Page:Annals of Augusta County.djvu/83

 every breast, and paleness covered almost every face. In short, the whole inhabitants were put into an universal confusion. Scarcely any man durst sleep in his own house, but all met in companies with their wives and children, and set about building little fortifications to defend themselves from such barbarians and inhuman enemies, whom they concluded would be let loose upon them at pleasure. I was so shocked upon my first reading Colonel Innes's letter that I knew not well what to do."

This was Braddock's defeat, which occurred on the 9th of July. On Wednesday, the i6th, Mr. McAden left Mr. Lapsley's in company with a young man from Charlotte county, who had been at the Warm Springs, and was flying from the expected inroad of savages.

The speed with which news of the disaster was circulated is wonderful. Colonel Innes was left by Braddock in command of Fort Cumberland. He wrote to Governor Dinwiddle on the 11th, giving him the first tidings of the defeat, and the letter was received by the Governor on the 14th, Cumberland being distant from Williamsburg 259 miles. It is hardly possible that this was the letter alluded to by Mr. McAden, who was more than 150 miles from Williamsburg; but Colonel Innes no doubt wrote also to the County Lieutenant of Augusta, and the direful news was speeded through the country.

Thackeray, in his novel called "The Virginians," gives an account of Braddock's defeat, and refers to the marvelous rapidity with which tidings of the disaster were circulated. Alluding to Eastern Virginia, he says: "The house negroes, in their midnight gallops about the country, in search of junketing or sweethearts, brought and spread news over amazingly wide districts. They had a curious knowledge of the incidents of the march for a fortnight at least after its commencement. * * But on the 10th of July a vast and sudden gloom spread over the province. A look of terror and doubt seemed to fall upon every face. Affrighted negroes wistfully eyed their masters and retired, and hummed and whispered with one another. The fiddles ceased in the quarters; the song and laugh of those cheery black folk were hushed. Right and left, everybody's servants were on the gallop for news. The country taverns were thronged with horsemen, who drank and cursed and bawled at the bars, each bringing his gloomy story. The army had been surprised. The