Source:Fleming-washington-in-fight
George T. Fleming. "Washington in fight with French: Stirring events in early history of vicinity give Pittsburgh street names: Foes also honored: Magnanimity of De Villiers and misfortunes of Van Braam have been remembered: Patriot's only defeat." Pittsburgh Gazette Times, Feb. 21, 1915, sec. 6, [p. 6]. Newspapers.com 85898552.
ON this day, February 21, a story in which George Washington performed a star part is eminently appropriate. It is easily deduced from two street names in Pittsburgh that are most familiar, and these have already received some mention.
Stobo and Van Braam streets are insignificant thoroughfares as far as business is concerned. They are short and far apart. Closely alliled [sic] in history, associated in their military service and confinement, streets named in honor of Stobo and Van Braam by the logic of events should be neighing [sic]. Both were captains under Lieut. Col. George Washington at Fort Necessity.
The proper Dutch spelling, with the double vowel, in the latter name has been shortened into Van Bram and sometimes written Vanbram. Obviously both are incorrect.
Stobo's name has been given to part of the Diamond in former Allegheny.
To get the proper historical connection of events in the first engagements in the struggle between the French and English for the possession of the Ohio valley it is necessary to go back to the memorable April 17, 1754. On that day Ensign Edward Ward of Virginia made the acquaintance of M. Contracoeur [sic] at the Forks of the Ohio in Pittsburgh, for a century and a half called The Point.
Story of Meeting Told.
The story of this meeting and the erection of Fort Duquesne appeared in last week's street story in these columns. The French spelled the name in two syllables, Du Quesne, after the governor general of Canada, or properly in their geography, La Nouvelle France (New France).
The full name and title of the governor was the Marquis du Ouesne [sic] de Mennville [sic]. We have, in English style, joined the preposition to the noun and write it Duquesne—a familiar though erroneous form.
Ensign Ward's arrival at Wills Creek, now Cumberland, Md., where Washington was with three companies, created consternation. Expresses were immediately sent to the governors of Pennsylvania, Maryland and Virginia detailing the occurrences in the region about the "Forks" and asking for reinforcements.
In the meantime Washington determined to advance and reach the Monongahela at Redstone, now Brownsville, and there fortify himself.
The French were readily kept informed of Washington's movements and prepared to check him. Active operations ensued and these were in what is now Fayette county.
These operations are directly connected with the history of Pittsburgh and must be adverted to in writing our history. They are especially in place when Stobo and Van Braam are written of.
May 8, 1754, Washington and his small command were at the Little Meadows, near the Youghiogheny river.
The next day he received definite information that Contracoeur [sic] had been greatly reinforced. May 18 Washington reached the Youghiogheny at what was subsequently called the Great Crossings, now the site of Somerfield, Pa. Several days later he moved to the Great Meadows.
News of the French.
May 27 an express—the special delivery of those days—arrived from the Half King, who was about six miles distant, with a party of his Mingo warriors. He brought the news that the French were nearby.
The night turned out a terrible one. Rain fell in torrents and the march was toilsome and tedious. Groping in the inky darkness of the intricate forest, falling over rocks and logs, tangled in dense thickets, the whole night was consumed in travelling the short distance and at daybreak Washington joined forces with the Half King.
There was an immediate council and a plan of joint action was agreed on.
The Half-King—whose proper name was Tanacharison—was a friend of the English. He was a Seneca by birth. He was called the Half—King because he had not entire sovereignty. The over-lord of the Iroquois, or Six Nations, who held the Mingoes in subjection, was the real sovereign. The Mingoes were mainly renegade Senecas.
Indian spies were sent out and the French position discovered. It was half a mile from the road and surrounded by rocks.
Washington and his men went to the right and the Indians to the left and the advance was made in single file. The alert enemy discovered this movement and an action at once began, which lasted but a quarter of an hour.
It was disastrous to the French. M. Jumonville, the commander, fell at the first fire, according to some accounts, and 10 of his men were killed, 1 wounded and 22 captured. Washington had one man killed and two wounded. The Indians escaped casualties.
Canadian Carries News.
A Canadian escaped and hurried with the news to Contracoeur [sic] at Fort DuQuesne [sic].
This short skirmish, so fateful in results, was the first bloodshed in a great war in America that lasted nine years. In April, 1754, when the French standard was flung to the breeze at our Point, the colors signalized French dominion in North America that extended from Nova Scotia by the St. Lawrence, the Great Lakes, the Ohio and the Mississippi to the Gulf of Mexico.
The fleur de lis, the emblem of France, likewise betokened sovereignty in parts of Africa and India.
