USA > Indiana > A history of Indiana from its exploration to 1850 > Part 8
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In connection with this attempt on Detroit there oc- curred the greatest disaster sustained in the West during the war. Col. Archibald Lochry raised 107 men in West- moreland county, Pennsylvania, and started with them to join Clark. They reached Wheeling August 8. Clark had waited for them five days, but his men growing restless and deserting, he had gone on leaving Lochry and his band to follow. Twenty or thirty miles below, Clark waited again, and again had to go and leave them behind. His
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troops were deserting so fast he did not dare wait any longer. Lochry followed, but, despairing of overtaking Clark with his whole force, he sent Lieutenant Shannon with seven men ahead to let Clark know he was coming.
These seven men were taken by the Indians and with them the letter of Lochry to Clark, detailing the condition and number of all Clark's forces, including those under Lochry.
There was great excitement, not only at Detroit but among the savages of Ohio, when it was learned Clark was gathering an army. DePeyster hastily gathered to- gether the frightened Indians and sent them, together with one hundred of Butler's rangers under partisan command- ers, to ward off the intended blow against Detroit. It was a part of this Indian army led by the Iroquois, Joseph Brant, and the Pittsburg refugee, George Girty, that cap- tured Lieutenant Shannon and immediately laid an ambus- cade for Lochry's company. A spot was selected about eleven miles below the mouth of the big Miami where Lochry creek joins the Ohio. There the Ohio was very narrow. A bar at low water ran almost across the river. Unfortunately the Americans decided to land on this bar for some purpose or other, thus walking directly into the ambuscade. The whole party was killed or captured. Some of the prisoners were killed, Colonel Lochry being of this number, and the rest were taken to Detroit, whence sixty finally reached home. The Indians, joined by the other tribes and led by the British Indian agent, Alexander Mc- Kee, followed on down to within thirty miles of the Falls, but, although they numbered near 1,000 men, they made no attack. As soon as they learned that Clark had aban- doned all hope of an offensive campaign they separated, a large band of Wyandottes and Miamis under McKee and Brant going into Kentucky on a marauding expedition.+
4 For a popular and fairly accurate account of the principal events of this period, in the history of the West, see James R. Albach Annals of the West. Mann Butler. History of Kentucky is valuable, being written from first hand evidence. A detailed account of Lochry's Defeat, by Charles Martindale, is published in Vol. II. Publications Indiana Historical Society; D. V. Culley, in Lawrenceburg Palladium, May 15.
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The year 1782 saw the last of the Revolutionary struggle between the English and Americans in the north- west, saw the most bloodshed of any year on the frontier, and saw the deepest gloom settle down over Kentucky. The agents of the British roused the Indians to frenzy by telling them that the Americans were preparing to drive them into Canada. The actions of the American troops on the border seemed to the Indians to confirm this. The year had scarcely begun when Col. David Williamson, with a company of Pennsylvania militia, on the track of a ma- rauding band of Wyandottes and Moravians, came to the Moravian towns on the Tuscarawas river, and, finding some of the bloodstained clothing of their murdered friends on the backs of these so-called peaceful Indians, they massacred every Indian they could get their hands on. The militia have been severely condemned for this bloody deed, but they did only what most men would have done under the circumstances.
Hardly had this unfortunate blow blotted out the Mo- ravian tribe when, on June 4, Col. William Crawford ap- peared among the Upper Sandusky Towns. The fact that Crawford was killed and his regiment driven back did not quiet the natives. Their scouts brought reports that Gen. William Irvine at Fort Pitt was collecting a powerful army of regulars to invade the Miami country. The Indians gathered in great numbers at the Shawnee town of Wapa- tomica in central Ohio. Here also at their own urgent request they were joined by Capt. William Caldwell of the British rangers. After the usual round of inflammatory speeches they decided to march on Wheeling under the lead of Captain Caldwell. Hardly had Caldwell started when a report reached Detroit that Clark was preparing for a campaign. Such was the fear of both British and Indians for that leader that the expedition against Wheeling was recalled and the Indian agents of Detroit were sent in haste in all directions to call in the warriors. Shawnees,
1830, tells the story as he had it from Patrick Hunter, one of the cap- tives, living in 1830 near Corydon; see also Life of Joseph Brant, and Butterfield, History of the Girtys.
