CHAPTER XIV
I CHANCE UPON A TRAGEDY
As the first weeks of May passed, we slowly got into shape for the advance, and I began to realize the magnitude of the task before us. Our march to Great Meadows the year before, arduous as it had been, was mere child's play to this, and I did not wonder that on every hand the general found himself confronting obstacles well-nigh insurmountable. And each day, as though to cover other defects, the discipline grew more exacting. Arms were constantly inspected and overhauled; roll was called morning, noon, and night; each regiment attended divine service around the colors every Sabbath, though neither officers nor men got much good from it that I could see; guard mount occurred each morning at eight o'clock; every man was supplied with twenty-four rounds and extra flints, and also a new shirt, a new pair of stockings and of shoes, and Osnabrig waistcoats and breeches, the heat making the others insupportable, and with bladders for their hats.
On the sixteenth, Colonel Gage, with two companies of the Forty-Fourth and the last division of the train, toiled into camp, very weary and travel-stained, and on this day, too, was the first death among the officers, Captain Bromley, of Sir Peter Halket's, succumbing to dysentery. Two days later, we all attended his funeral, and a most impressive sight it was. A captain's guard marched before the coffin, their firelocks reversed, and the drums beating the dead march. At the grave the guard formed on either side, and the coffin, with sword and sash upon it, was carried in between and lowered into place. The service was read by Chaplain Hughes, of the Forty-Fourth, the guard fired three volleys over the grave, and we returned to quarters.
There was a great demonstration next day to impress some Indians that had come into camp. All the guns were fired, and drums and fifes were set to beating and playing the point-of-war, and then four or five companies of regulars were put through their manoeuvres. The Indians were vastly astonished at seeing them move together as one man, and even to us provincials it was a thrilling and impressive sight. And on the twentieth happened one of the pleasantest incidents of the whole campaign.
The great difficulty which confronted our commander from the first was the lack of means of transport. Of the three thousand horses and three hundred wagons promised from the colonies, only two hundred horses and twenty wagons were forthcoming, so that for a time it seemed that the expedition must be abandoned. Small wonder the general raved and swore at provincial perfidy and turpitude, the more so when it was discovered that a great part of the provision furnished for the army was utterly worthless, and the two hundred horses scarce able to stand upon their feet.
Let me say here that I believe this purblind policy of delaying the expedition instead of freely aiding it had much to do with the result. Virginia did her part with some degree of willingness, but Pennsylvania, whence the general expected to draw a great part of his transport and provision, would do nothing. The Assembly spent its time bickering with the governor, and when asked to contribute toward its own defense, made the astounding statement that "they had rather the French should conquer them than give up their privileges." Some of them even asserted that there were no French, but that the whole affair was a scheme of the politicians, and acted, to use Dinwiddie's words, as though they had given their senses a long holiday.
Yet, strangely enough, it was from a Pennsylvanian that aid came at last, for just when matters were at their worst and the general in despair, there came to his quarters at Frederick a very famous gentleman,—more famous still in the troublous times which are upon us now,—Mr. Benjamin Franklin, of Philadelphia, director of posts in the colonies and sometime printer of "Poor Richard." The general received him as his merit warranted, and explained to him our difficulties. Mr. Franklin, as Colonel Washington told me afterward, listened to it all with close attention, putting in a keen question now and then, and at the end said he believed he could secure us horses and wagons from his friends among the Pennsylvania Dutch, who were ever ready to turn an honest penny. So he wrote them a diplomatic letter, and the result was that, beside near a hundred furnished earlier, there came to us at Cumberland on the twentieth above eighty wagons, each with four horses, and the general declared Mr. Franklin the only honest man he had met in America. We, too, had cause to remember him, for all the officers were summoned to the general's tent, and there was distributed to each of us a package containing a generous supply of sugar, tea, coffee, chocolate, cheese, butter, wine, spirits, hams, tongues, rice, and raisins, the gift of Mr. Franklin and the Philadelphia Assembly.
There was high carnival in our tent that night, as you may well believe. We were all there, all who had been present at Fort Necessity, and not since the campaign opened had we sat down to such a feast. And when the plates were cleared away and only the pipes and wine remained, Peyronie sang us a song in French, and Spiltdorph one in German, and Polson one in Gaelic, and old Christopher Gist, who stuck in his head to see what was toward, was pressed to pay for his entertainment by giving us a Cherokee war-song, which he did with much fire and spirit. We sat long into the night talking of the past and of the future, and of the great things we were going to accomplish. Nor did we forget to draft a letter of most hearty thanks to Mr. Franklin, which was sent him, together with many others, among them one from Sir Peter Halket himself.
The arrival of the wagons had done much to solve the problem of transport, and on the next day preparations for the advance began in earnest. The whole force of carpenters was put to work building a bridge across the creek, the smiths sharpened the axes, and the bakers baked a prodigious number of little biscuits for us to carry on the march. Two hundred pioneers were sent out to cut the road, and from one end of the camp to the other was the stir of preparation.
