Taking four days to travel twelve miles, they had no idea
whatever of woodland warfare. Washington complained that they had to stop to
flatten every mole hill and build a bridge across every stream. Their general
had been trained in the wars in Europe, where it was believed ungentlemanly to
duck, even if you saw a cannonball coming straight for you. These were the men
that toasted each other before battle, and would offer the other the chance to
fire first, which would be politely declined. They would march in neat rows
right at cannons and lines of men with guns, get mowed down in masses, while
their officers ordered them not to flinch but march as the men in front of them
were knocked down like dominoes.
When a detachment of scouting Indians and Frenchmen fired on
them, they formed up into nice neat rows in the middle of a clearing and began
to fire back. The Indians and their French allies lay down behind logs and
picked them off. Men on horses were the first ones killed and wounded, Braddock
among them. In all the Americans and British lost 900 men, the French and
Indians about 16.
With the commanding general down, Washington began to order
men about. He had two horses shot out from under, his hat shot off, and four
bullets passed through his coat. He was later told by an Indian chief that the
man had ordered his men to shoot the man on the horse, but that they could not
kill Washington. Finally the chief fired on him, but was mortified that he
could not die.
God, Washington said, had Providentially protected him, while
“death was leveling my companions on every side.”
I need not state what history would look like, if we had had
a revolution, minus Washington.
Through His Strength We Will Conquer,
Andrew C. Abbott
No comments:
Post a Comment