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Delawares, Wyandottes, Mingoes, Munceys, Ottawas, Chip- pewas and Miamis hastened to the rendezvous at the Piqua Plains. Had the hero of the Illinois led his Kentuckians into the Scioto country then he would have found the In- dians at home to receive him. Alexander McKee, the In- dian agent, said it was the largest force of Indians that had been collected in the Northwest up to that time. Only imminent danger could keep an Indian army together and when scouts from the Falls reported that the alarm was false this army melted away in a day. Of the 1,400 assembled, Captain Caldwell was able to persuade only 300 to go with him on a raid into Kentucky. It was this band that laid siege to Bryan's Station and a few days later, August 19, administered the disastrous repulse to the Ken- tucky militia at Blue Licks. Attacks were made about the same time on Rice's Fort, Fort Henry, and Wheeling, but the Indians had no skill in capturing fortified posts.5
During the latter part of August Colonel De Peyster at Detroit was warned that peace was at hand and to stop hostilities. Scouts were dispatched to the rangers acting with the Indians. Had these been a few days earlier the loss at Blue Licks would have been avoided. As it was the Indians had roused their dreaded enemy at the Falls and now were left leaderless to bear his vengeance. The call of Clark had awakened the settlers to their old-time courage, and under the inspiration of his fame 1,050 set- tlers assembled at the mouth of the Licking opposite Cin- cinnati to punish the invaders. He crossed the Ohio No- vember 4, and in six days was among the Miami towns. The Indians had barely time to scatter to the woods, warned only by the alarm cry. A score of tribesmen were killed or captured and all their towns burned. Thinking themselves secure, the Indians had gathered here their win- ter's supply of corn and beans, all of which were lost. The blow was especially severe to the women and children.
5 For this period there is no better history than Consul W. Butter- field's History of the Girtys. See also Roosevelt, Winning the West; McClung, Sketches of Western Adventure. The best sources are the Haldimand Papers, Pennsylvania Archives; Heckewilder's Narrative.
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One can only pity them in their privations as they faced the winter without food or shelter in the inhospitable wil- derness. Nor should he at the same time forget the women and children left defenseless by the dastardly crimes of the warriors on the frontier. Without appearing to con- done the deeds of the Indians, whose very savagery is a sort of excuse for their unspeakable atrocity, the reader is reminded at every turn of this border warfare that the British were more guilty than the Indians. British cap- tains in scarlet uniform led the savage warriors in battle or stood by and saw them commit on their white prisoners cruelties not paralleled in history during the Christian era.
The capture of Cornwallis, it was evident to all, would end the war between England and her former colonies and insure American independence. As noted above, the Brit- ish commanders soon after this event called in their forces. Provisional articles of peace were arranged on the last day of November, 1782, and the declaration was read at the head of the armies on the anniversary of the Battle of Lexington.
The treaty was finally signed September 3, 1783. The boundary was laid down through the middle of Lake Erie, through Detroit river, Lake Superior, Long Lake, Lake of the Woods, thence due west to the Missisippi river and down the middle of that stream to the thirty-first degree of latitude. Thanks to the peace commissioners the work of the Virginia pioneers had not been in vain. They had added to the United States a territory nearly as large as the original colonies. Much has been said concerning what might have happened but for Clark's conquest. The terri- tory north of the Ohio at the beginning of the war was a part of Canada by the Quebec Act, and, had British armies held it to the close of the war, it would no doubt have remained a part of that province. It was not a de- fense by the Virginians of their own territory but was essentially a foreign conquest. Since 1783 England has yielded very little territory to any power, and it is all but certain she would never have ceded this to the United States.
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She did not give up a single fort on account of the treaty and continued to hold Oswego, Niagara, Presque Isle, Sandusky, Detroit, Michillimacinac and Prairie du Chien, in the ceded territory, plague spots to the western settlements. Had England delivered up these posts, the two nations would have been spared the expense and hu- miliation of a second war twenty-nine years later.
