No one delighted more in the free and easy life of the frontier than did Colonel William Johnson. He was a typical colonial patroon, a representative of the king and a friend of the red man. The Indians trusted him implicitly. He had studied their character and knew well their language. He entered into their life with full sympathy for their traditions and was said to possess an influence over them such as had never been gained by any other white man. For a long time he lived at Fort Johnson, a three-storey dwelling of stone on the left bank of the Mohawk, and later at Johnson Hall, a more spacious mansion several miles farther north. Here all who came were treated with a lavish hand, and the wayfarer found a welcome as he stopped to admire the flowers which grew before the portals. Within were a retinue of servants, careful for the needs of all. When hearts were sad or time went slowly, a dwarf belonging to the household played a merry tune on his violin to drive away gloom from the wilderness mansion.
On one occasion, however, Johnson's hospitality was taxed beyond all bounds. This was at Fort Johnson in the year 1755, just after he had been made a major-general in the colonial militia. The French from Canada had already been making bold encroachments on territory claimed by the English to the north and the west. They had erected Fort Duquesne at the junction of the Alleghany and Monongahela rivers, where the great city of Pittsburgh now stands; they had fortified Niagara; and now they were bidding defiance to all the English colonists between the Alleghany Mountains and the sea. War had not been declared in Europe, but the inhabitants of the Thirteen Colonies, only too eager to stay the hand of France in America, planned a series of blows against the enemy. Among other things, they decided that an attempt should be made to capture the French stronghold of Fort Frederic at Crown Point on Lake Champlain. The officer selected to Command the expedition to be sent on this enterprise was William Johnson, now a major-general of the colony of New York.
It flashed at once across Johnson's mind that his redskin friends could aid him in the undertaking; so he sent messages with all speed to the tribes, asking them to gather at his house. Eleven hundred hungry Indians answered the summons. From all quarters they came in, taking up their residence for the time being upon his broad domain. Johnson's bright and genial face clouded as he looked upon the multitude of guests and saw his food supplies vanishing and every green thing that grew upon his fields and meadows being plucked up. But he bore it all good-naturedly, for he was determined to win their support. Seated on the grass in squads, according to their tribes, they listened while he addressed them and told them of their duties to the English crown. With rising eloquence he said that they were bound in their allegiance to the English as though with a silver chain. 'The ends of this silver chain,' he added, 'are fixed in the immovable mountains, in so firm a manner that the hands of no mortal enemy might be able to move it.' Then as he bade them take the field, he held a war belt in his hands and exclaimed with fervour:
'My war kettle is on the fire; my canoe is ready to put into the water; my gun is loaded; my sword is by my side; and my axe is sharpened.'
Little Abraham, sachem of the lower Mohawk valley, took the belt from him, Red Head, a chief of the Onondagas, made reply, telling him that from every castle warriors would follow him to the north. A war dance followed, and a large body of the Six Nations were ready for the fray.
No doubt young Joseph Brant was in this great audience, listening to the speeches of his elders. He was only thirteen years of age at the time, but the spirit of the war-path was already upon him. The zealous appeals of the major-general must have stirred him greatly, and it may well be that this lad, with youthful frame and boyish features, here received an impulse which often sustained him in later years during his long career of active loyalty on behalf of the English cause. As it happened, Joseph was soon to be in active service. On August 8, 1755, Johnson's expedition left Albany, and a week later arrived at the great carrying-place between the Hudson and Lac St Sacrement, as Lake George was then called. At this point Fort Lyman [Footnote: Afterwards named Fort Edward.] had been built the same summer. Thence the major-general set out, with fifteen hundred provincials and three hundred Indians, on his journey northward. King Hendrick, a chief of the Mohawks, led the tribesmen, and under his direction a number of braves were being tested for the first time. One of these—we may imagine the boy's intense delight—was young Joseph Brant.
On reaching Lac St Sacrement Johnson made a halt and took up a strong position on the shore. Soon reinforcements arrived under General Phineas Lyman, his second in command. Johnson re-named the lake. 'I have given it,' he says, 'the name of Lake George, not only in honour of His Majesty, but to assert his undoubted dominion here.'
Meanwhile Baron Dieskau, the commander of the French forces, having landed at South Bay, the southern extremity of the waters of Lake Champlain, was moving down through the woods. His army was made up of a large body of French Canadians, Indians, and regular soldiers of the regiments of La Reine and Languedoc. He marched by way of Wood Creek, and was bent on making a vigorous attack on Fort Lyman. But when he arrived at a point about midway between Fort Lyman and Johnson's camp on Lake George, his Indians became unruly, declaring that they would march no farther south nor venture off the soil that belonged to France. There was nothing for Dieskau to do but to change his plans. Swerving in a north-westerly direction, he struck the new road that Johnson had made to the lake. This he followed, intending to fall upon the English forces wherever he should find them.
Johnson's scouts, prowling to the southward, detected this move. Back to the encampment they brought the news of Dieskau's approach and the English leader at once made ready to defend his position. Trees were felled; the wagons and bateaux were brought up; a strong breastwork was built across the new-cut roadway; cannon were put in position to play upon the advancing enemy. Then discussion took place as to the advisability of making a sortie against the foe. It was suggested that five hundred men would be sufficient, but at the mention of this number King Hendrick, the Indian leader, interposed. What, indeed, could such a paltry handful do in the face of the oncoming Frenchmen?
'If they are to fight,' he said, 'they are too few; if they are to be killed, they are too many.'