USA > Kentucky > History of pioneer Kentucky > Part 14
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After the arrival of the Lexington men within the fort, the Indians made little effort to force the fighting but contented themselves with random firing and yelling of the most astounding fashion. As the afternoon wore on they killed all the cattle they could collect and made
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a great feast. About dusk Simon Girty cautiously ad- vanced to within a few yards of the fort, and prudently sheltering himself behind a long stump asked for a con- ference. This request was carried to Captain Craig who without leaving the fort inquired of Girty what he wanted. The substance of Girty's reply was a demand to surrender-a proceeding which Craig promptly re- fused to consider. Girty continued to urge a surrender, mentioning that he had six hundred Indians and was expecting artillery. In concluding he gave his personal guarantee that in case of surrender none of the garri- son would be mistreated and mentioned his name asking if the Kentucky people did not know him. To this ques- tion Aaron Reynolds replied that Simon Girty was well known in Kentucky and that he himself had two worth- less dogs, one of which he had named Simon and the other Girty on account of their striking resemblance to the moral character of that worthy. At this badinage Girty pretended to be, and perhaps was, much offended. He insisted that such an awful crisis should not be made light of. Reynolds interrupted to explain that if Girty or any other men came too near the fort the white men purposed to punish them with switches, of which com- modity they had secured a great amount for this partic- ular purpose. An end was put to this singular inter- view by an audible request from Reynolds to Craig for permission to try a shot at Girty. The latter lost no time in withdrawing.
It was evident to the Indians that no advantage would result from a longer investment. They decided to try the tactics of Hoy's Station and retreat in the hope of ambushing the white men if they pursued. So early in
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the night the whole force, thirty or forty, noisily with- drew. Toward daybreak all the others departed and the garrison coming cautiously out the next morning found only their campfires and the remnant of their breakfast. In a siege of twenty-four hours the Indians had lost five killed and two wounded, four of the garrison had been killed. Three hundred hogs, one hundred and fifty head of cattle, and many sheep had been destroyed; a number of horses had been stolen, the potatoes and corn destroyed. In itself the siege of Bryant's Station was of small moment; its importance is due to the fact that it was one link in the chain of disasters beginning with Strode's Station and culminating in the catastrophe of Lower Blue Licks.
As was usually the case, many legends sprang up after the investment was ended. The choicest of these, perhaps, is that which relates to the carrying of water during the siege. The tradition goes that the water was brought in by the women as the result of a shrewd surmise on the part of the garrison that the Indians would not fire on them. Each succeeding historian has added to the fable until it bids fair to crowd out all the other events of the day. As a matter of fact the story is pure fiction and has no support from contemporary authorities. Equally imaginative is the fear caused the settlers by Girty's threats. There were more than sixty men in the fort when Girty demanded its surrender and it would have been extremely difficult to find in Kentucky sixty well-armed men timid enough to feel dismayed at the threats of an intemperate Irishman. Under the facile touch of the Kentuckians the number of Indians at Bryant's Station has increased as remarkably as did
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Falstaff's opponents in buckram suits; we are repeat- edly assured that there were five or six hundred Indians around the fort. By Caldwell's own report he had but three hundred men with him when he crossed the Ohio and if we make allowance for the men sent to Hoy's Station and for deserters it is improbable that he reached Bryant's with many more than two hundred.
All during the day following the siege the relief forces kept coming into the fort. Colonel Levi Todd had led the seventeen men who had made their way into the fort through the opposing Indians.7 In the evening of the next day, Colonel John Todd, Colonel Trigg and Major McGary arrived with one hundred and thirty militia from Lincoln and Fayette.8 No aid, because of distance, was attempted from Jefferson, but Colonel Logan was busily engaged in getting out the militia in full force in Lincoln. A council of war was held on the night of the seventeenth, and immediate pursuit of the enemy was decided upon, notwithstanding the protests of McGary and others. One hundred and eighty-two men on horseback left the fort early on the morning of the eighteenth and marched swiftly over the trail that the Indians had rendered suspiciously evident. Colonel John Todd was the ranking officer of the little army and of the entire force over one-third were officers. They were well mounted and as there was no difficulty in keeping the trail, the march was rapid. By early afternoon they had reached the banks of Hinkston Creek near the present site of Millersburg and saw that the Indians had built their campfires there the night before. By night they
7 He himself, however, being on foot, was unable to get in.
8 Todd to Todd, Cal Va. St. Papers, Vol. III, p. 3331.
.
