This territory having been granted as part of Virginia, to the Ohio company, who complained loudly of these aggressions, Dinwiddie, the lieutenant governor of that province, laid the subject before the assembly, and dispatched MAJOR WASHINGTON, the gentleman who afterwards led his countrymen to independence, with a letter to the commandant of the French forces on the Ohio; requiring him to withdraw from the dominions of his Britannic majesty.
This letter was delivered at a fort on the river Le Boeuf, the western branch of French creek, to Monsieur le Guarduer de St. Pierre, the commanding officer on the Ohio, who replied that he had taken possession of the country by the directions of his general, then in Canada, to whom he would transmit the letter of the lieutenant governor, and whose orders he should implicitly obey.
[Sidenote: Defeat at the Little Meadows.]
Preparations were immediately made, in Virginia, to assert the rights of the British crown; and a regiment was raised for the protection of the frontiers. Early in the spring, Major Washington had advanced with a small detachment from this regiment into the country to be contended for, where he fell in with and defeated a party of French and Indians who were approaching him in a manner indicating hostile designs. On being joined by the residue of his regiment, the command of which had devolved on him, he made great exertions to pre-occupy the post at the confluence of the Alleghany and Monongahela rivers; but, on his march thither, was met by a much superior body of French and Indians, who attacked him in a small stockade hastily erected at the Little Meadows, and compelled him, after a gallant defence to capitulate. The French had already taken possession of the ground to which Washington was proceeding, and, having driven off some militia, and workmen sent thither by the Ohio company, had erected thereon a strong fortification called fort Du Quêsne.
The earl of Holderness, secretary of state, perceiving war to be inevitable, and aware of the advantages of union, and of securing the friendship of the Five Nations, had written to the governors of the respective colonies recommending these essential objects; and, at the same time, ordering them to repel force by force; and to take effectual measures to dislodge the French from their posts on the Ohio.