USA > Indiana > An illustrated history of the state of Indiana: being a full and authentic civil and political history of the state from its first exploration down to 1879 > Part 8
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Winthrop Sargent informs us that there were about one hundred and fifty French families at Vincennes in 1790. The heads of these families had all been at some time vested with certain titles to a portion of the soil, and while the Secretary was busily engaged endeavoring to straighten out these claims, he received a petition signed by eighty Americans, praying for the confirmation of the grants of lands ceded by the court which had been organized by Colonel John Todd, under the anthority of Virginia, to which reference has already been madc.
This case was met in the action of Congress on the third of March, 1791, empowering the Governor of the territory, in cases where land had been actually improved and cultivated under a supposed grant for the same, to confirm to the persons who made such improvements, the lands supposed to have been granted, not, however, exceeding the quantity of four hundred acres to any one person.
In the summer of 1790, a session of tlie general court was held at Vincennes, acting Governor Sargent* presiding, when the following laws were adopted :
I. An act to prohibit the giving or selling intoxicating
* Mr. Sargent acted in the capacity of Governor at the request of St. Clair, who, during the time, was busily engaged with military affairs.
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EARLY SETTLEMENTS AND LAND GRANTS.
liquors to Indians residing in, or coming into, the territory of the United States northwest of the river Ohio, and for prevent- ing foreigners from trading with Indians therein.
0
See page 21.
II. An act prohibiting the sale of spirituous or other intoxicating liquors to soldiers in the service of the United States, being within ten miles of any military post within the territory of the United States northwest of the river Ohio; and 8
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HISTORY OF INDIANA.
to prevent the selling or pawning of arms, ammunition, cloth- ing, and accontrements.
III. An act for suppressing and prohibiting every species of gaming for money or other property, and for making void contracts and payments made in consequence thereof, and for restraining the disorderly practice of discharging arms at certain hours and places.
We give here the sentiments of the principal inhabitants of Vincennes, which were addressed to Mr. Sargent while at that place, in 1790, in the following language: "The citizens of the town of Vincennes approach yon, sir, to express as well their personal respect for your honor as the full approbation of the measures you have been pleased to pursue in regard to their government and the adjustment of their claims, as inhabitants of the territory over which you at present preside. While we deem it a singular blessing to behold the principles of free government unfolding among us, we cherish the pleas- ing reflection that our posterity will also have cause to rejoice at the political change now originating. A free and efficient government, wisely administered, and fostered under the pro- tecting wings of an august union of States, cannot fail to render the citizens of this wide extended territory securely happy in the possession of every public blessing.
" We cannot take leave, sir, without offering to your notice a tribute of gratitude and esteem, which every citizen of Vin- cennes conceives he owes to the merits of an officer [Major Hamtramck] who has long commanded at this post. The unsettled situation of things, for a series of years previous to this gentleman's arrival, tended in many instances to derange, and in others to suspend, the operations of those municipal customs by which the citizens of this town were used to be governed. They were in the habit of submitting the superin- tendence of their civil regulations to the officer who happened to command the troops posted among them. Hence, in the course of the late war, and from the frequent change of masters, they labored under heavy and various grievances. But the judicious and humane attention paid by Major Hamtramck, during his whole command, to the rights and feelings of every
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HARMER, SCOTT AND WILKINSON'S EXPEDITIONS.
individual craving his interposition, demands, and will always receive our warmest acknowledgments.
" We beg you, sir, to assure the supreme authority of the United States of our fidelity and attachment; and that our greatest ambition is to deserve its fostering care, by acting the part of good citizens.
" By order, and on behalf, of the citizens of Vincennes.
ANTOINE GAMELIN, Magistrate. PIERRE GAMELIN, do.
PAUL GAMELIN, do.
JAMES JOHNSON, do.
LOUIS EDELINE, do.
LUKE DECKER, do.
FRANCIS BOSSERON, do.
FRANCIS VIGO, Major Commandant of Militia,
HENRY VANDERBURGH, Major of Militia.
To this complimentary testimonial Winthrop Sargent made & brief but appropriate reply.
CHAPTER VII.
HARMER, SCOTT AND WILKINSON'S EXPEDITIONS.
