the garrison, left the fort, taking such baggage as they could carry, and transporting the wounded upon their backs. The Indians, contrary to the stipulation, annoyed them exceedingly, and pilfered their baggage. After a toilsome march, they at length arrived at Wills' creek, where they found rest and refreshment."

From thence Washington proceeded to Williamsburg, and communicated the events of the campaign to Governor Dinwiddie.

As soon as the House of Burgesses assembled, they passed a vote of thanks to Col. Washington and his officers, for their bravery and gallant conduct. Thus ended the first campaign of Washington. "Although as yet a mere youth, with small experience, unskilled in war, and relying on his own resources, he had behaved with the prudence, address, courage, and firmness of a veteran commander. Rigid in discipline, but sharing the hardships, and solicitous for the welfare of his soldiers, he had secured their obedience and won their esteem, amidst privations, sufferings, and perils, that have seldom been surpassed."

Gov. Dinwiddie resolved to prosecute the war, but being wholly ignorant of military affairs, his preliminary measures, in undertaking to organize an army, were injudicious. In August, he wrote to Washington, who was at Winchester, to fill up the companies of his regiment by enlistment, and lead them without delay to Wills' creek, where Col. Innes, with some troops from the Carolinas and New York, were building Fort Cumberland. From thence, it was the governor's project that the united forces should immediately cross the Alleganies and drive the French from Fort Duquesne, or build another fort beyond the mountains. Washington, astonished at the absurdity of the scheme, contemplated at a season when the mountains would be covered with snow, and the army enfeebled and destitute of supplies, made such a strong remonstrance that the project was abandoned.

The governor was opposed by the assembly, who would not yield to all his demands, and he never ceased to complain of their " republican way of thinking." He had lately prorogued them, to punish their obstinacy, and wrote to the ministry that he was satisfied the French would never be effectually opposed unless the colonies were compelled, independently of assemblies, to contribute to the common cause. When the Burgesses again met, they contributed £20,000 for the public service, which was soon increased to £30,000 by specie sent from England.

In possession of funds, the governor now enlarged the army to ten companies of 100 men each, and placed them upon the establishment of independent companies, by which the highest officers in the Virginia regiment, among whom was Washington, would be dinary, had escaped from Quebec, and were passing the causeway leading from the city, at the moment that the governor of Canada was airing in his carriage. Stobo succeeded in effecting his escape; but Vanbraam, fainting with fatigue and hunger, and despairing of being able to effect his escape, called out to the governor from beneath the arch of the causeway, where he concealed himself, and desired to surrender. The governor received him in his carriage, and remanded him to prison, but without any extraordinary severity. Even these facts were not unknown to Mr. Dinwiddie; yet, without being touched by so generous an example, he persisted in his unjustifiable rigor towards La Force."

captains. He thereupon resigned his commission and retired from the service.

Early in the ensuing spring, (1755,) Major-Gen. Edward Braddock arrived in the country with the 44th and 48th regiments of royal troops, under Sir Peter Halkett and Col. Dunbar. The people seemed elated with joy, and in their imagination the intruding French seemed about to be driven back like a torrent upon the frontiers of Canada. Col. Washington, who now was to take an active part in the fearful scenes to be enacted, accepted the appointment of aid-de-camp to Gen. Braddock. At Wills' Creek, (Fort Cumberland,) the royal forces were joined by about 1000 Virginians, but the army was detained for want of horses, wagons, and forage. By the energy of Dr. Franklin, then postmaster-general of the provinces, the deficiency was supplied. The army moved at length on the 8th and 9th of June, but soon found themselves so encumbered with baggage and wagons, that it was determined, at the suggestion of Washington, to divide the force, pushing forward a small, but chosen band, with such artillery and light stores as were necessary, leaving the heavy artillery, baggage, &c., to follow by slow and easy marches.

