USA > Iowa > Scott County > Davenport > History of Davenport and Scott County Iowa, Volume I > Part 6
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The French, who composed a portion of this expedition of retaliation, ex- pected much loot and were grievously disappointed. A letter from one of the Cahokians to M. Mottin de la Balme, pensioner of the King of France, French colonel, etc., indicates their disgruntled attitude :
"Oh, Colonel Clark, affecting always to desire our public welfare and under pretext of avenging us, soon formed with us and conjointly with the Spaniards a party of more than 300 men to go and attack in their own village the savages who had come to our homes to harass us, and after substituting Colonel Mont- gomery to command in his place, he soon left us. It is then well to explain to you, sir, that the Virginians, who never employed any principle of economy, have been the cause, by their lack of management and bad conduct, of the non-success of the expedition, and that our glorious projects have failed through their fault ;
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for the savages abandoned their nearest villages where we have been, and we were forced to stop and not push further, since we had almost no more provisions, powder and balls, which the Virginians had undertaken to furnish us."
In a letter written by Capt. John Rogers, who commanded one of the com- panies in this expedition, he speaks of reaching the "river de la Rouze," which is a new variant on the name of Rock river. Here, he says, "we burn the towns of Saux and Reynards." If the Foxes shared in this castigation, it is possible that the town on the site of Davenport shared in the hostilities. But of this there is no record, or, at least, none has been discovered.
THE FIRST OF MANY TREATIES.
Soon after the events narrated, the Sacs and Foxes made their first treaty with the United States at Fort Harmar on the Muskingum river in Ohio. Bounda- ries were agreed upon and protection and friendship extended by the United States to these tribes.
In 1804 the treaty, given in full elsewhere, was made at St. Louis. Four years later adventurers began to enter the Indian country, led by reports of their richness in minerals. A fort was built in Iowa on Indian soil, a clear violation of the treaty of St. Louis, and this was resented by the Sacs and Foxes. Black Hawk led a war party which made an unsuccessful attack upon this fort.
Black Hawk was consistent in his allegiance to Great Britain, in his refusal to recognize the treaty which closed the war of the Revolution or the treaty of St. Louis. In his autobiography he tells of his parley with Pike in 1805. "Some time afterward a boat came up the river with a young American chief, at that time Lieutenant, and afterward General Pike, and a small party of soldiers aboard. The boat at length arrived at Rock river and the young chief came on shore with his interpreter. He made us a speech and gave us some presents, in return for which we gave him meat and such other provisions as we could spare. We were well pleased with the speech of the young chief. He gave us good ad- vice, and said our American father would treat us well. He presented us an American flag which we hoisted. He then requested us to lower the British colors, which were waving in the air, and to give him our British medals, prom- ising to send us others on his return to St. Louis. This we declined to do, as we wished to have two fathers."
THE FIRST FLAG.
Here we have the record of the first United States flag in the upper Missis- sippi valley, the first flinging to the breeze of the stars and stripes in all this re- gion. How long Black Hawk and his braves lived under the starry banner or how much they respected it, owing to their divided allegiance, no one knows. Any love that Pike inspired for the "American father" was dissipated at the out- break of hostilities between this country and Great Britain, known as the war of 1812. and the Sacs and Foxes lined up with the enemy.
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HISTORY OF SCOTT COUNTY
WAR OF 1812.
