England and France were, at this time, at peace in Europe, although the
troops of both nations were about to engage in conflict, in the forests
of America. Their position there was an anomalous one. England owned
the belt of colonies on the east coast. France was mistress of Canada
in the north, of Louisiana in the south, and, moreover, claimed the
whole of the vast country lying behind the British colonies, which were
thus cooped up on the seaboard. Her hold, however, of this great
territory was extremely slight. She had strong posts along the chain of
lakes from the Saint Lawrence to Lake Superior, but between these and
Louisiana, her supremacy was little more than nominal.
The Canadian population were frugal and hardy, but they were deficient
in enterprise; and the priests, who ruled them with a rod of iron, for
Canada was intensely Catholic, discouraged any movements which would
take their flocks from under their charge. Upon the other hand, the
colonists of New England, Pennsylvania, and Virginia were men of
enterprise and energy, and their traders, pushing in large numbers
across the Alleghenies, carried on an extensive trade with the Indians
in the valley of the Ohio, thereby greatly exciting the jealousy of the
French, who feared that the Indians would ally themselves with the
British colonists, and that the connection between Canada and Louisiana
would be thereby cut.
The English colonists were greatly superior to the French in number;
but they laboured under the disadvantage that the colonies were wholly
independent of each other, with strong mutual jealousies, which
paralysed their action and prevented their embarking upon any concerted
operations. Upon the other hand, Canada was governed by the French as a
military colony. The governor was practically absolute, and every man
capable of bearing arms could, if necessary, be called by him into the
field. He had at his disposal not only the wealth of the colony, but
large assistance from France, and the French agents were, therefore,
able to outbid the agents of the British colonies with the Indians.
For years there had been occasional troubles between the New England
States and the French, the latter employing the Indians in harassing
the border; but, until the middle of the eighteenth century, there had
been nothing like a general trouble. In 1749 the Marquis of
Galissoniere was governor general of Canada. The treaty of Aix la
Chapelle had been signed; but this had done nothing to settle the vexed
question of the boundaries between the English and French colonies.
Meanwhile, the English traders from Pennsylvania and Virginia were
poaching on the domain which France claimed as hers, ruining the French
fur trade, and making friends with the Indian allies of Canada. Worse
still, farmers were pushing westward and settling in the valley of the
Ohio.
In order to drive these back, to impress the natives with the power of
France, and to bring them back to their allegiance, the governor of
Canada, in the summer of 1749, sent Celoron de Bienville. He had with
him fourteen officers, twenty French soldiers, a hundred and eighty
Canadians, and a band of Indians. They embarked in twenty-three
birch-bark canoes, and, pushing up the Saint Lawrence, reached Lake
Ontario, stopping for a time at the French fort of Frontenac, and
avoiding the rival English port of Oswego on the southern shore, where
a trade in beaver skins, disastrous to French interests, was being
carried on, for the English traders sold their goods at vastly lower
prices than those which the French had charged.
On the 6th of July the party reached Niagara, where there was a small
French fort, and thence, carrying their canoes round the cataract,
launched them upon Lake Erie. Landing again on the southern shore of
the lake, they carried their canoes nine miles through the forest to
Chautauqua Lake, and then dropped down the stream running out of it
until they reached the Ohio. The fertile country here was inhabited by
the Delawares, Shawanoes, Wyandots, and Iroquois, or Indians of the
Five Nations, who had migrated thither from their original territories
in the colony of New York. Further west, on the banks of the Miami, the
Wabash, and other streams, was a confederacy of the Miami and their
kindred tribes. Still further west, in the country of the Illinois,
near the Mississippi, the French had a strong stone fort called Fort
Chartres, which formed one of the chief links of the chain of posts
that connected Quebec with New Orleans.
The French missionaries and the French political agents had, for
seventy years, laboured hard to bring these Indian tribes into close
connection with France. The missionaries had failed signally; but the
presents, so lavishly bestowed, had inclined the tribes to the side of
their donors, until the English traders with their cheap goods came
pushing west over the Alleghenies. They carried their goods on the
backs of horses, and journeyed from village to village, selling powder,
rum, calicoes, beads, and trinkets. No less than three hundred men were
engaged in these enterprises, and some of them pushed as far west as
the Mississippi.