§ 18 THE INDIANS BECOME THE WARDS OF THE UNITED STATES
WITH the signing of the treaty, September 3, 1783, there devolved on the national government the care of the Indians living on the national domain. Up to this time the Indian problem had been one purely of frontier defense. But an enlightened nation could not wantonly destroy these simple folks. By the laws of warfare they had for- feited all rights to their land and almost to their lives; yet Congress had no idea of punishing them. It was nec- essary to adopt an Indian policy and organize a depart- ment of goverment to carry it out. Two of the leading principles incorporated in the Indian policy were the recog- nition of the tribal governments, and the recognition of the Indian ownership of the land.6 After the long struggle of the pioneers was ended, as they thought, in 1783, the government recognized the Indian title as complete to all the Northwest territory. Not a settler could legally go into all that region. The men who went to treat with the tribes were given the same official title as those who went to treat with other foreign nations. Though ownership of the land was recognized in the tribes, they were not allowed to sell it to any other nation, nor were they allowed to sell it even to American settlers. If the Indians so de- sired, and the government lost no opportunity in creating such a desire, they might sell to the United States. It is
6 This principle is stated clearly in 8 Wheaton's Reports, 543. The opinion is by Chief Justice Marshall. The substance of the decision is given in the introduction to Vol VII, United States Statutes at Large. The case in question involved a sale of land by the Illinois and Pianke- shaw Indians.
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to the credit of the nation that it always paid the Indians fair prices for their lands, more, in many cases, than it received from the settlers after the expense of surveying was paid. Those tribes that behaved themselves became wealthy and were fostered far more than their conduct deserved.
An ordinance for the regulation of Indian Affairs passed the Old Congress August 7, 1786.7 By this the Indian country was divided into two departments, a north- ern and a southern, the Ohio river being the dividing line. For each of these a superintendent of Indian Affairs was appointed. He held his office for a term of two years and was to reside among the Indians if possible. The northern superintendent had two deputies who had the care and custody of all goods intended for the Indians. The super- intendent licensed all traders and supervised them in their business. The traders had to be citizens of the United States, bear an unquestioned reputation for morality certi- fied to by the governor of the State in which they lived, and then pay $50 each annually before a license was issued. It was the hope of Congress to attract good men into this work, but the majority of the early traders were refugee criminals, seeking a field where their criminal propensi- ties might have freer range. Traders were put under heavy bonds. Officers of the army and Indian agents were forbidden to trade with Indians on their own account. Finally, no white person was allowed to travel among them without regular passports, signed by the Indian agents. One wonders after reading this why the Americans were so indignant at the Proclamation of King George in 1763, after which this ordinance of 1786 was to some extent fash- ioned.
The most troublesome business of the Indian commis- sioners was the definition of the Indian boundary. There were several reasons why an amicable adjustment of the boundary question was difficult. The national government was sorely in need of money and the sale of public lands offered the most available source of immediate revenue.
7 American State Papers; Indian Affairs, I, 14.
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Before any of the national land could be surveyed and sold the Indian title had to be extinguished. The settlers themselves were just as eager to buy as the nation was to sell. They were not always observant of the Indian claims, and failing to buy the land they became squatters. Worst of all were the English soldiers and traders at the northwestern posts. The traders were anxious to push the Indian boundary far to the eastward and southward, so that the field for the fur trade might be as large as possible. Many of these English fur traders and English Indian agents were refugee loyalists and the bitterest enemies of the Americans. Every act of the American government was misinterpreted by them for the Indians. Last of all the Indians themselves were apprehensive. They had been crowded steadily westward by the whites till they had be- come so thoroughly suspicious of every move of the Ameri- cans that it was with difficulty they could be induced to hold a council.
CHAPTER V
INDIAN WARS
§ 19 THE STRUGGLE FOR THE OHIO RIVER BOUNDARY
THE first attempt to define the Indian boundary line was made in the summer of 1784 when Oliver Wolcott, Richard Butler and Arthur Lee met the Senecas, Mohawks, Onondagas, Oneidas, Tuscaroras, and Cayugas at Fort Stanwix, New York.1 These six Indian nations, it will be remembered, claimed all the land west of the Alleghanies. The commissioners acknowledged, at this time, the Ohio river as the boundary line.
