The Republican. [volume] (Oakland, Md.) 1877-current, 1927-09-08


in the vicinity. Their traces had been
found and they obviously We're track
ing the expedition, spying on it and
noting its progress.
With Indian crackers and forty men
Washington started out to deal with
this French force. 1t was raining and
his Indians at last brought him off the
trail beyond Laurel Hill to an over
hang of rocks under which the French
were taking shelter.
Their arms We're stacked. The two
parties were thus popped into each
others view, neither knowing what
the immediate intent of the other was.
The French naturally jumped for
their arms. The English Immediately
fired. The French returned the fire,
killed one Colonial and wounded 9TH
ers, but the little engagement was
over in fifteen minutes and the living
French were prisoners.
Among their dead was a gallant
young Frenchman, the commander, M.
De Jumonville, of a seigneural Cana
dian family.
He had double instructions from
Contrecoeur, the commander at the
Forks. One was to scout the advanc-
ing army and report their numbers
and movements. The other was the
utterly contradictory order to deliver
message to the English commander.
The letter was found on his body. AS
an ambassador he had thirty-six arm
ed men. AS a scout he had letter.
An older and more experienced SOL
der than the 22-year-old lieutenant
colonel of Virginia militia might not
have been SO quick on the trigger. He
might have seen that his men had the
French covered, and even as they
sprang for their arms have given
them an opportunity to surrender, but
Washington's experience had filled
him with distrust. He did not take
chances.
Later it was Jumonville's brother
who led the French against Washing
ton when he tried to hold his poor
Fort Necessity against the superior
numbers which had driven him with
in his makeshift Notifications. An
all-day rain made defenders and at
tackers miserable through the fight.
At night he French offered parley,
which Washington of necessity ac-
cepted.
The French wrote out the terms of
surrender. Van Braam translated
them. There was a great wind blow
ing and one candle, with difficulty
shielded against the blasts, by which
to read the articles. The English were
to go home and not to serve again for
year.
Van Braam stumbled over one stip-
ulation, and whether in precaution or
in error, mistranslated it. 1t was the
acknowledgment of Colonel Washing
ton that he had "assassinated" Jum-
onville. Van Braam, by the waver-
ing candle light, read an acknowledge
ment that Jumonville had been killed
in a fight and Washington signed it
as it had been interpreted to him.
His own dairy and other papers
were taken by the French. The arti-
cles of surrender, with the apparently
authenticated confession of assassina-
ton, were published in Paris and cir
culated throughout Europe to prove
the French contention that the Eug-
lish, with whom they were at peace,
were warning upon them in America
with savage barbarities. Washington
was an assassin and this was his
atrocity.
In all the barbarities Of French,
English and Indian war in America,
wars already of record and wars yet
to come, this episode with the French
under the overhanging rock beyond
Laurel Hill was a trivial episode in
which the English had the jump and
shot first Washington's Indians
scalped the dead. They always did
and generally got price for the
scalp. But it had its propaganding
value as an atracity and was so used.
Washington returned to Virginia,
defeated, detected and more than half
convinced that if military career
had been opening to him, as he de-
sired, it was forever closed on the spot
of Fort Necessity in the Pennsylvania
mountains.