As the party of Celoron proceeded they nailed plates of tin, stamped
with the arms of France, to trees; and buried plates of lead near them,
with inscriptions saying that they took possession of the land in the
name of Louis the Fifteenth, King of France.
Many of the villages were found to be deserted by the natives, who fled
at their approach. At some, however, they found English traders, who
were warned at once to leave the country; and, by some of them, letters
were sent to the governor of Pennsylvania, in which Celoron declared
that he was greatly surprised to find Englishmen trespassing in the
domain of France, and that his orders were precise, to leave no foreign
traders within the limits of the government of Canada.
At Chiningue, called Logstown by the English, a large number of natives
were gathered, most of the inhabitants of the deserted villages having
sought refuge there. The French were received with a volley of balls
from the shore; but they landed without replying to the fire, and
hostilities were avoided. The French kept guard all night, and in the
morning Celoron invited the chiefs to a council, when he told them he
had come, by the order of the governor, to open their eyes to the
designs of the English against their lands, and that they must be
driven away at once. The reply of the chiefs was humble; but they
begged that the English traders, of whom there were, at that moment,
ten in the town, might stay a little longer, since the goods they
brought were necessary to them.
After making presents to the chiefs, the party proceeded on their way,
putting up the coats of arms and burying the lead inscriptions. At
Scioto a large number of Indians were assembled, and the French were
very apprehensive of an attack, which would doubtless have been
disastrous to them, as the Canadians of the party were altogether
unused to war. A council was held, however, at which Celoron could
obtain no satisfaction whatever, for the interests of the Indians were
bound up with the English.
There can be no doubt that, had they been able to look into the future,
every Indian on the continent would have joined the French in their
effort to crush the English colonies. Had France remained master of
America the Indians might, even now, be roaming free and unmolested on
the lands of their forefathers. France is not a colonizing nation. She
would have traded with the Indians, would have endeavoured to
Christianize them, and would have left them their land and freedom,
well satisfied with the fact that the flag of France should wave over
so vast an extent of country; but on England conquering the soil, her
armies of emigrants pressed west, and the red man is fast becoming
extinct on the continent of which he was once the lord.
Celoron's expedition sailed down the Ohio until it reached the mouth of
the Miami, and toiled for thirteen days against its shallow current,
until they reached a village of the Miami Indians, ruled over by a
chief called, by the French, La Demoiselle, but whom the English, whose
fast friend he was, called Old Britain. He was the great chief of the
Miami confederation.
The English traders there withdrew at the approach of the French. The
usual council was held, and Celoron urged the chief to remove from this
location, which he had but newly adopted, and to take up his abode,
with his band, near the French fort on the Maumee. The chief accepted
the Frenchman's gifts, thanked him for his good advice, and promised to
follow it at a more convenient time; but neither promises nor threats
could induce him to stir at once.
No sooner, indeed, had the French departed, than the chief gathered the
greater part of the members of the confederation on that spot; until,
in less than two years after the visit of Celoron, its population had
increased eightfold, and it became one of the greatest Indian towns of
the west, and the centre of English trade and influence.
Celoron reached Miami, and then returned northward to Lake Erie, and
thence back to Montreal, when he reported to the governor that English
influence was supreme in the valley of the Ohio.
In the following year, a company was formed in Virginia for effecting a
settlement in Ohio, and a party proceeded west to the village of the
chief called Old Britain, by whom they were received with great
friendship, and a treaty of peace was solemnly made between the English
and the Indians. While the festivities, consequent on the affair, were
going on, four Ottawa Indians arrived from the French, with the French
flag and gifts, but they were dismissed with an answer of defiance. If,
at this time, the colonists could have cemented their alliance with the
Indians, with gifts similar to those with which the French endeavoured
to purchase their friendship, a permanent peace with the Indians might
have been established; but the mutual jealousies of the colonies, and
the nature of the various colonial assemblies, rendered any common
action impossible. Pennsylvania was jealous of the westward advance of
Virginia, and desired to thwart rather than to assist her.
