USA > Iowa > Howard County > Lime Springs > History of the Welsh in Minnesota, Foreston and Lime Springs, Ia. gathered by the old settlers > Part 11
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camp, McPhaill's force was seen approaching two or three miles east of the cooley and the boom of the cannon heard. The Indians concentrated such a force in front of MePhaill that he was scared and instead of pressing forward and giving bat- tle to the savages he dispatched a courier back to Fort Ridgely for re-enforcements and entrenched his army on the prairie to await their coming. The disappointment of the besieged camp at the sudden disappearance of the relief they thought at hand was great, and they spent a long night of intense suffering and anxiety. By morning the Indians were re-enforced and began to close in on the camp.
A message was sent to the few half breeds in the white force offering them their lives if they would surrender, but with heroic courage and fidelity they answered, that they would never desert their friends and would die with the whites if need be. The arms of the dead and wounded were distri- buted around so that nearly all had two or three loaded guns by their side and they defied the Indians to come. The savage horde made bold by numbers, was drawing nearer. when a big Indian stood up and shouted in Sioux from the east side of the cooley: "there are three miles of soldiers coming." Gen. Sibley with his entire force was at hand and the boom of his cannon and the rattle of his musketry was the sweetest of music to the distressed command. The Indians soon beat a hasty re- treat. A sad spectacle did that camp by Birch Cooley present. In a circle round the tents lay the swollen carcasses of ninety-one dead horses, behind them lay twelve dead men and forty-five wounded. For thirty-six long hours the camp had been without food, water or sleep in a desperate struggle for life. The dead were buried in one grave. One of the wounded died a day or two afterwards at the fort. The poor woman who had been picked up on the prairie had lain in the wagon during the entire time of the battle without food or drink, and strange to say, though the wagons were riddled and splintered with bullets she escaped with only a slight wound in her arm.
As Gen. Sibley had no cavalry to pursue the Indians, he re- turned to the fort. Appropriate monuments have been erected recently by the state to commemorate the battles of Birch Cooley and New Ulm.
On the day of the main battle at Birch Cooley, September 2, a refugee from Lake Shetek, Thos. Ireland by name, came to New Ulm to Capt. Danes' company. He had seven large buck- shot wounds in his body-two of them in his left lung. In this
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condition he had for thirteen days suffered every hardship in dragging himself through the eighty miles of Indian invested country to New Ulm, and he was indeed a pitiful object to be- hold. He had left, however, the morning before, two women, Mrs. Hurd and Mrs. Eastlick, and their four children at the house of a Mr. Brown, thirty miles west on the Big Cot- tonwood. Capt. Dane called at once for volunteers to rescue these women and children.
Lieut. Roberts, one of the bravest men in the company at once offered to go and fourteen others promptly joined him, about half of whom were Welsh boys-among others besides Lieut. Roberts, were Lewis P. Jones. David Y. Davis and Win. E. Williams. It was a very hazardous journey. The country was known to be thickly invested by savages. It was already late in the afternoon, so the journey would have to be made mostly in the night. The boys were only raw recruits without any military practice. Their horses were untrained so that the report of a gun would render them wholly unmanageable. Their guns were rejected Austrian rifles whose locks were too weak to fire the caps, and when by chance they did fire, no one could tell where the bullet would go, but the rebound of the gun was always sure to lame the shoulder if it did not land the gunner on his back. About 6 p. m. the little squad started in charge of Lieut. Roberts, and it was past midnight before they reached their destination. Mrs. Eastlick, has published in pamphlet form, a most vivid description of her trials. As her experience was similar to that of hundreds of others we will condense and quote a few paragraphs of her narrative to give a glimpse of the horrors of that massacre :
The family comprised Mr. and Mrs. Eastlick and five children, the oldest, eleven years old, named Merton, and the youngest fifteen months, named Johnny. Wednesday morning. while the family were at breakfast on their farm at Lake Shetek, young llatch, whom we met before at Buffalo Grove lake with Mr. Ever- ett and Mrs. Meyers, came running, saying, "The Indians are upon us." Leav- ing all they fled with the children-Mr. Eastlick carrying his two guns and am- munition with the youngest child. Meeting a number of neighbors on the road they all gathered into the house of a MIr. Wright and prepared to defend them- selves. A few Indians, well known to the settlers, were at this honse pretending to be friendly and ready to fight the bad Indians. One of them was called "Pawn." The hostiles appearing in large numbers in the vicinity, they left the the house on the advice of "Pawn" in a lumber wagon, thirty-four of them in- cluding men, women and children. Pursned and overtaken on the road by the In- dians, they fled into a slough near by. Most of them were wounded before they got into the grass. We will now quote from her narative:
"The balls fell around us like hail. I lay in the grass with my little ones gathered close around me; as it was very hot andl sultry. I tried to move a little
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distance from them, but could not get a foot away from them, for they would fol- low me. Poor little dears! they did not know how much they were destined to suffer, and they seemed to think if they kept close to mother, they would be safe. I could now hear groans about me in the grass, in various directions, and Mrs. Everett told me she was shot in the neck, and in a few minutes more, I was struck by a ball in the side. I told my husband I was shot. "Are you much hurt?" he asked. "Yes, I think I shall die," I answered, "but do not come here, for you can do me no good; stay there, for you can do more good with your rifle." I knew he could not come without being discovered by the Indians, Another ball soon struck me on the head, lodging between the skull and the scalp. where it still remains. I could tell if a ball struck any one, by the sound. My husband then said that he thought he would move a little, as the Indians had discovered bis hiding-place He removed, reloaded his gun, and was watching for a chance to shoot, when I heard a ball strike some one. Fearing that he was the one, 1 called to him, saying, "John, are you hurt?" Ile did not answer. I called again, but there was no reply, save that I heard him groan twice, very faintly, then I knew that he was hurt, and I thought that I must go to him, but Mrs. Cook begged me not to go. I told her that he was badly hurt, and I must go to him. "Do not, for God's sake," said Mrs Cook, "stay with your children , if you stir from that spot they will all be killed , your husband is dead already, and you can- not possibly do him any good, so stay with your children, I beg of you " I took her advice and stayed with them, for they were all I had left in the world "
After detailing how the women and children were induced by old Pawn to come out of the slough and surrender themselves to the savages on promise of their lives being spared, and how, a heavy thunder storm having come up, the In- dians began to hurry them away. She proceeds.
"I stopped, however, and looked around to see if my children were coming, and to tell them to follow me. Little Freddy, one of my boys, aged five years, arose out of the grass, at my call, and started to come. Then, for the first time, I observed a hideous old squaw, who had just joined the Indians ; she ran alter him, and felled him to the ground, with a blow upon the head from something she carried in her hand. Weak, wounded and tightly held by my captor, as I was, I could only stand and look on at the scene which followed, while such an- guish racked my soul as, I pray God, that you, ye mothers who read this, may never feel. The old hag beat him for some minutes upon the back part of the head, till I thought she had killed him. She stepped back a lew paces, when the little innocent arose, and again started for me; but, oh! what a piteous sight for a mother to behold! The blood was streaming from his nose, mouth and ears, The old squaw, not yet satisfied, again knocked him down, and pounded him awhile . then took him by the clothes, raised him as high as she could, and with all her force, dashed him upon the ground. She then took a knife and stabbed him sev- eral times. I could not stop or return, for my captor was by this time dragging me away, but my head was turned around, and my eyes riveted upon the cruel murder of my defenseless little ones, I heard some one call out, "Mother! mother !! " I looked, and there stood little Frank, my next oldest child, on his knees, with hands raised toward heaven, calling "Mother!" while the blood was streaming from his mouth. O! who could witness such a sight, and not feel their hearts melt with pity ! None but the brutal Indians could, He had been shot in the mouth, knocking out four of his teeth-once through the thigh, and once through the bowels, But what could I do? Nothing, but gaze in silent horror on my children while they were being murdered by savages."
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She then gives an account of the horrible outrage and butchery of her com- panions. Most of the younger children were left by the fiends wounded on the prairie to perish a lingering death from cold and starvation. Mrs. Eastlick was taken a short distance when Pawn shot her in the back and she fell on her face. Another Indian came up to her and struck her on the head with all his might a number of times with his gun until her head bounded from the ground with each blow. She was then left for dead. Though her skull was broken she did not loose consciousness, but lay where she was too weak to move for hours, The crying of a child whom she thought was her Johnny aroused the mother's heart.
