USA > Kentucky > A history of Kentucky and Kentuckians; the leaders and representative men in commerce, industry and modern activities, Volume I > Part 31
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Recurring to the disastrous results of Hull's campaign, it may be safely stated that it brought consternation not unmixed with an- ger, to all the people and particularly to Ken- tucky, as there was now no army intervening between the state and the English with their savage allies, the latter of whom would have been all too willing to be led against the peo- ple who were now in possession of their for- mer happy hunting grounds.
General Hull, who was charged with trea- son and cowardice, demanded and was prompt- ly granted a trial by court martial. The charge of treason was not sustained, but he was found guilty of cowardice and was sentenced to be shot to death, but the court coupled with this capital sentence, a recommendation for
mercy, which was accepted by the president and Hull's life was saved, but the general or- der issued in his case was worse than death to a soldier of true spirit. That order read: "The rolls of the Army are to be no longer disgraced by having upon them the name of General William Hull."
The disastrous defeat and surrender of Hull, served to build anew the fires of patri- otism in Kentucky, if such were needed, and volunteers could be had almost without the asking. The state had grown in population and in wealth in the years of peace that had followed the close of the war with England. Young men had listened to the stories told by their elders of "deeds of high emprise" in the first war with England and the countless con- tests with the Indians, and they accepted with gladness the opportunity now offered them to win military honors and glory for themselves. There was yet cherished a hearty hatred of England, more natural perhaps in Kentucky than elsewhere, for English officers had in- cited the Indians against its inhabitants and led them in their bloody forays, as this work has more than once stated.
At Louisville, soon after the call for volun- teers, two thousand young men reported, anx- ious for the fray, but these were doomed to temporary disappointment. Poorly equipped and withont rations for one-half of their num- ber, they were led by General Hopkins against the Indian towns in northern Illinois. Ill led, ill provisioned, untrained in the life of a soldier, this command accomplished nothing, and returned to Kentucky soon afterwards. But these young volunteers were yet to give a good account of themselves, as Kentucky soldiers have ever done no matter where the field on which they fought.
The Kentuckians who had not accompanied General Hopkins, had a better fortune. since they were placed under the command of Gen- eral Harrison, a steady and consistent old
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fighter, who had already rendered excellent service on many fields and was looking for more opportunities in the same line.
Arriving at Cincinnati in August, General Harrison assumed command of the volunteers from Kentucky, and from all the other states who were operating in Ohio and Indiana. These troops were drilled and taught that im- portant matter, discipline-something to which Kentucky soldiers have never too read- ily yielded. They are all right and to be de- pended upon in the matter of fighting, but discipline is irksome to their independent spir- its. Gen. Joseph Wheeler, the distinguished Confederate cavalry leader, who had under his command a number of Kentucky regi- ments, was accustomed to say that "the Ken- tucky regiments could have fewer men in their columns during a march and more men in a fight than any other regiments in his com- mand."
The first movement of General Harrison against the enemy was to the relief of Fort Wayne, which he had learned was besieged by Indians. An Indian spy in his service went forward, mingled with the Indians surround- ing the fort and returning gave General Har- rison the information he desired. This In- dian, known as Logan, had been captured as a boy by General Logan, who reared him to manhood and gave him his name. When Lo- gan returned to headquarters he stated that the Indian spies who had been observing Har- rison's movements, had reported the Kentuck- ians as coming and as numerous as the trees in the forest. General Harrison pushed for- ward rapidly, only to find on arriving in front of the beleaguered fort that the Indians had fled after burning a village in the vicinity of the fort and destroying such crops as they might in safety approach.
General Harrison, finding that the news of the approach of Kentuckians "numerous as the trees of the forest" had served him well and dispersed the enemy without a battle. di-
vided his forces, sending a column under Gen- eral Payne to destroy the Indian towns and crops along the banks of the Wabash and a second force under Colonel Wells to perform like service along the Elkhart river. Payne drove the Miamis without loss and Wells had equal good fortune with the Pottawattomies, the members of each of these tribes flying be- fore the approach of the two forces.