The general, with 1,200 chosen men, and Sir Peter Halkett, as brigadier, Lieut. Col. Gage, (afterwards Gen. Gage,) Lieut. Col. Burton, and Major Sparks, went forward, leaving Col. Dunbar to follow with the remainder of the troops and baggage. Col. Washington, who had been very ill with a fever, was left in charge of Col. Dunbar, but with a promise from Gen. Braddock that he should be brought up with the advanced corps before they reached Fort Duquesne. He joined it at the mouth of the Yough'ogheny, on the 8th July. On the 9th, the day of Braddock's defeat, he says, "I attended the general on horseback, though very low and weak. The army crossed to the left bank of the Monongahela, a little below the mouth of Yough'ogheny, being prevented by rugged hills from continuing along the right bank to the fort."

"Washington was often heard to say during his lifetime, that the most beautiful spectacle he ever beheld was the display of the British troops on this eventful morning.— Every man was neatly dressed in full uniform; the soldiers were arranged in columns and marched in exact order; the sun gleamed from their burnished arms; the river flowed tranquilly on their right, and the deep forest overshadowed them with solemn grandeur on their left. Officers and men were equally inspirited with cheering hopes and confident anticipations."

"In this manner they marched forward until about noon, when they arrived at the second crossing place, ten miles from Fort Duquesne. They halted but a little time, and then began to ford the river and regain its northern bank. As soon as they had crossed they came upon a level plain, elevated only a few feet above the surface of the river, and extending northward nearly half a mile from its margin. Then commenced a gradual ascent at an angle of about three degrees, which terminated in hills of a considerable height at no great distance beyond. The road from the fording place to Fort Duquesne led across the plain and up this ascent, and thence proceeded through an uneven country at that time covered with wood.

"By the order of march, a body of 300 men under Col. Gage made the advanced party, which was immediately followed by another of 200. Next came the general with the columns of artillery, the main body of the army, and the baggage. At one o'clock, the whole had crossed the river, and almost at this moment a sharp firing was heard upon the advanced parties, who were now ascending the hill, and had proceeded about a hundred yards from the termination of the plain. A heavy discharge of musketry was poured in upon their front, which was the first intelligence they had of the proximity of an enemy, and this was suddenly followed by another on the right flank. They were filled with the greater consternation, as no enemy was in sight, and the firing seemed to proceed from an invisible foe. They fired in turn, however, but quite at random, and obviously without effect.

"The general hastened forward to the relief of the advanced parties; but before he could reach the spot which they occupied, they gave way and fell back upon the artillery and the other columns of the army, causing extreme confusion, and striking the whole mass with such a panic that no order could afterwards be restored. The general and the officers behaved with the utmost courage, and used every effort to rally the men, and bring them to order, but all in vain. In this state they continued nearly three hours, huddled together in confused bodies, firing irregularly, shooting down their own officers and men, and doing no perceptible harm to the enemy. The Virginia* provincials were the only troops who seemed to retain their senses, and they behaved with a bravery and resolution worthy of a better fate. They adopted the Indian mode, and fought each man for himself, behind a tree. This was prohibited by the general, who endeavored to form his men into platoons and columns, as if they had been manœuvring on the plains of Flanders. Meantime the French and Indians, concealed in the ravines and behind trees, kept up a deadly and unceasing discharge of musketry, singling out their objects, taking deliberate aim, and producing a carnage almost unparalleled in the annals of modern warfare. The general himself received a mortal wound,† and many of his best officers fell by his side.

During the whole of the action, as reported by an officer who witnessed his conduct, Col. Washington behaved with the greatest courage and resolution.' Captains Orme and Morris, the two other aids-de-camp, were wounded and disabled, and the duty of distributing the general's orders devolved on him alone. He rode in every direction, and was a conspicuous mark for the enemy's sharpshooters. By the all-powerful dispensa

* Washington said-" The Virginia troops showed a good deal of bravery, and were nearly all killed; for, I believe, out of three companies that were there, scarcely 30 men are left alive. Capt. Peyrouny, and all his officers down to a corporal, were killed. Capt. Polson had nearly as hard a fate, for only one of his was left. In short, the dastardly behavior of those they call regulars, exposed all others that were inclined 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 pursued by dogs, and it was impossible to rally them. .. It conjectured, (I believe with much truth,) that two-thirds of our killed and wounded received their shot from our own cowardly regulars, who gathered themselves into a body, contrary to orders, ten or twelve deep-would then level, fire, and shoot down the men before them."