Vast were the possessions of France outside of her own geographical lines. All her extensive possessions were well guarded by fortifications and troops. When the war ended that began at our gates between Contracoeur [sic] and Washington, France was stripped of much of her possessions, and this, too, by a treaty arranged at Paris.
Washington found among his prisoners at Jumonville's defeat an old acquaintance, M. La Force, the commissary of the French forces; also M. Drouillon and two cadets. La Force had accompanied Washington and Gist the preceding winter from Fort Venango to Le Boeuff [sic].
Perhaps as at this time Washington is much in mind by reason of his natal day celebrations, it may be well to go into more details of the Jumonville affair and the action at Fort Necessity, for there Stobo and Van Braam first came into prominence in our history and there the untried Washington got his first baptism of fire.
Result of Battle.
Washington was young and impulsive and the leadership was thrust upon him by the accident which resulted in the death of his colonel, Joshua Fry.
Thackeray remarks it "strange that in a savage forest in Pennsylvania a young Virginia officer should fire a shot and waken up a war which was to last for 60 years, which was to cover his own country and pass into Europe, to cost France her American colonies, to sever ours from us and create the great Western republic, to rage over the old world when extinguished in the new, and of all the myriads engaged in the vast contest to leave the prize of the greatest fame with him who struck the first blow."
This was written decades ago. Within five years after this first shot in the expulsion of the French Pittsburgh was to have its beginning.
No wonder the mention of the names of two insignificant streets call up great events. They cannot fail.
Thackeray, of course, refers to the series of wars in which Great Britain and France engaged, ending with Waterloo.
In the intent to recite the actual happenings of Washington's first campaign the French and English accounts are given. They are at wide variance in one particular—the death of Jumonville. It was a sorry affair at best.
First the French version:
When Centracoeur [sic] at Fort DuQuesne [sic] learned that a considerable body of English was marching toward him he dispatched his half-brother Jumonville with a small force to meet them, not to fight, but to warn them.
He charged Jumonville with a written summons in the form of a letter directed to the first English officer he should meet.
Demand for Surrender.
It was almost of the same tenor as the summons he had before sent when he took possession of the little fort Ward hat built at our "Point."
Contracoeur [sic] assured the English no violence would be offered them. He desired the English commander to return an answer by Jumonville and requested that officer be treated with that distinction and respect which he deserved.
The account that Centracoeur [sic] received of the affray was that on the morning after they sent out the little escort of Jumonville, the commandant's deputy, found themselves surrounded by a number of Indians and an English force. The English fired quickly two volleys, killing some French soldiers. Jumonville made a sign that he had a letter from his commander; the firing thereupon ceased and the English surrounded the French officer in order to hear the letter. It was immediately read and as it was being read a second time the English assassinated Jumonville.
The rest of the French detachment were then made prisoners except one, who escaped, who gave the story as above. He assured Contracoeur [sic] that the Indians who were with the English had not fired a gun, but at the instant Jumonville was assassinated they threw themselves in between the French and the English.
Aid from Fort.
With the allegation that Jumonville had been treacherously murdered the French were greatly enraged. Contracoeur [sic] sent immediate word to Duquesne [sic] and received his instructions, which demanded retribution, and that the English be driven out.
Preparations were at once begun. In one month the French force was under way, viz., on June 28, and on July 3 the forces were in conflict. The French numbered 500 regulars and Canadian militia and as many Indians.
The Canadian who escaped was named Monceau. Contracoeur [sic] also wrote his story to Du Quesne.
Monceau alleged that the French were in platoons between the English and the Indians, and that he dropped out and made his way through the woods to the Monongahela and came down to the forks by a small canoe.
The Indian account of the affray, which Contracoeur [sic] likewise wrote to Du Quesne, states that Jumonville was killed by a musket shot in the head, and that the English would have killed all the French had not the Indians rushed in between them and the English, thus frustrating the design.
Contracoeur [sic], writing Duquesne [sic], records:
I believe, sir, it will surprise you to hear how basely the English have acted. It was what was never seen, even among nations who are the least civilized, to fall thus upon ambassadors and murder them. The Indians are so enraged that they have applied to me for liberty to fall upon the English.
We must believe that M. Contracoeur [sic] was somewhat a liar when he continues:
The English are, no doubt, on their march with an army 5,000 strong. The Indians say they have always 600 men going before in order to clear a broad road, to bring up strong cannon; this was the Indian expression.
How great a force Washington had is evidenced by the number surrendered at Fort Necessity, about 400.
Another French Story.
M. De Villiers is also a journalist. He records under date of June 26, 1754:
Arrived at Fort du Quesne about eight in the morning with several nations (Indians), the command of which the general had given me.
