The Braddock expedition, also called Braddock's campaign or (more commonly) Braddock's Defeat, was a British military expedition which attempted to capture Fort Duquesne (established in 1754, located in what is now downtown Pittsburgh) from the French in the summer of 1755, during the French and Indian War of 1754 to 1763. The British troops suffered defeat at the Battle of the Monongahela on July 9, 1755, and the survivors retreated. The expedition takes its name from General Edward Braddock (1695–1755), who led the British forces and died in the effort. Braddock's defeat was a major setback for the British in the early stages of the war with France; John Mack Faragher characterises it as one of the most disastrous defeats for the British in the 18th century.[6]
Braddock's expedition was part of a massive British offensive against the French in North America that summer. As commander-in-chief of the British Army in America, General Braddock led the main thrust against the Ohio Country with a column some 2,100 strong. His command consisted of two regular line regiments, the 44th and 48th, in all 1,400 regular soldiers and 700 provincial troops from several British American colonies, and artillery and other support troops. With these men, Braddock expected to seize Fort Duquesne easily, and then push on to capture a series of French forts, eventually reaching Fort Niagara. George Washington, promoted to Lieutenant-Colonel of the Virginia Regiment on June 4, 1754 by Governor Robert Dinwiddie,[7] was then just 23, knew the territory and served as a volunteer aide-de-camp to General Braddock.[8] Braddock's Chief of Scouts was Lieutenant John Fraser of the Virginia Regiment. Fraser owned land at Turtle Creek, had been at Fort Necessity, and had served as Second-in-Command at Fort Prince George (renamed Fort Duquesne by the French), at the confluence of the Allegheny and Monongahela Rivers.
Braddock mostly failed in his attempts to recruit Native American allies from those tribes not yet allied with the French; he had but eight Mingo Indians with him, serving as scouts. A number of Indians in the area, notably Delaware leader Shingas, remained neutral. Caught between two powerful European empires at war, the local Indians could not afford to be on the side of the loser. They would decide based on Braddock's success or failure.
Braddock's Road
French and British forts in the region. The French forts were Fort Duquesne and the forts to the north.
Setting out from Fort Cumberland in Maryland on May 29, 1755, the expedition faced an enormous logistical challenge: moving a large body of men with equipment, provisions, and (most importantly, for attacking the forts) heavy cannons, across the densely wooded Allegheny Mountains and into western Pennsylvania, a journey of about 110 miles (180km). Braddock had received important assistance from Benjamin Franklin, who helped procure wagons and supplies for the expedition. Among the wagoners were two young men who would later become legends of American history: Daniel Boone and Daniel Morgan. Other members of the expedition included Ensign William Crawford and Charles Scott. Among the British were Thomas Gage; Charles Lee, future American president George Washington, and Horatio Gates.
The expedition progressed slowly because Braddock considered making a road to Fort Duquesne a priority in order to effectively supply the position he expected to capture and hold at the Forks of the Ohio, and because of a shortage of healthy draft animals. In some cases, the column was only able to progress at a rate of two miles (about 3km) a day, creating Braddock's Road—an important legacy of the march—as they went. To speed up movement, Braddock split his men into a "flying column" of about 1,300 men which he commanded, and, lagging far behind, a supply column of 800 men with most of the baggage, commanded by Colonel Thomas Dunbar. They passed the ruins of Fort Necessity along the way, where the French and Canadians had defeated Washington the previous summer. Small French and Indian war bands skirmished with Braddock's men during the march.
Braddock Road trace near Fort Necessity, Pennsylvania.
Meanwhile, at Fort Duquesne, the French garrison consisted of only about 250 French marines and Canadian militia, with about 640 Indian allies camped outside the fort. The Indians were from a variety of tribes long associated with the French, including Ottawas, Ojibwas, and Potawatomis. Claude-Pierre Pécaudy de Contrecœur, the Canadian commander, received reports from Indian scouting parties that the British were on their way to besiege the fort. He realised he could not withstand Braddock's cannon, and decided to launch a preemptive strike, an ambush of Braddock's army as he crossed the Monongahela River. The Indian allies were initially reluctant to attack such a large British force, but the French field commander Daniel Liénard de Beaujeu, who dressed himself in full war regalia complete with war paint, convinced them to follow his lead.
19th-century engraving of the wounding of Major-General Braddock at the Battle of the Monongahela.
By July 8, 1755, the Braddock force was on the land owned by the Chief Scout, Lieutenant John Fraser. That evening, the Indians sent a delegation to the British to request a conference. Braddock sent Washington and Fraser. The Indians asked the British to halt their advance so that they could attempt to negotiate a peaceful withdrawal by the French from Fort Duquesne. Both Washington and Fraser recommended this to Braddock but he demurred.
