters the French, for their own selfish purposes. The agent selected was a Moravian, Christian Post, a man who had spent much time among the Indians, and had married among theni. He was a pious man speaking much in scripture phrase, and apparently sincerely believ- ing that he was under the special care of divine Providence, and it is a singular fact confirmatory of his belief, that although he made two journeys back and forth conveying messages from the Governor and from General Forbes, through a country everywhere infested by hostile savages thirsting for scalps, he escaped unharmed, and was everywhere kindly received and his pious conversation treasured in their hearts. His broad brimmed hat was like a halo over him. In closing his journal after a safe return, he says, " The Lord has pre- served me through all the dangers and difficulties I have ever been
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under. He directed me according to his will, by his holy spirit. I had no one to converse with but him. He brought me under a thick, heavy, and a dark cloud, into the open air; for which I adore, praise, and worship the Lord my God, that I know has grasped me in his hands, and has forgiven me all my sins, and has sent and washed my heart with his most precious blood; that I now live not for myself, but for him that made me; and to do his holy will is my pleasure."
Such was the spirit in which he went, and it was this spirit which inclined the most warlike and hostile Indians to listen. They would share with him their last morsel, would conduct him on his way, and watch patiently over him through the long hours of the gloomy night, that no evil should befall him. They were, therefore, disposed to listen to his message, and when he showed them that they were being put forward by the French to fight their battles, and that the purpose of the French was to hold all this fine country, and if they were successful in driving off the English, they would then turn upon the poor Indians and drive them off, they began to realize the truth of his words.
The following fragment of a conversation recorded in Post's first journal will illustrate the nature of his mission: " Now Brother (Post), we (Pisquetumen, Tom Hickman, and Shingiss), love you, but cannot help wondering why the English and French do not make up with one another, and tell one another not to fight on our land." Post replied to them, " Brother, if the English told the French so a thousand times, they never would go away. Brother, you know so long as the world has stood there has not been such a war. You know when the French lived on the other side the war was there, and here we lived in peace. Consider how many thousand men are killed, and how many houses are burned since the French lived here; if they had not been here it would not have been so; you know we do not blame you; we blame the French; they are the cause of this war; therefore, wedo not come to hurt you, but to chastise the French."
The effeet which the words of the messenger had upon the In- dians, may be judged by the following answer which was made to a messenger of the French who had come with wampum to summon them to the fort, by a party of chieftains who had assembled to con- fer with Post: "Give it (the wampmin) to the French captain and let him go with his young men; he boasted much of his fighting; now let us see his fighting. We have often ventured our lives for him; and hardly a loaf of bread, when we came to him; and now he thinks we should jump to serve him."
The Indian is naturally a worshiper, a bundle of superstitions. Though possessed of savage instincts they were captivated by Post because he professed to be ever under the control of the great spirit, and spoke with such trust, as though he was upon earth a vicegerent
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of the Lord. Post himself says of them; " There is not a prouder, or more high-minded people, in themselves, than the Indians. They think themselves the wisest and prudentest men in the world; and that they can overpower both the French and English when they please. The white people are in their eyes, nothing at all. They say that through their conjuring craft, they can do what they please, and nothing can withstand them. In their way of fighting, they have this method, to see that they first shoot the officers and com- inanders, and then they say they shall be sure to have them. They also say, that if their conjurers run through the middle of our peo- ple no bullet can hurt them. They say too that when they have shot the commanders the soldiers will all be confused, and will not know what to do. They say of themselves, that every one of them is like a king and captain, and fights for himself. They say that the English people are fools; they hold their guns half man high, and then let them snap; we take sight and have them at a shot and so do the French. They say the French load with a bullet, and six swan shot. We take care to have the first shot at our enemies and then they are half dead before they begin to fight."
The efforts of the messenger had great influence with the sav- ages. In the midst of his conference with them, a Cayuga Chief delivered a string in the name of the Six Nations, who had always remained true to the English, with these words: "Cousing, hear what I have to say; I see you are sorry, and the tears stand in your eyes. I would open your eyes, and clear your eyes from tears, so that you may see, and hear what your uncles, the Six Nations have to say. We have established a friendship with your brethren, the English. We see that you are all over bloody, on your body. I clean the heart from dust, and your eyes from tears, and your bodies from the blood, that you may hear and see your brethren, the En- glish, and appear clean before them, and that you may speak from the heart with them."
It is not strange .that the grave Cayuga chief should say, re- membering how the Ohio Indians had imbrued themselves in the affair with Braddock and had murdered and massacred along the whole frontier, " you are all over bloody, on your body," speaking in that Indian figurative way which was their custom. It was by such means as these we have here detailed, by messages taken among them by this plain Moravian Christian in his plain garb, that the In- dians were brought to realize the true position they were sustaining to the French, and the ties which bound them were loosened, so that when the English came in force their work was in a measure already done.
