Canal Voyage to Fort Edward. Scene on Board. Fort Edward. National Debt of England. merged, the river having been made deeper by the dam; but when the water is limpid they can be plainly seen. It was twilight before we reached the village on the eastern shore We supped and repaired to the packet office, where we waited until nine o'clock in the evening before the shrill notes of a tin horn brayed out the annunciation of a packet near. Its deck was covered with passengers, for the interesting ceremony of converting the diningroom into a dormitory, or swinging the hammocks or berths and selecting their occupants, had commenced, and all were driven out, much to their own comfort, but, strange to say, to the dissatisfaction of many who lazily preferred a sweltering lounge in the cabin to the delights of fresh air and the bright starlight. Having no interest in the scramble for beds, we enjoyed the evening breeze and the excitement of the tiny tumult. My companion, fearing the exhalations upon the night air, did indeed finally seek shelter in one end of the cabin, but was driven, with two other young ladies, into the captain's state-room, to allow the "hands" to have full play in making the beds. Imprisoned against their will, the ladies made prompt restitution to themselves by drawing the cork of a bottle of sarsaparilla and sipping its contents, greatly to the consternation of a meek old dame, the mother of one of the girls, who was sure it was " bed-bug pizen, or something a pesky sight worse." We landed at Fort Edward at midnight, and took lodgings at a small but tidily-kept tavern close by the canal. 1 Fort Edward was a military post of considerable im portance during the French and Indian wars and the Revolution. The locality, previous to the erection of the fortress, was called the first carrying-place, being the first and nearest point on the Hudson where the troops, stores, &c., were landed while passing to or from the south end of Lake Champlain, a distance of about twenty-five miles. The fort was built in 1755, when six thousand troops were collected there, under General Lyman, waiting the arrival of General Johnson, the com mander-in-chief of an expedition against Ticonderoga and Crown Point. It was at first called Fort Lyman, in honor of the general who superintended its erection. It 1 I refer particularly to the war between England and France, commonly called, in Europe, the Seven Years' War. It was declared on the 9th of June, 1756, and ended with the treaty at Paris, concluded and signed February 10th, 1763. It extended to the colonies of the two nations in America, and was carried on with much vigor here until the victory of Wolfe at Quebec, in 1759, and the entire subjugation of Canada by the English. The French managed to enlist a large proportion of the Indian tribes in their favor, who were allied with them against the Britons. It is for that reason that the section of the Seven Years' War in America was called by the colonists the "French and Indian War." I would here mention incidentally that that war cost Great Britain five hundred and sixty millions of dollars, and laid one of the largest foundation stones of that national debt under which she now groans. It was twenty millions in the reign of William and Mary, in 1697, and was then thought to be enormous; in 1840 it was about four thousand millions of dollars! 2 EXPLANATION: aa aa aa, six cannons; A, the barracks; B, the store-house; C, the hospital; D, the magazine; E, a flanker; F, a bridge across Fort Edward Creek; and G, a balm of Gilead tree which then overshadowed the massive water-gate. That tree is still standing, a majestic relic of the past, amid the surrounding changes in nature and art. It is directly upon the high bank of the Hudson, and its branches. heavily foliated when I was there, spread very high and wide. At the union below its three trunks it measures more than twenty feet in circumference. BALM OF GILEAD AT FORT EDWARD Daring Feat of Putnam at Fort Edward. Jane M'Crea Tree. Sir William Johnson and his Title. Fortifications. was built of logs and earth, sixteen feet high and twenty-two feet thick, and stood at the junction of Fort Edward Creek and the Hudson River. From the creek, around the fort to the river, was a deep fosse or ditch, designated in the engraving by the dark dotted part outside of the black lines. There are still very prominent traces of the banks and fosse of the fort, but the growing village will soon spread over and obliterate them forever. Already a garden was within the lines; and the old parade-ground, wherein Sir William Johnson