[257] “Lord’s day and Monday ... the sickness was very distressing.... Eleven of our men were sick, and scarcely one of us in perfect health; almost every man was troubled with the griping and flux.”—Norton, The Redeemed Captive.
[258] Rigaud erroneously makes the garrison a little larger. “La garnison se trouve de 24 hommes, entre lesquels il y avoit un ministre, 3 femmes, et 5 enfans.” The names and residence of all the men in the fort when the attack began are preserved. Hawks made his report to the provincial government under the title “An Account of the Company in his Majesty’s Service under the command of Sergt. John Hawks ... at Fort Massachusetts, August 20 [31, new style], 1746.” The roll is attested on oath “Before William Williams, Just. Pacis.” The number of men is 22, including Hawks and Norton. Each man brought his own gun. I am indebted to the kindness of Professor A. L. Perry for a copy of Hawks’s report, which is addressed to “the Honble. Spencer Phipps, Esq., Lieut. Govr. and Commander in Chief [and] the Honble. his Majesty’s Council and House of Representatives in General Court assembled.”
[259] When I visited the place as a college student, no trace of the fort was to be seen except a hollow, which may have been the remains of a cellar, and a thriving growth of horse-radish,—a relic of the garrison garden. My friend, Dr. D. D. Slade, has given an interesting account of the spot in the Magazine of American History for October, 1888.
[260] “L’Ennemi me tua un abenakis et me blessa 16 hommes, tant Iroquois qu’Abenaquis, nipissings et françois.”—Journal de Rigaud.
[261] “Je passay la nuit à conduire l’ouvrage auquel j’avois destiné le jour précédent, résolu à faire ouvrir la tranchée deux heures avant le lever du soleil, et de la pousser jusqu’au pied de la palissade, pour y placer les fascines, y appliquer l’artifice, et livrer le fort en proye à la fureur du feu.”—Journal de Rigaud. He mistakes in calling the log wall of the fort a palisade.
[262] Journal of Sergeant Hawks, cited by William L. Stone, Life and Times of Sir William Johnson, i. 227. What seems conclusive is that the French permitted Norton to nail to a post of the fort a short account of its capture, in which it is plainly stated that the first advances were made by Rigaud.
[263] One French account says that the Indians failed to meet the English party. N. Y. Col. Docs. x. 35.
[264] The note was as follows: “August 20 [31, new style], 1746. These are to inform you that yesterday, about 9 of the clock, we were besieged by, as they say, seven hundred French and Indians. They have wounded two men and killed one Knowlton. The General de Vaudreuil desired capitulations, and we were so distressed that we complied with his terms. We are the French’s prisoners, and have it under the general’s hand that every man, woman, and child shall be exchanged for French prisoners.”
[265] Journal de Rigaud.
[266] Kalm also describes the fort and its tower. Little trace of either now remains. Amherst demolished them in 1759, when he built the larger fort, of which the ruins still stand on the higher ground behind the site of its predecessor.