W HIEN Governor St. Clair arrived at Fort Washington from Kaskaskia, he determined, after a long conversa- tion with General Harmer, to send a powerful force to chastise the savages about the head waters of the Wabash. He had been empowered by the President to call on Virginia for one thousand troops, and on Pennsylvania for five hundred. This power he at once exercised. Three hundred of the Virginia militia were ordered to muster at Fort Stenben, and, with the garrison of that fort, to march to Vincennes, and join Major Hamtramck, who had orders to call for aid from the militia of
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HISTORY OF INDIANA.
Vincennes, march up the Wabash and attack any of the Indian villages to which, in his judgment, his force might be equal. The remaining twelve hundred of the militia were ordered to rendezvous at Fort Washington, and to join the regular troops at that post under the command of General Harmer .*
At this time the United States regular troops in the West were estimated by Gen. Harmer at four hundred effective men. These, with the militia, gave him a force of one thousand four hundred and fifty men. With this army Gen. Harmer marched from Fort Washington on the thirtieth of September. The troops continued the march until the seventeenth of October, when they reached the Maumee. The work of punishing the Indians was then begun, but, in one sense, ended disastrously. The savages received a severe scourging, but the militia behaved so badly as to be of little or no service. A detachment of three hundred and forty militia and sixty regulars, under the command of Colonel Hardin, were sorely defeated on the Mau- mec, on the twenty-second of October. On the twenty-third, the army took up the line of march for Fort Washington, and reached that place on the fourth of November, having lost in the expedition one hundred and eighty-three killed, and thirty- one wounded. The Indians lost about equally with the Amer- icans. During the progress of this expedition Major Ham- tramck marched up the Wabash from Vincennes as far as the mouth of the Vermillion river, destroyed several deserted villages, and returned, without finding an enemy to oppose him.
Although the savages were severely punished by these expe- ditions, yet they refused to sue for peace, and continued their hostilities. The inhabitants of the frontier settlements of Virginia took alarm, and the delegates of Ohio, Monongahela, Harrison, Randolph, Greenbrier, Kanawha and Montgomery connties, sent a joint memorial to the Governor of Virginia, saying that " the defenseless condition of these counties, form- ing a line of nearly four hundred miles along the Ohio river,
* Dillon's History of Indiana Territory, p. 241.
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HARMER, SCOTT AND WILKINSON'S EXPEDITIONS.
exposed to the hostile invasion of their Indian enemies, desti- tute of every kind of support, is truly alarming; for notwith- standing all the regulations of the General Government in that country, we have reason to lament that they have been hitherto ineffectual for our protection, nor indeed could it happen otherwise, for the garrisons kept by the Contimmcal
JOHN ROCHE, ESQ. See page 21.
troops on the Ohio river, if they are of any use, it must be - Kentucky settlements, as they immediately cover that country, To us they can be of no service, being from two to four hun- dred miles below our frontier settlements. We further beg leave to observe that we have reason to fear that the conse- quences of the defeat of our army by the Indians on the late
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HISTORY OF INDIANA.
expedition, will be severely felt on our frontiers, as there is no doubt but that the Indians will, in their turn, (being flushed with victory,) invade our settlements, and exercise all their horrid murder upon the inhabitants thereof, whenever the weather will permit them to travel. Then is it not better to support us where we are, be the expense what it may, than to oblige such a number of your brave citizens, who have so long supported, and still continues to support, a dangerous frontier, (although thousands of their relatives in the flesh, have, in the prosecution thereof, fallen a sacrifice to savage inventions,) to quit the country, after all they have done and suffered, when you know that a frontier must be supported somewhere."
This memorial cansed the Legislature of Virginia to author- ize the Governor of that State to make any defensive opera- tions necessary for the temporary defense of the frontiers, until the General Government could adopt and carry out measures to suppress the hostile Indians. The Governor at once called upon the military commanding officers in the western counties of Virginia, to raise, by the first of March, 1791, several small companies of rangers for this purpose. At the same time Charles Scott was appointed Brigadier-General of the militia of the district of Kentucky, with authority to raise two hundred and twenty-six volunteers, to protect the most exposed portions of that district.