The disposition of the authorities at Wash- ington to assume supreme control of troops in the field and direct their movements was com- mon then as it now is. Of course, every one recognizes that the president is commander- in-chief and may issue such orders as he chooses, but that he, in his office in Washing- ton, shall be better able to direct the move- ments of an army a thousand miles distant than the officer in command, few who have been soldiers will admit. An instance of the blundering of those in power at Washington was now shown.
General Winchester, an aged man, who had experience in the field during the Revolution, was sent out to supersede General Harrison. Winchester knew the arts, perhaps, of civil- ized warfare; Harrison knew those of Indian warfare. The troops under the latter's com- mand were attached to him because of this knowledge and of other admirable qualities they knew him to possess. Of General Win- chester they knew nothing, and however great may have been his soldierly qualities, they did not trust him as they did General Harrison. The situation being made known at Washing- ton, General Harrison was given supreme com- mand again, with power to act as to him seemed best.
Harrison, as every one knows, so admirably served his country in the field as to deserve and win the affectionate confidence of the peo- ple who, in after years, were to elevate him to the presidency of the United States. Among his subordinate officers was young Captain Zachary Taylor, of the regular army, who
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commanded a garrison of fifty men at Fort Harrison. To this fort in September, 1812, came a body of Indian men, women and chil- dren from the vicinage, asking to be admitted to the fort for a council and to procure food. Captain Taylor with soldierly prudence, gave them food, but denied their plea for admis- sion to the fort. The sequel proved the value of his denial of privilege, for, after lingering in the vicinity of the fort for several days dur- ing which they devoured the food so gener- ously supplied them, these Indians set fire to. one of the blockhouses at night. In the midst of the excitement caused by the fire a body of warriors, whose presence Captain Taylor had anticipated, fired upon the fort. The gar- rison made a gallant stand, repulsing the at- tack but not without serious losses. Captain Taylor ordered one of the cabins within the fort torn down and with the logs thus secured. barricaded the main entrance against any effort the Indians might make to gain admission into the fort. The Indians made a second assault and endeavored to fire the fort, but on each attempt, they were unsuccessful and were finally beaten off with great loss. The gallant young Captain Taylor was officially thanked for his successful defense and in addition. soon afterward received the brevet of major. His fifty men had successfully withstood the attack of several hundred Indians, so excel- lently was his defense planned and executed. The well-informed reader will readily recog- nize in this captain and brevet major, the Gen- eral Zachary Taylor who won honors in Mex- ico and, like General Harrison, died as presi- dent of the United States.
In December. 1812, General Harrison sent a column composed of six hundred dragoons, under Colonel Campbell, against a body of In- dians along Lake Michigan, who threatened to destroy the supplies for the forces of Gen- eral Winchester, who, in command of the left wing of the army, was at Maumee Rapids, This column was attacked at an early hour of
the morning at Mississiniway, by a large force of Indians. An engagement lasting for more than an hour followed, which resulted in the defeat and dispersion of the Indians. The losses of Colonel Campbell's command were fifty-six killed and wounded, showing that the Indians had fought bitterly and that the dra- goons had responded in kind. Following the events just recited there was, for a time, a period of inactivity.
The conformation of those portions of In- diana and Ohio in which the army was operat- ing was such that the heavy fall rains and the freezing and thrawing of the winter, rendered military operations extremely difficult. Gen- eral Harrison had new levies of troops from Kentucky, Virginia, Ohio and Pennsylvania amounting to about ten thousand men, only about two-thirds of whom were ready for ac- tive service at any time, owing to sickness and the fact that the new troops were not inured to the hardships of a fall and winter cam- paign, or the inaction of a life in a winter camp. General Winchester commanded some fifteen hundred men at Maumee Rapids ; Gen- eral Harrison had perhaps twenty-five hun- dred with him at Upper Sandusky, while the remainder of the forces under his command were stationed at such points as seemed to need a defensive force. The inclemency of the weather and the consequent bad condition of the roads, along which transportation was almost impossible, defeated General Harri- son's plans for attacking and capturing Mal- den, the British and Indian base of supplies.
