Colonel Washington

by Archer Butler Hulbert

In 1830—fourteen years after Mr. Lewis’ “survey,”—Mr. Jared Sparks, a careful historian and author of the standard work on Washington, visited Fort Necessity. According to him its remains occupied “an irregular square, the dimensions of which were about one hundred feet on each side.” Mr. Sparks drew a map of the embankments which is incorporated in his “Writings of Washington.” This drawing has not been reproduced in any later work, the authors of both “History of Cumberland” and “Frontier Forts of Pennsylvania” preferring to reproduce Mr. Lewis’ inconsistent survey and speculation rather than the drawing of what Mr. Sparks, himself, saw.

It is plain that Mr. Sparks found the embankment B E running in the direction it does today and not at all in direction of the line B C as Mr. Lewis drew it. By giving the approximate length of the sides as one hundred feet, Mr. Sparks gives about the exact length of the line B E in whatever direction it is extended to the brook. The fact that such an exact scholar as Mr. Sparks does not mention a sign or tradition of an embankment at B C, only fourteen years after Mr. Lewis “surveyed” it, is evidence that it never existed which cannot come far from convicting the latter of a positive intention to speculate.

Mr. Sparks gives us four sides for Fort Necessity. Three of these have been described as C A, A B and the broken line B E D. Is there any evidence of the fourth side such as indicated by the line C D? There is.

When Mr. Fazenbaker first questioned the accuracy of the map of Fort Necessity in “Frontier Forts of Pennsylvania,” he believed the fort was a four sided construction and pointed to a small mound, indicated at O, as the remains of the fourth embankment. The mound would not be noticed in a hasty view of the field but, on examination proves to be an artificial, not a natural, mound. It is in lower ground and nearer the old course of the brook than the remains of Fort Necessity. A mound here would suffer most when the brook was out of banks, which would account for its disappearance.

Western embankment of Fort Necessity marked with a line of white stones.

Remains of the Southern embankment of Fort Necessity.
The low ground covered with rank grass, on the right, marks the rifle-pit.
In the distance is the Eastern sweep of Great Meadows.

Excavations in the other mounds had been unsuccessful; nothing had been discovered of the palisades, though every mound gave certain proof of having been artificially made. But excavations at mound O gave a different result. At about four and one-half feet below the surface of the ground, at the water line, a considerable amount of bark was found, fresh and red as new bark. It was water-soaked and the strings lay parallel with the mound above and were not found at a greater distance than two feet from its center. It was the rough bark of a tree’s trunk—not the skin bark such as grows on roots. Large flakes, the size of a man’s hand, could be removed from it. At a distance of ten feet away a second trench was sunk, in line with the mound but quite beyond its northwestern extremity. Bark was found here entirely similar in color, position, and condition. There is little doubt that the bark came from the logs of the palisades of Fort Necessity, though nothing is to be gained by exaggerating the possibility. Bark, here in the low ground, would last indefinitely, and water was reached under this mound sooner than at any other point. No wood was found. It is probable that the French threw down the palisades, but bark would naturally have been left in the ground. If wood had been left it would not withstand decay so long as bark. Competent judges declare the bark to be that of oak. An authority of great reputation, expresses the opinion that the bark found was probably from the logs of the palisades erected in 1754.

If anything is needed to prove that this slight mound O was an embankment of Fort Necessity, it is to be found in the result of Mr. McCracken’s survey. The mound lies in exact line with the eastern extremity of embankment C A, the point C, being located seven rods from the obtuse angle A, in line with the mound C A, which is broken by Mr. Fazenbaker’s lane. Also, the distance from C to D (in line with the mound O) measures ninety-nine feet and four inches,—almost exactly Mr. Sparks’ estimate of one hundred feet. Thus Fort Necessity was in the shape of the figure represented by lines K C, C A, A B, and B E, and the projection of the palisades to the brook is represented by E D K, E H K, or L W K, (line B E being prolonged to L.) Mr. Sparks’ drawing of the fort is thus proven approximately correct, although Mr. Veech boldly asserts that it is “inaccurate,” (the quotation being copied in the “Frontier Forts of Pennsylvania”) and despite the fact that two volumes treating of the fort, “History of Cumberland,” and “Frontier Forts of Pennsylvania,” refuse to give Mr. Sparks’ map a place in their pages. It is of little practical moment what the form of the fort may have been, but it is all out of order that a palpably false description should be given by those who should be authorities, in preference to Mr. Sparks’ description which is easily proven to be approximately correct.