Throughout this war a portion of the Fox and Sac tribes at Rock island re- mained hostile to the United States. The first incident of the war which af- fected the region in the vicinity of Rock island was Governor Clark's expedition to Prairie du Chien. The following account of this expedition is taken from "Western Annals," by James H. Perkins :
About the first of May Governor Clark fitted out five barges, with fifty regular troops and 140 volunteers, and left St. Louis on an expedition to Prairie du Chien. On the 13th of June, Governor Clark, with several gentlemen who accompanied him, returned with one of the barges, hav- ing left the officers and troops to erect a fort and maintain the position. No Indians molested the party till they reached Rock river, where they had a skir- mish with some hostile Sauks. The Foxes resided at Dubuque and professed to be peaceable and promised to fight on the American side. Twenty days before the expedition reached Prairie du Chien the British trader Dixon left that place for Mackinac with eighty Winnebagoes, 120 Follsavoine, and 100 Sioux, probably as recruits for the British army along the lake country. He had gained infor- mation of the expedition of Governor Clark from his Indian spies, and had left Captain Deace with a body of Mackinac fencibles with orders to protect the place. The Sioux and Renards (Foxes) having refused to fight the Americans, Deace and his soldiers fled. The inhabitants, also fled into the country but re- turned as soon as they learned they were not to be injured. A temporary defense was immediately erected. Lieutenant Perkins, with sixty rank and file from Major Z. Taylor's company of the Seventh regiment, took possession of the house occupied by the Mackinac Fur Company, in which they found nine or ten trunks of Dixon's property, with his papers and correspondence. A writer in the "Gazette" says:
FORT SHELBY IS BUILT.
"The farms of Prairie du Chien are in high cultivation. Between two and three hundred barrels of flour may be manufactured there this season, besides a vast quantity of corn. Two of the largest boats were left in command of Aide- de-Camp Kennerly and Captains Sullivan and Yeizer, whose united forces amount to 135 men. The regulars, under command of Lieutenant Perkins, are stationed on shore and are assisted by the volunteers in building the new fort."
This was called Fort Shelby. On his return the people of St. Louis gave the governor a public dinner and expressed their hearty gratulations for the success of the enterprise.
About the last of June Captain John Sullivan, with his company of militia and some volunteers whose term of service had expired, returned from Prairie du Chien and reported that the fort was finished, the boats well manned and barricaded; that the Indians were hovering around and had taken prisoner a Frenchman while hunting his horses. The boats employed carried a six-pounder on their main deck and several howitzers on the quarters and gangway. The men were protected by a musket-proof barricade. On the 6th of August, the
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Gazette (our authority in these details) states : "Just as we had put our paper to press Lieutenant Perkins, with the troops which composed the garrison at Prai- rie du Chien, arrived here. Lieutenant Perkins fought the combined force of British and Indians three days and nights until they approached the pickets by mining. Provisions, ammunition and water expended, when he capitulated; the officers to keep their private property and the whole not to serve until duly ex- changed. Five of our troops were wounded during the siege."
In a letter from Captain Yeizer to Governor Clark, dated St. Louis, July 28, 1814. we find the following facts : Captain Yeizer commanded one of the gunboats a keelboat fitted up in the manner heretofore described. On the 17th of July, at 1:30 o'clock, from 1,200 to 1,500 British and Indians marched up in full view of the fort and the town and demanded a surrender, "which demand was posi- tively refused." They attacked Mr. Yeizer's boat at 3 o'clock, at long-shot distance. He returned the compliment by firing round-shot from his six-pounder, which made them change their position to a small mound nearer the boat. At the same time the Indians were firing from behind the houses and pickets. The boat then moved up the river to head of the village, keeping up a constant discharge of
firearms and artillery, which was answered by the enemy from the shore. The enemy's boats then crossed the river below to attack the Americans from the opposite side of the river. A galling fire from opposite points was now kept up by the enemy on this boat, until the only alternative was left for Captain Yeizer to run the boat through the enemy's lines to a point five miles below, keeping up a brisk fire. In the meantime another gun-boat that lay on shore was fired on until it took fire and was burnt. In Captain Yeizer's boat two officers and four privates were wounded and one private killed. The British and Indians were com- manded by Colonel McCay, (Mackey) who came in boats from Mackinac, by Green bay and the Wisconsin, with artillery. Their report gives from 160 to 200 regulars and "Michigan fencibles," and about 800 Indians. They landed their artillery below the town and fort and formed a battery, atacking the forts and the boats at the same time. After Captain Yeizer's boat had been driven from its anchorage sappers and miners began operations in the bank, 150 yards from the fort. Lieutenant Perkins held out while hope lasted. In the fort were George and James Kennerly, the former an aid to Governor Clark, the latter a lieutenant in the militia.