A full report of the proceedings of the Legislature of Vir- ginia in relation to the exposed condition and defense of the frontiers of that State, was transmitted to Congress, and upon consideration of the same, the General Government consti- tuted a local Board of War for the district of Kentucky, composed of Brigadier-General Scott, Henry Innis, John Brown, Benjamin Logan and Isaac Shelby. On the ninth of March, 1791, General Henry Knox, Secretary of War, sent a letter of instructions to Brigadier-General Scott, recommend- ing an expedition of mounted men, not exceeding seven hun- dred and fifty, against the Wea towns on the river Wabash. Ile recommended that this force be raised and conducted to the Indian villages of the Wabash, where, by rapid incursions the towns could be destroyed and many prisoners taken.
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HARMER, SCOTT AND WILKINSON'S EXPEDITIONS.
Pursuant to these instructions, Brigadier-General Scott, on the twenty-third of May, 1791, crossed the Ohio, with about eight hundred mounted men, and "commenced his march for the Wabash, which he reached on the first of June. Many of the Indians, having discovered his supreach, fled, but he suc- ceeded in destroying all the villages around Ouiatenon, together with several Kickapoo towns, killing thirty-two war- riors and taking fifty-eight prisoners. He released a few of the most infirm prisoners, giving them a "talk," which they carried to the towns farther up the Wabash, and which the wretched condition of his horses prevented him from reaching.
On the third of March, 1791, Congress provided for raising and equipping a regiment for the protection of the frontiers, and Governor St. Clair was invested with the chief command of about three thousand troops, to be raised and employed against the hostile Indians in the territory over which his administration extended. He was instructed by the Secretary of War to march to the Miami village, and to establish a strong and permanent military post at that place. He was also directed to establish, during his advance, such posts of communication with Fort Washington, along the Ohio, as, in his judgment might be required.
The post at the Miami village was intended to keep the sav- ages in that vicinity in check, so as to prevent future hostili- ties, and it was the wish of the Secretary of War that it should be garrisoned not only strong enough for the defense of the place, but so as to afford, at all times, a detachment of five or six hundred men, either to chastise any of the Wabashı or other hostile Indians, or to capture convoys of the enemy's provisions. In his letter to Governor St. Clair, he urged that " the establishment of said post is considered as an important object of the campaign, and is to take place in all events. In case of a previous treaty, the Indians are to be conciliated upon this point if possible; and it is presumed good argu-
* ments may be offered to induce their acquiescence. * *
Having commenced your march upon the main expedition, and the Indians continuing hostile, you will use every possible exertion to make them feel the effects of your superiority;
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HISTORY OF INDIANA.
and, after having arrived at the Miami village, and put your works in a defensible state, you will seek the enemy with the whole of your remaining force, and endeavor, by all possible :neans, to strike them with great severity. * In order to avoid future wars, it might be proper to make the Wabash and
-
See page 21.
thence over to the Manmee, and down the same to its month, at lake Erie, the boundary between the people of the United States and the Indians, (excepting so far as the same should relate to the Wyandots and Delawares,) on the supposition of their continuing faithful to the treaties. But if they should
.
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HARMER, SCOTT AND WILKINSON'S EXPEDITIONS.
join in the war against the United States, and your army be victorious, the said tribes ought to be removed without the boundary mentioned."
On the twenty-fifth of June, 1791, Governor St. Clair, previ- ous to marching a strong force to the Miami town, as directed by the War Department, authorized Brigadier-General Wil-
BAKER CO.CHI.
MRS. ELIZA HANNA. See page 21.
kinson to conduct a second expedition, not exceeding five hundred mounted men, against the Indian villages on the Wabash. Pursuant to these instructions, Wilkinson mustered his forces, and was ready to march on the twentieth of July, with five hundred and twenty-five mounted volunteers, well armed, and provided with thirty days' provisions. With this
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HISTORY OF INDIANA.
force he reached the Ke-na-pa-com-a-qua village, on the north- ern bank of the Eel river, about six miles from a point where that river joins the Wabash, on the seventh of August, and succeeded in killing six warriors and taking thirty-four pris- oners, before they could escape. This town, which was scat- tered along Eel river for a distance of three miles, was totally destroyed.
Wilkinson encamped on the ruins of the town that night, and on the following day he commenced his march for the Kickapoo town on the prairie, which he was unable to reach owing to the impassable condition of the route which he adopted, and the failing condition of his horses. IIe estimated the results of the expedition, in his official report, as follows: " I have destroyed the chief town of the Oniatenon nation, and have made prisoners of the sons and sisters of the king. I have burned a respectable Kickapoo village, and cut down at least four hundred and thirty acres of corn, chiefly in the milk."
