150 - STORY OF THE MAUMEE VALLEY the savages with tears. But it must not be denied that there were even some grown persons who showed an unwillingness to return. The Shawanese were obliged to bind several of their prisoners and force them along to the camp ; and some women who had been delivered up, afterwards found means to escape and ran back to the Indian towns. Some who could not make their escape, clung to their savage acquaintance at parting, and continued many days in bitter lamentations, even refusing sustenance. "For the honor of humanity we would suppose those persons to have been of the lowest rank, either bred up in ignorance and distressing penury, or who had lived so long with the Indians as to forget all their former connections. For, easy and unconstrained as the savage life is, certainly it could never be put in competition with the blessings of improved life and the light of religion by any persons who have had the happiness of enjoying, and the capacity of discerning them. By the 9th of November 206 prisoners had been delivered, including women and children; of whom thirty-two men and fifty-eight women and children were from Virginia, and forty-nine males and sixty-seven females from Pennsylvania." The Virginia House of Burgesses and the Assembly of Pennsylvania passed resolutions of thanks and commendation to Bouquet for his successful campaign and King George rewarded him by the promotion to brigadier-general. In the conference at the Muskingum Forks, Bouquet had a separate conference with the Shawnees. Many of their nation had gone on a hunt at a great distance and consequently did not receive notice to attend the treaty. The chiefs of the Shawnees present agreed, however, that they would visit Fort Pitt the following spring and bring with them the remaining prisoners. Bouquet took nothing for granted when an Indian was a party to the contract. He retained the Shawnee hostages as a guaranty of the fulfillment of the promise, but during the return march of the army to Fort Pitt they escaped. However, evidently knowing the consequences if they did not comply with the agreement, on May 5, 1705, ten Shawnee chiefs, fifty of their warriors, accompanied by many of their women and children, together with a large force of Delawares, Senecas, Sandusky and Munsey Indians arrived at Fort Pitt and delivered the remainder of the prisoners. They further agreed to faithfully preserve the peace forever and promised to call the English king "father." CHAPTER XIX ADVANCE OF BORDER SETTLEMENTS EMBASSY OF GEORGE CROGHAN-VISIT TO THE WABASH AND ILLINOIS SECTION-MEETS PONTIAC-CONFERENCES ON MAUMEE AND DETROIT -THE OHIO COMPANY AGAIN-OTHER LAND PROJECTS-DETROIT SEAT OF BRITISH AFFAIRS. With the English in possession of the lake region and the Ohio country at the close of the French and Indian war, with Pontiac at least thwarted, the Bradstreet expedition a closed incident, and the success of Bouquet gloriously celebrated, the Maumee and Sandusky region was for four or five years in a comparatively peaceful state. However, no sooner was one problem solved before another of equal seriousness came up for solution. There was no let-up in the determination of a hardy civilization to possess this local country, and the Indians were opposing this advance with all the force and ingenuity at the command of their savage nature. The English were now organizing land companies and sending surveyors across the Alleghenies, while the Indians were forming more alliances. The latter realized more and more that their hunting grounds were rapidly slipping from their control and to thwart this they proposed an unlimited alliance of the tribes with the Shawnees of Ohio as the rallying factor, under the leadership of the great chief Cornstalk. "The tribes to the southward as well as those toward the west were to be aligned, while the Six Nations of the Iroquois to the eastward were either to be won over, or, failing in this were to be overawed and subdued." A factor yet to be considered in the situation was Pontiac, who was still alive, and who was sending representatives beyond the Mississippi and south as far as New Orleans to further incite his people, and besides, to secure support from the French in the western and southern posts. The story of Cornstalk and attendant situations will come up later. In regard to the expeditions of Bradstreet and Bouquet, Sir William Johnson, among other things, under the date of December 26, 1764, wrote to the Lords of Trade, London as follows : "The result of this Expedition (by Colonel John Bradstreet) is, - 151 - 152 - STORY OF THE MAUMEE VALLEY that after losing near one-half of the great boats (in a storm on Lake Erie on his return) the Troops are returned in a most shattered situation ; many have perished in the Woods, and about forty are now daily fed by the Senecas, 'till they become able to march. Neither are all officers or Indians yet come in, having been turned a drift without any provision on Lake Erie, together With several hundred of the troops. * * * On the other hand Colonel Bouquet under all the disadvantages of a tedious and hazardous land march, with an army little more than half that of the other has penetrated into the heart of the country of the Delawares and Shawanese, obtained above 200 English captives from amongst them, with fourteen hostages for their coming here, and entering into a peace before me in due form, &c & I daily expect their chiefs for that purpose." Again in May, 1764, Johnson reported a treaty of peace with nine hundred Indians of the different tribes including those subdued by Colonel Bouquet. He also reported unrest among the Miamis along the Maumee and that "several French families of the worst sort live at ye Miamis;" that these Indians with French influence were objecting to the occupation of the Maumee, Wabash and Illinois countries by the British. Therefore, on May 15th, under the instructions of General Gage and by the advice of Sir William, the redoubtable George Croghan set out from Fort Pitt to the tribes on the Maumee, Illinois and Wabash, "to soften their antipathy to the English and to distribute presents among the tribes by way of propitation." His party consisted of fourteen representatives from the Senecas, Shawnees and Delawares and a number of whites. The journey was a thrilling one. The embassy, paddling down the Ohio, finally reached the mouth of the Scioto. But this story concerns more their movements in the Maumee section. Croghan persuaded the Shawnees at the junction of the Scioto and the Ohio to deliver to him seven French traders there who had been influencing them against the English. Seven other traders among the . Delawares hostile to the English were sent ahead to Vincennes to keep them from further disturbance. Near the mouth of the Wabash, further down the Ohio, on June 8, Croghan's party was fired upon by eighty Kickapoo and "Musquatine" warriors. Three of his number were killed and among several wounded was Croghan himself. The white men, of the party were made prisoners, plundered of all their belong. ings and taken to Post Vincent—Vincennes. Post Vincent up TOLEDO AND THE SANDUSKY REGION - 153 the Wabash had eighty or ninety French families. "An idle, lazy people, a parcel of renegadoes from Canada and are much worse than Indians"—so reported Croghan. Fortunately, near Vincent was a village of Pyankeshaws where proved to be many of Croghan's old acquaintances and some friends. They welcomed him cordially and rebuked the Kickapoos for the part they took in making him a prisoner and maltreating the ambassador. This changed the attitude of the Indians, and Croghan's party was given friendly treatment and conducted up the Wabash a distance of some two hundred miles more to a town called Ouiatenon, another French stockade post (now Lafayette, Ind.). There arrived at this place a Frenchman "with pipe and speech" from the Illinois through the Kickapoos and Musquottamies, to have Colonel Croghan burned at the stake. There followed several conferences with all the tribes, and the convincing eloquence of the Colonel himself, as well as his presents, saved his life. It also had the effect "to reconcile those Nations to his Majesties Interests and obtain their consent and approbation to take possession of any posts in their country which the French formerly possessed and an offer of their service, should any Nation oppose our taking possession of it, all of which they confirmed by four large pipes. * * * On July 13th, The Chiefs of the Twightwees (Miamis) came to me (Croghan) from the Miamis (Maumee River) and renewed their Antient Friendship with his Majesty and all his subjects in America and confirmed it with a Pipe." On July 18, 1765, Croghan started for the Illinois country, accompanied by the chiefs of all the tribes with whom he had been negotiating. He was still suffering from his wounds, but went as an accredited ambassador and not as a prisoner. Their destination was Fort Chartres, a French trading post built in 1720, on the Ohio River below Kaskaskia. One of the party was Francois Masonville, a French Indian interpreter. They soon came upon Pontiac with the deputies of the Six Nations of Iroquois, Delawares and Shawnees, who had accompanied Croghan down the Ohio River on his mission and from whom he had been separated. It was an extraordinary gathering, this conference in the forest. After friendly exchanges, all returned to Ouiatenon, where speeches were made in council, by representatives from the "four nations" of the Illinois country tribes. Pontiac and the others were in accord with the former agreement of the other chiefs, and the compact was confirmed by pipe-smoking and 7-VOL. 1 154 - STORY OF THE MAUMEE VALLEY wampum belts. Pontiac agreed not to resist the English in taking possession of the French forts, but would acknowledge allegiance to their new Father—the English. Misunderstandings were rectified, prisoners held by the Indians were surrendered, and this peace compact of Pontiac and the chiefs of his followers made it unnecessary for Croghan to proceed farther into the Illinois section. Turning his course eastward, Ambassador Croghan and his aides, proceeded up the Wabash and crossed the portage to Fort Miami, at the head of the Maumee (Fort Wayne). Regarding this phase of his journey Croghan's journal records the following: "Within a mile of the Twightwee (Miami) Village I was me by the chiefs of that nation who received us very kindly. Th most part of these Indians knew me and conducted me to their village, where they immediately hoisted an English flag that I had formerly given them at Fort Pitt. The next day they held a council after which they gave me up the English prisoners the had, then made several speeches in all of which they expressed the great pleasure it gave them to see the unhappy differences which embroiled the several nations in a war with their brethren (the English) were now so near a happy conclusion, and tha peace was established in their country. "The Twightwee village is situated on both sides of a rive called St. Joseph. This river where it falls into the Miame (Mau mee) River, about a quarter of a mile from this place, is one hundred yards wide, on the east side of which stands a stockad fort, somewhat ruinous. The Aborigine village consists of about forty or fifty cabins, besides nine or ten French houses—a run away colony from Detroit during the late Indian (Pontiac) war They were concerned in it, and being afraid of punishment, the came to this post where ever since they have spirited up the In dians against the English. All the French residing here are lazy, indolent people, fond of breeding mischief, and spiriting u the Indians against the English, and should by no means be suf fered to remain here. The country is pleasant, the soil rich an well watered. "After several conferences with these Indians, and their delivering me up all the English prisoners they had, on the 25th July (6th August?) we set off for Detroit down the Miamee (Maumee) River in canoes, having settled everything with these several Nations to the Westward, & was accompanied by several chiefs of those Nations which were going to Detroit to Meet Colonel Brad TOLEDO AND THE SANDUSKY REGION - 155 street agreeable to his invitation to them last winter by Mr. Maisonville. As I passed by the Twightwee (Miami) and the Ottawa villages on the Miamis (Maumee) River, they delivered me all the English prisoners they had & I found as I passed by those towns that several of the Indians had set off for Detroit. "This river (the St. Mary) is not navigable till you come to the place where the St. Joseph joins it and makes a considerably large stream. Nevertheless we found a great deal of difficulty in getting our canoes over shoals, as the water at this season was very low. The banks of the river are high, and the country overgrown with lofty timber of various kinds; and the land is level and the woods clear. "About ninety miles from the Miamies of Twightwee (head of the Maumee) we came to where the large river (the Auglaize) that heads in a lick, falls into the Miami (Maumee) River. This they call the forks. The Ottawas claim this country, and hunt here where game is very plenty. From hence we proceded to the Ottawa village (site of the present Providence, Lucas County). This nation formerly lived at Detroit, but is now settled here on account of the richness of the country, where game is always found to be plenty. Here we were obliged to get out of our canoes and drag them (occasionally) eighteen miles on account of the rifts which interrupted navigation. At the end of these rifts we came to a village of the Wyandots who received us very kindly, and thence we -proceeded to the mouth of the river where it falls (enters) into Lake Erie. From the Miamis (villages near the head of the Maumee) to the Lake it is computed one hundred and eighty miles (the distance about one hundred and sixty miles), and from the entrance of the river into the Lake to Detroit is sixty miles—that is forty-two miles up the Lake and eighteen miles up the Detroit River to the garrison of that name. "On the 17th (August) in the morning we arrived at the Fort, which is a large stockade enclosing about eighty houses. It stands on the west side of the river on a high bank, commands a very pleasant prospect for nine miles above and nine miles below. The country is thickly settled with French. Their plantations are generally laid out about three or four acres in breadth on the river and eighty acres in depth. The soil is good, producing plenty of grain. All the people here are generally poor wretches, and consist of three or four hundred French families, a lazy, idle people, depending chiefly on the savages for subsistence. Though the land with little labor produces plenty of grain, they scarcely raise 156 - STORY OF THE MAUMEE VALLEY as much as will supply their wants, in imitation of the Indians whose manners and customs they have entirely adopted and cannot subsist without them." Several councils were held at Detroit between Croghan and Colonel Campbell, the commandant there, and the