At last, all things were got in readiness; and the gallant little army
began its toilsome march through the forest, and over the mountains,
and up and down the valleys. Beside the regulars, fourteen hundred
strong, it consisted of two companies of hatchet-men, or carpenters,
whose business it was to go on before, and open the road; a small
company of seamen, who had the care and management of the artillery;
six companies of rangers, some of whom were Pennsylvanians; and two
companies of light horse, which, being composed of young men taken
from the very first families of Virginia, Braddock had chosen to be
his body-guard: the whole numbering two thousand, or thereabouts.
Owing to the difficulty of dragging the loaded wagons and heavy guns
over the steep and rocky roads, the march was slow and tedious in the
extreme; and what made it still more trying to Washington's patience
was to see so many wagons and pack-horses loaded down with the private
baggage of the English officers,--such as fine clothing, table
dainties, and a hundred little troublesome conveniences, which they
must needs lug about with them wherever they went. Weeks before they
left Fort Cumberland, Washington had pointed out to Braddock the folly
of attempting to cross that monstrous mountain barrier with a cumbrous
train of wheel-carriages; and expressed the opinion, that, for the
present, they had better leave the bulk of their baggage and their
heaviest artillery, and, trusting entirely to pack-horses for
transporting what should be needed most, make their way at once to
Fort Duquesne while the garrison was yet too weak to offer any
resistance. This prudent counsel, however, as usual, had failed to
produce the least effect on the narrow and stubborn mind of Braddock;
but by the time he had dragged his unwieldy length over two or three
mountains, and had made but a few miles in many days, it began to dawn
on his mind by slow degrees, that a campaign in an American wilderness
was a very different thing from what it was in the cultivated regions
of Europe, where nearly every meadow, field, or wood, could tell of a
Christian and civilized battle there fought, and where the fine roads
and bridges made the march of an army a mere holiday jaunt as compared
to this rough service. The difficulties that beset him seeming to
thicken around him at every step, he was at last so sorely put to it
and perplexed as to be obliged to turn to the young provincial
colonel for that advice which he, in his blind self-confidence, had
but a short while before disdained.
Too well bred to seem surprised at this unbending of the haughty old
general, although he really was not a little, Washington readily, yet
with all becoming modesty, did as he was desired, in a clear, brief,
and soldierly manner. He gave it as his opinion, that their best plan
would be to divide the army into two parts,--the smaller division,
under command of Col. Dunbar, to form the rear, and bring up the heavy
guns and baggage-wagons; the larger division, under the command of
Braddock, to form the advance, and taking with it but two pieces of
light artillery, and no more baggage than could be conveniently
carried on pack-horses, push rapidly on to Fort Duquesne, and surprise
the garrison before they could receive timely warning of their danger,
or be re-enforced by the troops from Canada, which would have arrived
ere then, had not the summer drought prevented. To some extent, this
prudent advice was followed; and, to give it the force of example,
Washington reduced his baggage to a few little necessaries that he
could easily carry in a small portmanteau strapped to his back, and
gave his fine charger to be used as a pack-horse. His brother
provincial officers, accustomed as they were to dealing with the
difficulties and inconveniences of a backwoods life, in a ready,
off-hand fashion, followed his example with the greatest willingness
and good-humor. Notwithstanding this, however, there were still two
hundred pack-horses loaded with the private baggage of the English
officers, who were unwilling, even in that hour of pressing need, to
make this little sacrifice of their present comfort to the common
good. So tender did they seem of their bodily ease, and so given up to
the pleasures of appetite, that Washington began to have serious
doubts of their fitness to endure the hardships of a rough campaign,
and of their courage and firmness to face the dangers of the
battle-field.
