Part 19

About two hundred yards from the line of hills, and three hundred south of the ravine just described, commences another of a more singular nature; with its steep sides, almost exactly perpendicular, it perfectly resembles a ditch cut for purposes of defence. Rising near the middle of the second bottom, it runs westwardly to the upper edge of the first, with a depth at its head of four or five feet, increasing as it descends, and a width of eight or ten. A century ago its channel was overhung and completely concealed by a luxurious thicket of pea-vines and trailers, of bramble-bushes and the Indian plum; its edges closely fringed with the thin, tall wood-grass of summer. But even now, when the forests are gone and the plough long since passed over the scene, the ravine cannot be at all perceived until one is directly upon it; and hence arose the chief disasters of the day. Parallel with and about one hundred fifty yards north of this second gulley ran a third; a dry, open hollow, and rather thinly wooded; but which afforded a happy protection to the enemy from the English fire. Either of these ravines would have sheltered an army; the second--the most important, though not the largest--would of itself afford concealment to a thousand men.

There is little reason to doubt that as Braddock drew near, M. de Contrecoeur was almost decided to abandon his position without striking a blow, and, withdrawing his men, as did his successor, in 1758, leave to the English a bloodless victory. He certainly was prepared to surrender on terms of honorable capitulation. A solitary gun was mounted upon a carriage to enable the garrison to evacuate with the honors of war; it being a point of nice feeling with a defeated soldier that he should retire with drums beating a national march, his own colors flying, and a cannon loaded, with a lighted match. This deprives the proceeding of a compulsory air; and to procure this gratification, Contrecoeur made his arrangements. The British army was so overwhelming in strength, so well appointed and disciplined, that he perhaps deemed any opposition to its advance would be not less fruitless than the defence of the works. However this may be, he had as yet on July 7th announced no definite conclusion, though possibly his views were perceptible enough to his subordinates. On that day it was known that the enemy, whose numbers were greatly magnified, were at the head-waters of Turtle Creek. On the 8th, where his route was changed, M. de Beaujeu, a captain in the regulars, proposed to the commander that he might be permitted to go forth with a suitable band to prepare an ambuscade for the English on the banks of the Monongahela, and to dispute with them the passage of the second ford. If we may believe tradition, it was with undisguised reluctance that Contrecoeur complied with this request, and even then, it is said, refused to assign troops for the enterprise, bidding him call for volunteers as for a forlorn hope. To that summons the whole garrison responded.

If this tale be true, Contrecoeur recanted his determination, and wisely preferred making him a regular detachment, conditioned on his success in obtaining the union of the Indians, who, to the number of nearly a thousand warriors, were gathered at the place. Accordingly, the savages were at once called to a council. These people, consisting of bands assembled from a dozen different nations, listened with unsuppressed discontent to the overtures of the Frenchman. Seated under the palisades that environed the fort, or standing in knots about the speaker, were gathered a motley but a ferocious crew. Alienated from their ancient friends, here were Delawares from the Susquehanna eager to speed the fatal stroke, and Shawanoes from Grave Creek and the Muskingum; scattered warriors of the Six Nations; Ojibwas, Pottawottomis from the far Michigan; Abenakis and Caughnawagas from Canada; Ottawas from Lake Superior, led on by the royal Pontiac; and Hurons from the falls of Montreal and the mission of Lorette, whose barbarous leader gloried in a name torn from the most famous pages of Christian story.

To these reluctant auditors Beaujeu stated his designs. "How, my father," said they in reply, "are you so bent upon death that you would also sacrifice us? With our eight hundred men do you ask us to attack four thousand English? Truly, this is not the saying of a wise man. But we will lay up what we have heard, and to-morrow you shall know our thoughts." On the morning of July 9th the conference was repeated, and the Indians announced their intention of refusing to join in the expedition. At this moment a runner--probably one of those dislodged by Gage in the early dawn--burst in upon the assembly and heralded the advent of the foe. Well versed in the peculiar characteristics of the savages, by whom he was much beloved, and full of tact and energy, Beaujeu took ready advantage of the excitement which these tidings occasioned. "I," said he, "am determined to go out against the enemy. I am certain of victory. What! will you suffer your father to depart alone?" Fired by his language and the reproach it conveyed, they at once resolved by acclamation to follow him to the fray.

In a moment the scene was alive with frantic enthusiasm. Barrels of bullets and flints and casks of powder were hastily rolled to the gates: their heads were knocked out, and every warrior left to supply himself at his own discretion. Then, painted for war and armed for the combat, the party moved rapidly away, in numbers nearly nine hundred strong, of whom six hundred thirty-seven were Indians, one hundred forty-six Canadians, and seventy-two regular troops. Subordinate to Beaujeu were MM. Dumas and De Ligneris, both captains in the regular army, four lieutenants, six ensigns, and twenty cadets. Though his numbers were thus not so greatly inferior to Braddock's, it is not likely that Beaujeu calculated on doing more than giving the English a severe check and perhaps delaying for a few days their advance. It is impossible that he should have contemplated the complete victory that was before him.