BATTLE OF CAMPBELL'S ISLAND.
At this time General Benjamin Howard was in command of the military district extending from the interior of Indiana to the frontier of Mexico. After the return of Governor Clark from Prairie du Chien, and, as it appears, prior to the receipt of news of the engagement at that place, General Howard fitted out an expedition, under the command of Captain John Campbell, First United States infantry, to proceed to Prairie du Chien and strengthen the garrison at that place. The expedition consisted of forty-two regulars, sixty-six rangers and about twenty-one other persons, including boatmen, women and the sutler's es- tablishment. This expedition left St. Louis early in July, 1814, and proceeded up the river in three keel-boats as far as Rock island, near which place it was
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attacked by the Indians and nearly destroyed. The following account of this expedition is taken from Governor Reynolds' "Life and Times."
Lieutenant Campbell commanded the boat with the regulars, and Captain Stephen Rector and Lieutenant Riggs the other two barges, manned by the rangers. The expedition reached Rock island in peace, but the Sac and Fox Indians, in great numbers, swarmed around the boats but still professed peace. The barge commanded by Rector was navigated mostly by the French of Ca- hokia, and were both good sailors and soldiers; and the same may be said of the company under Lieutenant Riggs, except as to the knowledge of naviga- tion. The boats lay still all night at or near the Sac and Fox villages at Rock island, and the Indians were all night making hollow professions of friendship. Many of the French, after the battle, informed me that they knew the Indians would attack the boats, and accordingly they informed Lieutenant Campbell, but he disbelieved them. The French said that the Indians wanted them to leave the Americans and go home. They would squeeze the hands of the French and pull their hands down the river, indicating to leave. The Indians disliked to fight their old friends the French.
The fleet all set sail in the morning and above Rock island the wind blew so hard that Campbell's boat was forced on a lee shore and lodged on a small island near the mainland, known from this circumstance as "Campbell's Island." The Indians, commanded by Black Hawk, when the wind drifted the boat on shore, commenced an attack on it. The boats of Rector and Riggs were ahead and could see the smoke of the fire arms, but could not hear the report of the guns. They returned to assist Campbell but the wind was so high that their barges were almost unmanageable. They anchored near Campbell but could not reach him, the storm raged so severely. When Campbell's boat was driven ashore by the wind he placed out sentinels and the men commenced cooking their breakfast; but the enemy in hundreds rushed on them, killing many on the spot, and the rest took refuge in the boat. Hundreds and hundreds of the warriors were on and around the boat and at last set it on fire. Campbell's boat was burning and the bottom covered with the dead, the wounded and blood. They had almost ceased firing when Rector and his brave men most nobly came to the rescue. Campbell him- self lay wounded on his back in the bottom of his boat and many of his men dead and dying around him. Riggs' boat was well fortified but his men were inexperienced sailors. Rector and company could not remain inactive spectators of the destruction of Campbell and men, but in a tempest of wind raised their anchor in the face of almost a thousand Indians and periled their lives in the rescue of Campbell. No act of noble daring and bravery surpassed the rescue of Campbell during the war in the west. The rangers under Rector were mostly Frenchmen and were well acquainted with the management of a boat in such a crisis. Rector and his men were governed by the high and ennobling principles of chivalry and patriotism. Rector's boat was lightened by casting overboard quantities of provisions and then many of the crew actually got out of the boat into the water, leaving the vessel between them and the fire of the enemy and pushed their boat against the fire of the warriors to Campbell's boat, which was in possession of the Indians. This was a most hazardous exploit for forty men,
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forcing their barge to a burning boat in possession of the enemy, nearly a thousand strong, and taking from it the wounded and living soldiers, together with their commander.
WOUNDED MEN ARE RESCUED.