strutted in the haughty pride of a victor by accident,' was desecrated by beds of beets, parsley, radishes, and onions Fort Edward was the theater of another daring achievement by Putnam. In the winter of 1756 the barracks, then near the northwestern bastion, took fire. The magazine was only twelve feet distant, and contained three hundred barrels of gunpowder. Attempts were made to batter the barracks to the ground with heavy cannons, but without success. Putnam, who was stationed upon Rogers's Island, in the Hudson, opposite the fort, hurried thither, and, taking his station on the roof of the barracks, ordered a line of soldiers to hand him water. But, despite his efforts, the flames raged and approached nearer and nearer to the magazine. The commandant, Colonel Haviland, seeing his danger, ordered him down; but the brave major did not leave his perilous post until the fabric began to totter. He then leaped to the ground, placed himself between the falling building and the magazine, and poured on water with all his might. The external planks of the magazine were consumed, and there was only a thin partition between the flames and the powder. But Putnam succeeded in subduing the flames and saving the ammunition. His hands and face were dreadfully burned, his whole body was more or less blistered, and it was several weeks before he recovered from the effects of his daring conflict with the fire. The first place of historic interest that we visited at Fort Edward was the venerable and blasted pine tree near which, tradition asserts, the unfortunate Jane M Crea lost her life while General Burgoyne had his encampment near Sandy Hill. It stands upon the west side of the road leading from Fort Edward to Sandy Hill, and about half a mile from the canal-lock in the former village. The tree had exhibited unaccountable signs of decadence for several years, and when we visited it, it was sapless and bare. Its top was torn off by a November gale, and almost every breeze diminishes its size by scattering its decayed twigs. The trunk is about five feet in diameter, and upon the bark is engraved, in bold letters, JANE M CREA, 1777. The names of many ambitious visitors are intaglioed upon it, and reminded me of the line " Run, run, Orlando, carve on every tree." I carefully sketched all its branches, and the engraving is a faithful portraiture of the interesting relic, as viewed from the opposite side of the road. In a few years this tree, around which history and romance have clustered so many associations, will crumble and pass away forever.2 The sad story of the unfortunate girl is so interwoven in our history that it has become a component part; but it is told with so many variations, in essential and non-essential par 1 Sir William Johnson had command of the English forces in 1755, destined to act against Crown Point He was not remarkable for courage or activity. He was attacked at the south end of Lake George by the French general, Deiskau, and was wounded at the outset. The command then devolved on Major-general Lyman, of the Connecticut troops, who, by his skill and bravery, secured a victory over the French and Indians. General Johnson, however, had the honor and reward thereof. In his mean jealousy he gave General Lyman no praise; and the British king (George II.) made him a baronet, and a present of twenty thousand dollars to give the title becoming dignity. NOTE.—As I shall have frequent occasion to employ technical terms used in fortifications, I here give a diagram, which, with the explanation, will make those terms clear to the reader. The figure is a vertical section of a fortification. The mass of earth, a b c d e f g h, forms the rampart with its parapet; a b is the interior slope of the rampart; b c is the terre-plein of the ram. part, on which the troops and cannon are placed; de is the banquette, or step, on which the soldiers mount to fire over the parapet; efg is the parapet; g h is the exterior slope of the parapet; hi is the revêtment, or wall of masonry, supporting the rampart; hk, the exterior front covered with the revetment, is called the escarp; i k l m is the ditch; I m is the counterscarp; m n is the covered way, having a banquette nop; sr is the glacis. When there are two ditches, the works between the inner and the outer ditch are called ravelins, and all outside of the ditches, outworks.