USA > Missouri > Centennial history of Missouri (the center state) one hundred years in the Union, 1820-1921, Volume I > Part 53
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treacherous Miamis, in ambush, fired on them in the field and Bowlin was killed. Their moccasin tracks in the field were followed to near the Miami village, thirty- miles away. "Col. Ben Cooper wrote a letter to Gov. Clark, at St. Louis, informing him of the circumstances and of the general conduct of the Miamis, and asking that proper action be taken against them. On receipt of Col. Cooper's letter Gov. Howard at once sent a force of rangers to the Miami village. The Indians surrendered and were escorted out of the country after the stolen property had been restored to the settlers.
Fort Cooper's Fighting Garrison.
"In September, 1813, Braxton Cooper, of Fort Cooper, was killed within a mile or so of the fort, as he was cutting logs for a cabin. He was a young man of considerable physical strength and great courage. He had his rifle and knife with him, and the broken bushes, marks on the ground, and other circumstances showed that he had sold his life at the highest possible price. He was found lying on his face. In his clenched right hand was his good knife, bloody from point to hilt; by his side lay his loaded gun. He was not scalped or mutilated, and everything indicated that he had put the Indians to flight before falling dead from his half dozen bullet wounds. Not far away was found an Indian's buckskin hunting shirt, with two bloody bullet holes in it. Cooper's faithful dog remained by his side, howling as if for help, until David Boggs and Jesse Turner crawled out to him during the night and recovered the body of his master.
"In October of the same year Stephen Cooper, then a boy of 16, and another young man named Joseph Still, both of Fort Cooper and belonging to the rangers, were sent up the Chariton river on a scout. They were returning, when, within about twenty-five miles of the fort, they were intercepted by over 100 Sac Indians. There was but one thing to do. The two rangers rode side by side steadily forward, their rifles on the cock, until within 100 yards of the savages, when both fired and then charged. Cooper killed a prominent 'brave' and Still wounded another. Reaching the Indian line Still was shot dead from the saddle, but gallant young Cooper dashed through, waving his rifle and cheering, and succeeded in escaping the shower of bullets, arrows and spears sent after him. As he rode a good horse and the Indians were afoot he was soon safe, and reached the fort in a few hours.
"The same month Wm. McLane was killed near the present site of Fayette. He, his brother Ewing, and four other men, went out to select a good claim for one of them. They came upon at least 100 Indians-presumably the same band encountered by Still and Cooper-and started to return. As they were ascending a slope from a ravine that empties into Moniteau creek, the Indians fired and McLane fell from his horse with a bullet in his brain. The other members of the party escaped. The Indians scalped Mc- Lane, hacked his body to pieces, and from appearances had a war-dance over it. A strong party of rangers went out to punish the Indians if possible, but the crafty red. men burned the woods and destroyed their trail so that it could not be followed. A week later, however, Capt. Cooper's rangers came upon five Indians encamped over in the Chariton timber and wiped them all out in a twinkling. On the body of one of the Indians was found a white man's scalp, which was believed to have been McLane's.
The Perils of the Salt Makers.
"Making salt at Burckhartt's Lick to supply the forts was a perilous business, but it had to be done. In an attack on the salt-makers at this lick in the spring of 1813 James Alcorn, Frank Wood and two other men drove off twenty Indians, killing three and wounding others. Frank Wood killed two, though he was suffering at the time with a severe wound in the arm received from the Indians a week before.
"In another attack on the salt-makers the workmen mounted their horses to retreat. In reining up his horse John Austin brought up the animal's head so as to shield his own person.
"The Indians fired and shot the horse in the head and it fell. Austin was extricating himself from the dead animal, every moment expecting a bullet or a tomahawk, when a companion, George Huff, fired on the advancing warriors and actually killed two of them
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at a single shot. The other Indians fell back and took to cover, while Austin and Huff took to their heels and escaped to Fort Kincaid.
