USA > Kentucky > The history of Kentucky, from its earliest discovery and settlement, to the present date, V. 1 > Part 35
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""'Second-That the proposed State shall take upon itself a just propor- tion of the public debt of this State.
"'Third-That all private rights and interests in lands within the said district derived from the laws of Virginia, prior to such separation, shall remain valid and secure under the laws of the proposed State, and shall be determined by the laws now existing in this State.
"'Fourth-That the use and navigation of the river Ohio, so far as the territory of the proposed State, or the territory which shall remain within the limits of this Commonwealth, lies thereon, shall be free and common to the citizens of the United States.'
"And if the convention should approve of the erection of the district into an independent State on the foregoing terms, they were to fix a day
I Marshall, Vol. I., p. 222.
263
THE BETROTHAL OF KENTUCKY.
posterior to the Ist of September, 1787; on which the authority of Virginia, and of her laws under the exceptions aforesaid, were to cease and determine forever. Provided, however, that prior to the Ist day of June, 1787, the United States, in Congress, should assent to the erection of the said district into an independent State.
"The act was to be transmitted to the Virginia delegates in Congress, who were instructed to use their endeavors to obtain from Congress a speedy act for admitting the new State into the Union."
The elected delegates should meet in September following this action. If they approved the act of separation, not until after September, 1787, should the formal divorce have effect; and not then unless Congress should, prior to June Ist, give assent, and admit Kentucky as one of the States of the Federal Union. That the vested rights of Virginia and of private persons in Kentucky domain should be protected was natural enough; and it was but reasonable that the obligations and good faith toward the United States should be observed by an important part of Virginia, as by the whole; but it is more than a suspicion that the old mother Commonwealth was watching with jealous eye the oglings of those seductive and bland cavaliers, France and Spain, who were but too eager to pay new court to the prospective transmontane maiden debutante, with a coveted dowry; and who, in her coyness with several rival suitors, might yet be betrayed into a mesalliance.
The temptation came, and only the inflexible patriotism and love of the institutions of liberty rescued Kentucky from the unnatural embraces of her Gallic suitors, and saved her to the Federal Union. Prudish Virginia, therefore, made it a condition that before she could give final consent there must be a betrothal, and Congress must recognize and place in the galaxy the fourteenth star. The ordeal was nigh that would tax the submissive patience of the backwoodsmen, as the crucial past had tried their fortitude and daring.
In all these years since the signing of the treaty of peace, in 1783, the British Government had, on various pretexts, refused to deliver the posts on the North-west frontier, the tenacious holding of which gave more of im- punity and opportunity to the Indians to renew their hostile raids upon the whites. Spain, having been thus far disappointed in controlling the rela- tions of Kentucky in the treaty adjustments, removed her restraints from the Southern tribes, and these were, more than ever before, harassing the frontiersmen. 1'There were not lacking some irritating causes on the other side. From the date of the signing of the articles of peace, in 1783, until 1790, the record bears witness to the slaughter of fifteen hundred men, women, and children within the borders of Kentucky, besides taking two thousand horses and much property. Yet these suffering people were asked to be patriotic, law-abiding, and patient.
Generals Clark. Butler, and Parsons negotiated a treaty with the Indians
I Virginia Calendar, Vol. III., p. 607.
264
HISTORY OF KENTUCKY.
at Fort McIntosh, at the mouth of Great Miami, on the 16th of October, 1785. In ten days after, the Indians raided the settlements near Limestone, did some killing, and stole sixty horses. In January following, General Clark negotiated another treaty with the old enemies, the Shawanees and Delawares, and the same year Indian murders and outrages increased over those of the past three years. Yet the Kentuckians must adorn themselves with the virtues of patience and patriotism, and endure these tortures of long waiting until order should come out of chaos.
