Young Washington’s early experience
Major General Edward Braddock snorted when Benjamin Franklin
cautioned him not to underestimate the fighting capability of
Indians:
”
Perhaps they set raw militia running but we are British
soldiers, Sir.
”
Young Washington’s early experience
Major General Edward Braddock snorted when Benjamin Franklin cautioned him not to underestimate the fighting capability of Indians: “Perhaps they set raw militia running but we are British soldiers, Sir.”
Despite his disdain for militia, he accepted the offer of Lt. Col. George Washington, 23, as an aide-de-camp, because he knew the roads to Fort Duquesne where Braddock planned to dislodge the French. Frenchmen had been creeping into English territory long enough, and Braddock, as His Majesty’s commander of British troops in North America, led an expedition to expel them.
It took months to assemble his two regiments of regulars, procure supplies and engage wagon drivers. He reluctantly took along some companies of militia and a handful of Indian scouts. Washington endorsed hiring his young friend, Daniel Boone, who had led him into the Ohio country on a surveying trip earlier.
The force of about 1,900 men found progress slow through rugged terrain and forests, especially in the summer heat with clouds of mosquitoes and gnats hovering over them. But Braddock insisted on strict discipline and the convoy moved along ponderously with few stops.
On July 9, 1755, after fording the Monongahela River, he took the greater part of his army forward, with the wagons to follow.
The forest suddenly exploded with war whoops and gunfire. Soldiers reeled under the attack and many fell. “Into formation!” Braddock roared, and soldiers formed lines in the middle of the road where they were cut down in swaths.
A few officers followed the militia’s lead and rushed into the woods to fight, only to be ordered back: “You’re Regulars, by God! Act like it!”
In the three-hour carnage a force of about 300 Frenchmen and Canadians and 600 Indians pressed the assault. Two-thirds of Braddock’s officers were killed or wounded, and many soldiers fled in panic. Braddock fell, with blood gushing from his mouth and exclaimed, “Who would have thought?”
When the Indians stopped to gather scalps, Washington led the survivors to safety. Braddock died four days later and was buried in the road. Of his force, 456 were killed and 521 wounded. The other side numbered 23 dead and 20 wounded.
The battle led to open war with France and earned Washington an international reputation for valor under fire. When he commanded the Continental Army 20 years later, two officers who had survived the battle, Horatio Gates and Charles Lee, became American generals. Each conspired to supersede him as commander. A 19-year-old wagon driver, Daniel Morgan, who impressed Washington by moving the wounded to safety, became an American general in the Revolution. His deadly sharpshooters turned the tide in more than one battle.
Among the surviving officers who remained loyal to the Crown was Thomas Gage. He was the commanding general at Boston who dispatched a force on April 18, 1775 to seize a store of arms and arrest a few prominent rebels. The ensuing events at Lexington and Concord ignited a powder keg that altered world history forever.