On the evening of July 8th the ground had been carefully reconnoitred and the proper place for the action selected. The intention was to dispute as long as possible the passage of the second ford, and then to fall back upon the ravines. But long ere they reached the scene the swell of the military music, the crash of falling trees apprised them that the foe had already crossed the river, and that his pioneers were advanced into the woodlands. Quickening their pace into a run, they managed to reach the broken ground just as the van of the English came in sight. Braddock had turned from the first bottom to the second, and mounting to its brow was about to pass around the head of the ravines to avoid the little morass caused by the water-course before described. His route did not lie parallel with the most dangerous defile, where the banks are so steep and the cover so perfect, but passed its head at an angle of about forty-five degrees; thus completely exposing his face and flanks from a point on the second bottom, at a hundred yards distance, to another within thirty, where he would turn the ravine. Of course the farther he advanced the nearer he would approach to its brink, till the whole should finally be left behind; thus opening a line of two hundred yards long, at an average distance of sixty, to the enemy's fire. Had he possessed the least knowledge of these defiles, he would undoubtedly have secured them in season, since nothing would have been easier than their occupation by Gage's advanced party. But not a man in his army had ever dreamed of their existence.

The arrangement of the march from the river's bank had been made as follows: The engineers and guides and six light-horsemen proceeded immediately before the advanced detachment under Gage, and the working-party under St. Clair, who had with them two brass six-pounders and as many tumbrils or tool-carts. On either flank, parties to the number of eight were thrown out to guard against surprises. At some distance behind Gage followed the line, preceded by the light horse, four squads of whom also acted as extreme flankers at either end of the column. Next came the seamen, followed by a subaltern with twenty grenadiers, a twelve-pounder and a company of grenadiers. Then the vanguard succeeded, and the wagon and artillery train, which began and ended with a twelve-pounder: and the rear-guard closed the whole. Numerous flanking-parties, however, protected each other; and six subalterns, each with twenty grenadiers, and ten sergeants, with ten men each, were detached for this purpose.

The greater part of Gage's command was actually advanced beyond the spot where the main battle was fought, and was just surmounting the second bottom, when Mr. Gordon, one of the engineers who were in front marking out the road, perceived the enemy bounding forward. Before them, with long leaps, came Beaujeu, the gayly colored fringes of his hunting-shirt and the silver gorget on his bosom at once bespeaking the chief. Comprehending in a glance the position he had attained, he suddenly halted and waved his hat above his head. At this preconcerted signal the savages dispersed to the right and left, throwing themselves flat upon the ground, and gliding behind rocks or trees or into the ravines. Had the earth yawned beneath their feet and reclosed above their heads, they could not have more instantaneously vanished. The French--some of whom, according to Garneau, were mounted--held the centre of the semicircular disposition so instantly assumed; and a tremendous fire was at once opened on the English. For a moment Gage's troops paused aghast at the furious yells and strangeness of the onset. Rallying immediately, he returned their fire, and halted a moment till St. Clair's working-party came up; when he bade his men advance at once upon the centre of the concentric line. As he drew near he was again greeted with a staggering discharge, and again his ranks were shaken. Then in return, they opened a fire of grape and musketry so tremendous as to sweep down every unsheltered foe who was upon his feet, and to utterly fright the savages from their propriety. Beaujeu and a dozen more fell dead upon the spot, and the Indians already began to fly, their courage being unable to endure the unwonted tumult of such a portentous detonation.

But reanimated by the clamorous exhortations of Dumas and De Ligneris, and observing that the regulars and militia still preserved a firm front, they returned once more to their posts and resumed the combat. For a time the issue seemed doubtful, and the loud cries of "_Vive le Roi!_" of the French were met by the charging cheers of the English. But precision of aim soon began to prevail over mere mechanical discipline. In vain the Forty-fourth continued their fire; in vain their officers, with waving swords, led them to the charge; hidden beneath great trees or concealed below the level of the earth, the muzzles of their pieces resting on the brink of the ravine, and shooting with a secure and steady aim, the majority of the enemy rested secure and invisible to their gallant foemen.