On July 9, 1755, Braddock's men crossed the Monongahela without opposition, about 10 miles (16km) south of Fort Duquesne. The advance guard of 300 grenadiers and colonials with two cannon under Lieutenant Colonel Thomas Gage began to move ahead. George Washington tried to warn him of the flaws in his plan—for example, the French and the Indians fought differently than the open-field style used by the British—but his efforts were ignored: Braddock insisted that his troops fight as "gentlemen". Then, unexpectedly, Gage's advance guard came upon Beaujeu's party of French and Indians, who were hurrying to the river, behind schedule and too late to set an ambush.
In the skirmish that followed between Gage's soldiers and the French, Beaujeu was among those killed by the first volley of musket fire by the grenadiers. Although some 100 French Canadians fled back to the fort and the noise of the cannon held the Indians off, Beaujeu's death did not have a negative effect on French morale; Jean-Daniel Dumas, a French officer, rallied the rest of the French and their Indian allies. The battle, known as the Battle of the Monongahela, or the Battle of the Wilderness, or just Braddock's Defeat, was officially begun. Braddock's force was approximately 1,400 men. The British faced a French and Indian force estimated to number between 300 and 900. The battle, frequently described as an ambush, was actually a meeting engagement, where two forces clash at an unexpected time and place. The quick and effective response of the French and Indians—despite the early loss of their commander—led many of Braddock's men to believe they had been ambushed. However, French battle reports reveal that the French and Indian force was too late to prepare an ambush and had been just as surprised as the British.
Plan of the Battle at the beginning of action on July 9, 1755 (1830 engraving)
After an exchange of fire, Gage's advance group fell back. In the narrow confines of the road, they collided with the main body of Braddock's force, which had advanced rapidly when the shots were heard. The entire column dissolved in disorder as the Canadian militiamen and Indians enveloped them and continued to snipe at the British flanks from the woods on the sides of the road. At this time, the French marines began advancing from the road and began to push the British back.
Following Braddock's example, the officers kept trying to reform units into regular show order within the confines of the road, a strategy that did little but make the soldiers easy targets. The artillery teams tried to provide covering fire, but there was simply not enough space for them to aim and load their pieces properly. The provincial troops accompanying the British eventually broke ranks and started firing back at will. In the confusion, the British soldiers mistook some of their own allies for the enemy and fired on them.
After several hours of intense combat, Braddock was fatally shot off his horse, and effective resistance collapsed. Colonel Washington, although he had no official position in the chain of command, was able to impose and maintain some order. He formed a rear guard, which allowed the remnants of the force to disengage. This earned him the sobriquet Hero of the Monongahela, by which he was toasted, and established his fame for some time to come.
We marched to that place, without any considerable loss, having only now and then a straggler picked up by the French and scouting Indians. When we came there, we were attacked by a party of French and Indians, whose number, I am persuaded, did not exceed three hundred men; while ours consisted of about one thousand three hundred well-armed troops, chiefly regular soldiers, who were struck with such a panic that they behaved with more cowardice than it is possible to conceive. The officers behaved gallantly, in order to encourage their men, for which they suffered greatly, there being near sixty killed and wounded; a large proportion of the number we had.
—George Washington, July 18, 1755, letter to his mother.[9]
The mortally wounded Braddock retreating with his troops.
By sunset, the surviving British and colonial forces were fleeing back down the road they had built. Braddock died of his wounds during the long retreat, on July 13, and is buried within the Fort Necessity parklands.
Of the approximately 1,300 men Braddock had led into battle, 456 were killed and 422 wounded. Commissioned officers were prime targets and suffered greatly: out of 86 officers, 26 were killed and 37 wounded. Of the 50 or so women that accompanied the British column as maids and cooks, only 4 survived. The French and Canadians reported 8 killed and 4 wounded; their Indian allies lost 15 killed and 12 wounded.
Colonel Dunbar, with the reserves and rear supply units, took command when the survivors reached his position. He ordered that excess supplies and cannons should be destroyed before withdrawing, burning about 150 wagons on the spot. Ironically, at this point the defeated, demoralized and disorganised British forces still outnumbered their opponents. The French and Indians did not pursue; they were far too busy looting dead bodies and collecting scalp trophies. The French commander, Dumas, realized the British were utterly defeated. Yet, to avoid upsetting his men, he did not attempt any further pursuit.
Strength of the expedition
According to returns given June 8, 1755, at the encampment at Will's Creek.
The French and Indian War (1754–1763) was a theater of the Seven Years' War, which pitted the North American colonies of the British Empire against those of the French, each side being supported by various Native American tribes. At the start of the war, the French colonies had a population of roughly 60,000 settlers, compared with 2 million in the British colonies. The outnumbered French particularly depended on their native allies.