Colonel Boquet, who had prevailed upon General Forbes, the commander of the expedition, and who had been left siek in Phila-
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delphia, to allow him to cut a new road over the mountains wholly in Pennsylvania, had made so slow progress, that so late as Septem- ber he was still with six thousand men not over the Alleghany Mountains. At Raystown, now Bedford, the General came up with the column, and was there joined by Washington from Fort Cumber- land. Colonel Boquet, with 2,000 men had already advanced to Loyalhanna. That it might be known what was the condition of the country in front, and the temper of the foe, Major Grant, accompa- nied with Major Andrew Lewis, of the Virginia forces, and a detach- ment of eight hundred men, was sent forward on the 11th of Sep- tember to reconnoiter. The third day out Grant arrived close in upon the fort without meeting any foe. Having left the baggage two miles to the rear, with his main force Grant approached under cover of darkness within a quarter of a mile, overlooking the fort. Early in the morning Major Lewis was sent with four hundred men to lay in ambush along the path by which they had come, and the remaining force with Grant lay along the hill facing the fort. Then sending out a company under Captain McDonald, with drums beat- ing, in the hope of drawing on the enemy, he waited the result, hoping that the garrison was weak. But in this he was mistaken; for they followed the decoy in great numbers, and boldly attacked. The regulars stood up boldly and were shot down from the coverts. The Americans took to the woods and fought Indian style. Major Lewis joined in the fight. Major Grant showed the most intrepid bravery, exposing himself to the enemy's fire, but all to no purpose. Many were drowned in attempting to cross the river. Seeing that he was outnumbered and hemmed in by the enemy standing on com- manding ground, Grant retired to the baggage, where Captain Bullet had held his company, and as the enemy came on with assurance, his little force made a determined stand, doing good execution. Here Grant endeavored to rally his broken columns; but the terror of the scalping knife had seized them, and one by one they slipped away. Bullet finding his force dwindling finally gave the order to retire; but the resolute stand he had made enabled the main body to retire without molestation, and the hail of bullets he had poured into the faces of the foe left them no stomach to pursue. The loss in this engagement was two hundred and seventy-two killed, forty-two wounded, and many, including Grant, taken prisoners. The loss in killed was out of all proportion to the wounded, and the number en- gaged. The ambuscade could not have been well planned, or was badly executed. Grant was sent with his force to reconnoitre and ascer- tain the strength and disposition of the enemy. Instead he marched his forces full upon the fort and offered the challenge of battle. The enemy, by keeping quiet in their fort and simulating fear, gave the impression that they were weak, so that when they threw off the
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disguise, and rushed out in overwhelming mmnumbers, they went to an easy vietory.
Gathering confidence by their great slaughter and great rout of the English here, determined them to follow up their advantage, hoping to find the main body thrown into confusion and ready to retreat as the Braddock army had done under the timid Dunbar. Accordingly they came on rejoicing in their strength, twelve hun- dred French and two hundred Indians, led by De Vetri, and boldly attacked the camp of Boquet at Loyalhanna on the 12th of October. From eleven in the morning till three in the afternoon the battle was maintained with great fury, when the French, finding that the Eng- lish were not likely to run, withdrew, but at night renewed the attack, hoping, between the terrors of the night and the wild whoop of the Indian brandishing his scalping knife, to start a stampede. But Boquet was prepared, and, " when, in return for their melodious musie," says the chronicler, " we gave them some shells from our mortars, it soon made them retreat." The loss in this engagement was twelve killed, seventeen wounded, and thirty-one prisoners. It will be observed that in this last engagement the French were com- pelled to do most of the fighting themselves, showing that the sava- ges were beginning to tire of their adhesion to the French.
General Forbes now pushed forward with the main body of the army from Bedford to Loyalhanna, where he arrived about the first of November. Here the wintry weather set in unusually early, and the summits were already white with snow. A council of war was held, and it was decided that it was impracticable to prosecute the campaign further before the opening of the spring. But it having been learned from captives that the garrison at Du Quesne was weak, the Indians having mostly gone off on their autumn hunt preparatory for the, winter, the decision of the council was reversed, and Forbes gave orders to push on with all possible despatch. Colonel Wash- ington was sent forward with a detachment to open the road, in prosecuting which he had a slight skirmish with the enemy, and a small force sent out to his assistance under Colonel Mercer having been mistaken for the foe, was fired upon and several fell. Hav- ing pushed forward Colonel Armstrong with a thousand men to aid Washington in opening the road, General Forbes followed with the main body, four thousand three hundred effective men, leaving a well- appointed force at Bedford and Loyalhanna. When arrived within twelve miles of the fort a rumor was current that the French, either by accident or design, had blown up the fort, and all had been burned. This was soon confirmed by the arrival of Indian scouts, who had been near enough to see the ruins. A company of cavalry was dis- patehed with instructions to extinguish the flames and save all the property possible. The whole army now pushed forward with joyous
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step, and arrived on the 29th; but only the blackened chimneys of the quarters and the walls of the fort remained. It was found that a strong work had been built at the point between the two rivers, and a much larger one apparently unfinished some distance up the bank of the Allegheny. There were two magazines, one of which had been blown up, and in the other were found sixteen barrels of ammunition, gun-barrels, a quantity of carriage iron, and a wagon load of scalping knives. The cannon had all disappeared, probably had been taken down the Ohio. The garrison, which consisted of some five hundred French, had separated, a part having gone down the Ohio, a hundred had gone to Presque Isle by an Indian path, and the remainder, with the Governor de Lignery, moved up the Alle- gheny to Fort Venango, where he informed the natives that he would winter and go down in the spring and rout the English.
