USA > Kentucky > The history of Kentucky, from its earliest discovery and settlement, to the present date, V. 2 > Part 7
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As the British filed off, no semblance of a guard was left, except Major Reynolds and two or three interpreters. This was an ominous foreboding, and gloomy apprehensions depressed the helpless wounded. The body of the Indians went with the British some six miles out, on a promise of an orgy of reveling in honor of the victory, except a few stragglers who pillaged through the village at night. The sun arose next morning, but to light up the opening scene of a tragedy, the bloody atrocities of which even sur- passed the horrors of the massacre of the previous day. At sunrise, some two hundred savages, insanely wild with the orgies of the last twenty-four hours, suddenly returned upon the unprotected town, painted black and red, and with frantic yells and menaces. They began plundering the pri- vate houses, and then broke into those where the wounded prisoners were lying, whom they cruelly abused and then mercilessly tomahawked to death. Captain Hickman was rudely dragged to the door, his brains dashed out with the tomahawk, and his body thrown back into the house. The houses of citizens Jerome and Godfrey, in which lay most of the suffering wounded, were assaulted and set on fire. and the most of the helpless inmates burned to death, mingling the dying cries of agonized torture with the horrid exulta- tions of the British allies without. Many who were able to crawl to the windows, in the desperate hope of escape, were met at the openings and forced to yield up their lives to the ruthless tomahawk, or give themselves as victims to the pitiless flames. Some others who were not in these two houses were seized and brained, and their mangled bodies pitched into the consuming fire, or left upon the streets and highways. Majors Woolfolk and Graves, Captain Hart, and others of lesser rank were among the vic-
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tims, some of whom were murdered on the way to Malden. Further details of the incidents of the tragedy would sicken the heart.
The fate of Captain Hart illustrated the perfidy of the British officers. Captain Elliott, of the latter, had become well acquainted with him in Ken- tucky. Captain Hart, inspector general, being wounded, appealed to his supposed friend to have him taken on to Malden the evening of the battle, uneasy at the prospect of being left to the mercy of the Indians. Captain Elliott assured him on the honor of a gentleman that he would be made safe, and that he would send his own conveyance for him next morning. Next day, after the bloody butchery of the prisoners began, Dr. Todd, sur- geon, was bound and taken to Stony creek, where Captain Elliott was in camp with some British prisoners. Dr. Todd appealed to the former to send back to Frenchtown and try and save some of the wounded, especially Cap- tain Hart. Elliott coldly and sneeringly replied that the Indians had by that time killed all the wounded they intended, and as to caring for Hart, that charity must begin at home, and when their own wounded were all re- moved, if any sleds remained, he would send them back. These are but incidents in the almost uniform and seemingly-designed brutality of the offi- cers in command of the English forces, and show conclusively, that though they dared not give open orders for these barbarities, yet by their passive permission and acquiescence, they as plainly licensed and instigated the savages in their perpetration. It was in their power easily to have prevented the revolting deeds of their Indian allies, and to have humanely saved many wounded and prisoners from the pitiless tomahawk; but their conduct throughout shows that the savages had the silent sympathy of their ap- proval.
The American army lost, in killed and massacred, two hundred and ninety men, and five hundred and ninety-two prisoners. Only thirty-three escaped to the Rapids. Of the British forces, Colonel Proctor reported one hundred and eighty-two killed and wounded. The Indians lost heavily, but there were no means of numbering their dead and wounded. Proc- tor crowded his prisoners in a small muddy wood-yard, in a heavy win- ter rain, without tents or blankets, and with scarcely fire enough to keep them alive. Not once did he mention the guard or sleds for the wounded. which he had pledged, though reminded of it by General Winchester ; and to the solicitations for surgical aid, Captain Elliott, with a sneer, replied. that " the Indians were excellent surgeons." Some of the prisoners taken and held by the Indians were ransomed by friends or humane persons.
The British offered a stipulated price for all scalps the Indians would bring in. The prices paid the Indians in ransom for the living prisoners were far in excess of the royalty for scalps ; hence, in a number of cases. the cupidity of the savages induced them to save alive the captives, rather than subject them to the tomahawk and scalping knife. Proctor learned of a number of instances of ransom, and, as if to crown his perfidious treachery
1
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SORROW THROUGHOUT KENTUCKY.
with an infamy of inhumanity. issued an order forbidding individuals to ran- som any more prisoners of the Indians ; and at the same time leaving open the offer of a premium for the scalps of men, women, and children, thereby seduc- ing the Indians to the massacre, in cold blood, of their prisoners.
