Tarhe, a prominent chief of the Wyandots, said at the treaty of Greenville, in 1795, to General Wayne: "Brother, you have proposed to us to build our good work on the treaty of Muskingum (Fort Harmar); that treaty I have always considered as founded upon the fairest principles * * * I have always looked upon that treaty to be binding upon the United States and us Indians." The same boundaries were fixed between the United States and the Wyandots and Delawares, as were fixed in the treaty of Fort McIntosh, and the Six Nations ceded to the government all lands west of the Pennsylvania line, but this time a valuable consideration was given for the land, and the United States "relinquished and quit claimed" to the tribes all claims to the territory embraced within the Indian boundaries "to live and hunt upon, and otherwise to occupy as they shall see fit." In other words, and as Secretary of War Knox says, congress had appropriated a sum of money solely for the purpose of extinguishing the Indian title, and for obtaining regular conveyances from the Indians, and this was accordingly accomplished. One who reads of this great triumph of right and justice, and this humane and merciful treatment of a race of savages, is certainly justified in feeling a profound respect and admiration for the fathers of the republic.



CHAPTER IX

THE KENTUCKIANS

—The first men to break through the mountain barriers to face the British and the Indians.

While the government of the United States was thus shaping its policy toward the Indian tribes, a new empire was building on the western waters, that was to wield a more powerful influence in the development of the western country, than all other forces combined. That empire was Kentucky.

The waters of the Ohio "moving majestically along, noiseless as the foot of time, and as resistless," sweep from the junction of the Monongahela and Allegheny to the waters of the Mississippi, a distance of nine hundred miles, enclosing in their upper courses the island of Blannerhassett, below the mouth of the Little Kanawha, the island of Zane, near Wheeling, and leaping in a descent of twenty-two feet in a distance of two miles the Falls opposite the present city of Louisville. The lofty eminences which crowned its banks, the giant forests of oak and maple which everywhere approached its waters, the vines of the frost-grape that wound their sinuous arms around the topmost branches of its tallest trees, presented a spectacle that filled the soul of the traveler with awe and wonder at every graceful turn of the river. In the spring a wonderful transformation took place in the brown woods. There suddenly appeared on every hand the opening flowers of the red-bud, whose whole top appeared as one mass of red blossoms, interspersed with the white and pale-yellow blossoms of the dog-wood, or cornus florida. Thus there extended "in every direction, at the same time, red, white and yellow flowers; at a distance each tree resembling in aspect so many large bunches of flowers every where dispersed in the woods." This was the Belle Riviere, or the beautiful river of the French, which they long and valiantly sought to hold against the advancing tides of English traders and land hunters. This was that glorious gate to the west, through which floated the rafts and keel-boats of the American settlers who took possession of the great northwest.

But notwithstanding the beauty and grandeur of this stream, there was not, at the close of the French and Indian War, on the tenth of February, 1763, a single habitation of either white man or savage on either the Ohio-Indiana side, or on the Kentucky side of this river. Says General William Henry Harrison: "The beautiful Ohio rolled its 'amber tide' until it paid its tribute to the Father of Waters, through an unbroken solitude. Its banks were without a town or village, or even a single cottage, the curling smoke of whose chimney would give the promise of comfort and refreshment to a weary traveler."

The reason for this solitude is apparent. To the south of the Ohio lay the "Dark and Bloody Ground" of Kentucky; "Dark," because of its vast and almost impenetrable forests; "Bloody," because of the constant savage warfare waged within its limits by roving bands of Miamis, Shawnees, Cherokees, and other tribes who resorted thither in pursuit of game. Says Humphrey Marshall, the early historian of Kentucky: "The proud face of creation here presented itself, without the disguise of art. No wood had been felled; no field cleared; no human habitation raised; even the redman of the forest, had not put up his wigwam of poles and bark for habitation. But that mysterious Being, whose productive power, we call Nature, ever bountiful, and ever great, had not spread out this replete and luxurious pasture, without stocking it with numerous flocks and herds; nor were their ferocious attendants, who prey upon them, wanting, to fill up the circle of created beings. Here was seen the timid deer; the towering elk; the fleet stag; the surly bear; the crafty fox; the ravenous wolf; the devouring panther; the insidious wildcat; the haughty buffalo, besides innumerable other creatures, winged, four-footed, or creeping."

This was the common hunting ground of the wild men of the forest. None took exclusive possession, because none dared. The Ohio was the common highway of the Indian tribes, and while their war paths crossed it at frequent intervals, none were so bold as to attempt exclusive dominion over it.

As was once said in the senate of the United States, "You might as well inhibit the fish from swimming down the western rivers to the sea, as to prohibit the people from settling on the new lands." While the great revolution was opening, that should wrest our independence from Great Britain, the stream of "long rifles" and hunting shirt men of Virginia and Pennsylvania, who followed the valleys of the Allegheny and the Blue Ridge from north to south, suddenly broke through the western mountain barriers and flowed in diminutive rivulets into the basins of the Tennessee, the Ohio and the Cumberland; afterwards forming, as Theodore Roosevelt most strikingly says, "a shield of sinewy men thrust in between the people of the seaboard and the red warriors of the wilderness." In 1774, James Harrod built the first log cabin in Kentucky. On the 14th of June, 1775, the first fort of the white man was erected at Boonesborough.

The situation of the first pioneers of Kentucky was indeed precarious. "They were posted," says Mann Butler, "in the heart of the most favorite hunting ground of numerous and hostile tribes of Indians, on the north and on the south; a ground endeared to these tribes by its profusion of the finest game, subsisting on the luxuriant vegetation of this great natural park. * * * * It was emphatically the Eden of the red man." On the waters of the Wabash, the Miamis and the Scioto, dwelt powerful confederacies of savages who regarded their intrusion as a menace and a threat. Behind these savages stood the minions of Great Britain, urging war on non-combatants and offering bounties for scalps. It was three or four hundred miles to the nearest fort at Pittsburgh, and a wilderness of forest and mountain fully six hundred miles in extent, separated them from the capital of Virginia.

But it is to the everlasting glory of these men that they knew no fear, and valiantly held their ground. Standing as they were, on the very outskirts of civilization, they looked on the perils of the wilderness with unquailing eye, and with stout hearts and brawny arms they carried forward the standards of the republic. The thin line of skirmishers thus thrown far out beyond the western ranges, was all that stood between the grasping power of Great Britain, and the realization of her desire for absolute dominion over the western country. The ambitious projects of her rebel children must be defeated, and they must be driven back beyond the great watershed which they had crossed. The western waters were to be preserved for the red allies of England, who supplied her merchants with furs and peltries. The great "game preserve," as Roosevelt called it, must not be invaded. Years before, a royal governor of Georgia had written: "This matter, my Lords, of granting large bodies of land in the back part of any of his majesty's northern colonies, appears to me in a very serious and alarming light; and I humbly conceive, may be attended with the greatest and worst of consequences; for, my Lords, if a vast territory be granted to any set of gentlemen, who really mean to people it, and actually do so, it must draw and carry out a great number of people from Great Britain, and I apprehend they will soon become a kind of separate and independent people, who will set up for themselves; that they will soon have manufactures of their own; and in process of time they will become formidable enough to oppose his majesty's authority." This, "kind of separate and independent people," had now in fact and in reality appeared, and were evincing a most decided inclination to "set up for themselves" on the king's domain.