The Americans determined to follow this up and make treaties with the northwestern tribes. The latter tribes had never ceased harassing the western settlements. Since their English leaders had been recalled they had not crossed the Ohio in formidable bodies, but small parties of ten or twenty continually hovered on the border to steal, rob and murder. To protect the advance guards of settlement, Con- gress decided by resolution of June 3, 1784, to equip a western regiment, to be known as the First American. It was placed under the command of Lieut .- Col. Josiah Harmar with headquarters at Fort Pitt. A general Indian council was to be held there under the protection of this regiment. Accordingly messengers were sent to all the tribes inviting them to meet at Pittsburgh in December, 1784. The troops and the three commissioners, Arthur Lee, Richard Butler, and George Rogers Clark, did not ar- rive at Pittsburgh till December 5, when, on account of the
1 Treaties Between the United States and the Indian Tribes, edited by Richard Peters, Boston, 1848. This is volume VII Statutes at Large of United States. All Indian Treaties from 1789 to 1845 are printed in this volume. No further reference on Indian treaties will be given.
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lateness of the season, it was decided to hold the council nearer the Indian country. The troops were accordingly marched to Fort McIntosh, thirty miles down the Ohio. Here January 21, 1785, a treaty was signed by the Wyan- dotte, Chippewa, Delaware and the Ottawa sachems. By its terms the boundaries were fixed as the Cuyahoga river from its mouth at Lake Erie to its source, thence west to the Big Miami and down that stream to the Ohio river and west with the Ohio.
The council at Fort McIntosh was not attended by all the tribes that were invited. Several were detained by the British Indian agents. It had been the custom during the later years of the Revolutionary War for the Indians to congregate in large numbers around the trading places of the English on the Maumee. This custom having been kept up after 1783, the traders now took advantage of it to persuade many of the Indians to stay away from the council at Fort McIntosh. After the treaty was signed, they began at once to denounce it. The Indians were told that they would find no resting place till the Americans had driven them beyond the Mississippi. The Canadian winters of the north and the fierce Sioux of the west made the prospect in either case unpleasant. The Shawnees and Miamis were not represented at the council, but they soon afterward manifested a desire to make peace.
Acting on this advice, Congress sent Richard Butler, George Rogers Clark and Judge Samuel Holden Parsons to hold a council. Capt. Walter Finney2 was instructed to build a fort at the mouth of the Big Miami and here the council met in the winter of 1785-6.3 Fearing the grow- ing influence of the Americans, and their councils of peace on the Indians, the British traders and agents had held a council with all the tribes of Ohio and Indiana at the Dela- ware town of New Coshocton. As a result of these in- trigues of the traders not many Indians attended at Fort
2 A graphic description of this council is given in the Western Sun, Vincennes, October 28, 1820, written by "An Old Army Officer" who was present at the council.
3 Heitman, Historical Register Officers of Continental Army, 175.
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Finney, and when articles of peace were finally concluded January 21, 1786, only a few young Shawnee chiefs signed. By the terms of the treaty, the Indians were allotted lands lying north of a line joining the headwaters of the Big Miami and the Wabash.
A small band of Cherokees living on the Scioto river were the firebrands that brought on the second Indian war on the northwest frontier, if it is worth while to distin- guish the different parts of one long, continuous struggle which began with the coming of English agents to Detroit and continued until the English garrisons were driven out of the country. The Cherokees having killed a number of squatters on the Scioto, were so enraged by the taste of blood that they crossed over into Kentucky and committed several murders. The Kentuckians called for protection on the governor of Virginia, who immediately notified Congress. The latter promptly ordered Col. Josiah Har- mar4 to station two companies at Fort Steuben, now Jeffer- sonville, Indiana, and to call on the Kentucky militia for more troops if needed.
