Memoirs of a Huguenot Family/Letters of Rev. James Maury
LETTERS OF THE REV. JAMES MAURY.[1]
Fredericksville Parish, Louisa County, Aug. 9th, 1755.
Dear Sir:—I am always tardy. Your kind and agreeable letter of October last, now before me, ought to have been answered by my friend Knox's ship, from Pamunkey, which sailed some time in June, and should have been so, had the map come to hand in time, which it was necessary to have my hand upon, in order to answer some parts of it. I am sorry the engraver had not the most accurate copy. He has copied from that which was transmitted to the Board of Trade and Plantations, who, it seems, wrote so expressly for it, that the government thought proper to send them one before it had received the finishing touch; since that, the fuller draughts have been sent over sea by the compilers, as presents, one to the late pious Bishop of Man, Dr. "Wilson, the other to a clergyman in Bristol. However, sir, incomplete as it is, you may form a tolerable guess, where each of our families is situated, by the directions which I am about to give you, whence you will also discover how the American branches of the Fontaine family are dispersed, and how seldom, of consequence, they can have the satisfaction of seeing one another, though residents in the same colony. But it is some comfort that a time is coming, when we hope for a happy meeting with all who are dear to us, in a happier state, however separated at present by extensive tracts of land and sea.
But, to the map. My uncle Peter's habitation is in Charles City County, about two miles to the northward of James River, pretty near midway between Weynoke and Swineyards.
Mr. Isaac Winston, who married his daughter, resides in Henrico, on the south side of Chickahominy, about six miles from the meadow bridges.
My cousin Peter, with a view of reaping the full benefit of his place, has lately removed into a new county, called Halifax, between Stanton and Dan, the two main branches of Roanoke River, and lives close upon the southern bank of the former, some few miles above the mouth of Difficult, as near as I can guess about seven; for, as it is several years since I was on the spot, and only once, I am not perfect in the geography of that part of the country.
My brother Claiborne has seated himself among the Forks of Nottoway, in Lunenburg.
My mother lives among the head springs of Jack's creek, which empties into Pamunkey, on the north side.
As to myself, I am planted about two miles to the northeast of Walker's under the South West Mountains in Louisa, close by one of the head springs of the main northern branch of Pamunkey, which runs through my grounds—a very wholesome, fertile, and pleasant situation, where, I thank God, I enjoy more blessings and comforts than I deserve; and am as happy as a good member of society can be, while the society to which he belongs is in a suffering and calamitous condition, as you will perceive by my letter to my uncle John (to which I refer you) ours is at present. God only knows when it will be better with us; as he only knows when and how the present contest between Great Britain and France will be decided, upon which depends the all not only of this, but of every other British plantation in America. And such seems to be the connection between the mother and children in this case, that the downfall of either must sooner or later be attended with that of the other.
Our people are loaded with debt and taxes. Money is much scarcer than it has been for many years. Our spring crops of wheat, barley, oats, and rye, have been ruined by an early drought. Our Indian corn, the main support of man and beast in this part of the world, has been so much hurt by a later drought, that I fear scarce enough will be made for the sustenance of our people, exclusive of our stocks, great numbers of which must in all probability perish this winter. Some of our neighboring colonies have likewise suffered in the same manner, and cannot assist us. So fertile, too, are our lands, that there is no such thing as a magazine for grain in all British America, which, as it has never known the want of bread, has never made any provision against it.
Our frontiers are daily ravaged by savages, and, worse than savages, papists, who, in conjunction with them, captivate and butcher our out-settlers, and have drove great numbers of them into the thicker inhabited parts, who, as they have left their farms and stocks, must be supported by us, who shall be scarcely able to support our own families. These, with many others that might be mentioned, are very melancholy and affecting considerations. However, dependence upon the supreme arbiter of all things, and resignation to the dispensations of infinite wisdom are, not only our duty and interest, but also our greatest comfort. Though storms and tempests rage without, it has been, and it shall be my study to keep all within calm and serene. Happy beyond expression are they who, when laboring under national or private calamities, can say with David's trust and confidence: God is our refuge and strength, a very present help in time of trouble; therefore will we not fear though the earth he removed, and the mountains he cast into the midst of the sea.
As to the controversy of the two crowns about limits, that perhaps has not so much alarmed us as it has many on your side of the Atlantic. It is true the balance is held by the Almighty, and he may elevate or depress which scale he pleases; but, were the race always to the swift, and the battle to the strong, our colonies would have little to apprehend from the exertion of all the power which France, especially in a general war, could spare to annoy us here on this continent. Her American strength, compared with ours, is quite contemptible in all respects but one, and that is, the wisdom and prudence with which it is directed. Canada is a very unfriendly clime; her soil in general unfruitful. Her inhabitants, in the year 1748, I am informed by persons who pretend to know, amounted to little more than forty thousand, and for that number the lands have never yet produced a sufficiency of bread. Slaves have never yet been found as industrious as the sons of liberty.
The British plantations, on the contrary, are both fertile and populous; so fertile, that even here in Virginia, where our main force is applied to the production of tobacco, the labor of one man in a tolerable year will feed eight, besides a competent number of hogs, sheep, horses, and cattle; and so populous, that on the most modest calculation, His Majesty has four hundred thousand men on this continent capable of bearing arms, hardy and robust, and ready, whenever called upon, to sacrifice life and fortune in his service and their country's cause. This strength wisely directed, would be justly formidable to France. But, it is our common misfortune, that there is no mutual dependence, no close connection between these several colonies; they are quite disunited by separate views and distinct interests; and like a bold and rapid river, which, though resistless when included in one channel, is yet easily resistible when subdivided into several inferior streams and currents. The Indians, though not very polite, are politic enough to observe this defect in our polity, and honest enough to tell us that we resemble a chain of sand. A remedy for this evil, though obvious and practicable, and recommended seriously by several of His Majesty's governors here, the great men on your side of the water have not thought proper to apply, from a principle in politics, which we on this side of it think more obvious than wise or just.
The colonies, sensible of the manifest disadvantages of their present unconnected state, have long wished for a coalition by means of a General Council formed by a certain number of deputies from each colony, to be presided over by a person commissioned by His Majesty to act as his representative. By this means, the whole strength of his subjects here (who, except a small intermixture of papists, and some natives of the northern part of your island, are behind none of their fellow-subjects in loyalty) might be easily and successfully exerted against any of the enemies of Great Britain in this quarter of the world.
Though we are numerous, we are poor, and unable to raise such large sums of money as would be required to defray the heavy expenses of war; and this is an evil which might also have been partly remedied, had not Great Britain chosen to buy of her European neighbors, her rivals in many respects, articles which she might have had from her children here, as good in kind, and at cheaper rates. But, poor as we are, we have already exerted ourselves to the utmost in the present dispute, and we still intend to do so, desirous to convince our common mother, that we are in truth, what we have often professed ourselves to be, her dutiful children. We want not men, but only money to pay them, and to pay for arms, ammunition, and a few engineers. We wish to see none of your officers, nor indeed regulars, unless they be better than what we have seen. As to any officers which may hereafter be sent over, officers of rank, I mean; if they make as free with the liberties of the people, and the constitutions of the several governments, as a late gentleman has attempted to do, and in some particulars has actually done, I am so far a prophet as to foretell, that neither your interests nor ours will be ever promoted by them. I believe it is the general opinion here, that, liberty and property once lost, a people have nothing left worth contending for. Had we been a people conquered and enslaved, a polite and generous conqueror would have treated us with less rudeness and insolence than the gentleman above hinted at (now no more) in the plenitude of his power, adventured to treat us Americans, which, I am almost confident nothing but an honest zeal to further by all means the common cause, prevented them from resenting in the same manner as they would the acts of a public enemy. But I will add nothing further on this head, lest I break through my above-mentioned resolve, of keeping all within calm and serene, which I am sensible would by no means recommend me to one of your calm and equable disposition.
You are already so well convinced what weight your opinion has with me, that, should I tell you, how much fonder I have been of that mode of instruction, on which I have providentially fallen, since it has obtained your approbation than I was before, I foresee, you would in your next charge me with saying what is superfluous. That, which you tell me you have so happily pursued in the education of my cousins, seems excellently calculated for answering all the good ends proposed. Although, perhaps, it may not be so proper for public instruction, especially in such extensive parishes as some in Virginia, yet I have so great an opinion of it for the education of a small community, that, God willing, I propose to make experiments of it in my own family, as soon as the winter evenings come on. I can well remember when it was my own misfortune to receive words without the proper ideas; which has doubtless been the misfortune of many others. And, in that case, as you remark, words are of but little use.
Hereabouts I thought to have closed, but remembering that I have not mentioned some places to my uncle John, which are either not set down in the map, or have received new names since the map was published, I imagine you will readily excuse the following directions.
In the map I perceive the name of a river erased, emptying itself into New River, and in its general tendency for some considerable distance, pointing towards the angle between the south boundary of Pennsylvania and the west of Maryland, and thence through several meanders penetrating into the Alleghany mountains, between Spring Head and Laurel Thickets. The word erased I guess to be Yaughyaughgaine. If so, there was an error, which I imagine has been corrected here by the surviving compiler of the map. The river now described has since been discovered to be Monongahela, though wrongly planned off, for it discharges itself into the Ohio, in the latitude of about 30 deg. 48 min. N. On the point of land formed by the confluence of these. Fort Duquesne now stands, to the eastward of the latter, and the northward of the former. If you would have Monongahela correctly laid down, you are to erase the river, which I suspect is called Yaughyaughgaine, from about four miles below that branch of it which most directly points to the above-mentioned angle, quite down to New River, and then extend it in an almost straight course from where you began to erase quite down to the Ohio, in the above-mentioned latitude.
Yaughyaughgaine is a branch of Monongahela, and falls into it on the north side, lat. N, 39 deg. 43 min. and long. W. from Philadelphia 5 deg. 7 min., and, after having run about twenty-five miles almost east, divides into three branches called the Turkey Foot, one of which verges northerly, the other southerly, and the third easterly, but none reach so far as the main chain of hills. Between the branches of this and Monongahela, about forty miles back of the hills just mentioned, are the Great Meadows where our brave Washington was last year attacked by the French and Indians.
On the north side of Cohongoronto you will see Caicucktuck, since called Will's Creek, on the point of land formed by which and the river, on the western side of the creek, is built Fort Cumberland, from which the brave but unfortunate, and I believe I may add, imprudent General Braddock marched this summer against Duquesne, near which, my uncle John, as well as the public prints can inform you, how shamefully he was defeated by a contemptible band of naked French and Indians.
