In all these wild days, the old path westward from Shippensburg and Carlisle was often crowded with fugitives fleeing from the reeking frontier, and, quite as often, shrouded in a cloud of dust raised by squads of wan militia hastening westward to the defense of the outposts. Though no officer guarding this strategic passage-way became endeared to his countrymen as Washington, here heroism and devotion were displayed, if ever on this continent. The plans of England during these years will be described elsewhere, but it is to our purpose to know now that for the present she deserted the southern provinces; that she was "willing to wait for the rains to wet the powder, and rats to eat the bow-strings of the enemy, rather than attempt to drive them from her [southern] frontiers." Until 1756 the matter of the defense of the Pennsylvania frontier was left almost entirely to individual initiative. But already the road through Carlisle and Shippensburg had been fortified. Fort Lowther was erected in Carlisle as early as 1753. It was an important post on the route to Virginia, over which the wagons and horses raised by Franklin for Braddock, were, in part, forwarded to Fort Cumberland. Here Governor Morris came, to be in closer touch with Braddock, and here the news of the defeat reached him. Fort Franklin was erected on the old road at Shippensburg, twenty miles west of Carlisle and thirty-six from Harris Ferry (Harrisburg). It was built sometime previous to Braddock's time but was not used after 1756. Ten miles further on at Falling Springs (Chambersburg) there was no fortification in 1755, nor was there one at Loudoun (Loudon) thirteen miles west of that point. Two miles south of Fort Loudoun Morris erected a deposit at McDowell's Mill (Bridgeport, Franklin County) but, though the spot was well known on the frontier, there seems to have been no regular fort there until 1756.[45] It was at this point that the new road toward Raystown diverged westward from the main road running south to Virginia. This junction was considered a strategic point by the time of Braddock's defeat, as shown by Shirley's order to Dunbar quoted at the close of the last chapter.