The governors of New York, Pennsylvania, and Virginia were fully
conscious of the importance of the Indian alliance, but they could do
nothing without their assemblies. Those of New York and Pennsylvania
were largely composed of tradesmen and farmers, absorbed in local
interests, and animated but by two motives; the cutting down of all
expenditure, and bitter and continuous opposition to the governor, who
represented the royal authority. Virginia and Pennsylvania quarrelled
about their respective rights over the valley of the Ohio. The assembly
of New York refused to join in any common action, saying, "We will take
care of our Indians, and they may take care of theirs."
The states further removed from the fear of any danger, from the action
of the Indians and French, were altogether lukewarm.
Thus, neither in the valley of the Ohio, nor on the boundaries of the
New England states, did the Indians receive their promised gifts, and,
as the French agents were liberal both in presents and promises, the
Indians became discontented with their new friends, and again turned
their eyes towards France. Old Britain, however, remained firm in his
alliance; and the English traders, by constant presents, and by selling
their goods at the lowest possible rates, kept him and his warriors
highly satisfied and contented.
The French, in vain, tried to stir up the friendly tribes to attack
Oswego on Lake Ontario, and the village of Old Britain, which were the
two centres to which the Indians went to trade with the English; but
they were unsuccessful until, in June, 1752, Charles Langlade, a young
French trader, married to a squaw at Green Bay, and strong in influence
with the tribes of that region, came down the lakes with a fleet of
canoes, manned by two hundred and fifty Ottawa and Ojibwa warriors.
They stopped awhile at the fort at Detroit, then paddled up the Maumee
to the next fort, and thence marched through the forests against the
Miamis.
They approached Old Britain's village in the morning. Most of the
Indians were away on their summer hunt, and there were but eight
English traders in the place. Three of these were caught outside the
village, the remaining five took refuge in the fortified warehouse they
had built, and there defended themselves.
Old Britain and the little band with him fought bravely, but against
such overwhelming numbers could do nothing, and fourteen of them,
including their chief, were killed. The five white men defended
themselves till the afternoon, when two of them managed to make their
escape, and the other three surrendered. One of them was already
wounded, and was at once killed by the French Indians. Seventy years of
the teaching of the French missionaries had not weaned the latter from
cannibalism, and Old Britain was boiled and eaten.
The Marquis of Duquesne, who had succeeded Galissoniere as governor,
highly praised Langlade for the enterprise, and recommended him to the
minister at home for reward. This bold enterprise further shook the
alliance of the Indians with the English, for it seemed to them that
the French were enterprising and energetic, while the English were
slothful and cowardly, and neglected to keep their agreements. The
French continued to build forts, and Dinwiddie, governor of Virginia,
sent George Washington to protest, in his name, against their building
forts on land notoriously belonging to the English crown.
Washington performed the long and toilsome journey through the forests
at no slight risks, and delivered his message at the forts, but nothing
came of it. The governor of Virginia, seeing the approaching danger,
made the greatest efforts to induce the other colonies to join in
common action; but North Carolina, alone, answered the appeal, and gave
money enough to raise three or four hundred men. Two independent
companies maintained by England in New York, and one in South Carolina,
received orders to march to Virginia. The governor had raised, with
great difficulty, three hundred men. They were called the Virginia
Regiment. An English gentleman named Joshua Fry was appointed the
colonel, and Washington their major.
Fry was at Alexandria, on the Potomac, with half the regiment.
Washington, with the other half, had pushed forward to the storehouse
at Wills Creek, which was to form the base of operations. Besides
these, Captain Trent, with a band of backwoodsmen, had crossed the
mountain to build a fort at the forks of the Ohio, where Pittsburgh now
stands.
Trent had gone back to Wills Creek, leaving Ensign Ward, with forty
men, at work upon the fort, when, on the 17th of April, a swarm of
canoes came down the Allegheny, with over five hundred Frenchmen, who
planted cannon against the unfinished stockade, and summoned the ensign
to surrender. He had no recourse but to submit, and was allowed to
depart, with his men, across the mountains.
The French at once set to, to build a strong fort, which they named
Fort Duquesne. While the governor of Virginia had been toiling, in
vain, to get the colonists to move, the French had acted promptly, and
the erection of their new fort at once covered their line of
communication to the west, barred the advance of the English down the
Ohio valley, and secured the allegiance of all the wavering Indian
tribes.