The task of faithfully portraying the heroic valour of this handful of men who defended their stockades and cabins, their wives and children, against British hate and savage inroad, is better left to those who have received the account from actual survivors. In 1777, the entire army of Kentucky amounted to one hundred and two men; there were twenty-two at Boonesborough, sixty-five at Harrodsburgh, and fifteen at St. Asaphs, or Logan's fort. Around these frontier stations skulked the Shawnees, hiding behind stumps of trees and in the weeds and cornfields. They waylaid the men and boys working in the fields, beset every pathway, watched every watering place, and shot down the cattle. "In the night," says Humphrey Marshall, "they will place themselves near the fort gate, ready to sacrifice the first person who shall appear in the morning; in the day, if there be any cover, such as grass, a bush, a large clod of earth, or a stone as big as a bushel, they will avail themselves of it, to approach the fort, by slipping forward on their bellies, within gun-shot, and then, whosoever appears first, gets the fire, while the assailant makes his retreat behind the smoke from the gun. At other times they approach the walls, or palisades, with the utmost audacity, and attempt to fire them, or beat down the gate. They often make feints, to draw out the garrison, on one side of the fort, and if practicable, enter it by surprise on the other. And when their stock of provisions is exhausted, this being an individual affair, they supply themselves by hunting; and again, frequently return to the siege, if by any means they hope to get a scalp." In this same year of 1777, St. Asaphs, or Logan's fort, was besieged by the savages from the twentieth of May until the month of September. "The Indians made their attack upon Logan's fort with more than their usual secrecy. While the women, guarded by a part of the men, were milking the cows outside of the fort, they were suddenly fired upon by a large body of Indians, till then concealed in the thick cane which stood about the cabin. By this fire, one man was killed and two others wounded, one mortally; the residue, with the women, got into the fort. When, having reached the protection of its walls, one of the wounded men was discovered, left alive on the ground. Captain Logan, distressed for his situation, and keenly alive to the anguish of his family, who could see him from the fort, weltering in his blood, exposed every instant to be scalped by the savages, endeavored in vain for some time to raise a party for his rescue. The garrison was, however, so small, and the danger so appalling, that he met only objection and refusal; until John Martin, stimulated by his captain, proceeded with him to the front gate. At this instant, Harrison, the wounded man, appeared to raise himself on his hands and knees, as if able to help himself, and Martin withdrew, deterred by the obvious hazard; Logan, incapable of abandoning a man under his command, was only nerved to newer and more vigorous exertions to relieve the wounded man, who, by that time, exhausted by his previous efforts, after crawling a few paces, had fallen to the ground; the generous and gallant captain took him in his arms, amidst a shower of bullets, many of which struck the palisades about his head, and brought him into the fort to his despairing family."

Let another tale be related of this same Benjamin Logan and this same siege. "Another danger now assailed this little garrison. 'There was but little powder or ball in the fort; nor any prospect of supply from the neighboring stations, could it even have been sent for, without the most imminent danger.' The enemy continued before the fort; there was no ammunition nearer than the settlements at Holston, distant about two hundred miles; and the garrison must surrender to horrors worse than death, unless a supply of this indispensable article could be obtained. Nor was it an easy task to pass through so wily an enemy or the danger and difficulty much lessened, when even beyond the besiegers; owing to the obscure and mountainous way, it was necessary to pass, through a foe scattered in almost every direction. But Captain Logan was not a man to falter where duty called, because encompassed with danger. With two companions he left the fort in the night and with the sagacity of a hunter, and the hardihood of a soldier, avoided the trodden way of Cumberland Gap, which was most likely to be waylaid by the Indians, and explored his passage over the Cumberland Mountain, where no man had ever traveled before, through brush and cane, over rocks and precipices, sufficient to have daunted the most hardy and fearless. In less than ten days from his departure, Captain Logan, having obtained the desired supply, and leaving it with directions to his men, how to conduct their march, arrived alone and safe at his 'diminutive station,' which had been almost reduced to despair. The escort with the ammunition, observing the directions given it, arrived in safety, and the garrison once more felt itself able to defend the fort and master its own fortune." The siege was at last raised, but on the body of one of the detachment were found the proclamations of the British governor of Canada, offering protection to those who should embrace the cause of the king, but threatening vengeance on all who refused their allegiance. Thus it was brought home to the struggling pioneers of Kentucky, that the British and the Indians were in league against them.

Men like Daniel Boone, James Harrod and Benjamin Logan, fighting, bleeding, hunting game for the beleaguered garrisons, were the precursors of George Rogers Clark. Clark possessed prescience. He knew the British had determined on the extermination of the Kentucky settlements, because these settlements thwarted the British plan of preserving the west as a red man's wilderness. He had been in the fights at Harrodstown, in 1777, and doubtless knew that the British partisans at Detroit were paying money for scalps. Knowing that all the irruptions of savages into Kentucky were encouraged and set on foot from Kaskaskia, Vincennes and Detroit, he suddenly resolved upon the bold project of capturing these strongholds. This would put the British upon the defensive, relieve the frontiers of Kentucky, Virginia and Pennsylvania, and in the end add a vast territory to the domain of the republic. In the accomplishment of all these designs the soil of Kentucky was to be used as a base of operations.

It is not the purpose of this work to give a history of the Clark campaigns, nor of the daring stratagems of that great leader in effecting his purposes. Kaskaskia, Cahokia, and Vincennes, each in turn fell into his hands, and when Henry Hamilton, the British lieutenant-governor at Detroit, received the astounding news that the French on the Mississippi and the Wabash had sworn allegiance to the Americans, he abandoned his enterprise of capturing Fort Pitt and at once entered upon a campaign to retrieve the lost possessions and "sweep" the Kentuckians out of the country. His scheme was formidable. With a thousand men, and with artillery to demolish the stockades and destroy the frontier posts, he proposed to drive the settlers back across the mountains. "Undoubtedly," says Roosevelt, "he would have carried out his plan, and have destroyed all the settlements west of the Alleghenies, had he been allowed to wait until the mild weather brought him his host of Indian allies and his reinforcements of regulars and militia from Detroit." How Clark with his Virginians and Kentuckians, and a few French allies from the western posts, anticipated his attack, swam the drowned lands of the Wabash, and surprised him at Vincennes, has been well told. Instead of "sweeping" Kentucky, the "hair-buyer" general was taken a prisoner to the dungeons of Virginia, and the newborn possessions were erected into the county of Illinois.

For a number of years following the revolution, there were those in the east, and especially in New England, who suffered from myopia. They utterly failed to see the future of the republic, or the importance of holding the western country. To them, such men as Harrod and Kenton, Logan and Boone, were "lawless borderers" and willful aggressors on the rights of the red man. And yet, back of the crowning diplomacy of John Jay, that placed our western frontiers on the banks of the Mississippi, and extended our northern lines to the thread of the lakes, lay the stern resolution of the men of Kentucky and the supreme audacity of the mind of Clark.

From this crucible of fire and blood a great people emerged, hardy, brave, chivalrous, quick to respond to the cries and sufferings of others, but with an iron hate of all things Indian and British stamped eternally in their hearts. Others might be craven, but they were not. Every savage incursion was answered by a counterstroke. The last red man had not retreated across the Ohio, before the mounted riflemen of Kentucky, leaving old men and boys behind to supply the settlements, and with a little corn meal and jerked venison for their provision, sallied forth to take their vengeance and demolish the Indian towns. Federal commanders, secretaries of war, even Presidents might remonstrate, but all in vain. They had come forth into the wilderness to form their homes and clear the land, and make way for civilization, and they would not go back. In every family there was the story of a midnight massacre, or of a wife or child struck down by the tomahawk, or of a loving father burned at the stake. To plead with men whose souls had been seared by outrage and horror was unavailing. All savages appeared the same to them. They shot without discrimination, and shot to kill. They marched with Clark, they rode with Harmar, and they fought with Wayne and Harrison. In the war of 1812, more than seven thousand Kentuckians took the field. It was, as Butler has aptly termed it, "a state in arms." You may call them "barbarians," "rude frontiersmen," or what you will, but it took men such as these to advance the outposts of the nation and to conquer the west. Strongly, irresistibly, is the soul of the patriot moved by the story of their deeds.

With all its bloody toil and suffering, Kentucky grew. After the spring of 1779, when Clark had captured Vincennes, the danger of extermination was over. Following the revolution a strong and ever increasing stream of boats passed down the Ohio. The rich lands, the luxuriant pastures, the bounteous harvests of corn and wheat, were great attractions. Josiah Harmar, writing from the mouth of the Muskingum in May, 1787, reports one hundred and seventy-seven boats, two thousand six hundred and eighty-nine men, women and children, one thousand three hundred and thirty-three horses, seven hundred and sixty-six cattle, and one hundred and two wagons, as passing that point, bound for Limestone and the rapids at Louisville. On the ninth of December of the same year, he reports one hundred and forty-six boats, three thousand one hundred and ninety-six souls, one thousand three hundred and eighty-one horses, one hundred and sixty-five wagons, one hundred and seventy-one cattle, and two hundred and forty-five sheep as on the way to Kentucky, between the first of June and the date of his communication. In 1790, the first census of the United States showed a population of seventy-three thousand six hundred and seventy-seven. On June 1st, 1792, Kentucky became the fifteenth commonwealth in the federal union; the first of the great states west of the Alleghenies that were to add so much wealth, resource and vital strength to the government of the United States.