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had covered thirty-three miles. They went into the camp for the night near the Licking River; the Indians were encamped only four miles away; neither force knew that the other was near.
A short march the following morning brought them to the banks of the Licking. As they came to the edge of the stream they could see on the opposite side the stragglers of the Indian army dissappearing over the hill.9 Evidently the enemy was at hand and the longed for encounter of white man and Wyandot was imminent. In the presence of danger the leaders were sobered and halted their troops for a consultation. The march had been impetuous and disorderly, the hearts of the Ken- . tuckians were hot for revenge, and they meant to attain it at all hazards. Yet for all their ardor none knew better than they that in a planless encounter every chance favored their enemies. It was, moreover, increasingly evident that the Indians were acting on a well-calculated plan. They had retreated slowly, covering in two days the distance that the hot-headed Kentuckians had tra- versed in one. They had left so many signs of their passing that all the white leaders knew that they were courting pursuit. Finally, they had allowed themselves to be overtaken at a place the most suitable for their style of fighting. These things influenced Todd to call a halt.
The location was as well known to Boone as was Boonesborough itself. In the council he explained the nature of the ground and predicted an ambuscade along the ridge that rose from the river. He counseled cross- ing the river up stream and so flanking the Indians.
9 Logan to Harrison, Cal. Va. St. Papers, Vol. III, p. 280.
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Boone's advice was not to be disregarded, and two horse- men were sent across the river and along the ridge to discover, if possible, the suspected ambush. They re- turned and reported that the Indians had retired and were no longer to be seen. When the white men heard this, there was no restraining either officer or man; they spurred their horses into the river and splashed their way tumultuously to the other side. The advance, how- ever, was not without method. It had already been decided that when the enemy was encountered an advance guard should attack on horseback and the others dismounted should rush up and finish the work when the Indian lines were broken. The foot soldiers were to separate into three divisions of which Boone was to command the left, Trigg the right and Todd the center. Harlan, McGary and McBride were to lead the advance.
With this arrangement the Kentuckians advanced up the ridge in good order.10 The advance guard had come within forty yards of the place where Boone had predicted an ambush would be made when they received from the hidden Wyandots a volley so furious that all but three of the Kentuckians fell. The battle was now on and in spite of the surprise of the advance, it went at first not unfavorably to the white men. Boone on the left fighting heroically drove back his enemy by sheer force of valor. But Todd and his men had been caught in the open and were annihilated; Trigg on the right had been outflanked. As Boone was coolly going about his work of destruction he suddenly perceived that the right was being doubled back and that the Wyandots were surrounding him. There was no further thought
10 Boone to Harrison, Cal. Va. St. Papers, Vol. III, p. 275.
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of advance nor was there any order given to retreat. Out of that flaming wall of fire the Kentuckians broke desperately, each man for himself. As they turned, the Wyandots broke from cover, threw away their rifles and prepared to finish the work with the tomahawk. The retreat became a rout; the rout a slaughter. The Indians took possession of the horses and rode to and fro among the Kentuckians striking with the tomahawk until their insensate souls were satiated with killing. They pursued to the very brink of the water and were only prevented from crossing by a terrible fire from a group of men who had been rallied on the other side by Benjamin Netherlands. The Kentuckians made their way where- ever and whenever they could across the river and reach- ing the other side, without waiting for consultation, plunged panic-stricken into the forest and each for him- self made for the nearest station.
The battle had lasted about five minutes and sixty- six men had fallen of the pioneers. Four were captured. The Indians had lost ten men and a French leader, Le Bute. Todd, Trigg, Harlan and McBride were among the slain. No such calamity had ever before be- fallen Kentucky.