Although war had not yet been declared between England and France, the
colonists, after this seizure, by French soldiers, of a fort over which
the English flag was flying, henceforth acted as if the two powers were
at war. Washington moved forward from Wills Creek with his hundred and
fifty men, and surprised a French force which had gone out scouting.
Several of the French were killed, and the commander of Fort Duquesne
sent despatches to France to say that he had sent this party out with a
communication to Washington, and that they had been treacherously
assassinated.
This obscure skirmish was the commencement of a war which set two
continents on fire. Colonel Fry died a few days after this fight, and
Washington succeeded to the command of the regiment, and collected his
three hundred men at Green Meadow, where he was joined by a few
Indians, and by a company from South Carolina.
The French at Duquesne were quickly reinforced, and the command was
given to Coulon de Villiers, the brother of an officer who had been
killed in the skirmish with Washington. He at once advanced against the
English, who had fallen back to a rough breastwork which they called
Fort Necessity, Washington having but four hundred men, against five
hundred French and as many Indians.
For nine hours the French kept up a hot fire on the intrenchment, but
without success, and at nightfall Villiers proposed a parley. The
French ammunition was running short, the men were fatigued by their
marches, and drenched by the rain which had been falling the whole day.
The English were in a still worse plight. Their powder was nearly
spent, their guns were foul, and among them they had but two cleaning
rods.
After a parley, it was agreed that the English should march off with
drums beating and the honours of war, carrying with them all their
property; that the prisoners taken in the previous affair should be set
free, two officers remaining with the French as hostages until they
were handed over.
Washington and his men arrived, utterly worn out with fatigue and
famine, at Wills Creek. This action left the French masters of the
whole country beyond the Alleghenies.
The two mother nations were now preparing for war, and, in the middle
of January, 1755, Major General Braddock, with the 44th and 48th
Regiments, each five hundred strong, sailed from Cork for Virginia;
while the French sent eighteen ships of war and six battalions to
Canada.
Admiral Boscawen, with eleven ships of the line and one frigate, set
out to intercept the French expedition. The greater part of the fleet
evaded him, but he came up with three of the French men of war, opened
fire upon them, and captured them. Up to this time a pretence of
negotiations had been maintained between England and France, but the
capture of the French ships brought the negotiations to a sudden end,
and the war began.
A worse selection than that of Major General Braddock could hardly have
been made. He was a brave officer and a good soldier, but he was rough,
coarse, and obstinate. He utterly despised the colonial troops, and
regarded all methods of fighting, save those pursued by regular armies
in the field, with absolute contempt. To send such a man to command
troops destined to fight in thick forests, against an enemy skilled in
warfare of that kind, was to court defeat.
As might be expected, Braddock was very soon on the worst possible
terms with the whole of the colonial authorities, and the delays caused
by the indecision or obstinacy of the colonial assemblies chafed him to
madness. At last, however, his force was assembled at Wills Creek. The
two English regiments had been raised, by enlistment in Virginia, to
700 men each. There were nine Virginian companies of fifty men, and the
thirty sailors lent by Commodore Keppel. General Braddock had three
aides-de-camp--Captain Robert Orme, Captain Roger Morris, and Colonel
George Washington.
It was the 1st of June, when James Walsham rode with Colonel Washington
into the camp, and, three days later, the last companies of the
Virginian corps marched in. During the next week, some of the English
officers attempted to drill the Virginians in the manner of English
troops.
"It is a waste of time," Colonel Washington said to James, one day,
when he was watching them, "and worse. These men can fight their own
way. Most of them are good shots, and have a fair idea of forest
fighting; let them go their own way, and they can be trusted to hold
their own against at least an equal number of French and Indians; but
they would be hopelessly at sea if they were called upon to fight like
English regulars. Most likely the enemy will attack us in the forest,
and what good will forming in line, or wheeling on a flank, or any of
the things which the general is trying to drum into their heads, do to
them? If the French are foolish enough to wait at Fort Duquesne until
we arrive, I have no doubt we shall beat them, but if they attack us in
the woods it will go hard with us."