"So I determined to try to go to them, thinking we could, perhaps, keep warm better, tor the rain still fell very fast, and the night was settling in, cold and stormy. I rose upon my feet, and found that I could walk, but with great diffi- culty. I heard Willie Duly, whom I supposed dead long before this, cry ont, "Mother ! mother ! ! " but a few steps from me, and then he called, "Mrs. Smith ! Mrs. Smith !! " Having to pass close by him, as I left the slough, I stopped and thought I would speak to him . but, on reflecting that I could not possibly help the poor boy, I passed him without speaking. He never moved again from the spot where I last saw him ; for when the soldiers went there to bury the dead, they found him in the same position, lying on his face. at the edge of the slough I was guided to the place where my children and neighbors were killed, by the cry of a child, which I supposed to be Johnny's voice but, on reaching the spot where it lay, it proved to be Mrs. Everett's youngest child. Her eldest, Lily, aged six years, was leaning over him, to shield him from the cold storm. I called her by name: she knew my voice instantly, and said, "Mrs. Eastlick, the Indians haven't killed ns yet?" "No, Lily," said I, "not quite, but there are very few of us left"' "Mrs. Eastlick," said she. "I wish you would take care of Charley?" I told her it was impossible, for my Johnny was somewhere on the prairie, and I feared he would die unless I could find him, and keep him warm. She begged me to give her a drink of water, but it was out of my power to give her even that, or to assist her in any way, and I told her so. She raised her eyes, and, with a sad, thought- ful, hopeless look, asked the question. "Is there any water in heaven?" "Lily." I replied, "when you get to heaven, you will never more suffer from thirst or pain." On hearing this, the poor little patient sufferer, only six years old, laid herself down again, and seemed reconciled to her fate."
After wandering among the dead and dying and failing to find either Johnny or Merton, she thought they might have escaped the savages and wandered out on the prairie. So she dragved herself away some distance in quest of them, imagining every few minutes she heard them crying here or there. All night and next day she wandered around in the vicinity, and all this time she could hear the agonizing cries of the poor little children that had not yet perished in the slough, After three nights and three days of wandering she was overtaken, only five miles from where she started, by a mail carrier, who helped her into his sulky, and they proceeded about ten or eleven miles farther to the house of a German, called Dutch Charley. ' The owners had deserted the place some days, but to the great surprise of Mrs Eastlick she found there her old neighbor, Thomas Ireland, whom she supposed killed as she had last seen him in the slough in a dying condition, pierced with seven bullets. But he had revived and managed to crawl thus far, though in a sorry plight. From him she received the first tidings of her two missing boys. Merton had left the slough the after- noon of the massacre with his baby brother on his back to go to "Dutch Charleys." After resting a few minutes the mail carrier, Mrs. Eastlick and Mr. Ireland hurried
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on as well as they could. Next day (Sunday) a little before noon they overtook Mrs. Hurd and her two children in the road. They, too, were from Lake Shetek. but the pitiful story of her trials is too long for us. A short distance ahead Mrs. Eastlick found her two lost children Merton had little Johnny on his back and had carried him thus for fitty miles, and they had suffered terribly from want of food and shelter, so their emaciated faces could hardly be recognized. Two miles further and they came to the deserted home of J. F Brown, which stood in Section 22, of Burnstown, in Brown county, thirty miles west of New Ulm Here Mr. Ireland and the women and children were left while the mail carrier went on to get help from New Ulm. Ile returned the following Wednesday with the dis- heartening news that New Um had nearly all been burnt, and when he got near it six Indians rose from the grass and chased him, and that the settlers everywhere had all been killed. Ile then left them to go to Sioux Falls, Dakota, for help. They waited at Brown's house until the following Monday, when Mr. Ireland felt strong enough to make another attempt to reach New Ulm and succeeded in get- ting there Tuesday afternoon as we stated before.
Lieut. Roberts and his squad reached Mr. Brown's house about 1 o'clock at night. The women thought they were In- dians at first, but when they learned the truth their joy knew no bounds and there was not a dry eye in the room. After resting until dawn the soldiers put the women and children into a wagon, which they had brought and started back. For fear of an am- bush Lieut. Roberts returned by another road, on the opposite side of the Cottonwood, from that on which they had come. One of the men, J. R. Gilfillan by name, tarried behind a few minutes to get some corn for his horse. He was not missed by his comrades for a time. The men sent back to look for him failed to find him. It seems he took the same road he had come on, and searching parties, two or three days afterwards, found his headless trunk in a field near the road. The Indians after- wards said that they had seen the soldiers going out, but thought they were scouts and that the main army was coming right after them so they did not fire on them, but when the main army did not come they had fixed a good ambush for the soldiers when they returned, and it was only the foresight of Lieut. Rob- erts that saved the entire squad from sharing the fate of poor Gilfillan.