CHAPTER VIII.
ST. CLAIR AND WAYNE'S EXPEDITIONS.
T
MIIE three expeditions under Harmer, Scott and Wilkinson resulted in great damage to the Indians, but by no means subdued them. They regarded the policy of the United States as calculated to exterminate them from the land, and, goaded on by the English of Detroit, the enemies of the Americans, they were excited to desperation. At this time the govern- ment of Great Britain still supported garrisons at Niagara, Detroit and Michilimackinac, notwithstanding it was declared by the second article of the definite treaty of peace of 1783, that the king of Great Britain would, "with all convenient speed, and without causing any destruction or carrying away
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ST. CLAIR AND WAYNE'S EXPEDITIONS.
any negroes or property of the American inhabitants, with- draw all his forces, garrisons and fleets from the United States, and from every post, place and harbor within the same." It was also made a part of the treaty that the creditors on either side should meet with no lawful impediments to the recovery of the full value, in sterling money, of all bona fide debts previously contracted. The British government claimed that the United States had broken faith in this particular under- standing of the treaty, and, in consequence, refused to with- draw its forces 'from the territory. The British garrisons already mentioned were a great source of annoyance to the Americans, as they afforded succor to the hostile Indian tribes, and encouraged them in their incursions against the frontier American settlements, frequently aiding them with stores and provisions. This state of affairs in the territory of the United States northwest of the Ohio, continued from a period previous to its organization until the British power was withdrawn from the country in 1796, under the second treaty.
In September, 1791, Governor St. Clair moved from Fort Washington with a force of about two thousand men. On the the third of November the main army, consisting of about fourteen hundred effective troops, moved forward to the head- waters of the Wabash, where Fort Recovery was afterwards erected. Here the army encamped. At this time the Little Turtle, Blue Jacket and Buck-ong-a-helas, and other Indian chiefs were secreted a few miles distant with a force of twelve hundred Indians, awaiting a favorable opportunity to begin an attack, which they improved on the morning of the fourth of November, about half an hour before sunrise. The attack was first made upon the militia, which immediately gave way. But we shall not, in this place, tax our readers with an account of St. Clair's defeat, with which they are undoubtedly familiar. It will suffice to say that he returned to Fort Washington with a broken and dispirited army, having lost in the unsuccessful action of the fourth of November, thirty-nine officers killed, and five hundred and thirty-nine men killed and missing. Twenty-two officers and two hundred and thirty-two men were wounded. Several pieces of artillery, and all the baggage,
RESIDENCE OF HON. SAMUEL HANNA, FORT WAYNE.
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ST. CLAIR AND WAYNE'S EXPEDITIONS.
ammunition and provisions, were left on the field of battle, and fell into the hands of the victorious Indians. The stores and other public property lost in the action were valued at thirty- two thousand eight hundred dollars. Mr. John B. Dillon, in his early history of Indiana, speaks of St. Clair's defeat in these words: " With the army of St. Clair, following the for- tunes of their husbands, there were more than one hundred women. Very few escaped the carnage of the fourth of No- vember, and after the flight of the remnant of the army, the Indians began to avenge their own real and imaginary wrongs, by perpetrating the most horrible acts of cruelty and brutality upon the bodies of the living and the dead Americans who fell into their hands. Believing that the whites, for many years, made war merely to acquire land, the Indians crammed clay and sand into the eyes and down the throats of the dying and the dead."*
Although no particular blame was attached to Governor St. Clair for the loss in this expedition, yet he resigned the office of Major General, and was succeeded by Anthony Wayne, a distinguished officer of the Revolutionary War. Early in 1792, provisions were made by the General Government for re-organizing the army, so that it should consist of a respect able force. Wayne arrived at Pittsburg in June of the same year, where the army was to rendezvous. Here he continued actively engaged organizing and training his forces, until October, 1793, when, with an army of about three thousand six hundred effective men, he moved westward to Fort Wasb ington.