Meanwhile Logan had raised the Lincoln militia and had advanced to Bryant's; Colonel Todd was already a day's march on his way. Logan learned with dismay of the headlong pursuit and hurried with five hundred men to anticipate the slaughter he feared. He had advanced but a few miles from Bryant's when twenty- five fugitives were encountered; from these the details of the awful conflict were learned. At this news Logan halted his men and throwing out scouts far in advance,
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waited throughout the long dismal day while the fugi- tives kept coming into camp. Toward night he turned and went back to Bryant's. The news had already reached the fort and the ensuing hours of desolation are not to be described in words. Here while the stricken families lamented and strong men seemed shocked into listlessness, Logan waited. On the twenty-fourth, with five hundred men, he began his march to the Lower Licks, but when he reached the battlefield the Indians were gone. The mutilated bodies of the dead were collected and given a common grave. Nothing else could be done. Logan returned to Bryant's and the battle of Lower Blue Licks passed into history.
In the thoughts of pioneer Kentuckians the battle of Lower Blue Licks was the most portentous thing of their lives; those who took part in it never succeeded in forgetting its horrors.11 In after years it was talked over around the firesides and its incidents were magnified a thousand times.12 But the topic in which the pioneer mind most delighted was the problem presented by the defeat-what caused it? The Kentuckians were slow to admit defeat in a fair fight. They found balm for their wounded pride in magnifying the strength of the enemy and stressing the fact of an ambuscade. As in the case of Bowman's defeat a scapegoat was sought for and found in the person of Major McGary. The story was put in circulation that McGary had seditiously incited the men to cross the river by his taunt that all who were not cowards should follow him. This action accorded well
11 The letters of the commanders and survivors of Lower Blue Licks are admirably grouped in the appendix to Colonel Young's Battle of Lower Blue Licks.
12 In Cuming's Tour it is related that 2,000 white men took part in the battle and that of these 600 were killed.
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with the character of the hot-headed McGary and the story was not long in finding a place in history. That McGary uttered the words attributed to him is not at, all improbable; but that they had any such effect on the Kentuckians as tradition relates, it is scarcely pos- sible to believe. Boone, Levi Todd, Logan and Clarke all made reports of the battle and none of them mention McGary in any such role. It is not plausible that if McGary's conduct had been so reprehensible, he would have escaped censure at the hands of these men. Their silence is significant. Moreover, there is much evidence to show that McGary was throughout for caution, but that when fighting became necessary he did it with his accustomed vigor and resolution. Forty years after the battle a doubtful author gave the statement of an un- known gentleman that McGary had admitted to him his fault. History will not permanently accept as true the story of a witness so doubtful. There is no respectable evidence to prove that McGary was in any way more than his comrades responsible for the great calamity.
The truth is that the Kentuckians were outgeneraled and outfought. They had no one to blame but them- selves. In the Wyandots they found an enemy far superior to the other Indians in craft and resolution. Their operations during 1782 had completely baffled the settlers ; they had kept the white men divided while they roamed almost at will through the country. When encountered they showed a disposition for hand-to-hand fighting that amazed the pioneers. In half a dozen con- flicts they had shown themselves superior to their white antagonists. They had not ambushed the settlers at Lower Blue Licks in any real sense of the word. The
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Kentuckians had not gone into the battle in confusion, but with plans already made. The number of the Wyandots was not largely in excess of that of the whites. The battle was decided when, after the first fire, the Wyandots threw away their rifles and with only their tomahawks rushed in hand to hand. Excuses notwithstanding, the Kentuckians had met their match- and more.