-Sce Brande's Cyc., art. Fortification. .. ? It was cut down in 1853, and converted into canes, boxes, &c. The Fort Edward Romance. Mrs. M'Neil and her Grand-daughter. Narrative of the latter ticulars, that much of the narratives we have is evidently pure fiction; a simple tale of In dian abduction, resulting in death, having its counterpart in a hundred like occurrences, has been garnished with all the high coloring of a romantic love story. It seems a pity to spoil the romance of the matter, but truth always makes sad havoc with the frost-work of the imagination, and sternly demands the homage of the historian's pen. All accounts agree that Miss McCrea was staying at the house of a Mrs. M'Neil, near the fort, at the time of the tragedy. A granddaughter of Mrs. McNeil (Mrs. 1848. F-n) is now living at Fort Edward, and from her I received a minute account of the whole transaction, as she had heard it a "thousand times" from her grandmother. She is a woman of remarkable intelligence, about sixty years old. When I was at Fort Edward she was on a visit with her sister at Glenn's Falls. It had been my intention to go direct to Whitehall, on Lake Champlain, by way of Fort Ann, but the traditionary accounts in the neigh JANE M'CREA TREE, FORT EDWARD. borhood of the event in question were so contradictory of the books, and I received such assurances that perfect reliance might be placed upon the statements of Mrs. F-n, that, anxious to ascertain the truth of the matter, if possible, we went to Lake Champlain by way of Glenn's Falls and Lake George. After considerable search at the falls, I found Mrs. F-n, and the following is her relation of the tragedy at Fort Edward. Jane M Crea was the daughter of a Scotch Presbyterian clergyman of Jersey City, oppo site New York; and while Mrs. M'Neil (then the wife of a former husband named Campbell) was a resident of New York City, an acquaintance and intimacy had grown up between Jenny and her daughter. After the death of Campbell (which occurred at sea) Mrs. Campbell married M'Neil. He, too, was lost at sea, and she removed with her family to an estate G Residence of Jane M'Crea at Fort Edward. Her Betrothal. Abduction of Mrs. M'Neil and Jane. owned by him at Fort Edward. Mr. McCrea, who was a widower, died, and Jane went to live with her brother near Fort Edward, where the intimacy of former years with Mrs. M Neil and her daughter was renewed, and Jane spent much of her time at Mrs. M'Neil's house. Near her brother's lived a family named Jones, consisting of a widow and six sons, and between Jenny and David Jones, a gay young man, a feeling of friendship budded and ripened into reciprocal love. When the war broke out the Joneses took the royal side of the question, and David and his brother Jonathan went to Canada in the autumn of 1776. They raised a company of about sixty men, under pretext of re-enforcing the American garrison at Ticonderoga, but they went further down the lake and joined the British garrison at Crown Point. When Burgoyne collected his forces at St. John's, at the foot of Lake Champlain, David and Jonathan Jones were among them. Jonathan was made captain and David a lieutenant in the division under General Fraser, and at the time in question they were with the British army near Sandy Hill. Thus far all accounts nearly agree. The brother of Jenny was a Whig, and prepared to move to Albany; but Mrs. McNeil, who was a cousin of General Fraser (killed at Stillwater), was a stanch loyalist, and intended to remain at Fort Edward. When the British were near, Jenny was at Mrs. M'Neil's, and lingered there even after repeated solicitations from her brother to return to his house, five miles further down the river, to be ready to flee when necessity should compel. A faint hope that she might meet her lover doubtless was the secret of her tarrying. At last her June 1, 1777. Mrs. M'Neil's daughter, the young friend of Jenny, and mother of my informant, was with some friends in Argyle, and the family consisted of only the widow and Jenny, two small children, and a black female servant. As usual at that time, the kitchen stood a few feet from the house; and when the alarm was given the black woman snatched up the children, fled to the kitchen, and retreated through a trap-door to the cellar. Mrs. McNeil and Jenny followed, but the former being aged and very corpulent, and the latter young and agile, Jenny reached the trap-door first. Before Mrs. M'Neil could fully descend, the Indians were in the house, and a powerful savage seized her by the hair and dragged her up. Another went into the cellar and brought out Jenny, but the black face of the negro woman was not seen in the dark, and she and the children remained unharmed. With the two women the savages started off, on the road toward Sandy Hill, for Burgoyne's camp; and when they came to the foot of