SIR,

TO GOVERNOR DINWIDDIE.

Little Meadows, 9 May, 1754.

Even

I acquainted you by Mr. Ward with the determination, which we prosecuted four days after his departure, as soon as wagons arrived to carry our provisions. The want of proper conveyances has much retarded this expedition, and at this time it unfortunately delays the detachment I have the honor to command. when we came to Will's Creek, my disappointments were not less than before; for there I expected to find a sufficient number of packhorses provided by Captain Trent, conformably to his promise, and to Major Carlyle's letters and my own, that I might prosecute my first intention with light, expeditious marches; but instead of that, there was none in readiness, nor any in expectation that I could perceive, which reduced me to the necessity of waiting till wagons could be procured from

The only rightful owners were the Indian occupants, and these were not the Iroquois. This point is very clear from the whole tenor of Indian history, and is fully confirmed by Hecke welder, though in some things that venerable missionary was credulous, and too much influenced by the traditions of his favorite Delawares.

Besides the above memorable treaties of the high European powers, Governor Dinwiddie gave great weight to an Indian treaty made at Lancaster, in 1744, between a large number of delegates from the Iroquois tribes, and Commissioners from Pennsylvania, Maryland, and Virginia. This treaty was conducted with much parade and formality, after the Indian manner, and the Iroquois professed to give up their claim to the lands on the west of the Allegany Mountains for four hundred pounds, paid to them by Virginia in money and goods; but the extent of these lands is not defined; and the Commissioners themselves seem to doubt the title of the Iroquois, when they tell them, "We are informed that the Southern Indians claim these very lands that you do." During the whole transaction, which lasted several days, the Indian negociators expressed more solicitude about the rum, that was given them from time to time, than the affairs of state in which they were engaged.

There was much good sense, however, in the following remarks of the Sachem Gachradodow, in his speech to the Commissioners from Virginia;

the Branch, forty miles distant. However, in the mean time, I detached a party of sixty men to make and mend the road, which party since the 25th of April, and the main body since the 1st instant, have been laboriously employed, and have got no farther than these Meadows, about twenty miles from the New Store. We have been two days making a bridge across the river, and have not done yet.†

*

The great difficulty and labor, that it requires to mend

-"You know very well, when the white people first came here, they were poor; but they have got our lands, and are by them become rich, and we are now poor; what little we have had for the land goes soon away, but the land lasts for ever." And again;-"The great king might send you over to conquer the Indians; but it looks to us, that God did not approve it; if he had, he would not have placed the great sea where it is, as the limits between us and you." - Colden's History of the Five Nations, Vol. II. pp. 86, 87.

When Mr. Gist went over the Alleganies, in February, 1751, on a tour of discovery for the Ohio Company, "an Indian, who spoke good English, came to him, and said that their great man, the Beaver, and Captain Oppamyluah, (two Chiefs of the Delawares) desired to know where the Indians' land lay, for the French claimed all the land on one side of the Ohio River, and the English on the other." This question Mr. Gist found it hard to answer, and he evaded it by saying, that the Indians and white men were all subjects of the same king, and all had an equal privilege of taking up and possessing the land, in conformity with the conditions prescribed by the King. Gist's Manuscript Journal.

* A storehouse, or magazine, established by the Ohio Company at Will's Creek.

A council of war had been called, when the news of Ensign Ward's capitulation reached Will's Creek, in which it was agreed to be impossible to march towards the fort without reinforcements; but it was resolved to advance to the mouth of Red-stone Creek on the Monongahela, and raise a fortification, clearing the roads on the way, so that the artillery and baggage could pass, and there wait for fresh orders.

The reasons for this decision were, that the mouth of the Red-stone was the nearest convenient position on the Monongahela; that the storehouses already built there by the Ohio Company would receive their munitions and provisions; that the heavy artillery might be easily transported by water from that place, whenever it should be expedient to attack the French fort; and that by this movement the soldiers would be kept from the ill consequences of inaction, and the Indians encouraged to remain true to their alliance.

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and alter the road, prevent our marching above two, three, or four miles a day; and I fear, though no diligence shall be spared, that we shall be detained some considerable time before it can be made good for the carriage of the artillery with Colonel Fry.