In the mean time Braddock, whose extreme rear had not yet left the river's bank, hearing the uproar in advance, ordered Burton to press forward with the vanguard, and the rest of the line to halt; thus leaving Halket with four hundred men to protect the baggage while eight hundred engaged the enemy. But just as Burton, under a galling fire, was forming his troops upon the ground, Gage's party gave way and precipitately endeavored to fall into his rear; confusing men who were confused before. The manoeuvre was unsuccessfully executed, and the two regiments became inextricably commingled. Vainly Braddock strove to separate the soldiers, huddling together like frightened sheep. Vainly the regimental colors were advanced on opposite directions as rallying-points.

"_Ut conspicuum in proelio Haberent signum quod sequerentur milites._"

The officers sought to collect their men together and lead them on in platoons. Nothing could avail. On every hand the officers, distinguished by their horses and their uniforms, were the constant mark of hostile rifles; and it was soon as impossible to find men to give orders as it was to have them obeyed. In a narrow road twelve feet wide, shut up on either side and overpent by the primeval forest, were crowded together the panic-stricken wretches, hastily loading and reloading, and blindly discharging their guns in the air, as though they suspected their mysterious murderers were sheltered in the boughs above their heads; while all around, removed from sight, but making day hideous with their war-whoops and savage cries, lay ensconced a host insatiate for blood.

Foaming with rage and indignation, Braddock flew from rank to rank, with his own hands endeavoring to force his men into position. Four horses were shot under him, but mounting a fifth he still strained every nerve to retrieve the ebbing fortunes of the day. His subordinates gallantly seconded his endeavors, throwing themselves from the saddle and advancing by platoons, in the idle hope that their men would follow; but only to rush upon their fate. The regular soldiery, deprived of their immediate commanders and terrified at the incessant fall of their comrades, could not be brought to the charge, while the provincials, better skilled, sought in vain to cover themselves and to meet the foe upon equal terms; for to the urgent entreaties of Washington and Sir Peter Halket, that the men might be permitted to leave the ranks and shelter themselves, the general turned a deaf ear. Wherever he saw a man skulking behind a tree, he flew at once to the spot and, with curses on his cowardice and blows with the flat of his sword, drove him back into the open road.

Wherever the distracted artillerymen saw a smoke arise, thither did they direct their aim; and many of the flankers who had succeeded in obtaining the only position where they could be of any service, were thus shot down. Athwart the brow of the hill lay a large log, five feet in diameter, which Captain Waggoner, of the Virginia Levies, resolved to take possession of. With shouldered firelocks he marched a party of eighty men to the spot, losing but three on the way; and at once throwing themselves behind it, the remainder opened a hot fire upon the enemy. But no sooner were the flash and the report of their pieces perceived by the mob behind, than a general discharge was poured upon the little band, by which fifty were slain outright and the rest constrained to fly.

By this time the afternoon was well advanced and the whole English line surrounded. The ammunition began to fail and the artillery to flag; the baggage was warmly attacked; and a runner was despatched to the fort with the tidings that by set of sun not an Englishman would be left alive upon the ground. Still, gathering counsel from despair, Braddock disdained to yield; still, strong in this point only of their discipline, his soldiers died by his side, palsied with fear, yet without one thought of craven flight. At last, when every aide but Washington was struck down; when the lives of the vast majority of the officers had been sacrificed with a reckless intrepidity, a sublime self-devotion, that surpasses the power of language to express; when scarce a third part of the whole army remained unscathed, and these incapable of aught save remaining to die or till the word to retire was given--at last, Braddock abandoned all hope of victory, and, with a mien undaunted as in his proudest hour, ordered the drums to sound a retreat. The instant their faces were turned, the poor regulars lost every trace of the sustaining power of custom; and the retreat became a headlong flight. "Despite of all the efforts of the officers to the contrary, they ran," says Washington, "as sheep pursued by dogs, and it was impossible to rally them."

Beneath a large tree standing between the heads of the northernmost ravines, and while in the act of giving an order, Braddock received a mortal wound; the ball passing through his right arm into the lungs. Falling from his horse, he lay helpless on the ground, surrounded by the dead, abandoned by the living. Not one of his transatlantic soldiery "who had served with the Duke" could be prevailed upon to stay his headlong flight and aid to bear his general from the field. Orme thought to tempt them with a purse containing sixty guineas; but in such a moment even gold could not prevail upon a vulgar soul, and they rushed unheeding on. Disgusted at such pusillanimity, and his heart big with despair, Braddock refused to be removed, and bade the faithful friends who lingered by his side to provide for their own safety. He declared his resolution of leaving his own body on the field; the scene that had witnessed his dishonor he desired should bury his shame. With manly affection, Orme disregarded his injunctions; and Captain Stewart, of Virginia, the commander of the light-horse which were attached to the general's person, with another American officer, hastening to Orme's relief, his body was placed first in a tumbrel, and afterward upon a fresh horse, and thus borne away. Stewart seems to have cherished a sense of duty or of friendship toward his chief that did not permit him to desert him for a moment while life remained.