During the ten days which elapsed between his arrival and the start,
James was kept hard at work, being for the most part employed galloping
up and down the road, urging up the waggoners, and bringing back
reports as to their position and progress. On the 10th of June the army
started; 300 axemen led the way, cutting and clearing the road; the
long train of pack horses, waggons, and cannon followed; the troops
marched in the forest on either side, while men were thrown out on the
flanks, and scouts ranged the woods to guard against surprise.
The road was cut but twelve feet wide, and the line of march often
extended four miles. Thus, day by day they toiled on, crossing the
Allegheny Mountains, range after range; now plunging down into a
ravine, now ascending a ridge, but always in the deep shadow of the
forest. A few of the enemy hovered round them, occasionally killing a
straggler who fell behind.
On the 18th of June, the army reached a place called the Little
Meadows. So weak were the horses, from want of forage, that the last
marches had been but three miles a day, and, upon Washington's advice,
Braddock determined to leave the heavy baggage here, with the sick men
and a strong guard under Colonel Dunbar; while he advanced with 1200
men, besides officers and drivers.
But the progress was still no more than three miles a day, and it was
not until the 7th of July that they arrived within eight miles of the
French fort. Between them lay, however, an extremely difficult country
with a narrow defile, and Braddock determined to ford the Monongahela,
and then cross it again lower down.
The garrison of Fort Duquesne consisted of a few companies of regular
troops, some hundreds of Canadians, and 800 Indian warriors. They were
kept informed, by the scouts, of the progress of the English, and, when
the latter approached the Monongahela, a party under Captain Beaujeu
set out to meet them. His force consisted of 637 Indians, 100 French
officers and soldiers, and 146 Canadians, in all about 900 men.
At one o'clock in the day, Braddock crossed the Monongahela for the
second time. The troops had, all the day, been expecting the attack and
had prepared for it. At the second ford the army marched in martial
order, with music playing and flags flying. Once across the river they
halted for a short time, and then again continued their advance.
Braddock made every disposition for preventing a surprise. Several
guides, with six Virginian light horsemen, led the way. Then came the
advanced column, consisting of 300 soldiers under Gage, and a large
body of axemen, under Sir John Sinclair, with two cannon. The main body
followed close behind. The artillery and waggons moved along the road,
the troops marched through the woods on either hand, numerous flanking
parties were thrown out a hundred yards or more right and left, and, in
the space between them and the line of troops, the pack horses and
cattle made their way, as they best could, among the trees.
Beaujeu had intended to place his men in ambuscade at the ford, but,
owing to various delays caused by the Indians, he was still a mile away
from the ford when the British crossed. He was marching forward when he
came suddenly upon the little party of guides and Virginian light
horsemen. These at once fell back. The Indians raised their war whoop,
and, spreading right and left among the trees, opened a sharp fire upon
the British.
Gage's column wheeled deliberately into line, and fired volley after
volley, with great steadiness, at the invisible opponents. The greater
part of the Canadians bolted at once, but the Indians kept up their
fire from behind the shelter of the trees. Gage brought up his two
cannon and opened fire, and the Indians, who had a horror of artillery,
began also to fall back.
The English advanced in regular lines, cheering loudly. Beaujeu fell
dead; but Captain Dumas, who succeeded him in command, advanced at the
head of his small party of French soldiers, and opened a heavy fire.
The Indians, encouraged by the example, rallied and again came forward,
and, while the French regulars and the few Canadians who had not fled
held the ground in front of the column, the Indians swarmed through the
forests along both flanks of the English, and from behind trees,
bushes, and rocks opened a withering fire upon them. The troops,
bewildered and amazed by the fire poured into them by an invisible foe,
and by the wild war whoops of the Indians, ceased to advance, and,
standing close together, poured fruitlessly volley after volley into
the surrounding forest.
On hearing the firing, Braddock, leaving 400 men in the rear under Sir
Peter Halket, to guard the baggage, advanced with the main body to
support Gage; but, just as he came up, the soldiers, appalled by the
fire which was mowing them down in scores, abandoned their cannon and
fell back in confusion. This threw the advancing force into disorder,
and the two regiments became mixed together, massed in several dense
bodies within a small space of ground, facing some one way and some
another, all alike exposed, without shelter, to the hail of bullets.
