Page:Historic highways of America (Volume 4).djvu/139

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BATTLE OF THE MONONGAHELA
135

following paid dearly for their supine indifference.

For with Beaujeu's victory the French arms became impregnable on the Ohio. Braddock's defeat brought ten-fold more wretchedness than his victory could ever have brought of advantage. After that terrible scene of savagery at Fort Duquesne on the night of the victory, when the few prisoners taken were burned at the stake, there were no wavering Indians. And instantly the frontier was overrun with marauding bands which drove back to the inhabited parts of the country every advanced settlement. All the Virginian outposts were driven in; and even the brave Moravian missionaries in Pennsylvania and New York gave up their work before the red tide of war which now set eastward upon the long frontiers.

For Shirley had likewise been beaten back from Fort Niagara, and Johnson had not captured Fort Crown Point. Two of the campaigns of 1755 were utter failures.