With the fall of Presqu'isle, Le Boeuf, and Venango, the
trade-route between Lake Erie and Fort Pitt was closed.
Save for Detroit, Niagara, and Pitt, not a British fort
remained in the great hinterland; and the soldiers at
these three strong positions could leave the shelter of
the palisades only at the risk of their lives. Meanwhile,
the frontiers of the British settlements, as well as the
forts, were being raided. Homes were burnt and the inmates
massacred. Traders were plundered and slain. From the
eastern slopes of the Alleghanies to the Mississippi no
British life was safe.
CHAPTER VI
THE RELIEF OF FORT PITT
On the tongue of land at the confluence of the Monongahela
and Aheghany rivers stood Fort Pitt, on the site of the
old French fort Duquesne. It was remote from any centre
of population, but was favourably situated for defence,
and so strongly garrisoned that those in charge of it
had little to fear from any attempts of the Indians to
capture it. Floods had recently destroyed part of the
ramparts, but these had been repaired and a parapet of
logs raised above them.
Captain Simeon Ecuyer, a Swiss soldier in the service of
Great Britain and an officer of keen intelligence and
tried courage, was in charge of Fort Pitt.
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