The Rout Of Braddock's Army

On the 9th Lt July, at tnid-day, they waded the shallow Monongahela. b-ut eight miles from Duquesne, making a brave ehow the sun struck upon thelr serrld ranks. their bright uni.orms. their tluttering banners. and their glittering arms, and went straight into the rough and shadowed forest path that led to the French poet. Upon a sudden there carne a man boundlng ilong the path to meet them, wearing the gorget of a French officer, and the foreet bohind him swarmed with a great hoet of but half-discovered men. Upon signal given, these spreadt hemselves to right and left within the shelter of the iorest, and from their covert poured a deadly lire upon Braddock's advancing lines. With good British pluck the 6teady ïegulars formed their accustomed ranks, crying, "God save the King !" to give grace to the volleys they sent back into the forest ; the ordnanee was brought up and swung to lts vork; all the force pressed forward to take what place it could in the figlit; but where was the use ? Washington Ijesought General Braddock to bcatter his men too, and meet the enemy undev cover as they came, but ie would not listen. They must stand In ranks, as fhey were bidden, and take the fire of their hidden foes Hke men, without breach of discipline. When they would have broken in spite of him, in their panic at being slaughtered there in the open glade vvituout sight of the enemy, Braddock beat them back with his sword, ïnd bitterly cursed them for cowards. He would have kept the Virginians, too, back from the covert If he could, wheii he saw them seek to close with the attacking party In true forest fasbion. As it was, they were as often shot down by the terror-stricken regulare behind them as by thelr right foes in f rooit. They alone made any head in the fight ; but who ':ould teil in such a place how the Dattle fared ? No one could count the enemy where they 6praag irom covert to covert. They were, in fact, near a thousand strong at the first ineetinjj in the way, - more than six hundied Indians, a motley host ijathered from far and near at the summons of the French, sevenscoie Canadian langers, seventy-odl regulars irom the fort, and thirty or forty Vrench officers, came out of sheer eagerness to have a hand in the daring game. Contrecoeur could not spare more Frenchmen from his little garrlson, his connections at the lakes being threatened, and he eorely straitened for men and stores. He was staking everything, as it was, upon this encounter on the way. If the EngllsH should sluike the savages off, as he deemed they would, he must no doubt withdniw as he could ere the lines of siege were closed about Mni. He never dreamed of Kuch largess of good fortune as came pouring in upon him. The Englieh were not only checked, but beatn. They had never seen business like this. 'Twas a pitiful, shameful slaughter,- men shot like Uni.s!:s a a pent here where they eowered close in their ecarlet ranks. Their first blazing volleys had sent the craven Canadians scampering back the way they had come ; Beaujeu, who led the attack, was killed altnost at the first onset ; but the gallant youngsters who led the motley array wavered never an instant, and readily held the Indians to their easy work. Washintgon dld all that iurious energy and reckless courage could to keep the order of battle hls commander had so madly chosen, to liold the regulars to their blind work and hearten the Virginians to stay the threatened rout, driving his horse everywhere into the thick of the murderous firing, and crying upon all alike to keep to it steadily like men. He had but yesterday re}olned the advance, havlng for almost two weeks lain stricken wlth a fever In Dunbar's eainp. He could hardly uit in his cushic-ned saddle for weakness when the fight began ; but when the blaze of the battle burst, his eagemess was suddenly like that of one possessed, and Uis immunity Irom harm like tliat of cme chianned. Thrlce a horse was shot under him, many bullets cut his clothing, but lie went without a wound. A like mad energy drove Braddock storming up and down the breaking Unes ; but he was mortally stricken at last, and Washington alone remained to exercise such control as was possible when the inevitable rout carne. It was impossible to hold the ground In such faeliion. The stubborn Braddock himself had ordered a retreat ere the fatal bullet found him. Sixty-three out of the eighty-six officers of his force were killed or dlsabled ; less than five hundred men out of thirteen hundred who had but Just now passed so gallantly through the ford remained unliurt ; the deadly slaughter must have gone on to utter destruetion. Ketreat was inevitable - 'twas blessedgood jortune that it was still possible. When once it began it was headlong, reckless, frenzied. The men ran wildly, blindly, as if hunted by demons whom no man might hope to resist,- liaunted by the frightful cries, maddened by the searching and secret fire of their foes, now coming hot upon their heels. Wounded comrades, rnilitaiy stores, baggage, their very arms, they left upon ïho grouad, abandoned. Far into fh night they ran madly on, in frantic search for the camp of the rear división, crying, as they ran, for help ; they even passed the camp in their uncontrollable terror of pursuit, and went desperately on towards the settlements. Washington and the few officers and provincials who scorned the terror íound the utmost difficulty in bringing off their stricken General, where he lay wishing to die. Upon the fourtli day after the battle he died, loathing tlxe sight of a redcoat, they said, and niurmuringpraises of "the blues," the once despised Virginians. They buried hi? body in the road, that the army wagons rniglit pass over the place and oblitérate every trace of a grave their savage euemies might rejoice to find and descérate. - From "Oolonel Washington," by Woodrow Wilson, in Harper's Magazine for March.