Proctor did not bury the dead, but left the bodies to be devoured by dogs and wolves.
There were many incidents of personal and special character, bearing testimony to the same spirit and conduct of the British officers toward the Americans, of which we have not space for historic mention. Colonel Proctor made his reports of the campaign and battle to the commander-in- chief, General Brock. Of the duplicity of his representations, some idea may be formed from the following extracts from the same :
"His excellency, the commander-in-chief, has the highest satisfaction in announcing to the troops under his command another brilliant action achieved by the division of the army at Detroit, under Colonel Proctor. * *
* On this occasion, the gallantry of Colonel Proctor was most nobly displayed in his humane and unwearied exertions, which succeeded in rescuing the vanquished from the revenge of the Indian warriors."
For these services and unmilitary barbarities, Colonel Proctor received of his approving superiors promotion to a brigadier-generalship.
The report of the massacre at the river Raisin spread a pall of unmiti- gated sorrow throughout Kentucky. The slain were of her best families, and there were few households that did not have cause to lament the loss of kindred, near or remote. When the full tidings of the bloody atrocities. planned and perpetrated in collusion by the red savages and guilty whites, went abroad, the sentiment of sorrow was di- vided with that of burning indignation and revenge.
1 The gallant old veteran. Shelby, had been again elected governor, to succeed « Scott, and all thought now centered on . him. By special resolution of the Leg- islature, he was requested to take com- mand of a new levy of militia. He was authorized to call out three thousand men. On the 16th of February. Gov- ernor Shelby ordered this number to be drafted and organized into four regi- ments, under Colonels Boswell, Dudley, Cox, and Caldwell, and all placed under the command of General Green Clay. The two former rendezvoused at New-
GENERAL GREEN CLAY.
1 McAfee, p. 246.
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HISTORY OF KENTUCKY.
port, and from there promptly pushed on toward Fort Meigs, recently built at the Rapids.
General Green Clay was appointed to this command as well for his emi- nent services and experiences as from military precedence. Of Welsh an- cestry, he was born in Virginia, in 1757, and after coming to Kentucky, he settled in Madison county, where he often witnessed and participated in those perils and sufferings to which its people were exposed. He was ap- pointed deputy surveyor of Lincoln county in 1781, and was the first and only surveyor for a considerable time in the part of Kentucky where he first settled, and did nearly all of the surveying in that part of the country. In 1788, he was sent as a delegate from Madison county to the Virginia convention which ratified the Constitution of the United States. Above twenty years' service in the Legislatures of Virginia and Kentucky afforded him ample opportunity of acquiring a knowledge of the means calculated to promote the interests of Kentucky. As a legislator, he endeavored to augment the prosperity of the Commonwealth by economy in public ex- penditure, a multiplication of the means and institutions for education, an attention to the energetic organization of the militia, an equal and impartial administration of laws, and particularly of the criminal jurisprudence of the State. The molding influence of his mind is to be found in many of our early statutes. He was the author of the charter of the Bank of Ken- tucky, an institution which made its mark in the early history of the State. He was a member of the convention of 1799, which framed our second constitution, and its journal gives abundant evidence of his activity as a member of that body. He was speaker of the Senate of Kentucky in 1807. His thrift and enterprise, together with a remarkable acquaintance with the land laws of Virginia governing Kentucky titles, enabled him to accumulate a large estate. After a long and eventful life, he died in 1826. To his sons, Cassius M. and Brutus Clay, was imparted much of that intel- lectual and will power which gave great force of character and influence to their distinguished father.
Early in April. information was had that Colonel Proctor was preparing for an attack on and investment of Fort Meigs, where were now collected very large and important military supplies of inestimable value to the Amer- icans. Tecumseh and his brother, the Prophet, soon reached Malden with six hundred warriors to join in the campaign. On the 28th, the British and their Indian allies appeared in view. Landing and mounting their artillery on the opposite side of the river, at the old fort. the boats next carried the Indians across to the east side, and by these Fort Meigs was invested, amid their war-whoops and hideous yells. The enemy's mode of attack being now defined, on both sides the work of strengthening the respective positions was vigorously prosecuted until May ist. when the artillery duel opened briskly. But little execution was done, after two days' bombardment. On the 3d, a concealed battery was opened on the fort from the bushes on the
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DISASTER AT FORT MEIGS.
left, and on the same side of the river with Fort Meigs. This was soon silenced by an effective fire from the fort.