One evening late, about this time, as the army lay encamped at the
Little Meadows, there suddenly appeared among them, from the
neighboring woods, a large party of hunters, all Pennsylvanians,
dressed in the wild garb of Indians, and armed with hatchets, knives,
and rifles. Their leader was a certain Capt. Jack, one of the greatest
hunters of his day, and nearly as famous in the border tales of
Pennsylvania as Daniel Boone in those of green Kentucky. When your
Uncle Juvinell was quite a lad, he read the story of this strange man,
in an old book, which pleased and interested him so much at the time,
that he has never since forgotten it, and will now repeat it to you in
the very words of the old chronicler:--
"The 'Black Hunter,' the 'Black Rifle,' the 'Wild Hunter of
Juniata,' is a white man. His history is this: He entered the
woods with a few enterprising companions, built his cabin,
cleared a little land, and amused himself with the pleasure of
fishing and hunting. He felt happy; for then he had not a care.
But on an evening, when he returned from a day of sport, he
found his cabin burnt, his wife and children murdered. From
that moment he forsakes civilized man, hunts out caves in which
he lives, protects the frontier inhabitants from the Indians,
and seizes every opportunity of revenge that offers. He lives
the terror of the Indians, and the consolation of the whites.
On one occasion, near Juniata, in the middle of a dark night, a
family were suddenly awaked from sleep by the report of a gun.
They jumped from their huts; and, by the glimmering light from
the chimney, saw an Indian fall to rise no more. The open door
exposed to view the Wild Hunter. 'I have saved your lives!' he
cried; then turned, and was buried in the gloom of night."
Bidding his leather-stockings to wait where they were till he came
back, the Black Hunter strode on to the general's tent, and, without
more ado than to enter, made known the object of his coming there, in
a speech that smacked somewhat of the Indian style of oratory; which I
will give you, as nearly as I can, in his own words:--
"Englishmen, the foe is on the watch. He lurks in the
strongholds of the mountains. He hides in the shadows of the
forest. He hovers over you like a hungry vulture ready to
pounce upon its prey. He has made a boast that he will keep his
eye upon you, from his look-outs on the hills, day and night,
till you have walked into his snare, when he will shoot down
your gay red-birds like pigeons. Englishmen, dangers thicken
round you at every step; but in the pride of your strength you
have blinded your eyes, so that you see them not. I have
brought my hunters, who are brave and trusty men, to serve you
as scouts and spies. In your front and in your rear, and on
either hand, we will scour the woods, and beat the bushes, to
stir up the lurking foe, that your gallant men fall not into
his murderous ambuscade. To us the secret places of the
wilderness are as an open book; in its depths we have made our
homes this many a year: there we can find both food and
shelter. We ask no pay, and our rifles are all our own."
To this noble and disinterested offer, Braddock returned a cold and
haughty answer.
"There is time enough," said he, "for making such arrangements;
and I have experienced troops on whom I can rely."
Stung to the quick by this uncivil and ungenerous treatment, the Black
Hunter, without another word, turned, and, with a kindling eye and
proud step, left the tent. When he told his followers of the scornful
manner in which the English general had treated their leader, and
rejected their offer of service, they staid not, but, with angry and
indignant mien, filed out of the camp, and, plunging once more into
the wilderness, left the devoted little army to march on to that
destruction to which its ill-starred commander seemed so fatally bent
on leading it. The contemptuous indifference which always marked the
demeanor of Braddock towards these rude but brave and trusty warriors
of the woods was very offensive to Washington; the more, as he knew,
that, when it came to be put to the test, these men, unskilled though
they were in the modes of civilized warfare, would be found far better
fitted to cope with the cunning and stealthy enemy they had then to
deal with, than those well-dressed, well-armed, well-drilled, but
unwieldy regulars.
After having rested a few days at the Little Meadows, the advanced
division of the army once more took up the line of march; but, to
Washington's disappointment, made scarcely better speed than before,
although lightened of nearly all of the heavy baggage. "I found,"
wrote he a short time after, "that, instead of pushing on with vigor,
we were halting to level every mole-hill, and erect bridges over every
brook; by which means we were sometimes four days in getting twelve
miles." Slowly the long and straggling lines held on their weary way,
now scrambling over some rugged steep, now winding along some narrow
defile, till at length the silence of that gloomy vale--the Shades of
Death--was again broken by the shouts and uproar of a marching army.