Simon Girty has suffered at the hands of the his- torians less only than McGary. Among the early writ- ers he was credited with the command of the Indians around Bryant's and at the Licks. Modern writers show a tendency to represent him as an ignorant renegade entirely without authority. All picture him as a mon- ster of depravity. There can be no question now as to who was in nominal command around Bryant's. The testimony of the Haldimand Papers is incontestable that it was Caldwell. But the reports of the Kentucky lead- ers make it plain that the real commander was Girty. His official position, it was true, was only that of inter- preter, but as an adopted child of the Wyandot tribe he wielded enormous power and influence. There can hardly be a doubt that Girty was the leading spirit in the campaign. It must be remembered that nearly all Caldwell's Indians were Wyandots.
The character and reputation of Simon Girty have been variously distorted to suit the views of Kentucky historians. He was bad enough, in all truth, but by no means the monster of depravity he is usually repre- sented. Born of Irish parents in the most abject pov- erty and the most immoral environment, he could hardly have escaped being what he was. He had been reared
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among the Indians and was conscious of no disgrace when he finally cast his lot among them. He was no traitor. He would have been one had he taken any other side than he did. He was wildly intemperate and, drunk or sober, endowed with a reckless courage that made his name a proverb in the west. His nature was not essentially cruel and he acted often from noble impulses ; he saved Kenton from the stake and tried to save Crawford. His conduct must always be viewed as that of an Indian, for he was Indian more than he was white. He was not, as is so often stated, hated or despised by the Kentuckians. There is some evidence that he was personally popular among them. White Indians were not uncommon then and inspired no such feeling among the pioneers as among later generations. Had Girty been hated by the Kentuckians, he would hardly have dared to come within five yards of the fort for a conference. His asking if the Kentuckians knew him showed his consciousness of the feeling toward him.
Aside from the question of Girty and McGary there is the additional problem of dissension among the leaders of the Kentuckians. That such dissension existed is clearly shown by the language used by the different writers after the battle. McGary in a letter to Clarke openly charged that Todd wished by an early pursuit to rob Logan of the credit for the expected victory. Logan reported to Harrison that the pursuit had been rash, and indirectly he blamed the other leaders. After the battle Boone and others wrote to Harrison, blaming Clarke for inactivity; Clarke wrote to Harrison, cen- suring the leaders-and Todd in particular-and Har-
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rison finally sent Clarke a most cutting reprimand for his conduct. Logan did not escape suspicion. The question was asked why he was so dilatory in his move- ments. He did not reach Bryant's till the enemy had been gone twenty-four hours and twelve hours later had advanced but five miles. His delay of four days in marching to the battlefield is inexplicable. The most accommodating of enemies could not have so long awaited his convenience.
The aftermath of the Licks was more comforting to the pride of Kentucky. Lashed into action by the re- bukes of Harrison, Clarke in November essayed to revenge the disaster that he should have prevented. In a meeting of the officers held at the Falls shortly after the battle, it was decided to invade the Indian country. The militia was to gather at Bryant's under Logan and at Louisville under Floyd. The two divisions were to meet at the mouth of the Licking, and under the com- mand of Clarke proceed against the Indian towns on the
Great Miami. More than one thousand men gathered at the appointed rendezvous and moved into Ohio. A straggling Indian discovered the advance and gave the alarm; the Indian towns were deserted when Clarke arrived. He burnt the towns and sent Logan to per- form the same kind office for the British post at the head of the Miami. Then, having taken ten scalps, seven prisoners and regained two captives, the army of one thousand men returned somewhat ingloriously to Kentucky.
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THE STRUGGLE FOR AUTONOMY.
F FOR Kentucky the year 1782 had ended, as it began, in bloodshed. But beginning with 1783 it may fairly be said that a new era was ushered in. Previous to this, the thoughts of the Kentuckians had been directed al- most exclusively to matters offensive and defensive against the Indians; subsequently things political and economic occupied the greater part of their attention. For with the carnage of Blue Licks the energy of the Indians seemed to perish wholly and Kentucky was destined not again to be visited by hostile war-bands of any great size. At the same time the population was growing apace, towns began to spring up, forts were gradually abandoned for farmhouses and the entire country took on the appearance of a long-settled community. In these unwonted times of peace the people were at leisure to meditate on and discuss their government, to criticize its defects and to formulate plans for its improvement. Politics, not war, was to occupy the center of the stage for a decade. With 1782 the Heroic Age of Kentucky history may be said to end. Of the great names of earlier days Logan's alone remained undimmed. Clarke was sinking into a drunkard, Todd had fallen in battle, Kenton, Boone and Harrod had remained hunters or become unsuccessful farmers. Floyd was soon to find a grave. New names were to be found in the place of old ; new interests were come in essentially different from those of the last decade.