While Wayne was preparing for the offensive campaign every possible means was employed to induce the hostile tribes of the northwest to enter into a general treaty of peace with the American government. Speeches were sent among them ; agents to make treaties were also sent, but little was accom- plished. Major Hamtramck, who still remained at Vincennes, succeeded in concluding a general peace with the Wabash and Illinois Indians, but the tribes more immediately under the
* In Atwater's History of Ohio, we are informed that there were two hundred and fifty women with the army.
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HISTORY OF INDIANA.
influence of the British, refused to hear the sentiments of friendship that were sent among them, and tomakawked seve- ral of the messengers. Their courage had been aronsed by St. Clair's defeat, as well as the unsuccessful expeditions that preceded it, and they were now quite prepared to meet a superior force under General Wayne. The Indians insisted on the Ohio river as the boundary line between their lands and the lands of the United States, and chose rather to trust to the fortunes of a war than to make any further concessions.
On the twenty-sixth of July, 1794, Major-General Scott, with about sixteen hundred mounted volunteers from Ken- tucky, joined the regular troops under General Wayne, and on the twenty-eighth of the same'month the united forces com- menced their march for the Indian towns on the Mamince river. Arriving at the confluence of the Auglaize and Mau- mce rivers, General Wayne erected Fort Defiance, and on the fifteenth of August he moved the army from this place toward the British fort at the foot of the rapids of the Maumee, when, on the twentieth, alnost within the reach of the guns of the fort, the American army gained a decisive victory over the combined forces of the hostile Indians and a considerable number of the Detroit militia. The number of the enemy was estimated at two thousand, against about nine hundred American troops actually engaged. This horde of savages, as soon as the action began, abandoned themselves to flight, and dispersed with terror and dismay, leaving Wayne's victorious army in full and quiet possession of the field.
During the action the Americans lost thirty-three killed and one hundred wounded. The loss of the eneiny was more than double that of the Federal army. The woods, for a distance of nearly two miles, was strewn with the dead bodies of the Indians and British volunteers, who were shot down in their mad retreat.
The army remained three days and nights on the banks of the Maumee, in front of the field of battle, during which time all the houses and cornfields were consumed and destroyed for a considerable distance both above and below Fort Miami, as well as within pistol shot of the British garrison, who were
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ST. CLAIR AND WAYNE'S EXPEDITIONS.
compelled to remain idle spectators to this general devastation and conflagration, among which were the houses, stores and and property of Colonel McKee, the British Indian agent, and "principal stimulator of the war then existing between the United States and savages."
Of le ary Every
See page 21.
During the return march to Fort Defiance, the villages and cornfields for about fifty miles on each side of the Maumee were destroyed, as well as those for a considerable distance around that post.
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HISTORY OF INDIANA.
On the fourteenth of September, 1794, the army under the command of General Wayne commenced its march toward the deserted Miami villages which stood at the confluence of the rivers St. Joseph's and St. Mary's. This place was reached on the seventeenth of October, and on the following day the site of Fort Wayne was selected. The fort was completed on the twenty-second of November of the same year, and gar- risoned by a strong detachment of infantry and artillery, under the command of Colonel John F. Hamtramck, who gave to the new fort the name of Fort Wayne .*
The Kentucky volunteers returned to Fort Washington, and were mustered out of the service. General Wayne, with the Federal troops, marched to Greenville, where he took up his headquarters during the winter, and where, in the month of August, 1795, after several months of active negotiation, this gallant officer succeeded in concluding a general treaty of peace with all the hostile tribes who inhabited the territory of the United States northwest of the Ohio.
The treaty of Greenville, which was effected through the good offices of General Wayne, opened the way for the flood of emigration which from that day, flowed from the Eastern States into the Northwestern territory.
Aside from military affairs in the northwestern territory, there was but little of civil progress worthy of mention in a history of Indiana. In July, 1796, after the treaty between the United States and Spain had been concluded, the British garrisons, with their arms, artillery and stores, were with- drawn from the posts within the boundaries of the United States northwest of the Ohio river, and a detachment of Amer ican troops, consisting of sixty-five men, under the command of Captain Moses Porter, took possession of the evacuated post of Detroit in the same month. In the latter part of the year 1796, Winthrop Sargent proceeded to Detroit and erected the county of Wayne, and established a civil govern -- ment in that quarter. This county of Wayne, now the most wealthy county in Michigan, formed a part of the Indiana territory until its division, in 1805, when the territory of Michigan was organized.
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