Fort Duquesne was a fort established by the French in 1754, at the confluence of the Allegheny and Monongahela rivers. It was later taken over by the British, and later the Americans, and developed as Pittsburgh in the U.S. state of Pennsylvania. Fort Duquesne was destroyed by the French before its British conquest during the Seven Years' War, known as the French and Indian War on the North American front. The British replaced it, building Fort Pitt between 1759 and 1761. The site of both forts is now occupied by Point State Park, where the outlines of the two forts have been laid in brick.
Major-General Edward Braddock was a British officer and commander-in-chief for the Thirteen Colonies during the start of the French and Indian War (1754–1763), the North American front of what is known in Europe and Canada as the Seven Years' War (1756–1763). He is generally best remembered for his command of a disastrous expedition against the French-occupied Ohio River Valley in 1755; he was killed in the effort.
William Darke was an American soldier who served with British forces before the Revolutionary War. He served with British regulars commanded by Major General Edward Braddock in his 1755 expedition to the French-controlled Ohio Valley, as part of the French and Indian War. The British forces were defeated and Braddock died.
The Battle of the Monongahela took place on July 9, 1755, at the beginning of the French and Indian War at Braddock's Field in present-day Braddock, Pennsylvania, 10 miles (16 km) east of Pittsburgh. A British force under General Edward Braddock, moving to take Fort Duquesne, was defeated by a force of French and Canadian troops under Captain Daniel Liénard de Beaujeu with its American Indian allies.
The Battle of Jumonville Glen, also known as the Jumonville affair, was the opening battle of the French and Indian War, fought on May 28, 1754, near present-day Hopwood and Uniontown in Fayette County, Pennsylvania. A company of provincial troops from Virginia under the command of Lieutenant Colonel George Washington, and a small number of Mingo warriors led by the chieftain Tanacharison, ambushed a force of 35 French Canadians under the command of Joseph Coulon de Jumonville.
The Battle of Fort Duquesne was a British assault on the eponymous French fort that was repulsed with heavy British losses on 14 September 1758, during the French and Indian War.
Fort Necessity National Battlefield is a National Battlefield in Fayette County, Pennsylvania, United States, which preserves the site of the Battle of Fort Necessity. The battle, which took place on July 3, 1754, was an early battle of the French and Indian War, and resulted in the surrender of British colonial forces under Colonel George Washington, to the French and Indians, under Louis Coulon de Villiers.
The Battle of Fort Ligonier was a battle of the French and Indian War. On 12 October 1758, French and Indian forces directed from nearby Fort Duquesne were repulsed in an attack on the British outpost of Fort Ligonier, then still under construction.
The Braddock Road was a military road built in 1755 in what was then British America and is now the United States. It was the first improved road to cross the barrier of the successive ridgelines of the Appalachian Mountains. It was constructed by troops of Virginia militia and British regulars commanded by General Edward Braddock of the Coldstream Guards, part of an expedition to conquer the Ohio Country from the French at the beginning of the French and Indian War, the North American portion of the Seven Years' War. George Washington was an aide-de-camp to General Braddock who accompanied the expedition. The expedition gave him his first field military experience along with other American military officers. A number of these men would profit from this experience during the Revolutionary War.
George Washington's military experience began in the French and Indian War with a commission as a major in the militia of the British Province of Virginia. In 1753 Washington was sent as an ambassador from the British crown to the French officials and Indians as far north as present-day Erie, Pennsylvania. The following year he led another expedition to the area to assist in the construction of a fort at present-day Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. Before reaching that point, he and some of his men, along with Mingo allies led by Tanacharison, ambushed a French scouting party. Its leader was killed, although the exact circumstances of his death were disputed. This peacetime act of aggression is seen as one of the first military steps leading to the global Seven Years' War. The French responded by attacking fortifications Washington erected following the ambush, forcing his surrender. Released on parole, Washington and his troops returned to Virginia.
Braddock's Field is a historic battlefield on the banks of the Monongahela River, at Braddock, Pennsylvania, near the junction of Turtle Creek, about nine miles southeast of the "Forks of the Ohio" in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. In 1755, the Battle of the Monongahela was fought on Braddock's Field, which ended the Braddock Expedition.
Daniel Hyacinthe Liénard de Beaujeu was a French officer during King George's War and the French and Indian War. He participated in the Battle of Grand Pre (1747). He also organized the force that attacked General Edward Braddock's army after it forded the Monongahela River. The event was later dubbed the Battle of the Monongahela. Beaujeu led his small force into the attack, where he was shot dead in the opening moments when the attack was launched on July 9, 1755. However, his adoption of Native American customs, such as wearing war paint and regalia, helped raise the morale and fighting tenacity of the warriors under his command.
Jean-Daniel Dumas was a French officer in the Seven Years' War. The French and Indians launched an attack on General Edward Braddock's column at the Battle of the Monongahela. Dumas and Charles Michel de Langlade took charge when their commanding officer, Daniel Liénard de Beaujeu, was shot dead in the opening moments of the battle.
Little Meadows is located at the foot of Meadow Mountain in western Maryland. It was a common stopping point for British troops during the French and Indian War and was frequented by George Washington.
The Forbes Expedition was a British military expedition to capture Fort Duquesne, led by Brigadier-General John Forbes in 1758, during the French and Indian War. While advancing to the fort, the expedition built the Forbes Road. The Treaty of Easton served to cause a loss of Native American support for the French, resulting in the French destroying the fort before the expedition could arrive on November 24.
Captain Robert Orme was a British Army officer who took part in the Battle of the Monongahela on 9 July 1755 at the beginning of the French and Indian War, during which he was injured. He served with the young George Washington, with whom he became friends, and soon after his return to England in 1755 was painted by Joshua Reynolds.
Sir Peter Halkett, 2nd Baronet was a Scottish baronet who served in the British army and was Member of Parliament for Stirling Burghs from 1734 to 1741.
Order of battle at the Battle of the Monongahela lists the opposing forces engaged in the Battle of the Monongahela July 9, 1755.
British Army Independent Companies in South Carolina formed a major component of the Province of South Carolina's military security. Regular independent companies were first established in British North America in 1664. The first Independent Company in South Carolina was organized in 1721. With the raising of Oglethorpe's Regiment in 1737 it was disbanded. In 1746 three understrength independent companies were sent to South Carolina, but they were disbanded two years later. When Oglethorpe's Regiment was disbanded in 1748, three new independent companies were raised in South Carolina, partly recruited with soldiers from the disbanded regiment. These three companies participated in the French and Indian War and the Cherokee War, participating in the Battle of Fort Necessity, the Braddock Expedition, the battle of the Monongahela, and the siege of Fort Loudoun. They were disbanded in 1763, with the rest of the British army independent companies in North America.
References
1 2 3 4 Borneman, Walter R. (2007). The French and Indian War. Rutgers. p.55. ISBN978-0-06-076185-1. French: 28 killed 28 wounded, Indian: 11 killed 29 wounded
↑ History of the Royal Regiment of Artillery, Duncan, Major Francis, London, 1879, Vol. 1, p. 58, Fifty Royal Artillerymen, 4 brass 12 pounders, 6 brass 6 pounders, 21 civil attendants, 10 servants and six "necessary women".
↑ John Mack Faragher, Daniel Boone, the Life and Legend of an American Pioneer, Henry Holt and Company LLC, 1992, ISBN0-8050-3007-7, p. 38.
↑ "PHMC Historical Markers Search". Pennsylvania Historical and Museum Commission. Commonwealth of Pennsylvania. Archived from the original(Searchable database) on 2016-03-21. Retrieved 2014-01-25.
↑ Longmore, The Invention of George Washington, University of Virginia Press, 1999, p. 20
↑ Some accounts state that Washington commanded the regiment on the Braddock Expedition, but this is incorrect. Washington did command the Virginia Regiment before and after the expedition. As a volunteer aide-de-camp, Washington essentially served as an unpaid and unranked gentleman consultant, with little real authority, but much inside access.
↑ Similarly, Washington's report to Governor Dinwiddie. Charles H. Ambler, George Washington and the West, University of North Carolina Press, 1936, pp. 107–109.
1 2 3 Pargellis, Stanley (1936). Military Affairs in North America 1748–1765. The American Historical Association, pp. 86–91.
Jennings, Francis. Empire of Fortune: Crowns, Colonies, and Tribes in the Seven Years War in America. New York: Norton, 1988. ISBN0-393-30640-2.
Kopperman, Paul E. Braddock at the Monongahela. Pittsburgh, PA: University of Pittsburgh Press, 1973. ISBN0-8229-5819-8.
O'Meara, Walter. Guns at the Forks. Pittsburgh, PA: University of Pittsburgh Press, 1965. ISBN0-8229-5309-9.
Preston, David L.The Battle of the Monongahela and the Road to Revolution (2015)
Russell, Peter. "Redcoats in the Wilderness: British Officers and Irregular Warfare in Europe and America, 1740 to 1760", The William and Mary Quarterly (1978) 35#4 pp.629–652 in JSTOR
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Daniel Liénard de Beaujeu † 
Gen. Edward Braddock † 
