long thwarted the efforts of
Johnson to engage the Five Nations in the English cause. But recent
English successes had had their effect. Joncaire's influence was waning,
and Johnson was now in Prideaux's camp with nine hundred Five Nation
warriors pledged to fight the French. Joncaire, finding his fort
untenable, burned it, and came with his garrison and his Indian friends
to reinforce Niagara.[737]

[Footnote 736: Pouchot says 515, besides 60 men from Little Niagara;
Vaudreuil gives a total of 589.]

[Footnote 737: Pouchot, II. 52, 59. _Proces de Bigot, Cadet, et autres,
Memoire pour Daniel de Joncaire-Chabert._]

Pouchot had another resource, on which he confidently relied. In
obedience to an order from Vaudreuil, the French population of the
Illinois, Detroit, and other distant posts, joined with troops of
Western Indians, had come down the Lakes to recover Pittsburg, undo the
work of Forbes, and restore French ascendency on the Ohio. Pittsburg had
been in imminent danger; nor was it yet safe, though General Stanwix was
sparing no effort to succor it.[738] These mixed bands of white men and
red, bushrangers and savages, were now gathered, partly at Le Boeuf and
Venango, but chiefly at Presquisle, under command of Aubry, Ligneris,
Marin, and other partisan chiefs, the best in Canada. No sooner did
Pouchot learn that the English were coming to attack him than he sent a
messenger to summon them all to his aid.[739]

[Footnote 738: _Letters of Colonel Hugh Mercer, commanding at Pittsburg,
January-June, 1759. Letters of Stanwix, May-July, 1759. Letter from
Pittsburg_, in _Boston News Letter_, No. 3,023. _Narrative of John
Ormsby._]

[Footnote 739: Pouchot, II. 46.]

The siege was begun in form, though the English engineers were so
incompetent that the trenches, as first laid out, were scoured by the
fire of the place, and had to be made anew.[740] At last the batteries
opened fire. A shell from a coehorn burst prematurely, just as it left
the mouth of the piece, and a fragment striking Prideaux on the head,
killed him instantly. Johnson took command in his place, and made up in
energy what he lacked in skill. In two or three weeks the fort was in
extremity. The rampart was breached, more than a hundred of the garrison
were killed or disabled, and the rest were exhausted with want of sleep.
Pouchot watched anxiously for the promised succors; and on the morning
of the twenty-fourth of July a distant firing told him