Harper's New Monthly Magazine, February, 1852

by Unknown

They arrived at length at Gnadenhütten, where a most melancholy spectacle awaited them. The village was in ruins. The country people of the neighborhood had attempted to give the bodies of the murdered inhabitants a hurried burial; but they had only half performed their work, and the first duty which devolved on Franklin's soldiers was to complete the interment in a proper manner. The next thing to be thought of was to provide some sort of shelter for the soldiers; for they had no tents, and all the houses had been destroyed.

There was a mill near by, around which were several piles of pine boards which the Indians had not destroyed. Franklin set his troops at work to make huts of these boards, and thus in a short time his whole army was comfortably sheltered. All this was done on the day and evening of their arrival, and on the following morning the whole force was employed in commencing operations upon the fort.

The fort was to be built of palisades, and it was marked out of such a size that the circumference was four hundred and fifty-five feet. This would require four hundred and fifty-five palisades; for the palisades were to be formed of logs, of a foot in diameter upon an average, and eighteen feet long. The palisades were to be obtained from the trees in the neighborhood, and these trees were so tall that each tree would make three palisades. The men had seventy axes in all, and the most skillful and able woodmen in the company were immediately set at work to fell the trees. Franklin says that he was surprised to observe how fast these axmen would cut the trees down; and at length he had the curiosity to look at his watch when two men began to cut at a pine. They brought it down in six minutes; and on measuring it, where they had cut it off, Franklin found the diameter of the tree to be fourteen inches.

While the woodmen were cutting the palisades a large number of other laborers were employed in digging a trench all around the circumference [pg 295] of the fort to receive them. This trench was made about three feet deep, and wide enough to receive the large ends of the palisades. As fast as the palisades were cut they were brought to the spot, by means of the wagon wheels which had been separated from the wagon bodies for this purpose. The palisades were set up, close together, in the trench, and the earth was rammed in around them; thus the inclosure of the fort was soon completed.

A platform was then built all around on the inside, for the men to stand upon to fire through the loop holes which were left in the palisades above. There was one swivel gun, which the men had brought with them in one of the wagons. This gun they mounted in one corner of the fort, and as soon as they had mounted it they fired it, in order, as Franklin said, to let the Indians know, if any were within hearing, that they had such artillery.

There were Indians within hearing it seems; several bands were lurking in the neighborhood, secretly watching the movements of Franklin's command. This was found to be the case a short time after the fort was completed, for when Franklin found his army securely posted he sent out a party of scouts to explore the surrounding country to see if any traces of Indians could be found. These men saw no Indians, but they found certain places on the neighboring hills where it was evident that Indians had been lurking to watch the proceedings of the soldiers in building the fort. Franklin's men were much struck with the ingenious contrivance which the Indians had resorted to, in order to escape being observed while thus watching. As it was in the depth of the winter it was absolutely necessary for them to have a fire, and without some special precaution a fire would have betrayed them, by the light which it would emit at night, or the smoke which would rise from it by day. To avoid this, the Indians, they found, had dug holes in the ground, and made their fires in the bottoms of the holes, using charcoal only for fuel, for this would emit no smoke. They obtained the charcoal from the embers, and brands, and burnt ends of logs, which they found in the woods near by. The soldiers found by the marks on the grass around these holes that the Indians had been accustomed to sit around them upon the edges, with their feet below, near the fire.

The building and arming of such a fort, and the other military arrangements which Franklin made on the frontier produced such an impression upon the Indians that they gradually withdrew, leaving that part of the country in a tolerably secure condition. Soon after this Franklin was summoned by the governor to return to Philadelphia, as his presence and counsel were required there. He found on his arrival that he had acquired great fame by the success of his military operations. In fact quite a distinguished honor was paid to him, soon after this time, on the occasion of his going to Virginia on some public business. The officers of the regiment resolved to escort him out of the town, on the morning when he was to commence his journey. He knew nothing of this project until just as he was coming forth, when he found the officers at the door, all mounted and dressed in their uniforms. Franklin says that he was a good deal chagrined at their appearing, as he could not avoid their accompanying him, though if he had known it beforehand he should have prevented it.

While Franklin was thus acquiring some considerable military renown in America, he was becoming quite celebrated as a philosopher on the continent of Europe. It seems that some years before, the library society of Philadelphia had received some articles of electrical apparatus from England, and Franklin had performed certain experiments with them which led him to believe, what had not been known before, that lightning was an electrical phenomenon. He wrote some account of his experiments, and of the views which they had led him to entertain, and sent it to the person from whom the library society had received the apparatus. These papers attracted much attention, and were at length laid before the Royal Society of London, and soon afterward published in the transactions of the Society. In this form they were seen by a distinguished French philosopher, the Count de Buffon, who caused them to be be translated into the French language and published at Paris. By this means the attention of the whole scientific world was called to Franklin's speculations, and as the correctness of his views was fully established by subsequent investigations and experiments, he acquired great renown. He was elected a member of the various scientific societies, and the Royal Society of London sent him a magnificent gold medal.