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TO COLONEL STANWIX. - George Washington, The Writings of George Washington, vol. II (1758-1775) [1889]Edition used:The Writings of George Washington, collected and edited by Worthington Chauncey Ford (New York and London: G. P. Putnam’s Sons, 1889). Vol. II (1758-1775).
Part of: The Writings of George Washington, 14 vols.
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TO COLONEL STANWIX.Mount Vernon, 4 March, 1758. My Dear Colonel,Your favors of the 13th January and the 24th ultimo, with the extract of a letter from Lord Loudoun, were this day delivered to me. In the latter you condescend to ask my opinion of Major Smith. Pray, does not his plan sufficiently indicate the man? Can there be a better index to his abilities, than his scheme for reducing the enemy on the Ohio, and his expeditious march of a thousand men to Detroit? Surely, he intended to provide them with wings to facilitate their passage over so mountainous and extensive a country, or what way else could he accomplish it in? I am unacquainted with the navigation of the rivers he proposes to traverse, and, consequently, cannot be a competent judge of his scheme in this respect; but the distance is so great, and that through an enemy’s country, that, I candidly confess, it appears to me a romantic plan, in general, that may exist in the imagination, but cannot be executed. For, if we are strong enough to attempt the reduction of the Ohio, what necessity is there for our making such a circuitous march, and leaving Fort Duquesne behind us, which is the source from whence flow all our ills? And if we are too weak to attempt this place, what have we not to dread from leaving it in our rear? These, Sir, are my sentiments upon Major Smith’s plan. With regard to the person, if I have been rightly informed, he actually had a commission to command a ranging company, and obtained it by making promises, he never could comply with. He was adjudged, by persons better acquainted with him than I am, to be quite unfit to command even a company, and lost the Block-House, in which he commanded, by suffering his men to straggle from it at pleasure, which the Indians observing, took advantage of his weakness, and attacked him at a time when he had no men in his works. It is, nevertheless, agreed on all hands, that he made a gallant defence, but I never before heard of any capitulation that was granted to him. I have not had the pleasure of seeing Major Smith, though I have been favored with a letter from him, in which he politely professes some concern at hearing of my indisposition, as it prevented him from seeing me at Winchester; but desires, at the same time, that I will attend him at his house in Augusta, about two hundred miles hence! or in Williamsburg by the 20th instant, when, I suppose, he intends to honor me with his orders.1 I have never been able to return to my command, since I wrote to you last, my disorder at times returning obstinately upon me, in spite of the efforts of all the sons of Æsculapius, whom I have hitherto consulted. At certain periods I have been reduced to great extremity, and have now too much reason to apprehend an approaching decay, being visited with several symptoms of such a disease. I am now under a strict regimen, and shall set out to-morrow for Williamsburg to receive the advice of the best physicians there. My constitution is certainly greatly impaired, and as nothing can retrieve it, but the greatest care and the most circumspect conduct, as I now have no prospect left of preferment in the military way, and as I despair of rendering that immediate service, which my country may require from the person commanding their troops, I have some thoughts of quitting my command, and retiring from all public business, leaving my post to be filled by some other person more capable of the task, and who may, perhaps, have his endeavors crowned with better success than mine have been. But, wherever I go, or whatever becomes of me, I shall always possess the sincerest and most affectionate regards for you; being, dear Sir, your most obedient and obliged humble servant.1 [1 ]Colonel Stanwix replied:—“I have been favored with your obliging letter, and find your judgment tallies with Lord Loudoun’s and mine, in regard to Major Smith’s wild scheme.” [1 ]Soon after writing this letter, he went to Williamsburg. Having attended to the necessary affairs, which called him there, he returned to his command at Fort Loudoun about the 1st of April. |