All the world knows of the splendid victory over the British naval forces gained on Lake Erie during this war by a newly-constructed squadron of American vessels under the com- mand of Commodore Oliver Hazard Perry, but it does not know that the idea for the building of these ships for the purpose of driving the British from the lake, was first conceived in the soldierly mind of General Harrison. Doomed by weather conditions to
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a period of military inactivity, he wrote a let- ter to the secretary of the navy, proposing the construction of a fleet to compete with the English for the possession of Lake Erie, and to drive them from its waters, if possible. He argued that this plan was cheaper than land operations and probably the best means of re- gaining the ground lost by Hull's ill-advised surrender. The secretary of the navy was attracted by the idea, and at once proceeded to put it into execution. The United States. axe and saw in hand, went into the forest with a divine purpose, emerging therefrom with a newly made navy which, under the gallant Perry, boldly attacked and defeated the proud officers of the supposed invincible British navy. Too much honor cannot be paid to the memory of Commodore Perry and his gallant officers and men, but General Harrison's mem- ory should also receive equal honors.
General Winchester in January. 1813, de- spatched a force of some seven hundred Ken- tuckians under command of Colonels Lewis and Allen, to meet a threatened attack by the English upon the settlements at Frenchtown and in its vicinity. This force, reaching Frenchtown after forced marches, found that place occupied by the enemy who were con- cealed in the homes of the residents. An im- mediate attack was made and the enemy was driven out and retreated for about half a mile. Reforming his broken lines, the English com- mander made a stand with small arms and a single gun battery. The Kentuckians were divided, a portion of them remaining in front of the enemy while the remainder were sent around the English left, thus causing the lat- ter to retreat for two miles or more, when darkness came on and put an end to the en- gagement. The losses of the Kentuckians were twelve killed and fifty-five wounded. The English losses were estimated as three times those of the American force.
Frenchtown, where this victory was gained by the American forces, was but eighteen
miles from Malden, the headquarters of the English army. When news of the defeat of the latter reached General Winchester, that offi- cer, believing that the commanding officer at Malden would at once send out reinforce- ments to his beaten forces, led a column of two hundred and fifty men. all that could be spared from the Rapids, to reinforce the vic- torious Kentucky troops. On joining these, it was determined to at once begin the construc- tion of fortifications. On the next day, the 2Ist, he received information that a force of three thousand English and Indians were pre- paring to march upon and attack the Ameri- can forces on the River Raisin. For some inexplicable reason, no attention was paid to this information by General Winchester. Col- onel Lewis and Major Madison, of the Ken- tucky forces, were more alert and cautioned their men to remain under cover of the houses and other protection at Frenchtown. Men who have had experience as soldiers will be surprised that a camp, in the presence of the enemy, who threatened to immediately attack, was unprotected by pickets, the excuse for this negligence being the extreme cold of the night. Even the road by which the enemy was expected to approach, it is stated by the historians of that period, was unprotected by a picket. It is difficult to believe that a man who had experience in the Revolution, as had General Winchester, could be so remiss in duty. Better a thousand pickets suffering in the cold than an army surprised.
It appears that some one kept awake in the American camp, for at daybreak reveille was sounded. In a few moments a yet sterner call to duty was heard. Three guns, sounded in quick succession, told of the near approach of the enemy. The Americans had scarcely formed until the enemy's artillery opened on them from a point only three hundred yards away. The English troops charged the front of the American lines, while the Indians at- tacked on both right and left flanks. No more
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complete a surprise could have occurred. Half a score of pickets on duty under competent officers, could have averted the disaster. Col- onel Lewis' men poured a deadly fire into the enemy repulsing him on the left and center, but on the right the reinforcements that had accompanied General Wnichester, being un- protected, as were those of Colonel Lewis, were driven back and Winchester's most strenuous efforts could not rally them. The British troops poured a hot fire into them in front ; the Indians flanked them on the right and the disaster was complete, a retreat on the order of every man for himself resulting. Col- onels Lewis and Allen made gallant but inef- fectual efforts to rally the. men on the south side of the river, but the Indians had gained their flank and rear; human nature has its limitations, and they too joined in the disas- trous retreat. The Indians, finding the Amer- icans at their mercy, shot, tomahawked and scalped them at will, regardless of efforts to surrender. It is stated that one hundred men were thus maltreated in a space one hundred yards square. Colonel Allen and Captain Simpson of the Kentucky volunteers were among those who were killed, as was Captain Meade of the regular forces. Hundreds were overtaken in the deep snow, which retarded their retreat, and were ruthlessly tomahawked and scalped.