As I believe you to be master of a good stock of patience, and as you have informed me of the extraordinary strength of your eyes, you will suspect I mean to put both to the test, if I go much farther; my pen, too, is almost foundered, my fingers cramped, and my stock of matter almost exhausted, so that, after desiring you to accept of our good wishes and respects, I shall take my leave of you for the present, with a declaration that I am, very sincerely, dear sir,
Your affectionate friend and dutiful nephew,
Louisa County, Fredericksville Parish, Jan. 10, 1756.
Dear Sir:—Your kind letter, bearing date 1st January, I have now sat down to answer, and must tell you I consider it as a New-Year's gift; and believe me, it is a very acceptable one.
It pleases me much that the directions sent you as to the habitations of our relations here, and as to some alterations requisite to be made in the map of Virginia to render it more complete had been intelligible. Had it not been for the present troubles, which have rendered it unsafe for our people to make such long peregrinations into the backwoods as they used to do before their commencement, many other inaccuracies would doubtless, ere this, have been discovered in the western parts of it, where the courses of many considerable streams, several ranges of hills, and other particulars, must have been laid down, partly on conjecture, and partly on but imperfect information, which will ever be the case with one who undertakes to publish a map of a country not yet thoroughly explored, or actually surveyed. Since the publication of that map, another has made its appearance in the world, much more extensive, as it comprehends all that part of the British American Empire that lies between Boston and the southern boundary of Virginia, the Territory of the six confederate Northern Indian nations, the river St. Lawrence almost from Quebec to its source, the various communications between that river and the lakes, and Ohio; also Ohio with its dependencies lower than the Falls; and in short, the present scene of action as far as their Excellencies Shirley and Johnson are, and Braddoc was concerned, published by Lewis Evans, Esq., of Philadelphia, and engraven there, and therefore, in that respect clumsily executed. With it the author has published an instructive, curious, and useful pamphlet, explanatory not only of the map, but of many particulars, too, relative to the face and products, and natural advantages of the tract of territory which is the subject of it. The map is but small, not above half as large as Fry and Jefferson's, consequently crowded. Though both it and the pamphlet be liable to several exceptions, and I believe just ones, yet both are very useful in the main, and together, give an attentive peruser a clear idea of the value of the now contested lands and waters to either of the two competitor princes, together with a proof amounting to more than probability, that he of the two who shall remain master of Ohio and the Lakes at the end of the dispute, must, in the course of a few years, without an interposal of Providence to prevent it, become sole and absolute lord of North America, to which I will farther add as my own private opinion, that the same will one day or other render either Hudson's river at New-York, or Potomac river in Virginia, the grand emporium of all East Indian commodities. Marvel not at this, however surprising it may seem; perhaps, before I have done with you. you will believe it to be not entirely chimera.
When it is considered how far the eastern branches of that immense river, Mississippi, extend eastward, and how near they come to the navigable, or rather canoeable parts of the rivers which empty themselves into the sea that washes our shores to the east, it seems highly probable that its western branches reach as far the other way, and make as near approaches to rivers emptying themselves into the ocean to the west of us, the Pacific Ocean, across which a short and easy communication, short in comparison with the present route thither, opens itself to the navigator from that shore of the continent unto the Eastern Indies.
Before I go on, lest from the word canoeable, just now used, you should form but a contemptible idea of the navigation of a river which must be carried on by vessels slender and tottering as canoes, I must beg you will suspend sentence for a while, and give me time to inform you, that although one single canoe will carry but a small weight, yet nothing is more common than to see two of these tottering vehicles, when lashed together side by side with cords, or any other strong bandages, carrying down our upland streams eight or nine heavy hogsheads of tobacco at a time to the warehouses, rolled on their gunwales crossways, and secured against moving fore or aft by a small piece of wood drove under the bilge of the two extreme hogsheads; an almost incredible weight for such slender embarkations! But as they will bear such a burden, their slender contexture is an advantage: they draw but few inches water, move down a current with great city, and leave the waterman nothing but Palinurus's task to perform when going downwards; and when they return, two men will shove the canoes with poles as far against stream in one day, as four brisk watermen with oars can a boat that will carry the same burden, in two days. For this great improvement of inland navigation, we mountaineers are indebted to the late Reverend and ingenious Mr. Rose. But, to return: There are more than probable reasons for believing that the western branches of this river are no less extensive than its eastern branches. This is a common property of most rivers, and that it is of the Mississippi, I have the authority of one Mr. Cox, an English gentleman who either some time before, or during the reign of King William III (in virtue of a charter granted by Charles I., if I remember right, for I speak without book, to his Attorney-General, Sir Robert Heath, constituting him the Lord-Proprietor of the lands and waters of the Mississippi, and afterwards transferred through several hands, till it fell into those of this gentleman), sailed up to its Great Falls near 1500 miles from its mouth, both took its soundings that whole distance, traced some of its most considerable branches on either side, and almost up to their sources, made a settlement and planted a colony upon it near midway that distance, if my memory fails me not, and published a map of it from his own and the Company's journals as far as those Falls; and above them, from what information he could collect from the savages. One of its western branches, he tells you, he followed through its various meanders for seven hundred miles (which, I believe, is called Missouri by the natives, or Red River, from the color of its waters), and then received intelligence from the natives that its head springs interlocked in a neighboring mountain with the head springs of another river, to the westward of these same mountains, discharging itself into a large lake called Thoyago, which pours its waters through a large navigable river into a boundless sea, where, they told him, they had seen prodigious large canoes, with three masts, and men almost as fair as himself, if I mistake not; for, as I have read a History of the travels of an Indian towards those regions, as well as those of Mr. Cox, the reports of the natives to both of them as to the large canoes are so similar, that I perhaps may confound one with the other. Mr. Cox's book, I imagine, is very scarce. I know of but one copy in this colony, of which I had an accidental, and therefore a cursory view, about four years ago. It is a small octavo volume, entitled Cox's Carolana, that country being thus called from the Donor.
Now, sir, though this narrative hath in it something of the romantic air of the voyager, yet the author's accounts of such branches of that river, and such parts of that country, even as high up as the latitude of Huron's Lake, and also his description of the extent, situation, shape, soundings and other properties of the Lakes now confessedly navigated by him, together with his character of the circumjacent lands, are said to have been found just by late discoveries, as far as discoveries have been made. And, if so, it is but reasonable to give credit to what he tells us concerning others of its waters and countries, into which, perhaps, no British subject has ever since penetrated.
I presume the credit which Colonel Fry gave to Mr. Cox, and his recommending these matters to the consideration of the Governor and Council, gave birth to a grand scheme formed here about three years ago. But this is only a conjecture, founded on my having seen that book at his house. The scheme might have been formed in Great Britain, and was this. Some persons were to be sent in search of that river Missouri, if that be the right name of it, in order to discover whether it had any such communication with the Pacific Ocean: they were to follow that river if they found it, and make exact reports of the country they passed through, the distance they travelled, what sort of navigation those rivers and lakes afforded, &c., &c. And this project was so near being reduced into practice, that a worthy friend and neighbor of mine, who has been extremely useful to the Colony in the many discoveries he has made to the westward, was appointed to be the chief conductor of the whole affair, had, by order of their Honors, drawn up a list of all the necessary implements and apparatus for such an attempt, and an estimate of the expense, and was upon the point of making all proper preparations for setting out. when a sudden stop was put to the further prosecution of the scheme for the present, by a commencement of hostilities between this Colony and the French and their Indians, which rendered a passage through the interjacent nations with whom they are ever tampering, too hazardous to be attempted. This, I must observe to you, still remains a secret; and to prevent its discovery to the enemy, in case the ship I write by should be taken, the person to whom I have recommended this packet has instructions to throw it overboard in time. However, you are at liberty to impart it to my uncle John, or to any other friend, of whose retentive faculty you can be as confident as I can be of yours. But to return once more. As there is such short and easy communication by means of canoe navigation, and some short portages between stream and stream, from the Potomac, from Hudson's River in New-York, and from the St. Lawrence to the Ohio, the two latter through the lakes, the former the best and shortest. As there also is good navigation, not only for canoes and batteaux, but for large flats, schooners and sloops down the Ohio into the Mississippi, should Cox's account be true of the communication of this last river with the South Sea, with only one portage, I leave you to judge of what vast importance such a discovery would be to Great Britain, as well as to her Plantations, which, in that case, as I observed above, must become the general mart of the European World, at least for the rich and costly products of the East, and a mart at which chapmen might be furnished with all those commodities on much easier terms than the tedious and hazardous, and expensive navigation to those countries can at present afford. This would supersede the necessity of going any more in quest of the North East passage, which, probably, if ever discovered, will also be productive of another discovery, that it lies in too inclement a latitude ever to be useful.
The discovery of a communication through this part of the continent with the South Sea, would not only be a nursery for our seamen, but would be instrumental in saving the lives of great numbers of them, under Heaven, the protectors of you and of us; who, poor fellows, drop off like rotten sheep by scorbutic disorders consequent upon such long voyages as that to the East Indies.
What an exhaustless fund of wealth would here be opened, superior to Potosi and all the other South American mines? What an extent of region I What a{{bar}! But no more. These are visionary excursions into futurity, with which I sometimes used to feast my imagination, ever dwelling with pleasure on the consideration of whatever bids fair for contributing to extend the empire and augment the strength of our mother island, as that would be diffusing liberty both civil and religious, and her daughter Felicity the wider, and at the same time be a means of aggrandizing and enriching this spot of the globe, to which every civil and social tie binds me, and for which I have the tenderest regard.
But, these pleasing expectations, if not entirely vanished, are much weakened and suspended, till Heaven decide the controversy between the two mighty monarchs now contending, in some sort, for the empire of the world.
Sir, as these lands now in dispute are so immensely valuable, what reason can you assign why most of the great men with you, and why persons of the highest rank here, with very few exceptions, either were, or seemed to be, quite unacquainted with its value till of late? I know the reason of it here. Great men are too wise to be informed. They are too indolent to look about them; therefore their views and notions of matters of this nature, are contracted within so narrow a compass, that they think nothing worth their inquiry beyond their own reach. And, when men of inferior fortune, but not therefore of inferior merit, have been animated by a principle both of industry and public spirit, to search unknown forests and wilds, and made discoveries valuable and important to the State, and imparted them to these epicurean gods, they either discountenance, disregard, or discredit them. This, in too many instances, has been the misfortune here, though not in all, as you will perceive by the scheme communicated above, which is an instance to the contrary, provided my conjecture be correct, that it was originally formed here.
On the other hand, our politic and sagacious, though turbulent neighbors, leave nothing unattempted to extend the territory, and heighten the glory of the Grand Monarch. For, I am told that in Canada, to have made the tour of the Lakes, and Ohio and Mississippi, is reckoned an essential qualification, almost the sine quá non to recommend young gentlemen to any important posts, civil or military, under the government, the advantages of which they are now reaping. And happy would it have been for us if a tour of the same nature had been an especial qualification for recommending gentlemen to seats in the Supreme Court, while those regions were equally accessible to us and to them. But now, these gentlemen living in the lower parts of the country, within a day's ride of Williamsburg, except one, and none of them knowing any thing of the back country, our frontiers, from this very reason, have been left thus naked and exposed.