On the 4th of May, Major Trimble reached Meigs in a barge with fifteen men, and brought intelligence that General Green Clay was at Fort Defi- ance, with a detachment of twelve hundred Kentuckians. Captain Leslie Combs had atttempted this dangerous venture the day previous in a canoe, but was fired on by the Indians within a mile of Meigs, and driven back, with most of his men killed. General Harrison at once sent orders to Clay, by Captain Hamilton, to descend and land eight hundred men upon the northern shore, opposite the fort, and carry the British batteries, and spike the cannon, and then regain their boats and cross over. The residue of his forces he should land upon the south bank, and with them to fight through the Indians into the fort.
All was propitious for the execution of this order, but unhappily the men and officers to execute it were mainly raw militia, with enthusiasm and courage to rashness, but of little drill and discipline. The batteries were lightly guarded, the larger part of the British troops being at the camp two miles below, and the river dividing all these from the Indians camped around the fort. Colonel Dudley was instructed to land about eight hun- dred men from the first twelve boats, on the northern shore, and storm the batteries, which was done handsomely and quickly; but instead of crossing over in the boats to the south side and taking shelter in the fort, as Harri- son had ordered, the raw and impetuous Kentuckians were drawn off by some decoy parties of Canadians and Indians, who fired on them, and then retreated to the woods. Pursuing these one or two miles, they were flanked and cut off by the British troops, who were hurried forward from their camp two miles below, immediately on learning of the arrival of General Clay's supports. Colonel Dudley was lost sight of, and there seemed to be no specific commands from him. In the first confusion, General Harrison, standing in the fort with spyglass in hand, had called to Dudley and his men to come across the river at once, but his call was unheard or unheeded. The Indians were re-enforced also, and the Kentuckians were at the mercy of the enemy, in small and disordered detachments. Colonel Dudley him- self was wounded and overtaken, and dispatched with the tomahawk. Of all his detachment, less than two hundred escaped and got safely into the fort.
The prisoners were taken down to headquarters, and put into old Fort Miami, where the Indians were permitted to fire indiscriminately into them from the ramparts. Others went in and selected victims, led them to the gateway, and there, under the eye of General Proctor and the whole British army, tomahawked and scalped them. About twenty had been massacred thus without a word of interference from Proctor, when Tecumseh galloped down from the batteries, and drawing his sword, indignantly ordered them, "for shame to desist. It is a disgrace to kill a defenseless prisoner." The
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red barbarian thus in mercy brought that relief from atrocious murder which had been denied by the white savage in the very sight and presence of the mangled and expiring victims. The prisoners were, several hundred of them, stowed away in the hold of the brig Hunter for two days, suffering the horrors of stifling, akin to those of the English prisoners in the " Black Hole of Calcutta," in the hands of their Sepoy captors, until liberated upon parole at the mouth of Huron river.
Here we leave Dudley and go over to General Clay, with his remaining troops. Six boats contained all the remainder of the brigade after Dudley had left it with his detachment of men. In the foremost boat, near the shore on which Fort Meigs was situated, Clay was seen approaching the fort, assailed by a host of savages. He landed, and fought his way to the fort with about five hundred men. General Harrison now ordered a sortie, un- der Colonel Miller and Major Todd, of the regulars, against the batteries which had been planted in the brush on the south side, the battalion num- bering three hundred and fifty men. They charged on the enemy, number- ing eight hundred British, Canadians, and Indians, drove them back with severe loss, spiked the cannon, and brought back forty-one prisoners, not- withstanding they were outnumbered more than two to one.
The combined forces under Proctor in this affair of the 5th were thirty- two hundred men; those of Harrison, including Clay's brigade, twenty-five hundred. Upon the whole, it was a day of disaster to the Americans, but barren of the fruits of victory to the British.
