Behind the Art: Fort Ligonier work depicts George Washington’s ‘friendly fire incident’

Amongst pivotal French and Indian Conflict dates is Nov. 12, 1758, when a raiding get together of French troops from Fort Duquesne and their Native American allies went to filch livestock from the Publish at Loyalhanna, later rechristened Fort Ligonier.

The raiders have been chased off by about 500 Virginians underneath Col. George Mercer, with one other 500 underneath the younger Col. George Washington despatched behind to assist encompass them. However within the night nightfall, wooded terrain and fog, the state of affairs turned confused and the 2 teams of Virginians fired on one another.

Washington and different officers rode by way of the center of the melee to cease the barrage. He escaped unscathed, however two officers and 38 troopers have been both killed or went lacking.

This “Pleasant Hearth Incident” is commemorated in a portray in Fort Ligonier’s George Washington Gallery, which additionally accommodates such artifacts from the nation’s first president as Washington’s handwritten recollection of his years on the Pennsylvania frontier and a pair of saddle pistols introduced to him by the Marquis de Lafayette.

Famend artist and Ligonier native Chas Fagan was commissioned to color “Flash Level,” which depicts Washington on horseback, sword drawn, galloping by way of the musket fireplace. It was unveiled April 26, 2019, throughout the fort affiliation’s annual assembly.

“What’s all the time fascinated me concerning the Pleasant Hearth Incident is that it revealed Washington’s human vulnerability,” Fagan was quoted as saying within the fort’s spring 2019 e-newsletter. “In that second, our iconic towering man of American historical past turns into relatable.”

Most individuals have had a second of being overwhelmed by sudden circumstance, the artist stated.

“We are able to place ourselves in Washington’s giant boots and picture the surprising gunshots within the fog, the belief of the dire state of affairs as troopers droop to the bottom, and the determined must act,” Fagan stated.

Turning the tide

The incident modified the trajectory of the conflict in favor of the British Colonials, stated Julie Donovan, the fort’s director of selling and public relations.

Amidst the chaos, “in garments so tattered they didn’t acknowledge their very own troopers, they captured three of the French troops and found simply how susceptible Fort Duquesne was.”

As an alternative of ready as deliberate till spring for an assault on Fort Duquesne, the Colonials set out the following day with Washington, newly promoted to brevet brigadier basic, in command — solely to seek out the fort an deserted, smoldering destroy.

In preparation for portray “Flash Level,” Donovan stated Fagan “went to the presumed pleasant fireplace website within the fall, near the anniversary date, to be impressed by the environment.”

The location that archaeologists and historians deem almost definitely is on non-public property about “two or three miles because the crow flies” from Fort Ligonier, Donovan stated.

Fagan’s native ties, household historical past and inventive follow made him the proper match for the fee, Donovan stated.

He was born in Ligonier in 1966, however spent a lot of his adolescence in Belgium along with his diplomat father, Charles Fagan III.

The elder Fagan served as principal deputy assistant secretary of commerce underneath President Richard Nixon and within the state division underneath President Gerald Ford, as the federal government’s consultant for Europe, based mostly in Brussels. A present Ligonier resident, he’s a Fort Ligonier trustee emeritus.

Now a resident of Charlotte, N.C., Chas Fagan is a Yale College graduate with a level in Russian and East European research. The earliest works of the self-taught painter and sculptor have been political cartoons.

Fagan’s notable commissions embrace oil portraits of U.S. presidents; statues of President Ronald Reagan within the Rotunda of the U.S. Capitol, astronaut Neil Armstrong at Purdue College and civil rights activist Rosa Parks within the Washington Nationwide Cathedral; and the official portrait of Mom Teresa for her canonization at St. Peter’s Basilica in Rome.