General Winchester, Colonel Lewis and other officers and men, being captured by the English troops, escaped murder after capture. Majors Graves and Madison, two brave Ken- tucky officers commanding Kentuckians of equal bravery, held their positions and refused to surrender. Proctor, the English com- mander, with much discretion, after with- standing their deadly fire until ten o'clock, withdrew his white forces, intending to renew the attack on the return of his brutal savage allies from their saturnalia of murder in the ranks of the fleeing soldiers.
Proctor advised his prisoner. Winchester,
to surrender his entire force as in no other manner could their slaughter by the savages be prevented. The English commander had willingly engaged the services of the devil, and now confessed his inability to control the myrmidons of His Satanic Majesty. Our cousins across the seas seem to have had some original ideas as to how best to conduct their military operations. In the Revolution they confronted the Continental forces with hired Hessians ; in 1812-15 they found their allies among the cruelest of savages whom they ruthlessly set upon the men, women and chil- dren of their own kith and kin, "bone of their bone; flesh of their flesh."
Winchester, in the hands of the enemy, was unaware that two Kentucky officers and their gallant followers were still holding out against the enemy's attacks. Graves and Madison, still fighting and ready to fight on, were sur- prised when one of their comrades, Major Overton, accompanied by Proctor, approached with a flag of truce. Then only did they learn that General Winchester was a prisoner and that he had sent them an order to surrender. It is not often that the annals of warfare re- cord instances where the commander of an army, a prisoner in the hands of the enemy, issues an order to those of his subordinates who are still free and still fighting, to surren- der to an enemy who has been unable to dis- lodge them or prevent the continuance of their defense. Madison, the fire of conflict burn- ing in his soldierly eyes, answered the surpris- ing demand for a surrender by stating his knowledge of Indian warfare and declining to surrender unless the fullest protection was af- forded his command. Proctor demanded to know if Madison proposed to dictate to him, to which the gallant Kentuckian replied that he proposed to dictate for himself and that he and his men proposed to continue fighting rather than to be murdered by the savage al- lies of the English forces.
Proctor then agreed that private property
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should be respected; that the sick and wounded American soldiers should be taken to Malden for treatment and that they should be protected. It will be noted that no prom- ise was made for the protection of those who were neither sick nor wounded. Major Mad- ison, upon inquiry among his subordinate of- ficers, found that the supply of ammunition was almost exhausted; that half, or more, of the army had already surrendered, and that the success of a retreat was impossible. There- fore hie accepted Proctor's terms and surren- dered his gallant fellows to a fate worse than dleath-to the ruthless savagery of a body of Indians who knew not mercy and reveled in butchery undeterred by their white allies.
When the English forces withdrew on the return march to Malden, bearing their own sick and wounded and leaving behind those of the American army, the promised guard of protection was found to consist of one Eng- lish Major and two or three interpreters. The stage was set for a tragedy and it quickly fol- lowed. The main body of the Indians accom- panied the English for a few miles on the re- turn march to Malden. But they did not con- tinue their march. Early on the morning of the following day, hundreds of them returned to the scene of the preceding day's battle, hid- eous in their war paint and rending the air with their murderous yells of triumph. They broke into and plundered the houses where lay the sick and wounded whom they mur- dered and scalped. Captain Hickman, a wounded officer of the Kentucky troops, was dragged from his bed, tomahawked, scalped and thrust back into the house which had sheltered him and which was immediately set on fire. The houses where most of the wounded lay were fired and the suffering wounded men, who had been surrendered to an English officer on his promise to protect them, were burned to death in the beds from which their wounds prevented their escaping. Those who were equal to attempting escape Vol. 1-14.
were met by the red demons, tomahawked and scalped. None escaped their savage fury. Major Woolfolk, Major Graves, Captain Hart, other officers of lesser grade and all the private soldiers, met the same fate, either at Frenchtown, or on the road to Malden. And Proctor had solemnly promised protection to the sick and wounded. The value of an Eng- lish officer's word, at least in those days, may be estimated by the bloody record written by savage hands on the banks of the River Rai- sin, where lie the whitening bones of hundreds of murdered Kentuckians.
