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Rh "I hope Capt. McKay who Com'ds the Independ't Compa., will soon be with You And as he appears to be an Officer of some Experience and Importance, You will, with Colundefined. Fry and Colundefined. Innes, so well agree as not to let some Punctillios ab'undefined Com'd render the Service You are all engag'd in, perplex'd or obstructed."

Relying implicitly on Dinwiddie, Washington pushed on and on into the wilderness, opening a road and building bridges for a colonel and an army that was never to come. As he advanced into the Alleghanies he found the difficulty of hauling wagons very serious, and long before he reached the Youghiogheny he determined to test the possibility of transportation down that stream and the Monongahela to his destination at the mouth of Redstone creek.

May 11th, he sent a reconnoitering force forward to Gist's, on Laurel Hill, the last spur of the Alleghanies, to locate a French party, which, the Indians reported, had left Fort Duquesne, and to find if there was