XXVI
The action with De Jumonville took place on May 28, and the Half-King, although disappointed as to scalps, went away, promising to return with many warriors. He told me his friends the English had now at last begun in earnest, but that it was no good war to keep prisoners.
As I trusted him more than most of the Indians, I sent thirty men and some horses to assist in moving the Indian families, for without them the warriors would never return; and I did not neglect to send a runner back to hasten Mackay, who was in command of an independent company from South Carolina. They were indeed quite independent, having neither good sense nor discipline, as I was soon to discover. My little skirmish with the French on May 28 added to my perplexities the knowledge that as soon as the runners who escaped should reach the fort at the Forks Contrecœurwould undertake to avenge the loss of his officer.
While I was impatiently waiting supplies from Croghan at Wills Creek, for now we were six days without flour, came news that Colonel Frye, my commander, was dead at that post. Colonel Innes of North Carolina, who was to succeed him in the whole command, lay at Winchester with four hundred men; but as he continued to lie there, neither he nor his troops were of any use in the campaign.
During the period which elapsed between my fight on May 28 and my being attacked on July 3, being now a colonel, and sure of soon being reinforced, I made haste to complete the fort at Great Meadows.
There I had excellent help from Captain Stobo and Mr. Adam Stephen, whom I made captain, and who, long after, became a general and served under me in the great war.
It was only a log work we built, near to breast-high, with no roof, one hundred feet square, with partitions, and surrounded at some distance by a too shallow ditch and palisadoes. Captain Stobo gave to this defence the name of Fort Necessity, and saidthat the name was suggested by his empty belly, for indeed we were at this time half starved.
Near about this time came three hundred men from Wills Creek, and, to my satisfaction, my friend Dr. Craik, who was of a merry disposition, and kept us in good humour, besides what aid he gave us as a physician, and I never had the service of a better.
On the 9th of June arrived my old military teacher, Adjutant Muse, with other men, nine swivels, and a very small supply of ammunition. He fetched with him a wampum belt and presents and medals for the Indians, as I had desired of the governor.
At this time, in order to secure the Indians, who are fickle and must always be bribed, we had a fine ceremony, and I delivered a speech sent from the governor.
Dr. Craik gave me, two years ago, the account he wrote home of this occasion, and I leave it in this place for the time, since it serves to record matters of which I have no distinct remembrance, and is better wrote than it would have been by me.
My dear Anne: To-day, before we move on, I send you a letter by a runner who returns to hasten our supplies. We had a great ceremony to-day. A space in the meadows near the fort was cleared, and all our men set around under arms in a great circle. In the middle stood the Colonel, very tall and, like all of us, very lean for lack of diet, for we are all shrunk like persimmons in December. Before him were seated the Half-King and the son of Aliquippa, the Queen of one of the tribes. Last year our Colonel gave her a red match-coat and a bottle of rum, and now she is his great friend and waiting for more favours, especially rum.The warriors were painted to beat even a London lady, and no bird has more feathers or finer. The pipe of Council was passed around, and all took a few whiffs. When it came to the turn of our Colonel, he sneezed and coughed and made a wry face, but none of the Indians so much as smiled, for they are a very solemn folk. I could not refrain to laugh, so hid my face in the last handkerchief I possess. There are holes in it, too. Then we had the Indian’s speech and that the Governor sent to be spoken. After this the Colonel hung around the necks of the Chiefs medals of silver sent from England. One had the British lion mauling the Gallic cock, and on the other side theKing’s effigy. Then the drums were beat, and the son of Aliquippa was taken into Council as a sachem, and given, as is the custom, a new name. I suppose it is a kind of heathen Christening. He was called Fairfax. I hope his Lordship will look after his Godson, or devil son, as he is more like to be. The Half-King was made proud with the name of Dinwiddie, and so we are friends until to-morrow, and allies—I call themall lies. After this the Colonel read the morning service, which I hope pleased them. They believed he was making magic.
My dear Anne: To-day, before we move on, I send you a letter by a runner who returns to hasten our supplies. We had a great ceremony to-day. A space in the meadows near the fort was cleared, and all our men set around under arms in a great circle. In the middle stood the Colonel, very tall and, like all of us, very lean for lack of diet, for we are all shrunk like persimmons in December. Before him were seated the Half-King and the son of Aliquippa, the Queen of one of the tribes. Last year our Colonel gave her a red match-coat and a bottle of rum, and now she is his great friend and waiting for more favours, especially rum.
