This threw the advancing force into disorder,
and the two regiments became mixed together, massed in several dense
bodies within a small space of ground, facing some one way and some
another, all alike exposed, without shelter, to the hail of bullets.
Men and officers were alike new to warfare like this. They had been
taught to fight in line against solid masses of the enemy, and against
an invisible foe like the present they were helpless. The Virginians
alone were equal to the emergency. They at once adopted their familiar
forest tactics, and, taking their post behind trees, began to fight the
Indians in their own way.
Had Braddock been a man of judgment and temper, the fortunes of the day
might yet have been retrieved, for the Virginians could have checked
the Indians until the English troops were rallied and prepared to meet
the difficulty; but, to Braddock, the idea of men fighting behind trees
was at once cowardly and opposed to all military discipline, and he
dashed forward on his horse, and with fierce oaths ordered the
Virginians to form line. A body of them, however, under Captain
Waggoner, made a dash for a huge fallen tree, far out towards the
lurking places of the Indians, and, crouching behind it, opened fire
upon them; but the regulars, seeing the smoke among the bushes, took
them for the enemy and, firing, killed many and forced the rest to
return.
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