Great are my hopes, that as the people both of Great Britain and the Colonies seem now at length to be highly sensible of the mischiefs of our past lethargy and supineness, we at last shall rouse, and let those bold intruders know they are not thus insolently to encroach on the demesne of the British Crown with impunity, nor peaceably allowed to wrest from us a country, the present intrinsic value of which, together with such future and contingent advantages as are in prospect, besides others out of view, of which yet the womb of time may be productive, almost exceed the power of numbers to calculate. Were I only to enumerate in a concise manner such of the important benefits only of the country watered by the Ohio, which is but one branch of the Mississippi, as occur even to myself, who have not leisure to attend to matters of that sort, my letter would swell to an enormous size. Your own imagination, therefore, shall be permitted at leisure to range this ample field which I have here been endeavoring to open just to your view, or rather to bring you nearer the verge of. You will no doubt ruminate with some little satisfaction on the vast importance of that prodigious river Mississippi, which is said to take its rise on the south side of hills which empty the springs on their northern side into Hudson's Bay, which rolls its waters due south, through a great variety of latitudes, between those mountains and the Mexican Gulf, where it intermingles with the sea, and, in its course, waters a fat and fertile soil, which, from those various latitudes, with proper culture, is capable of bearing almost any of the productions of any climate or country. Of this the French are well aware, as I collect from their insinuations to the various European powers, in order to weaken the interest of Great Britain among them, that the sole possession of North America which they apprehend would be the consequence of our keeping the Ohio and the Lakes without partner or rival, would put it in the power of England not only to grasp at, but seize universal monarchy in Europe, in process of time. And though I may be mistaken, yet I verily believe as much. However, I think the Monsieurs in this ship have been somewhat abandoned by their usual sagacity, since the powers of Europe, upon an impartial comparison of the past conduct of the two contending nations for some centuries back, may possibly form a conclusion but little favorable to them—a conclusion that should the English get such an opportunity, there is only a probability that they might; but should the French get such an opportunity, there is an infallible certainty that they would make use of it; and also that in the former case liberty, both civil and religious, but, in the latter, tyranny of both kinds would be more widely diffused and extensively propagated. Your observations and criticisms, or rather hints on the probability of the children doing well without the parent, and on the coalition I mentioned in my last, appear to me extremely just, and have contributed to open my eyes. However, they are subjects that require to be treated with great delicacy, and like fenny lands, will only bear to be gently touched and slightly skimmed. God only knows the determinations of his own wise counsels, or what grand revolutions may be ripe for birth. Our business is patiently to wait their execution, and when executing or executed, humbly to acquiesce in them as wise, and just, and right, and best.
Our public affairs, as you will collect from mine to my uncle John, are not in such a state as blind mortals, who see but little beyond the present, would wish, or as a friend to his country, who attentively surveys them, any satisfaction.
You will therefore also see, that we are trying first one expedient and then another, to give them a more pleasing aspect, depending, I hope, on Providence, to crown them with success. For this purpose, several schemes have been recommended, and several projects seen the light, besides many more which probably have perished in their embryo state.
Among other adventurers of this sort in the aerial world who erect elaborate piles of building in the air, you will fear I have classed myself, from a letter which, at the request of some neighboring gentlemen, I wrote to one of His Majesty's Council here, of which I herewith send you a copy, with a view (since you seem inquisitive into our affairs) of letting you further into our present circumstances; from the contents of which, I imagine, you will discover what we think has certainly rendered them bad as they are, and what we believe to be the most effectual method to mend them. And in order to render that letter still more conducive to those purposes, I propose to add to it some explanatory annotations, if I can find time.
Although I have already given such a loose to my pen, I must not yet hold my hand. Your postscript enjoins me to give some certain directions where my mother lives. Infandum jubes renovarem! Alas! she lives no more on earth! She, for several reasons, the most weighty of which was, to consult my brother's interest, determined to remove to Lunenburg, and spend the remainder of her days with him. But as he was not yet prepared for accommodating her there in a manner suitable to her age and many infirmities, she last fall accepted of an invitation from my uncle Peter, to make his house her home, while my brother was preparing for her reception. There, I doubt not, the great kindness of my aunt, and my uncle's vivacity, as well as agreeable and instructive conversation, contributed to her passing the time with much comfort and satisfaction for a while, that is, until the hour was come when she was summoned to remove home into a building of God, an house not made with hands, eternal: in the heavens. That she now lives there, we have abundant reason to conclude, as from her deportment while in the body, so from the manner in which she relinquished that perishable tabernacle; of which my brother has given me some account in two letters. One informs me when, about three in the afternoon, on Tuesday the 30th of December last, after four days' illness; the other, how; the most important point, which please to take in his own words. "The manner of her death was much like my father's. She was first taken with an ague, which was followed by a fever, which, after three days' continuance, deprived her of the use of one side. When my aunt acquainted her she was dying, she lifted up her hands and thanked God that he had at length heard her prayers; and she spent her last moments in wholesome admonitions to all about her, and in blessing us her children and all that we have. Thus," adds my dear brother, "our dearest mother made a most glorious end! which, God grant we may all have the happiness to make whenever we shall be called upon!" Amen! say I; and so I am confident will you too. The grand business of life is to prepare for death, as that is preparing for eternity. Of all the acts of that piece, the last is the most important as well as the most difficult, and therefore requires spiritual succor to perform it well. My mother having performed her last act so well, is much comfort even in the midst of affliction. Death, it seems, was regarded by her in the true light, as a removal from a laborious and fatiguing post to a state of reward, for having so faithfully maintained it. This, surely, caused her consolations to abound and overflow in that hour of darkness, and has, I hope, had the same effect on her surviving friends, as far as self-love and other imperfections of human nature will permit.
The decease of a person of her character, if we listen to divine revelation and unbiased reason, cannot be lamented on the person's own account, except we think it acting a rational and Christian part to grieve that the deceased has exchanged mortality and corruption for immortality and in-corruption, and removed from the busy, perplexing and toilsome scenes of life to a permanent and immutable state of rest, and peace, and bliss. However, at first, it is true we are but too apt to do so; prompted thereto partly by the tender affections of humanity, and partly by a very singular regard for ourselves, which makes us reluctant to part from the comfort and pleasure we used to enjoy in the conversation and society of the departed. But, though it is not avoidable to sorrow on such occasions, yet there are not only different degrees, but different kinds of sorrow, too; and, were it not for the certain discoveries of life and immortality through the sacrifice of our Redeemer, which have been so clearly brought to light by the Gospel, the sorrow consequent on such a loss as we have sustained, in the death of that excellent and pious parent, must have been a sorrow destitute of any alleviating intermixture of comfort. But, according to the tenor of the precious promises of the Gospel, and of her life, thanks be to the Adorable Trinity, we are not quite void of comfort, because thence we have hope, that she now rests in a much happier place than a changeable and fleeting world; hope, that her felicity has no limit as to its duration, nor any as to its measure, except those of the enlarged capacity of such a creature as man in his glorified and exalted state; and hope, that the virtuous soul is making a perpetual progress towards the perfection of its nature, going on from strength to strength, arriving from one degree of happiness to another, and shining for ever with still new accessions of glory and bliss; in a word, we have hope, that we too, who are left behind, shall not therefore be excluded the heavenly Jerusalem, but though we may arrive somewhat later thither, shall, if our honest endeavors co-operate with our gracious Redeemer's all-sufficient merits, be at length admitted into God's presence, where alone is fulness of joys and pleasures for evermore. These are pleasing and triumphant considerations, and the basis of those glorious hopes which shoot enlivening rays of comfort through the blackest clouds, and dash even grief with some refreshing alloy of joy, but of a joy which perhaps it is easier to feel than describe, and which, it may be. can be felt by none but those whose minds have been happily tinctured with Christian principles, and who. to a lively faith and hope in Christ have been taught to add an absolute resignation to the will of God, our strictest duty, our greatest wisdom, and truest magnanimity.
That in all the afflictions and adversities which may occur in our passage through this vale of misery and tears, these considerations and hopes may be your support and mine, and, indeed, the support of all others who need it, is the constant and fervent prayer of, dear sir,
Your dutiful nephew and affectionate friend,
P. S. I had like to have forgot to inform you, that, thank God, myself and mine are all well, and that they unanimously desire to be affectionately remembered to yourself, and every branch of my uncle's family. I am glad to hear of the welfare of our relations in London; may the Lord continue it!
N. B. Evans's map, colored, together with the pamphlet, were sold in Philadelphia at two Spanish dollars, 4s. 6d. of our money.
To Mr. John Fontaine.
Louisa County, Fredericksville Parish,June 15th, 1756.
Dear Sir:—The receipt of your kind and agreeable letter of 1st January, happened at a very seasonable juncture, as it administered much comfort where comfort was much wanting. Comfortable and satisfactory, to the highest degree, it is; when we cannot see, yet to hear from those with whom we are connected by the endearing ties of blood and friendship, ties which, I trust, mutually link our hearts together now, and will continue so to do, till we meet in that more perfect, and, as my uncle Moses terms it, that inseparable and immutable state, where all imperfections will be done away, and every impediment to a more intimate intercourse be removed. Hopes and views of this sort are most reviving cordials to a mind laboring under the pressure either of public or private afflictions, and Providence has been pleased to afford me an opportunity of proving them to be so by my own experience in both.
The private affliction, named in my letter to my uncle Moses, is one in which you will both be no small sharers; which, though in truth very deep, is far from incurable, as the same Hand that gave it has graciously furnished means of cure, and poured healing balsam into the wound.
As to the other kind of afflictions, they are still incumbent, and when they will be removed, God only knows. I hope I am resigned to the will of the great arbiter of all things, yet I cannot remain an unconcerned spectator of the calamities of my country. But, lest you should suspect me of being uneasy without just reason, I shall give you as just and succinct an account as I can of the present state of affairs in this once flourishing and happy colony.
