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76 throwing an army three hundred miles into the forests that was the crucial problem. Fort Duquesne could have been captured with half of Forbes's army; Wolfe had hardly more than that at Quebec in the year succeeding. If Forbes could move this army, or any considerable fraction of it, across the mountains, there was no reasonable doubt of his success.

Forbes was much more delayed in getting his expedition off than was either of his two colleagues, Abercrombie and Amherst. Little dreaming that it would not be until the middle of June that his stores would arrive from England, Forbes had in March settled upon Conococheague (Williamsport, Maryland) as a convenient point of rendezvous for his army. In this he acted upon the advice of his quartermaster-general, Sir John St. Clair, who was sent forward to examine routes and provide forage, but for whom, however, Forbes had little respect. Some time later St. Clair urged Forbes to alter this plan and make the new outpost on Burd's Road toward the Youghiogheny, Raystown, the point of