OLD TIMES IN THE COLONIES.
BY CHARLES CARLETON COFFIN.
No. VIII.
THE BATTLE OF THE RANGERS.
When war broke out between France and England in 1755, the French and Indians came down from Canada and attacked the settlers of New England and New York, as they had done in previous wars, burning their dwellings, killing men and women, or carrying them to Canada as prisoners.
The French had a fort at Crown Point, on Lake Champlain, and another at Ticonderoga; while the English had Fort William Henry, at the southern end of Lake George, and Fort Edward, on the Hudson.
The English officers who had been sent over by the King to command the "Provincials," as the people of England called all who lived in America, thought that soldiers must march in the wilderness with just as much precision as along a hard beaten road, that they must move in platoons and columns, keeping step to the drum-beat. The French officers, on the other hand, adopted the plan of the Indians, marching in single file, each man carrying his provisions. They made quick movements, falling suddenly upon a settlement, with their Indian allies, making all the havoc possible, and before the settlers could gather to resist them, would be far on their way to Crown Point or Canada.
Robert Rogers, of New Hampshire, who was fighting the French, prevailed upon Lord Loudon, the English commander-in-chief, to allow him to form a battalion of troops, who should have the privilege of scouting the woods around Lake George and Lake Champlain, to discover the movements of the French and Indians, to fall upon them just as they were stealing upon the English, strike a blow, and be gone before the French would know what had happened. He would play their own game upon them.
Lord Loudon having given his consent, Major Rogers went to New Hampshire and enlisted his men. They were all young, strong, athletic. They had tramped over the hills and mountains of that province, hunting bears, and had set their traps along the streams for beavers. They could pick their way through the forest on a cloudy day when there was no sun to guide them, and could tell in the darkest and cloudiest night which way was north by feeling the bark on the trees—for the bark is always more mossy on the northern than on the side exposed to the sun.
It was to be a service of hardship and privation. They would have to make long marches; to sleep on the ground; to endure great fatigue; brave the cold of winter, wrapping themselves in their blankets at night, and lying down with the snow for their bed.