in that region.' The claims of the real owner, the Indian, were lost sight of These disputes soon ended in action. The territorial question was speedily brought to an issue. In 1749, George the Second granted six hundred thousand acres of land, on the south-east bank of the Ohio River, to a company composed of London merchants and Virginia land speculators, with the exclusive privilege of traffic with the Indians. It was called The Ohio Company. Surveyors were soon sent to explore, and make boundaries, and prepare for settlements; and English traders went even as far as the country of the Miamies' to traffic with the natives. The French regarded them as intruders, and, in 1753, seized and imprisoned some of them. Apprehending the loss of traffic and influence among the Indians, and the ultimate destruction of their line of communication between Canada and Louisiana, the French commenced the erection of forts between the Alleghany River and Lake Erie, near the present western line of Pennsylvania. The Ohio Company complained of these hostile movements; and as their grant lay within the chartered limits of Virginia, the authorities of that colony considered it their duty to interfere. Robert Dinwiddie, the lieutenant-governor, sent a letter of remonstrance to M. De St. Pierre, the French commander. George Washington was chosen to be the bearer of the dispatch. He was a young man, less than twenty-two years of age, but possessed much experience of forest life. He already held the commission of adjutant-general of one of the four militia districts of Virginia. From early youth he had been engaged in land surveying, had become accustomed to the dangers and hardships of the wilderness, and was acquainted with the character of the Indians, and of the country he was called upon to traverse. Young Washington, as events proved, was precisely the instrument needed for such a service. His mission involved much personal peril and hardship. It required the courage of the soldier, and the sagacity of the statesman, to perform the duty properly. The savage tribes through which he had to pass, were hostile to the English, and the French he was sent to meet were national enemies, wily and suspicious. With only two or three attendants, Washington started from Williamsburg late in autumn [Oct. 31, 1753], and after journeying full four hundred miles (more than half the distance through a dark wilderness), encountering almost incredible hardships, amid snow, and icy floods, and hostile Indians, he reached the French outpost at Venango on the 4th of De Page 180. 6 "When the agent of the Ohio Company went into the Indian country, on the borders of the Ohio River, a messenger was sent by two Indian sachems, to make the significant inquiry, “Where is the Indian's land? The English claim it all on one side of the river, the French on the other; where does the Indian's land lay?" 3 Page 19. Twelve hundred men erected a fort on the south shore of Lake Erie, at Presque Isle, now Erie; soon afterward, another was built at Le Boeuf, on the Venango (French Creek), now the village of Waterford; and a third was erected at Venango, at the junction of French Creek and the Alleghany River, now the village of Franklin. Already the governors of Virginia and Pennsylvania had received orders from the imperial government, to repel the French by force, whenever they were "found within the undoubted limits of their province." He was afterward joined by two others at Willis Creek (now Cumberland), in Maryland. cember. He was politely received, and his visit was made the occasion of great conviviality by the officers of the garrison. The free use of wine made the Frenchmen incautious, and they revealed to the sober Washington their hostile designs against the English, which the latter had suspected. He perceived the necessity of dispatching business, and returning to Williamsburg, as speedily as possible; so, after tarrying a day at Venango, he pushed forward to the head-quarters of St. Pierre, at Le Boeuf. That officer entertained him politely during four days, and then gave him a written answer to Dinwiddie's remonstrance, enveloped and sealed. Washington retraced his perilous pathway through the wilderness, and after an absence of eleven weeks, he again stood in the presence of Governor Dinwiddie, on the 16th of January, 1754, his mission fulfilled to the satisfaction of all. His judgment, sagacity, courage, and executive force-qualities which eminently fitted him for the more important duties as chief of the Revolutionary armies, more than twenty years afterward [1775] -were nobly developed in the performance of his mission. They were publicly acknowledged, and were never forgotten. Already the Virginians were restive under royal rule, and at that time were complaining seriously of an obnoxious fee allowed by the Board of Trade, in the issue of patents for lands. The House of Burgesses refused, at first, to pay any attention to Dinwiddie's complaints against the French; but at length they voted fifty thousand dollars for the support of troops which had been enlisted to march into the Ohio country. The revelations made to Washington, and the tenor of St. Pierre's reply, confirmed the suspicions of Dinwiddie, and showed the wisdom of the legislative co-operation. St. Pierre said he was acting in obedience to the orders of his superior, the Marquis Du Quesne,' at Montreal, and refused to withdraw his troops from the disputed territory. Dinwiddie immediately prepared an expedition against the French, and solicited the co-operation of the other colonies. It was the first call for a general colonial union against a common enemy. All hesitated except North Carolina. The legislature of that colony promptly voted four hundred men, and they were soon on the march for Winchester, in Virginia. They eventually proved of little use, for becoming doubtful as to their pay, a greater part of them had disbanded