[Congressional Record Volume 148, Number 98 (Thursday, July 18, 2002)]
[House]
[Page H4919]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




   GEORGE WASHINGTON AND THE HAND OF PROVIDENCE IN AMERICA'S HISTORY

  The SPEAKER pro tempore. Under a previous order of the House, the 
gentleman from Indiana (Mr. Pence) is recognized for 5 minutes.
  Mr. PENCE. Mr. Speaker, in the next few moments this evening, I want 
to share a story about a remarkable act of providence in American 
history. By remarkable providence, I mean an example of one of those 
small twists and turns in history that could have turned out otherwise 
but did not. And as a function of that, in so many ways, we are 
gathered here today in a city that bears the name of a man named 
Washington.
  It was the year 1755, 20 years before the American Revolution. The 
British were fighting the French over territory along the Ohio and 
Mississippi Rivers. And I think of a 23-year-old soldier who found 
himself in the midst of a conflagration.
  The Americans were sided, Mr. Speaker, with the British, and most of 
the Indians sided with the French. Tensions grew, diplomatic solutions 
failed, so Great Britain sent 2,300 soldiers to join the rugged 
untrained American militias to fight the French.
  A 23-year-old colonel led the Virginia militia, about 100 buckskins 
who had volunteered to fight. The British soldiers joined them, and 
over a thousand men made their way north toward Fort Duquesne, now 
known as the City of Pittsburgh. It was a long march in the summer, a 
few hundred miles along wooded paths. The Red Coats and militia could 
not have been more different; one orderly and disciplined, dressed in 
red wool and uniforms, another a ragtag bunch of young farmers, driven 
by passion, adventure, and a love of freedom. The differences would be 
important in what was about to confront them.
  Seven miles from the fort on July 9, 1755, the soldiers were ambushed 
in a wooded ravine. They were trapped on every side. The French and 
Indians fired shots from behind rocks and deep in the woods from high 
in the trees and behind the brush. The British tried to line up in 
traditional military lines, shoulder to shoulder, but the shots came 
from behind them and above them. They were familiar with open field 
fighting, not ambushes deep in the woods.
  Over 700 British and American troops died, compared to only 30 French 
and Indians. Eighty-six officers fought in the battle, according to 
historian David Barton, and only one of those officers remained unhurt 
after the ambush, and still bestride his horse. It was that 23-year-old 
American leader from the Virginia militia.
  The colonel assembled what remained of his men and retreated to Fort 
Cumberland on the western side of Maryland. There he wrote a letter to 
his family explaining what had happened. He recounted the battle, the 
death of his men, the British officers, and how he had removed his 
jacket after the battle and found four bullet holes in it. Four horses 
had been shot out from underneath George Washington that day. Bullet 
fragments were in his hair. And he wrote a letter to his family that he 
was completely unharmed, and said, ``By the all powerful dispensations 
of Providence I have been protected beyond all human probability or 
expectation.''
  Fifteen years later, in a time of peace, he would return to that same 
battlefield, and an Indian chief traveled a great distance to see him. 
That Indian chief had preyed upon those Virginia militiamen that day. 
He had ordered his men to shoot every officer. But as Washington would 
recount many times later in life, the Indian chief had sat him down and 
told him that he had come to meet him to pay homage ``to the man who is 
a particular favorite of heaven; a man who could never die in battle.''
  Mr. Speaker, George Washington's life would lead him from those 
humble 23-year-old miraculous events in battle to greater things. He 
always understood throughout his life, with a deep Christian humility, 
that he was part of a grand design. A grand design for America.

                              {time}  1815

  A design yet to be fulfilled. That made him humble and grateful to be 
one such man that would shape the lives of millions to come. Like 
George Washington, I believe that every one of our lives is guided by 
that invisible hand, that everything happens for a reason. That in 
every moment from our greatest trials to our greatest triumphs, from 
small unanticipated events can come the great unimaginable feats of 
history, discovering land, freeing slaves, defeating tyranny, and maybe 
even defeating the mindlessness of terrorism. Behind each great turning 
point in history, I will always believe, as George Washington did, that 
there is a providential hand leading willing hearts.

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