You may remember, I told you last year, the drought had been of long continuance and threatened famine; but the wise and gracious Disposer of all things, who, in the midst of judgment remembers mercy, mitigated things so far as to afford a sufficiency of bread for the life of man, but, in general, very little more, so that vast numbers of stock, of all kinds, perished, notwithstanding the uncommon clemency of last winter. Taxes on taxes are multiplied, and, though it be a necessary, it is a heavy burden. Besides genteel presents to the officers who behaved well last campaign at Monongahela, and a gratuity of £5 per man to every common soldier of our own regiment who survived the action, and pensions or presents to the disabled and to the widows of the slain, which amounted to a round sum; and besides levying money to pay the owners for upwards of one thousand hogsheads of tobacco, burnt in the warehouses of Bolling's Point, £40,000 was voted for His Majesty's service and our own defence, then, and £65,000 more this spring. This, as little or no tobacco was made last summer, falls heavily on the lower ranks of people, especially, as tobacco is the only medium of raising money, and as they generally cultivate the meanest lands, so were their crops proportionally short. Of this the legislature has been so sensible, that an act, to continue in force one year, was last fall passed, indulging the people by allowing them to pay off their public dues to the secretary, the county court clerks, the clergy and other public creditors (which ever before had been payable in tobacco), in money, at the rate of two pence per pound. The current market value has, hitherto, been twenty-six shillings per hundred, so that the law saves to those who have tobacco to sell, four pounds thirteen shillings and four pence per thousand, while it deducts the same from the annual salaries and revenues of the creditors. In my own case, who am entitled to upwards of seventeen thousand weight of tobacco per annum, the difference amounts to a considerable sum. However, each individual must expect to share in the misfortunes of the community to which he belongs.
Furthermore, to enable people to pay their taxes and debts, paper money has been issued, which, in every colony where it has been recurred to, has been attended with many evils, one of which is draining out the remains of their specie.
Notwithstanding all this, our people pay their taxes with much more cheerfulness than could reasonably be expected from those whose necks were never heretofore accustomed to such a yoke, and who have had the mortification to see those contributions, large compared with their circumstances, surprisingly misapplied, and, through a complication of most egregious blunders, promotive of scarce one good effect to our country. Of these blunders, it may suffice to remark, that, notwithstanding the sums levied and expended, and the readiness of the people to pay their taxes and risk their persons in the defence of their country, and vindication of the insults offered to the crown, yet, ever since the tragical event last July, on the banks of the Monongahela, our frontiers have been ravaged and dispeopled, great quantities of the stock of the back inhabitants driven off by the French and their Indians to Duquesne. Fire, sword and perpetual alarms have surrounded them, persons of every age and sex have fallen a prey to the barbarians, and, in short, the most shocking outrages perpetrated on the western settlements of this colony, and our two next neighbors to the northward. By these means, our frontiers have been contracted in many places 150 miles, and still are drawing nearer and nearer to the centre.
To what secondary causes all this has been imputable, you will discover from a letter which the persuasion of some of my friends induced me to write to one of our honorables, early in the spring, of which I have sent my uncle Moses a copy; whence you will collect what methods we think most proper (and ours is the general opinion) for putting a stop to the further progress of those evils, and guarding against the like in time to come. In furtherance of these ends, I drew up, and, by means of my acquaintance, dispersed in the three frontier and five contiguous counties, petitions to the General Assembly before its last session, praying, that such a line of forts might be built, and such an Indian factory established. To these a favorable hearing was given, and a bill framed according to them, as far as relates to the chain of forts. But before this bill had gone through the several formalities requisite to constitute it a law, an unlucky clause was tacked to it, which, it is to be feared, will destroy every good effect that we had reason to hope for from it; a clause incorporating five hundred men, now levying for the construction and defence of these forts, into the Virginia regiment: rather than submit to which, where the character of the regiment is known, people will pay any fines. The five hundred men are to be raised by a draught upon the young men of each county, who, on refusal to go upon duty are obliged to deposit £10 on the drumhead, by way of fine.
Such was the treatment which that unfortunate regiment received last campaign from the commander in chief, that no person of any property, family or worth has since enlisted in it, and the Governor has filled up the vacant commissions and the new companies with raw, surly and tyrannical Scots, several of them mere boys from behind the counters of the factors here; thus, that regiment, from an exceedingly good one, has degenerated into a most insignificant and corrupt corps. Whence, I apprehend, the salutary purposes of that act will be defeated, as the above complement of men will generally be made up of worthless vagrants, servants just out of servitude, and convicts bought with the fines paid by recusants; men utterly unacquainted with the woods and the use of fire arms, and, for these reasons, were there no other, unfit to be sent against Indians.
Besides this, feuds and dissensions still subsist between different branches of the legislature.
To crown our misfortunes, we have been informed that such accounts of our temper and disposition in this colony have been transmitted to England, by a certain person, that the Ministry suppose we want nothing but ability and opportunity to attempt shaking off allegiance to the Most Gracious Prince, that, peradventure, ever adorned the British throne. This is a vile calumny, for the calumniator well knows that we have shed our blood with the utmost cheerfulness, and we have paid taxes freely and willingly in support of the common cause, equally with any of our sister colonies, in proportion to our numbers and wealth.
I fear nothing good will be done with all the money we have raised, unless affairs shall take quite a different turn on the arrival of the Earl of Loudoun, whom private letters, as well as public prints, give us reason daily to expect in his government. Besides augmenting our regiment to one thousand men, in the fall, and endeavoring to augment it further, now, to fifteen hundred men, levying monies and guarding our frontiers, the Honorable Peter Randolph and the Honorable William Byrd, two of the Council, have been sent ambassadors to the Cherokees, and have concluded a treaty between this government and that nation; obliging us, on the one hand, to build and garrison a good and sufficient fort in their country, for the protection of their women and children, which a body of men are now on their march to perform; and that nation, on the other part, is to furnish us with five hundred warriors, this summer. This will probably afford some security to our frontiers; and it gives a general satisfaction, for all now seem sensible, of what only some few were sensible, till of late, that Indians are the best match for Indians.
It is a very pleasing consideration to observe the general spirit of patriotism, and the resentment against the common enemy, which seems to have diffused itself through every rank of men. The common people have lately given proof of it. This spring, upon advice that some thousands of French and Savages were approaching our frontiers, in their northern quarter, the government thought it necessary to make a draught of the militia of ten counties, contiguous to the three frontier counties, with orders to rendezvous at the town of Winchester, otherwise called Frederick, there to receive further orders from Col. Washington: and although it was at a season of the year when men could least be spared from home, and, indeed, when a long continuance on duty must have blasted all expectations of a crop in those who had no slaves to labor for them; yet great numbers voluntarily offered themselves, and marched with the utmost alacrity to meet the enemy, till they had advanced as far as the place of rendezvous, where the alarm appeared to be false. I am fully convinced, had there been occasion, they would have followed their own officers, with the utmost spirit to Duquesne, or any other place; if I may form a judgment from what I then saw, for I was present, having, at the request of the detachment from this county, accompanied them as chaplain.
Upon its being determined, in a council of war, held there by Col. Washington and the militia field officers, that only a certain quota of the militia of each county should be left behind, amounting in the whole to only four hundred and four men, the quota of each county to be commanded by a lieutenant, and two sergeants of its own; the bare suspicion that some of the officers of the regiment were to act over them as captains, had almost the same effect on the men as a spark of fire on a train of gunpowder. It raised such a fermentation, as Col. Washington's positive declaration that they should not be commanded by any officers but these lieutenants, could scarce allay.
Although I have already been so prolix in these two letters, yet, lest you should have reason to charge me with harping only on the elegiac string, I must further inform you, which I do with great pleasure, that the bountiful Giver of all good things, has been pleased to cheer our spirits, under our misfortunes, with a prospect of almost unparalleled plenty and abundance for the current year. The last year's scarcity has made us much more provident than usual. Much larger fields of wheat, barley and rye last fall, and of oats this spring, have been sown, and much larger quantities of ground planted with Indian corn, than has ever, heretofore, been known. And, although it be too early in the season to form any judgment of the latter, yet, as the former will, in a few days, call for the sickle and scythe some weeks sooner than usual, which is an eminent instance of divine goodness, we can form a very good judgment of them; and unless some disaster befalls them between this and harvest, I may venture to say that more wheat, barley, rye and oats will be made here this year, than perhaps has ever been made in any two or three preceding years together; for, besides the quantities sown, the winter and spring have been so unprecedentedly seasonable, that the earth produces by handfuls. And as we have known the evil of a scarcity, though not want of bread, it is to be hoped the approaching plenty will inspire us with due sentiments of gratitude to Him who sends us rain from heaven and fruitful seasons, and makes the valleys stand so thick with corn, that, in the Psalmist's bold and significant metaphor, they laugh and sing.
The wise man's general remark, that, When goods increase they are increased that eat them, is applicable to my own particular case, my wife having lately increased our family with a daughter, whom we have named Elizabeth.
As to affairs in the north, they continue much as they were left after Sir William Johnston's victory over the Baron, in our favor on the whole, but not so much so, but that our miscarriage there would give a turn to the scales.
Should the forces expected in America with Lord Loudoun be destined for this quarter, and the officers who command them have learned, from General Braddock's disaster, not to be too conceited of their own ability, and not to form too contemptible an opinion of the enemy, I think, if they arrive safe, they, in conjunction with some Pennsylvania, Maryland and Virginia troops, might make a successful attempt against Duquesne this summer and fall, and thereby largely contribute to forward the success of the general plan.
With my hearty prayers for the welfare of the whole little community at Cwm Castle, I am, with very great regard, dear sir,
To Mr. Moses Fontaine.
Louisa County, Fredericksville Parish, June 11, 1759.
Respected Sir:—Yours of the 14th September, 1758, with the glasses which you have been so kind as to procure for me, and also the pamphlets, came safe to hand some months ago. Accept of my sincere thanks for the trouble you have taken to oblige me herein.
I am glad the manuscript afforded you any satisfaction. My reason for not sending it to the press without consulting those gentlemen, was, that I had cause to believe their influence necessary to procure it a passage into the world, for want of which many useful things had been suppressed, and also a persuasion founded on their usual conduct and general character, that they would have readily undertaken and heartily engaged in the business. Had I not taken this for granted, I should at first have sent it to some other press, for at that time I imagined it might have some little tendency to open the eyes of such as wanted to see. But at present I know not of what service it could be.
Many persons who have had better opportunities of information in such matters than myself, and whose rank and station in life give more weight to what they recommend than any proposals of mine could be expected to have; have both here and with you, with invincible force of argument, recommended those, or such like measures for our mutual security against the French intrigues and encroachments in America, both at present and in time to come. And Providence has been pleased of late to give so favorable a turn to public affairs in almost every department of the war, that I am in hopes those salutary measures will be carried into execution, if not before, yet immediately after the conclusion of a peace, and such an one as you mention, solid, honorable, and lasting, may be no very distant event. For, blessed be the only Giver of victory for it, affairs both on your side of the Atlantic and ours wear a face very different from what they did some time ago, and much more pleasing than perhaps the most sanguine of us all could then expect they would at the present time.
At our entrance on the war, we indeed seemed possessed of every advantage and means that could conduce to victory, and thence were willing to conceive hopes of seeing our enemy well nigh crushed, almost before completely prepared for combat. But yet our counsels, we had the mortification to observe, were all frustrate, our enterprises unprosperous, and our arms almost every where disgraced.
