A History of Missouri from the Earliest Explorations and Settlements Until the Admission of the state into the union, Volume III, Part 14

Author: Louis Houck
Publication date: 1908
Publisher: R. R. Donnelley & sons company
Number of Pages: 405


USA > Missouri > A History of Missouri from the Earliest Explorations and Settlements Until the Admission of the state into the union, Volume III > Part 14


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Not long after the capture of this boat two other men were killed by the Saukee Indians on the north side of the river, being the first men killed in the Boonslick country during the war of 1812, named respectively Jonathan Todd and Thomas Smith. These men were out at the time in the wilderness, on the Moniteau, selecting a loca- tion to settle.24 It is said that the savages, after slaying them, "cut off their heads, cut out their hearts and placed them on the side of the road on poles." What road is referred to is not stated, nor is it at all likely that any road, further than a trail or trace existed in the locality where Smith and Todd were killed. When the news reached the settlers a party of men started out to get their bodies. On the way an Indian was captured who seemed to observe their movements, but as they came near the fort with him he suddenly broke away, and when it was found that he could not be caught he was shot and in- stantly killed. After this, James Cole and others were sent out on a


" History of Cooper county by Lewin and Drake, p. 23.


2 Ibid., p. 23.


115


SARSHALL COOPER KILLED


· scouting expedition to ascertain if the Indians were really on the war- path. As they returned they discovered that they were being pur- sued by a large band of Indians and that they had intercepted their retreat to the fort. In order to escape they fled to a trading post kept by a man named Johnson, known as Johnson's factory, on Moni- teau creek, in what is now Howard county, and nearly two hundred yards from the Missouri river. That night at about 12 o'clock they left the factory by stealth in order to advise the settlers of the im- pending danger and were nearly captured by the vigilant Indians.25


On the south side another man named Smith was killed while out hunting with one Savage, but Savage fortunately escaped. This attack occurred near Cole's fort not far from the present Boonville.26


On the 14th of April, 1814, Captain Sarshall Cooper was killed at Cooper's fort on a dark and stormy night. The night was so dark and stormy that the watchful sentinel could not see an object six feet from the stockade. Captain Cooper lived in one of the angles of the fort, and while sitting at his fireside with his family, his youngest child on his lap and others playing around the room, his wife sitting by his side sewing, a single Indian warrior crawled up to the fort, made a hole through the clay between the logs just large enough for the muzzle of his gun, the noise of his work being drowned by the howling storm, and discharged it with fatal effect.27 The death of


" History of Cooper county by Lewin and Drake, p. 25.


" History of Cooper county, by Lewin and Drake, p. 22.


27 Life of John Mason Peck, p. 138. The muster-roll of Capt. Sarshall Cooper's company, dated April, 1812, and which manifestly embraced all the settlers then living in the upper Boonslick country, on both sides of the river, preserved in Draper's Notes, vol. xxiii, pp. 65-81, is not without interest, and gives us the names of the following officers and men: Wm. McMahan, Ist Lieutenant; David McQuilty, 2d Lieutenant; John Monroe, 3d Lieu- tenant; Ben Cooper, Jr., Ensign; John McMurray, Ist Sergeant; Sam Mc- Mahan, 2d Sergeant (killed December 24, 1814); Adam Woods, 3d Sergeant; David Todd, 4th Sergeant; John Mathews, 5th Sergeant; Andrew Smith, Thomas Vaughn, James McMahan, John Busby (killed February, 1814), James Barnes, Corporals. The privates were: Jesse Ashcraft, Jesse Cox, Sam Perry, John Thorp, Solomon Cox, Henry Ferrill, Harman Gregg, Wm. Gregg (killed December 24, 1814), John Wasson, Josiah Higgins, David Gregg, Robert Cooper, Gray Bynums, David Cooper, Abbott Hancock, Wm. Thorp, Wm. Cooper, John Cooper, Jos. Cooper, Stephen Cooper, Wm. Read, Stephen Turley, Thos. McMahan, James Anderson, Wm. Anderson, Stephen Jackson, John Hancock, Robert Irvin, Francis Cooper, Benoni Sappington, James Cooley, Nathan Teague, James Douglass, John Snethan, Wm. Creas- son, Jos. Cooley, Wm. McLane (killed October, 1814), James Turner, Ervin McLane, Wm. Baxter, Peter Creasson, David Burns, Price Arnold, John Smith (killed November, 1814), John Stephenson, Alfred Head, Gilliard Roop, Daniel Durbin, Jas. Cockyill, Jesse Tresner, Mitchel Poage, Townsend