Miami, Ottawa, Ouiatenon, Pinkashaw, Pottawattomie, Kickapoo, "Musquatomi," Chippewa, Six Nations, Delaware, Shawnee and Wyandot Indians. By these conferences was cleared up the complete occupation by the English, of the Maumee, Wabash and Illinois sections. On the strength of the report of his accomplishments, on the return of Croghan to Fort Pitt with the promise of Pontiac that he would the following spring visit Oswego as a representative of the western tribes to confirm the pact, a company of the 42nd Regiment of Highlanders under Capt. Thomas Stirling proceeded from Fort Pitt down the Ohio River to take welcome possession of Fort Chartres from Commandant St. Ange. The date of arrival was October 10, 1765, and these were the first British troops to enter the Illinois country. According to promise, Pontiac with other chiefs, the following year, visited the Indian Agent Sir William Johnson at Albany, New York. The date of the meeting was July 24, 1766, and after being laden with presents Pontiac and his party, apparently satisfied with the situation, returned to the Maumee. In Croghan's return to Fort Pitt and then Niagara, and in the going and coming of Pontiac thereafter from the Maumee region, their route led through the lower Maumee, along the south shore of Lake Erie, past the mouth of the Sandusky; thus showing the great importance of these sections in the making of history. While the story of Pontiac has been told in giving the account of his conspiracy, his activities were so entwined with important western events that his name appears many times where other actors held the leading role. In this repetition, let it be said that on the banks of the Maumee near where he was born, not far from the junction of the Auglaize and the former river, Pontiac passed the winter of 1766-1767, "pitching his lodge in the forest with his wives and children, and pursuing the chase like an ordinary member of his tribe." He was at the Post of St Louis in the early months of 1769. His tragic end has already been described. The story in the progress of affairs in the Ohio country from 1766, up to the American Revolution involved two distinct features. One was the problem of the English government in their TOLEDO AND THE SANDUSKY REGION - 157 dealings with the Indians. The second was the question of colonization and the problems confronting the mother country relative to the occupation and settlement of the lands west of the Alleghenies, the Ohio country, by home seekers clamoring for admission. They should make two distinct narratives, but their separation is difficult in a short account. There still remained this Indian balance of power, and the colonies were growing stronger and demanded more serious consideration. Could England have had her way in her new possessions, she probably would have wished the savage wiped from the face of all her, or rather their, domain. But the Indians were here and they too had their desire; and had this desire been backed by sufficient power, they would have driven every paleface into the sea from across which they came. However, many tribes were in a measure beginning to realize that their interests demanded that they subject themselves to the will of the English. They could expect no more help from the French. Unfortunate incidents as told later on, lit the fires anew. The plans laid by the English government for the subjugation of the savage through the leverage of the colonies had cost the latter dearly, and in the future they were still to pay heavily in lives and suffering and in treasure and hardships. In their struggles with the French and their Indian allies, it is recorded that the colonists lost thirty thousand of their people and had expended in money sixteen millions of dollars. The English parliament had reimbursed to them about one-third of this sum, but they still had a large indebtedness and taxation had become an almost unbearable burden. The home government's indebtedness, according to authority, had increased one hundred and forty million pounds sterling during the French wars. They attempted, through parliament to shift more of this burden upon the shoulders of the colonists than the latter considered within justice and reason. There was the Stamp Act in the East and the restrictions of settlement on the western borders. The Indians had heard of the riotous disturbances at the seat of affairs and had become uneasy about the frauds perpetrated upon themselves. With all this, the French ambition dying hard, their disturbers in the Illinois country, began trade again with the Indians and sent wampum belts to the various tribes with a view of reviving a lost hope for supremacy. As to the desire of the ambitious colonists to possess lands 158 - STORY OF THE MAUMEE VALLEY which included the Ohio country, Sir William Johnson on December 16, 1766, wrote the home secretary of state, London, as follows: "The thirst after the lands of the Indians is become almost universal, the people who generally want them are either ignorant of or remote from the consequences of disobliging the Indians, many make a traffic of lands, and few or none will be at any pains or expence to get them settled, consequently they cannot be losers by an Indian war, and should' a Tribe be driven to despair, and abandon their country, they have their desire tho' at the expence of lives of such ignorant (innocent) settlers as may be upon it. * * * The majority of those who get lands, being persons of consequence (British) in the Capitals who can let them lye dead as a sure Estate hereafter, and are totally ignorant of the Indians, make use of some of the lowest and most selfish of the Country Inhabitants to seduce the Indians to their houses, where they are kept rioting in drunkenness till they have effected their bad purposes." In the following May at the instance of Sir William some eight hundred Indians gathered in conference at the German Flats, New York. The boundary line between Pennsylvania and Maryland was up for consideration and the permission of the Six Nations for the surveyors to run the lines as agreed between the provinces was sought. At the same time Governor Fauquier of Virginia whose province lay between the Cherokees of the South and the Six Nations, hereditary enemies, desired a reconciliation between them. Nothing specific was accomplished and another conference at Johnson Hall (Johnstown, New York) was held in February, 1768, at which the Cherokees and the Six Nations entered into an amicable treaty. This meeting was really a preliminary to the important Treaty of Stanwix made at that fort (now Rome, New York) , in September the same year, attended by some thirty-two hundred representatives from various tribes. This conclave lasted nearly two months and Sir William the Indian agent, displayed great diplomacy in its conduct, Among the tribes represented were the Shawnees, Mingoes and Delawares from Ohio, including the great chief Kilbuck from the Muskingum Forks. The result was that the Six Nations transferred to the King of England their interest in all lands south of the following lines : Beginning at the mouth of the Ten nessee River and following the Ohio and Allegheny to Kitter nang; thence on a direct line to the nearest fork of the west branc of the Susquehanna; thus on that stream through the Allegheni TOLEDO AND THE SANDUSKY REGION - 159 by way of Burnett's Hill and the east branch of the Susquehanna and Delaware, into New York to the confluence of Canada and Woods creeks. The treaty surrender included most of now Kentucky, Western Virginia and portions of Pennsylvania. As a part of the agreement the English were not to intrude upon the Indian lands north and west of this line—the Ohio country. Shortly after this gathering, Fort Stanwix was dismantled. But towards now Ohio, civilization was fast approaching. Turning again to the Ohio Company, organized in 1748, this project was primarily formed in the interests of Virginia, with the idea of establishing better water transportation between the Potomac and the eastern branch streams of the Ohio, which would give this colony an advantage over the commercial interests of Pennsylvania. This Ohio Company, as has been stated, was given a grant by the crown of a half a million acres of land within Virginia, on both sides of the Ohio between the Kanawha and the Monongahela. As already stated a part of this grant was in Ohio. The conditions were that 200,000 acres of this tract was to be located immediately; to be free of quit rent for ten years, provided the company would locate therein three hundred families within seven years and protect the settlement by establishing a fort. Now that the Stanwix Treaty had been negotiated, the time seemed ripe for reviving this project which had been delayed by the French-English contest and one of the causes of its formation. It is not within the province of this story to follow the detail history of this company and several other land projects. The Mississippi Company was formed in 1763, shortly before the declaration of the Quebec Act, prohibiting Ohio settlements. The Walpole Company was one of the most prominent. Its organization was made up, among others, of Sir William Johnson, the Indian agent himself, George Croghan, so prominent, as shown, in western affairs, William Franklin, governor of New Jersey, and a son of Benjamin Franklin, and other leaders in colonial matters, including the elder Franklin who was then in England and represented its interests there. The company took its name from Thomas Walpole, a London banker, a leading factor. The company's idea was to purchase some two and a half million acres of land from the Indians, but after the Stanwix Treaty, they necessarily were obliged to deal with the English crown, which had acquired title to the lands involved in the proposed purchase. 160 - STORY OF THE MAUMEE VALLEY The new province was to have a government similar to the Massachusetts Bay Colony. Vandalia was even selected as the name of the capital, which was to be located at the mouth of the Great Kanawha River with Sir William Johnson the colonial governor. George Washington was interested in the Ohio Company and Benjamin Franklin as an advocate of the Walpole proposition held opposite interests. Evidently as a compromise, the Ohio Company, in 1770, was merged into the Walpole Company which eventually succeeded, in 1772, in having their petition for the proposed purchase granted by the London Board of Trade and approved by the King. But rumblings of the American Revolution were now heard at intervals throughout the colonies and through the forest west of the Alleghenies and to even across the Atlantic. All land projects were now set aside, to come up againest for consideration after is told the story immediately preceding and during that period. While matters were coming to a climax in the colonies in general, the second Quebec Act which passed Parliament in June 1774, especially obnoxious to the Virginians, was another disturbing factor. It provided for a government for the Province of Quebec embracing the vast country west and north of the Ohio River, known later as the Northwest Territory. It sanctioned the French civil law which was centered at or subject to Detroit. The legislative power was vested in the governor. CHAPTER XX OPENING OF REVOLUTION IN THE WEST PRELIMINARY SITUATION - CORNSTALK'S CONFEDERACY -"CRESAP'S WAR"-DUNMORE WAR-BATTLE OF POINT PLEASANT-CORNSTALK MAKES PEACE WITH DUNMORE--CHIEF LOGAN-WESTERN PATRIOTISM RAMPANT-RESOLUTIONS OF LIBERTY PASSED. Telling the story from one standpoint, settlers had been establishing themselves this side of the mountain barriers without warrant, were lawless in their methods, and in their dealings disregarded any rights possessed by the Indians. The "renegade" French in the west and some among the Spaniards beyond the Mississippi were causing ferment among the Illinois tribes, while in the Canadian region the mixed French were using undue influence with the upper Muskingum tribes and even among the Iroquois, who were adhering to their friendliness with the English. And with it all, Cornstalk, mentioned earlier, the leader of the Shawnees, was tenaciously holding to his alliance project. As Shetrone puts it "formal steps toward consummation of the gigantic plan were taken at a congress of the interested tribes held at the Shawnee headquarters on the Pickaway plains in the autumn of 1770. A second congress followed in the summer of 1771, at which the Shawnee, Delawares, Wyandots, Miamis, Ottawas, and the Illinois and other western tribes were present. The confederacy thus effected promised to be the greatest in the history of the native race. The southern tribes, who were in complete accord with the plans of the alliance, were unable, owing to their geographical location to participate actively therein. The Six Nations, for the time being, were secure to the English and through the efforts of Sir William Johnson, even took some half-hearted steps toward discouraging the plans of the allies. The clouds of impending war were thickening rapidly, with every indication that the storm soon would envelop the Ohio valley." Not alone were desirous settlers crowding the Pennsylvania and Virginia borders, but they had their eyes on the new Kenky region. The section of now that state as George Rogers - 161 - 162 - STORY OF THE MAUMEE VALLEY Clark has written was but partially explored prior to 1773, when a considerable number of surveyors and private adventurers passed through it, the first settlement being at Harrodsburg, undertaken by Colonel J. Harrod in the spring of 1774. "But before much progress had been made the settlers were compelled to abandon the country on account of the war with the Shawnees.' The situation thus described is the preliminary to the "Cresaps war" and the "Dunmore war" so ably treated in a paper prepared by the late E. O. Randall and published in 1903 and is quoted in its completeness although it repeats some matters already stated : "The American colonists had fought the French and Indian war with the expectation that they were to be, in the event of success, the beneficiaries of the result and be permitted to occupy the Ohio country as a fertile and valuable addition to their Atlantic coast lodgments. But the war over and France vanquished, the royal greed of Britain asserted itself, and the London government most arbitrarily pre-empted the territory between the Alleghenies and the Mississippi as the exclusive and peculiar dominion of the crown, directly administered upon from the provincial seat of authority at Quebec. The parliamentary power promulgated the arbitrary proclamation (1763) declaring the Ohio country and the Great Northwest Territory should practically be an Indian, reservation, ordering the few straggling settlers to move therefrom, forbidding the colonists to move therein, and even prohibiting trading with the Indians, save under licenses and restrictions so excessive as to amount to exclusion. "On June 22, 1774, Parliament passed the detestable Quebec Act which not only affirmed the policy of the Crown adopted in the proclamation of 1763, but