USA > Indiana > Montgomery County > History of Montgomery County, together with historic notes on the Wabash Valley; gleaned from early authors, old maps and manuscripts, private and official correspondence, and other authentic sources > Part 24
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* Christopher Gist's Journal.
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HISTORIC NOTES ON THE NORTHWEST.
of that people, with their presents, returned to the French post from whence they came.
When negotiations failed to win the Miamis back to French authority, force was resorted to. On the 21st of June, 1752, a party of two hundred and forty French and Indians appeared before Pick- awillany, surprised the Indians in their corn-fields, approaching so suddenly that the white men who were in their houses had great difficulty in reaching the fort. They killed one Englishman and fourteen Miamis, captured the stockade fort, killed the old Pianka- shaw king, and put his body in a kettle, boiled it and ate it up in retaliation for his people having killed the French traders on the Vermilion River and at Vincennes. * "Thus," says the eloquent historian, George Bancroft, "on the alluvial lands of western Ohio began the contest that was to scatter death broadcast through the world."+
* The account of the affair at Pickawillany is summarized from the Journal of Capt. Wm. Trent and other papers contained in a valuable book edited by A. T. Goodman, secretary of the Western Reserve Historical Society, and published by Robert Clarke & Co., 1871, entitled "Journal of Captain Trent.'
t Old Britton's successor was his son, a young man, whose name was Mu-she- gu-a-nock-que, or "The Turtle." The English, and Indians in their interests, had a very high esteem for the young Piankashaw king. It is said by some writers, and there is much probability of the correctness of their opinion, that the great Miami chief, Little Turtle, was none other than the person here referred to. His age would correspond very well with that of the Piankashaw, and members of one band of the Miami nation frequently took up their abode with other bands or families of their kin- dred.
CHAPTER XXI.
THE WAR FOR THE EMPIRE. ITS LOSS TO THE FRENCH.
THE English not only disputed the right of the French to the fur trade, but denied their title to the valley of the Mississippi, which lay west of their American colonies on the Atlantic coast. The grants from the British crown conveyed to the chartered pro- prietors all of the country lying between certain parallels of latitude, according to the location of the several grants, and extending west- ward to the South Sea, as the Pacific was then called. Seeing the weakness of such a claim to vast tracts of country, upon which no Englishman had ever set his foot, they obtained deeds of cession from the Iroquois Indians, - the dominant tribe east of the Mississip- pi,- who claimed all of the country between the Alleghanies and the Mississippi by conquest from the several Algonquin tribes, who occu- pied it. On the 13th of July, 1701, the sachems of the Five Nations conveyed to William III, King of Great Britain, "their beaver- hunting grounds northwest and west from Albany," including a broad strip on the south side of Lake Erie, all of the present states of Michigan, Ohio and Indiana, and Illinois as far west as the Illi- nois River, claiming "that their ancestors did, more than fourscore years before, totally conquer, subdue and drive the former occupants out of that country, and had peaceable and quiet possession of the same, to hunt beavers in, it being the only chief place for hunting in that part of the world," etc .* The Iroquois, for themselves and heirs, granted the English crown "the whole soil, the lakes, the
* The deed is found in London Documents, vol. 4, p. 908. The boundaries of the grant are indefinite in many respects. Its westward limit, says the deed, "abutts upon the Twichtwichs [Miamis], and is bounded on the right hand by a place called Quadoge." On Eman Bowen's map, which is certainly the most authentic from the British standpoint, is a " pecked line " extending from the mouth of the Illinois river, up that stream, to the Desplaines, thence across the prairies to Lake Michigan at Quadoge or Quadaghe, which is located on the map some distance southeast of Chicago, which is also shown in its correct place, and at or near the mouth of the stream that forms the harbor at Michigan City, formerly known by the French as Riviere du Che- min, or " Trail River," because the great trail from Chicago to Detroit and Ft. Wayne left the lake shore at this place. The "pecked line,"-as Mr. Bowen calls the dotted line which he traces as the boundary of the Iroquois deed of cession, -extends from Michigan City northward through the entire length of Lake Michigan, the Straits of Mackinaw and between the Manitou-lin islands and the main shore in Lake Huron; thence into Canada around the north shore of Lake Nipissing; and thence down the Ottawa River to its confluence with the St. Lawrence.