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HISTORY OF MISSOURI


Captain Cooper was deeply deplored by the settlers and the whole pioneer community mourned his loss. He was a natural leader; was about five feet ten inches high, of fine physique, a superior horse- man, cool and deliberate.28 His wife was Ruth, a daughter of Stephen Hancock, the Boonsboro pioneer with Daniel Boone. Cooper county was so named in his honor.


However, only small bands of Indians harassed the settlers. Thus in May, 1814, two negroes belonging to James and John Heath while cutting wood for making salt were captured by the Indians. A party of fully sixty men pursued these Indians in a northerly direction high up the Chariton, on horseback, fifty or sixty miles, and near night found where the Indians had killed a deer and evidently encamped, indicating twenty or twenty-five of them. But some of the Indians were up in a tree on watch, and could look over the prairie a mile and a half in every direction. When they saw the settlers approach they decamped, leaving two axes and a water jug they had taken from the negroes, blankets, leggings, moccasins, camp kettle, awls, and the fresh venison they had just commenced to broil. Although the set- tlers searched all next day for the trail of these Indians it could not be found, nor were the negroes ever recovered or anything heard of them afterward. This pursuing party was hastily assembled and made sixteen miles by sunrise and galloped nearly all day. On their return the men were much fatigued and on short allowance, and opened the keg of whiskey seized from Captain Coursault, and which had long tempted them, and James Cole says that they "had a jolly high time."


In the following August a band of eight Indians was followed by a party of forty men from Cooper's and Kinkead's fort. These Indians had killed some cattle and stolen some ten or twelve horses, driving away the horses to high ground not over three or four


Brown, John Arnold, Robert Poage, Francis Berry, Lindsay Carson, David Boggs, Jesse Richardson, Robert Brown, John Peak, John Elliott, Jos. Beggs, Andrew Carson, John Cooley, Reuben Fugitt, Seibert Hubbard, John Berry, Wm. Brown, Francis Woods, Wm. Allen, Robert Wells, Jos. Moody, Jos. Alexander, Amos Barnes, Daniel Hubbard, Harris Jamison, Abraham Barnes, Wm. Ridgeway, Enoch Taylor, Mathew Kinkead, John Barnes, Henry Weadon, Otto Ashcraft, John Pursley, Wm. Monroe, Isaac Thornton, Stephen Feils, Dan Monroe, Giles Williams, Henry Barnes, Wm. Savage, Thomas Chandler, John Jokley, Stephen Cole, Wm. Robertson, Wm. Bolen, Mike Box, Sabert Scott, John Savage, James Cole, Stephen Cole, Jr., John Ferrill, Delaney Bolen, James Savage, Jos. McMahan, Braxton Cooper, Robert Hancock.


