Abbildungen der Seite
PDF
EPUB

1756.]

HIS PLANS AND SUGGESTIONS.

169

are the most stealthy and patient of spies and lurkers; will lie in wait for days together about small forts of the kind, and if they find, by some chance prisoner, that the garrison is actually weak, will first surprise and cut off its scouting parties, and then attack the fort itself. It was evident, therefore, observed he, that, to garrison properly such a line of forts, would require at least two thousand men. And, even then, a line of such extent might be broken through at one end before the other end could yield assistance. Feigned attacks, also, might be made at one point, while the real attack was made at another quite distant; and the country be overrun before its widely-posted defenders could be alarmed and concentrated. Then must be taken into consideration the immense cost of building so many forts, and the constant and consuming expense of supplies and transportation.

His idea of a defensive plan was to build a strong fort at Winchester, the central point, where all the main roads met, of a wide range of scattered settlements, where tidings could soonest be collected from every quarter, and whence reinforcements and supplies could most readily be forwarded. It was to be a grand deposit of military stores, a residence for commanding officers, a place of refuge for the women and children in time of alarm, when the men had suddenly to take the field; in a word, it was to be the citadel of the frontier.

Beside this, he would have three or four large fortresses erected at convenient distances upon the frontiers, with powerful garrisons, so as to be able to throw out, in constant succession, strong scouting parties to range the country. Fort Cumberland he condemned as being out of the province, and out of the track of Indian incursion; insomuch that it seldom received an alarm until all the mischief had been effected.

His representations with respect to military laws and regulations were equally cogent. In the late act of the Assembly for raising a regiment, it was provided that, in cases of emergency, if recruits should not offer in sufficient number, the militia might be drafted to supply the deficiencies, but only to serve until December, and not to be marched out of the province. In this case, said he, before

they have entered upon service, or got the least smattering of duty, they will claim their discharge; if they are pursuing an enemy who has committed the most unheard-of cruelties, he has only to step across the Potomac and he is safe. Then as to the limits of service, they might just as easily have been enlisted for seventeen months as seven. They would then have been seasoned as well as disciplined; "for we find by experience," says he, "that our poor ragged soldiers would kill the most active militia in five days' marching."

Then, as to punishments: death, it was true, had been decreed for mutiny and desertion; but there was no punishment for cowardice, for holding correspondence with the enemy, for quitting or sleeping on one's post-all capital offences, according to the military codes of Europe. Neither were there provisions for quartering or billeting solders, or impressing waggons and other conveyances, in times of exigency. To crown all, no court-martial could sit out of Virginia a most embarrassing regulation when troops were fifty or a hundred miles beyond the frontier. He earnestly suggested amendments on all these points, as well as with regard to the soldiers' pay, which was less than that of the regular troops or the troops of most of the other provinces.

All these suggestions, showing, at this youthful age, that forethought and circumspection which distinguished him throughout life, were repeatedly and eloquently urged upon Governor Dinwiddie with very little effect. The plan of a frontier line with twenty-three forts was persisted in. Fort Cumberland was pertinaciously kept up at a great and useless expense of men and money, and the militia laws remained lax and inefficient. It was decreed, however, that the great central fort at Winchester, recommended by Washington, should be erected.

In the height of the alarm a company of one hundred gentlemen, mounted and equipped, volunteered their services to repair to the frontier. They were headed by Peyton Randolph, attorney-general, a man deservedly popular throughout the province. Their offer was gladly accepted. They were denominated the "Gentlemen Associators," and great expectations, of course, were enter

1756.]

THE GENTLEMEN ASSOCIATORS.

171

tained from their gallantry and devotion. They were empowered, also, to aid with their judgment in the selection of places for frontier forts.

66

The Gentlemen Associators," like all gentlemen associators in similar emergencies, turned out with great zeal and spirit, and immense popular effect, but wasted their fire in preparation and on the march. Washington, who well understood the value of such aid, observed dryly in a letter to Governor Dinwiddie, "I am heartily glad that you have fixed upon these gentlemen to point out the places for erecting forts, but regret to find their motions so slow." There is no doubt that they would have conducted themselves gallantly had they been put to the test, but before they arrived near the scene of danger the alarm was over. About the beginning of May, scouts brought in word that the tracks of the marauding savages tended toward Fort Duquesne, as if on the return. In a little while it was ascertained that they had recrossed the Allegany Mountain to the Ohio, in such numbers as to leave a beaten track equal to that made in the preceding year by the army of Braddock.