CHAPTER X

THE BRITISH POLICIES

—The British reluctant to surrender the control of the Northwest—their tampering with the Indian tribes.

The seventh article of the definitive treaty of peace between the United States and Great Britain in 1783, provided that "His Britannic Majesty," should, with all convenient speed, "withdraw all his armies, garrisons, and fleets from the said United States, and from every port, place and harbour within the same," but when demand was made upon General Frederick Haldimand, the British governor of Canada, for the important posts of Niagara, Oswego, Michillimacinac and Detroit, he refused to surrender them up, alleging that he had no explicit orders so to do, and that until he had received such commands, he conceived it to be his duty as a soldier to take no step in that direction. This action of Haldimand was cool and deliberate and received the full and entire approbation of the British cabinet. Tories, and apologists for Great Britain, have written much about a justification for this action, but there is no real justification. Lord Carmarthen, the British secretary of state, afterwards said to John Adams that English creditors had met with unlawful impediments in the collection of their debts, but the real reason why England violated her treaty he did not state. She retained the posts to control the tribes. She looked with covetous eye on the lucrative fur-trade of the northwest territory upon which the commerce of Canada was in great measure dependent, and sooner than resist the entreaties of her merchants and traders, she was willing to embroil a people of her own race and blood, in a series of long and merciless wars with murderous savages. For the fact remains, that if England had promptly surrendered up the posts; had not interfered with our negotiations for peace with the Indian tribes; had refused to encourage any confederacy, and had instructed her commanders to keep their spies and agents out of American territory, the murders on the Ohio, the slaughter of innocents, and the long, costly and bloody campaigns in the Indian country might have been avoided.

Nothing can ever extenuate the conduct of England in keeping in her employ and service such men as Alexander McKee, Matthew Elliott and Simon Girty. The chief rendezvous of the tribes after the revolution was at Detroit. Here were located a British garrison and a British Indian agency. This agency, while guarding the trade in peltries, also kept its eye on the fleets that descended the Ohio, on the growing settlements of Kentucky, and warned the Indians against American encroachment. In 1778, and while the revolution was in progress, the missionary John Heckewelder, noted the arrival at Goschochking on the Muskingum, of three renegades and fugitives from Pittsburg. They were McKee, Elliott and Girty. McKee and Elliott had both been traders among the Indians and understood their language. All three had deserted the American cause and were flying into the arms of the British. They told the Delawares and Wyandots, "That it was the determination of the American people to kill and destroy the whole Indian race, be they friends or foes, and possess themselves of their country; and that, at this time, while they were embodying themselves for the purpose, they were preparing fine sounding speeches to deceive them, that they might with more safety fall upon and murder them. That now was the time, and the only time, for all nations to rise, and turn out to a man against these intruders, and not even suffer them to cross the Ohio, but fall upon them where they should find them; which if not done without delay, their country would be lost to them forever." The same men were now inculcating the same doctrines at Detroit. They pointed out to the Indians that the Americans were bent on extinguishing all their council fires with the best blood of the nations; that despite all their fair promises and pretensions, the Americans cared nothing for the tribes, but only for their lands. That England by her treaty had not ceded a foot of the Indian territory to the United States. That all the treaties thus far concluded with the tribes by the Americans, were one-sided and unfair, made at the American forts, and at the cannon's mouth.

A powerful figure now arose among the savages of the north. Joseph Brant was a principal chief of the Mohawk tribe of the Six Nations of New York. His sister Molly was the acknowledged wife of the famous British Indian superintendent, Sir William Johnson. In his youth he had been sent by Johnson to Doctor Wheelock's charity school at Lebanon, Connecticut, where he learned to speak and write English and acquired some knowledge of history and literature. In the war of the revolution the Mohawks sided with England, and Brant was given a colonel's commission. He remained after the war a pensioner of the British government, and General Arthur St. Clair is authority for the statement that he received an annual stipend of four hundred pounds sterling.

The Mohawks had been terribly shattered and broken by the revolution, but they still retained that ascendency among the tribes that resulted from their former bravery and prowess. In the mind of Brant there now dawned the grand scheme of forming a confederacy of all the northwestern tribes to oppose the advance of the American settlements. The first arbitrary assumptions of the continental congress gave him a great leverage. They had assumed to exercise an unlimited power of disposal over the Indian lands. The surveyors of the government were advancing west of the Pennsylvania line and staking off the first ranges. Now was the opportune time to fan the flame of savage jealousy, and stand with united front against the foe.

It is probable that Brant took part in the grand council held at Coshocton in 1785, and reported to Captain John Doughty by Alexander McCormick. The account of McCormick relates that there "were present the chiefs of many nations," and that "the object of this council was to unite themselves against the white people." There was an excited activity on the part of McKee, Elliott, Caldwell and Girty and they were endeavoring to keep the tribes away from the American treaties. The newspapers of London in speaking of Brant's arrival in England in the latter part of the same year, gave accounts of his lately having presided over a "grand congress of confederate chiefs of the Indian nations in America," and said that Brant had been appointed to the chief command in the war which the Indians meditated against the United States.

In the month of December, 1785, the distinguished warrior arrived at the British capital. In an age of less duplicity his coming might have excited some feeling of compassion. He had journeyed three thousand miles across the seas, to see what the great English king could do to restore the broken fortunes of his people. The beautiful valley of the Mohawk was theirs no longer. Their ancient castles and villages had been destroyed, or were in the hands of strangers. All had been lost in the service of the great "father" across the waters. What would that "father" now do for his ruined and sorrowing children? He reminded Lord Sidney of the colonial department, that in every war of England with her enemies the Iroquois had fought on her side; that they were struck with astonishment at hearing that they had been entirely forgotten in the treaty of peace, and that they could not believe it possible that they could be so neglected by a nation whom they had served with so much zeal and fidelity. The Americans were surveying the lands north of the Ohio, and Brant now desired to know whether the tribes were still to be regarded as "His Majesty's faithful allies" and whether they were to have that support and countenance such as old and true friends might expect. In other words, the blunt savage wanted to know whether England would now support the Indian tribes in beginning hostilities against the United States.

The conduct of the British was characteristic. The lands in controversy had just been ceded by solemn treaty to the new republic. To openly espouse the cause of Brant was to declare war. A little finesse must be resorted to in order to evade the leading question, and at the same time hold the tribes. They therefore wined and dined the American chief, and presented him to the king and queen, but promised him nothing. Lord Sidney rained platitudes. He said the king was always ready to attend to the future welfare of the tribes, and upon every occasion wherein their happiness might be concerned he was ready to give further testimony of his royal favor. He hoped that they might remain united and that their measures might be conducted with temper and moderation. In the meantime, the arts of diplomacy must be employed. The barbarian chief must be bribed with a pension, and covertly used as a tool and instrument of British design.

The great chief then and afterwards entertained misgivings, but he proceeded to play the dupe. In November and December, 1786, he was back in America, and a great council of the northwestern tribes was convened at the Huron village, near the mouth of the Detroit river. Present were the Five Nations, the Hurons or Wyandots, the Delawares, Shawnees, Ottawas, Potawatomi, Miamis, and some scattering bands of the Cherokees. A letter was here formulated and addressed to the congress of the United States, which at once marks Joseph Brant and the British agents back of him as the originators of the idea that all the Indian lands were held in common by all the tribes, and that no single tribe had the right to alienate. In answer to the treaties of Fort Stanwix and Fort McIntosh, they alleged that congress had hitherto managed everything in their own way, and had kindled council fires where they thought proper; that they had insisted on holding separate treaties with distinct tribes, and had entirely neglected the Indian plan of a general conference. They held it to be "indispensably necessary" that any cession of Indian lands should be made in the most public manner, "and by the united voice of the confederacy;" all partial treaties were void and of no effect. They urged a full meeting and treaty with all the tribes; warned the United States to keep their surveyors and other people from crossing the Ohio, and closed with these words: "Brothers: It shall not be our fault if the plans which we have suggested to you should not be carried into execution. In that case the event will be very precarious, and if farther ruptures ensue, we hope to be able to exculpate ourselves and shall most assuredly, with our united force, be obliged to defend those rights and privileges which have been transmitted to us by our ancestors; and if we should be thereby reduced to misfortune, the world will pity us when they think of the amicable proposals which we now make to prevent the unnecessary effusion of blood. These are our thoughts and firm resolves, and we earnestly desire that you transmit to us, as soon as possible, your answer, be it what it may."