+"There had long existed a tradition that Braddock was killed by one of his own men, and more recent developments leave little or no doubt of the fact. A recent writer says: "When my father was removing with his family to the west, one of the Fausetts kept a public house to the eastward from, and near where Uniontown now stands, as the county seat of Fayette, Penn. This man's house we lodged in about the tenth of October, 1781, twenty-six years and a few months after Braddock's defeat, and there it was made any thing but a secret that one of the family dealt the death-blow to the British general.

"Thirteen years afterwards I met Thomas Fausett in Fayette co., then, as he told me, in his 70th year. To him I put the plain question, and received a plain reply," I did shoot him!" He then went on to insist, that, by doing so, he contributed to save what was left of the army. In brief, in my youth, I never heard the fact either doubted or blamed, that Fausett shot Braddock.'

"Hon. Andrew Stewart, of Uniontown, says he knew, and often conversed with Tom Fausett, who did not hesitate to avow, in the presence of his friends, that he shot Gen. Braddock. Fausett was a man of gigantic frame, of uncivilized half-savage propensities, and spent most of his life among the mountains, as a hermit, living on the game which he killed. He would occasionally come into town, and get drunk. Sometimes he would repel inquiries into the affair of Braddock's death, by putting his fingers to his lips and uttering a sort of buzzing sound; at others, he would burst into tears, and appear greatly agitated by conflicting passions.

"In spite of Braddock's silly order, that the troops should not protect themselves behind trees, Joseph Fausett had taken such a position, when Braddock rode up, in a passion, and struck him down with his sword. Tom Fausett, who was but a short distance from his brother, saw the whole transaction, and immediately drew up his rifle and shot Braddock through the lungs, partly in revenge for the outrage upon his brother, and partly, as he always alleged, to get the general out of the way, and thus save the remainder of the gallant band, who had been sacrificed to his obstinacy, and want of experience in frontier warfare."-Day's Penn.

tions of Providence,' said he, in a letter to his brother, 'I have been protected beyond all human probability or expectation, for I had four bullets through my coat, and two horses shot under me, yet I escaped unhurt, although death was levelling my companions on every side of me.'* So bloody a contest has rarely been witnessed. The number of officers in the engagement was 86, of whom 26 were killed, and 37 were wounded. The killed and wounded of the privates amounted to 714. On the other hand, the enemy's loss was small. Their force amounted, at least, to 850 men, of whom 600 were Indians. According to the returns, not more than 40 were killed. They fought in deep ravines, concealed by the bushes, and the balls of the English passed over their heads.

"The remnant of Braddock's army being put to flight, and having re-crossed the river, Col. Washington hastened to meet Col. Dunbar, and order up horses and wagons for the wounded. Three days were occupied in retreating to Gist's plantation. The enemy did not pursue them. Satiated with carnage and plunder, the Indians could not be tempted from the battle-field, and the French were too few to act without their aid. The unfortunate general, dying of his wounds, was transported first in a tumbril, then on a horse, and at last was carried by the soldiers. He expired the fourth day, and was buried in the road near Fort Necessity. A new panic seized the troops; disorder and confusion reigned; the artillery was destroyed; the public stores and heavy baggage were burnt, no one could tell by whose orders; nor were discipline and tranquillity restored, till the straggling and bewildered companies arrived at Fort Cumberland.

"Such was the termination of an enterprise, one of the most memorable in American history, and almost unparalleled for its disasters and the universal disappointment and consternation it occasioned. Notwithstanding its total and even disgraceful failure, the bitter invectives everywhere poured out against its principal conductors, and the reproaches heaped upon the memory of its ill-fated commander, yet the fame and character of Washington were greatly enhanced by it. It was known that he gave prudent counsel to General Braddock, which was little heeded. During the march, a body of Indians offered their services, which, at the earnest request and recommendation of Washington, were accepted, but in so cold a manner, and the Indians were treated with so much neglect, that they withdrew, one after another, in disgust. On the evening preceding the action, they came again to camp and renewed their offer. Again Col. Washington interposed, and urged the importance of these men as scouts and outguards, their knowledge of the grounds and skill in fighting among woods. Relying on the prowess of his regular troops, and disdaining such allies, the general peremptorily refused to receive them, in a tone not more decided than ungracious. Had a scouting party of a dozen Indians preceded the army after it crossed the Monongahela, they would have detected the enemy in the ravines, and reversed the fortunes of the day."+

