Edward Braddock

Edward Braddock (born 1695, Perthshire, Scotland—died July 13, 1755, Great Meadows, Pennsylvania [U.S.]) was an unsuccessful British commander in North America in the early stages of the French and Indian War. He is best known for the Battle of the Monongahela, in which his army was decisively defeated and he was mortally wounded.

Braddock, the son of Major General Edward Braddock (died 1725), joined the Coldstream Guards in 1710 and served in the Netherlands during the siege of Bergen op Zoom in 1747. He was appointed major general in 1754 and arrived in Virginia the following February to command all British forces in North America against the French. Although hampered by administrative confusion and lack of resources, he undertook—after several months of preparation—to attack the French-held Fort Duquesne (now Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania) in an extremely arduous wilderness expedition. His force cut a road westward from Cumberland, Maryland, the first road across the Allegheny Mountains. George Washington, then lieutenant colonel of the Virginia militia, was among the 700 provincials and 1,400 British regulars under his command. Braddock’s force safely crossed the Monongahela River and reached a point only 8 miles (13 km) from Fort Duquesne. The forward column of 1,459 officers and men, being short of Native American scouts, was ambushed in a ravine by 254 French and 600 Native Americans on July 9. Wounded during the ensuing slaughter and riot, Braddock was carried off the field and died four days later at a rallying point known as Great Meadows, Pennsylvania, where he was buried in an unmarked grave in the middle of a road. In 1804, workers fixing the road found his remains and reburied them on a knoll near the original burial site. Visitors to Fort Necessity National Battlefield in Farmington, Pennsylvania, can visit the sites of both burial locations.