A fortification erected by the
French on the site of the city of
Pittsburgh.,
Pa., in 1754.
While
Captain Trent and his company were building this fort,
Captain Contrecoeur, with 1,000 Frenchmen and eighteen cannon, went down the
Alleghany River in sixty bateaux and 300 canoes, took possession of the unfinished fortification, and named it
Fort Duquesne, in compliment to the captaingeneral of
Canada.
Lieutenant-Colonel Washington, with a small force, hurried from
Cumberland to recapture it, but was made a prisoner, with about 400 men, at
Fort Necessity.
In 1755 an expedition for the capture of
Fort Duquesne, commanded by
Gen. Edward Braddock (q. v.)marched from
Will's Creek (
Cumberland) on June 10, about 2,000 strong, British and provincials.
On the banks of the
Monongahela Braddock was defeated and killed on July 9, and the expedition was ruined.
Washington was a lieutenant-colonel under
Braddock in the expedition against
Fort Duquesne, in 1755, and in that of 1758.
In the former he was chiefly instrumental in saving a portion of the
British and provincial troops from utter destruction.
At the battle near the
Monongahela, where
Braddock was killed, every officer but
Washington was slain or wounded; and he, alone, led the survivors on a safe retreat.
He was not injured during the battle.
To his mother he wrote: “I luckily escaped unhurt, though I had four bullets through my coat, and two horses shot under me.”
To his brother he wrote: “By the all-powerful dispensation of Providence, I have been protected beyond all human probability or expectation.
Death was levelling my companions on every side.”
An Indian chief, who, fifteen years afterwards, travelled a long way to see
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Washington when he was in
Ohio, said he had singled him out for death, and directed his fellows to do the same.
He fired more than a dozen fair shots at him, but could not hit him. “We felt,” said the chief, “that some Manitou guarded your life, and that you could not be killed.”
The expedition of 1758 was commanded by
Gen. John Forbes, who had about 9,000 men at his disposal at
Fort Cumberland and
Raystown.
These included
Virginia troops under
Colonel Washington, the
Royal Americans from
South Carolina, and an auxiliary force of
Cherokee Indians.
Sickness and perversity of will and judgment on the part of
Forbes caused delays almost fatal to the expedition.
He was induced, by the advice of some
Pennsylvania land speculators, to use the army in constructing a military road farther north than the one made by
Braddock.
Washington, who knew the country well, strongly advised against this measure, but he was unheeded, and so slow was the progress of the troops towards their destination, that in September, when it was known that there were not more than 800 men at
Duquesne,
Forbes, with 6,000 troops, was yet east of the
Alleghany Mountains.
Major Grant, with a scouting-party of
Colonel
Bouquet's advance corps, was attacked (Sept. 21), defeated, and made a prisoner.
Still
Forbes went creeping on, wasting precious time, and exhausting the patience and respect of
Washington and other energetic officers; and when
Bouquet joined the army it was 50 miles from
Fort Duquesne.
The winter was approaching, the troops were discontented, and a council of war was called, to which
Forbes intended to propose an abandonment of the enterprise, when three prisoners gave information of the extreme weakness of the
French garrison.
Washington was immediately sent forward, and the whole army prepared to follow.
When the Virginians were within a day's march of the fort, they were discovered by some
Indians, who so alarmed the garrison by an exaggerated account of the number of the approaching troops that the guardians of
Fort Duquesne, reduced to 500, set it on fire (Nov. 24), and fled down the
Ohio in boats with such haste and confusion that they left everything behind them.
The Virginians took possession the next day, and the name of the fortress was changed to
Fort Pitt, in honor of the great English statesman.