Near our own doors, a well-appointed army of disciplined troops fled before a contemptible band of savages and ragamuffins, and stained Monongahela's memorable stream with British blood; and not far from yours, Mahon was wrested from the nation in a manner which will greatly surprise posterity. In short, every attempt to annoy the enemy or secure ourselves miscarried, notwithstanding a great inequality of strength in our favor in those quarters of the world where the war chiefly centered.
None, I believe, but David's fool, and such as he, will deny this to be the Lord's doing. And, although in many cases, his judgments, and the reasons of them are unsearchable and impenetrable by short-sighted mortals, yet here, methinks, they do not seem inexplicable. Had not too many of us, think you, been under the influence of that spirit which prompted Mezentius, in the poet, before combat to boast, Dextra mihi Deus et telum quod missile libro, and the proud Assyrian, in the prophet, after victory to vaunt. By the strength of my hand I have done it, and by my wisdom? If so, the Great Superintendent of the Universe seemed concerned to exhibit some new proof that He doeth according to his will, not only in the armies of heaven, but also among the inhabitants of the earth. Accordingly he chastised that insolent spirit in us, as he did in the two instances just given; and as he sooner or later does in all others of the like sort, consistently with that dreadful sentence, Cursed be the man who trusteth in man, and maketh flesh his arm, and whose heart departeth from the Lord. But whatever were his reasons for chastising, he has now graciously interfered to rescue from destruction his heritage, humbled and penitent, I hope, and sensible that without his blessing all human force is vain; for our enemies, who then filled us with terror, have since been themselves dismayed. Our efforts have reduced them, instead of an offensive, to act a defensive part. Their naval power has received severe and fatal checks. Their commerce is not only greatly encumbered, but probably well nigh ruined. Their coasts have been perpetually alarmed by repeated descents, and the horrors of war have been turned loose to rage within their own borders, both in Europe and here. The armies of the Grand Monarch once, nay of late, the terror of Europe, have been surprisingly mortified and reduced, nay, almost annihilated, as effectually, though not so suddenly, as those of his brother Sennacherib. The loss of Mahon has been abundantly compensated by the acquisition of Louisburg, which puts us in possession of the keys of Canada. Frontenac, too, the gate from Canada into the lakes, and their rich and extensive environs, is an important as it was a cheap conquest. Niagara, too, the shortest and best communication between Canada and Louisiana, is said to be ours, though this I doubt cannot be depended on. However, it is confidently said Colonel Gage marched with two thousand men against it, upwards of two months ago, and has taken it.
Guadaloupe, too, in the West Indies, is no mean acquisition; and I am in hopes, at the present date, the British cannon, in the West Indies, on Lake Champlain, and up St. Lawrence, are venting the resentments of an injured nation against the fortresses of Martinico, Crown Point, and Quebec. May this series of successes produce in our hearts such effects as they ought! May they lead us to repent and constrain us to obey.
I can give you no account of our families here, only that my brother is concerned in victualling the troops stationed on the south-western frontier of this colony, and that by his prudence and activity, and his spirited conduct as Lieutenant of Halifax county, he has greatly contributed to keep the remote inhabitants from abandoning their habitations, and thereby done no small service to his country!—that my cousin Peter this spring lost a son with the nervous fever, and that my cousin James, son of my uncle Francis by his second marriage, has had the misfortune to lose a fine parcel of slaves, which came by his mother, taken from him by a suit at law.
The measles, now epidemic almost all over this continent, has gone through my family lately (only two or three having escaped), without any other inconvenience than retarding our plantation business so much at a critical season of the year, that our crops and harvest are likely to suffer. The smallpox, too, is near us in some places.
My wife and family desire to be respectfully remembered to you.
- I am, dear sir,
Yours affectionately and dutifully.
To Mr. Moses Fontaine.
Louisa County, Fredericksville Parish,June 19 th, 1760.
Dear Sir:—Yours from Cwm Castle of Nov. 30th came to hand some few days ago.
It has escaped my memory if you before advertised me of your intention to quit London.
My conjectures concerning the effect of your exchanging the gross air of that immensely populous city for the purer air you now breathe, I perceive were not quite without foundation. Indeed, they were in good measure built on what I have had occasion to observe here. Persons who have been either born in the mountainous country hereabouts, or resided in it long enough to acquire what we call a mountain constitution, on their removal to the flatter lands and the large rivers, are infallibly unhealthy there, however healthy and robust they used to be here, so that, in the course of a few years, an athletic habit degenerates and dwindles into one valetudinary and cachectic. But when driven thence to this part of the country again, which is beautifully diversified with Milton's grateful variety of hill and dale, you would be surprised to see how suddenly they recover their wonted strength and vigor. I suppose the great difference between the two airs to be the cause which produces these effects. In the lower parts of the country, near the large rivers, the lands are flat and the declivity towards the sea-coast much more gradual than here. Hence, the water there descends with less rapidity, and is not so pure; hence, too, there are many more stagnant collections of it, which may be considered as so many seminaries of disease. On the rivers, too, are extensive tracts of marshy land, many parts of which are so miry that, without exaggerating, you may with a light impulse of the hand, bury a ten-foot rod in a perpendicular direction. These are covered with a luxuriant growth of grass and weeds in summer, and with a thick coat of dry sedge in winter; so that, except in the spring, when these places are set on fire, they are utterly impenetrable to sun or air, excluding the salubrious blasts of the one and the purifying rays of the other, and remain ever fraught with noxious and morbific particles. Hence arise fogs, prodigiously dense, impregnated with unwholesome vapors, arising from these sloughs, and extremely offensive to the smell, which often continue undispersed till nine o'clock in the morning, by which probably the purity and salubrity of the air is impaired. From the evils of these treasuries of disease we mountaineers are happily exempt. The descent of our lands is so quick, that morasses are scarcely known among us, and the rapidity of our waters so great that none of them have leisure to stagnate. Now, the difference between the air of London and that of the country may possibly be as great as between that of a lowland and mountainous situation here; for, methinks it is highly probable, that the smoke and filth of that prodigious city may infect and pollute the air as much as the exhalations from our marshy grounds. Whether these speculations be just or not, I, who never made philosophy my study, will not undertake to decide, but it is notorious that many constitutions, which had been so impaired by the unwholesome air of the lower country, that the physician's art could neither mend nor restore, have surprisingly recovered their vigor by a change of situation. May your removal to rural retreats and sylvan scenes be attended with the like happy effects!
A sound mind in a sound body, with a competent share of the comforts of life, is doubtless the highest pitch of happiness to which a reasonable man could aspire, till the desirable period arrive when He, who has so wonderfully connected and interwoven in one frame two such different and heterogeneous principles as flesh and spirit, shall think fit to dissolve the union, in order to that more perfect and glorious re-union which we expect to take place on that awful day, when this corruptible shall put on incorruption, and this mortal, immortality, and when Death, that scourge of guilt and enemy of our nature, shall be triumphantly swallowed up in victory.
Your command to let you know the distance and bearings between the several branches of our family and Williamsburg, and also between each other, I will execute as well as I am able, without the assistance of a pair of dividers, which I have not at present by me.
Mr. Fontaine, if I mistake not, lives near Bear Swamp, close on the southern branch of the North Anna, a northern branch of Pamunkey River, about 75 miles northwest from Williamsburg, and about 56 miles almost due east from hence, in the county of Hanover.
Mr. Claiborne is seated in the forks of Nottoway, in the county of Lunenburg, between ninety and a hundred miles distant from Williamsburg, by a course about two points to the southward of west, and about the same distance hence in a direction somewhat to the eastward of south.
My brother, as well as I remember, lives on the waters of Difficult Creek, near the extremity of that point of land where the great river Roanoke is formed by the confluence of the Dan and Stanton, one hundred and twenty miles from the metropolis, in a course somewhat to the southward of west, in the county of Halifax, and a hundred miles at least from hence, a little to the westward of south.
The rector of Fredericksville is planted close under the southwest mountains, one hundred and thirty miles nearly northwest from Williamsburg.
To the article of public affairs, I have little to add to what has been said in my letters to uncle John and to Mr. Torin. However, it may not be unacceptable to subjoin, that General Stanwix. who last year commanded at Pittsburg, has, by his singular industry and application, and by prosecuting the works during the whole winter, as far as the rigors of the season would allow, completely finished a large and strong fortification there. Instead of wasting time in those pleasures and diversions which officers commonly indulge in during the winter, this gentleman continued at his post, and carried on the works with assiduity and vigor, and left not the wilds of Ohio till late in the spring, when he returned to Philadelphia in order to embark for Great Britain, where I hope his great merit will meet with the approbation, and applause, and grateful acknowledgment of his country and his Royal Master.
The command of the Southern army, since his departure, devolves on General Monkton, an officer, universally esteemed by those who have been witnesses of his spirited conduct on many occasions since the commencement of the war. At the time that the behavior of Braddock, and some other British officers, had caused very unfavorable ideas to be attached to the words—English officer—this gentleman, though only Lieutenant Colonel, was respected wherever he was known. By this date, I expect, he is on the point of embarking, either from Oswego or Niagara, on an expedition against Detroit, a French fortress, built on the western side of the strait, through which the upper lakes pay their constant tribute to Erie. This place is otherwise called Pontchartrain. Should he succeed, he is to advance to St. Sulpice, situate on the strait through which the Lake Michigan discharges its waters into Huron. Thence, if all go smoothly, and summer enough be left, a chain of forts is to be extended to the Mississippi, and all the most important portages and communications between the waters of the Mississippi, and the Lake Michigan, secured quite into Mississippi. Whether this intelligence be authentic, I know not. The plan, however, seems to be good, pleasing at least to myself, as it exactly falls in with my own notion; and, to me it appears practicable, as, without some uncommon disaster, the enemy, there, must submit to our superiority of strength. It is excellently calculated to prevent the augmentation of the French power here, to finish the glorious work of stopping up all the avenues of communication between their northern and southern settlements, and to open a most lucrative trade with nations scarce ever heard of by the American English. And should the armaments, which, your prints tell us, are destined against their settlement of Louisiana, also triumph, Great Britain will then be in possession of what will one day prove a more copious source of wealth than all the Mexican and Peruvian mines.
The honorable and successful issue of the war, will, probably, put it out of the power of any thing but our iniquities to hurt us; though, according to the course of things, it may minister material for cherishing those vices, which, alas! have already grown to a gigantic and enormous size. So that we may possibly, at length, fall under the Psalmist's malediction, and see those very things, which should have been for our wealth, by our own perverse abuse of them, unhappily converted into an occasion of falling. This is certainly an alloy that embitters the pleasure resulting from prospects of temporal greatness, to feel that all the enjoyments and possessions of this world carry in them, what, though not necessarily, yet, eventually, becomes a temptation to evil. And, therefore, you may believe that I, very heartily, join with you in praying that such a wonderful series of successes may not produce the unnatural fruits it sometimes does, but those, which in reason, and justice and duty it ought to do.