before reaching Winchester. Some volunteers from South Carolina and New York, also hastened toward the seat of future war. The Virginians responded to the call, and a regiment of six hundred men was soon organized, with Colonel Joshua Fry as its commander, and Major Washington as his lieutenant. The troops rendezvoused at Alexandria, and from that city, Washington, at the head of the advanced corps, marched [April 2, 1754] toward the Ohio. Private and public interest went hand in hand. While these military preparations were in progress, the Ohio Company had sent thirty men to construct a fort at the confluence of the Alleghany and Monongahela Rivers, now the site of Pittsburg. They had just commenced operations [April 18], when a party of French and Indians, under Contrecœur, attacked and expelled them, completed Pronounced Du Kane, the fortification, and named it Du Quesne, in honor of the governor-general of Canada. When intelligence of this event reached Washington on his march, he hastened forward with one hundred and fifty men, to a point on the Monongahela, less than forty miles from Fort Du Quesne. There he was informed that a strong force was marching to intercept him, and he cautiously fled back to the Great Meadows, where he erected a stockade,' and called it Fort Necessity. Before completing it, a few of his troops attacked an advanced party of the French, under Jumonville. They were surprised at the dead of night [May 28], and the commander and nine of his men were slain. Of the fifty who formed the French detachment, only about fifteen escaped. This was the first blood-shedding of that long and eventful conflict known as the French and Indian War. Two days afterward [May 30], Colonel Fry died, and the whole command devolved on Washington. Troops hastened forward to join the young leader at Fort Necessity, and with about four hundred men, he proceeded toward Fort Du Quesne. M. de Villiers, brother of the slain Jumonville, had marched at about the same time, at the head of more than a thousand Indians and some Frenchmen, to avenge the death of his kinsman. Advised of his approach, Washington fell back to Fort Necessity, and there, on the 3d of July, he was attacked by almost fifteen hundred foes. After a conflict of about ten hours, de Villiers proposed an honorable capitulation. Washington signed it on the morning of the 4th, and marching out of the stockade with the honors of war, departed, with his troops, for Virginia. It was during this military campaign, that a civil movement of great importance was in progress. The English and French governments had listened to the disputes in America with interest. At length the British ministry, perceiving war to be inevitable, advised the colonies to secure the continued friendship of the SIX NATIONS,' and to unite in a plan for general defense. All the colonies were invited to appoint delegates to meet in convention at Albany, in the summer of 1754. Only seven responded by sending delegates." The convention was organized on the 19th of June. Having renewed a treaty with the Indians, the subject of colonial union was brought forward. A plan of confederation, similar to our Federal Constitution, drawn up by Dr. Franklin, was submitted. It was adopted on the 4th of July, 1754, and was ordered to be laid before the several colonial Assemblies, and the imperial Board of Trade,' 1 Page 182. 2 Stockade is a general name of structures for defense, formed by driving strong posts in the ground, so as to make a safe inclosure. It is the same as a palisade. See picture on page 127. Near the national road from Cumberland to Wheeling, in the south-eastern part of Fayette county, Pennsylvania. The Great Meadows are on a fertile bottom about four miles from the foot of Laurel Hill, and fifty from Cumberland. A mutual restoration of prisoners was to take place, and the English were not to erect any establishment beyond the mountains, for the space of a year. The English troops were to march, unmolested, back to Virginia. Page 25. New Hampshire, Massachusetts, Rhode Island, Connecticut, New York, Pennsylvania, and Maryland. James Delancy, of New York was elected president. There were twenty-five delegates in all. Franklin was a delegate from Pennsylvania. The idea of union was not a new one. William Penn suggested the advantage of a union of all the English colonies as early as 1700; and Coxe, Speaker of the New Jersey Assembly, advocated it in 1722. Now it first found tangible expression under the sanction of authority. Note 5, page 134. for ratification.' Its fate was singular. The Assemblies considering it too aristocratic-giving the royal governor too much power-refused their assent; and the Board of Trade rejected it because it was too democratic. Although a legal union was not consummated, the grand idea of political fraternization then began to bud. It blossomed in the midst of the heat of the Stamp Act excitement eleven years later [1765], and its fruit appeared in the memorable Congress of 1774. The convention at Albany had just closed its labors, when the Indians commenced murderous depredations upon the New England frontiers [August and September, 1754]; and among the tribes west of the Alleghanies, French emissaries were busy arousing them to engage in a war of extermination against the English. Even in full view of these menaces, some of the colonies were tardy in preparations to avert the evil. Shirley was putting forth energetic efforts in Massachusetts; New York voted twenty-five thousand dollars for military service, and Maryland thirty thousand dollars for the same. The English government sent over fifty thousand dollars for the use of the colonists, and with it a commission to Governor Sharpe of Maryland, appointing him commander-inchief of all the colonial forces. Disputes about military rank and precedence soon ran high between the Virginia regimental officers, and the captains of independent