For several days, Washington had been suffering much from fever,
attended with a racking headache, which had obliged him to travel in a
covered wagon. By the time they reached the great crossings of the
Youghiogeny, his illness had so increased, that Dr. Craik, his good
friend and physician, declared it would be almost certain death for
him to travel further; at the same time advising him to stay where he
was until his fever should somewhat abate its violence, when he could
come up with Dunbar's rear division. His brother officers also, and
even his old general, kindly urged him to give up all thought of going
on for the present; while, to render his disappointment more bearable,
some of them promised to keep him informed, by writing, of every thing
noteworthy which should happen in the course of their march. Seeing
then; was no help for it, he suffered himself to be left behind: but
it was with a sad and heavy heart that, he saw them pass on without
him; and when they had vanished, one by one, in the shadows of the
neighboring wilds, and the gleaming of their arms could no longer be
seen through the openings of the trees and bushes, he turned with a
sigh, and said to the men whom Braddock had left to nurse and guard
him, "I would not for five hundred pounds miss being at the taking of
Fort Duquesne." Here he lay for ten days; his fever, no doubt, much
aggravated by his impatience to rejoin his comrades, and the fear lest
he should not be well in time to share with them the dangers and
honors of the coming contest.
Meanwhile, Braddock pursued his slow and tedious march, and in a few
days had passed the Great Meadows, where young Washington, the year
before, as you must well remember, had learned his first lessons in
the rude art of war. A few miles beyond this, he came to a deserted
Indian camp, on the top of a rocky hill, where, to judge from the
number of wigwams, at least one hundred and seventy warriors must have
lodged. The fires were still burning; which showed but too plainly
that the stealthy foe was on the watch, and not far distant. Some of
the trees hard by had been stripped of their bark; and on their white,
sappy trunks were to be seen, in the rude picture-writing of the
Indians, savage taunts and threats of vengeance meant for the English;
while intermixed with these were bullying boasts and blackguard slang,
written in the French language, as if to force on the notice of those
who were to read them the fact, that there were white as well as red
men lurking near.
It had almost slipped my mind to tell you, that Braddock, moved
perhaps by the advice of Washington, had, before setting out from Fort
Cumberland, employed a small party of Indians, with their sachem Yadi
at their head, to serve as guides and spies during the campaign. A few
days after passing the deserted camp on the rock, four or five
soldiers, straggling too far in the rear, were suddenly waylaid by the
prowling foe, and all murdered and scalped on the spot.
To avenge the death of their comrades, a squad of regulars went out
in quest of the enemy, and soon came in sight of a small party of
Indians, who held up the boughs of trees before them, and stood their
rifles on the ground, as a sign that they were friends. Not
understanding this, however, and the distance being too great for them
to make out who they were, the blundering regulars fired, and one of
the party fell dead on the spot,--a youthful warrior, who proved to be
the son of the sachem Yadi. When Braddock heard of this melancholy
accident, he was deeply grieved. He forthwith sent for the bereaved
father, and, to his praise be it ever recorded, endeavored, by kind
words and liberal presents, to console him, and make some little
amends for his heavy loss; and, as a still further token of his
regard, he ordered the hapless youth to be buried with all the honors
of war. The body, borne on a bier, was followed by the officers, two
and two; while the soldiers, drawn up in two lines, with the grave
between them, stood facing each other, with the points of their
muskets turned downward, and their chins resting in the hollow of the
breeches. When the body was lowered, they fired three volleys over the
grave, and left the young warrior to his long sleep on the hillside,
with his bright hatchet and trusty rifle beside him. All this was very
soothing to the sorrow and gratifying to the fatherly pride of the old
sachem, and made him ever after a loving friend and faithful ally of
the English. I have told you this little story to show you, that this
testy and obstinate old general, with all his faults, was far from
being the hard, unfeeling man that he sometimes seemed; and also as a
tribute that every historian should pay to the memory of one whose
misfortune it has been to be blamed so much, and pitied so little.
