"From Ray's Town to the Shawana Cabbins 8 M To Edmund's Swamp 8 M To Stoney Creek 6 M To Kickener Paulin's House, (Indian) 6 M To the Clear Fields 7 M To the other side of the Laurel Hill 5 M To Loyal Haning 6 M To the Big Bottom 8 M To the Chestnut Ridge 8 M To the parting of the Road[22] 4 M Thence one Road leads to Shannopin's Town the other to Kisscomenettes, old Town."[23] So much for the Old Trading Path before the memorable year of 1755. It is significant that the route had already been "surveyed"; Pennsylvania herself desired a share of the Indian trade which Virginia hoped to monopolize through her Ohio Company, which already had storehouses built at Wills Creek on the Cumberland and at Redstone Old Fort on the Monongahela. But with the beginning of hostilities with the French, precipitated by Washington and his Virginians in 1754, the Indian trade was now completely at a standstill. General Braddock and his army which was destined to march westward and capture Fort Duquesne arrived at Alexandria, Virginia, February 20, 1755. Already Braddock's deputy quartermaster-general, Sir John St. Clair, had passed through Maryland and Virginia and had decided upon the route of the army to Fort Cumberland, the point of rendezvous. Four days after Braddock reached Alexandria, Governor Morris of Pennsylvania received a letter from St. Clair asking him to "open a road toward the head of Youghheagang or any other way that is nearer the French forts," in order that the stores to be supplied by the northern colonies might take a shorter course than by way of the roads then being opened through Maryland and Virginia.[24] Morris immediately replied "... there is no Waggon Road from Carlisle West through the Mountains but only a Horse Path, by which the Indian Traders used to carry their Goods and Skins to and from the Ohio while that Trade remained open."[25] Though Morris usually made requests of the assembly in vain, the request concerning this road was granted, and Morris was empowered, in the middle of March, to open a road "through Carlisle and Shippensburg to the Yoijogain, and to the camp at Will Creek."[26] He immediately appointed George Croghan, John Armstrong, James Burd, William Buchannan, and Adam Hoops to find a road to the three forks of the Youghiogheny--or "Turkey Foot" as the spot was familiarly known on the frontier. On April 29 Burd reported as follows to Morris: "... We have viewed and layed out the Roads leading from hence to the Yohiogain and the camp at Will's Creek, and enclosed You have the Draughts thereof.... We have dispersed our Advertisements through the Counties of Lancaster, York, and Cumberland, to encourage Labourers to come to Work, and We intend to set off to begin to clear up