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HISTORIC NOTES ON THE NORTHWEST.
rivers, and all things pertaining to said tract of land, with power to erect forts and castles there," only reserving to the grantors and " their descendants forever the right of hunting upon the same," in which privilege the grantee "was expected to protect them." The grant of the Iroquois was confirmed to the British crown by deeds of renewal in 1726 and 1744. The reader will have observed, from what has been said in the preceding chapters upon the Illinois and Miamis and Pottawatomies relative to the pretended conquests of the Iroquois, how little merit there was in the claim they set up to the territory in question. Their war parties only raided upon the country,-they never occupied it; their war parties, after doing as much mischief as they could, returned to their own country as rapidly as they came. Still their several deeds to the English crown were a "color of title" on which the latter laid great stress, and paraded at every treaty with other powers, where questions involv- ing the right to this territory were a subject of discussion .*
The war for the fur trade expanded into a struggle for empire that convulsed both continents of America and Europe. The limit assigned this work forbids a notice of the principal occurrences in the progress of the French-Colonial War, as most of the military movements in that contest were outside of the territory we are con- sidering. There were, however, two campaigns conducted by troops recruited in the northwest, and these engagements will be noticed. We believe they have not heretofore been compiled as fully as their importance would seem to demand.
In 1758 Gen. Forbes, with about six thousand troops, advanced against Fort Du Quesne.+ In mid-September the British troops had only reached Loyal-hannon, # where they raised a fort. "Intelli- gence had been received that Fort Du Quesne was defended by but eight hundred men, of whom three hundred were Indians,"§ and Major Grant, commanding eight hundred Highlanders and a com- pany of Virginians, was sent toward the French fort. On the third
* The Iroquois themselves,- as appears from an English memoir on the Indian trade, and contained among the London Documents, vol. 7, p. 18,-never supposed they had actually conveyed their right of dominion to these lands. Indeed, it appears that the Indians generally could not comprehend the purport of a deed or grant in the sense that the Europeans attach to these formidable instruments. The idea of an absolute, fee-simple right of an individual, or of a body of persons, to exclusively own real estate against the right of others even to enter upon it, to hunt or cut a shrub, was beyond the power of an Indian to comprehend. From long habit and the owner- ship (not only of land but many articles of domestic use) by the tribe or village of property in common, they could not understand how it could be held otherwise.
+ At the present site of Pittsburgh, Pa.
# Loyal-hannon, afterward Fort Ligonier, was situated on the east side of Loyal- hannon Creek, Westmoreland county, Pa., and was about forty-five miles from Fort Du Quesne; vide Pennsylvania Archives, XII, 389.
§ Bancroft, vol. iv, p. 311.
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DEFEAT OF THE ENGLISH.
day's march Grant had arrived within two miles of Fort Du Quesne. Leaving his baggage there, he took position on a hill, a quarter of a mile from the fort, and encamped .*
Grant, who was not aware that the garrison had been reinforced by the arrival of Mons. Aubry, commandant at Fort Chartes, with four hundred men from the Illinois country, determined on an an- buscade. At break of day Major Lewis was sent, with four hundred men, to lie in ambush a mile and a half from the main body, on the path on which they left their baggage, imagining the French would send a force to attack the baggage guard and seize it. Four hundred men were posted along the hill facing the fort to cover the retreat of MacDonald's company, which marched with drums beating toward the fort, in order to draw a party out of it, as Major Grant had rea- son to believe there were, including Indians, only two hundred men within it. +
M. de Ligneris, commandant at Fort Du Quesne, at once assem- bled seven or eight hundred men, and gave the command to M. Aubry.# The French sallied out of the fort, and the Indians, who had crossed the river to keep out of the way of the British, returned and made a flank movement. Aubry, by a rapid movement, attacked the different divisions of the English, and completely routed and dispersed them. The force under Major Lewis was compelled to give way. Being flanked, a number were driven into the river, most of whom were drowned. The English lost two hundred and seventy killed, forty-two wounded, and several prisoners; among the latter was Grant.
On the 22d of September M. Aubry left Fort Du Quesne, with a force of six hundred French and Indians, intending to reconnoitre the position of the English at Loyal-hannon.
"He found a little camp in front of some intrenchments which would cover a body of two thousand men. The advance guard of the French detachment having been discovered, the English sent a captain and fifty men to reconnoitre, who fell in with the detach- ment and were entirely defeated. In following the fugitives the French fell upon this camp, and surprised and dispersed it.