By this time, Washington had so far regained his strength as to admit
of his being borne along in a covered wagon; and, setting out
accordingly, in five days came up with the advance division, where it
lay encamped in a beautiful spot about two miles from the Monongahela,
and fifteen miles from Fort Duquesne. Here he was joyfully welcomed by
both officers and men, with whom his generosity, and frank, manly
bearing, had made him a great favorite. Shortly after his arrival, Mr.
Gist and two Indian scouts, who had been sent out to reconnoitre or
spy out the enemy, came back with the cheering tidings, that the
re-enforcements had not yet come down from Canada, and that the
garrison in the fort was at present too weak to stand a single hour's
siege. But what gave him a little uneasiness was a lofty column of
smoke, rising from a deep and densely wooded hollow, where they were
quite sure the watchful enemy was lurking, and hatching some mischief
for the English.
Now, the fort and the camp lay on the same side of the river; and the
most direct route between them was by a narrow mountain pass, rising
abruptly from the water's edge on the left, and, on the right, shut
in by a steep and lofty hill, whose stony sides were overgrown with
laurel and stunted cedars and pines. As it was altogether out of the
question to drag their wagons and artillery along this pass, it was
resolved to cross the river, first at a point just over against the
camp, and then, moving down along the opposite bank, recross it at
another point five miles below; at both of which places the fords were
shallow, and the banks not high.
At last, the 9th of July, 1755,--a day ever to be remembered in
American annals,--began to dawn. Long before its first red light had
streaked the east, a hum in the camp told that the little army was,
even at that hour, all astir, and big with the bustle of preparation.
Officers and men were in the highest hopes, and looked forward with
confidence to the coming evening, when they were to plant their
victorious banners on the ramparts of Fort Duquesne. Although they had
marched thus far without serious molestation, yet Col. Washington's
fears of an ambuscade were not a whit diminished; for he felt quite
certain that they should never reach the French fort without an
attempt being made to surprise, or drive them back. Full of these
apprehensions, he went to Gen. Braddock, and, pointing out to him the
danger hanging over them, urged him by all means to send out the
Virginia rangers to scour the woods and thickets, front and flank, and
beat up the enemy, should any chance to be lurking near with the
design of drawing them into an ambuscade. No advice, as it afterwards
turned out, could have been more timely: but, coming from a raw
provincial colonel, Braddock cast it aside with angry impatience; and
when the line of march was formed, as if to show in what light esteem
he held it, he ordered the rangers to the rear, to guard the baggage.
Before daybreak, a large party of pioneers, or road-cutters, with a
small guard of regulars, numbering in all about three hundred, had
gone on before to open a passage for the army through the woods, and
make the fords more passable by levelling the banks.
The midsummer sun was shooting its first beams, level and red, among
the Alleghany hills, when the little army, having crossed the
Monongahela at the upper ford, stood on its southern bank, forming in
line of march. By order of their general, officers and men had scoured
and polished their arms and accoutrements the night before; and now
appeared in full uniform, as if some grand military parade were to be
the programme of the day. The whole line was soon moving slowly
forward, with fifes playing, drums beating, and colors flying; the
regulars keeping step the while to the "Grenadier's March." In the
clear and tranquil depths of the river, as they moved along its shady
banks, could be seen, as in a mirror, the long array of
leather-shirted rangers and red-coated regulars, with their sun-lit
arms and prancing steeds, and bright banners that floated in the
morning breeze. This brilliant spectacle, so well set off by the
smiling river in front and the frowning woods beyond, formed a picture
that ever lived in the memory of Washington; and in after-years he
used often to say, that, as it then appeared to him, he thought he had
never seen any thing so beautiful. In the enthusiasm of the moment, he
forgot his late illness, the still enfeebled condition of his
body,--all, save the glory of serving his country; and, mounting his
horse, he joined his brother-aides in their attendance on their
general, else far more fatal must have been the end of that bloody
day.