My family desires to be particularly remembered to you, and as for myself, I am, respected sir.
Your dutiful nephew and affectionate friend,
To the Rev. John Camm.
Dear Sir:—Now that I am somewhat more at leisure, than when I wrote to you by Major Winston, from Hanover, some few days ago, I have sat down to give you the best account I can of the most material passages in the trial of my cause against the Collectors in that Court, both to satisfy your own curiosity, and to enable the lawyer, by whom it is to be managed in the General Court, to form some judgment of its merits. I believe, sir, you were advised from Nov'r Court, that the Bench had adjudged the twopenny act to be no law; and that, at the next, a jury, on a writ of inquiry, were to examine whether the Plaintiff had sustained any damages, and what. Accordingly, at December Court, a select jury was ordered to be summoned; but, how far they who gave the order, wished or intended it to be regarded, you may judge from the sequel. The Sheriff went into a public room, full of gentlemen, and told his errand. One excused himself (Peter Robinson of King William) as having already given his opinion in a similar case. On this, as a person then present told me, he immediately left the room, without summoning any one person there. He afterwards met another gentleman (Richard Sq. Taylor) on the green, and, on his saying he was not fit to serve, being a churchwarden, he took upon himself to excuse him, too, and, as far as I can learn, made no further attempts to summon gentlemen. These, you'll say, were but feeble endeavors to comply with the directions of the Court in that particular. Hence, he went among the vulgar herd. After he had selected and set down upon his list about eight or ten of these, I met him with it in his hand, and on looking over it, observed to him that they were not such jurors as the Court had directed him to get, being people of whom I had never heard before, except one, whom, I told him, he knew to be a party in the cause, as one of the Collector's Securities, and, therefore, not fit for a juror on that occasion. Yet this man's name was not erased. He was even called in Court, and, had he not excused himself, would probably have been admitted. For, I cannot recollect, that the Court expressed either surprise or dislike that a more proper jury had not been summoned. Nay, though I objected against them, yet, as Patrick Henry (one of the Defendant's lawyers) insisted they were honest men, and, therefore, unexceptionable, they were immediately called to the book and sworn. Three of them, as I was afterwards told, nay, some said four, were Dissenters of that denomination called New Lights, which the Sheriff, as they were all his acquaintance, must have known, Messrs. Gist and McDowall, the two most considerable purchasers in that county, were now called in to prove the price of tobacco, and sworn. The testimony of the former imported, that, during the months of May and June, 1759, tobacco had currently sold at 50s. per hundred, and that himself, at or about the latter end of the last of those months, had sold some hundreds of hhds. at that price, and, amongst the rest, one hundred to be delivered in the month of August, which, however, were not delivered till September, That of the latter only proved, "That 50s. was the current price of tobacco that season." This was the sum of the evidence for the Plaintiff. Against him, was produced a receipt to the Collector, to the best of my remembrance in these words: "Received of Thomas Johnson, Jun'r, at this and some former payments, £144, current money, by James Maury." After the lawyers on both sides had displayed the force and weight of the evidence, pro and con. to their Honors, the jurors, and one of those who appeared for the Defendants had observed to them that they must find (or if they must find, I am not sure which, but think the former) for the Plaintiff, but need not find more than one farthing; they went out, and, according to instruction (though whether according to evidence or not, I leave you to judge), in less than five minutes brought in a verdict for the Plaintiff, one penny damages. Mr. Lyons urged, as the verdict was contrary to evidence, the jury ought to be sent out again. But no notice was taken of it, and the verdict admitted without hesitation by the Bench. He then moved to have the evidence of Messrs. Gist and McDowell recorded, with as little effect. His next motion, which was for a new trial, shared the same fate. He then moved it might be admitted to record, "that he had made a motion for a new trial, because he considered the verdict contrary to evidence, and that the motion had been rejected;" which, after much altercation, was agreed to. He lastly moved for an appeal, which, too, was granted. This, sir, as well as I can remember, is a just and impartial narrative of the most material occurrences in the trial of that cause. One occurrence more, tho' not essential to the cause, I can't help mentioning, as a striking instance of the loyalty, impartiality and attachment of the Bench to the Church of England in particular, and to religion at large. Mr. Henry, mentioned above (who had been called in by the Defendants, as we suspected, to do what I some time ago told you of), after Mr. Lyons had opened the cause, rose and harangued the jury for near an hour. This harangue turned upon points as much out of his own depth, and that of the jury, as they were foreign from the purpose; which it would be impertinent to mention here. However, after he had discussed those points, he labored to prove "that the act of 1758 had every characteristic of a good law; that it was a law of general utility, and could not, consistently with what he called the original compact between King and people, stipulating protection on the one hand and obedience on the other, be annulled." Hence, he inferred. "that a King, by disallowing Acts of this salutary nature, from being the father of his people, degenerated into a Tyrant, and forfeits all right to his subjects' obedience." He further urged, "that the only use of an Established Church and Clergy in society, is to enforce obedience to civil sanctions, and the observance of those which are called duties of imperfect obligation; that, when a Clergy ceases to answer these ends, the community have no further need of their ministry, and may justly strip them of their appointments; that the Clergy of Virginia, in this particular instance of their refusing to acquiesce in the law in question, had been so far from answering, that they had most notoriously counteracted, those great ends of their institution; that, therefore, instead of useful members of the state, they ought to be considered as enemies of the community; and that, in the case now before them, Mr. Maury, instead of countenance, and protection and damages, very justly deserved to be punished with signal severity." And then he perorates to the following purpose, "that excepting they (the jury) were disposed to rivet the chains of bondage on their own necks, he hoped they would not let slip the opportunity which now offered, of making such an example of him as might, hereafter, be a warning to himself and his brethren, not to have the temerity, for the future, to dispute the validity of such laws, authenticated by the only authority, which, in his conception, could give force to laws for the government of this Colony, the authority of a legal representative of a Council, and of a kind and benevolent and patriot Governor." You'll observe I do not pretend to remember his words, but take this to have been the sum and substance of this part of his labored oration. When he came to that part of it where he undertook to assert, "that a King, by annulling or disallowing acts of so salutary a nature, from being the Father of his people degenerated into a Tyrant, and forfeits all right to his subjects' obedience;" the more sober part of the audience were struck with horror. Mr. Lyons called out aloud, and with an honest warmth, to the Bench, "That the gentleman had spoken treason," and expressed his astonishment "that their worships could hear it without emotion, or any mark of dissatisfaction," At the same instant, too, amongst some gentlemen in the crowd behind me, was a confused murmur of Treason, Treason! Yet Mr. Henry went on in the same treasonable and licentious strain, without interruption from the Bench, nay, even without receiving the least exterior notice of their disapprobation. One of the jury, too, was so highly pleased with these doctrines, that, as I was
afterwards told, he every now and then gave the traitorous declaimer a nod of approbation. After the Court was adjourned he apologised to me for what he had said, alleging that his sole view in engaging in the cause, and in saying what he had, was to render himself popular. You see, then, it is so clear a point in this person's opinion, that the ready road to popularity here, is, to trample under foot the interests of religion, the rights of the church, and the prerogative of the Crown. If this be not pleading for the "assumption of a power to bind the King's hands," if it be not asserting "such supremacy in provincial Legislatures" as is inconsistent with the dignity of the Church of England, and manifestly tends to draw the people of these plantations from their allegiance to the King, tell me, my dear sir, what is so, if you can. Mr. Cootes, merchant on James River, after Court, said "he would have given a considerable sum out of his own pocket, rather than his friend Patrick should have been guilty of a crime, but little, if any thing inferior to that which brought Simon Lord Lovatt to the block;" and justly observed that he exceeded the most seditious and inflammatory harangues of the Tribunes of old Rome.
My warmest wishes and prayers ever attend you. And besides these there is little else in the power of, my dear Camm,
Your affectionate
To Mr. John Fontaine.
But what hath given a most general alarm to all the colonists on this continent, and most of those in the islands, and struck us with the most universal consternation that ever seized a people so widely diffused, is a late Act of the British Parliament, subjecting us to a heavy tax, by the imposition of stamp duties on all manner of papers required in trade, law, or private dealings; on pamphlets, newspapers, almanacs, calendars, and even advertisements; and ordaining that the causes of delinquents against the Act, wheresoever such delinquents may reside, shall be cognizable, and finally determinable by any Court of Admiralty upon the continent, to which either plaintiff or defendant shall think proper to appeal from the sentence either of the inferior Courts of Justice or the superior. The execution of this Act was to have commenced on the first of the last month all over British America, but hath been, with an unprecedented unanimity, opposed and prevented by every province on the continent, and by all the islands, whence we have had any advices since that date. For this 'tis probable some may brand us with the odious name of rebels, and others may applaud us for that generous love of liberty which we inherit from our glorious forefathers, while some few may prudently suspend their judgment till they shall have heard what may be said on either side of the question.