added many obnoxious features. "This policy of the Crown stultified the patents and charters granted the American colonies in which their proprietary rights extended to the Mississippi and beyond, embracing the very territory to which they were now denied admittance. "The establishment of England's authority in Canada, with Quebec as the seat of arbitrary and direct rule over the colonies, was a tightening of the fetters that bound the chafing colonies. The Quebec Act was one of the irritants complained of in the Declaration of Independence 'for abolishing the free system of English law in a neighboring province, establishing therein an arbitrary government and enlarging its boundaries so as to render TOLEDO AND THE SANDUSKY REGION - 163 it at once an example and fit instrument for introducing the same absolute rule into these colonies.' The French Canadians were favored by the Quebec Act in their legal rights and religious privileges. The untutored savages were its especial foster children. The colonists were flagrantly and unjustly discriminated against. The restless enterprise and obstinate opposition of the frontier settlers led them to encroach and 'poach' upon the 'preserves' of the Crown. The fearless and independent frontiersmen of Pennsylvania and Virginia longed for the unrestrained opportunity to cross the Ohio, and pushing their way into the trackless wilderness, seek homes upon the banks of the Tuscarawas, the Muskingum, the Scioto; the Sandusky and the Miamis. They went first as hunters, then as prospectors, and finally as settlers; 'they purchased lands with bullets, and surveyed claims with tomahawks.' "Such was the situation until the year 1774 when the smouldering embers burst into a flame, and Dunmore's war was the prelude to the Revolution. The Dunmore war has been promotive of much ingenious speculation and curious guesswork by writers and historians. An air of semi-mystery heightens the intense interest that attaches to this most important and romantic event in western American history. John Murray, Earl of Dunmore, was the royal governor of Virginia Colony. He was a descendant in the feminine line from the house of Stuart; the blood of the luxurious, imperious and haughty Charleses ran in his veins. He was a Tory of the Tories. He was an aristocratic, domineering, determined, diplomatic representative of his sovereign, King George, but he was also a tenacious stickler for the prerogatives of the colony over which he presided. He held his allegiance as first due the Crown, but he also was 'eager to champion the cause of Virginia as against either the Indians or her sister colonies.' He was avaricious, energetic and interested in the frontier land speculations. He had an eye for the main chance, financial and political. He could not have looked complacently upon the Canadian policy of his government. But he was the center of opposing influences. The prescribed limits of the various colonies, while generally distinctly defined near the Atlantic coast, often became indefinite and conflicting west of the mountains. The grant to Virginia gave her a continuation of territory west across the continent, and according to her claim took in the southern half of Ohio, Indiana and Illinois. The Quebec Act nullified this claim and incurred the disfavor of Dunmore, who defiantly opposed this 164 - STORY OF THE MAUMEE VALLEY injustice to his colony. More than this the Virginians assumed title to all of the extreme Western Pennsylvania, especially the forks of the Ohio River and the valley of the Monongahela. This, of course, meant Fort Pitt, which, at this time was occupied as a Virginian town, though claimed by the Pennsylvanians as their territory. "Governor Dunmore appointed as his agent or deputy at Fort Pitt one Dr. John Connolly, a man of reputed violent temper and bad character. Connolly was named vice governor and commandant of Pittsburgh and its dependencies. Connolly was at best an impetuous and unscrupulous minion of his master. He changed the name of the settlement from Fort Pitt to Fort Dunmore, and proceeded to assume jurisdiction in such an arrogant and merciless manner in behalf of the Virginians, and against the peaceable Pennsylvanians, that a warlike collision was narrowly averted. "Connolly's counter plays between the Virginians, the Pennsylvanians, the Indians and the British authorities are too complex and contradictory to be unraveled here. Whatever Lord Dunmore was, this man Connolly was double-dyed in duplicity. He pitted one colony against the other, the Indians against both, and, so far as he could, doubtless aided the British to urge on the Indians. That the British authorities were, in this whole affair, the abettor of the savages, is sufficiently evidenced by the fact that while the Indians were openly and unitedly fighting the colonies who were still British subjects on the Ohio frontier, they (the Indians) were receiving arms, ammunition and provisions from the English distributing station at Detroit. "The Canadian French traders who drove a thriving business with the Indians naturally stimulated them to resist the frontiersmen's encroachments. The occupation of the exclusive territory by the colonists meant the termination of their traffic. The brunt of this contention fell upon the Ohio Indians and the Virginian backwoodsmen. The Six Nations as such took no part in it. The Pennsylvanians stood aloof. They were not so aggressive as their southern neighbors, and their interest in the Indian was a commercial and peaceful one. The Virginians, therefore, were the only foes the Ohio Indians really dreaded. The Virginians were crack fighters in those frontier days. They were adventurous, courageous, and of hardy stuff. In the mountain dwellers of the Monongahela and Kanawha valleys the red man found a foeman worthy of his prowess. It was they the Indians styled TOLEDO AND THE SANDUSKY REGION - 165 the ‘Long Knives,' or 'Big Knife,' because of the bravery they displayed in the use of their long belt knives, or swords. They were a match for the deadly tomahawk. Another reason why the Virginians were willing and active aggressors in these border difficulties was that the royal authority had promised the Virginia troops a bounty in these western lands as reward for their services in the French and Indian war. A section had been allowed them by royal proclamation on the Ohio and Kanawha rivers. When in the spring of 1774 Colonel Angus McDonald and party proceeded to survey these lands they were driven off by the Indians. Meanwhile, intrusions across the border, depredations, conflagrations and massacres were committed in turn by either side. Much has been written as to which was the earlier or greater aggressor. That discussion is not pertinent to our purpose. Many cabins were burned and many lives brutally destroyed. Havoc and horror were prevalent. "Most prominent among the leaders of the whites in this Indian warfare was one Captain Michael Cresap, a Marylander who removed to the Ohio early in 1774, and after establishing himself below the Zane settlement (Wheeling) organized a company of pioneers for protection against the Indians. He was appointed by Connolly a captain of the militia of the section in which he resided, and was put in command of Fort Fincastle. Cresap was a fearless and persistent Indian fighter, and just the one to lead retaliatory parties across the Ohio into the red men's country. In April, Connolly, only too anxious to spring the explosion, issued an open letter warning the frontiersmen of the impending war and commanding them to prepare to repel the Indian attack. Such a letter from Dunmore's lieutenant amounted to a declaration of war. The backwoodsmen were at once in arms and seeking an opportunity to fight. As soon as Cresap's band received Connolly's letter they proceeded to declare war in regular Indian style, calling a council, planting the war post, etc. What is sometimes known as `Cresap's war' ensued. Several Indians while descending the Ohio in their canoes were killed by Cresap's company. Other Indians were shot within the Ohio border by intruding and exasperated whites. Logan, chief of the Mingoes, established a camp near the mouth of Yellow Creek, about forty miles above Wheeling. It was first thought Logan's camp was a hostile demonstration, and the camp should be attacked and destroyed. Cresap and his party proposed and started to do this, but finally thought better and decided Logan's intentions were peaceful—for 166 - STORY OF THE MAUMEE VALLEY he had ever been the friend of the whites—and the intended attack was abandoned. But Logan's people did not escape. Opposite the mouth of Yellow Creek on the Virginia side of the Ohio resided an unscrupulous scoundrel and cut-throat, Daniel Greathouse, and fellow frontier thugs. They kept a carousing resort, known as Baker's Bottom, where the Indians were supplied with rum, at Baker's cabin. On the last day of April, a party of Indians from Logan's camp, on the invitation of Greathouse, visited Baker's place and while plied with liquor were set upon and massacred. There were nine, including a brother and a sister of Logan, the latter being the reputed squaw of John Gibson, who were thus foully murdered. Other relatives of Logan had been previously killed. "The Baker massacre is one of the most awful blots upon the white man's record. Michael Cresap was not present and had nothing to do with the dastardly deed, and his innocence in the affair is well established, though many authorities still couple his name with the plot, if not the act itself. Logan believed Cresap to be the guilty party, as is evidenced by his using Cresap's name in the famous speech. There were many bloody enactments. Vengeance and retaliation were resorted to equally by both sides. The malevolent murder of 'Bald Eagle, the Delaware chief, of Silver Heels, the Shawnee chief, the malignant massacre of the mother, brother, sister and daughter of the famous Mingo chief Logan, were but incidents among many that aroused the hostility of the Indians to a furious pitch. They thirsted for the warpath. The white borderers were no less anxious for the encounter. Lord Dunmore did not wish to repress it. While the solitude of the western forest was broken by the war whoop, and the crack of the white man's deadly rifle, and the midnight sky was lighted with the flaming cabin, and the burning ripened crops, the citizens of the New England colonies were no less astir with intense excite. ment. Freedom was beginning to breathe. Meetings were being held to protest against royal tyranny, and committees of correspondence were sending forth their missives laden with the id of independence. It was 1774. The Boston Port Bill had b passed by Parliament in March, and denounced in the Bosto public meeting in May. That same month the Virginia Hou of Burgesses, of which George Washington, Patrick Henry an Thomas Jefferson were members, assembled at Williamsburg, t colony capital, and resolved 'with a burst of indignation,' to aside the first of June, when the Port Bill should go into operatio TOLEDO AND THE SANDUSKY REGION - 167 `as a day of fasting and prayer to implore the divine interposition for averting the heavy calamity which threatens the civil rights of America.' The right honorable, the Earl of Dunmore, governor of Virginia, at once dissolved that highly impertinent king-insulting assembly. The Virginians saw the clouds gathering in the East. But the storm in the West was howling at their door. They were prepared to take up arms for their political rights against the mother government, while they hastily made ready to fight for their proprietary rights against their hostile neighbors, the forest savages. The panic among the inhabitants along the river banks, and for a distance inland, had become terrible. The time to strike could not be delayed. Both red men and palefaces were spoiling for the fray. "When Dunmore learned of the failure of the surveying expedition of Col. Angus McDonald, he authorized that brave soldier to raise a regiment and proceed into the country of the enemy and punish them. McDonald easily collected some four hundred militiamen, and crossing the mountains moved down the Ohio to the site of Wheeling, where he built Fort Fincastle, afterwards Fort Henry. In June he descended the Ohio to Captina Creek, the scene of one of the late massacres, and there the men debarking from their boats and canoes, made a dashing raid upon the Shawnee villages as far as Wappatomica, an Indian town on the Muskingum, near the present City of Coshocton. "The little army suffered many hardships, and encountered many perils. At times their only sustenance consisted of weeds and one ear of corn a day. Many villages and fields of crops were destroyed. The soldiers returned in a few weeks without serious loss. This forceful invasion of the Indian country was sufficient declaration of war, and produced a general combination of the various Indian tribes northwest of the Ohio. "Meanwhile the Virginians were girding up their loins. Governor Dunmore was awake to the situation. His actions have been both attacked and applauded. He is credited with moving promptly and zealously in defense of his colony, and in defiance of the policy and public promulgation of the sovereign powers concerning the inhabited Indian province. He is charged with using this opportunity, in view of the coming colonial revolt, to bring about a clash between the ferocious Indians and the strength and flower of Virginian soldiery, that the onslaught might divert the attention of the colonists from the threatening rebellion against the mother country, and through the inhuman methods 168 - STORY OF THE MAUMEE VALLEY of the savage and the ensuing calamities and atrocities cause the Americans to pause in, if not positively desist from, their further procedure towards independence. The proof of his alleged treachery is not conclusive. His movements in this war were at times not above suspicion, and his subsequent proceedings were such as to add grave conjectures concerning his integrity. But Dunmore thus far seems entitled to the benefit of a doubt. "In August the governor began his preparations and the plan for the campaign agreed upon. An army for offensive operations was called for. Dunmore directed this army should consist of volunteers and militiamen, chiefly from the countries west of the Blue Ridge, and be organized into two divisions. The northern division, comprehending the troops collected in Frederick, Dunmore (now Shenandoah) , and adjacent counties, was to be commanded by Lord Dunmore in person ; the southern division comprising the different companies raised in Botetourt, Augusta and adjoining counties east of the Blue Ridge, was to be led by Gen. Andrew Lewis. The two armies were to number about fifteen hundred each; were to proceed by different routes, unite at the mouth of the Big Kanawha, and from thence cross the Ohio and penetrate the northwest country, defeat the red men and destroy all the Indian towns they could reach. "The volunteers who were to form the army of Lewis began to gather at Camp Union, the