It was a cluster of thirty log-cabins, the principal being that of the chief, Jacobs, which was loopholed for musketry, and became the centre of resistance.  The fight was hot and stubborn.  Armstrong ordered the town to be set on fire, which was done, though not without loss; for the Delawares at this time were commonly armed with rifles, and used them well.  Armstrong himself was hit in the shoulder.  As the flames rose and the smoke grew thick, a warrior in one of the houses sang his death-song, and a squaw in the same house was heard to cry and scream.  Rough voices silenced her, and then the inmates burst out, but were instantly killed.  The fire caught the house of Jacobs, who, trying to escape through an opening in the roof, was shot dead.  Bands of Indians were gathering beyond the river, firing from the other bank, and even crossing to help their comrades; but the assailants held to their work till the whole place was destroyed.  “During the burning of the houses,” says Armstrong, “we were agreeably entertained by the quick succession of charged guns, gradually firing off as reached by the fire; but much more so with the vast explosion of sundry bags and large kegs of gunpowder, wherewith almost every house abounded; the prisoners afterwards informing us that the Indians had frequently said they had a sufficient stock of ammunition for ten years’ war with the English.”

These prisoners were eleven men, women, and children, captured in the border settlements, and now delivered by their countrymen.  The day was far spent when the party withdrew, carrying their wounded on Indian horses, and moving perforce with extreme slowness, though expecting an attack every moment.  None took place; and they reached the settlements at last, having bought their success with the loss of seventeen killed and thirteen wounded.[447] A medal was given to each officer, not by the Quaker-ridden Assembly, but by the city council of Philadelphia.

[Footnote 447:  Report of Armstrong to Governor Denny, 14 Sept. 1756, in Colonial Records of Pa., VII. 257,—­a modest yet very minute account. A list of the Names of the Persons killed, wounded, and missing in the late Expedition against the Kittanning.  Hazard, Pennsylvania Register, I. 366.]

The report of this affair made by Dumas, commandant at Fort Duquesne, is worth noting.  He says that Attique, the French name of Kittanning, was attacked by “le General Wachinton,” with three or four hundred men on horseback; that the Indians gave way; but that five or six Frenchmen who were in the town held the English in check till the fugitives rallied; that Washington and his men then took to flight, and would have been pursued but for the loss of some barrels of gunpowder which chanced to explode during the action.  Dumas adds that several large parties are now on the track of the enemy, and he hopes will cut them to pieces.  He then asks for a supply of provisions and merchandise to replace those which the Indians of Attique had lost by a fire.[448] Like other officers of the day, he would admit nothing but successes in the department under his command.