"The fugitives scarcely gained the principal intrenchment, which M. Aubry held in blockade two days. He killed two hundred horses and cattle." The French returned to Fort Du Quesne mounted. § "The English lost in the engagement one hundred and fifty men,
* The hill has ever since borne Grant's name.
+ Craig's History of Pittsburgh, p. 74.
# Garneau's History of Canada, Bell's translation, vol. 2, p. 214.
§ Pouchot's Memoir, p. 130.
15
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HISTORIC NOTES ON THE NORTHWEST.
killed, wounded and missing. The French loss was two killed and seven wounded."
The Louisiana detachment, which took the principal part in both of these battles, was recruited from the French posts in "The Illi- nois," and consisted of soldiers taken from the garrison in that terri- tory, and the coureurs des bois, traders and settlers in their respective neighborhoods. It was the first battalion ever raised within the limits of the present states of Illinois, Indiana and Michigan. After the action of Loyal-hannon, "the Louisiana detachment, as well as those from Detroit, returned home."*
Soon after their departure, and on the 24th of November, the French abandoned Fort Du Quesne. Pouchot says: "It came to pass that by blundering at Fort Du Quesne the French were obliged to abandon it for want of provisions." This may have been the true reason for the abandonment, but doubtless the near approach of a large English army, commanded by Gen. Forbes, had no small influence in accelerating their movements. The fort was a mere stockade, of small dimensions, and not suited to resist the attacks of artillery. +
Having burnt the stockade and storehouses, the garrison sepa- rated. One hundred retired to Presque Isle, by land. Two hundred, by way of the Alleghany, went to Venango. The remaining hun- dred descended the Ohio. About forty miles above its confluence with the Mississippi, and on a beautiful eminence on the north bank of the river, they erected a fort and named it Fort Massac, in honor of the commander, M. Massae, who superintended its construction. This was the last fort erected by the French on the Ohio, and it was occupied by a garrison of French troops until the evacuation of the country under the stipulations of the treaty of Paris. Such was the origin of Fort Massac, divested of the romance which fable has thrown around its name."
* Letter of Marquis Montcalm: Paris Documents, vol. 10, p. 901.
+ Hildreth's Pioneer History, p. 42.
# Monette's Valley of the Mississippi, vol. 1, p. 317. Gov. Reynolds, who visited the remains of Fort Massac in 1855, thus describes its remains: "The outside walls were one hundred and thirty-five feet square, and at each angle strong bastions were erected. The walls were palisades, with earth between the wood. A large well was sunk in the fortress, and the whole appeared to have been strong and substantial in its day. Three or four acres of gravel walks were made on the north of the fort, on which the soldiers paraded. The walks were made in exact angles, and beautifully graveled with pebbles from the river. The site is one of the most beautiful on La Belle Rivere, and commands a view of the Ohio that is charming and lovely. French genius for the selection of sites for forts is eminently sustained in their choice of Fort Massacre." The Governor states that the fort was first established in 1711, and "was enlarged and made a respectable fortress in 1756." Vide Reynolds' Life and Times, pp. 28, 29. This is, probably, a mistake. There are no records in the French official documents of any military post in that vicinity until the so-called French and Indian war.
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CHANGE OF WAR-PLAN.
On the day following the evacuation, the English took peaceable possession of the smoking ruins of Fort Du Quesne. They erected a temporary fortification, named it Fort Pitt, in honor of the great English statesman of that name, and leaving two hundred men as a garrison, retired over the mountains.
On the 5th of December, 1758, Thomas Pownall, governor of Massachusetts Bay Province, addressed a memorial to the British Ministry, suggesting that there should be an entire change in the method of carrying on the war. Pownall stated that the French were superior in battles fought in the wilderness ; that Canada never could be conquered by land campaigns ; that the proper way to succeed in the reduction of Canada would be to make an attack on Quebec by sea, and thus, by cutting off supplies from the home gov- ernment, Canada would be starved out .*
Pitt, if he did not act on the recommendations of Gov. Pownall, at least had similar views, and the next year (1759), in accordance with this plan, Gen. Wolfe made a successful assault on Quebec, and from that time, the supplies and reinforcements from the home gov- ernment being cut. off, the cause of the French in Canada became almost hopeless.