Proctor, in the evening, demanded the surrender of Fort Meigs, which was treated with derision. It was done to cover his retreat. Learning by a messenger of the capture of Fort George by the Americans, and having the cannon at his batteries spiked, he became alarmed at his jeopardized posi- tion. The Indians were chagrined and dissatisfied, and began deserting to their villages in serious numbers. On the night of the Sth, he abandoned his camp, and retreated back to Malden. The killed, wounded, and prison- ers of the Americans, in the series of engagements of the day, were near one thousand. Those of the British and allies, not exceeding five hundred. There were opportunities of a splendid victory, and the total rout or capture of the opposing army, in the plans and orders of the commanding general: but all these were marplotted and destroyed by the disorderly disregard of all authority and discipline on the part of Colonel Dudley and the raw Ken- tuckians at the first assault on the enemy's batteries. The old pioneer veterans of Kentucky were passing from the theater of military action ; their sons who filled their places in the armies were just as brave and impetuous in battle as they, but lacked that wary discretion which only experience gives. General Harrison courteously rebuked the fatal imprudence which led to disaster, in the following words: "It rarely occurs that a general has to complain of the excessive ardor of his men, yet such appears always to be the case when Kentucky militia are engaged. It is indeed the source of
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TROOPS RAISED BY JOHNSON.
all their misfortunes; they appear to think that valor alone can accomplish everything."
To this date of the war, the cowardly and imbecile surrender of Detroit by Hull, the unmilitary negligence of Winchester, and the rash and reckless indiscretions of Dudley and his subordinates, had sacrificed five thousand as brave men as ever bore arms upon a field of battle. In any one of the three engagements, the direction of the troops by competent commanders and the observance of the plainest laws of military experience should have extorted victory, instead of disaster. from the wage of battle. The rank and file had now the plainest demonstrations that the unbridled willfulness and license of raw novices might be as fatal to the efficiency of the army in the presence of a wily enemy, as the stereotyped martinetism of the old fossil element of the regulars. Armies and nations, like individuals, are usually too inapt and stupid to learn by any experiences except their own, and then often too late to profit by their lessons. From this time forward, the regulars had learned better the art of fighting Indians, and the militia the necessity of military drill and discipline.
On the adjournment of Congress. Colonel Richard M. Johnson, then a member, returned home and proceeded to raise a regiment of mounted Kentuckians, to join the forces of General Harrison. This was speedily accomplished, with Lieutenant-Colonel James Johnson, and Majors Duval Payne and David Thompson next in command. At the heads of the com- panies were Captains R. B. McAfee, Richard Watson, Jacob Elliston, Ben- jamin Warfield, John Payne, Elijah Craig, Jacob Stucker, James Davidson, S. R. Combs, W. M. Rice, and James Coleman. During June and July these troops were employed in almost continuous campaign expeditions against the Indian towns in the North-west, but with comparatively fruitless effect, as the Indians had mainly joined Proctor at Malden, with their women and children, where they were fed and cared for.
After the siege of Fort Meigs was raised by the coming of Clay, Harri- son left the place, and Clay was put in command of the fort. While Clay and his troops were engaged in garrisoning Fort Meigs, on the 20th of July, that place was again menaced with an attack of the combined British and Indian armies, but the firm bearing exhibited by the garrison prevented a second attempt to storm the fort.
Major Croghan, a young Kentuckian of twenty-one years, and a nephew of General George Rogers Clark, held Fort Stephenson at Sandusky, with about one hundred and sixty men, and one six-pounder. On the 2d of August, General Proctor, with five hundred British regulars and eight hun- dred Indians, besieged the fort, and after a bombardment from several pieces of artillery, attempted an assault. They were met with a deadly fire of small arms and the single piece of artillery, and repulsed and routed with a loss of one hundred and fifty killed and wounded. Major Croghan lost but one killed and seven wounded. This brilliant victory was unexpected,
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HISTORY OF KENTUCKY.
even by General Harrison himself, as he had sent orders to Croghan to abandon the fort and retreat, if possible, on the appearance of the enemy in force.