28 Draper's Notes, vol. 23. Trip of 1868, pp. 65 to 81, inclusive.


II7


AN INDIAN FIGHT


hundred yards from the bottom, to a place about three miles from the present Franklin, where they tied the horses in a thicket. Captain Cooper with 25 or 30 men, among them Lindsay Carson, the father of Kit Carson, David Boggs, Stephen Jackson, William Thorp, then and afterward a Baptist preacher, and James Cole, who in 1868 gave Draper this version of the affair, found the horses in the thicket and then followed the trail of the Indians into the bottom below. After going not much more than a quarter of a mile, they divided into three parties, Captain Cooper with one party going up to the left of the hollow of a branch; another party going direct up the hollow, and the third party up the eastern bank skirting the hollow. Just after entering the mouth of the hollow, four or five of the men, mostly on foot, whose feet from long and hot pursuit had become blistered, among them James Barnes, whose horse had given out, remained behind, and sat down on a log together, some one hun- dred yards above where the hollow commenced at the river bottom. As the three parties of whites advanced, the Indians who as the event proved were in the hollow, seeing the approaching settlers were too numerous for them, hid in bushes till they passed, when they ran out of the branch and came unexpectedly upon the men on the log, who seeing the Indians fired on them. The Indians returned the fire and wounded Francis Woods through the thigh, and Barnes' horse. Both parties then took to the trees, this about midday. Hearing the firing, all three parties quickly returned, being but a short distance away, arriving nearly simultaneously, and surrounded the Indians before they were aware of it. Captain Cooper's party was on the high point skirting the western side of the branch, some twenty or thirty feet above the Indians, and fired down on them. The Indians concealing themselves in the thick, tall fern grass some three or four feet high, would rise up and shoot, then drop down and reload. Cap- tain Cooper then ordered a charge, and the whole party being near enough to hear, suddenly ran down upon the Indians. One Indian who had his ball about halfway down his rifle, was knocked down by Lindsay Carson, and David Boggs shot off his gun between Car- son's legs, the muzzle close to the Indian's head, blowing his head all to pieces; just then Lieutenant McMahan, with savage ferocity, ran up and plunged his knife into the dead Indian's body, broke off the blade and made a flourish of the handle. But this Lieutenant Mc- Mahan, James Cole, says made many false alarms, and was not much thought of. The men engaged in this expedition were from


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HISTORY OF MISSOURI


Cooper's and Kinkead's forts. In this encounter five Indians were killed, all shot to pieces. A day or two afterward another dead In- dian was found three or four miles above the scene of conflict, on the river where he had evidently attempted to move into the water a canoe which the Indians had left there, but was too feeble to do so and had died on the bank of the river. Unquestionably he was one of the band Captain Cooper had encountered. The party of whites now got the horses and Indian guns, and carried home Woods who, though badly wounded, recovered."" Thus terribly were the Indians punished for stealing horses. To what tribe these Indians belonged is not certain, likely, however, they were affiliated with the Saukees and Renards, or may have been, as General Dodge supposes, Miam- ies.30 They were certainly not Quapaws as is supposed in the "His- tory of Cooper County," because that tribe of Indians was located on the Arkansas river, and not on the warpath at that time.


During the whole year 1814 small parties of Indians continued to keep the settlements on the Missouri river in constant agitation. In September of that year Braxton Cooper, Jr., was killed, apparently after a desperate struggle with several Indians, near the present town of New Franklin, while cutting logs to build a house. He was a cousin to Ben and Sarshall Cooper, and only two or three months before he was killed had married a daughter of David Boggs. In October Joseph Still was killed near the Chariton river. He was one of a party pursuing some Indians who had killed a negro named Joe, belonging to Sam Brown, near Burckhart's lick. This party, among whom were Stephen Jackson,31 James Cockrill, Stephen Cooper, Lindsay Carson," John Peck, and others, was nearly surrounded by the Indians, who on this occasion, happened to be more numerous than the settlers.33 In the same month Wil- liam McLane was killed near where is the present town of Fayette, in Howard county. McLane had gone from his fort with Ewing McLane and four others to select a location for settlement, and was killed on his horse just as he came out of a big ravine leading


" Draper's Notes, vol. 23, pp. 65-81.


30 Iowa Historical Record, October, 1889, p. 360.


31 Stephen Jackson came to upper Louisiana from Georgia; settled in St. Charles; after the war he lost his wife, then returned to Georgia, and finally moved to Irish Bayou, Texas, where he died in 1848.


32 Came from Marion county, Kentucky, to upper Louisiana; had his finger shot off at the time Wm. McLane was killed; was accidentally killed about three years after the war by a piece of falling burning timber.


" Draper's Notes, vol. 23, pp. 65, et seq.