Brant's whole scheme of a confederacy among savage tribes was, of course, wild and chimerical. The same savage hate and jealousy which was now directed toward the Americans, would, at the first favorable moment, break out in fiery strifes and dissensions in the Indian camp, and consume any alliance that might be formed. To imagine that the Miami and the Cherokee, the Shawnee and the Delaware, the Iroquois and Wyandot, after centuries of war and bloodshed, could be suddenly brought together in any efficient league or combination, that would withstand the test of time, was vain and foolish. The history of the Indian tribes in America from the days of the Jesuit fathers down to the day of Brant, had shown first one tribe and then another in the ascendency. Never at any time had there been peace and concord. Even within the councils of the same tribe, contentions frequently arose between sachems and chiefs. It is well known that in his later days the Little Turtle was almost universally despised by the other Miami chieftains. A deadly hatred existed between the Cornplanter and Joseph Brant. Tecumseh and Winamac were enemies. Governor Arthur St. Clair, writing to the President of the United States, on May 2, 1789, reported that a jealousy subsisted between the tribes that attended the treaty at Fort Harmar; that they did not consider themselves as one people and that it would not be difficult, if circumstances required it, "to set them at deadly variance."

Equally pretentious was Brant's claim of a common ownership of the Indian lands. The Iroquois themselves had never recognized any such doctrine. In October, 1768, at the English treaty of Fort Stanwix, they had sold to the British government by bargain and sale, a great strip of country south of the Ohio river, and had fixed the line of that stream as the boundary between themselves and the English. At that time they claimed to be the absolute owners of the lands ceded, to the exclusion of all other tribes. At the treaty of Fort Wayne, in 1809, between the United States and the northwestern tribes, the Miamis claimed the absolute fee in all the lands along the Wabash, and refused to cede any territory until a concession to that effect was made by William Henry Harrison. In the instructions of Congress, of date October 26th, 1787, to General Arthur St. Clair, relative to the negotiation of a treaty in the northern department, which were the same instructions governing the negotiations at Fort Harmar in January 1789, specific directions were given to defeat all confederations and combinations among the tribes, for congress clearly saw the British hand behind Brant's proposed league, and knew how futile it was to recognize any such savage alliance.

The British officials were well aware of the shortcomings of Brant's league, but they hailed its advent with delight. If the tribes could be collected together under the shadow of the British forts, and freely plied by the British agents, they could be kept hostile to the American vanguard. If the government of the United States could not acquire a foothold north of the Ohio, the British forts were safe, and the trade in peltries secure. The result of this policy was of course foreseen. It meant war between the United States and the Indian tribes. But in the meantime England would hold the fur-trade. Thus in cold blood and with deliberation did the British rulers pave the way to the coming hostilities.

In November, 1786, Sir Guy Carleton, now Lord Dorchester, arrived at Quebec. Like most of the royal officers of that day he looked with disdain upon the new republic of the United States. It was evident that the old confederation could not be held together much longer. There was constant strife and jealousy between the states. In Massachusetts Shays' rebellion was in progress, which seemed at times to threaten the existence of the commonwealth itself. The courts were occluded, and the administration of justice held in contempt. In the west, the people of Kentucky were embittered toward the states of the Atlantic seaboard. Their prosperity in great measure depended upon the open navigation of the Mississippi, and a free market at New Orleans. Spain had denied them both, and in the eyes of the Kentuckians congress seemed disposed to let Spain have her own way.

Under all these circumstances, which appeared to be so inauspicious for the American government, Dorchester determined to keep a most diligent eye on the situation. Spain had the nominal control, at least, of the lands west of the Mississippi. She had designs on the western territory of the United States, and was about to open up an intrigue with James Wilkinson and other treasonable conspirators in Kentucky, who had in mind a separation from the eastern states. To hold the posts within the American territory, was to be on the ground and ready to act, either in the event of a dissolution of the old confederation, or in case of an attempt on the part of Spain to seize any portion of the western country. Added to all this was the imperative necessity, as Dorchester looked at it, of maintaining a "game preserve" for the western tribes. If the Americans advanced, the Indian hunting grounds were endangered, and this would result in lessening the profits of the English merchants.

Brant was impatient, but Dorchester, like Lord Sidney, proceeded cautiously. On March 22, 1787, Sir John Johnson, the British Indian superintendent wrote to Brant, expressing his happiness that things had turned out prosperously in the Indian country, and saying that he hoped that the chief's measures might have the effect of preventing the Americans from encroaching on the Indian lands. "I hope," he writes, "in all your decisions you will conduct yourselves with prudence and moderation, having always an eye to the friendship that has so long subsisted between you and the King's subjects, upon whom you alone can and ought to depend. You have no reason to fear any breach of promise on the part of the King. Is he not every year giving you fresh proofs of his friendship? What greater could you expect than is now about to be performed, by giving an ample compensation for your losses, which is yet withheld from us, his subjects? Do not suffer bad men or evil advisors to lead you astray; everything that is reasonable and consistent with the friendship that ought to be preserved between us, will be done for you all. Do not suffer an idea to hold a place in your mind, that it will be for your interests to sit still and see the Americans attempt the posts. It is for your sakes chiefly, if not entirely that we hold them. If you become indifferent about them, they may perhaps be given up; what security would you then have? You would be left at the mercy of a people whose blood calls aloud for revenge." On May 29th of the same year, Major Matthews of the English army, who had been assigned to the command of the king's forces at Detroit, communicated with Brant from Fort Niagara, expressing the views of Dorchester as follows: "In the future his Lordship wishes them (the Indians) to act as is best for their interests; he cannot begin a war with the Americans, because some of their people encroach and make depredations upon parts of the Indian country; but they must see it is his Lordship's intention to defend the posts; and while these are preserved, the Indians must find great security therefrom, and consequently the Americans greater difficulty in taking possession of their lands; but should they once become masters of the posts, they will surround the Indians, and accomplish their purposes with little trouble. From a consideration of all which, it therefore remains with the Indians to decide what is most for their own interests, and to let his Lordship know their determination, that he may take measures accordingly; but, whatever their resolution is, it should be taken as by one and the same people, by which means they will be respected and become strong; but if they divide, and act one part against the other, they will become weak, and help to destroy each other. This, my dear Joseph, is the substance of what his Lordship desired me to tell you, and I request that you will give his sentiments that mature consideration which their justice, generosity, and desire to promote the welfare and happiness of the Indians, must appear to all the world to merit." Thus did this noble lord, while refraining from making an open and a manly declaration of war, secretly and clandestinely set on these savages; appealing on the one hand to their fear of American encroachment, and urging on the other the security the tribes must feel from the British retention of the frontier posts. In the meantime, he bided that moment, when the weakness of the states or their mutual dissensions would enable him to come out in the open and seize that territory which the king had lately lost. One is reminded of the remarks that Tecumseh made to Governor William Henry Harrison in 1810. "He said he knew the latter (i. e., the English) were always urging the Indians to war for their advantage, and not to benefit his countrymen; and here he clapped his hands, and imitated a person who halloos at a dog, to set him to fight with another."