Levels of Greenbrier (Lewisburg) before the first of September. It was a motley gathering. They were not the king's regulars, nor trained troops. They were not knights in burnished steel on prancing steeds. They were not drilled martinets. They were, however, determined, dauntless men, sturdy and weather-beaten as the mountainsides whence they came. They were undrilled in the arts of military movements, but they were in physique and endurance and power na ture's noblemen, reared amid the open freedom and hardihood of rural life. The army as finally made up consisted of four main commands, a body of Augusta troops, under Col. Charles Lewis, brother of the General; a contingent of Botetourt troops, under Col. William Fleming; those commands numbered four hundred each; a small independent company, under Col. John Field, of Culpeper; a company from Bedford, under Capt. Thomas Buford, and two from the Holstein settlement under Capts. Evan Shelby. and Harbert. The three latter companies were part of the force to be led by Colonel Christian, who was likewise to join the two TOLEDO AND THE SANDUSKY REGION - 169 main divisions of the army at Point Pleasant as soon as the other companies of his regiment could be assembled. "The army started on September 8th in three divisions, the two under Col. Charles Lewis and Gen. Andrew Lewis, respectively, followed by the rather irregular and independent force under Col. John Field. Colonel Christian's contingent left later, and portions of them did not reach Point Pleasant in time to engage in the battle, but Captains Shelby and Russell, with parts of their companies, hastened ahead and did valiant service in the engagement. It was a distance of one hundred and sixty miles from Camp Union to their destination at the mouth of the Kanawha. The regiments passed through a trackless forest so rugged and mountainous as to render their progress extremely tedious and laborious. They marched in long files through the deep and gloomy wood' with scouts or spies thrown out in front and on the flanks, while axmen went in advance to clear a trail over which they would drive the beef cattle, and the pack-horses, laden with provisions, blankets and ammunition. They struck out straight through the dense wilderness, making their road as they went. On September 21st they reached the Kanawha at the mouth of Elk Creek (present site of Charleston). Here they halted and built dugout canoes for baggage transportation upon the river. A portion of the army proceeded down the Kanawha, while the other section marched along the Indian trail, which followed the base of the hills, instead of the river bank, as it was thus easier to cross the heads of the creeks and ravines. Their long and weary tramp was ended October 6th, when they camped on Point Pleasant, the high triangular point of land jutting out on the north side of the Kanawha where it empties into the Ohio. "General Lewis was disappointed in not finding Governor Dunmore at the appointed place of meeting. Dunmore was far away. While the backwoods general was mustering his 'unruly and turbulent host of skilled riflemen,' the Earl of Dunmore had led his own levies, some fifteen hundred strong, through the mountains at the Potomac Gap to Fort Pitt. Here he changed his plans and decided not to attempt uniting with Lewis at Point Pleasant. Taking as scouts George Rogers Clark, Michael Cresap, Simon Kenton, and Simon Girty, he descended the Ohio River with a flotilla of a hundred canoes, besides keel boats and pirogues, to the mouth of the Hockhocking, where he built and garrisoned a small stockade, naming it Fort Gower. Thence he proceeded up the Hockhocking to the falls, moved overland to the Scioto, finally 170 - STORY OF THE MAUMEE VALLEY halting on the north bank of the Sippo Creek four miles from its mouth at the Scioto, and about the same distance east of Old Chillicothe, now Westfall, Pickaway County. He entrenched himself in a fortified camp, with breastworks of fallen trees, so constructed as to embrace about twelve acres of ground. In the center of this he built a citadel of entrenchments, in which he and his chief officers resided for special protection. This camp Dunmore named Charlotte, according to most authorities, in honor of the handsome queen of George III, but more likely the gallant governor called the camp Charlotte after his accomplished wife Charlotte, who was the daughter of the Earl of Galloway. While Governor Dunmore was thus engaged in the heart of the Ohio country Lewis was destined to strike the decisive blow on the banks of the Kanawha. On the ninth of October Simon Girty and probably two other messengers arrived at Lewis's camp bringing the message from Lord Dunmore which bade Lewis join his lordship at the Indian towns on the Pickaway plains. General Lewis, deeply displeased at this change in the campaign, arranged to break camp that he might set out the next morning in accordance with his superior's orders. He had with him about eleven hundred men. His plans were destined to be rudely forestalled, for Cornstalk, coming rapidly through the forest, had reached the Ohio. The very night that Girty brought Lewis the message from Dunmore the Indian chief ferried his men across the river on rafts a few miles above the Kanawha, and by dawn was on the point of hurling his whole force of savage braves on the camp of the slumbering Virginians. The great Shawnee chief, Cornstalk, was as wary and able as he was brave. He was chief of the Shawnees, and the head of the Indian tribes of Ohio now united against the whites. The Shawnees were a very extensive and warlike tribe. They were the most populous of any of the tribes in Ohio, and they had, in the main, ever been the fierce foe of the whites, first against the French, then with the French against the British, and now goaded on by the late depredations upon their land and homes, and the recent massacre of members of their own and fellow tribes, they were aroused to the greatest warlike ferocity. Cornstalk's army numbered about eleven hundred, practically the same as that of Lewis, and was composed of the flower of the Shawnees, Delaware, Mingo, Wyandot, and Cayuga and minor tribes. The great General Cornstalk, sachem of the Shawnee and king of the northern confederacy, though in chief command, was aided by some of the most famous and skilled warriors TOLEDO AND THE SANDUSKY REGION-171 of his race. Logan, Ellinipsico, son of Cornstalk; Red Hawk, the Delaware chief; Scrappathus, a Mingo; Chiyawee, the Wyandot; Red Eagle, Blue Jacket, Packishenoah, the Shawnee chief and father of Tecumseh; his son Cheesekau, elder brother of Tecumseh. In no battle were there ever so many bold and distinguished braves. They were unaided by French or English allies. Cornstalk had the craft of his race and the tact of a Napoleon. He saw his enemy divided. Lewis was at Kanawha; Dunmore on the Pickaway Plains. If Lewis's army could be surprised and overwhelmed, the fate of Lord Dunmore would be merely a question of days. So Cornstalk, mighty in battle and swift to carry out what he had planned, led his long file of warriors with noiseless speed, through leagues of trackless woodland to the banks of the Ohio.' Stealthily and unannounced had Cornstalk arrived on the Virginia side of the Ohio banks below the mouth of Oldtown Creek, which, parallel to the Kanawha, pours into the Ohio some three miles above the Kanawha point. Early on the morning of the tenth, just as the sun was peeping over the Virginia hills, two soldiers (Robertson and Hickman) left the camp and proceeded up the Ohio River in quest of game. When they had progressed about two miles they unexpectedly came in sight of a large number of Indians, just rising from their encampment, and who discovering the two hunters, fired upon them and killed one (Hickman) ; the other escaped unhurt and fled back to communicate the intelligence 'that he had seen a body of the enemy covering four acres of ground as closely as they could stand by the side of each other.' "Gen. Andrew Lewis was a well seasoned soldier, alert and self-possessed in every emergency and an Irishman, quick-witted and full of fight. He had been schooled in Indian warfare for twenty years. He was major of a Virginia regiment at Brad-dock's defeat. He had served with Washington, who held him in the highest esteem. General Lewis, 'lighting a pipe,' it is reported, coolly ordered the troops in battle array in the grey of early dawn. Col. Charles Lewis with several companies was directed to move toward the right in the direction of Crooked Creek. Colonel Fleming, with other companies, was instructed to proceed to the left up the Ohio. Lewis's force met the left of Cornstalk's column about a half mile from the Virginian's camp. Fleming's command found the Indian right flank at a greater distance up the Ohio bank. Cornstalk's line of advance was more than a mile 172 - STORY OF THE MAUMEE VALLEY in front stretch, so drawn as to cut diagonally across the river point. By this tactic he had calculated upon pocketing General Lewis on the corner of the bluff between the Ohio and the Kanawha. "The first shock of the onslaught was favorable to the foe. Col. Charles Lewis made a gallant advance that was met by a furious response. The colonel was mortally wounded at almost the first fire of the enemy. He calmly marched back to the camp and died. His men, many of whom were killed, unable to withstand the superior numbers of the Indians at this point, began to waver and fall back. Colonel Fleming was equally hard pressed in his encounter. He received two balls through his left arm and one through his breast, urging his men on to victorious action he retired to the camp, the main portion of his line giving way. "General Lewis now began to fortify his position by felling timber and forming a breastwork before his camp. The fight was soon general, and extended the full front of the opposing armies. What a strange and awful scene was presented, one of mingled picturesque beauty and ghastly carnage on that October Monday morning. A host of forest savages, 'a thousand painted and plumed warriors, the pick of the young men of the western tribes, the most daring braves between the Ohio and the Great Lakes' their brown athletic and agile bodies decked in the gay and rich trappings of war; their raven black hair tossed like netted manes in the fray as with glowering eyes and tense muscles they leaped through the brush and stood face to face with the white foe, the latter rigid with firm resolution and unwincing courage, fighters typical of the frontier; a primitive army equal in numbers to their assailants, heroes in homespun, and backwoodsmen in buckskin, clothed in fringed leather hunting shirts and coarse woollen leggings of every color; they wore skin and fur caps, and slung over their shouders were the straps of the shot-bag and the strings of the powder-horn. Each, like his barbaric antagonist, carried his flint-lock, his tomahawk and his gleaming scalp-knife. For that tragic tableau, quaint and dramatic, nature never made a more magnificent or peaceful setting. The two lines grappled in deadly conflict on the peak of land elevated by precipitate banks high above the Ohio, which swept by in majestic width, joined by the Kanawha that noiselessly crept its way amid a forest and hill-framed valley. The Ohio heights fretted the sky to the west, and the Virginia mountains in the near eastern background were resplendent in the gorgeous drap- TOLEDO AND THE SANDUSKY REGION - 173 ery of early autumn. It was a landscape upon which nature had lavished her most luxuriant charms. It was a picture for the painter and the poet rather than the cold chronicler of history. No event in American annals surpasses this in the mingling of natural beauty and human violence. The brutal savage and the implacable Anglo-Saxon were to exchange lives by gory combat in the irrepressible conflict between their races. "It was nearly noon and the action was 'extremely hot,' says a participant. The Indians, who had pushed within the right line of the Virginians, were gradually forced to give way; the dense underwood, many steep banks and fallen timber favored their gradual retreat. They were stubbornly but slowly yielding their ground, concealing their losses as best they could by throwing their dead in the Ohio, and carrying off their wounded. The incessant rattle of the rifles; the shouts of the Virginians, and war whoops of the red men made the woods resound with the 'blast of war.' The groans of the wounded and the moans of the dying added sad cadence to the clash of arms. At intervals, amid the din, Cornstalk's stentorian voice could be heard as in his native tongue he shouted cheer and courage to his faltering men, and bade them 'be strong, be strong.' But their desperate effort did not avail, though exerted to the utmost. No more bitter or fierce contest in Indian warfare is recorded. The hostile lines though a mile and a quarter in length were so close together, being at no point more than twenty yards apart, that many of the combatants grappled in hand-to-hand fighting, and tomahawked or stabbed each other to death. The battle was a succession of single combats, each man sheltering himself behind a stump or rock, or tree-trunk. The superiority of the backwoodsmen in the use of rifles —they were dead shots, those Virginia mountaineers—was offset by the agility of the Indians in the art of hiding and dodging from harm. After noon the action in a small degree abated. The slow retreat of the Indians gave them an advantageous resting spot whence it appeared difficult to dislodge them. They sustained an 'equal weight of action from wing to wing.' Seeing the unremitting obstinacy of the foe, and fearing the final result if they were not beaten before night, General Lewis, late in the afternoon, directed Captains Shelby, Mathews and Stuart with their companies to steal their way under cover of the thick and high growth of weeds and bushes up the bank of the Kanawha and along the edge of Crooked Creek until they should get behind the 174 - STORY OF THE MAUMEE VALLEY flank of the enemy, when they were to emerge from their covert, move downwards towards the river point, and attack the Indians in the rear. The strategic manoeuver thus planned was promptly and adroitly executed and turned the tide in favor of the colonial soldiers. The Indians finding themselves suddenly and unexpectedly encompassed between two armies and believing that the force appearing in the rear was the reinforcement from Colonel Christian's delayed troops, they were discouraged and dismayed, and began to give way. The appearance of troops in the rear of the Indians at once prevented the continuance of Cornstalk's scheme of fighting, namely, that of alternately attacking and retreating, particularly with his center, thus often exposing the advancing front of the Virginians to the mercy of the Indian flanks. The skirmishing continued during the afternoon, the Indians though at bay making a show at bravado. But their strength was spent, and at the close of the day under the veil of darkness they noiselessly and precipitately retreated across the Ohio and started for the Scioto towns. "The battle of Point Pleasant was won. 