I asked of the governor in a letter such respect and favour for these persons as was due to gentlemen placed in their unfortunate condition. Neither of them seemed to me to have been aware of the character of their commander’s orders. To my regret, the request I made to Governor Dinwiddie received small consideration, as I may have to relate. I was of opinion, however, that La Force should not be set free too soon, because of his power to influence the Indians.
The action with De Jumonville took place on May 28, and the Half-King, although disappointed as to scalps, went away, promising to return with many warriors. He told me his friends the English had now at last begun in earnest, but that it was no good war to keep prisoners.
As I trusted him more than most of the Indians, I sent thirty men and some horses to assist in moving the Indian families, for without them the warriors would never return; and I did not neglect to send a runner back to hasten Mackay, who was in command of an independent company from South Carolina. They were indeed quite independent, having neither good sense nor discipline, as I was soon to discover. My little skirmish with the French on May 28 added to my perplexities the knowledge that as soon as the runners who escaped should reach the fort at the Forks Contrecœur would undertake to avenge the loss of his officer.
While I was impatiently waiting supplies from Croghan at Wills Creek, for now we were six days without flour, came news that Colonel Frye, my commander, was dead at that post. Colonel Innes of North Carolina, who was to succeed him in the whole command, lay at Winchester with four hundred men; but as he continued to lie there, neither he nor his troops were of any use in the campaign.
During the period which elapsed between my fight on May 28 and my being attacked on July 3, being now a colonel, and sure of soon being reinforced, I made haste to complete the fort at Great Meadows.
There I had excellent help from Captain Stobo and Mr. Adam Stephen, whom I made captain, and who, long after, became a general and served under me in the great war.
It was only a log work we built, near to breast-high, with no roof, one hundred feet square, with partitions, and surrounded at some distance by a too shallow ditch and palisadoes. Captain Stobo gave to this defence the name of Fort Necessity, and said that the name was suggested by his empty belly, for indeed we were at this time half starved.