A salt-water sailor by the name of Hoadley did gallant service in this daring enterprise by his superior knowledge of the management of a vessel. Rector took all of the live men from Campbell's boat into his; and his men, in the water, hauled their own boat out into the stream. The Indians feasted on the aban- doned boat of Campbell. Rector had his boat crowded with the wounded and dying but rowed night and day until they reached St. Louis. It was supposed the boat of Riggs was captured by the enemy; but the vessel was strongly for- tified so that it lay, as it were, in the hands of the Indians for several hours; the enemy having possession of the outside and the whites of the inside; but the wind in the evening subsided and Riggs got his boat off without losing many men. It was a general jubilee and rejoicing when Riggs arrived at St. Louis; the hearts of the people swelled with patriotic joy to know that the lives of so many brave soldiers were saved by the courage and energies of Rector, Riggs and their troops. I saw the soldiers on their return to St. Louis and the sight was distressing. Those who were not wounded were worn down to skeletons by labor and fatigue.
TO DAVENPORT FOR DISTRIBUTION.
Writing of this engagement Black Hawk, in his autobiography, tells of the disposition of the spoils of war. He first emptied the cargo of whiskey, "bad medicine," several barrels, in the river ; next, to quote him, "I found a box full of small bottles and packages which appeared to be bad medicine also, such as the white medicine men kill the white people with when they get sick, this I threw into the river." The ammunition intended for Fort Shelby fell into Black Hawk's hands, also boat loads of guns, clothing and provisions which were brought to the Fox village on the site of Davenport for distribution. The same day of the Campbell's island fight, Fort Shelby, at Prairie du Chien, surrendered to an overwhelming force of British and Indians, the name changed to Fort Mc- Kay and the command given to Captain Thomas G. Anderson.
The National Intelligencer of August, 1814, states the number of killed and wounded in this engagement to have been thirty-six. Capt. Campbell and Dr. Abram Stewart, surgeon's mate, were also wounded, the former seriously. After this disaster and the return of the survivors to St. Louis, another and larger expedition was fitted out, the object of which was to punish the Indians at Rock island and to establish and maintain a fort at or near that place. The detach- ment was under the command of Brevet Major Zachary Taylor, Seventh United States infantry, afterward president of the United States, and consisted of 334 officers and men (regulars, militia and rangers). There were only forty of the regular troops and it is presumed that these belonged to the Seventh United States infantry.
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BATTLE OF CREDIT ISLAND.
August 21st the British were informed by the Fox Indians that another expe- dition, larger than the preceding ones, had left St. Louis for the upper river. Six days later, Captain Anderson sent Lieutenant Duncan Graham to meet this new force with a command of thirty British soldiers, a brass three-pounder and two swivels, with instructions to harass the Americans and if possible compel a return to St. Louis. Thus was brought about an engagement within the corporate limits of the city of Davenport and known as the battle of Credit Island. The unwieldly nature of the keel boats, the inadequate means of propulsion or maneuver, brought disaster to the American arms. These were not battle ships but rather transports and of the most primitive sort. The issue of the conflict brought no reproach to the officer in command, Major Taylor, later the hero of the Mexican war and president of the United States.
ST. LOUIS TREATY REAFFIRMED.