119


COX'S FORT


to Moniteau creek, the ball striking the back of his head. He fell backwards off his horse, and the Indians, so it is said, cut out his heart and ate it." His companions managed to escape to the fort, where they collected a large party of settlers, but the Indians had left no trace of the direction in which they retreated. Not long before the negro, Joe, was killed, one Austin, stopping at McLane's fort, while coming around the corner of a fence, about two miles from the fort, discovered an Indian in the act of firing from the corner of the fence, and suddenly reining up his horse, the ball passed through the horse's head, and the horse fell upon Austin. One Hough, and Nicholas Burckhart, who were some distance in the rear, saw what had happened, and Hough shot and wounded the Indian as he was jumping over the fence to kill Austin. Austin soon extricated himself and reached the fort, so also Hough, but Burckhart, who ran into the woods, did not come in until the next morning. This Hough only temporarily remained in the Boons- lick country, and was a hunter and trapper on the upper Missouri."


On the south side of the river in the bottom, about three miles above Arrow Rock, William Gregg and his father-in-law, Jesse Cox, made a settlement in 1814. There they built a blockhouse, a sort of family fort, called "Cox's Fort," and began to make im- provements, hunting also for subsistence. Gregg and Cox killed a bear on the 23d of October, and the next day Gregg went out on his horse and got it, and subsequently went to feed his hogs, and while doing so he was shot by an Indian lying in ambush. He ran to the blockhouse a hundred yards off, got inside the stockade, grasped his gun, and fell dead. It is said that seven bullets hit the gate post of the stockade where he entered.3%


" Draper's Notes, p. 65 and 31, Sam Cole's narrative.


" Draper's Notes, vol. 23, pp. 65, et seq.


" Cox and Gregg came from Looking Glass Prairie, Illinois, to the Mis- souri Territory. Cox was a native of Madison county, Kentucky, and William Gregg married his daughter there. It is said that after the Indians killed William Gregg they made an attack on the cabin and captured his daughter Patsy, and took her away as a prisoner; that a party was immediately organ- ized to pursue the Indians; that the girl was on horseback, seated behind an Indian warrior, to whom she was tied by one hand, but that the horse on account of this double load lagged behind and that she, in the hope of seeing some one following to rescue her, constantly looked behind; that at last dis- covering horsemen she prepared to escape, waiting until the white men were within fifty yards of her, when, with her unbound hand she suddenly seized the Indian's knife, drawing it from the scabbard, cut the thongs which bound her hand to his, sprang to the ground and rushed into the brush on the side of the trail, all in almost an instant. The pursuing party then fired on the Indians, who fled precipitately. According to another account the Indians


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HISTORY OF MISSOURI


On the same day and in the same month, Samuel McMahan was also slain, not far from the present site of Boonville, while out driving up his cattle. The day after McMahan was killed all the settlers living near where Boonville is now located, came to the house of Hannah Cole, which was located on a bluff overlooking the Missouri river, to erect a fort in which to take refuge against Indian attacks. In about one week they completed the work. This fort was built on this bluff because near where a good supply of water could always be procured from the river. Among others killed by the Indians was a man by the name of Campbell, commonly called "Potter" because he was a potter by trade; being the only person of that trade in the neighborhood, his loss was keenly felt by the settlers.


The number of militia-men in the western part of the Missouri . Territory during the war of 1812 did not exceed 290 men, and these Indian troubles thus continuing on the Missouri, General Dodge in command of the militia of the territory, was ordered to take command of 350 mounted rangers, and march to the relief of these settlers in September, 1814. Lyman C. Draper, who noted down the personal reminiscences of General Dodge in this cam- paign, says that the mounted men in his command consisted of a company under Capt. W. Thompson of St. Louis, a com- pany under Capt. Isaac Vanbibber of Loutre island, a company under Captain Poston of the mining country (now Washington and François counties), a company under Captain Daugherty of Cape Girardeau,37 and finally a company of the Boonslick settle- ment under Capt. Benjamin Cooper. Nathaniel Cook and Daniel M. Boone were Majors. General Dodge says that he had some blank commissions with him, and that in this campaign he appointed Benjamin Cooper Major, who was an elder brother of Sarshall


tomahawked their prisoner in the head and hip and fled, but she recovered. It is also said that Patsy Cox was the name of the young woman captured, and not Gregg. Harmon, William and David Gregg were natives of Overton county, Tennessee, and members of Capt. Sarshall Cooper's company, and so also Jesse Cox. Dr. Josiah Gregg, author of the Commerce of the Prairies, undoubtedly was a relative of these Greggs. He, too, seems to have for a time at least, made Missouri his home and started out on his trading expeditions from Missouri. The Cox family subsequently moved to Lafayette county.