"Over on the Cooper county side of the river, and especially in the neighborhood of Cole's Fort, there were other murders from time to time. A few months after the fort was built a strong band of Indians came into the neighborhood. At the time there were two parties from the fort out hunting. In one of these were two men named Smith and Savage, who on their way to the fort were attacked by the Indians. At the first fire Smith was severely wounded, but he staggered on to within fifty yards of the fort, where he was again wounded, two balls entering his body. He fell, and Savage turned to assist him, but, with the death agony upon him, the stricken man handed his gun to Savage, saying: 'I am done for; take my gun and save yourself, and help the people in the fort.' Savage then ran for the fort, and the Indians fired twenty-five shots after him before he could get inside the walls. The Indians ran up and scalped Smith, shook the gory trophy at his friends, and barbarously, mutilated his body in plain view of the inmates of the fort, and then retired into the woods.
"There were only six fighting men in the fort at the time, and they were restrained from firing by old Aunt Hannah Cole, who urged that they could not afford to fight until the hunting parties had all returned. These parties did not all get in until late in the night.
"December 24. 1814, Samuel McMahan, a bold settler in the bottom near Arrow Rock, in what is now Saline county, was killed four miles west of Fort Cole. He was on his way to the fort to bring up his cattle corraled there. Two young men named Cole and Roup, and old Muke Box, were cutting a bee tree near the trail, and it was supposed that the Indians were crawling . upon them when McMahan came riding along. They fired on him, shot him through the body, and killed his horse. He sprang up and ran toward the river, but the Indians soon came up with him, and killed him by three savage spear thrusts in the back. They then scalped him, cut off his head, and disembowled him. Hearing the firing, Cole and Roup ran to the fort and gave the alarm. Muke Box climbed a tree, and as the Indians were returning in great glee from the killing of McMahan he shot one of them. The Indians, in some alarm, caught up the body and bore it off, limp and lifeless, but it was afterward found in a ravine a mile or more away.
Brave Sally Gregg.
"The same Christmas Eve Wm. Gregg, who had ventured to settle in the Big Bottom, on the Saline county side, was killed. He was crossing the river on his return to his cabin from Fort Cooper, and was killed in his canoe as he was paddling to the shore by some Indians in ambush on the south bank. His brave daughter, Sally Gregg, recovered the body and guarded it till help came. The next day the men at Cole's Fort, re-enforced by some of the Howard County Rangers, went out and secured the mangled remains of McMahan. James Cole carried in the body on the pommel of his saddle, and David Mc- Gee brought the head, wrapped in a sheepskin. The remains were buried on the site of the old Boonville Fair Grounds.
"The following day all of the settlers living in the vicinity of where Boonville now stands repaired to the house of good old Hannah Cole, in East Boonville, and within a week they had built another good, strong cabin fort. It stood on the edge of the bluff, which was very steep at that point, and on that-the river-side was inaccessible to an attack. Arrangements were made for a plentiful supply of water from the river in case of siege. A huge well bucket was fashioned from a hollow log and a sort of flume con- structed from the fort down into the water. The bucket was let down and drawn up through this flume by means of a rope and windlass. As soon as the fort at Hannah Cole's was completed, the old fort at Capt. Stephen Cole's a mile away, was abandoned and all the settlers gathered into the new fort. But these precautions proved unneces- sary, as the killing of McMahan and Gregg was virtually the end of the Indian war in the Boone's Lick settlements, although small bands of the savages occasionally roamed through the country a year or so, running off stock and committing like depredations."
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The Miamis' Version.
A different version of the trouble with the Miamis is given by one of the early writers on Indian troubles in Missouri. It is said that Colonel Benjamin Cooper, with 250 armed settlers, joined Dodge when the latter reached the Boone's Lick country and marched with him against the Miamis. They swam the Mis- souri near Arrow Rock and went to the fort of the Miamis but the Indians had withdrawn and gone into camp. The Indians at once surrendered. They had some of the property that had been stolen from the Boone's Lick settlers but their version was that the thieving had been done by Sacs and Foxes and that the stolen property had been sold to them as the other Indians retreated from the Howard county raid. Recognizing some of their property in the hands of the Miamis, Cooper's men began to take possession of it. Colonel Dodge com- manded that this summary method stop and that an investigation of the cir- cumstances be made. Cooper resented the interference with his men. Dodge called on his regulars to stop the settlers. Cooper, so tradition has it, drew his sword, took Dodge by the collar and said: "If you attempt to enforce that order, your head will fly off your shoulders like popcorn off a hot shovel." The Boone's Lick settlers had their own way. They claimed that the Miamis, or some of them, had participated in the raid with the Sacs and Foxes. It developed that the Miamis were innocent.