The American army's loss was almost total. There were two hundred and ninety men killed in actual conflict or murdered by the savages ; five hundred and ninety-two were made prisoners, and a mere handful-thirty- three, escaped. Of the English troops, their commander reported one hundred and eighty- two killed and wounded. He made no report of the Indian losses, perhaps because he had no use for a dead Indian ; the only Indian who was valuable to him was one who would mur- der, scalp and burn his sick and wounded ene- mies to whom he had promised protection.
The story of that English commander, Col- onel Hamilton, whom Gen. George Rogers Clark called "the hair buyer," has been told at an earlier period in this work. Hamilton of- fered a premium for the scalps of white men, women and children brought to him by the Indians. Proctor, it seems, profited by this early scheme of his fellow-butcher Hamilton, and also offered a price for scalps. The In- dians learned that by refraining from murder- ing their white captives and holding them for ransom, they could receive a greater return than Proctor paid for scalps. Therefore, the returns from the scalp industry fell off and Proctor, making inquiries, learned that the trade in ransoms had affected the market for scalps. He therefore issued an order "for- bidding individuals to ransom any more pris- oners of the Indians," but at the same time
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continuing the proffered price for the scalps of men, women and children.
The English language usually supplies a medium for the full expression of any senti- ment, but it is sadly at fault in that it has no words with which to properly characterize this atrocity of Proctor's. To call him a beast or a brute is to cast a stigma upon every animal of field or forest.
That the conduct of Proctor met the ap- proval of his superiors in command, is shown by the congratulatory order of the command- er-in-chief, who announced his gratification at the butchery of sick and wounded prison- ers and commended Proctor for the notable display of his gallantry "in his humane and unwearied exertions which succeeded in res- cuing the vanquished from the revenge of the
Indian warriors." It may, therefore, be con- cluded that the British government was en- tirely willing to use as allies savages who could only be prevented from wreaking ven- geance on the sick and wounded "by the hu- mane and unwearied exertions" of English officers.
For this modern exhibition of savage bar- barity on the part of an officer of an English army, Proctor was promoted to be a brigadier general. It is difficult to understand this mod- eration. It was to be expected that he would be made nothing less than a lieutenant gen- eral at least. Certain organizations of today, in our own country and in the piping times of peace, make lieutenant generals of even cheaper material than Proctor.
CHAPTER XXXVII.
ISAAC SHELBY TO THE FRONT-GENERAL GREEN CLAY-INVESTMENT OF FORT MEIGS-DISAS- TER TO RAW KENTUCKIANS-TECUMSEH STOPS MASSACRE-BRITISH WITHDRAW TO MAL- DEN-A DEARLY BOUGHT LESSON-JOHNSON'S KENTUCKY CAVALRY-HEROIC DEFENSE OF FORT STEPHENSON-SHELBY TAKES THE FIELD KENTUCKY SHARPSHOOTERS WITH PERRY-VICTORY ELECTRIFIES LAND FORCES-GALLANT CHARGE OF JOHNSON'S CAVALRY -INDIAN DEFEAT-TECUMSEH'S DEATH-HEROIC JOHNSON FAMILY-HONOR TO SHELBY AND OTHERS-A KENTUCKY VICTORY-CAMPAIGN AGAINST THE POTTAWATTOMIES-WAR CENTERS IN NEW ORLEANS-KENTUCKY TROOPS EN ROUTE-FIRST NAVAL FIGHT-JACK- SON PROCLAIMS MARTIAL LAW-BRITISHI ATTACKED AT BAYOU BIENVILLE-JACKSON CHOOSES ANOTHER POSITION-AMERICANS CANNONADED, AND CANNONADE.
When the news came from the River Rai- sin, there were few families in Kentucky that were not stricken with grief. The very flower of the young men of the state was represented in the ranks of the volunteers who had bared their bosoms to the storm of savage battle and gone down to death in that awful strife. But the feeling was not all of grief. There was even a deeper feeling than any personal sorrow, a feeling that the disaster must be re- trieved; that the victors, white savages and red, should be made to feel the hand of retri- bution. The people, young and old, had never been so aroused as now.
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