We daily receive intelligence from Ohio by one or another of the traders, who are continually retreating to the inhabitants with their effects. They all concur, that the French are reinforced with eight hundred men; and this day, by one Kalendar, I received an account, which he sets forth as certain, that there are six hundred at the Falls of the Ohio, from whence they intend to move up to the lower Shawnese Town, at the mouth of Scioto Creek, to erect fortresses. He likewise says, that the forces at the Fork are erecting their works with their whole strength; and as he was coming he met at Mr. Gist's new settlement Monsieur La Force with four soldiers, who, under the specious pretence of hunting after deserters, were reconnoitring and discovering the country. He also brings the agreeable news, that the Half-King has received, and is much pleased with, the speech I sent him, and is now upon his march with fifty men to meet us. The French down the river are sending presents and invitations to all the neighbouring Indians.

We have heard nothing from the Catawbas, or any of the Southern Indians, though this is the time we mostly need their assistance. I have not above one hundred and sixty effective men with me, since Captain Trent's have left us, whom I discharged from this detachment, and ordered them to wait your commands at Captain Trent's; for I found them rather injurious to the other men, than serviceable to the expedition, till they could be upon the same establishment with us, and come under the rigor of martial law. I am, &c.

SIR,

TO GOVERNOR DINWIDDIE.

Youghiogany, 18 May, 1754.

I am heartily concerned, that the officers have such real cause to complain of the Committee's resolves; and still more to find my inclinations prone to second their just grievances.

I have endeavoured, as far as I was able, to see in the best light I could the trifling advantages that may accrue; yet nothing prevents their throwing down their commissions, (with gratitude and thanks to your Honor, whose good intentions of serving us we are all well assured of,) but the approaching danger, which has too far engaged their honor to recede till other officers are sent in their room, or an alteration made regarding their pay, during which time they will assist with their best endeavours voluntarily, that is, without receiving the gratuity allowed by the resolves of the Committee.

Giving up my commission is quite contrary to my intention. Nay, I ask it as a greater favor, than any amongst the many I have received from your Honor, to confirm it to me. But let me serve voluntarily; then I will, with the greatest pleasure in life, devote my services to the expedition without any other reward, than the satisfaction of serving my country; but to be slaving dangerously for the shadow of pay, through woods, rocks, mountains, I would rather prefer the great toil of a daily laborer, and dig for a maintenance, provided I were reduced to the necessity, than serve upon such ignoble terms; for I really do not see why the lives of his Majesty's subjects in Virginia should be of less value, than of those in other parts of his American dominions; especially when it is well known, that we must undergo double their hardship.

VOL. II.

I could enumerate a thousand difficulties that we have met with, and must expect to meet with, more than other officers who have almost double our pay; but as I know you reflect on these things, and are sensible of the hardships we must necessarily encounter, it would be needless to enlarge.

Besides, as I have expatiated fully (and, perhaps, too warmly) in a letter to Colonel Fairfax, who, I suppose, will accompany you to Winchester, upon the motives that occasion these my resolves, I shall not trouble you with them; for the subject leads me too far when I engage in it. *

Another thing resolved by the Committee is, that only one sergeant and one corporal be allowed to a company; with whom it is as much impossible to do the necessary duty, as it is to conquer kingdoms with my handful of

men.

Upon the whole, I find so many clogs upon the expe

* The Governor was at this time in Winchester, having previously made arrangements for meeting there several Indian chiefs, to brighten the chain of friendship by a new treaty, or rather to give them presents, and exchange belts of wampum. He assigned this as a reason, why Virginia did not send delegates to the Albany Convention, which was recommended by the Board of Trade, and attended by commissioners from the northern and middle colonies, and which acquired notoriety from the celebrated Plan of Union drawn up by Franklin, and adopted by the Convention. The attempt to treat at Winchester was a failure, as two or three subordinate Chiefs only appeared, though Washington used his best endeavours to bring down the Half-King and some of his friends. They made excuses, that they were planting corn, and engaged in other affairs at home.

The Albany Plan of Union was disapproved in Virginia, as it was everywhere else, and by the Governor particularly, because he had already matured a project of his own. He communicated the year before to Lord Halifax a scheme for colonial government, which he deemed "more reasonable and more constitutional," than the one proposed by the commissioners at Albany. The prominent feature of his scheme was, that the colonies should be divided into two districts, a northern and southern, in each of which there should be a congress, or some kind of general council, for the regulation of their respective interests.