It was about five o'clock in the afternoon when the English abandoned the field. Pursued to the water's edge by about fifty savages the regular troops cast from them guns, accoutrements, and even clothing, that they might run the faster. Many were overtaken and tomahawked here; but where they had once crossed the river, they were not followed. Soon turning from the chase, the glutted warriors made haste to their unhallowed and unparalleled harvest of scalps and plunder. The provincials, better acquainted with Indian warfare, were less disconcerted; and though their losses were as heavy, their behavior was more composed. In full possession of his courage and military instincts, Braddock still essayed to procure an orderly and soldier-like retreat; but the demoralization of the army now rendered this impossible. With infinite difficulty, a hundred men, after running about half a mile, were persuaded to stop at a favorable spot where Braddock proposed to remain until Dunbar should arrive, to whose camp Washington was sent with suitable orders. It will thus be seen how far was his indomitable soul from succumbing in the discharge of his duties, beneath the unexpected burthen that had been laid upon him. By his directions Burton posted sentries here, and endeavored to form a nucleus around which to gather the shattered remains of the troops, and where the wounded might be provided for.

But all was idle. In an hour's time almost every soldier had stolen away, leaving their officers deserted. These, making the best of their way off, were joined beyond the other ford by Gage, who had rallied some eighty men; and this was all that remained of that gallant army which scarce six hours before was by friend and foe alike deemed invincible. With little interruption the march was continued through that night and the ensuing day, till at 10 P.M. on July 10th they came to Gist's plantation; where early on the 11th some wagons and hospital stores arrived from Dunbar for their relief. Despite the intensity of his agonies, Braddock still persisted in the exercise of his authority and the fulfilment of his duties. From Gist's he detailed a party to return toward the Monongahela with a supply of provisions to be left on the road for the benefit of stragglers yet behind, and Dunbar was commanded to send to him the only two remaining old companies of the Forty-fourth and Forty-eighth, with more wagons to bring off the wounded; and on Friday, July 11th, he arrived at Dunbar's camp. Through this and all the preceding day men half famished, without arms and bewildered with terror, had been joining Dunbar; his camp was in the utmost confusion, and his soldiers were deserting without ceremony.

Braddock's strength was now fast ebbing away. Informed of the disorganized condition of the remaining troops, he abandoned all hope of a prosperous termination to the expedition. He saw that not only death, but utter defeat, was inevitable. But conscious of the odium the latter event would excite, he nobly resolved that the sole responsibility of the measure should rest with himself, and consulted with no one upon the steps he pursued. He merely issued his orders, and insisted that they were obeyed. Thus, after destroying the stores to prevent their falling into the hands of the enemy--of whose pursuit he did not doubt--the march was to be resumed on Saturday, July 12th, toward Will's Creek. Ill-judged as these orders were, they met with but too ready acquiescence at the hands of Dunbar, whose advice was neither asked nor tendered on the occasion. Thus the great mass of those stores which had been so painfully brought thither were destroyed. Of the artillery but two six-pounders were preserved; the cohorns were broken or buried, and the shells bursted. One hundred fifty wagons were burned; the powder-casks were staved in, and their contents, to the amount of fifty thousand pounds, cast into a spring; and the provisions were scattered abroad upon the ground or thrown into the water. Nothing was saved beyond the actual necessities for a flying march; and when a party of the enemy some time afterward visited the scene, they completed the work of destruction. For this service--the only instance of alacrity that he displayed in the campaign--Dunbar must not be forgiven. It is not perfectly clear that Braddock intelligently ever gave the orders; but in any case they were not fit for a British officer to give or to obey. Dunbar's duty was to have maintained here his position, or at the least not to have contemplated falling back beyond Will's Creek. That he had not horses to remove his stores was, however, his after-excuse.

It was not until Sunday, July 13th, that all this was finished; and the army with its dying general proceeded to the Great Meadows, where the close was to transpire:

"Last scene of all, That ends this strange, eventful history."

Ever since the retreat commenced Braddock had preserved a steadfast silence, unbroken save when he issued the necessary commands. That his wound was mortal he knew; but he also knew that his fame had received a not less fatal stab; that his military reputation, dearer than his own life to a veteran or those of a thousand others, was gone forever. These reflections embittered his dying hours; nor were there any means at hand of diverting the current of his thoughts or ministering to the comfort of his body; even the chaplain of the army was among the wounded. He pronounced the warmest eulogiums upon the conduct of his officers--who, indeed, had merited all he could say of them--and seems to have entertained some compunctions at not having more scrupulously followed the advice of Washington, or perhaps at the loss of power to provide for that young soldier's interests as thoroughly as he would have done had he returned victorious.