The warriors were painted to beat even a London lady, and no bird has more feathers or finer. The pipe of Council was passed around, and all took a few whiffs. When it came to the turn of our Colonel, he sneezed and coughed and made a wry face, but none of the Indians so much as smiled, for they are a very solemn folk. I could not refrain to laugh, so hid my face in the last handkerchief I possess. There are holes in it, too. Then we had the Indian’s speech and that the Governor sent to be spoken. After this the Colonel hung around the necks of the Chiefs medals of silver sent from England. One had the British lion mauling the Gallic cock, and on the other side theKing’s effigy. Then the drums were beat, and the son of Aliquippa was taken into Council as a sachem, and given, as is the custom, a new name. I suppose it is a kind of heathen Christening. He was called Fairfax. I hope his Lordship will look after his Godson, or devil son, as he is more like to be. The Half-King was made proud with the name of Dinwiddie, and so we are friends until to-morrow, and allies—I call themall lies. After this the Colonel read the morning service, which I hope pleased them. They believed he was making magic.
This is a good account, and I certainly did make a face with the tobacco-smoke, for, although at that time I raised the weed, I cannot endure it.
Captain Mackay arrived on the 7th of June, but it came about untowardly that the company which thus joined me was not Virginian, and gave me more trouble than help. I may be wrong concerning the date of Captain Mackay’s arrival, but he was with us when, on the 10th of June, I moved out of our fort to prepare the road for the larger attempt proposed to take the defences at the Forks of the Ohio. I soon found that I was to have difficultywith this officer. I found him a good sort of a gentleman, but, as he had a distinct commission from the King, he declined to receive my commands, and, I found, would rather impede the service than forward it. I have made it a rule, however, to do the best I can in regard to obstacles I cannot control, and so I kept my temper and was always civil to this gentleman, even when he would not permit his men, unless paid a shilling a day, to assist in the making of roads.
As two masters are worse in an army than anywhere else, he agreed willingly enough to remain at Fort Necessity, while I went on toward Redstone Creek with my Virginians to better my road. It was a hard task, and at night the men were so tired that the scouts and sentries could hardly keep awake. The Indians came in daily, asking presents, and were mostly spies.
At Gist’s old camp, thirteen miles from Great Meadows, I learned that Fort Duquesne had been reinforced and that I was to be attacked by a large force. I sent back for Mackay, and at once called in all my hunters and scouting-parties. When CaptainMackay arrived we held a council and resolved that we had a better chance to defend ourselves at Fort Necessity. The officers gave up their horses to carry the ammunition, and we began a retreat with all possible speed. The weather was of the worst, very hot and raining, and the Carolina men, who called themselves king’s soldiers, would give no assistance in dragging the swivels. What with hunger and toil, my rangers were worn out when, on July 1, we were come back to the fort. I was of half a mind to push on and secure my retreat to Wills Creek; but the men refused to go on with the swivels, and the few horses we had were mere bone-bags, and some of them hardly fit to walk.
I turned over the matter that night with Captains Mackay and Stephen, and resolved, for, indeed, I could do no better, to send for help and abide in the fort. I was well aware that to retreat would turn every Indian on the frontier against us, and I was in good hope to hold out.
If, as I wrote the governor, the French behaved with no greater spirit than they did in the Jumonville affair, I might yet come off well enough if provisions reachedme in time, and I thought with proper reinforcements we should have no great trouble in driving them to the devil and Montreal.
On the evening of July 1 an Indian runner came in. He had been with De Villiers and a force from Duquesne. He told me that when that officer reached Gist’s palisado he fired on it, but, finding no one there, was of a mind to go back, thinking I had returned to the settlements. Unfortunately, some of our Indians, who were now leaving us in numbers, told him I meant to make a stand at Fort Necessity.
Whether I should fall back farther or not was now a matter for little choice. If I retreated with tired, half-starved men and no rum for refreshment, De Villiers’s large, well-fed force and quick-footed Indians would surely overtake us, and we should have to meet superiour numbers without being intrenched. If Captain Mackay and his men, in my absence, had done anything to complete my fort, I should have fared better. Meanwhile we might be aided with men from Winchester, or, at least, be provisioned. I said nothing to the South Carolina officer of his neglect, for that woulddo no good, and I desired when it came to fighting he should be in a good humour.
News seemed to fly through the forests as if the birds carried it, and I was not surprised to learn before I got to the fort that the Half-King and nearly all his warriors had stolen away. He was out of humour with the officers I had left in charge and said no one consulted him. I think he desired to escape a superiour force and to assure the safety of his squaws and papooses, whom I was not ill pleased to be rid of, but not of the warriors.
After my men were fed, Captain Stobo, Adjutant Muse, Captain Stephen, and I took off our coats and went to work to help with axes, Dr. Craik very merry and cheering the poor fellows, who were worn out with work.
We raised the log shelter a log higher, and dug our ditch deeper, and, had we had more time, had done better to have enlarged the fort, for it was quite too small for the force.