companies. To silence these, Dinwiddie unwisely dispensed with all field officers, and broke the Virginia regiments into separate companies. This arrangement displeased Washington; he resigned his commission, and the year 1754 drew to a close without any efficient preparations for a conflict with the French.' CAMPAIGN OF 1755. Yet war had not been declared by the two nations; and for more than a year and a half longer the colonies were in conflict, before England and France formally announced hostility to each other. In the mean while the British government, perceiving that a contest, more severe than had yet been seen, must soon take place in America, extended its aid to its colonies. Edward Braddock, an Irish officer of distinction, arrived in Chesapeake Bay, with two regiments of his countrymen, on the 20th of February, 1755. He had been 1 It proposed a general government to be administered by one chief magistrate, to be appointed by the crown, and a council of forty-eight members, chosen by the several legislatures. This council, answering to our Senate, was to have power to declare war, levy troops, raise money, regulate trade, conclude peace, and many other things necessary for the general good. The delegates from Connecticut alone, objected to the plan, because it gave the governor-general veto power, or the right to refuse his signature to laws ordained by the Senate, and thus prevent them becoming stat utes. "The Board of Trade had proposed a plan which contained all the elements of a system for the utter enslavement and dependence of the Americans. They proposed a general government, composed of the governors of the several colonies, and certain select members of the several councils. These were to have power to draw on the British Treasury for money to carry on the impending war: the sum to be reimbursed by taxes imposed upon the colonists by Parliament. The colonists preferred to do their own fighting, and levy their own taxes, independent of Great Britain. According to a return made to the Board of Trade at about this time, the population of the colonies amounted to one million four hundred and eighty-five thousand, six hundred and thirty-four. Of these, two hundred and ninety-two thousand seven hundred and thirty-eight were negroes. 2 appointed commander-in-chief of all the British and provincial forces in America; and at his request, six colonial governors' met in convention at Alexandria, in- April following, to assist in making arrangements for a vigorous campaign. Three separate expeditions were planned; one against Fort du Quesne, to be led by Braddock; a second against Niagara and Frontenac (Kingston), to be commanded by Governor Shirley; and a third against Crown Point, on Lake Champlain, under General William Johnson, then an influential resident among the Mohawk nation of the IROQUOIS Confederacy. Already a fourth expedition had been arranged by Shirley and Governor Lawrence of Nova Scotia, designed to drive the French out of that province, and other portions of ancient Acadie.* These extensive arrangements, sanctioned by the imperial government, awakened the most zealous patriotism of all the colonists, and the legislatures of the several provinces, except Pennsylvania and Georgia, voted men and supplies for the impending war. The Quaker Assembly of Pennsylvania was opposed to military movements; the people of Georgia were too poor to contribute. There was much enthusiasm in New England, and the eastern expedition first proceeded to action. Three thousand men, under General John Winslow," sailed from Boston on the 20th of May, 1755, and landed at the head of the Bay of Fundy. There they were joined by Colonel Monckton with three hundred British regulars' from the neighboring garrison, and that officer, having official precedence of Winslow, took the command. They captured the forts in possession of the French there, in June, without difficulty, and placed the whole region under martial rule.' This was the legitimate result of war. But the cruel sequel deserves universal reprobation. The total destruction of the French settlements was decided upon. Under the plea that the Acadians would aid their French brethren in Canada, the innocent and happy people were seized in their houses, fields, and churches, and conveyed on board the English vessels. Families were broken, never to be united; and to compel the surrender of those who fled to the woods, their starvation was insured by a total destruction of their growing crops. The Acadians were stripped of every thing, and those who were carried away, were scattered among the English colonies, helpless beggars, to die heart-broken in a strange land. In one short month, their paradise had become a desolation, and a happy people were crushed into the dust. The western expedition, under Braddock, was long delayed on account of difficulties in obtaining provisions and wagons. The patience of the commander was sorely tried, and in moments of petulance he used expressions against the colonists, which they long remembered with bitterness. He finally commenced his march from Will's Creek (Cumberland) on the 10th of June, 1755, with about two thousand men, British and provincials. Anxious to reach Fort du 1 Shirley, of Massachusetts; Dinwiddie, of Virginia; Delancey, of New York; Sharpe, of Maryland; Morris, of Pennsylvania; and Dobbs, of North Carolina. Admiral Keppel, commander of the British fleet, was also present. 2 Page 190. 3 Page 25. + Page 58. He was a great grandson of Edward Winslow, the third governor of Plymouth. He was a major-general in the Massachusetts militia, but on this occasion held the office of lieutenant-colonel. This term is used to denote soldiers who are attached to the regular army, and as distinguished from volunteers and militia. The latter term applies to the great body of citizens who are liable to do perpetual military duty only in time of war. 7 Note 8, page 170. |