At my arrival was informed that M. de Contracoeur [sic] had made a detachment of 500 French and 11 Indians of different nations on the Ohio, the command of which he had given to Chevalier le Mercier, who was to depart the next day.
As I was the oldest officer and commanded the Indian nations, and as my brother had been assassinated, M. de Contracoeur [sic] honored me with that command, and M. le Mercier, though deprived of the command, seemed very well pleased to make the campaign under my orders.
It is to this circumstance that we owe the name De Villiers (sometimes spelled as one word) in our Pittsburgh street nomenclature instead of M. le Mercier's.
De Villiers goes on to say:
M. de Contracoeur [sic] called Messrs. le Mercier, de Longneil and myself in order to deliberate upon what should be done in the campaign, as to the place, the strength of the enemy, the assassination committed by them upon my brother and the peace we intended to maintain between the two crowns.
It must be admitted the French were magnanimous. Witness the honorable terms accorded Washington at Fort Necessity.
Washington always kept an accurate journal of his transactions—in fact, he was one of the most careful and methodical of men. We must believe him. Tomorrow is his birthday. From our infancy we have heard the story of his hatchet. It has become almost a national emblem. He is not always a correct speller; for instance, he refers to Ensign Ward as "Wart;" but he is specific and concise. May 27, 1754, he records:
At eight at night received an express from the Half King which informed me that as he was, coming to join us he had seen along the road the tracks of two men, which he had followed till he was brought thereby to a low, obscure place that he was of opinion the whole party of the French was hidden there; that very moment I sent out forty men and ordered my ammunition to be put in a place of safety under a strong guard to defend it, fearing it be a stratagem of the French to attack our camp, and with the rest of my men set out in a heavy rain; and in a night as dark as pitch along a patch [sic] scarce broad enough for one man.
Trip a Hard One.
We were sometimes fifteen or twenty minutes out of the path before we could come to it again; and so dark that we would often strike one against another.
After mention of the meeting and council with the Half King at sunrise, Washington proceeds.
We formed ourselves for an engagement marching one after another, in the Indian manner. We were advanced pretty near to them, as we thought, when they discovered us; whereupon I ordered my company to fire, mine was supported by that of Mr. Wagner's and my company and his received the whole fire of the French during the greatest part of the action, which lasted only a quarter of an hour, before the enemy were routed.
Washington refers to Lieut. Thomas Waggener, whose company and Washington's received all the fire of the enemy. Waggener subsequently served under Braddock, displaying soldiery [sic] conduct and good common sense at Braddock's defeat.
Washington further records:
I marched on with the prisoners. They informed me they had been sent with a summons to order me to depart, a plausible pretense to discover our camp and to obtain the knowledge of our forces and our situation! It was so clear that they had come to reconnoitre what we were that I admired their assurance, when they told me they were come as an embassy for their instructions mentioned they should get what knowledge they could of the roads, rivers, and all of the country as far as the Potomac.
Washington refutes the allegation that they could come as ambassadors—rather were they spies for they remained hidden for whole days and were known to have sent spies to reconnoiter his camp. They went back two miles only after doing this and sent Contracoeur [sic] full intelligence.
"Besides, an ambassador," says Washington, "has princely attendants, whereas this was a small petty French officer.
He continues:
An ambassador has no need of spies; his character being always sacred.
Their actions were suspicious, the summons insolvent and favored the gasconade so much that if it had been brought openly by two men it would have been an immediate indulgence to have supered [sic] them to return.
Nevill [sic] B. Craig comments that it was certain that Washington had orders to attack and he believes Washington endeavors in his journal to justify himself and in Washington's statement that the Half King had given his opinion that the intentions of the French were evil.
Craig sees an excuse which only shows remorse. We must stick to the Father of Our Country, however. We have been doing so too long to quit in 1915.
Dr. Cyrus Townsend Brady regards the claim of the French that Jumonville was assassinated as absurd, and that he was an envoy equally untenable. Brady says these claims were abandoned by everybody but statesmen and romancers—"terms not devoid of a certain association."
One can discover here a trace of irony if he looks sharp.
Full Record Kept.
Washington faithfully records each day's happenings until the surrender at Fort Necessity where his weary, half-starved men lay down their arms. He had been joined by a company from North Carolina under Capt. James Mackaye who held a king's commission and who refused to be a subordinate to a Virginia provincial officer even of a righer [sic] rank.
When the articles of capitulation were signed Mackaye signed first.
Capt. Mackaye removed to Pittsburgh before the Revolution and was a justice of the peace for Westmoreland county. He had a varied career. Incidentally it might be mentioned we have no Mackaye street in Pittsburgh.