If the Parliament indeed have a right to impose taxes on the colonies, we are as absolute slaves as any in Asia, and consequently in a state of rebellion. If they have no such right, we are acting the noble and virtuous part which every freeman and community of freemen hath a right, and is in duty bound to act. For my own part, I am not acquainted with all that may be said on the one part or the other, and therefore am in some sort obliged to suspend my judgment. But no arguments that have yet come in my way, have convinced me that the Parliament hath any such right. The advocates for the Act, I observe, have alleged both precedents and arguments in support of the Parliament's right of taxation over the colonies. The precedents alleged are two Acts of Parliament; one establishing a Post-Office in America; the other, making some regulations with regard to the British troops sent hither in the late war; which are so very dissimilar from what they have been alleged to support, and therefore so foreign from the point, that instead of producing conviction, they really excite laughter. And of the arguments I have seen urged in behalf of this, till now unheard-of claim, the chief seems to be but a bare ipse dixit, an unsupported assertion that we, as British subjects, are virtually represented in the British Parliament, and consequently obliged by all its Acts. But, how some millions of people here (not a man of whom can, in consequence of his property here, either give a vote for sending a member to, or himself obtain a seat in, your House of Commons) can, in any sense, be said to be represented by that House, is utterly incomprehensible to an American understanding, or to any European understanding I have yet met with, which hath breathed American air. That we are subject to the jurisdiction of Parliament in matters of government that are of a nature purely external; subject, too, to such of its statutes as are of a date prior to the first migration of our ancestors hither, and to the first foundation of our government, is what seems to be generally granted amongst those I have conversed with. But taxation is an act of government purely internal, in which (allowing us to be freemen) we conceive a British House of Commons and a Parliament of Paris have an equal right to intermeddle. We flatter ourselves with a notion, that though we be subjects of Great Britain, and, we hope, as loyal as any others (and perhaps not less useful), we yet are freemen. All our charters declare (which we are not conscious of having ever forfeited) that all British subjects dwelling and their children born here, shall have and enjoy all liberties, franchises and immunities to all intents and purposes, as if they had been abiding and born within the realm of England And if these charters have not been legally forfeited, as we trust they have not, are we not entitled to all the rights and liberties of Britons? If we be, we cannot, one would think, consistently with the principles of the British government, as ascertained in Magna, Charta, be taxable without our own consent. We also conceive that the consent of no freeholder in America hath been given, or can possibly be given, in any constitutional mode, either personally or vicariously, to the Act in question, or to any other Act of taxation; because, not a man of us, as possessor of American property, can, as was before observed, vote for a member, or himself become a member, in that august House, whence all money bills, as far as their jurisdiction extends, must take their rise. We, moreover, consider ourselves, if you will allow me the expression for want of a better, as a peculium of the Crown. By charters from the Crown, that company was incorporated which first planted us. By the Crown were those charters afterwards revoked. By the Crown, too, we are told, all the grants of liberties, all the charters which had passed from the company during its existence, to the colony, were, upon the revocation of the company's charters and its dissolution, confirmed and ratified to us. Under the immediate protection, direction, and government of the Crown have we been from that time to this. In short, thenceforward all the Acts of our Legislature either have, or constitutionally ought to have been, transmitted to Great Britain and subjected to the royal government, either to be disallowed, or ratified and confirmed by the ultimate sanction of the royal assent, previously to their having the force and validity of laws, without any parliamentary interposition whatever. So that the King, not as a branch of the British Legislature, but as a sovereign lord and absolute proprietor of the colony, in conjunction with his commissioner the Governor, his Council of State, and the people's representatives here, we suppose, form that aggregate Legislature, to the Acts of which alone, in all articles of internal government (of which taxation is a most important one) we owe obedience. To such alone, and to no other, have we paid obedience quite from our first establishment to this present day. And to such alone, in all such articles, particularly that of taxes, if I mistake not the sentiments of my countrymen, will they ever be disposed or prevailed on to pay obedience by any other argument than what some have called the ultima ratio regum, which may, for aught I know, be as convincing in matters of policy, as fire and faggot have been in those of religion. Besides all this, whenever the colony hath labored under any grievance which the branches of the Legislature here resident could not redress, or hath found it necessary to crave any indulgence or enlargement of privileges and immunities, their application has been always made to the King. And it doth not appear to me, that ever they have made any application to Parliament since King James I. took them out of the company's hands in 1624, on any occasion whatever, except once or twice when it was apprehended some bills, depending in Parliament, would pass into Acts, which would be prejudicial to their trade abroad, till they remonstrated against the Stamp Act. And, indeed, they have had very little encouragement to do so again, if what their agent hath told them be true; that their remonstrances against that bill (though modest as could be expected from men not sunk into the most abject slavery) were not so much as permitted to be heard. Such hath been the form of government under which we have lived from the year 1621, when our government was thoroughly established by charter from the company, to this present date. This we think a succession of years sufficient to establish that argument in support of our rights, had we no other, which is called prescription; for, during this whole period, no archives, records, or histories, that any here are acquainted with, or that any with you have cited, as far as I know, show, that ever the British Parliament attempted to tax us, or intermeddle in any matters relative to our interior government, till the date of this unhappy Stamp Act. All these rather prove the contrary. Nay, it appears that some Acts, even under an arbitrary Stewartine reign sent over hither with Lord Culpepper, when he came as Governor, were, by his Lordship's instructions, previously to their execution, to be subjected to the consideration of our General Assembly, in order to obtain their consent. It further appears, that they were so subjected and consented to by the Assembly, after the addition of two provisoes to one of them. In a word, it is indisputable that, whenever the kings of Great Britain have wanted any aids either of men or money from this colony, the method of obtaining them hath been by letters requisitory, in the royal name, from a Secretary of State to the Governors, by whom those letters have been laid before the Assembly, who have levied the aids asked in such mode and by such ways and means as they thought most effectual and least oppressive, of which they surely are the best judges; from all which premises the people of Virginia conclude, the Parliament hath no right to tax them. But if they had, it is as steadfastly believed by most men here, as any article of their creed, that they have no right to deprive us of the inestimable privilege of being tried by juries. This unconstitutional stretch of authority they are certain it is not their duty to obey. The transition from subjecting us to be tried by Courts of Admiralty in civil matters to military government is so easy, that the thoughts of it almost reduce us to despair. For these reasons, amongst many others, the people of this colony would not allow the stamped papers to be distributed, and forced the stamp-master to resign immediately on his arrival. These reasons convince them that the moment they acquiesce under the Stamp Act, they commence slaves; and the blood of their generous ancestors which flows in their veins, or some other cause, seems to have given them such an instinctive abhorrence of slavery that, were we to judge from appearances, they think any evil whatever more eligible than that. How the affair will end, God only knows! May his wise Providence prevent those tragedies, which my very heart even bleeds at the thoughts of!
But, put the case (which is the most favorable supposition that can be put) that the Colonies at last submit to the galling yoke, every friend to Great Britain must even then find cause to detest and execrate the Act. For the execution of it, or of any other Act of Taxation, will affect her in the tenderest points,—her manufactures, trade, and naval power. The Colonies were poor before the war. They are much more so since. Additional taxes must increase their poverty. The poorer they are, the less of your manufactures can they pay for and consume. The less demand there is for those manufactures, the more of your manufacturers must want bread. When we can no longer pay for your manufactures, we cannot go naked. Necessity will set us upon improving the natural advantages of our soil and climate, and manufacturing the products of it, flax, hemp, wool, and cotton, which are to be had here in great plenty, as well as perfection. Besides, it is said, some eminent merchants in London have computed that one-third, others one-fourth, of your exports are brought to the Colonies; and have observed that those exports have greatly diminished since this Act hath been on the carpet. How just that computation or remark may be, I do not know. But this I know, that the orders for goods from Great Britain have greatly decreased, wherever I am acquainted, as well as the consumption of them, within these few months; that the number of wheels, looms, &c., have increased-to an amazing degree, and that only at one meeting in a neighboring Colony, upwards of two hundred merchants are said to have bound themselves under most solemn engagements, not to order any goods from Great Britain till that Act should be repealed. In short, necessity will force every man of us to employ his own labor and that of his slaves, so as may best supply his needs; from which, I believe, nothing but some dragoons at each man's door will prevent us. More need not be said to prove this detestable Act productive of the most direful mischief, not only to the children, but to the mother island. For my own part, whatever the event may be, I comfort myself with the reflection, that every thing here below is subject to the control of irresistible power, directed by unerring wisdom and infinite goodness, &c. &c.
- To the Honorable Philip Ludwell.
Honorable Sir:—However misbecoming it may in general be thought, in such as act only in a private station, to intermeddle in affairs of a public nature; yet when our country is in danger, to ward that danger off seems to be an object of common concern. Hence, I trust, any member of the community will be deemed pardonable, at least, in showing a readiness to forward the accomplishment of that desirable end. With this view then, I am about to take the freedom to offer to your Honor's consideration some few particulars with which, peradventure, the great distance between Williamsburg and those parts of the country which are most immediately affected by them, may have prevented some gentlemen, who share in the administration, from being so thoroughly acquainted, as, it is conceived, public utility, requires they should.
Not to mention the repeated acts of hostility and violence committed, on our fellow-subjects in the remoter parts of the Colony, by those bloody instruments of French policy, the Indians; nor the great extent of country on both sides the Alleghanies, now almost totally depopulated by them, which are facts long since notorious to all; I beg leave to inform you, that such numbers of people have lately transplanted themselves hence into the more southerly governments, as must appear almost incredible to any, except such as have had an opportunity of knowing it, either from their own observation, or the credible information of others.
From the waters of Potomac, James River, and Roanoke, on the eastern side of the above-mentioned ridge of mountains, nay, from the side of the Blue Ridge, hundreds of families have, within these few months past, removed, deserted their habitations, and conveyed themselves and their most valuable movables into other governments.
By Bedford Court House, in one week, it is said, and I believe truly said, near three hundred persons, inhabitants of this colony, passed on their way to Carolina. And I have it from good authors, that no later in autumn than October, five thousand more had crossed James River, only at one ferry, that at Goochland Court House, and journeying towards the same place; and doubtless great numbers have passed that way since. And, although all these had not been settled in Virginia, yet a large proportion of them had. From all the upper counties, even those on this side the Blue Hills, great numbers are daily following, and others preparing to follow in the spring. Scarce do I know a neighborhood but has lost some families, and expects quickly to lose more. What aggravates the misfortune, is, that many of these are not the idler and the vagrant, pests of society, whom it is ever salutary to a body politic to purge off, but the honest and industrious, men of worth and property, whom it is an evil at any time to a community to lose, but is most eminently so to our own in the present critical juncture.
Now, sir, as many have thus quitted fertile lands and comfortable habitations, left behind them their friends, relations, and country, to all which they were attached by many powerful and endearing ties, we may conclude that weighty have been the reasons, at least these people have thought them such, which have already determined so many to act as these have done, and will determine others to follow their example. But, whether they be weighty in themselves or not, it is certain they are such as reduce the numbers of our inhabitants very fast, to the great detriment and loss of the public.
As I have had an opportunity of conversing with some of them upon the subject, and have thence discovered what considerations have influenced their conduct in this point, I shall take the liberty briefly and candidly to represent them to your Honor; after which, you may judge whether they have any weight or not; that, if they have, the gentlemen whose province it is to direct public affairs, may, if upon inquiry they find this information founded on truth, consider what will be the properest remedies for a timely prevention of the further progress of this consumption in our political constitution.
Although it be natural to suspect that the heavy taxes which the pressing exigencies of our country have rendered necessary, possibly may, and perhaps actually have, determined some to remove, yet, I know none who have been prevailed on to do so, purely and simply from that consideration. But, sir, an unhappy concurrence of various sinister events and untoward circumstances, preventing the Colony from reaping advantages from the sums levied and expended, adequate to those sums, together with a suspicion and dread that their persons and possessions are not sufficiently insured against the cruelties and depredations of the savages, have been the prevailing and principal inducements to these people, thus, to their own private, as well as to the public detriment and loss, to become voluntary exiles.
Gentlemen in the administration may think, and I do believe they do think, that abundant provision has been already made for their protection and defence, as well by the several companies of Rangers sent out in the fall, as by the present expedition against the Shawanese, Whether the former of these measures has answered all the good ends, which, I presume, the Government had in view when it was resolved on, I undertake not to affirm or deny. And, whether the latter will, no man not endowed with the prophetic gift can foretell. However, I hope it will.