Under date of Fort Madison, September 6, 1841, Mayor Taylor reports to Gen. Howard :
SIR: In obedience to your orders I left Fort Independence on the 2d ult., and reached Rock river, our place of destination, on the evening of the 4th inst., with- out meeting a single Indian or any occurrence worthy of relation. On my arrival at the mouth of Rock river the Indians began to make their appearance in con- siderable numbers; running up the Mississippi to the upper village and crossing the river below us. After passing Rock river, which is very small at the mouth, from an attentive and careful examination as I proceeded up the Mississippi I was confident it was impossible for us to enter its mouth with our large boats. Immediately opposite its mouth a large island commences, which, together with the western shore of the Mississippi, was covered with a considerable number of horses; which were doubtless placed in those situations in order to draw small detachments on shore. But in this they were disappointed and I determined to alter the plan which you have suggested-which was to pass the different villages as if the object of the expedition was Prairie du Chien-for several reasons : first, that I might have an opportunity of viewing the situation of the ground to enable me to select such a landing as would bring our artillery to bear on the villages with the greatest advantage. I was likewise in hopes a party would ap- proach us with a flag, from which I expected to learn the situation of affairs at the Prairie, and ascertain in some measure their numbers and perhaps bring them to a council, when I should have been able to have retaliated on them for their repeated acts of treachery ; or, if they were determined to attack us, I was in hopes to draw them some distance from their towns toward the rapids, run down in the night and destroy them before they could return to their defense. But in this I was disappointed-the wind which had been in our favor, began to shift about at the time we passed the mouth of Rock river ; and by the time we reached the head of the island, which is about a mile and a half long, it blew a perfect hurricane, quarterly down the river, and it was with difficulty we made land at a small island containing six or eight acres covered with willows, near the middle
HISTORY OF SCOTT COUNTY
of the river, and about sixty yards from the upper end of the island. In this situation I determined to remain during the night, if the storm continued; as I knew the anchors of several of the boats in that event would not hold them and there was a great probability of their being drifted on sand-bars, of which the river is full in this place, which would have exposed the men very much in getting them off, even if they could have prevented their filling with water. It was about 4 o'clock in the evening when we were compelled to land, and large parties of Indians were on each side of the river, as well as crossing in different directions in canoes, but not a gun was fired from either side. The wind continued to blow the whole night with violence, accompanied with some rain, which induced me to order the sentinels to be brought in and placed in the bow of each boat. About daylight Captain Whitesides' boat was fired on at the distance of about fif- teen paces and a corporal who was on the outside of the boat was mortally wounded. My orders were if a boat was fired on to return it, but not a man to leave the boat without positive orders from myself. So soon as it got perfectly light, as the enemy continued about the boat, I determined to drum them from the island, let their numbers be what they might-provided we were able to do so. I then assigned to each boat a proper guard, formed the troops for action, and pushed through the willows to the opposite shore; but those fellows who had the boldness to fire on the boats, cleared themselves as soon as the troops were formed, by wading from the island we were encamped on to the one just below us. Cap- tain Whitesides, who was on the left, was able to give them a warm fire as they reached the island they had retreated to. They returned the fire for a few moments when they retreated. In this affair we had two men badly wounded. When Captain Whitesides commenced the fire, I ordered Captain Rector to drop down with his boat to ground and to rake the island below with artillery, and to fire on every canoe he should discover passing from one shore to the other which should come within reach. In this situation he remained about one hour, and no Indians making their appearance, he determined to drop down the island about sixty yards and destroy several canoes that were laying to shore. This he effected, and just on setting his men on board the British commenced a fire on our boats with a six, a four and two swivels, from behind a knoll that completely covered them. The boats were entirely exposed to the artil- lery, which was distant about 350 paces from us. So soon as the first gun fired I ordered a six-pounder to be brought out and placed, but, on recollect- ing a moment, I found the boat would be sunk before any impression could be made on them by our cannon, as they were completely under cover, and had al- ready brought their guns to bear on our boats-for the round-shot from their six passed through Lieutenant Hempstead's boat and shattered her considerably. I then ordered the boats to drop down which was done in order and conducted with the greatest coolness by every officer, although exposed to a constant fire from their artillery for more than half a mile. So soon as they commenced firing from their artillery the Indians raised the yell and commenced firing on us in every direction, whether they were able to do us any damage or not, from each side of the river. Captain Rector, who was laying to the shore of the island, was attacked the instant the first gun was fired, by a very large party, and in a close and well-contested contest of about fifteen minutes they drove them, after giving three
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rounds of grape from his three-pounder. Captain Whitesides, who was near- est to Captain Rector, dropped down and anchored nigh him, and gave the enemy several fires with his swivel; but the wind was so hard down stream as to drift his anchor. Captain Rector at that moment got his boat off, and we were then exposed to the fire of the Indians for two miles, which we returned with interest from our small arms and small pieces of artillery, whenever we could get them to bear. I was compelled to drop down about three miles before a proper place presented itself for landing, as but few of the boats had anchors sufficient to stop them in the river. Here I halted for the purpose of having the wounded attended and some of the boats repaired, as some of them had been injured by the enemy's artillery. They followed us in their boats until we halted on a small prairie and prepared for action, when they returned in as great a hurry as they followed us.
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