Pursuant to the instructions of the continental congress heretofore referred to, Governor Arthur St. Clair, in the year 1788, opened up a correspondence with the tribes of the northwest in order to bring them to a treaty. The government, though suffering from a paucity of funds, had determined to enter into engagements looking to the fair and equitable purchase of the Indian lands. It was plainly to be seen that unless an accommodation could be arrived at with the tribes that the government either had to abandon the territory north of the Ohio, or levy war. This they were reluctant to do. The treasury was practically empty and the people poor. The country had practically no standing army, nor was there the means to raise one. In fact, the new constitution had not as yet been ratified by an adequate number of states, and the first president of the United States had not been elected. Again, something must be done, if possible, to relieve the sufferings of the western people. They were loudly complaining of the inattention and neglect of the government, and if they were left entirely without support in fighting their way to the Spanish markets at New Orleans, and in repelling the constant attacks of the Indian raiders urged on by British agents, grave doubts might justly be entertained of their continued loyalty. In fact, during the month of November, in this same year of 1788, the infamous Dr. John Connolly, arrived at Louisville. He came as a direct agent of Lord Dorchester, seeking to undermine the allegiance of the Kentuckians to their government, and offering them arms and ammunition with which to attack the Spaniards. This inglorious mission ended in Connolly's disgraceful and cowardly flight.

In their efforts to negotiate a fair compact, the United States had some reason to anticipate a friendly disposition on the part of the Delawares and Wyandots. Large numbers of the latter tribe had been won over to the principles of Christianity and were inclined towards peace, but the Miamis of the Wabash, the Shawnees and the Kickapoos were hostile. At Miamitown were the Little Turtle and Le Gris; close by, were the Shawnees under Blue Jacket; all were under the influence of the Girtys, George and Simon, and all had been engaged in the Indian raids. The Miami confederates at Eel River, Ouiatenon and Tippecanoe all looked to the head men at Miamitown for inspiration. Miamitown was in turn connected with the British agency at Detroit. The confederates of the Three Fires, the Ottawas or Tawas, the Chippewas and Potawatomi, otherwise known as the "Lake Tribes," were also under the influence of the British. On July 5th, 1788, General Arthur St. Clair, writing to the Secretary of War from Pittsburg, said that the western tribes, meaning those under the influence of the Miami chiefs, had been so successful in their depredations on the Ohio river, their settlements were so distant and "their country so difficult," that they imagined themselves to be perfectly safe, and that as they were able by these incursions "to gratify at once their passions of avarice and revenge, and their desire for spirituous liquors, every boat carrying more or less of that commodity, few of them may be expected to attend; nor are they much to be depended on should they attend generally." He further remarked: "Our settlements are extending themselves so fast on every quarter where they can be extended; our pretensions to the country they inhabit have been made known to them in so unequivocal a manner, and the consequences are so certain and so dreadful to them, that there is little probability of there ever being any cordiality between us. The idea of being ultimately obliged to abandon their country rankles in their minds, and our British neighbors, at the same time that they deny the cession of the country made by them, suffer them not to forget for a moment the claim that is founded upon it."

The first attempt of the government in 1788, to form a treaty ended in disaster. In order to mollify the tribes, it was proposed to hold the negotiations at the falls of the Muskingum river, in what the Indians were pleased to term "their own country" and "beyond the guns of any fort." General Josiah Harrnar was instructed to erect a council house there, and appropriate buildings in which to house the goods to be distributed among the Indians. On the night of July 12th, some Ottawas and Chippewas attacked the sentries and attempted to steal the goods they were guarding. Two soldiers were killed and two wounded. Friendly Delawares who arrived identified an Indian who was slain in the fight, as an Ottawa. It was learned that both the Chippewas and Ottawas were opposed to a treaty, "and in favor of war, unless the whites would agree to the Ohio as a boundary line." Who set on these wild tribes from the north may well be imagined. General St. Clair now determined to hold the treaty at Fort Harmar at the mouth of the Muskingum, and sent a message to the tribes now collecting on the Detroit river, to that effect.

The machinations of the British agents at Detroit in the summer and autumn of 1788, while involved in some degree of mystery, seem to have been about as follows: Lord Dorchester was apprehensive that the Americans contemplated the taking of the posts and thereby uprooting the British influence. In order to avoid such action, it might be the safer policy to make certain concessions and advise the Indians to give up a small portion of the territory north of the Ohio, rather than to bring on an armed conflict. But all the tribes must be kept together, if possible, and under the direction of the authorities at Detroit. No single tribe must be allowed to negotiate a separate treaty, for that might result in the cultivation of friendly relations with the United States, and if one tribe could be brought under the American influence, this might ultimately lead to the disintegration of the British power over all. Therefore it was resolved that before any negotiations were entered into with General St. Clair, that another grand council of the northwestern tribes should be held in the valley of the Miami of the Lake, or Maumee, and that to that council should be summoned the principal sachems and warriors of all the tribes. Alexander McKee, the British Indian agent, was to be there, and Joseph Brant, and all action taken was to be under their supervision and control.

On July 14th, General Richard Butler wrote to General St. Clair that about eighty chiefs were present at the Detroit river, awaiting the arrival of Brant. On August the 10th that chieftain reached Detroit, but instead of meeting with unanimity of counsel, he found that the Wyandots were for "a private and separate meeting with the Americans to settle matters for themselves," while the warlike Miamis were against any peace at all and in favor of open hostilities. After five weeks of waiting and cajolery, Brant got them all together in the Miami valley, and the council started to deliberate. The Hurons, Chippewas, Ottawas, Potawatomi and Delawares stood with Brant, and in favor of surrendering up a small portion of their country, rather than of entering headlong into a destructive war. The Potawatomi, Ottawas and Chippewas were far to the north and were probably indifferent; the Wyandots and Delawares were sincerely for peace. But insuperable objections were now offered by the Miamis, Kickapoos and the Shawnees. Horse stealing was their "best harvest," and the plundering of the boats they would not forego. In vain did the Wyandots urge a treaty. They presented the Miamis with a large string of wampum, but this was refused. They then laid it on the shoulder of a principal Miami chieftain, but he turned to one side and let it fall on the ground without making any answer. In the end the Wyandots withdrew and the council broke up in confusion. It was plain that if any agreement was entered into with the American government that it would not be through any concerted action on the part of the tribes. Tribal jealousy and savage hate rendered that impossible.

It has been related that when Brant perceived that his confederacy was a failure, and that he could not secure united action, that he said "that if five of the Six Nations had sold themselves to the devil, otherwise the Yankees, that he did not intend that the fierce Miamis, Shawnees and Kickapoos should do so." However this may be, it is evident that from the time of the breaking up of the Indian council on the Miami, that Brant and the British agents did all that lay within their power to frustrate the American negotiations with the Wyandots and Delawares at Fort Harmar. According to reports reaching the ears of General St. Clair, stories were placed in circulation among the tribes that in case they attended the treaty, that the Americans would kill them all, either by putting poison in the spirits, or by inoculating the blankets that would be presented to them, with the dreaded smallpox. Brant, after coming within sixty miles of the fort, turned back to Detroit, taking all the Mohawks with him, and urging back the oncoming tribes of the Shawnees and Miamis. "It is notorious," says President Washington, in a letter to governor Clinton, of New York on December 1st, 1790, "that he (Brant) used all the art and influence of which he was possessed to prevent any treaty being held; and that, except in a small degree, General St. Clair aimed at no more land by the treaty of Muskingum than had been ceded by the preceding treaties."

Thus did the British government, through its duly authorized agents, its governor and army officers, retain the posts belonging to the new republic, encourage the tribes in their depredations, and defeat the pacific intentions of the American people, and all from the sordid motives of gain. On April 30th, 1789, when George Washington was inaugurated as the first President, every savage chieftain along the Wabash, or dwelling at the forks of the Maumee, was engaged in active warfare against the people of the United States, largely through the instrumentality of the British officials.



CHAPTER XI

JOSIAH HARMAR

—The first military invasion of the Northwest by the Federal Government after the Revolution.

The treaty of Fort Harmar, on January 9th, 1789, so far as the Wabash tribes were concerned, was unavailing. The raids of the Miamis and the Shawnees continued. Murders south of the Ohio were of almost daily occurrence. For six or seven hundred miles along that river the inhabitants were kept in a perpetual state of alarm. In Kentucky, killings and depredations took place in almost every direction; at Crab Orchard, Floyd's Fork and numerous other places. Boats were constantly attacked on the Ohio and whole families slaughtered, and their goods and cattle destroyed.