But this is foreign to my purpose, which is to inform your Honor of the sentiments and reasonings of those people who are daily seeking new habitations out of this Government. And they, sir, notwithstanding those measures, and all others which have yet been pursued with the same views, look upon our frontiers to be in so insecure and defenceless a state as to justify their apprehensions that the same bloody tragedies which were acted at the expense of their neighbors last summer, will, if they stay, be re-acted the ensuing at their own.
If only fifty Indians, which they believe to be as many as were upon our borders in the south-west last year, made such havoc and desolation, drove off upwards of 2,000 head of cattle and horses to support themselves and the enemy at Fort Duquesne, besides what they wantonly destroyed; if so contemptible a band depopulated and ravaged so large a tract of country, they suspect, much greater numbers, animated and tempted by the extraordinary success of those few, will, ere long, renew the same hostilities, and consequently, much greater and more extensive mischief will ensue. And, certain it is, should that be attempted and no effectual methods pursued to defeat the attempt, many parts of this Colony, now several miles within the frontier, will shortly become frontier in their turn.
As to the expedition under the command of Major Lewis, they regard it as a mark of the government's concern for their particular security, and of its attention to the welfare of the community at large. But yet, the success of it being uncertain, they think it not prudent to risk all that is dear in life, nay, life itself, upon such an uncertainty. They steadfastly believe, because it has been confidently affirmed by persons whom they judge worthy of credit, that the Shawanese have long since received intelligence of the march and destination of that party of Cherokees who are now to act in concert with the forces of this Colony, that are under the command of Major Lewis. And, hence, it is concluded, they have time either to augment their strength sufficiently to face us in the field, or else to retreat beyond the reach of our forces for awhile, in order, either when they shall be withdrawn thence, or even while they continue there in one body, to return on our back settlements by some one or other of those various passes through the Alleghany mountains, all which it will be utterly impossible for those forces in that united state to command or guard. And should this expedition, for these or any other reasons, succeed no better than some others have, what our remote inhabitants have heretofore suffered is judged but trifling, compared with what they would suffer in consequence of so disastrous an event; a dread of which, it is generally feared, would determine all the people beyond the Blue Ridge instantly to abandon their habitations, and retreat to a place of greater security; which they, as well as those who have already removed thither, expect to find in the western parts of the Carolinas, in the neighborhood and under the shelter of the Catawbas and Cherokees; whither, it is supposed, the French Indians will, at present, scarce think proper to make any inroads; for, sir, in the present state of our frontiers, they must be sensible, if they judge of the future from the past, that they may with less trouble and hazard, get both scalps and plunder in Virginia, as valuable, nay, more valuable than they can well expect in the neighborhood of those two nations, our friends, who are truly formidable to them, one for its martial and enterprising genius, the other for its numbers.
It is generally believed by the most prudent and discerning in this part of the country, that during the present troubles, nothing will put a stop to this prevailing humor of removing southerly, because nothing will convince the people they are safe, but a line of forts extended quite across the Colony, as a barrier against incursions of the barbarians; and that this would, is quite probable, because a trifling fort on Jackson River, a little below the mouth of Carpenter's Creek, and another more trifling at the Drunkard's Bottom, on New River, have, notwithstanding surrounding dangers, kept their neighboring settlements tolerably well together, as yet. Sir, if this be the case, it is submitted to superior judgments to decide, whether or not it will be a prudent and necessary measure to have a chain of forts thrown across the Colony with all convenient speed.
Should such a scheme be resolved on, the following line might, perhaps, upon being viewed by proper persons, be found to be not altogether inconvenient to build them on, to wit: beginning near the head of Patterson's Creek on Potomac (for there is a fort already thirteen miles above its mouth), continued up the western branch of Woppocomo, and down Jackson River, and up Craig's Creek, crossing the Alleghany Mountains to the Horse Shoe Bottom on New River, thence up to the head of Reedy Creek, and extended down Holston, quite to the latitude of our southern boundary. Each of these forts might be built from other about thirty miles distant, more or less, as the natural situation of the grounds, and some other requisite conveniences, would admit. Each, too, might be garrisoned by a company of about fifty men, exclusive of officers, part whites and part Indians. As the whole distance is somewhat upwards of 300 miles only, and some few forts are already erected on or near this line, ten or twelve at most, might be sufficient to serve our whole frontier, and six hundred men at most, Indians and whites together, to garrison the whole chain.
Should it be further determined that no person bear any commission in these garrisons, except such as besides some little fortune and a good character, are expert woodsmen, it would still further insure the success of this matter.
As his Honor, the Governor, cannot be so well acquainted with persons who may be best qualified to command these companies, as several gentlemen in the upper counties are, who are themselves experienced woodsmen, and personally know such as are most proper for such an office; both on this and the other accounts just mentioned, would it be amiss, should directions be given to the several courts of Augusta, Frederick, and Hampshire, Halifax, Lunenburg, Prince Edward and Bedford, Albemarle and Louisa, Orange, Culpepper, Prince William and Fairfax, each to recommend three or four persons, the best qualified in their respective counties for that business; out of whom his Honor might make choice of such as he should think fit? Perhaps, too, it might be thought necessary to appoint one general commander over all these garrisons, who, upon any emergency, by drafting a certain quota from each, would be enabled more speedily and more effectually to relieve any particular place in distress, as well as to harass and intercept any parties of the enemy, daring enough to adventure within the line. Supposing these fortresses built each from other at the distances mentioned above, the whole extent of country from north to south might be daily ranged and explored, and a constant communication maintained between fort and fort; for each garrison would bear dividing into six parties. Two might in regular rotation be constantly employed in scouring the woods; one about fifteen miles to the northward, the other about as far to the southward of their own fort, while the remaining four continued at home, both for their own refreshment and for the necessary guard and defence of their post. Each of the two dividends upon duty might be obliged to range from their own fort as above proposed to some distance, as nearly central as may be, between it and that towards which they respectively patrol. The scouting parties of these two forts might there meet each other in the evening, camp together that night for mutual security, and before setting out for their several homes in the morning, make an appointment where the two next detachments from the two same garrisons to be next upon duty should meet and encamp on the evening of the succeeding day; taking care, as frequently as may be, to change their places of encampment, in order both to render the passage of the enemy by night or by day more precarious, and more effectually to guard against a surprise in the night, which might also be further guarded against were each party to have some few well-tutored and mettlesome dogs, the most vigilant of sentinels, whose antipathy against Indians is as strong as that of Indians against them. And by these parties thus frequently meeting, any intelligence might be easily transmitted from one extremity of this line to the other, or from any of the intermediate stations to either extremity, without any extraordinary trouble or expense. As all these garrisons might be under the same regulations, and detachments from each be daily ranging in the manner above-mentioned, the country thereabouts would be thoroughly searched and guarded, and yet the soldiers, through this alternate vicissitude of exercise and repose, not obliged to undergo any immoderate fatigue; for two-thirds of their time would be spent at their fort, and only one-third upon duty out of doors.
Now, sir, do not you think it highly probable that a scheme of this sort judiciously planned and faithfully executed, of which this may be considered only as an imperfect sketch, would render it extremely hazardous for the enemy, notwithstanding their celebrated activity and expertness in the woods, and the ruggedness and unevenness of those grounds, to make any inroads upon us with success? The diligence and activity that may be expected in officers thus cautiously chosen, and the garrisons under their command, having a proper intermixture of Indians no less subtle than the enemy, as bold, and equally well versed in all the barbarian arts and stratagems of war, would be much more formidable to those brutal ravagers, and embarrass them much more than many thousands of the best disciplined troops, and would either keep them at due distance, or, should they adventure within the barrier, severely chastise their insolence and temerity. Such a measure, too. besides affording the people in these quarters greater security than they have ever yet had, it is supposed will be less expensive to the Government than any other that seems to promise equal success. Good judges of work are of opinion that each of these forts, together with its necessary buildings, will not cost more than between £40 and £50, provided the several companies be obliged to assist the undertaker in felling, hewing, sawing, and conveying into place the timber, in digging the trenches for the stockades, and in other services of that nature; and provided forts, built after the model, in the manner, and of the dimensions of that of which you herewith receive a plan, be judged sufficient to answer the end. Men, too. may be had to garrison them with very little bounty; many, perhaps, without any, provided the Government would give them an assurance that they should not be obliged to enter into any other service. When enlisted, they would be less apt to desert than men are from corps of a different denomination, and destined for services of a different nature.
Moreover, the Indians in these garrisons will certainly require less costly clothing, and perhaps be satisfied with lower wages than soldiers are commonly allowed. The white men, too, would be clothed as cheaply, perhaps more so, than soldiers regularly regimented. Several officers thought necessary in corps of this latter denomination, would here be needless; such as colonel, lieutenant-colonel, major, adjutant, quarter-master, pay-master, commissary, and perhaps some others. If I am not mistaken in the pay these several officers receive in the Virginia Regiment, which, according to my calculation amounts to £177 10s. per month, the six hundred men in these forts will be cheaper to the Colony by £2,130 per annum than the same number regimented, out of which, however, is to be deducted the pay of an officer to command the whole, which, rated at twenty shillings per day, a very bountiful and genteel allowance, leaves an annual clear saving to the Colony of £1,765.
As some of these forts will be convenient to the back inhabitants, the garrisons may be fed at much less expense than the Colony's troops at Cumberland can be, because the heavy charges of a long land carriage will be saved, savings which well merit the attention of a government, most especially when its treasury is well-nigh exhausted, and its subjects so little able to replenish it as our countrymen at present confessedly are.
But there is another very considerable expense which I had like to have forgotten, which this method of guarding our frontiers will render needless, and which therefore may be saved; for draughting the militia will probably hence be rendered unnecessary, which has frequently been done last year, and for aught that is known to the contrary, the Government may be necessitated to do the same the ensuing. And, should only six hundred of them be employed in defence of our frontiers, and stationed there only for one campaign, on the pay established by Act of Assembly, it would be such an addition to that load of debt and taxes under which the country at present labors, as, together with its unhappy circumstances in some other respects, must infallibly sink it beyond a possibility of emerging through a course of many years, how favorable a turn soever its present situation of affairs may take.
Such a chain of fortresses would also bring back the fugitives to their deserted plantations, would encourage others to prosecute anew their former schemes of seating the back lands, which these unhappy contests between the courts of London and Versailles have deterred them from executing, and would invite new settlers thither from several of the neighboring colonies, as well as from the crowded and interior parts of our own; hence, a considerable increase of people, which has ever been thought an augmentation of wealth and power. Industry, too, would revive, which in the remoter parts of the Colony, has for some time past been in a stagnant state, occasioned by the husbandman's uncertainty whether the returns of his labor were to support the enemies of his country or his own family. The people would cease to remove, as they would believe the Government had fallen upon the [The remainder of this letter lost.]
- ↑ Son of Mary Ann Fontaine, who married Matthew Maury. He was ordained in London, in the year 1742.