Note 72 — Chapter V

Washington’s jealousy of Virginia’s welfare appeared in 1755 when the question of Braddock’s route from Alexandria to Fort Cumberland arose. It would seem to us today that conditions in Virginia must have been pitiable if the marching of an army through the colony could have been considered in any way a boon. Yet such was Washington’s attitude in 1755 toward the Governor of Maryland’s new road. In a letter to Lord Fairfax dated May 5, 1755, Washington objected to Dunbar’s regiment marching to Cumberland by way of Frederick, Maryland; in a letter to Major Carlisle written from Fort Cumberland May 14, 1755, he ridicules the route: “Dunbar had to recross [the Potomac] at Connogagee [Williamsport, Maryland] and come down [into Virginia]—laughable enough.”