By the articles of peace signed in November, 1782, the status of Kentucky was confirmed rather than deter-
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mined. Whatever the paper stipulations might have been, by no stretch of the imagination can we conceive the Kentuckians permitting themselves to become French, Spanish or English. The Mississippi did not become the western boundary of the young nation merely by treaty ; the retention of the west was the necessary result of aggressive settlement beginning when Boone blazed the way along the Wilderness Road. Had the treaty of Paris left the transmontane lands nominally Spanish or English, the western settlers could have been depended upon to violate it swiftly and effectually. England, at least, knew this fact well and the other nations could hardly have been ignorant of it. Nothing done at Paris could affect the destinies of the Kentuckians; their fu- ture was not a matter of diplomacy; they were Vir- ginians and could be changed by no power but them- selves. No sentiment need be wasted on the generosity. or shrewdness that extended the United States to the Mississippi; the diplomats merely recognized an unalter- able status quo. Within the next few years there was much talk in Kentucky about a union with Spain; it was an evidence of discontent rather than an earnest of intention.
Of much greater moment to Kentucky was that ar- ticle of the treaty providing that England should sur- render her posts in the Northwest. This more than anything else secured for Kentucky a cessation of Indian attacks. It would perhaps be no exaggeration to say that nine-tenths of the Indian depredations during the Revolution were instigated from these English posts in the Northwest; their surrender, or the promise of it, meant that henceforth the Indians themselves must plan
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and support their expeditions. It is significant that Kentucky was not again invaded by Indians in any con- siderable number. The Indian depredations had been planned by British brains, financed by British money and mitigated by British humanity. The withdrawal of Brit- ish aid was necessarily accompanied by a cessation of Indian hostilities. Yet candor compels the admission that the Indian warfare against Kentucky has been mon- strously exaggerated. The Indians were not, as is so often asserted, the implacable foe of the Kentuckians; the British agents, as the Haldimand Papers abundantly show, were compelled to put forth enormous efforts to rouse the sluggish red men for the warpath. They were always reluctant to cross the Ohio and were induced to do so only by dint of extraordinary expenditures for presents and provisions. Early in their relations with the British they had learned that gifts were the wages of indifference, and their impatience was never so great nor their wrath so savage that they failed to profit by their knowledge. England paid many times over for every effort of the Indians in her behalf. Moreover, the Indians once on the warpath were, for the most part, lukewarm and could rarely be incited to vigorous action. Notwithstanding the volumes that have been written about the Indian atrocities in Kentucky, the country suffered no more therefrom than did Virginia, Massachusetts or many of the eastern States. As far as war between white man and Indian is concerned, Kentucky certainly was not a "dark and bloody ground." The name had been gained and perhaps deserved long before John Finley encamped at Eskippakithiki.
Equally important toward securing peace for Ken- tucky was the cession by Virginia to the Confederation
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of all her territory north of the Ohio River. The Con- tinental Congress had found the claim of Virginia to the Northwest too shadowy for recognition but real enough for transfer. The cession was completed in 1783 and the Ohio made the northern limit of Virginia's sovereignty beyond the mountains. The treaty of Paris had withdrawn from the Indians the aid of the British; the action of Virginia left them for a care to the cen- tral government. This power in a series of treaties with the separate tribes took up energetically and, for the most part, successfully the task of appeasing the wrath and alienating the territory of the red men. The trans- fer of sovereignty redounded to the benefit of Kentucky. Virginia had not been able to prevent the depredations of the Ohio tribes; now they were forced to live in com- parative quiet and Kentucky benefited by the change.
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