DeVilliers in his report to his superior, Contracoeur [sic] gives a detailed account of what occurred at Fort Necessity. He tells how he cooped the English in their fort and how he "obliged them to leave us their cannon consisting of nine pieces;" also of destroying all of Washington's horses and cattle," and "Made them to sign the favor we granted them was only to prove how desirous we were to maintain the peace between the crowns."
DeVilliers destroyed all of Washington's cannon, even the one granted them in the capitulation; all the liquor, of which there were several casks. The single cannon allowed Washington he could not carry away. No animals were left to draw it.
The first and seventh articles of the capitulation granted concern our story of Van Braam and Stobo. The first article reads, under date "July 3, 1754 at 8 o'clock at night."
As our intentions have never been to trouble the peace and good harmony subsisting between the two princes in amity, but only to revenge the assassination committed on one of our officers, bearer of a summon, as also on his escort, and to hinder any establishment on the dominions of the king, my master; upon these considerations we are willing to show favor to all the English who are in the said fort on the following conditions: "leave to retire and return peacefully to their own country," without insult, with honors of war, etc., with all their belongings except artillery and draft animals.
The translation of the seventh article made trouble. The French version is:
And as the English have in their power two cadets and most of the prisoners made at the assassination of M. de Jumonville, and promise to send them back, with a safe guard to Fort Du Quesne, situate on the Ohio, for surety of their performing this article as well as this treaty, M. Jacob Vambrane—and Robert Stobo, both captains shall be delivered to us as hostages, till the arrival of our French and Canadians above mentioned. We oblige ourselves on our side to return these two officers in safety and expect to have our French in two months and a half at farthest, a duplicate of this being fixed upon one of the posts of our stockade the day and year mentioned.
Signed Messrs. JAMES MACKAYE,
G. WASHINGTON,
COULON VILLIERS.
Washington tells of the signing of this document and of Van Braam's deceit. Notice the misspelling of the latter's name in the document.
Doughty old Gov. Dinwiddie, grouch and French hater, disavowed the terms of this capitulation, much to Washington's chagrin, great enough on account of his forced surrender.
We must admire M. De Villier [sic] as an honorable man and foe. He really believed his brother was assassinated. He was truly magnamimous [sic]. He restrained his Indians from slaughtering the English and kept them well in hand.
It was otherwise under Dumas at the battle on the Monogahela [sic] one year later when Braddock fell.
De Villiers records his feelings when he states:
The 4th (July) I sent a detachment to take possession of the fort, the garrison filed off, and the number of their dead and wounded moved me to pity, notwithstanding my resentment for their having in such a manner taken away my brother's life.
In naming a street for De Villiers we have commemorated a man of fine sensibilities, a soldier and a gentleman, though an enemy.
Van Braam has been characterized as a poltroon and a villain. Washington admits he was a good soldier, but lamented always the imposition or ignorance Van Braam manifested in his translation of the articles of capitulation.
"The interpreter," Washington says, "was a Dutchman, little acquainted with the English tongue."
He adds:
Therefore he might not advert to the tone and meaning of the word in English.
But whatever his motives were for so doing, certain it is he called it "the death" or "the loss of Sieur Jumonville, so we received and so we understood it, until to our great surprise and mortification we found otherwise in a literal translation.
Washington was not learned in French. He had in his command a French Protestant, a chevalier, who had settled in Virginia. Unfortunately, badly wounded in the engagement, he was unable to be of any service.
This was Ensign Peyronie, who became a captain the next year and was killed at Braddock's defeat.
Prisoner Six Years.
Poor Van Braam paid dearly for his errors as will appear. He was a prisoner with the French for six years.
The signing of the capitulation was highly dramatic. In fact it was a difficult task. A solitary candle was with difficulty kept burning in the rain that was falling in torrents. Van Braam stumbled through the blurred, blotted terms of the capitulation, and Washington was satisfied and signed the papers.
The retreat of the weary troops was distressing. Seventy miles to safety at Mills Creek and there Washington's first campaign ended in disaster and gloom.
In one year another phase of his character was to appear, a promising soldier in a battle where retreat and panic gave the hated French the victory over Braddock.
We have seen Washington first as a hardy frontiersman daring and suffering, then as a somewhat reckless provincial commander, and then the promise of his rise was forthcoming.
Stobo was a patriot of high order. The action of Dinwiddie consigned both these men to long imprisonment.
Stobo has gone into history. Hume mentions him, and Lyman C. Draper, a Baltimore historian of 75 years ago, goes into details to prove fully the statement of Hume that Stobo's adventures were extraordinary. Draper has also something to say of Van Braam.
But these facts will receive consideration in due time, as will also the fate of LaForce and his companions.