The Constitution of the United States was not adopted in convention until the 17th of September, 1787 ; and not of effect until, as by its pro- vision, it was ratified by nine States. Virginia was the tenth to ratify, which she did on the 26th of June, 1788, by a vote of eighty-eight to seventy-eight. Until the adoption of the Federal Constitution the general government was, of course, administered under the " Articles of Confed- eration and Perpetual Union " adopted by the Continental Congress, on the 15th of November, 1777. The transition of jurisdiction and administration from the improvised government of the revolutionary period to the suc- cessive one formed for an era of peace and stability was, from the force of circumstances, an occasion of indecision and doubt. if not of palpable chaos. New York delayed her constitutional covenant longer than Virginia, while North Carolina ratified at the end of two years, and Rhode Island three. It was within the elective power of any one, or all, of the States to have declined to enter the constitutional compact : yet, when it was adopted by nine States, the force and effect of such majority action was the dissolu- tion of the union of the States as based on the Articles of Confederation, and the formation of the government unit on the terms of the new Federal Constitution.
When the nine States had ratified, therefore, the dissolution of the old union of the thirteen was the necessary sequence, and the four States with- holding consent were adrift as dissociated Commonwealths, isolated and aimless of purpose, and too exposed and feeble for exclusive sovereignty. Fortunately for Kentucky, the interval of acquiescence on the part of Virginia was of duration too brief for any unhappy results.
George Washington was installed the first President; and the first Con- gress under the Constitution assembled on the 4th of March, 1789. The old government was disintegrating, and the disposition was to refer all im- portant matters to the new. In the meantime, it was more comfortable and convenient for the Eastern States, now in rest and security from the horrors of war, to adjourn the plaints and appeals for attention from the trans- montane people, who alone were left to be the victims of broken treaties and of savage atrocities growing out of these infractions.
In the midst of the distracting confusion of the day, it would be unjust to attribute designed wrong toward the people of Kentucky by any inter- ested party to whom they looked for relief and redress. They had the
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265
EULOGY OF COLONEL CHRISTIAN.
means of defense within themselves, but were waiting upon Federal or State authority to organize and use the same. The circumstances seem to form a coincidence of misfortune, rather than to point out any unusual fault on the part of the responsible jurisdictions. It was but the common phase of human nature. Had the people around the centers of any one of the States on the Atlantic slopes been subjected to the same sufferings and out- rages that were visited on the devoted heads of the Kentuckians, they would have been quickly redressed by the General Government; but these were not expected to feel and to do for distant and unrepresented fellow- citizens as they would for themselves. The neglect and indifference shown, but repeat the almost unbroken examples of folks bearing with patience and composure the ills and misfortunes of neighbors, provided those neighbors will bear all the griefs and privations of the same.
1 " In the month of April, the Indians, as they had done before, stole horses on Beargrass, with which they crossed the Ohio, thereby expecting to escape pursuit, according to former experience. But Colonel William Chris- tian, having raised a party of men, crossed the river, determined that these robbers should no longer evade his pursuit by flying to their own forests, although north-west of the great stream. About twenty miles within the Indian territory, he came up with these freebooters, attacked and totally destroyed them, but fell in the conflict, with one of his men.
" In the death of Colonel Christian, Kentucky sustained a most sensible and important loss. He had migrated from Virginia the preceding year and settled on Beargrass, where he was distinguished for his intelligence, activity, and enterprise. He had been used to the Indians from an early period of his life, had distinguished himself as an officer, acquired much practical in- formation, and possessed the manners and accomplishments of a man of cul- tivated mind. He was a Virginian by birth, and served, when a young man, as a captain in Colonel Byrd's regiment, which had been ordered, in the time of Braddock's war, to the south-western frontier of his native State. In this service he obtained the reputation of a brave, active, and skillful partisan. After peace, he married the sister of Patrick Henry, settled in the county of Bottetourt, and was made a colonel in the militia. His natural bias was strong toward military affairs. In 1774, Colonel Christian raised three hun- dred volunteers, with whom he joined the army of General Andrew Lewis, at the mouth of the great Kanawha, on the night after the battle, already noticed, at the Point, having performed an extraordinary march of near two hundred miles, to arrive in time for the expected battle, which he missed by half a day. With General Lewis, he crossed the Ohio, and was with Dunmore at the treaty which ensued.
