The home ministry sent out men unfit for the work of
command. Military disasters followed one after the other.
Washington and Braddock had both been overthrown in successive
attempts upon Fort Duquesne; and now the English Fort of Oswego,
their outpost at Lake Ontario, was lost through mismanagement and
bad generalship.
Canada owned a centralized government. She could send out her men
by the various routes to the points of vantage where the struggle
lay. England had an enormous border to protect, and no one centre
of operations to work from. She was hampered at every turn by
internal jealousies, and by incompetent commanders. Braddock had
been a good soldier, but he could not understand forest fighting,
and had raged against the Virginian men, who were doing excellent
work firing at the Indians from behind trees, and meeting their
tactics by like ones. Braddock had driven them into rank by beating
them with the flat of his sword, only to see them shot down like
sheep. Blunders such as this had marked the whole course of the
war; and misfortune after misfortune had attended the English arms
upon the mainland, although in Acadia they had been more
successful.
These things Stark and his little band heard from the Dutch of
Albany; they also heard that the English were encamped at the
southern end of Lake George, at Forts Edward and William Henry,
their commander being John Winslow, whose name was becoming known
and respected as that of a brave and humane soldier, who had
carried through a difficult piece of business in Acadia with as
much consideration and kindliness as possible.
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