Men and officers were alike new to warfare like this. They had been
taught to fight in line against solid masses of the enemy, and against
an invisible foe like the present they were helpless. The Virginians
alone were equal to the emergency. They at once adopted their familiar
forest tactics, and, taking their post behind trees, began to fight the
Indians in their own way.
Had Braddock been a man of judgment and temper, the fortunes of the day
might yet have been retrieved, for the Virginians could have checked
the Indians until the English troops were rallied and prepared to meet
the difficulty; but, to Braddock, the idea of men fighting behind trees
was at once cowardly and opposed to all military discipline, and he
dashed forward on his horse, and with fierce oaths ordered the
Virginians to form line. A body of them, however, under Captain
Waggoner, made a dash for a huge fallen tree, far out towards the
lurking places of the Indians, and, crouching behind it, opened fire
upon them; but the regulars, seeing the smoke among the bushes, took
them for the enemy and, firing, killed many and forced the rest to
return.
A few of the soldiers tried to imitate the Indians, and fight behind
the trees, but Braddock beat them back with the flat of his sword, and
forced them to stand with the others, who were now huddled in a mass,
forming a target for the enemy's bullets. Lieutenant Colonel Burton led
100 of them towards a knoll from which the puffs came thickest, but he
fell wounded, and his men, on whom the enemy instantly concentrated
their fire, fell back. The soldiers, powerless against the unseen foe,
for afterwards some of the officers and men who escaped declared that,
throughout the whole fight, they had not seen a single Indian,
discharged their guns aimlessly among the trees.
They were half stupefied now with the terror and confusion of the
scene, the rain of bullets, the wild yells which burst ceaselessly from
their 600 savage foemen; while the horses, wild with terror and wounds,
added to the confusion by dashing madly hither and thither. Braddock
behaved with furious intrepidity. He dashed hither and thither,
shouting and storming at the men, and striving to get them in order,
and to lead them to attack the enemy. Four horses were, one after the
other, shot under him. His officers behaved with equal courage and self
devotion, and in vain attempted to lead on the men, sometimes advancing
in parties towards the Indians, in hopes that the soldiers would follow
them. Sir Peter Halket was killed, Horne and Morris, the two
aides-de-camp, Sinclair the quartermaster general, Gates, Gage, and
Gladwin were wounded. Of 86 officers, 63 were killed or disabled, while
of non-commissioned officers and privates only 459 came off unharmed.
James Walsham had been riding by the side of Washington when the fight
began, and followed him closely as he galloped among the troops, trying
to rally and lead them forward. Washington's horse was pierced by a
ball and, staggering, fell. James leaped from his horse and gave it to
the colonel, and then, seeing that there was nothing for him to do,
withdrew a short distance from the crowd of soldiers, and crouched down
between the trunks of two great trees growing close to each other; one
of which protected him, for the most part, from the fire of the
Indians, and the other from the not less dangerous fire of the English.
Presently, seeing a soldier fall at a short distance from him, he ran
out and picked up his musket and cartridge box, and began to fire at
the bushes where the puffs of smoke showed that men were in hiding.
After three hours' passive endurance of this terrible fire, Braddock,
seeing that all was lost, commanded a retreat, and he and such officers
as were left strove to draw off the soldiers in some semblance of
order; but at this moment a bullet struck him, and, passing through his
arm, penetrated his lungs, and he fell from his horse. He demanded to
be left where he lay, but Captain Stewart of the Virginians, and one of
his men, bore him between them to the rear.
The soldiers had now spent all their ammunition, and, no longer kept in
their places by their general, broke away in a wild panic. Washington's
second horse had now been shot, and as, trying to check the men, he
passed the trees where James had taken up his position, the latter
joined him.
In vain Washington and his other officers tried to rally the men at the
ford. They dashed across it, wild with fear, leaving their wounded
comrades, cannon, baggage, and military chest a prey to the Indians.
Fortunately, only about fifty of the Indians followed as far as the
ford, the rest being occupied in killing the wounded and scalping the
dead. Dumas, who had now but twenty Frenchmen left, fell back to the
fort, and the remnants of Braddock's force continued the flight
unmolested.