Note 293 — Chapter XVIII · 1763. FRONTIER FORTS AND SETTLEMENTS.
Reading edition
Extract from a MS. Letter—Colonel Bouquet to Sir J. Amherst:—
“Fort Pitt, 11th Aug. 1763.
“Sir:
“We Arrived here Yesterday, without further Opposition than Scattered Shots along the Road.
“The Delawares, Shawnese, Wiandots, & Mingoes had closely Beset, and Attacked this Fort from the 27th July, to the First Instant, when they Quitted it to March against us.
“The Boldness of those Savages is hardly Credible; they had taken Post under the Banks of Both Rivers, Close to the Fort, where Digging Holes, they kept an Incessant Fire, and threw Fire Arrows: They are good Marksmen, and though our People were under Cover, they Killed one, & Wounded seven.—Captain Ecuyer is Wounded in the Leg by an Arrow.—I Would not Do Justice to that Officer, should I omit to Inform Your Excellency, that, without Engineer, or any other Artificers than a few Ship Wrights, he has Raised a Parapet of Logs round the Fort, above the Old One, which having not been Finished, was too Low, and Enfiladed; he has Fraised the Whole; Palisadoed the Inside of the Aria, Constructed a Fire Engine; and in short, has taken all Precautions, which Art and Judgment could suggest for the Preservation of this Post, open before on the three sides, which had suffered by the Floods.”