A somewhat more spirited account of this important event is given by Mr. Ormsby, a commissary in the army, as quoted in the Western Annals: " At Turtle Creek a council of war was held, the result of which was, that it was impracticable to proceed, all the pro- visions and forage being exhausted. On the General's being told of this, he swore a furious oath, that he would sleep in the fort or in a worse place the next night. It was a matter of indifference to the General where he died, as he was carried the whole distance from Philadelphia and back on a litter. About midnight a tremendous explosion was heard from the westward, on which Forbes swore that the French magazine was blown up, which revived our spirits. This conjecture of the ' head of iron' was soon confirmed by a deserter from Fort du Quesne, who said that the Indians, who had watched the English army, reported that they were as numerous as the trees in the woods. This so terrified the French that they set fire to their magazine and barracks, and pushed off, some up and some down the Ohio."
Forbes now saw himself in possession of the fort and the com- manding ground, which, for four years, the English had been strug- gling for. Well knowing that he could not subsist his army and beasts here, he rapidly threw up an earthwork on the Monongahela bank, and, leaving Colonel Mercer in command with two hundred men, he retired with the army to Loyalhanna, where he built a block- house, which he stocked with stores and manned with a garrison, and then moved back across the mountains. He died in the following March. The Gazette said of him: "His services in America are well known. By a steady pursuit of well concerted measures, in defiance of disease and numberless obstructions, he brought to a happy issue a most extraordinary campaign, and made a willing sacrifice of his own life to what he valued more-the interests of his King and country."
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The campaigns of the English in 1758 had proved very success- ful. Louisburg, Frontenac and dn Quesne were in their hands. Pitt was now become the master of the Parliament and nation. Elated by his successes in America, he formed the bold plan of not only holding the Ohio valley, but of conquering and possessing the whole of Canada. The Indians, too, had been shaken in their al.egiance to the French, a great couneil-fire having been kindled at Easton in the summer of 1758, at which the Delawares, Shawneese, Nanticokes, Mohegans, Conoys, Monseys and Twigtwees sat, and pledged lasting friendship for the English. The terms of this treaty were carried by the Moravian, Post, to the tribes upon the Ohio, who still remained hostile, which he often refers to in his journal, and contributed largely to weaken their faith in the French cause.
The Secretary, Pitt, had kept his word with the colonists, and had fully reimbursed them for all their expenses, in the sum of over a million dollars. They were therefore ready to second him in his grand schemes' of ending French dominion in America. Ilis plan was a bold one. General Amherst succeeded Abererombie in chief command. Twenty thousand provincials and a strong detachment of land and naval forces of regulars stood ready to execute his orders. General Wolfe was sent up the St. Lawrence against Quebec. Amherst himself was to move upon Lake Champlain and seize Montreal, and General Prideaux was to capture Fort Niagara. Amherst took the field, and with eleven thousand men moved upon Fort Ticonderoga, which the French abandoned without a struggle. Amherst pursued to Crown Point, which the French likewise abandoned and fled to Isle Aux Noix in the Sorel River. Deterred from pursuing further by the heavy storms that now, October 11, began to prevail, he re- tired to Crown Point, where he built a fortress and placed his army in winter quarters.
General Prideaux, with Sir William Johnson second in con- mand, moved by transport from Oswego by Lake Ontario to Niagara, and laid seige to the fort. Prideaux was almost immediately killed by the bursting of a gun, and the command devolved upon Johnson. For three weeks the closely beleagured garrison of French held out, when on the 24th of July a force of three thousand French came to their relief. But Johnson so met them that they were put to rout after a desperate and sanguinary engagement, and on the following day the garrison, some seven hundred men, surrendered. After having strongly garrisoned this fort, the last remaining link between Canada and the Ohio country, Johnson returned home.
General Wolfe with eight thousand troops, and a fleet under Admirals Holmes and Saunders, moved up the St. Lawrence, and landed on Orleans Island, a little below-Quebec, on the 27th of June. Montcalm with a strong body of French regulars held the
N, H, Biddle
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