1 At the suggestion of General Harrison, the Government had, early in the spring, ordered the construction and equipment of a fleet of vessels of sufficient numbers and strength to cope with that of the British, and to co- operate with the land forces. The port of Erie was the point selected for this important work, and was well fortified and protected against attack by the British naval forces, during its progress. The English, in the meantime. repaired and increased their navy with the construction of one large new brig at Malden, then Detroit. Commodore Perry was appointed to take command of the American fleet, which was completed. and the ships buoyed over the bar into the deep waters of the lake, by the 4th of August, and in sight of the British vessels, which lay at a distance in full view. The latter soon after weighed anchor and sailed for Malden. Commodore Perry sailed for Sandusky bay, and from thence appeared before the harbor of Malden to offer battle, if the enemy desired. Failing to draw him out, he retired to Put-in-Bay, to watch the sailing of the British fleet under Commodore Barclay.
General Harrison had received the sanction and authority of the Govern- ment to call for more forces to undertake a campaign against Malden, by the 20th of July. On the 30th, his letter reached Governor Shelby asking for not less than four hundred nor more than two thousand volunteers, to be furnished at the earliest possible day. On the 31st, the patriotic and gallant old governor issued the call for as many as would respond to rendezvous at Newport on the 3ist of August. Said he : "I will meet you there in per- son. I will lead you to the field of battle, and share with you the dangers and honors of the campaign." On the day appointed, thirty-five hundred Kentuckians met the governor at the rendezvous, and on September 12th they had reached the camp at Upper Sandusky, ready for the campaign. The troops were formed into eleven regiments, commanded respectively by Colonels Trotter, Donaldson, Poague, Montjoy, Rennick, Davenport, Taul, Calloway, Simrall, Barbour, and Williams, and these regiments into five brigades, under the lead of Generals Calmes, Chiles, King, Allen, and Cald- well. The whole was in two divisions, at the head of which were Major- Generals William Henry and Joseph Desha.
Colonel Richard M. Johnson's regiment of dragoons was now swollen to twelve hundred men, and had been put into an efficiency of drill and exer- cise by the indefatigable attentions of its lieutenant-colonel, James Johnson. The men were daily taught the special art of fighting Indians by charging through their lines and forming in their rear, and by outflanking them. Frequent sham battles had even taught their horses to charge through the lines of infantry in the midst of musketry fire, without halting or shying.
1 McAfee, P. 342.
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AMERICAN VICTORY ON LAKE ERIE.
."The oth of September," says McAfee, who was present as captain of a company, "was appointed by the president for fasting, humiliation, and prayer. Throughout the camp, many groups of soldiers could be seen pay- ing their devotions to God, and chanting His praises with simple zeal and sincerity, while the less pious preserved the strictest order and decorum. The author could not but feel a deep reverence, approaching a complete re- liance, that the special protection of Heaven would be enjoyed by the Amer- ican army while fighting in the sacred cause of justice and humanity."
General Harrison had detailed the company of Captain Stockton, and about twenty men from the company of Captain Payne, all Kentucky volun- teers, as marines and sharpshooters, on board the fleet of Commodore Perry, in all about one hundred men. The two fleets equipped and manned. and now contestants for the supremacy of Lake Erie, were in daily expectation of an engagement that would be decisive for the nationality of the one country or the other. The respective naval armaments opposed to each other were as follows: The American fleet was composed of brigs Lawrence, Niagara, and Caledonia, forty-three guns; schooners Ariel. Scorpion, Tigress, Som- ers, and Porcupine. twelve guns: and sloop Trippe, one gun; total, fifty-six guns. The British fleet of the ships Detroit and Queen Charlotte, thirty- nine guns ; brig Hunter, ten guns; schooners Provost and Chippeway, seven- teen guns; and sloop Little Belt, three guns; total, sixty-nine guns. On the 12th, General Harrison dispatched from Seneca to Governor Shelby, a dupli- cate of the celebrated laconic note of Commodore Perry as received by him :
"UNITED STATES BRIG NIAGARA, September 10, 1813. - Dear General : We have met the enemy and they are ours-two ships, two brigs, one schooner, and a sloop. Yours,
OLIVER HAZARD PERRY."
Not a vessel of the British had escaped : and the shock of unexpected defeat came to them with the forebodings of a change in the fortunes of war now at hand. The electrifying news was received by the divisions of the American army at Seneca and Sandusky with tumultuous joy. As it was borne from post to station down to Cincinnati, and across to Kentucky, the people took up the refrain, and echoed and re-echoed the glad tidings through- out the land. Minuter description of this great naval battle we leave for the pages of American history, where it properly belongs.
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