One hundred and forty-five miles northwest of the mouth of the Kentucky river were the Indian villages at Ouiatenon, on the Wabash river. On the south side of that stream and near the outlet of Wea creek, were the towns of the Weas; across the river from these towns was a Kickapoo village. About eighteen miles above Ouiatenon was the important trading post of Kethtipecanunck (Petit Piconne or Tippecanoe) near the mouth of the Tippecanoe river, commanded by the chieftain Little Face. About six miles above the present city of Logansport, and on the Eel river, was the Miami village of Kenapacomaqua or L'Anguille, commanded by "The Soldier." At the junction of the St. Marys and the St. Joseph, one hundred and sixty miles north of the Kentucky river, was the principal Indian village of Kekionga or Miamitown, commanded by Pecan and LeGris. All these towns were visited by the French and English traders who communicated with Detroit and all were under the domination and control of the British. The savages in these various Indian villages were so far away from the Kentucky settlements that they considered themselves immune from any attacks; they were taught by the English to look with contempt upon the American government, and were given to understand that as long as the British held the upper posts they would be fully protected. In war parties of from five to twenty they suddenly appeared upon the banks of the Ohio to pillage the boats of the immigrants and murder their crews, or crossing that stream they penetrated the settlements of the interior, to kill, burn and destroy, and lead away horses and captives to the Indian towns. Pursued, they were often lost in the almost impenetrable forests of the north, or the savage bands scattered far and wide in thicket and swamp.

In the winter of 1789-1790 strange things were happening in the Miami villages on the St. Joseph and the Maumee. Henry Hay was there, the British agent of a Detroit merchant. Here are some of the facts that he has recorded in his diary. LeGris, the Little Turtle, Richardville, and Blue Jacket, the Shawnee chief, were all in that vicinity. George Girty lived close by in a Delaware town. He had married an Indian woman and was really a savage. On the twenty-sixth of December 1789, Girty came to Miamitown to report to Hay. He said that the Delawares were constantly being told by the Miamis that the ground they occupied was not theirs; that the Delawares had answered that they were great fools to fight for others' lands, and that they would war no longer against the Americans, but would remove to the Spanish territory beyond the Mississippi. These facts Hay must report in writing to Alexander McKee, the British Indian agent. On the second of January, 1790, it was reported that Antoine Laselle, a French trader who had resided at Miamitown for nineteen years, was a prisoner in the hands of the Weas. The crime charged against him was that he had written a letter to the Americans at Vincennes apprising them of an Indian attack, and that as a consequence of that letter the attacking party had been captured. One of them was the son of a Wea who had burned an American prisoner at Ouiatenon the preceding summer, and the Weas now charged that this son would be burned by his American captors. Laselle was supposed to be in imminent peril, and all the French and English traders at Miamitown called on LeGris. LeGris said that he had always warned the traders about penetrating the lower Indian country, but that numbers of the French had gone to trade there without his knowledge. He had cautioned Laselle, but Laselle had gone without letting him know. If Laselle had told him of his intended trip, he would have sent along one of his chiefs with him, or given him a belt as a passport. LeGris said that no time must be lost, and that he would at once send forward three of his faithful warriors to put a stop to the business. On the fifth day of January, one Tramblai arrived from Ouiatenon, and said that all the reports concerning Laselle were false and that he was having a good trade. On the thirteenth, Laselle himself arrived with Blue Jacket and a Frenchman. He bore a letter from the Indians and the French-Canadians at Tippecanoe to LeGris, certifying that "the bearer Antoine Laselle is a good loyalist and is always for supporting the King," That was a satisfactory certificate of character along the Wabash in 1790.

On the thirteenth of February, 1790, the Shawnees who live near Miamitown, arrive at that village with the prisoner McMullen. His face is painted black, as one who approaches death. In his hands he holds the "Shishequia" made of deer hoofs. He constantly rattles this device, and sings, "Oh Kentuck!" He thinks that the day of doom is at hand and that he will be burned at the stake. Some Indian chief, however, has lost a son. The paint will be washed off and the feathers fastened in his scalplock, and he will be adopted to take the place of the slain, but he does not know that now. The story of his capture is typical of the times. He was born in Virginia and came to Kentucky to collect a debt. With two companions he crosses the Ohio at the mouth of the Kentucky to hunt wild turkeys. They separate in the woods, and the Shawnees surround him, and cut off all means of escape to the canoe. He tries to break through the encircling ring but is hit on the head with a war billet, and now he is here. The Shawnee band who captured him were out for revenge. Last spring they had gone out to hunt. A party of Miamis who were on the warpath returned by another route. The Kentuckians who followed them, fell in with the Shawnees, and slew some of their women and children. Thus runs the tale of blood and reprisal of those savage days.

On the twelfth day of December, 1789, and shortly after his arrival at Miamitown, Hay relates that he saw the heart of a white prisoner, "dried like a piece of dried venison," and with a small stick "run from one end of it to the other." The heart "was fastened behind the fellows bundle that killed him, with also his scalp." On Sunday, the twenty-first day of March, 1790, and shortly before Hay's departure from Detroit, a party of bloody Shawnees arrived with four prisoners, one of them a negro. Terrible havoc had been done on the Ohio. One boat had been attacked on which were one officer and twenty-one men. All had been killed, the boat sunk, and its contents hid in the woods. Nineteen persons had been taken near Limestone, now Maysville, Kentucky. All were prisoners, save two or three. John Witherington's family had been separated from him. He had a wife "7 months gone with child" and seven children. In addition to all the above outrages, information was gathered from time to time of all affairs along the Ohio. The garrisons were numbered, the officers named, and every motion of governor St. Clair closely scrutinized.

Thus in the very heart of the American country did British officers and agents control the Indian trade; heartlessly wink at or encourage the scalping parties of the savages, and keep a close and jealous watch on the numbers and movements of the American forces. The diary of the Englishman reveals the whole story.

The spring of 1790 was one of horror. Says Judge Burnet: "The pioneers who descended the Ohio, on their way westward, will remember while they live, the lofty rock standing a short distance above the mouth of the Scioto, on the Virginia shore, which was occupied for years by the savages, as a favorite watch-tower, from which boats, ascending or descending, could be discovered at a great distance. From that memorable spot, hundreds of human beings, men, women and children, while unconscious of immediate danger, have been seen in the distance and marked for destruction." On the fourth of April, William W. Dowell writing to the honorable John Brown of Kentucky, relates that about fifty Indians were encamped near the mouth of the Scioto. To decoy the passing boats to the shore they made use of a white prisoner, who ran along the bank uttering cries of distress and begging to be taken on board. Three boats and a pirogue were captured, and several persons brutally murdered. A boat belonging to Colonel Edwards of Bourbon, Thomas Marshall and others, was hailed by the same white prisoner who pleaded to be taken on board and brought to Limestone. The stratagem failing to work the savages at once exposed themselves and began to fire on the boats, but without effect. They then pushed off from the shore with a boat load of about thirty warriors and gave chase, and as they were better supplied with oars than the white men, they would have soon overtaken them. The cool resolution and presence of mind of one Colonel George Thompson now saved the day. He threw out all the horses in the boat he commanded, received Colonel Edward's crew into his own, and after a frantic chase of fifteen miles, effected an escape. Seventeen horses were lost, fifteen hundred pounds worth of dry goods, and a considerable quantity of household goods.

The leading spirits in all these attacks at the mouth of the Scioto were the Shawnees. The attacks became so frequent, that it was now determined to organize a punitive expedition against them. Two hundred and thirty Kentucky volunteers under General Charles Scott crossed the river at Limestone and were joined by one hundred regulars under General Harmar. They struck the Scioto several miles up from its mouth and marched down that stream, but the savages scattered in front of them and only four Indians were slain. Harmar reported to the government that he might as well have tried to pursue a pack of wolves.