'Such a battle with the Indians, it is imagined, was never heard of before,' says the writer of a letter printed in the Government reports. But the day was dearly bought. The Americans lost a fifth of their number, some seventy-five being killed or fatally wounded, and one hundred and forty-seven severely or slightly wounded. Among the slain were some of the bravest Virginian officers, including Col. Charles Lewis, Maj. John Field, Captains Thomas Buford, John Murray, James Ward, Samuel Wilson, Robert McClannahan; and Lieutenants Allen, Goldsby and Dillon. The Indian loss was never definitely known. They cunningly carried off or concealed most of their killed, and secretly cared for their wounded. They lost probably only half as many as the whites. About forty warriors were known to be killed outright, or to have died of their wounds. Of the number of wounded no estimate could be made. While the Virginians lost many officers, strangely enough among the Indians no chief of importance was slain, except Packishenoah, the Shawnee chief, and father of Tecumseh. No 'official report' of this battle was made, or if so, probably not preserved. The battle of Point Pleasant was the most extensive, the most bitterly contested, and fraught with the most significance of any Indian battle in American history. It was purely a frontier encounter. The whites were colonial volunteers. The red men, the choice of their tribes, led by their greatest warriors. The TOLEDO AND THE SANDUSKY REGION - 175 significance of that battle was manifold and far-reaching. It was the last battle fought by the colonists while subject to British rule. It was the first battle of the Revolution. Whatever the exact understanding may have been between Lord Dunmore and the royal authorities, or between the Indians and the British powers, or whether there was any explicit understanding at all, that battle represented the opening bloodshed between the allies of the British and the colonial dependents. Had Cornstalk been the conqueror of that contest the whole course of American events would doubtless have been otherwise than history records. The colonists would have been stunned to inaction by the blow of defeat, the fear of an extended and horrible Indian warfare on their western borders, would have deterred them from entering upon a revolt against England's power. At any rate the Ohio and Mississippi valleys would most certainly have remained the great western province of the royal power, and the United States be but a strip east of the Alleghenies. The victory of General Lewis destroyed the danger in the West, and gave nerve and courage to the Virginians, who were the strength and sinew of the Revolutionary movement. England's fate lay in the balance in the battle of Point Pleasant, though no British soldier participated therein. America has no more historic soil than the ground of the Kanawha and Ohio point—reddened that October day by the blood of savage warriors and frontier woodsmen. "The Virginian victors buried their dead, and left the bodies of the vanquished to the decay of uncovered graves. General Lewis, leaving his sick and wounded in the camp at the Point, protected by rude breastworks, and with an adequate guard, crossed the Ohio (October 18) and began his march by way of the Salt Licks and Jackson to join Dunmore on the Pickaway Plains. When but a few miles from Dunmore's camp Lewis was met by a messenger from the Earl informing him that a treaty of peace was being negotiated with the Indians and ordering him (Lewis) to return immediately to the mouth of the Big Kanawha. Lewis's men were flushed with success, and exasperated at their losses in the late battle and eager for revenge upon the red men, and the opportunity to crush their power and destroy their homes. Lewis shared the feelings of his soldiers and refused to obey the order of Dunmore. He continued to advance until when on the east bank of the Congo near its juncture with the Sippo, he was met by the Earl himself and the Indian chief, White Eyes. The Earl explained the situation to Lewis, complimented his general- 176 - STORY OF THE MAUMEE VALLEY ship, and the bravery of his men, stating there was no further need of advancement by his (Lewis's) division of the army. General Lewis, recrossing the Congo, encamped for the day, and then reluctantly commenced his return march to the Ohio, proceeding by the route he had come, to Point Pleasant. Meanwhile Cornstalk and his crestfallen warriors had reached the Pickaway Plains. The spirit of the Indians had been broken by their defeat; but the stern old chief, their commander, Cornstalk, remained with unshaken heart. He was still prepared to fight to the bitter end. He summoned a council over the situation, and in an eloquent address strove to goad on the braves to another campaign. They listened in sullen silence. Finally, finding himself unable to stir his braves to further battle, he struck his tomahawk into the war post and peremptorily declared, 'I will go and make peace.' He was as good as his word. With his retinue of fellow chiefs, some eight in number, Cornstalk proceeded to Dunmore's quarters within the entrenchments of Camp Charlotte. Here he made a prolonged and passionate plea for his people, reciting the wrongs inflicted by the whites, and the rights denied the red men. Various parleyings ensued, the net conclusion of which was, the Indians agreed to give up all white prisoners and stolen horses in their possession, cease from further hostilities, and molestation of travelers down the Ohio and 'surrender all claim to the lands south of the Ohio.' "This agreement, whatever its explicit text, was another step in the westward progress of the white invader. Cornstalk haughtily and disdainfully acceded to the terms of the whites. But there was one distinguished chief who was not at that council, and who had refused to be present. It was Logan. He declared that he was a 'warrior, not a councillor, and he would not come.' Logan was a splendid specimen of his race. He was chief of the Mingo tribe and his father, whom he succeeded, had been chief of the Cayugas. Up to the time of the Dunmore war Logan had been the friend of the white man. He took no part in the French and Indian war, except that of peacemaker. But when in the border troubles between the Indians and whites in the spring of 1774, Logan's relatives were massacred at the Yellow Creek, as he supposed, by Cresap and party, Logan's rage became terrible. His character changed into all the revengeful and distorted hate and unrelenting ferocity of which the Indian nature is capable. From that moment for the rest of his life he was the inveterate and implacable foe of the white. He would not attend the peace TOLEDO AND THE SANDUSKY REGION - 177 council with Cornstalk. His influence with the Indians made it important that his concurrence be secured. Lord Dunmore, desiring his presence, sent John Gibson, afterwards general, a frontier veteran and one familiar with the Indian language, to urge the attendance of Logan. Taking Gibson aside, under the shade of a neighboring tree, Logan suddenly addressed him that famous speech which immortalized the chief and furnished a model of oratory for thousands of American school boys. The speech is popularly supposed to have been delivered in Logan's native Indian tongue, and have been literally translated and written down in English by John Gibson, and so delivered to Lord Dunmore, who read it in open council to the Virginian army. However it may have been, that speech is one of the great Indian classics. It has a weird, pathetic strain, and is a poetic recital with a rhetorical charm not unlike the Greek Chorus. " ‘ I appeal to any white man to say if ever he entered Logan's cabin hungry and he gave him not meat; if ever he came cold and naked and he clothed him not? During the course of the last long and bloody war, Logan remained idle in his camp, an advocate of peace. Such was my love for the whites that my countrymen pointed as I passed and said, "Logan is the friend of the white man." I had even thought to have lived with you, but for the injuries of one man. Colonel Cresap, the last spring, in cold blood and unprovoked, murdered all the relations of Logan, not even sparing my women and children. There runs not a drop of my blood in the veins of any living creature. This called on me for revenge. I have sought it. I have killed many. I have fully glutted my vengeance. For my country I rejoice at the beams of peace; but don't harbor a thought that mine is the joy of fear. Logan never felt fear. He will not turn on his heel to save his life. Who is there to mourn for Logan? Not one.' "This speech was a fitting epilogue to the close of the Dunmore war. The campaign had ended. The camp was struck and the soldiers took up their march from the Pickaway Plains back to the Ohio. When Dunmore's army arrived at Fort Gower at the mouth of the Hockhocking the soldiers learned for the first time of the action taken by the first Continental Congress, which had assembled at Philadelphia September 5, 1774. The officers of the army thereupon held a meeting and passed resolutions to the effect, after complimenting the success of their general, that they professed allegiance to the king and crown, but added that 'their devotion would only last while the king deigned to reign over a 178 - STORY OF THE MAUMEE VALLEY free people, for their love of liberty for America outweighed all other considerations, and they would exert every power for its defense when called forth by the voice of their countrymen.' Strange scene, on the soil of Ohio, on the banks of the 'beautiful river,' Virginia frontiersmen celebrate their triumph over the western Indians by proclaiming their sympathy with colonial independence. That was six months before the shot was fired at Lexington that was 'heard 'round the world'." The resolutions referred to by Randall and taken from the American Archives are as follows: "Meeting of Officers Under Earl of Dunmore.—At a meeting of the officers under the command of his Excellency, the Right Honorable the Earl of Dunmore, convened at Fort Gower, November 5, 1774, for the purpose of considering the grievances of British America, an officer present addressed the meeting in the following words: " 'Gentlemen :—Having now concluded the campaign, by the assistance of Providence, with honor and advantage to the colony and ourselves, it only remains that we should give our country the strongest assurance that we are ready, at all times, to the utmost of our power, to maintain and defend her just right and privileges. We have lived about three months in the woods without any intelligence from Boston, or from the delegates at Philadelphia. It is possible, from the groundless reports of designing men, that our countrymen may be jealous of the use such a body would make of arms in their hands at this critical juncture. That we are a respectable body is certain, when it is considered that we can live weeks without bread or salt; that we can sleep in the open air without any covering but that of the canopy of Heaven; and that our men can march and shoot with any in the known world. Blessed with these talents, let us solemnly engage to one another, and our country in particular, that we will use them to no purpose but for the honor and advantage of America in general, and of Virginia in particular. It behooves us, then, for the satisfaction of our country, that we should give them our real sentiments, by way of resolves, at this very alarming crisis. "Whereupon the meeting made choice of a committee to draw up and prepare resolves for their consideration, who immediately withdrew, and after some time spent therein, reported that they had agreed to and prepared the following resolves, which were read, maturely considered, and agreed to, nemine contradicente TOLEDO AND THE SANDUSKY REGION - 179 by the meeting, and ordered to be published in the Virginia Gazette: "Resolved, That we will bear the most faithful allegiance to His Majesty, King George the Third, whilst His Majesty delights to reign over a brave and free people, that we will, at the expense of life, and everything dear and valuable, exert ourselves in support of his crown, and the dignity of the British Empire. But as the love of liberty, and attachment to the real interests and just rights of America outweigh every other consideration, we resolve that we will exert every power within us for the defense of American liberty, and for the support of her just rights and privileges; not in any precipitate, riotous or tumultuous manner, but when regularly called forth by the unanimous voice of our countrymen. "Resolved, That we entertain the greatest respect for His Excellency, the Right Honorable Lord Dunmore, who commanded the expedition against the Shawnese ; and who, we are confident, underwent the great fatigue of this singular campaign from no other motive than the true interest of this country. "Signed by order and in behalf of the whole corps. "Benjamin Ashby, Clerk." The historian Galbreath in his writings gives this story : "The immediate cause of the Dunmore war appears to have been the effort of soldiers who had served the British cause in the French and Indian war to come into possession of lands in Virginia, south of the Ohio River, for which they had been granted warrants by Lord Dunmore. Authority was granted to locate these lands on and after April 14, 1774. On that date parties were waiting on the south side of the Ohio to locate their claims on choice lands in the valleys of its tributaries. Ebenezer Zane, George Rogers Clark and Michael Cresap led three of these parties. As the Indians saw these men coming in large numbers to claim their land, and with their surveyors and their surveying instruments that had come to have for the red man a more sinister look than firearms in the hands of a foe, they felt instinctively that their homes and their hunting grounds were doomed. The white man, it is true, was confining himself to what had reluctantly been conceded to be his side of the river; but what would now the privilege of hunting on both sides of the river be worth to the Indian if white men should flock, 'like pigeons,' into the valley of the Ohio and take up their permanent abode? And how long would it be until they crossed the river and crowded the Indian farther back into the wilderness? When civilization 180 - STORY OF THE MAUMEE VALLEY of the pioneer type comes into contact with civilization of the Indian type, both are apt to degenerate into savagery, and this certainly what happened in the Ohio Valley in the spring a summer of the eventful year of 1774. "As nearly. as can be gleaned from much confusing test mony, the first recorded offense was by a band of Shawnees, w about April 1st of that year captured three white men, Thoma Green, Lawrence Darnell, and William Nash, who were locating lines in Mason County, Virginia. They held them for a few days and then ordered them away with the threat that in the f ture Virginians