This military activity, and the former acts of Congress directing the Indian commissioners to secure large cessions of the Indian lands, when explained to the Indians by Eng- lish traders, caused the Wabash tribes to join the Shaw- nees and Cherokees. Their action was perhaps determined upon at a grand council of the tribes held at Quiatanon late in the fall of 1785. A chief, sent by this council, notified the French at Vincennes that the Indians had decided to make war on the Americans, and that if the French re- mained at Vincennes they would also be killed. Nearly all the out-settlers around Vincennes were driven in or killed. Those who had attempted to settle on Clark's Grant were driven off, and travel on the Ohio and Wabash became extremely hazardous.5
Acting on the suggestion of Congress, the Kentucky militia to the number of 1,500 was called out. One thou- sand of these under the command of Gen. George Rogers
4 Heitman, Historical Register Officers of Continental Army, 209.
5 American State Papers; Indian Affairs (index).
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Clark were directed to protect Vincennes and invade the Indian country up the Wabash. The troops rendezvoused at the Falls in the summer of 1786, and thence marched overland to Vincennes.6 Their supplies, in nine keel boats, were sent down the Ohio and up the Wabash. The army reached Vincennes about October 1, but, on account of low water in the Wabash, the supplies did not reach them until nine days later; when they did arrive nearly all were spoiled. A spirit of mutiny in the meantime manifested itself in the army. Whether due to inactivity, to the loss of the supplies and consequent low rations, or to the in- temperance of the commander, is not known. At any rate, after moving up to the Vermillion towns and finding them vacated, General Clark did not deem it prudent to pro- ceed farther with such troops and marched them back to Vincennes, where he disbanded them. This was the first of a series of mutinies that disgraced the Kentucky militia and twice brought disaster to the national arms.7
While his army lay at Fort Steuben waiting for sup- plies, General Clark ordered Col. Benjamin Logan back to Kentucky to raise a force and attack the Shawnees, while their attention was attracted by Clark to the Wabash. That intrepid officer found no difficulty in enlisting 500 mounted riflemen. With these he crossed the Ohio where Maysville now stands and by forced marches hurried to the Shawnee towns on the head branches of Mad river. A deserter from his army gave timely warning to the towns, enabling most of the Indians to escape. Colonel Logan burned eight towns, destroyed their corn just then ready to harvest, took seventy or eighty prisoners and killed twenty warriors. The raid, which was considered a great success, tended to arouse the spirit of the Kentuckians after the disgrace on the Wabash.
As soon as General Clark returned to Vincennes after his unfortunate invasion of the Vermillion towns, he called a meeting of the field officers of the army, October 8, 1786,
6 Dillon, History of Indiana, 187; Secret Journals of Congress, IV. 311.
7 John B. Dillon, History of Indiana, 185.
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at which it was decided to establish a permanent garrison at Vincennes. It was hoped that this would prevent any large body of savages leaving their homes to invade Ken- tucky. For this garrison it was thought one field officer and 250 men would be sufficient. To these were to be added an artillery company under Capt. Valentine Dalton. Gen- eral Clark assumed the lead and began to enlist men, ap- point officers, and seize goods for the support of the garri- son. The lawless mob thus gathered kept up the pretense of a garrison until they had, under color of law, plundered nearly all the citizens of the village, and had openly robbed the stores of some resident Spaniards.8
It was also decided by this hastily constituted board of field officers to make another attempt to get the Indians into council. Carrying out this resolution, General Clark sent letters to all the tribes inviting them to meet him at Clarksville for a council, November 20, 1786. Quite a num- ber of chiefs answered this invitation, but all insisted on holding the council at Vincennes instead of Clarksville. Ac- cepting the suggestion, General Clark changed the time and place to Vincennes, in April, 1787.
The work of General Clark was disavowed by Virginia, whereupon Congress ordered Gen. Josiah Harmar to pro- ceed to Vincennes and dispossess the disorderly garrison. In the meantime, the superintendent of Indian affairs was directed to meet the Indians at the appointed time. How- ever, after trying in vain all summer and during a large part of the year 1788, it was found impossible to get the Indians to attend. The English hold could not be broken.
General Harmar was instructed to dispose his regiment so as to protect the frontier. On an average one boatload of settlers passed the mouth of the Muskingum river, where Harmar was stationed, every day. Nothing was better calculated to arouse the Indians than this steady stream of immigrants. Harmar prepared at once to visit the posts
8 Charges were preferred against Clark, and the State of Virginia ordered an investigation. The report and the papers are given in Secret Journals of Congress; Foreign Affairs, IV, 301; Butler, History of Kentucky, ch. 9.
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