The movements of the federal government in 1789 and 1790 were extremely slow. In the first place, a great many of the people of the eastern seaboard regarded the Kentuckians and all ultra-montane dwellers with positive distrust. This feeling crept into the counsels of the government itself. On June 15th, 1789, in a report of Henry Knox, secretary of war, to President Washington, on the Wabash Indians, the secretary says that since the conclusion of the war with Great Britain, "hostilities have almost constantly existed between the people of Kentucky and the said Indians. The injuries and murders have been so reciprocal, that it would be a point of critical investigation to know on which side they have been the greatest." It was probably just such sentiments as these that led to the orders of July, 1789, withdrawing the Virginia scouts and rangers who had helped to protect the frontiers, thus leaving the western people entirely dependent upon the limited garrisons stationed at the few and widely separated frontier posts. In the second place, the government neither had the men nor the money at command wherewith to undertake a successful expedition against the savages. The number of warriors on the Wabash and its communications were placed by Secretary Knox at from fifteen hundred to two thousand. This was probably an over-estimate, but the Indians were formidable. The regular troops stationed at the frontier posts were less than six hundred. To organize and equip an army sufficient to extirpate the Indians and destroy their towns, would require the raising of nineteen hundred additional men, and an expenditure of two hundred thousand dollars. This was a sum of money, says the secretary, "far exceeding the ability of the United States to advance, consistently with a due regard to other indispensable objects." In the third place, the government vainly imagined that it was possible to effect a peace with the Wabash tribes. The views of Secretary of War Knox were very emphatic on this subject. "It would be found, on examination, that both policy and justice unite in dictating the attempt of treaty with the Wabash Indians; for it would be unjust, in the present confused state of injuries, to make war on those tribes without having previously invited them to a treaty, in order amicably to adjust all differences." With these views, Washington himself concurred, observing, "that a war with the Wabash Indians ought to be avoided by all means consistently with the security of the frontier inhabitants, the security of the troops, and the national dignity."

Accordingly, about the first of January, 1790, Governor Arthur St. Clair, descended the river Ohio from Marietta, opposite Fort Harmar, to Losantiville, opposite the mouth of the Licking river. Here was located Fort Washington. He changed the name of Losantiville to Cincinnati, organized the county of Hamilton, and proceeded to Fort Steuben or Clarksville, at the Falls of the Ohio. There he dispatched a messenger to Major John Hamtramck, the commandant at Vincennes, with friendly speeches to be forwarded by him to the Indians of the Wabash. A sincere and honest effort was to be made to bring about peace, although St. Clair himself had but little faith in an amicable adjustment and expressed the opinion that the Miamis and the renegade Shawnees, Delawares and Cherokees, lying near them, were "irreclaimable by gentle means." The heart "dried like a piece of dried venison" was ample proof that St. Clair was right.

The first peace messenger sent by Hamtramck was Fred Gamelin, a Frenchman. He proceeded no farther than the Vermilion river, where he was informed by an Indian that if he went any farther his life would be taken, and he returned to Vincennes. On the first of April, Hamtramck sent forward Antoine Gamelin, an intelligent French merchant. The first village he arrived at was close to Vincennes, and was named Kikapouguoi. The Indians at this place were friendly, and he proceeded up the Wabash. He next arrived at a town of the Vermilion Piankeshaws. The first chief of the village and all the warriors seemed to be pleased with the words of peace from the Americans, but said that they could not give a proper answer before consulting their "eldest brethren," the Miamis. They desired that Gamelin should go forward to Kekionga or Miamitown, and bring back a report of what the head chiefs should say. Gamelin had now fairly entered the sphere of British influence. He was told that the nations of the lake had a bad heart and were ill disposed toward the Americans; that the Shawnees of Miamitown would never receive his speech.

Gamelin now advanced to the large Indian village of the Kickapoos, situated on the Big Vermilion river, in what is now Vermilion County, Indiana. Their principal town was on the site of what is now known as "The Army Ford Stock Farm," a few miles from the present village of Cayuga. This farm has been in the possession of the old Shelby family for years. The house contains two or three old fireplaces and has been built for about a century. It stands on a high bluff facing the Vermilion river, and the view is very picturesque. In making recent excavations for gravel along the roadway to the west of the buildings, an Indian skeleton was unearthed. It was in a fair state of preservation and the teeth in the skull were still perfect. There were also several Indian arrowheads, remains of a leathern pouch with a draw-string, and parts of a grass-woven blanket. By the side of the skeleton of the savage were the bones of a dog, and also a small copper bell, which was probably worn about the dog's neck. The Kickapoos held the dog in especial veneration and at the time of the burial of the warrior, fully equipped with arms and tobacco for the happy hunting ground, the dog was probably slain to accompany his master.

No tribe of savages along the Wabash was more irreconcilable than the Kickapoos. "They were," says Beckwith, "pre-eminent in predatory warfare. Small parties, consisting of from five to twenty or more, were the usual number comprising their war parties. These would push out hundreds of miles from their villages, and swoop down upon a feeble settlement, or an isolated pioneer cabin, and burn the property, kill the cattle, steal the horses, capture the women and children and be off again before the alarm could be given." They were always strongly on the British side, and numbers of them fought against the Americans at Tippecanoe.

Gamelin at once encountered opposition. The Kickapoos first found fault with his speech and said that it contained a threat of war. Upon his eliminating the objectionable words, they said he could go farther up the river, but that they could not give a definite answer because some of their warriors were absent, and they had first to consult the Weas, who were the owners of their lands. They next found fault with Gamelin for coming among them empty-handed. They said that they expected "a draught of milk from the great chief, and the commanding officer of the post, for to put the old people in good humor; also some powder and ball for the young men for hunting, and to get some good broth for their women and children." They promised to keep their young men from stealing, and to send speeches to their nations in the prairies to prevent them from making expeditions.

On the fourteenth of April, Gamelin held a council with the Weas and Kickapoos at Ouiatenon. He found everything hostile. As a Frenchman he was welcome, but was plainly told that nothing could be done without the consent of the Miamis; that it was useless to ask them (the Indians) to restrain their young men, for they were "being constantly encouraged by the British." One of the chiefs said: "Know ye that the village of Ouiatenon is the sepulcher of all our ancestors. The chief of America invites us to go to him, if we are at peace. He has not his leg broke, having been able to go as far as the Illinois. He might come here himself; and we should be glad to see him at our village. We confess that we accepted the axe, but it is by the reproach we continually receive from the English and other nations, which received the axe first, calling us women; at the present time they invite our young men to war."

On the eighteenth of April, Gamelin arrived at Kenapacomaqua or L'Anguille. The head chief was absent, and the tribesmen would give no answer. However, they sent some of their men along to hear what the Miamis at Kekionga would say. On the twenty-third of April, Gamelin arrived at the head of the Maumee. The next day he got the Miamis, the Shawnees and a few Delawares in council. He presented each tribe with two branches of wampum, and began his friendly speeches before the French and English traders who had been invited to be present. After his speeches were delivered he displayed the treaty of Fort Harmar. This greatly displeased them.

Nothing can better display the treachery of the Miamis on this occasion than the statements of the principal chieftain, LeGris, made to Gamelin in a private conversation. After telling the Frenchman not to pay any attention to the Shawnees, as they were the "perturbators of all the nations," he said that he knew that the Miamis had a bad name on account of mischief done on the Ohio, but that this mischief was not occasioned by his young men, but by the Shawnees; that his young men had only gone out to hunt. This glaring falsehood was told in the face of the fact that the Little Turtle himself had been out on the warpath only the winter before, returning with captives and plunder.

On the twenty-fifth of April, Gamelin held a conference with the famous Shawnee chief, Blue Jacket. The chief was implacable. He informed Gamelin that no answer could be given to the American peace messenger without hearing from the British at Detroit. That the Shawnees had determined to give the two branches of wampum back, and to send Gamelin to Detroit, or detain him twenty days until an answer could be received from the British. The chief also stated that he believed that the Americans were guilty of deception. The next day after this conference five Potawatomi arrived at Miamitown with two captured negro slaves, which they openly sold to the British traders.

A day or two after the interview with Blue Jacket, Gamelin was told by LeGris to call at a French trader's house and receive his answer. He was there told that he might go back to Vincennes when he pleased, and that no definite answer could be given to his speeches "Without consulting the commandant at Detroit." LeGris professed to be pleased with Gamelin's address, and said that it should be communicated to all the confederates, but declared that the nations had resolved not to do anything without the unanimous consent of the tribes.

"The same day, Blue Jacket, chief of the Shawnees, invited me to his house for supper; and, before the other chiefs, told me that, after another deliberation, they thought necessary that I should go myself to Detroit, for to see the commandant, who would get all his children assembled for to hear my speech. I told them I could not answer them in the night; that I was not ashamed to speak before the sun."