During this year the French made every effort to stir up the Indians north of the Ohio to take the tomahawk and scalping-knife in hand, and make one more attempt to preserve the northwest for the joint occupancy of the Gallic and American races. Emissa- ries were sent to Lake Erie, Detroit, Mackinaw, Ouiatanon, Vincennes, Kaskaskia and Fort Chartes, loaded with presents and ammunition, for the purpose of collecting all those stragglers who had not enter- prise enough to go voluntarily to the seat of war. Canada was hard pressed for soldiers ; the English navy cut off most of the rein-
* Pownall's Administration of the Colonies, Appendix, p. 57. Thomas Pownall, born in England in 1720, came to America in 1753; was governor of Massachusetts Bay, and subsequently was appointed governor of South Carolina. He was highly edu- cated, and possessed a thorough knowledge of the geography, history and policy of both the French and English colonies in America. His work on the "Administration of the American Colonies " passed through many editions. In 1756 he addressed a memorial to His Highness the Duke of Cumberland, on the conduct of the colonial war, in which he recommended a plan for its further prosecution. The paper is a very able one. Much of it compiled from the official letters of Marquis Vaudreuil, Governor- General of Canada, written between the years 1743 and 1752, showing the policy of the French, and giving a minute description of their settlements, military establishments in the west, their manner of dealing with the Indians, and a description of the river communications of the French between their possessions in Canada and Louisiana. In 1776 he revised Evans' celebrated map of the " Middle British Provinces in America." After his return to England he devoted himself to scientific pursuits. He was a warm friend of the American colonists in the contest with the mother country, and de- nounced the measures of parliament concerning the colonies as harsh and wholly unwarranted, and predicted the result that followed. He died in 1805.
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HISTORIC NOTES ON THE NORTHWEST.
forcements from France, while the English, on the contrary, were constantly receiving troops from the mother country.
Mons. de Aubry, commandant at Fort Chartes, persuaded four hundred men from the "Illinois country " to follow him eastward. Taking with him two hundred thousand pounds of flour, he em- barked his heterogeneous force in bateaux and canoes. The route by way of the Ohio was closed ; the English were in possession of its headwaters. He went down the Mississippi, thence up the Ohio to the month of the Wabash. Having ascended the latter stream to the Miami villages, near the present site of Fort Wayne, his fol- lowers made the portage, passed down the Maumee, and entered Lake Erie.
During the whole course of their journey they were being con- stantly reinforced by bands of different tribes of Indians, and by Canadian militia as they passed the several posts, until the army was augmented to sixteen hundred men, of whom there were six hundred French and one thousand Indians. An eye-witness, in speaking of the appearance of the force, said : "When they passed the little rapid at the outlet of Lake Erie (at Buffalo) the flotilla ap- peared like a floating island, as the river was covered with their bateaux and canoes."*
Aubry was compelled to leave his flour and provisions at the Miami portage. He afterward requested M. de Port-nenf, com- mandant at Presque Isle, to take charge of the portage, and to send it constantly in his bateaux. +
Before Aubry reached Presque Isle he was joined by other bodies of Indians and Canadians from the region of the upper lakes. They were under the command of French traders and commandants of interior posts. At Fort Machault; he was joined by M. de Lignery ; the latter had assembled the Ohio Indians at Presque Isle.§ It was the original intention of Aubry to recapture Fort Du Quesne from the English. On the 12th of July a grand council was held at Fort Machault, in which the commandant thanked the Indians for their attendance, threw down the war belt, and told them he would set out the next day for Fort Du Quesne. Soon after messengers arrived with a packet of letters for the officers. After reading them Aubry told the Indians: "Children, I have received bad news; the Eng- lish are gone against Niagara. We must give over thoughts of going down the river to Fort Du Quesne till we have cleared that place of
* Pouchot's Memoirs, vol. 1, pp. 186, 187
+ Idem, p. 152.
# Located at the mouth of French Creek, Pennsylvania.
§ Idem, 187.