Immediately after the occupation of New Uim by Dane's company, and Ft. Ridgely by Col. Sibley's force the settlers liv- ing east of these places returned mostly to their homes to care for their stock and crops. Tuesday, September 2, the very day of the battle of Birch Cooley and the departure of Lieut. Rob- erts' squad from New Ulm to rescue Mrs. Eastlick and Mrs. Hurd, a band of eight Indians suddenly appeared in the town of Courtland, then called "Hilo," on the other side of the Minne-
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sota from Cambria, and adjoining the Welsh settlement of Eureka, in Nicollet county, on the west, and killed two men and a boy. Crossing the river they passed through the town of Cambria. In the afternoon, David P. Davis and his boys were making hay on their farm, three quarters of a mile west of Horeb church. Ilis son, Eben P. Davis, had just put a span of young horses into the pasture near by and was returning along a mar- gin of grass between the fence and a field of standing grain. Suddenly an Indian jumped up and made a grab for his shoulder, but Eben, with a mighty jump. eluded his grasp and fled for the woods like a deer. The Indian chased him a short distance, then fired. The ball passed through Eben's left arm, between the elbow and the wrist. The settlers soon heard of the shoot- ing and hurried with their families to James Morgan's house to learn the particulars and for mutual defence. A stampede of the settlers was prevented by the arrival, just before sundown of a company of soldiers-belonging to the Twenty-fifth Wis- consin-who were on their way to New Ulm. They helped the settlers search for the Indians, but no trace of them could be found nor of the two horses Eben had put into the pasture. The soldiers camped by Horeb church that night with the Welsh set- tlers.
The Welsh people of Eureka with the rest of the settlers of that part of Nicollet county fled to Nicollet village where they fortified themselves. The bodies of the three men murdered in Courtland were brought there next day and buried.
Next day Col. Flandreau sent Capt. Rogers' company of the Seventh Minnesota to relieve Capt. Dane's company at New Uim and the latter company were brought down and stationed in the midst of the Welsh settlement at the southwest corner of Evan Davis' present farm in Judson-just half a mile west of Jerusa- lem cemetery. The camp was called "Camp Crisp." from Mr. Crisp's house just across the road from it. It was not the wisest location as subsequent events proved, for it left half of the Welsh settlement to the west exposed to the Indians. A vigilant watch was now kept by the soldiers. Squads of mounted men were sent out every day from Camp Crisp and New Ulm to scour the country thoroughly. The Welsh settlers of Horeb neigh- borhood were wont to gather for mutual protection every night at James Morgan's house. Tuesday night, September 9, just one week after Eben P. Davis was shot. most of the families concluded, because the soldiers were searching the country every day, that the danger was over and so staid at their homes. A
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few, however, came together as usual. These were the families of David P. Davis, James Edwards, Lewis D. Lewis and Rich- ard Morgan-twenty-two persons between men, women and children. David Price and family had also come with their neighbor, James Edwards, but at the invitation of Thos. Y. Davis they drove over to spend the night with him. His house, (the present residence of Rev. Thos. E. Hughes ) was only about fifty rods away, on the other side of a little knoll. A number of the men gathered at James Morgan's house in the early evening to hear and talk over the news. Among others were John S. Jones ( Prairie ), David J. Davis and Henry Hughes. The latter spoke of an adventure he had just had in looking for his cow on the creek, under his house-a suspicious noise in the brush, which kept moving away from him. Win. Edwards was sure he had seen Indians down on the Minnesota river below their house that afternoon. Not much credence was given to stories about seeing Indians in those days, for everything then as- sumed the appearance of an Indian warrior, to the excited im- agination.
