I shall think myself very happy to form an acquaintance with a person so universally esteemed, and shall use every opportunity of assuring you how much I am
Your obedient servant,
Robert Orme,
Aide-de-camp.
I have no doubt that Colonel Peyton was the gentleman who, knowing my wishes, had suggested my appointment. I was considered by some to have been imprudent at Fort Necessity, and the governor, because of the freedom of speech I used with him in the matter of Stobo and La Force, had for me no great regard, and was very unlikely to have favoured me with the general.
Before leaving Williamsburg, Mr. C——, a cousin of Colonel Peyton, visited me and said he had been well advised to seek my friendship in a letter from the colonel, which he thought might please me and which I was free to read. As to my appearance, wit, and judgment, the letter spoke in the most agreeable language, and added that I was destined to make no inconsiderable figure in our country. I confess to having felt, as I read it, both pleasure and doubt.
XXX
I had thus engaged as a volunteer, much against the wishes of my mother, who, as she said, saw no good in war and entreated me not again to expose myself to peril in the wilderness. If the French had been of her opinion as to war, I might have stayed at home. We had an unpleasant meeting, or rather parting, for she did little else but lament; but what was there I could do? I left her in tears.
I have no intention to record here the full history of this expedition, but rather to revive for my own interest what I, personally, saw, and what is nowhere else fully set down.