"7 This company was mustered into service for 60 days on the 15th of August. Medad Randall was Ist Lieutenant, Andrew Patterson 2d Lieu- tenant; Robert Buckner, 3d Lieutenant; Frederick Kelp, Ensign; Michael Rodney, William Cox, Joseph Thompson, Ben. Anthony, Sergeants; Jacob Yount, Henry Shaner, Hall Hudson, John Davis, Nero Thompson and John Ezell, Corporals.


I21


INDIAN ALLIES


Cooper, on account of his experience in Indian warfare.38 David Barton, afterwards United States senator, was a volunteer in Thompson's company, refusing any rank, but tendering General Dodge any service he might be able to render him.3º With Dodge's command. Draper says were forty friendly Shawnees, but Peck says fifty Delawares and Shawnees. These were under four Indian captains named Na-kour-me, Kish-ka-le-wa, Pap-pi-qua, and Wa-pe-pil-le-se, the two latter were fully seventy years old and had both served in the early Indian wars. These Indians resided on Apple creek in the Cape Girardeau district, and were


" The Coopers came from Culpepper county, Virginia. Sarshall Cooper born in 1762, was younger than Col. Ben Cooper, and never performed any military service except perhaps at the Bluelick fight in Kentucky. Col. Ben Cooper was in that battle, also his two brothers-in-law, Peak and Woods, both of whom were killed. Col. Ben Cooper was engaged in all the Indian wars in Kentucky before he came to the Missouri territory. They were early settlers in Madison county, Kentucky. Col. Ben Cooper died on the Osage river about eighteen miles above Osceola, in 1842. He was a large and tall man, over six feet high, and weighed 200 pounds; a man of temper and action; was a typical frontiersman. Sarshall and Braxton Cooper came to the terri- tory in 1807 and settled in what was then known as Hancock's bottom in St. Charles county. It is related that after they settled there they went up the Mis- souri to procure a supply of salt from Nathan Boone, and took it down in sycamore troughs with ends fastened and caulked with clay. Col. Ben Cooper settled in the same bottom in 1806. In the spring of 1808 Col. Ben Cooper and family moved to Boonslick country and located on the river on the northern bank, about a mile below Arrow Rock, built a house and got into it, but was ordered off by government officials, the Gasconade being the western line to which the Indian title had been extinguished. He then moved back, first to Hancock's bottom, and the next year, spring 1809, to Loutre island, and about the same time Sarshall and Braxton Cooper also moved to Loutre island. Stephen Jackson, John Fail and families, settled there in the fall of 1809; so also Joseph Wolfscale. The Coopers again started in February, 1810, for the Boonslick country, and arrived there about the Ioth of March. The following forty persons came and settled successively in the country that spring, to wit: Col. Ben Cooper, and his sons, Francis Cooper, Wm. Cooper, David Cooper, and John Cooper; Braxton Cooper, and his son, Robert Cooper; Capt. Sarshall Cooper, and his sons, Braxton, Joseph and Stephen Cooper; John Hancock and son, Abbott Hancock, unmarried; John Busby; John Berry, and cousin Wm. Berry, unmarried; John Ferrill and son, Henry Ferrill; Peter Popineau, unmarried; Gray Bynum, unmar- ried; Robt. Irvin, unmarried; Jas. Cyle, unmarried; Joseph Wolfscale and son, Wm. Wolfscale, unmarried; James Anderson, and his sons Middleton and Wm. Anderson, unmarried; Stephen Jackson; Wm. Thorp, and son John Thorp; Josiah Thorp and small family; James Thorp, unmarried; Amos Ashcraft and sons, Otto and Jesse Ashcraft, latter son unmarried; Gilliard Roop and young family; James Jones and family; James Alexander and family. All the young Coopers were unmarried. Col. Ben Cooper and Capt. Sarshall Cooper had leased of Mrs. Ira Nash a Spanish grant of 600 arpens claimed by her husband, so as to settle in the country under the guise of this claim, but they all settled considerably above this claim, the precise location of which was much in dispute for a long time. Nash never lived on the claim at any time.