The repeated inroads of the savages called for an effectual and permanent check. The idea of being constantly subject to the irruptions of a deadly foe, that moved with stealth and mystery, and was only to be traced by its ravages, and counted by its footprints, discouraged all settlement of the country. The beautiful valley of the Shenandoah was fast becoming a deserted and a silent place. Her people, for the most part, had fled to the older settlements south of the mountains, and the Blue Ridge was likely soon to become virtually the frontier line of the province.

We have to record one signal act of retaliation on the perfidious tribes of the Ohio, in which a person whose name subsequently became dear to Americans was concerned. Prisoners who had escaped from the savages reported that Shingis, Washington's faithless ally, and another sachem, called Captain Jacobs, were the two heads of the hostile bands that had desolated the frontier. That they lived at Kittanning, an Indian town, about twenty miles above Fort Duquesne; at which their warriors were

fitted out for incursions, and whither they returned with their prisoners and plunder. Captain Jacobs was a daring fellow, and scoffed at palisadoed forts. He could take

66

any fort," he said, "that would catch fire.”

A party of two hundred and eighty provincials, resolute men, undertook to surprise and destroy this savage nest. It was commanded by Colonel John Armstrong; and with him went Dr., now Captain Hugh Mercer, eager to revenge the savage atrocities of which he had been a witness at the defeat of Braddock.

Armstrong led his men rapidly, but secretly, over mountain and through forest, until, after a long and perilous march, they reached the Ohio. It was a moonlight night when they arrived in the neighbourhood of Kittanning. They were guided to the village by whoops and yells, and the sound of the Indian drum. The warriors were celebrating their exploits by the triumphant scalp-dance, After a while the revel ceased, and a number of fires appeared here and there in a corn-field. They were made by such of the Indians as slept in the open air, and were intended to drive off the gnats. Armstrong and his men lay down " quiet and hush," observing everything narrowly, and waiting until the moon should set, and the warriors be asleep. At length the moon went down, the fires burned low, all was quiet. Armstrong now roused his men, some of whom, wearied by their long march, had fallen asleep. He divided his forces; part were to attack the warriors in the corn-field, part were despatched to the houses, which were dimly seen by the first streak of day. There was sharp firing in both quarters, for the Indians, though taken by surprise, fought bravely, inspired by the war-whoop of their chief, Captain Jacobs. The women and children fled to the woods. Several of the provincials were killed and wounded. Captain Hugh Mercer received a wound in the arm, and was taken to the top of a hill. The fierce chieftain, Captain Jacobs, was besieged in his house, which had port-holes, whence he and his warriors made havoc among his assailants. The adjoining houses were set on fire. The chief was summoned to surrender himself. He replied he was a man, and would not be a prisoner. He was told he would be burnt. His reply was, "he would kill four or

1756.]

DESTRUCTION OF THE SAVAGES.

173

five before he died." The flames and smoke approached. "One of the besieged warriors, to show his manhood, began to sing. A squaw at the same time was heard to cry, but was severely rebuked by the men."1

66

In the end, the warriors were driven out by the flames; some escaped, and some were shot. Among the latter was Captain Jacobs, and his gigantic son, said to be seven feet high. Fire was now set to all the houses, thirty in number. "During the burning of the houses," says Colonel Armstrong, we were agreeably entertained with a quick succession of charged guns, gradually firing off as reached by the fire, but much more so with the vast explosion of sundry bags and large kegs of powder, wherewith almost every house abounded." The colonel was in a strange condition to enjoy such an entertainment, having received a wound from a large musket-ball in the shoulder.

The object of the expedition was accomplished. Thirty or forty of the warriors were slain, their stronghold was a smoking ruin. There was danger of the victors being cut off by a detachment from Fort Duquesne. They made the best of their way, therefore, to their horses, which had been left at a distance, and set off rapidly on their march homewards.

Captain Hugh Mercer was again left behind wounded. He had another long, solitary, and painful struggle through the wilderness, and again reached Fort Cumberland sick, weary, and half famished. Heaven reserved him to illustrate a more distinguished page in American history.

CHAPTER XXI.

Founding of Fort Loudoun-Washington's Tour of Inspection-Inefficiency of the Militia System-Gentlemen Soldiers-Cross-Purposes with Dinwiddie-Military Affairs in the North-Delays of Lord Loudoun-Activity of Montcalm-Loudoun in Winter Quarters. THROUGHOUT the summer of 1756, Washington exerted himself diligently in carrying out measures determined upon for frontier security. The great fortress at Winchester was 1 Letter from Col. Armstrong.

* Colonial Register, vii., 257.

« ZurückWeiter »