"Colonel Christian had attained a high reputation for his acquirements and knowledge, both civil and military. In 1785, he removed his family to Kentucky, on his own land in Jefferson county. Being about forty-two
t Marshall, Vol. I., p. 223.
266
HISTORY OF KENTUCKY.
years of age, he felt all his former activity of disposition, all his former at- tention to the safety of his country, and participated in the active means of repelling the predatory parties of savages who infested his neighborhood.
"The ideas of separation and of independent government having been familiarized in Kentucky, although Colonel Christian had kept himself pretty much out of the debate, he was frequently spoken of by his acquaintances as the first governor of the new Commonwealth. The event of his death, as mentioned, terminated these anticipations, so agreeable to the public, and so honorable to him."
1 Higgins' block house, a mile or so above Cynthiana, on Licking, was. about this time attacked, and young McCombs and McFall mortally wounded before they could get under protection. The garrison was weak, and a messenger must be sent to Hinkson's or Harrison's for aid. All de- clined the hazard, until Mr. E. Williams, afterward a citizen of Covington, volunteered the attempt. The fort was on a precipitous cliff. He sprang down, trusting to the thicket of undergrowth to break his fall, and reached the ground with a brush of limb he had grasped and broken off in the descent. Recovering from the jar, he crossed Licking, and followed a cow- path on the opposite side. The body of the Indians lay ambushed in a field of growing corn breast high, while a few of their number exposed themselves to decoy the garrison from the fort. Williams, from his vantage ground on the other side of the river, shouted back, to assure his friends of his safety, and to let the savages know that re-enforcements would be on them. The Indians immediately scampered off, and, though Williams re- turned with friendly aid in an hour's time, they were beyond reach.
Captain John Logan, of Lincoln county, received advices of some killing and robbing done by a band of Southern Indians on Fishing creek. He promptly collected a body of neighbors, got upon the trail, and gave chase. following the enemy into Tennessee. Here he overtook and brought them to bay, killing a number and dispersing the remainder. He recaptured all the stolen property and a considerable amount of furs belonging to the In- dians.
In October, 1786, a large number of families, known as McKnitt's Com- pany, coming into Kentucky, were surprised near Laurel river, and over twenty killed, and the remainder dispersed or taken prisoners. It seemed a favorite method with these prowling murderers to lay in wait for and massacre parties of emigrants coming in, sparing neither sex nor age, as every scalp counted one, and the slaughter was with less danger and resistance from those unfamiliar with Indian warfare.
2 Captain William Hardin, a noted Indian fighter and hunter, had settled in what is now Breckinridge county, and, learning that Indians were build- ing a town at Saline, beyond the Wabash, in Illinois, and deeming this a dangerous proximity, collected a force of eighty bold foresters and led
I'Notes of E. E. Williams.
2 Collins, Vol. II., p. 97.
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267
AN ARMY IS RAISED.
them against these savages. Coming upon the town or camp suddenly, they found but three Indians in possession, the main body having gone out on a hunt. These were shot down before they could escape. Supposing that the main body would return toward the close of the day from their hunt, Hardin selected a motte of timber situated in a prairie, where he ambushed his men, and gave orders not to fire until the Indians were in close range, and at a given signal. In due time, the Indians, seemingly about one hun- dred in number, came in view, and when yet at long range, one of the rangers inopportunely fired his rifle, and the battle opened. . The savages charged boldly, and at the first volley Captain Hardin was shot by a ball through both thighs and physically disabled. Sorely wounded as he was, he coolly seated himself on a log, and, in resolute and inspiring words, rallied his men to battle, and delivered his orders of command to the close of the action, and with as much self-possession as if on dress parade. An- imating his soldiers with his Spartan fortitude, they fought for victory and won it. The savages were put to flight, after losing one-third their number. Many times the fight was hand-to-hand, with tomahawk, or knife, or clubbed gun. The loss of the whites was severe.
Many other incidents of rencounters, of skirmishes, and of violent out- rages might be gathered from the dim chronicles of the past, and many more are of faded tradition, with which it would serve no worthy purpose to burden this history. How many of those who were comparative strangers and without interested kindred and friends in the labyrinthine wilderness of Kentucky, how many of small and defenseless family groups of emi- grants moving in through the forest range to find homes in the settlements, and how many of straggling hunters and soldiers were waylaid and mas- sacred, of whom even tradition could take no notice, or could give but a conjectural doubt for a few years of time, are among the mysteries passed under the veil of oblivion, not to be revealed in time.
