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CXXXII: TO A FRIEND 1 - Benjamin Franklin, The Works of Benjamin Franklin, Vol. III Letters and Misc. Writings 1753-1763 [1904]

Edition used:

The Works of Benjamin Franklin, including the Private as well as the Official and Scientific Correspondence, together with the Unmutilated and Correct Version of the Autobiography, compiled and edited by John Bigelow (New York: G.P. Putnam’s Sons, 1904). The Federal Edition in 12 volumes. Vol. III (Letters and Misc. Writings 1753-1763).

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CXXXII

TO A FRIEND1

Gnadenhutten, 25 January, 1756.

Dear Sir:—

We got to Hays’s the same evening we left you, and reviewed Craig’s company by the way. Much of the next morning was spent in exchanging the bad arms for the good. Wayne’s company having joined us, we that night reached Uplinger’s, where we got into good quarters, and Saturday morning we began to march towards Gnadenhutten, and proceeded nearly two miles; but it seeming to set in for a rainy day, the men unprovided with great coats, and many unable to secure effectually their arms from the wet, we thought it advisable to face about, and return to our former quarters, where the men might dry themselves and lie warm; whereas, had they proceeded, they would have come in wet to Gnadenhutten, where shelter and opportunity of drying themselves that night were uncertain. In fact, it rained all day, and we were all pleased that we had not proceeded.

The next day, being Sunday, we marched hither, where we arrived about two o’clock in the afternoon, and before five had enclosed our camp with a strong breastwork musket-proof; and, with the boards brought here before by my order from Dunker’s Mill, we got ourselves under some shelter from the weather. Monday was so dark, with a thick fog all day, that we could neither look out for a place to build, nor see where materials were to be had. Tuesday morning we looked around us, pitched on a place, and marked out our fort on the ground. By three in the afternoon the logs were all cut, and many of them hauled to the spot, the ditch dug to set them in three feet deep, and many were pointed and set up. The next day we were hindered by rain most of the day. Thursday we resumed our work, and before night were perfectly well enclosed; and on Friday morning, the stockade was finished and part of the platform within erected, which was completed next morning, when we dismissed Foulke’s and Wetherhold’s companies, and sent Hays down for a convoy of provisions. This day we hoisted the flag, made a general discharge of our pieces, which had been long loaded, and of our two swivels, and named the place Fort Allen in honor of our old friend. It is one hundred and twenty-five feet long, and fifty wide; the stockades most of them a foot thick, three feet in the ground and twelve feet out, pointed at the top.

This is an account of our week’s work, which I thought might give you some satisfaction. Foulke is gone to build another fort between this and Schuylkill fort, which I hope will be finished (as Trexler is to join him) in a week or ten days, as soon as Hays returns. I shall detach another party to erect another at Surfass’s, which I hope may be finished in the same time, and then I suppose end my campaign, God willing, and do myself the pleasure of seeing you on my return. I can now add no more than that I am with great esteem and affection, &c.,

B. Franklin.

[1 ]This letter was probably directed to one of the commissioners, but the name of the individual is not known.