French and Indian War Tactical

April 30, 2005
Crown Point, NY

I received summons to report to Crown Point, which the French call Fort St. Frederick, to assist in rousting a small band of the enemy seen in the vicinity.  Sadly, not enough of them showed up, so I and a few other British soldiers ended up detached to the French for this particular event.  As you read, don't be confused by my firing at other rangers.

On a cool, wet afternoon, we came to Crown Point for a tactical, to be held in the south side of the fort property.  We and several other soldiers set up tents from our trek tarps for the night and enjoyed a very simple camp.

Attending were two or three French soldiers, 3 men from the 60th of Foot, Wade Stoner and myself from Rogers' Rangers, a lone British from the 3rd Mass, and a good number of Gorham's Rangers under the command of James Ross.  Most us were thus assigned to the French forces except Gorham's, who were the sole British Forces.  The goal was to go in different directions to reach a redoubt on the south side, by the lake's water, and to claim it before the other side.  We were to take our orders from Dave Bayer (Behr?).

We French went down a road on the NW side of the property and there split; Wade and I went to clear a field while the rest continued down the road. Wade and I then split and I went along the east edge of the field, just inside the tree line.  I determined it was safe at that part of the area, near where eventually the rest of my group should be appearing. Wade began to cross the field at the end near me, having come down the opposite tree line. He heard me calling softly to him but didn't make out what I was saying and turned around to go back at a quick trot to the far trees.  We need to regroup so I had no choice but to chase after him as quietly and stealthily as was possible without his getting away.  Eventually I sprinted at the tree edge and caught up with him.

Almost immediately after, the rest of our unit showed up along the road, and we found we were very close to the goal. We took the redoubt without ever seeing the enemy (the Brits in this case). We then had lunch.  After everyone grabbed a small bite, some of our group went to find Gorham's while several of us stayed to guard the redoubt. Gorham's finally showed up, guns a'blazing, not realizing we held the fort.  But all ended well.

We then needed to get back and so launched a second tactical. We French were given a head-start and Gorham's was in pursuit.  We managed to get to the next redoubt near the brick chimney but were then attacked from the trees to our right. Amazingly, some of Gorham's had got ahead of us through the trees and we were attached from the side and the rear.  We fought as well we could and our distance kept most of us out of range.  Eventually, we called a draw. This battle would have been much different with twice the men.

It was a great day. Wet, but a LOT of fun!!