The impunity of savage outrages became intolerable. True, there were exceptional bad men among the whites, who depredated at times upon the Indians; but with the Indians, the vicious and murderous class was the general mass, while the peaceably disposed were the exceptional few. The causes for retaliatory measures were mainly, and almost wholly, of their own creation, and called for decisive punishment.
The governor of Virginia felt himself constrained to assume the responsi- bility of action, while Congress hesitated, or took no measure on the subject of the governor's reference to them, the defense of the frontiers. Some general instructions were issued by him to the commandants of counties, to prepare the means of defense. It was determined to raise an army, and to place General Clark at the head, and march against the Indians on the Wabash. Such was the excited state of feeling, that one thousand men were soon rallied and assembled at Louisville. The provision and ammunition were shipped in nine keel-boats, to be transported by water to St. Vincent's,
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HISTORY OF KENTUCKY.
while the troops marched there by land. The doubts and delays of naviga- tion made the arrival of the same uncertain.
The troops reached the destined point, and lay waiting nine days for the arrival of the boats, which were detained by low water in the Wabash. On inspection, it was found that one-half the provisions were spoiled. This proved very unfortunate. A spirit of discontent had already manifested itself in camp, and this condition of the army supplies but caused it to be shown more openly. The army was placed upon short allowance, and marched toward the Indian towns, which were the object of attack. 1
A flag of truce was dispatched to the Indians, with the offer of peace or war. Such an offer is so inconsistent with the usages of Indian warfare, in which surprise is so essential a feature, that it throws some discredit on the relation. Whatever may have been the fact, this measure upon the part of the general, in addition to the want of provisions, is represented to have converted previous restlessness into positive disaffection, fomented by some officers of rank, who were displeased with the general. This state of things eventuated in three hundred men deserting in a body, when but two days' march from the Indian villages. The evil spirit of discontent had got pos- session of the troops. and they obstinately returned home, without having seen an enemy or struck a blow. Still, there was a residue left greater than many a gallant band that had penetrated in earlier times into the very heart of the Indian country, spreading dismay and destruction before it. But something was wanting upon this expedition more essential than numbers, without which the largest numbers only increase the spoil of an enemy; it was a manly and patriotic subordination to orders, and an honorable confi- dence of the men in their officers, and of officers in their commander. Never had General Clark led so unfortunate a party. Hitherto, victory seemed to have hung with delight upon his banner. At the same time, mournful as the truth is, and reluctantly as the record is wrung from the author, General Clark was no longer the same man as the conqueror of Kaskaskia and the captor of Vincennes. The mind of Clark was wounded by the neglect of the government of Virginia to settle his accounts for his great expeditions, which had stretched the republic to the Mississippi. Private suits had been brought against him for public supplies, which ultimately swept away his private fortune; and with this injustice, the spirits of the hero fell. and the general never recovered those energies which had stamped him in the noblest mold of a hero. At the same time, the habit of intemperance contributed its mischievous effects. Several officers are accused of having fomented insubordination, which terminated the expedition so dishonorably.
A more fortunate issue attended the expedition of Colonel Logan, who had been detached by General Clark from his camp at Silver Creek, oppo- site to Louisville, to return to Kentucky, and raise, as expeditiously as pos- sible, another party to go against the Shawanees, whose attention, it was
Butler, p. 152; Memoirs of Harrison, p. 82, note 2.
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269
DEATH OF CAPTAIN IRVINE.
supposed, would be engaged by the Wabash expedition. Logan repaired home, and soon returned with a competent number of mounted riflemen. On this rapid expedition, several towns of the Shawanees were burned, some twenty warriors killed, and a number of women and children brought away prisoners. This, as usual, consoled the public mind in some degree for the misfortunes of General Clark.