" Iowa Historical Record, October, 1889, p. 360, note.


I22


HISTORY OF MISSOURI


induced, as we have seen, to settle in the Spanish possessions by Lorimier at the instance of the Spanish government. Their rela- tions with the white people on the west side of the river always had been friendly. They had small farms on Apple creek and its branches, and resided there until finally, in 1835, they were removed to the Indian Territory. But Wa-pe-pil-le-se had a village where Bloomfield is now located, in 1830. Dodge marched to the Boons- lick country on the north side of the Missouri and crossed over to the southern bank at Arrow Rock by swimming the stream. This crossing he effected by selecting six of his most active men, good swimmers on horseback, for the advance, the others followed flanked by canoes, and in the rear by canoes as a vanguard above and below the main body, stemming the swift current. When about one-half way over, he says he struck a strong eddy, which soon carried his men to the south- ern bank in safety. Only two hours were thus con- sumed in crossing the river with horses and baggage. Once on the south side his GEN. HENRY DODGE Indian allies soon located the hostile Miamis where they had thrown up a small entrenchment. Dodge's men rapidly pushed forward several miles up the river and quickly surrounded these Indians at this point, since known as Miami's bend, in Saline county. The Miamis saw that it would be folly to resist, and proposed through the Shawnees to surrender themselves prisoners. At a council of officers called by General Dodge for the purpose of asking advice, all agreed to receive them as prisoners, and that their lives should be sacredly preserved, the Coopers and other Boonslick officers assenting. General Dodge then told all the officers that he would hold them personally responsible for their own conduct and that of their men in par-


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GENERAL DODGE


ticular, in that matter. It is quite evident from this that General Dodge even then anticipated some trouble in carrying out faith- fully the stipulations made with the Indians, and that in order to prevent a massacre he exacted an explicit pledge from the officers of the several commands. The Indians now formally surrendered to him, and 31 warriors and 122 women and children, 153 in all, were received under his protection. The trouble General Dodge expected would arise must have come on earlier even than he thought, for the next morning Cooper and others who had been scouring around in search of hidden property in the Indian camp, found the well known rifle of Campbell (the potter), who had been slain in the Boonslick region, and, greatly infuriated by this discovery, and the fact that these Miamis had perpetrated the killing, came gal- loping up to General Dodge and demanded a surrender of the Indian who had killed Campbell, so as to make an example of him. This General Dodge peremptorily denied, when Cooper threatened that his company, who had all come dashing up on their horses, would kill all of the Indians, and his men, as if by com- mon consent, cocked their rifles and assumed a shooting attitude. When Dodge heard the clicking of the locks of the rifles, fearing consequences, without even turning to the men, he drew his sword, and thrusting its point within six inches of Captain Cooper's breast, he reminded him of his pledge to protect the Indians on their sur- render, and said that if Captain Cooper's men fired on them Cap- tain Cooper himself should immediately suffer the consequences. At this critical moment Major Nathan Boone rode up by the side of General Dodge and said that he would stand by him to the last, taunting Cooper with the treachery of the act proposed. Cooper at length yielded, and Dodge ordered him to take his place in the line and march away; he doggedly obeyed, and his men rode by. The Indians, who had been in dreadful consternation, jumped to their feet with expressions of joy and gratitude to Dodge and Boone. The Shawnees were also gratified that the Miamis had been saved. A strong attachment sprung up between Kish-ka-le-wa and Dodge, and long afterwards, at Fort Worth, in 1835, there was an affec- tionate recognition between him and Dodge. Salter, the biographer of Dodge, says that he looked back "upon his conduct in saving these prisoners as one of the happiest acts of his life." But for a long time General Dodge, by reason of his magnanimous conduct on that occasion, was not popular in the Boonslick country.




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