Next morning, September 10, at break of day the people at James Morgan's house were awakened by the furious barking of the dogs. Mr. Morgan opened the front door and saw some per- son in the road in front of the house with a dog barking vic- iously at his heels. He was dressed in citizen's clothes and had a straw hat on, but as he turned to look at the dog, James Mor- gan recognized him to be an Indian and called the attention of Lewis D. Lewis, who had also stepped to the door, to him. Mr. Lewis raised his right hand to shield his eyes as he peered through the dusk of the morning in the direction pointed by Morgan. Suddenly a bullet struck his hand, passed through its entire width, a little above the knuckles and hit his fore- head a slight blow, then fell to the floor. His hand had saved his brain. Another bullet came whizzing through the north window on the east side of the front door, but though the room was full of people it passed between them doing no harm. James Edwards had just jumped from his bed on the floor to reach for his gun, when a third ball came through the east win- dow hitting him in the neck, severing the jugular vein. With- out a word he fell dead across the bed, his blood spurting over the room. The other men had now secured their guns and opened a brisk fire on the enemy and they retreated into Thos. Y. Davis' corn field across the road. David P, Davis, Jr., thinks he hit one Indian as he passed over the fence, but no
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Jerusalem Church and Cemetery, Judson, Minn. By grove in center stood C'amp C'risp.
View of Horeb Church and School House, from Southeast. By the trees in left foreground stood house of James Morgan, attacked by Indians Sept. 10, 1562.
TEE WELSH IN MINNESOTA.
trace of him could be found afterwards. As soon as the Indians were driven off, John P. and Henry P. Davis started for Camp Crisp, six miles away, for help. Win. Edwards and David P. Davis, Jr., followed in a short time on the same errand. Miss Mary Morgan, taking one of her brother's young children in her arms started, also, for the camp. The others staid in the house for a time and kept a watch from the upstair's window. David P. Davis had been stacking grain the day before and had left his horses in his pasture over night. Not long after the shoot- ing a number of Indians were observed chasing the horses. They soon corraled them in the corner of the field, where they had made a pen with the wagons used in stacking. The In- dians then congregated on Daniel P. Davis' hill (a knoll or ridge on the southwest corner of the same farm ). There were twelve to fifteen of them. After a short consultation the four mounted on David P. Davis' and Richard Morgan's horses and two on foot started down the hill eastward, the direction of Morgan's house. Three or four went south, where they stole Rev. Jenkins' horses, the rest passed beyond the hill to the west.
The people in James Morgan's house, seeing a portion of the Indians coming again towards them, concluded they were bent.on another attack, and all fled from the house. David P. Davis, Sr., got into Thos. Y. Davis' corn field, Jas. Morgan hid in the grain stacks near the house. The rest ran down a little gully towards Cambria creek. When about eighty rods west of the house the two Indians on foot turned to the left into Thos. Y. Davis' field; those mounted, evidently to avoid passing the house, turned on the right into Henry Hughes' field, and passed down a branch of the same gully just mentioned and barely missed the women and children, who had just reached a clump of bushes, when the Indians passed within a few feet of them. Lewis D. Lewis, being unable to stanch the flow of blood from his hand, had left the house about fifteen minutes before, to go to the camp. When nearing Bennett's creek he saw the Indians coming after him in the road. He ran and threw him- self into a small clump of bushes by the roadside. IIe found himself lying down within a foot or two of a monster prairie snake. Lewis concluded to trust the snake, however, rather than the Indians, and so remained where he was until the Sioux were gone, nor did his snakeship resent his den being made a city of refuge.
The two Indians who had turned into Thos. Y. Davis' field went straight for his horses, which had been staked out to grass
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near the house. Mr. Davis thought they were soldiers, and ran out to stop them from taking his horses, and when close to them perceived they were Indians. He ran back and then over to James Morgan's house for help. The front door was locked and no one, to his surprise, answered his raps. He ran to the back door and opened it. Nothing but confusion and blood everywhere. A glance into that chamber of death was enough. Mr. Davis ran down the road to the house of Mr. Shields, whom he found at home. Taking Enoch, the youngest child, on his back Mr. Davis ran into the brush followed by the balance of the Shields family. Emerging from the woods where David E. Bowen's house now stands, they saw not more than ten rods ahead of them, in the road, the four Indians mounted on D. P. Davis' horses. The Indians glanced back over their shoulders at them, but did not stop. Half a mile further Wm. P. Jones, Hugh R. Williams, Stephen and David Walters, and Thos. D. Lloyd were approaching the Mankato road from Lloyd's house with an ox-team and wagon. The Indians turned from the main road and approached the wagon on the full gal- lop, whooping and brandishing their weapons. The men scat- tered into the adjoining corn fieldl, except Stephen Walters, who, mounted on Hugh Williams' fleet mare tried to outrun the foe, but gave up too soon, and ran into the cornfieldl, leaving the mare for the Indians. They plundered the wagons of a few articles and exchanged their poorest horse for the mare and then passed down the road.
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