caught on the Ohio River would be killed. Shortly afterward a party of surveyors attacked a band of Shawnee wa riors opposite the mouth of the Scioto River, killed a number o them 'and took thirty horse-loads of skins from them.' "Lord Dunmore was intensely loyal to the King of Great Brig tin. He was also ambitious to advance the prestige and power o Virginia, the colony over which he had been commissioned to rule He refused to recognize the Quebec Act and pleased Virginia by insisting upon the original charter rights of the colony to lam on both sides of the Ohio River. He laid claim also to Weste Pennsylvania, and appointed Dr. John Connolly, an unscrupulou adventurer, Royal Commandant of 'West Augusta,' includin Fort Pitt, which was now rebuilt and renamed Fort Dunmore." While the quoted resolution passed by the army of Genera Lewis cannot in any sense be termed "the first declaration American Independence" as some enthusiasts of spectacular pro clivities refer to it, surely the sentiments therein expressed shot they held that "the love of liberty and attachment to the real i terests and just rights of America" outweighed "every other co sideration"—even their support and honor of the crown. With this sentiment in the hearts of those patriots who fought the battle of Point Pleasant, October 10, 1774, and with ti, same spirit possessed by the American patriots at this very ti in session at Philadelphia, certainly, there is reason for referrin to the engagement of General Lewis as "the first battle of t American Revolution." While it may matter little as to the title given to the engage ment at Point Pleasant, Randall in again referring to it as ter "first battle of Revolution" further says : "Our grounds fl that view were that in this frontier contest the Virginians we fighting against the Indians, not merely from retaliatory motive, but in defiance of the Quebec Act, for they were proposing to '1 TOLEDO AND THE SANDUSKY REGION - 181 vade the British royal domain—the Ohio country—then part of the province of Quebec, and attack the Indians who were the protected wards of England and consequently allies of Parliamentary power. Moreover, did not the Virginians have for their ulterior result [underlying motive—Editor] the privilege of settling across the Ohio in a territory they claimed to be a part of their colony? In brief, were they not as Virginians contending for colonial rights against the mother country? The unjust and usurping features of the Quebec Act were as said, cause for one of the clauses of the Declaration of Independence." As to the motives of Lord Dunmore in inaugurating this campaign, without going into details, it would seem that he believed he was doing what he considered the best for the Virginians, if not the colonies. CHAPTER XXI THE GREAT NORTHWEST IN THE REVOLUTION ACTIVITIES IN MAUMEE AND SANDUSKY COUNTRY-BRITISH MILITARY AND CIVIL HEADQUARTERS AT DETROIT-CONGRESS CREATES INDIAN DEPARTMENTS-MURDER OF CHIEF CORNSTALK-FIRST SIEGE OF FORT HENRY. As recorded early in this story, it was inevitable that the struggle for supremacy in America including the great Northwest and the Maumee and Sandusky country, between the French and English, could only be settled by the force of arms. It was visioned by farseeing statesmen and leaders in the mother country, and especially in the colonies, soon after the domination of the English and long before the American Revolution, that a people of independent thought and character such as were the colonials and frontiersmen, would eventually assert their rights to some form of independent government. By the unwise attitude and procedure of the home government, the crisis came sooner than was anticipated, and the period beginning with the year 1775 witnessed on the American continent the birth of a new nation. History generally confines the record of these events in a great measure to the section on the seaboard and east of the Alleghenies. But the truth is that within the bounds of now Ohio, there were more activities which concerned the Revolution than in many New England states. It continued here "a score of years, three times as long as was suffered by the more pretentious settlements in the Atlantic states." Even- then full independence was not achieved in the West until two score years more. One western writer calls attention to the fact that there was no campaign, not even a battle of note on the soil of Connecticut. Yet from the standard histories, little is said about the terrible struggles during those famous years west of the Allegheny range. And in all this western struggle, the Maumee and Sandusky region played the most conspicuous part. True, not a single English settlement that could be called sue was to be found within the present borders of Ohio at the time th first gun was fired at Lexington, April 19, 1775; yet the story it unfolds will show that within the borders of now Ohio and th - 182 - TOLEDO AND THE SANDUSKY REGION - 183 Maumee and Sandusky valleys occurred the great war dramas which saved the Northwest to a greater and stronger nation. Here were matched "diplomacy, strategy and courage," upon the result of which depended whether the Northwest would be under American or British rule; whether the line of Great Lakes or the Ohio River would mark the division between American and British territory; whether the Maumee and Sandusky would be populated by Americans or Canadian French. Independence was bound to come to the colonies later, if not when it did. But if George Rogers Clark had failed in the West and at Vincennes; if the Indians with British backing had been victorious at Fallen. Timbers; or later the tide of battle had turned toward the British in 1812 on the Maumee, the Sandusky and Lake Erie; the British flag today might be flying over Toledo, the state capital and all Ohio to the "River Beautiful." Continuing this narrative : As in the contest between the French and the English, the Indian once more "assumed his place in the triangle, and as the party of the third part again wielded the balance of power. The tribes concerned in the struggle in the Ohio region were practically the same and their locations the same as earlier outlined. The always hostile and powerful Shawnees were still established on the Scioto and the Miami, their various villages being known as "Chillicothe"—the "place where the people dwell." The Delawares had their important towns on the Muskingum, a number of whom under the influence of the Moravian missionaries to be referred to later, had been converted to Christianity. The Wyandots, a strong factor, were located on the Sandusky River, to which region with the Maumee this story is gradually narrowing. The Wyandots generally espoused the cause of the British until late in their career, and were friendly with the British traders who had their posts upon the Sandusky, well on toward the close of the Revolution. The Delawares were divided in their allegiance, the non-Christians being with the British and the Christian members of the tribe, under the leadership of the renowned chief White Eyes, leaning toward the Americans. Captain Pipe was at the head of the pro-British portion of the tribe, but his followers to a great extent were held back by the Moravian missionaries. The Shawnees were held in check by Chief Cornstalk according to his promise, until his death, after which as events will show they espoused the British cause as an uncompromising foe of the Americans. The same efforts to align the Indians with their cause were 184 - STORY OF THE MAUMEE VALLEY now made by the Americans and the British that obtained betweer the French and the English. Both the Americans and British made efforts to secure or hold the friendship of the Six Nation; as well as other tribes. Sir William Johnson died in 1774. His chief deputy and son-in-law, Col. Guy Johnson, who succeeded him as the British Superintendent of Indian Affairs, assisted by Chief Joseph Brandt, made haste to adopt measures and assure the Indians that there would be no change in the attitude toward them than existed under the British government. But the outbreak of the Revolution compelled Johnson to flee from his country seat (Johnson Hall) near Johnstown, New York, to Canada, in May, 1775, and he later joined Gen. William Howe in New York. The representatives of the Americans were likewise alert. The result was that the Iroquois,' the Mohawks, Senecas and Cayugas joined the British, while the Oneidas and Tuscaroras, espoused the American cause; thereby neutralizing the influence )f the great Iroquois federation or Long-House. During the French rule and under the British control until the close of the Revolutionary war, the commandant of the military post at Detroit to which the Maumee and Sandusky region was subject, exercised the functions of military governor and administrator of civil affairs, with power that was absolute. A civil government was first provided for the territory with Detroit as the capital, under the Quebec Act, June 22, 1774. All the :erritory northwest of the Ohio River was under its jurisdiction. The legislative power was also vested in the governor (at the time Sir Guy Carleton), a lieutenant-governor or commander-in-chief, and in a council of not less than seventeen and no more than twenty-three members. All were to be appointed by the King. The English criminal law was used as the rule of procedure, but he judgment or will of the commandant, or the justice of the peace or notary of his appointing, generally declared and interpreted such law. As open hostilities began, on June 9, 1775, Governor Carleton proclaimed martial law and an organized system of raids of frontier settlements at the south begun, as a rule ed by British officers. With the progress of events, to the office of lieutenant-governor was added the British Superintendent of Indian Affairs for Detroit, the Maumee and Sandusky region and also Vincennes and Michilimackinac. The first appointee was Captain, later the famous Col. Henry Hamilton of the Fifteenth Regiment of the British forces, who will be heard of more prominently later. War TOLEDO AND THE SANDUSKY REGION - 185 belts of wampum were distributed to all the Indian tribes with enticing invitations to join the British at Detroit, where "feasts were held at which rum flowed freely in the incitement of the savages against the Americans who," as the British told, "were endeavoring to crowd them from their lands and had now rebelled against the good King, their father who was distributing many presents and kindnesses to his (Indian) children." Through Commandant Hamilton's policy, the Indians arrived and departed from Detroit as they pleased, and were given rum, tobacco, provisions and firearms for white scalps. To aid the Americans in offsetting the diligence of the British among the Indians, the Continental Congress created three Indian departments to superintend Indian affairs. The Northern Department was to include the Six Nations and all the tribes northward and eastward; the Southern Department was to embrace the Cherokees and all the Indians that might be south of them ; the Middle Department had to do with the nations between the other two departments—the Ohio Country tribes. In June, 1775, the Continental Congress also authorized General Washington to recruit the friendly tribes of the Six Nations to be used in the Canadian campaign, and made an appropriation for the distribution of Indian presents. In April, 1776, Col. George Morgan was appointed Indian agent for the central department, with headquarters at Pittsburg. A delegation of Indians was received by Congress at Philadelphia and a sort of conciliatory meeting held. During all this "the Kentucky settlers were hovering close to their stockades and awaiting anxiously the trend of events," while the frontiers of Pennsylvania. and Virginia were the scenes of Indian invasions and atrocities. The stories of those indomitable characters, Daniel Boone, Simon Kenton and Samuel Brady, will be taken up individually. While there were being enacted a continuous series of border raids by the Indians from as far north as Detroit, by the efforts of George Rogers Clark and the diplomacy and firmness of the Indian agent, Colonel Morgan, a general outbreak and war by the Indians had been averted. But now a sad occurrence set the whole section aflame. A majority of the tribes had identified themselves with the British. While the Shawnees too were hostile, since the Dunmore treaty, through the influence of Cornstalk who had remained loyal to his agreement, they had been held in leash. Under the pressure of the British representatives and glowing promises, the Shawnees had now broken away and were preparing to take the warpath 8-VOL. 1 186 - STORY OF THE MAUMEE VALLEY against the settlements of Virginia and Kentucky. To avert this calamity, Cornstalk planned to visit the garrison at Point Pleasant, the scene of his earlier disaster. Consequently in the spring of 1777, with Chief Red Hawk who had fought with him in his engagement with Lewis, he crossed the Ohio to Fort Randolph, the name of the Point Pleasant quarters, and gave information which enabled the Americans to forestall the coming attack. Whether planned or not, two young Virginian volunteers, Gilmore and Hamilton, crossed the Kanawha from the garrison to hunt deer. On their return to the fort, they were fired on by unknown Indians from across the Kanawha and Gilmore was killed. In their rage and madness over the death of their comrade, the soldiers of the garrison failing to find the attacking party, to satisfy their vengeance attacked and murdered the friendly Cornstalk while he with Red Hawk had been detained at Fort Randolph as hostages and guaranty for the peaceful behavior of their tribes. Ellinipsico, Cornstalk's son, who had arrived to see his father was also killed, and Red Hawk while attempting to escape up a chimney shared the same fate. Cornstalk evidently was not ignorant of the situation and his possible end. A short time before the tragedy he remarked: "When I was a young man and went to war, I thought that might be the last time; and that I would return no more. Now I am here among you; you may kill me if you please; I can die but once." The then governor of Virginia, Patrick Henry, made all efforts possible to apprehend Cornstalk's assassins and offered a reward for their capture. Several soldiers were put on trial but for lack of evidence were released. The members of the garrison stood together in protection of the real murderers, when their evidence was called for. It had now been two years since the battle of Lexington; Washington had been made commander-in-chief of the American army within a couple of months of the same period; Lord Dunmore, after his flight, had destroyed Norfolk some sixteen months previous and ten• months had passed since independence had been proclaimed. With it all, the Continental Congress and Virginia as well, gave some attention to the protection of the western settlements. At the instance of Virginia, Fort Pitt and Fort Randolph were strengthened and Fort Fincastle at the mouth of Wheeling River