the ascent on which the pine tree stands, where the road forked, they caught two horses that were grazing, and attempted to place their prisoners upon them. Mrs. M'Neil was too heavy to be lifted on the horse easily, and as she signified by signs that she could not ride, two stout Indians took her by the arms and hurried her up the road over the hill, while the others, with Jenny on the horse, went along the road running west of the tree. The negro boy who ran to the fort gave the alarm, and a small detachment was imme 1 Bateaux were rudely constructed of logs and planks, broad and without a keel. They had small draught, and would carry large loads in quite shallow water. In still water and against currents they were propelled by long driving-poles. The ferry-scows or flats on the southern and western rivers are very much like the old bateaux. They were sometimes furnished with a mast for lakes and other deep water, and had cabins erected on them. Traces of this cellar and of the foundation of the house are still visible in the garden of Dr. Norton. in Fort Edward village, who is a relative of the family by marriage. Flight of the Indians toward Sandy Hill. Treatment of Mrs. M'Neil. Indian Account of the Death of Jane. The Spring. diately sent out to effect a rescue. They fired several volleys at the Indians, but the savages escaped unharmed. Mrs. McNeil said that the Indians, who were hurrying her up the hill, seemed to watch the flash of the guns, and several times they threw her upon her face, at the same time falling down themselves, and she distinctly heard the balls whistle above them. When they got above the second hill from the village the firing ceased; they then stopped, stripped her of all her garments except her chemise, and in that plight led her into the British camp. There she met her kinsman, General Fraser, and reproached him bitterly for sending his "scoundrel Indians" after her. He denied all knowledge of her being away from the city of New York, and took every pains to make her comfortable. She was so large that not a woman in camp had a gown big enough for her, so Fraser lent her his camp-coat for a garment, and a pocket-handkerchief as a substitute for her stolen cap. Very soon after Mrs. McNeil was taken into the British camp, two parties of Indians arrived with scalps. She at once recognised the long glossy hair of Jenny,' and, though shuddering with horror, boldly charged the savages with her murder, which they stoutly denied. THE SPRING.3 Sure They averred that, while hurrying her along the road on and already on horseback, might have been carried off with far greater ease. It was known in camp that Lieutenant Jones was betrothed to Jenny, and the story got abroad that he had sent the Indians for her, that they quarreled on the way respecting the reward he had offered, and murdered her to settle the dispute. Receiving high touches of coloring as it went from one narrator to another, the sad story became a tale of darkest horror, and produced a deep and wide-spread indignation. This was heightened by September 2, a published letter from Gates to Burgoyne, charging him with allowing the In 1777.. It was of extraordinary length and beauty, measuring a yard and a quarter. She was then about twenty years old, and a very lovely girl; not lovely in beauty of face, according to the common standard of beauty, but so lovely in disposition, so graceful in manners, and so intelligent in features, that she was a favorite of all who knew her. "I positively forbid bloodshed when you are not opposed in arms. Aged men, women, children, and prisoners must be held sacred from the knife and hatchet, even in the time of actual conflict. You shall receive compensation for the prisoners you take, but you shall be called to account for scalps. In conformity and indulgence of your customs, which have affixed an idea of honor to such badges of victory, you shall be allowed to take the scalps of the dead when killed by your fire and in fair opposition; but on no account, or pretense, or subtilty, or prevarication are they to be taken from the wounded, or even the dying; and still less pardonable, if possible, will it be held to kill men in that condition on purpose, and upon a supposition that this protection to the wounded would be thereby evaded."-Extract from the Speech of Burgoyne to the Indians assembled upon the Bouquet River, June 21, 1777. This is a view of a living spring, a few feet below the noted pine tree, the lower portion of which is seen near the top of the engraving. The spring is beside the old road, traces of which may be seen. |