After the defeat of Braddock, Col. Dunbar, who succeeded to the command, marched his troops to Philadelphia. The whole frontier, even to the Blue Ridge, was now harassed and horror-stricken by the bloody incursions of the French Indians. Col. Washington, in his capacity as adjutant-general of militia, circulated orders for them to assemble in their respective districts for exercise and review. Volunteer companies were organized, and the martial spirit of the people revived. Addresses were made to them from the pulpit, in one of which, the eloquent Samuel Davies of Hanover, after complimenting the bravery shown by the Virginia troops, added the following encomium, which seems almost

When Washington went to the Ohio, in 1770, to explore wild lands near the mouth of the Kenhawa River, he met an aged Indian chief, who told him, through an interpreter, that during the battle of Braddock's field, he had singled him out as a conspicuous object, fired his rifle at him many times, and directed his young warriors to do the same; but none of his balls took effect. He was then persuaded that the young hero was under the special guardianship of the Great Spirit, and ceased firing at him. He had now come a long way to pay homage to the man who was the particular favorite of heaven, and who could never die in battle.

+ Sparks' Life of Washington, from which much important information relating to this war is inserted in this chapter.

prophetic. "As a remarkable instance of this, I may point out to the public that heroic youth, Col. Washington, whom I cannot but hope Providence has hitherto preserved in so signal a manner for some important service to his country."

In consequence of the desperate state of affairs, Gov. Dinwiddie convened the Assembly on the 4th of August. They voted £40,000 for the public service, and enlarged their regiment to sixteen companies. Money was also granted to Col. Washington and the other officers and privates, " for their gallant behavior and losses," in the late disastrous battle. To Col. Washington was given the command of all the forces raised and to be raised in Virginia, with the unusual privilege of selecting his own field-officers. He now applied himself with his wonted energy to the discharge of the high responsibility conferred upon him. Lieut. Col. Adam Stephens, and Major Andrew Lewis, were the field officers next in rank. Washington's head quarters were at Winchester. After putting affairs in train, he performed a tour of inspection among the mountains, visiting all the outposts in the frontier, from Fort Cumberland to Fort Dinwiddie, on Jackson's river. He then started for Williamsburg, to confer with the governor on the plan of operations, when he was overtaken below Fredericksburg by an express, announcing a new irruption of the savages upon the back settlements. He hastened back, mustered a force, and gave a timely and effectual check to the invaders, but not such as to quiet the fears of the settlers, many of whom, with their families, fled into the lower country, and increased the general terror.

The defects of the militia system were such as to put the patience of Col. Washington to a severe trial. He represented in strong language, to the government of the colony, these defects, and their fatal consequences, and at last prevailed. A new law was passed providing a remedy, but too late in the year for him to undertake offensive operations.

In April of the ensuing year, (1756,) when the Assembly again met at Williamsburg, Col. Washington hastened thither to mature a plan for defence during the summer. Had the several colonies united, the intruding French might have been driven from the Ohio; but local jealousies prevented a union, and Virginia saw that the most strenuous exertions were necessary to defend their long line of frontier. The Assembly determined to augment the army to 1500 men. A bill was passed for drafting militia to supply the deficiency of recruits. Col. Washington returned to Winchester. But a few men were stationed there, most of the regiment being scattered at different posts for the better protection of the frontiers. The enemy, encouraged by the successes of the preceding year, were continually on the alert, and accounts were daily received of fresh massacres by them. Scouting parties, and even forts were attacked, and some of the bravest troops killed. Serious apprehensions were felt for the safety of Winchester. The number of troops was wholly insufficient for the protection of the

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