"The twenty-ninth of April, I got them all assembled. I told them that I was not to go to Detroit; that the speeches were directed to the nations of the river Wabash and the Miami; and that, for to prove the sincerity of the speech, and the heart of Governor St. Clair, I have willingly given a copy of the speeches, to be shown to the commandant at Detroit; and, according to a letter wrote by the commandant of Detroit to the Miamis, Shawnees, and Delawares, mentioning to you to be peaceable with the Americans, I would go to him very willingly, if it was in my directions, being sensible of his sentiments. I told them I had nothing to say to the commandant; neither him to me. You must immediately resolve, if you intend to take me to Detroit, or else I am to go back as soon as possible."

"Blue Jacket got up and told me, 'My friend, we are well pleased with what you say. Our intention is not to force you to go to Detroit: It is only a proposal, thinking it for the best. Our answer is the same as the Miamis. We will send, in thirty nights, a full and positive answer, by a young man of each nation, by writing to Post Vincennes.' In the evening, Blue Jacket, chief of the Shawnees, having taken me to supper with him, told me, in a private manner, that the Shawnee nation was in doubt of the sincerity of the Big Knives (Americans), so called, having been already deceived by them. That they had first destroyed their lands, put out their fire, and sent away their young men, being a hunting, without a mouthful of meat; also, had taken away their women; wherefore, many of them would, with great deal of pain, forget the affronts. Moreover, that some other nations were apprehending that offers of peace would, maybe, tend to take away, by degrees, their lands; and would serve them as they did before; a certain proof that they intend to encroach on our lands, is their new settlement on the Ohio. If they don't keep this side (of the Ohio) clear, it will never be a proper reconcilement with the nations Shawnees, Iroquois, Wyandots, and perhaps many others."

On the journey back to Vincennes, every indication along the way was threatening. At L'Anguille, Gamelin was told that one of the Eel river chieftains had gone to war with the Americans; that a few days before his arrival a band of seventy Indians, Chippewas and Ottawas from Michillimacinac, and some Potawatomi, had passed through the village on the way to the American frontier. At Ouiatenon, the Weas said that the English commandant was their father, and that they could do nothing without his approbation. "On the eighth day of May, Gamelin returned to Fort Knox, and on the eleventh, some traders arrived from the upper Wabash, bringing the intelligence that war parties from the north had joined the Wabash Indians; that the whole force of the savages had gone to make an attack on the settlements, and that three days after Gamelin left the Miamis, an American captive had been burned in their village."



Reluctant as was the government of the United States to engage in war with the Wabash Indians, no doubt now remained of their warlike intentions. Every savage town from the Vermilion Piankeshaws to ancient Kekionga, was under British control. On the first of May, 1790, Governor Arthur St. Clair transmitted to the war department a part of the report of Antoine Gamelin, written from Tippecanoe, and observed as follows: "By this letter, you will perceive that everything seems to be referred to the Miamis, which does not promise a peaceable issue. The confidence they have in their situation, the vicinity of many other nations not very well disposed, and the pernicious counsels of the English traders, joined to the immense booty obtained by the depredations upon the Ohio, will most probably prevent them from listening to any reasonable terms of accommodation, so that it is to be feared the United States must prepare effectually to chastise them." Shortly afterwards, St. Clair hastened to Fort Washington at Cincinnati, and there held a military conference with General Josiah Harmar. Being empowered to call upon Virginia, then including Kentucky, for one thousand militia, and upon the State of Pennsylvania for five hundred more, it was resolved to concentrate three hundred of the Kentucky troops at Fort Steuben (Clarksville), to march from that place to Post Vincennes. From thence an expedition under Major John F. Hamtramck was to be directed against the villages on the lower Wabash, so as to prevent them from aiding the Miamis higher up. The remaining twelve hundred militiamen were to join the regulars at Fort Washington and strike directly across the country to the principal Miami village at Kekionga. No permanent military post was to be established, however, at the forks of the Maumee. Secretary of War Knox was fearful of results. While admitting that the Miami village presented itself "as superior to any other position," for the purpose of fixing a garrison to overawe the Indians at the west end of Lake Erie, on the Wabash and the Illinois, still, he was apprehensive that the establishment of a post at this place would be so opposed to the inclinations of the Indians generally as to bring on a war of some duration, and at the same time render the British garrisons "so uneasy with such a force impending over them, as not only to occasion a considerable reinforcement of their upper posts, but to occasion their fomenting, secretly, at least, the opposition of the Indians." How any official of the government with the report of Antoine Gamelin in his hands, could hope to soften the animosity of the tribes by the taking of half measures, or to propitiate the British by a display of timidity, is hard to conceive. Four months later the hesitating secretary changed his course.

The army with which General Harmar marched out of Fort Washington in the latter days of September, 1790, to strike the Indian towns, was a motley array. Pennsylvania had only partly filled her quota. She had sent forth substitutes, old and infirm men, and boys. The troops from Kentucky had seemingly brought into camp every old musket and rifle in the district to be repaired. There was a scarcity of camp kettles and axes. The commissariat was miserably deficient. To add to the confusion, the Kentucky militia were divided in their allegiance between a certain Colonel William Trotter and Colonel John Hardin. Hardin was fearless, but extremely rash; Trotter was wholly incompetent. In two or three days the Kentuckians were formed into three battalions, under Majors Hall, McMullen, and Ray, with Trotter at their head. Harmar, an old army officer of the revolution, who felt a contempt for all militia, was in sore dismay, for the hasty muster was totally lacking in discipline, and impatient of restraint.

In numbers, as Colonel Roosevelt observes, this army was amply sufficient to do its work. It consisted of three battalions of Kentucky militia, one battalion of Pennsylvania militia, one battalion of light troops, mounted, and two battalions of the regular army under Major John Plasgrave Wyllys, and Major John Doughty; in all, fourteen hundred and fifty-three men. There was also a small company of artillery, with three small brass field pieces, under Captain William Ferguson. But to fight the hardy and experienced warriors of the wilderness in their native woods, required something more than hasty levies, loose discipline, and inexperienced Indian fighters. Harmar was not a Wayne. The expedition was doomed to failure from the very beginning.

The details of the march along Harmar's trace to the site of the present city of Fort Wayne it is not necessary to give. The army moved slowly, and gave the British agents under Alexander McKee plenty of time to furnish the redskins with arms and ammunition. The star of the Little Turtle was in the ascendant. He was now thirty-eight years of age, and while not a hereditary chieftain of the Miamis, his prowess and cunning had given him fame. The Indians never made a mistake in choosing a military leader. He watched the Americans from the very time of their leaving Fort Washington and purposed to destroy them at the Indian town.

On the fourteenth of October the army reached the River St. Marys, described by Captain John Armstrong as a pretty stream, and Hardin was sent forward with a company of regulars and six hundred militia to occupy Miamitown. He found the villages on both banks of the St. Joseph deserted by the foe. The English and French traders had fled from the main Indian town on what is now known as the Lakeside shore of the St. Joseph, and had carried away most of their valuables. John Kinzie and Antoine Laselle were among the refugees. The savages had burned the houses in their main village to prevent their occupation by the Americans, and had buried vast quantities of corn and vegetables in Indian caches. One hundred and eighty-five houses of the Delawares, Shawnees and Miamis, were still left standing in the neighboring villages. All of these were destroyed by the torch after Harmar's arrival.

On Sunday the seventeenth, the main army crossed the Maumee river from the south and encamped on the point of land formed by the junction of the St. Joseph and the Maumee. It was a beautiful spot covered by the Indian corn fields and gardens. The Kentucky militia in parties of thirty and forty, throwing aside all discipline, wandered about in search of plunder. The Indians were wary. They lurked in the woods and thickets, biding the time when they might destroy the army in detail. Major McMullen now discovered the tracks of women and children in a pathway leading to the northwest. Harmar resolved to locate the Indian encampment and bring the savages to battle. On the morning of the eighteenth, Colonel Trotter was given the command of three hundred men, equipped with three days' provisions, and ordered to scour the country. The detachment after pursuing and killing two Indian horsemen, marched in various directions until nightfall, and returned to camp. Colonel Hardin was now given command of the expedition for the two remaining days.