was repaired and the name changed to Fort Henry in honor, probably, of the present governor of Virginia, chosen after the flight of Dunmore. TOLEDO AND THE SANDUSKY REGION - 187 While many tribes were engaged in the raids upon the advanced settlements after Cornstalk's death, the Shawnees were the most prominent in these incursions. The system was aided and abetted by the notorious Hamilton at Detroit. Harrodsburg, Boonesborough and Logan's Fort were among the stockades attacked and during the summer of 1777, a formidable onslaught was directed at Fort Henry. The parties engaged were the Shawnees, Mingoes, Ottawas and a few non-Christian Delawares accompanied from Detroit by British renegades, flying the British colors. The fort was garrisoned by some fifty soldiers under command of Col. David Shepherd. A part of the garrison upon the approach of the Indians, boldly went forth to meet the force of nearly four hundred, were ambushed and the greater number killed. It was September 1, 1777, and the siege continued during the day. The next morning Col. Andrew Swearingen with twenty men succeeded in entering the fort and Maj. Samuel McCullough being apprised of the attack, arrived from Short Creek with forty mounted men. Although the savages were all about, the gates of the stockade were thrown open and all of McCullough's men succeeded in entering. McCullough himself, however, who had remained in the rear intent on the safety of his band, held back until his own chance of entry was cut off. Realizing his plight he turned his horse toward what was known as Van Meter's stockade a few miles away. The path led to the top of a hill overlooking Wheeling Creek. At the brow of this hill McCullough was met by Indians returning from another expedition. With the prospect of death before him he forced his horse to plunge over the precipice. The leap to a brush covered terrace of the hill was near fifty feet. As by a miracle, McCullough's horse kept his feet and carried his rider two hundred feet farther along the sloping declivity to the bed of the creek. Neither horse or rider was injured, although the entire descent was three hundred feet. The Indians, chagrined at the escape and discouraged by the arrival of the reinforcements, abandoned the siege and wended their way again toward Detroit. Back of the fort upon cleared land were some twenty to thirty cabins, one of which was occupied by Col. Ebenezer Zane. Elizabeth Zane, wife of the Colonel and a sister of McCullough, rendered great service during the siege by "running bullets, cutting patches, making cartridges, cheering and encouraging by her presence, exhortations and assistance, the sometimes almost exhausted efforts of the brave defenders." CHAPTER XXII STORY OF DANIEL BOONE HAMILTON IN CONTROL AT DETROIT-PLANS INDIAN RAIDS-BOONE'S CAPTIVITY AND ESCAPE-OTHER STIRRING EVENTS. In September, 1777, Governor Hamilton of Detroit was "honored" with absolute control of this then western country, by the British government. He had proven by his barbarous and inhuman methods that he was the man of the hour to take charge of affairs and, incite the Indians to murderous raids directed against different sections of the Ohio country. A reward was offered for white scalps, and when Hamilton sent out the savages on their campaigns it is said that the governor sometimes encouraged them by singing war songs attended by the gift of some weapon to "show his sympathy with the Indians in their raids and murderous work." He was charged with establishing regular prices for scalps, but ordinarily none for prisoners; thus inducing the dispatch of captives on the spot. The stronger prisoners were reserved to assist in carrying the plunder to Detroit, and the lives of noted persons were also sometimes spared, their fate being determined later. The Maumee and Sandusky rivers were the great highways for these raiding parties and consequently many famous characters passed through these regions. On February 7, 1778, Daniel Boone and twenty-seven Kentuckians were surprised and captured while making salt at the Blue Licks on (Kentucky) Licking River. Their captors were a party of over one hundred Ohio Indians from the Maumee region under the Shawnee chief Black Fish, and guided by two French-Canadian scouts in the British service, Baubin and Lorimer. James and George Girty are also said to have been with the raiders. Boone himself told his story to the noted John Filson of Kentucky, who published it in 1784 like this : "On the first day of January, 1778, I went with a party of thirty men to Blue Licks on Licking River (Kentucky) to make salt for the different garrisons of the country. On the 7th day of February as I was hunting to procure meat for the company, - 188 - TOLEDO AND THE SANDUSKY REGION - 189 I met with a party of one hundred and two Indians and two Frenchmen on their march against Boonesborough. They pursued and took me and brought me the next day to the Licks, where twenty-seven of my party were, three of them having returned home with the salt. * * * We proceeded with them as prisoners to Old Chillicothe (near now Xenia, Ohio) , the principal Indian town on the Little Miami (home of Black Fish), where we arrived after an uncomfortable journey and very severe weather, on the 18th day of February. We received as good treatment as prisoners could expect from savages. On the 10th day of March following, I and ten of my men were conducted by forty Indians to Detroit, where we arrived on the 30th day and were treated by Governor Hamilton, the British commander at that post, with humanity. During our travels (to Detroit) the Indians entertained me well, and their affection for me was so great that they utterly refused to leave me there with the others; although the governor offered them one hundred pounds sterling for me." Black Fish was at the head of the party in charge of Boone and his fellow prisoners. The route to Detroit, it is claimed by some historians, was by striking east from the Chillicothe town at the head of the Little Miami to the Scioto-Sandusky trail, then north through Lower Sandusky (Fremont) on to Detroit. But at that season of the year especially, the most likely route, as claimed by another authority, would have been from this Chillicothe to the Auglaize; thence along that route to now Defiance; thence down the Maumee trail and across the River Raisin to Detroit. The reward from Hamilton for the ordinary prisoners brought in was one hundred dollars each. But elated with the prospect of having within his possession a famous white leader and American such as was Boone, the governor raised the price for this intrepid backwoodsman to a fabulous sum. The situation shows the two sides of the Indian nature. On occasion they practiced the most awful cruelty and barbarity. But Boone, a brave and fearless fellow, had a manner with him that at once appealed to Black Fish, and he hoped for his adoption into his own family and displayed toward his prisoner real effection. Returning to Boone's story to Filson, he says: "The Indians left my men in captivity with the British at Detroit, and on the 10th day of April brought me toward Old Chillicothe, where we arrived on the 25th day of the same month. This was a long and fatiguing march through an exceedingly fertile country, remarkable for fine springs of water. At Chillicothe I spent my 190 - STORY OF THE MAUMEE VALLEY time as comfortably as I could expect; was adopted according to their custom into a family (Black Fish) where I became a son and had great share in the affection of my new parents, brothers, sisters and friends. I was exceedingly familiar and friendly with them, always appearing as cheerful and satisfied as possible, and they put great confidence in me. I often went hunting with them, and frequently gained their applause for my activity at our shooting matches. I was careful not to exceed many of them in shooting; for no people are more envious than they are in this sport, I could observe, in their countenance and gestures, the greatest expressions of joy when they exceeded me; and when the reverse happened, of envy. The Shawnee king (Black Fish) took great notice of me and treated me with profound respect and entire friendship, often intrusting me to hunt at my liberty. I frequently returned with the spoils of the woods, and as often presented some of what I had taken to him, expressive of my duty to my sovereign. My food and lodgings were in common with them; not so good indeed as I could desire, but necessity makes everything acceptable. I now began to meditate an escape and carefully avoided their suspicion; continuing with them at Old Chilli. cothe until the first of June following, and was then taken by them to the Salt Springs on the Scioto and kept there making salt ten days. During this time I hunted for some of them, and found the land, for a great extent about this river, to exceed the soil of Kentucky, if possible, and remarkably well watered. When I returned to Chillicothe, alarmed to see four hundred and fifty of their choicest warriors, painted and armed in a fearful manner, ready to march against Boonesborough, I determined to escape at the first opportunity. On the 16th, before sunrise, I departed in the most secret manner and arrived at Boonesborough (by way of the Blue Licks) on the 20th (four days) after a journey of one hundred and sixty miles." Boone was received with great rejoicing. As he had been ab. sent four and a half months, his wife supposing him dead, had returned with their children to their old Carolina home on the Yadkin. The life of Daniel Boone of course makes a long and fascinating story in itself. He was now again the bitter foe of the Redskin and they would have been willing to have paid dearly for his scalp. From this on his life was again a series of remarkabl adventures as was the case before his capture. And while these stirring events, like that concerning Boon were taking place along the lower Ohio and in the region of th TOLEDO AND THE SANDUSKY REGION - 191 Miamis and the Scioto, there were great activities relative to the Revolution transpiring in the Ohio section westward from Pittsburgh. Three prominent personages concerned in the latter were Simon Girty, Alexander McKee and Matthew Elliott. To better understand future events, something of the story of these three notorious renegades is also given here before taking up the important expedition of George Rogers Clark. CHAPTER XXIII THE RENEGADES STORY OF THE GIRTY BROTHERS—ALEXANDER McKEE AND MATTHE ELLIOTT—SIMON GIRTY THE KING OF OUTLAWS—HIS BROTHE JAMES AND GEORGE GIRTY ALSO ACTIVE—RENEGADE INFLUENCE I THE MAUMEE AND SANDUSKY REGION. There were four brothers of the Girtys: Thomas, born 1739 in Pennsylvania, on the Susquehanna River ; Simon, born in 1741, just above Harrisburg; James, born in 1743, and George born in 1745. The father, also Simon, was an Irishman, born near Harrisburg and was of a wandering disposition, intemperate and was killed in 1751 in a drunken debauch with the Indians. His wife, Mary Newton, was English. The family home was at Chambells Mills, on the Susquehanna. The Indian named "The Fish" who killed this elder Girty, was in turn slain by John Turner who lived with the Girtys. Turner later married the widow, and they had one son also named John. In August, 1756, the entire family were captured by a roving band of Indians. The step-father Turner was put to death after a revolting torture. The boys, all then well below their majority, witnessed the scene, as did the mother, while sitting on a log with an infant son in her arms. Simon was taken to the Senecas, James to the Shawnees and George to the Delawares. Thomas, the eldest, escaped soon after his capture. Three years after they were taken, Simon, James and George were returned to their friends at Pittsburgh. Thomas was the only one of the brothers to remain loyal to the American cause. He married, made his home on Girty's Run, named for him, where he raised a respectable family. In 1783, with his half-brother, John Turner, he visited Simon while the latter was at Detroit. Evidently under the influence of Simon, the loyalty of Thomas and the half-brother seemed in the balance but soon after their return, both took the oath of allegiance. Thomas died in 1820. John Turner became a man of affairs. He presented a burial ground to the community where he lived and became known as "the benefactor of Squirrel Hill." Of the three renegade brothers, Simon, whose Indian name - 192- TOLEDO AND THE SANDUSKY REGION - 193 was Katepakomen, for a time was loyal to the colonies and exercised considerable influence. He was a guide and interpreter for Lord Dunmore in the Governor's (1774) campaign against Cornstalk. With Simon Kenton he was the bearer of a message from Dunmore to General Lewis and did valiant duty as a scout. He met Colonel Crawford during these operations and the Colonel had in several ways befriended him. C. W. Butterfield gives an authentic story of the Girtys. For his services on behalf of Virginia, Simon was awarded a commission of second lieutenant of militia at Pittsburgh. On February 22, 1775, he took the prescribed oath in open court—"To be faithful and bear true allegiance to his majesty King George the Third," and as Butterfield further says, "Girty, notwithstanding there was trouble of a serious nature between the colonies and the mother country, was well disposed toward the latter." In Lord Dunmore's report to his government of loyal subjects, Girty's name is included in the list. In 1775, as guide and interpreter with pay of five shillings a day, he accompanied James Wood, a commissioner to the Indians on a long tour through the wilderness. In this tour they visited the Upper Sandusky Wyandots, the Shawnee and other towns on the Scioto, together with several other tribes and Girty was evidently faithful to his duties. He was employed again by a commission and sent to the Six Nations, but was dismissed evidently, on account of suspicious behavior. His allegiance now began to waver, the cause being attributed to his failure to receive a captaincy, as a reward for his services to the Americans. He was appointed second lieutenant of a company, but instead of going to the front remained at Pittsburg on detached duty. He was then arrested on a charge of disloyalty but acquitted. At this point in the story there enter upon the stage, Matthew Elliott and Alexander McKee. Elliott, born in Ireland, had resided in Pennsylvania east of the Alleghenies, and at the close of the French and Indian war became a trader at Fort Pitt. He was at this post at the outbreak of serious trouble between the Ohio Indians and Virginia. He was in the Dunmore war with the Shawnees on the Scioto when Dunmore invaded that section; was one of the messengers for the Indians to the Virginia forces bearing a flag of truce, who asked on behalf of Cornstalk's confederacy the terms of peace. He returned to Pittsburg after the war and again engaged in trade with the Indians of the Muskingum section. It was at this time that he was taken by a band of 194 - STORY OF THE MAUMEE VALLEY Wyandots who also appropriated his