So two days passed, and on the afternoon of the twenty-fourth, Spiltdorph and myself crossed the creek on the bridge, which was well-nigh completed, and walked on into the forest to see what progress the pioneers were making. We each took a firelock with us in hope of knocking over some game for supper, to help out our dwindling larder. We found that the pioneers had cut a road twelve feet wide some two miles into the forest. It was a mere tunnel between the trees, whose branches overtopped it with a roof of green, but it had been leveled with great care,—more care than I thought necessary,—and would give smooth going to the wagons and artillery. We reached the end of the road, where the axemen were laboring faithfully, and after watching them for a time, were turning back to camp, when Spiltdorph called my attention to the peculiar appearance of the ground about us. We were in the midst of a grove of chestnuts, and the leaves beneath them for rods around had been turned over and the earth freshly raked up.
"What under heaven could have caused that?" asked Spiltdorph.
"Wild turkeys," I answered quickly, for I had often seen the like under beeches and oaks as well as chestnuts. "Come on," I added, "perhaps they are not far away."
"All right," said Spiltdorph, "a wild turkey would go exceeding well on our table;" and he followed me into the forest. The turkeys had evidently been frightened away by the approach of the pioneers, and had stopped here and there to hunt for food, so that their track was easily followed. I judged they could not be far away, and was looking every moment to see their blue heads bobbing about among the underbrush, when I heard a sharp fusilade of shots ahead.
"Somebody 's found 'em!" I cried. "Come on. Perhaps we can get some yet."
We tore through a bit of marshy ground, up a slight hill, and came suddenly to the edge of a little clearing. One glance into it sent me headlong behind a bush, and I tripped up Spiltdorph beside me.
"Good God, man!" he cried, but I had my hand over his mouth before he could say more.
"Be still," I whispered "an you value your life. Look over there."
He peered around the bush and saw what I had seen, a dozen Indians in full war paint busily engaged in setting fire to a log cabin which stood in the middle of the clearing. They were going about the task in unwonted silence, doubtless because of the nearness of our troops, and a half dozen bodies, two of women and four of children, scattered on the ground before the door, showed how completely they had done their work. Even as we looked, two of them picked up the body of one of the women and threw it into the burning house.
"The devils!" groaned Spiltdorph. "Oh, the devils!" and I felt my own blood boiling in my veins.
"Come, we must do something!" I said. "We can kill two of them and reload and kill two more before they can reach us. They will not dare pursue us far toward the camp, and may even run at the first fire."
"Good!" said Spiltdorph, between his teeth. "Pick your man;" but before I could reply he had jerked his musket to his shoulder with a cry of rage and fired. An Indian had picked up one of the children, which must have been only wounded, since it was crying lustily, and was just about to pitch it on the fire, when Spiltdorph's bullet caught him full in the breast. He threw up his hands and fell like a log, the child under him. Quick as a flash, I fired and brought down another. For an instant the Indians stood dazed at the suddenness of the attack, and then with a yell they broke for the other side of the clearing. Spiltdorph would have started down toward the house, but I held him back.
"Not yet," I said. "They will stop so soon as they get to cover.
Wait a bit."
We waited for half an hour, watching the smoke curling over the house, and then, judging that the Indians had made off for fear of being ambushed, we crossed the clearing. It took but a glance to read the story. The women had been washing by the little brook before the cabin, with the children playing about them, when the Indians had come up and with a single volley killed them all except the child we had heard crying. They had swooped down upon their victims, torn the scalps from their heads, looted the house, and set fire to it. We dragged out the body of the woman which had been thrown within, in the hope that a spark of life might yet remain, but she was quite dead. Beneath the warrior Spiltdorph had shot we found the child. It was a boy of some six or seven years, and so covered with blood that it seemed it must be dead. But we stripped it and washed it in the brook, and found no wounds upon it except in the head, where it had been struck with a hatchet before its scalp had been stripped off. The cold water brought it back to life and it began to cry again, whereat Spiltdorph took off his coat and wrapped it tenderly about it.
We washed the blood from the faces of the women and stood for a long time looking down at them. They were both comely, the younger just at the dawn of womanhood. They must have been talking merrily together, for their faces were smiling as they had been in life.
As I stood looking so, I was startled by a kind of dry sobbing at my elbow, and turned with a jerk to find a man standing there. He was leaning on his rifle, gazing down at the dead, with no sound but the choking in his throat. A brace of turkeys over his shoulder showed that he had been hunting. In an instant I understood. It was the husband and father come home. He did not move as I looked at him nor raise his eyes, but stood transfixed under his agony. I glanced across at Spiltdorph, and saw that his eyes were wet and his lips quivering. I did not venture to speak, but my friend, who was ever more tactful than I, moved to the man's side and placed his hand gently on his shoulder.
"They died an easy death," he said softly. "See, they are still smiling. They had no fear, no agony. They were dead before they knew that danger threatened. Let us thank God that they suffered no worse."
The man breathed a long sigh and his strength seemed to go suddenly from him, for he dropped his rifle and fell upon his knees.
"This was my wife," he whispered. "This was my sister. These were my children. What is there left on earth for me?"
I no longer sought to control the working of my face, and the tears were streaming down Spiltdorph's cheeks. Great, gentle, manly heart, how I loved you!