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AUBRY'S CAMPAIGN.
the enemy. If it should be taken, our road to you is stopped, and you must become poor." Orders were immediately given to pro- ceed with the artillery, provisions, etc., up French Creek, and the Indians prepared to follow .*
These letters were from M. Pouchot, commandant at Niagara, t and stated that he was besieged by a much superior force of English and Indians, who were under the command of Gen. Predeaux and Sir William Johnson. Aubry answered these letters on the next day, and said he thought they might fight the enemy successfully, and compel them to raise the siege. The Indians who brought these mes- sages to Pouchot informed him that they, on the part of the Indians with Aubry and Lignery, had offered the Iroquois and other Indian allies of the English five war belts if they would retire. These prom- ised that they would not mingle in the quarrel. "We will here recall the fact that Pouchot, by his letter of the 10th, had notified Lignery and Aubry that the enemy might be four or five thousand strong without the Indians, and if they could put themselves in condition to attack so large a force, he should pass Chenondac to come to Niagara by the other side of the river, where he would be in con- dition to drive the English, who were only two hundred strong on that side, and could not easily be reinforced. This done, they could easily come to him, because after the defeat of this body they could send bateaux to bring them to the fort."
M. Pouchot now recalled his previous request, and informed Aubry that the enemy were in three positions, in one of which there were three thousand nine hundred Indians. He added, could Aubry succeed in driving the enemy from any of these positions, he had no doubt they would be forced to raise the siege. }
Aubry's route was up French Creek to its head-waters, thence making the portage to Presque Isle and sailing along the shores of Lake Erie until he reached Niagara. Arriving at the foot of Lake Erie he left one hundred and fifty men in charge of his canoes, and with the remainder advanced toward Niagara. Sir William John- son was informed, on the evening of the 23d, of this advance of the French, and ordered his light infantry and pickets to take post on the left, on the road between Niagara Falls and the fort; and these, after reinforcing them with grenadiers and parts of the 46th and 44th regiments, were so arranged as to effectually support the guard left
* Extract from a letter dated July 17, 1759, of Col. Mercer, commandant at Fort Pitt, published in Craig's Olden Time, vol. 1, p. 194.
+ Fort Niagara was one of the earliest French military posts, and situated on the right, or American shore of Lake Ontario, at the mouth of Niagara River. It has figured conspicuously in all of the wars on the lake frontier.
+ Pouchot's Memoirs, vol. 1, pp. 186, 187, 188.
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HISTORIC NOTES ON THE NORTHWEST.
in the trenches. Most of his men were concealed either in the trenches or by trees.
On the morning of the 24th the French made their appearance. They were marching along a path about eight feet wide, and "were in readiness to fight in close order and without ranks or files." On their right were thirty Indians, who formed a front on the enemy's left. The Indians of the English army advanced to speak to those of the French. Seeing the Iroquois in the latter's company, the French Indians refused to advance, under pretext that they were at peace with the first named. Though thus abandoned by their chief force, Aubry and Lignery still proceeded on their way, thinking that the few savages they saw were isolated men, till they reached a narrow pathway, when they discovered great numbers beyond. The English Indians then gave the war-whoop and the action con- menced. The English regulars attacked the French in front, while the Indians poured in on their flank. Thus surprised by an am- · buscade, and deserted by their savage allies, the French proved easy victims to the prowess of far superior numbers. They were assailed in front and rear by two thousand men. The rear of the column, unable to resist, gave way, and left the head exposed to the enemy's fire, which crushed it entirely. An Indian massacre followed, and the pursuit of the victors continued until they were compelled to desist by sheer fatigue. Almost all the French officers were killed, wounded or taken prisoners. Among the latter was Aubry. Those who escaped joined M. Rocheblave, and with his detachment re- treated to Detroit and other western lake posts .*
This defeat on the shores of Lake Erie was very severe on the struggling western settlements. Most all of the able-bodied men had gone with Aubry, many never to return. In 1760 M. de Mac- Carty, commandant at Fort Chartes, in a letter to Marquis Vaudreuil, stated that "the garrison was weaker than ever before, the check at Niagara having cost him the élite of his men."+
It is apparent, from the desertion of Aubry by his savage allies, that they perceived that the English were certain to conquer in the end. They felt no particular desire to prop a falling cause, and thus deserted Mons. Aubry at the crisis when their assistance was most needed. Thus was defeated the greatest French-Indian force ever collected in the northwest. #
* The account of this action has been compiled from Mante, p. 226; Pouchot, vol. 1, p. 192; and Garneau's History of Canada, vol. 2, pp. 250, 251, Bell's translation. + Paris Documents, vol. 10, p. 1093.
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