Another incident of the times, romantic and tragic, of this expedition, illustrates how much of personal adventure made up the unwritten history of the day. Captain Christopher Irvine, of Madison county, joined Logan with a battalion of mounted riflemen, in this campaign. He was a man of fine intellect and high character, and of intrepid daring. In a skirmish, an Indian was wounded, who proved a brave and resolute fellow. He attempted to escape, and Captain Irvine, with a squad of men, followed, trailing him through the brush and grass by his blood. The foremost pursuer came in range, when the Indian shot him dead, and resumed his retreat. Another of Irvine's men in the pursuit getting in the advance, and coming in sight, was also fired upon by the wounded savage, and killed. At this, Captain Irvine became much excited, and determined to lead the pursuit, against the remonstrance of friends. The delay gave the Indian a chance to get some distance off, but the pursuers soon gained on him. Captain Irvine, in the lead of his men, imprudently ventured in range, when the Indian fired and gave him a mortal wound. One of his men rushed up to the place of concealment, found the Indian again loading his gun, and at once dis- patched him. Irvine's death was much lamented.
1 "A single incident attending this expedition deserves to be commemo- rated. Upon approaching a large village of the Shawanees, from which, as usual, most of the inhabitants had fled, an old chief named Moluntha came out to meet them, fantastically dressed in an old cocked hat set jauntily upon one side of his head, and a fine shawl thrown over his shoulders. He carried an enormous pipe in one hand, and a tobacco-pouch in the other, and strutted out with the air of an old French beau, to smoke the pipe of peace with his enemies, whom he found himself unable to meet in the field.
"Nothing could be more striking than the fearless confidence with which he walked through the foremost ranks of the Kentuckians, evidently highly pleased with his own appearance, and enjoying the admiration which he doubted not that his cocked hat and splendid shawl inspired. Many of the Kentuckians were highly amused at the mixture of dandyism and gallantry which the poor old man exhibited, and shook hands with him very cordially. Unfortunately, however, he at length approached Major McGary, whose temper, never particularly sweet, was as much inflamed by the sight of an Indian as that of a wild bull by the waving of a red flag. It happened, unfortunately too, that Moluntha had been one of the chiefs who commanded
I McClung, p. 127.
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HISTORY OF KENTUCKY.
at the Blue Licks, a disaster which McGary had not yet forgotten. He could not recall it now, with the equanimity of his comrades.
"Instead of giving his hand as the others had done, McGary scowled upon the old man, and asked him if ' he recollected the Blue Licks?' Mo- luntha smiled, and merely repeated the word 'Blue Licks,' when McGary instantly drew his tomahawk and cleft him to the brain. The old man received the blow without flinching for a second, and fell dead at the feet of the destroyer. Great excitement instantly prevailed in the army. Some called it a ruthless murder, and others swore that he had done right-that an Indian was not to be regarded as a human being, but ought to be shot down as a wolf whenever and wherever he appeared. McGary himself raved like a madman at the reproach of his countrymen, and declared, with many bitter oaths, that he would not only kill every Indian whom he met, whether in peace or war, at church or market, but that he would equally as readily tomahawk the man who blamed him for the act."
The Government of the parent Commonwealth had given the Kentuckians power and authority to assume their own defense, and they were grateful. Congress did nothing, as yet.
According to the consenting act of the Virginia Legislature, delegates were elected in August, 1786, to the fourth convention, called by the act to sit at Danville, in September. So exhaustive were the drafts of Clark and Logan of men for their expeditions, at this time marching for the Indian towns beyond the Ohio, that a quorum of delegates-elect could not be had during the autumn, and adjournment from day to day was made until Jan- uary, 1787. The requisite number then attended, and proceeded to the order of business. A resolution was adopted setting forth that it was expe- dient for, and the will of the good people of, the district, that the same should become a State separate from, and independent of, Virginia, upon the terms of the act.
In the meeting of the minority of the convention in September, they had prepared a memorial to the Legislature of Virginia, advising that body of the circumstances which prevented the meeting of the convention, and pro- posing an alteration of some of the terms of the act, which had given dis- content to some of their constituents, and recommending an extension of the time to obtain the consent of Congress.
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