"Yes, there is something!" cried the man, and he sprang to his feet and seized his gun. "There is vengeance! Friends, will you help me bury my dead?"
"Yes, we will help," I said. He brought a spade and hoe from a little hut near the stream, and we dug a broad and shallow trench and laid the bodies in it.
"There is one missing," said the man, looking about him. "Where is he?"
"He is here," said Spiltdorph, opening his coat. "He is not dead. He may yet live."
The father looked at the boy a moment, then fell on his knees and kissed him.
"Thank God!" he cried, and the tears burst forth. We waited in silence until the storm of grief was past. At last he wrapped the coat about the child again, and came to us where we stood beside the grave.
"Friends," he said, "does either of you know the burial service? These were virtuous and Christian women, and would wish a Christian burial."
Spiltdorph sadly shook his head, and the man turned to me. Could I do it?
I trembled at the thought. Yet how could I refuse?
"I know the service," I said, and took my place at the head of the grave.
The mists of evening were stealing up from the forest about us, and there was no sound save the plashing of the brook over the stones at our feet. Then it all faded from before me and I was standing again in a willow grove with an open grave afar off.
"'I am the resurrection and the life, saith the Lord,'" It was not my voice, but another ringing up to heaven from beside me. And the voice kept on and on until the last amen.
We filled in the shallow grave and covered it with logs and rocks. Night was at hand before we finished.
"You must come with us," said Spiltdorph to the stranger. "The doctor at the fort will do what he can for the child. If you still think of vengeance, you can march with us against the Indians and the French who set them on."
He made a gesture of assent, and we set off through the forest.
"Stewart," asked Spiltdorph, in a low voice, after we had walked some time in silence, "how does it happen you knew the burial service?"
"I have read it many times in the prayer-book," I answered simply. "Moreover, I heard it one morning beside my mother's grave, and again beside my grandfather's. I am not like to forget it."
He walked on for a moment, and then came close to me and caught my hand in his.
"Forgive me," he said softly. "You have done a good and generous thing. I can judge how much it cost you," and we said no more until we reached the fort.
The news that the Indians had pushed hostilities so near the camp created no little uproar, and a party was sent out at daybreak to scour the woods and endeavor to teach the marauders a lesson, but they returned toward evening without discovering a trace of them, and it was believed they had made off to Fort Duquesne. The Indians whom we had killed were recognized as two of a party of Delawares who had been in camp a few days before, and who, it was now certain, had been sent as spies by the French and to do us what harm they could. Wherefore it was ordered that no more Delawares should be suffered to enter the camp.
We turned the child over to Doctor Craik, and took the man, whose name, it seemed, was Nicholas Stith, to our tent with us, where we gave him meat and drink, and did what we could to take his mind from his misfortune. He remained with us some days, until his child died, as it did at last, and then, finding our advance too slow to keep pace with his passion for revenge, secured a store of ball and powder from the magazine, slung his rifle across his back, and disappeared into the forest.
In the mean time our preparations had been hurried on apace. It was no light task to cut a road through near a hundred and fifty miles of virgin forest, over two great mountain ranges and across innumerable streams, nor was it lightly undertaken. Captain Waggoner brought with him to table one night a copy of the orders for the march and for encampment, which were adhered to with few changes during the whole advance, and we discussed them thoroughly when the meal was finished, nor could we discover in them much to criticise.
It was ordered that, to protect the baggage from Indian surprise and insult, scouting parties were to be thrown well out upon the flanks and in front and rear, and every commanding officer of a company was directed to detach always upon his flanks a third of his men under command of a sergeant, the sergeant in turn to detach upon his flanks a third of his men under command of a corporal, these outparties to be relieved every night at retreat beating, and to form the advanced pickets. The wagons, artillery, and pack-horses were formed into three divisions, and the provisions so distributed that each division was to be victualed from the part of the line it covered, and a commissary was appointed for each. The companies were to march two deep, that they might cover the line more effectively. Sir Peter Halket was to lead the column and Colonel Dunbar bring up the rear. An advance party of three hundred men was to precede the column and clear the road.
The form of encampment differed little from that of march. The wagons were to be drawn up in close order, the companies to face out, the flanking parties to clear away the underbrush and saplings, half the company remaining under arms the while, and finally a chain of sentries was to be posted round the camp. Sir Peter Halket, with the Forty-Fourth, was to march with the first division; Lieutenant-Colonel Burton with the independent companies, provincials, and artillery, was to form the second; and Colonel Dunbar, with the Forty-Eighth, the third.
I confess that when I had become acquainted with these orders, they seemed to me most soldier-like. A copy of them lies before me now, and even at this day, when I scan again the plan of march, I do not see how it could be improved. I admit that there are others who know much more of the art of war than I, and to them defects in the system may be at once discernible. But at the time, these orders gave us all a most exalted opinion of our general's ability, and I remembered with a smile the gloomy prophecies of Colonel Washington. Surely, against such a force, so ably handled, no army the French might muster could avail, and I awaited the event with a confidence and eager anticipation which were shared by all the others.