stock in trade. Quoting Randall : "He escaped to Detroit, where Governor Hamilton treating him as a spy (though it is believed there was a traitorous compact between them) sent him as a prisoner to Quebec, in which guise he was retained until late in 1777. Released on parole (or pretending to be, for in reality he had a captain's commission from the British and was in their service) Elliott returned to Pittsburg where he is found in the spring of 1778. At this time he was at heart a Tory and in sympathy with the British, unscrupulous and deceitful, although assuming loyalty to the Americans." Alexander McKee, born in Pennsylvania, was an associate of Elliott and also a trader among the Indians with headquarters at Pittsburg. He was a deputy Indian agent under Sir William Johnson from 1772 until Johnson's death in 1774. McKee had prospered by his Indian trade and was a man of property and wielded considerable influence in the section around the head of the Ohio. By his suspicious operations he had, in April, 1776, three months before the Declaration of Independence, been put under parole by the colonial authorities at Pittsburg to refrain in any manner from giving aid to the British. Under these situations in the most trying times, McKee and his two negro servants, with Simon Girty; Matthew Elliott and a number of soldiers (Tory sympathizers) on March 28, 1778, deserted Pittsburg and the Americans who had employed them, and struck out for Detroit. On their way they stopped with the Delawares on the Muskingum and according to the Moravian records, by their nefarious misrepresentations came near changing the attitude of that tribe from neutrality to open hostility to the Americans. They circulated among the Delawares the statement that the American forces east of the mountains had been beaten and annihilated by the British; that General Washington was among the slain ; that Congress sitting at Yorktown had passed from existence; and that what was left of the American army was coming over the Alleghenies to wreak their vengeance upon the Indians. Naturally, the report, given credence, created great consternation. In the situation Captain Pipe, pro-British, saw an opening to overthrow his rival, Captain White Eyes, American sympathizer. He urged the Delawares to take up the hatchet against the Americans and "Goschochgung (Coshocton) rang with songs of war, rifles were cleaned, tomahawks sharpened, the warriors TOLEDO AND THE SANDUSKY REGION - 195 painted their faces and decorated themselves with their plumes." But White Eyes was doubtful of the story. He asked for delay until what Girty and Elliott and McKee told could be confirmed. John Heckewelder, the Moravian missionary, with a companion from the Moravian towns, hastened to Pittsburg where they learned of the American victories and not defeats. With all haste and amid constant danger of Indian attacks, Heckewelder and his companion, John Shabosh, with dispatches, started for Goschochgung to contradict the false stories. On the third day out they reached Gnadenhutten. Being assured that among the Indians around Goschochgung, all was excitement and confusion, and that many Indians were preparing for war, without one hour's sleep they started for the Delaware capital yet thirty miles away. They were given a cool reception. Many Indians showed their hostility and for a time the situation was precarious. Even White Eyes and several other chiefs who had befriended Heckewelder, refused his extended hand. The missionary after a pause in the proceedings finally secured the attention of White Eyes who said sternly: "Then you will tell us the truth with regard to what I state to you. Have the American armies been cut to pieces by the English troops? Is General Washington killed? Is there no more Congress, and have the English hung some of them and taken the remainder to England to hang them there? Is the whole country beyond the mountains in the possession of the English, and are the few thousand Athericans who have escaped organizing themselves on this side of the mountains for killing all the Indians in this country; men, women and children?" Heckewelder declared before the whole assembly that the stories that had been told were false. All the leaders then quickly repaired to the council-house, where the dispatches from Pittsburg were read, following which White Eyes made an elaborate peace address. A newspaper containing the account of the capitulation of Burgoyne's army was found with the dispatches. This the chief unfolded and held up so that all could get a full view of it. "See, my friends and relatives," said White Eyes, "This document containeth great events; not the song of a bird, but the truth." Stepping up to Heckewelder, the chief gave the missionary his hand saying : "Brother, you are welcome with us." All present followed his example. Girty, McKee, Elliott and their "horrid brood of followers" slunk away from the Delawares, and on their journey westward sowed the seeds of more disturbance among the Shawnees on their 196 - STORY OF THE MAUMEE VALLEY way to Detroit, where they were welcomed by Hamilton into the British fold. At the Forks of the Muskingum, the renegades met James Girty, who under their influence followed them to Detroit some weeks later and was employed as Indian interpreter. Pennsylvania issued a proclamation declaring Simon Girty, Indian interpreter, Alexander McKee, formerly Indian trader, Matthew Elliott, Indian trader, and James Girty, laborer, as aiding and abetting the common enemy and summoning them bac to trial. George Girty joined his brothers a year later, thus completing the list of "renegades." He was forthwith engaged by the British Indian department as an interpreter and sent among the Shawnees, acting also as disbursing agent in apportioning sup plies to the tribes. At Detroit McKee was appointed captain and interpreter o the British Indian department. Girty was given employment a' interpreter, his pay being two dollars per day. The party on way to Detroit had stopped at (Lower) Sandusky (Fremont) and Simon was sent back there to join the Indians in their onslaughts against the Americans. Butterfield calls attention the fact that up to this time, 1781, when Girty formally took u' his residence with the Wyandots, he had taken no part in the slay ing of his former countrymen—the Americans. He had good knowledge of many of the Indian tongues, especially the Wyandot and Delaware and began to wield much influence in the Mamee and Sandusky regions. He was a leader if not an instigator in' many of the Wyandot, Shawnee and Seneca raids and it seemed. his delight to outdo the savages themselves in his heartless cruel ties. One of the first Girty raids concerns the well known story of Ruddell's Station up the Kentucky Licking River. The head of the attacking force was Col. Henry Bird, who ascended t Maumee River from Detroit with six hundred British soldie and Indians and two pieces of artillery. With the expeditions were Simon, James and George Girty and Alexander McKee Ruddell's Station was surrounded by a part of Bird's force an) the balance of the army arriving the following day, Simon Gir was sent forward with a flag of truce demanding an immediate surrender. Captain Ruddell agreed to the terms, provided h' men would be protected from the Indians. The conditions were accepted by Colonel Bird. But upon the gates of the stockad being opened, the Indians rushed upon the terror stricken fan ilies, killed many of the mothers with suckling babes and wounded TOLEDO AND THE SANDUSKY REGION - 197 many of the inhabitants. The three hundred prisoners, after the Indians had satisfied their thirst for blood, were next day turned back to Bird. But all the cattle at the post were shot down, which later proved serious by the scarcity of supplies. Simon Girty was the "chief conspiring agent of the British." At Detroit he declared that seven or eight hundred warriors, Mingo, Shawnees, Wyandots and even Delawares, could be assembled at Upper Sandusky and marched to the beleaguerment of Fort Laurens. Captain. Lernoult, then in charge at Detroit, dispatched Capt. Henry Bird of the Eighth or King's Regiment and ten soldiers with Girty to Upper Sandusky to aid in the proposed attack. In the latter part of February (1779) with a band of Indians under Girty, the whole force under Bird, plentifully armed and supplied with ammunition from Detroit, set out from Upper Sandusky and secreted themselves about Fort Laurens—on the west bank of the Tuscara was River, near now Bolivar and the first fort built by Americans within present Ohio. By stealth some of the garrison were decoyed from the fort. Sixteen were killed and two taken prisoner. The besieged soldiers left in the works bravely held out until relieved by General McIntosh in March, who on arrival found that Girty's forces had fled. The story of Simon Kenton and Girty will come in with the mention of Kenton later. The Girtys during the year 1779, were the instigators of most of the Indian raids. Maj. Arnet Schuyler de Peyster, a Knickerbocker Tory from New York, was placed in charge at Detroit in October and the Girtys, and sometimes McKee and Elliott circulated from there south of the lakes with parties of savages headed generally by the British. Early in the above month one David Rogers was returning from New Orleans with supplies for the Virginians. He landed his two keel-boats and seventy men on the Kentucky side of the Ohio some three miles below the mouth of the Little Miami. Here as from a clear sky he was suddenly attacked by a party of Shawnees, Mingoes, Wyandots and Delawares under Simon and George Girty and Matthew Elliott, who had been apprised of Rogers' approach. The entire party of whites, forty-two in number, including Rogers, were shot down and tomahawked on the spot, except two who were badly wounded and finally escaped to tell the story. Simon Girty's connection with Colonel Crawford will be told in the chapter on the campaign of Crawford. While the renegade had his headquarters on the Sandusky, even the Chief Half- 198 - STORY OF THE MAUMEE VALLEY King of the Wyandots lent his ear to the council of Girty, who was terrifying to the pioneer homes and to the women and chil- dren. When the Moravian Indians after their capture by the Wyan dots were brought to the Sandusky, according to the story of till missionaries, Girty took much delight in treating the Christiai Indians and the white missionaries as well, with cruelty and dis dain. The missionaries were the cause of the Delawares no joining in the border raids. At Lower Sandusky, Girty had as signed a Frenchman named Francis Levalle to conduct the Mo ravians from that place to Detroit; ordering him to "drive then all the way by land like cattle." Levalle was of a merciful trend treated them with kindness and sent to Detroit for boats to con vey the missionaries there. Before the boats arrived, Girty re turning from an expedition, learned of the Frenchman's human ity and according to Heckewelder of the missionary party, he "be hayed like a madman on hearing that we were still here and tha our conductor had disobeyed orders. He flew at the Frenchman who was in the room adjoining ours most furiously, striking ai him and threatening to split his head in two. He swore the moss horrid oaths respecting us and continued that way until after mid night. His oaths were all to the purport that he never would leave the house until he split our heads in two with the tomahawk and made our brains stick to the walls of the room in which w were Never before did any of us hear the like oaths, or know any one to rave like him. He appeared like an host of evil spirits He would sometimes come up to the bolted door between us and him, threatening to chop it in pieces to get at us. How we should escape the clutches of this white beast in human form no on( could foresee. Yet at the proper time relief was at hand; for in the morning at break of day, and while he was still sleeping two large flat-bottomed boats arrived from Detroit for the purpose of taking us to that place. This was joyful news." In June, 1782, after the Crawford disaster described in a later chapter, the Indians became greatly encouraged and al Wapatomica, near the headwaters of the Muskingum, with a host of Indians. from many tribes, were present Simon Girty, Matthew Elliott and Alexander McKee. Under the advice of the renegades was planned the campaign against Bryant's Station in now Fayette County, Kentucky, and described also later in more detail. The result was the battle of Blue Licks at which George Girty was also present, and on the American side Daniel Boone, TOLEDO AND THE SANDUSKY REGION - 199 After the slaughter of the Americans, George Girty went to the Mad River section in the vicinity of now Logan County and Simon Girty to the Half-King's village on the Sandusky, about five miles below now Upper Sandusky on the west bank of the river. From here he then led an expedition against the border settlement within five miles of Fort Pitt, "on the very day Lieut.-Col. Stephen Bayard, then temporarily in command of the post, was firing a salute in celebration of the confirmation of the news of peace between the United States and Great Britain." Butterfield says this was the last of Simon Girty's border exploits during the American Revolution. He went to Detroit where he remained in the pay of the British Indian Department as interpreter. In the Indian war, which opened about 1790, with the Americans, Girty, however, was on the side of the Indians and was active in the defeat of St. Clair in now Mercer County. In August, 1784, Simon Girty married Catherine Malotte, a prisoner among the Indians and reported as a most comely woman only half the renegade's age. She probably selected this course rather than remain with the Indians. The ceremony was performed on the Canada side of the Detroit River, near now Amherstburg. A daughter, Ann, was born in 1786. Other children were Thomas, Sarah, and a second son Prideaux, born in 1797. With Great Britain acknowledging American Independence, Simon was a leading factor in keeping the Indians loyal to the British. He was under the leadership of McKee and while he no longer lived among the Indians he was constantly in touch with them as an emissary of the British. Matthew Elliott who had taken up his home with the Shawnees was in the same line of work. Alexander McKee had established a store and trading post at the foot of the Maumee Rapids (Maumee) and an Indian council was held there in 1788, attended by Girty as McKee's representative. McKee, Elliott and Simon Girty were present at a grand Indian council held at the Glaize (Defiance) in October, 1793, but Girty was the only white man admitted to the secret talks. Girty, Elliott, and McKee witnessed the battle of Fallen Timbers, August 20, 1794, but took no part in the engagement. After Wayne had destroyed all the Indian corn and other crops along the Maumee, Girty and McKee aided in furnishing the Indians with food. Regarding the situation McKee, Superintendent of Indian Affairs, wrote Colonel England, British commandant at Detroit, as follows: