Washington [24]
On the British side, the impetus for this looming confrontation came from the huge royal grant to the Ohio Company. To encourage settlers and protect them from French encroachment, Lawrence Washington and his colleagues advocated establishing a fort and trading post at the Forks of the Ohio (the site of present-day Pittsburgh), which would act as the flash point of imperial conflict for many years. In 1752 the Marquis de Duquesne, governor general of French Canada, countered the British move by announcing plans to construct several forts between Lake Erie and the Ohio River system, buttressing French claims in a smooth crescent from Canada to the Mississippi. This aggressive move guaranteed a violent clash with British forces.
Lieutenant Governor Robert Dinwiddie, a portly, bewigged Scot, was a prime investor in the Ohio Company. Born in Glasgow and a former customs official in Bermuda, he had a beefy, well-fed face with a drooping chin, which one wag aptly described as the “face of a longtime tax collector.”7 He wanted to secure the Ohio Company’s interests as well as the lucrative fur trade with the Indians, so he lobbied London for permission to erect forts in the Ohio Country. In August 1753 his superiors returned a dispatch that forever altered the life of George Washington. Dinwiddie was empowered to create a chain of forts in the disputed area and to send an envoy to the French to deliver a solemn ultimatum that they should vacate this territory claimed by England. It was a sure recipe for military conflict.
Washington likely learned of this directive from Colonel William Fairfax and in late October galloped off to Williamsburg to proffer his services as the special envoy. His prompt resolve demonstrated his courage and confidence and suggested no ordinary craving for success. Incredibly enough, on October 31, 1753, Dinwiddie and his council entrusted the twenty-one-year-old with this perilous mission. Three decades later Washington reflected on the extraordinary circumstance “that so young and inexperienced a person should have been employed on a negotiation with which subjects of the greatest importance were involved.”8 The instructions that Dinwiddie had received from London—and that Washington presumably stashed in his saddlebag—stated categorically that if the French were found to be building forts on English soil, they should be peacefully asked to depart. If they failed to comply, however, “we do hereby strictly charge and command you to drive them off by force of arms.”9 This order was signed by none other than King George II.
How could young George Washington have snared this prestigious commission? At the time, few Virginians were seasoned in frontier warfare, creating a simple lack of competitors. Washington confirmed that he was picked to go “when I believe few or none would have undertaken it.”10 Some practical reasons made Washington an excellent choice. He knew the western country from surveying; had the robust constitution to survive the winter woods; was mostly unflappable; had a mature appearance and sound judgment; and was a model youth, with no tincture of rowdiness in his nature. In certain ways, he was a very old young man. In London’s Gentleman’s Magazine, an approving author explained Washington’s selection by stating that he was “a youth of great sobriety, diligence, and fidelity.”11 His friendship with leading personalities of the Ohio Company likely clinched the appointment. Four years later he admitted that there had been pervasive suspicions in other colonies that he represented only the interests of the company.
Such was the urgency of Washington’s mission that he set out for the western country the same day he pocketed the assignment. He stopped in Fredericksburg to enlist the services of Jacob Van Braam, a Dutchman by birth and a fellow Mason who would serve as his French interpreter. A proficient swordsman, Van Braam had taught Washington how to fence. Two weeks