The Council at Portage des Sioux.
The government of the United States, after the acquisition of the country, made Auguste Chouteau a colonel and looked to him to help solve immediate Indian problems. Having stirred up the hostility of the tribes as a part of the campaign of 1812, the British government, under the treaty of Ghent, in 1814, imposed upon the United States the responsibility of making peace among the Indians. And the United States selected Auguste Chouteau as one of the commis- sioners to bring about a general treaty. Always influential with the Indians Colonel Chouteau achieved his greatest feat in diplomacy with the redmen at the council held at Portage des Sioux, across the Missouri River a few miles above St. Louis. He made a telling talk at that council, using with rare judgment figura- tive speech so effective with Indians. He said: "Put in your minds that as soon as the British made peace with us they left you in the middle of a prairie without shade or cover against the sun and rain. The British left you positively in the middle of a prairie, worthy of pity. But we Americans have a large umbrella which covers us against the sun and rain and we offer you, as friends, a share of it."
Auguste Chouteau was a man of pleasing countenance, light-haired, with high forehead and a straight nose, always smooth shaven and carefully dressed. At Portage des Sioux, while one of these Indian conferences was in progress. a chief, Black Buffalo of the Teton Sioux, died. This might have been interpreted as a bad omen by the Indians. The white men were disturbed over the event. But Big Elk, chief of the Omahas, averted the danger by an oration. He said :
"Do not grieve-misfortunes will happen to the wisest and best men. Death will come, and always comes out of season; it is the command of the Great Spirit, and all nations and people must obey. What is past and cannot be prevented should not be
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grieved for. Be not discouraged or displeased then, that in visiting your father here you have lost your chief. A misfortune of this kind may never again befall you, but this would have attended you perhaps at your own village. Five times have I visited this land, and never returned with sorrow or pain. Misfortunes do not flourish particularly in our path-they grow everywhere.
"What a misfortune for me that I could not have died this day, instead of the chief that lies before us. The trifling loss my nation would have sustained in my death would have been doubly paid for by the honours of my burial-they would have wiped off every- thing like regret. Instead of being covered with a cloud of sorrow-my warriors would have felt the sunshine of joy in their hearts. To me it would have been a most glorious occurrence. Hereafter, when I die at home, instead of a noble grave and a grand proces- sion, the rolling music and the thundering cannon, with a flag waving at my head, I shall be wrapped in a robe (an old robe, perhaps), and hoisted on a slender scaffold to the whistling winds, soon to be blown down to the earth-my flesh to be devoured by the wolves and my bones rattled on the plains by the wild beasts.
"Chief of the soldiers-your labors have not been in vain; your attention shall not be forgotten. My nation shall know the respect that is paid over the dead. When I return I will echo the sound of your guns."
The British Influence.
In his management of Indian affairs, General William Clark encountered and combatted influences more dangerous than the savage natures of his wards. Gen- eral Clark's jurisdiction extended over tribes anywhere west of the Mississippi river. Near the British border there were the bloody evidences of intrigue in the years when there was supposed to be complete peace between Great Britain and the United States. Benjamin O'Fallon was the United States agent for Indian affairs up the Missouri. He reported to General William Clark at St. Louis. In the sum- mer of 1823 after General Ashley and his party of fur traders had suffered severely from the attacks of the Arickarees, Captain O'Fallon sent word that General Ashley believed, from many circumstances, "The British traders (Hud- son's Bay Company) are exciting the Indians against us to drive us from that quarter." Captain O'Fallon added his own view to General Ashley's suspicions. He wrote :
"I was in hopes that the British traders had some bounds to their rapacity; I was in hopes that during the late Indian war, in which they were so instrumental in the indis- criminate massacre of our people, that they had become completely satiated with our blood, but it appears not to have been the case. Like the greedy wolf, not yet gorged with the flesh, they guard over the bones; they ravage our fields, and are unwilling that we should glean them. Although barred by the Treaty of Ghent from participating in . our Indian trade, they presumed and are not satisfied, but being alarmed at the individual enterprise of our people, they are exciting the Indians against them. They furnish them with the instruments of hell and a passport to heaven-the instruments of death and a passport to our bosoms."
Recollections of John B. Clark.
General John B. Clark in a reminiscent talk at his home in Fayette told the writer of the service against the Indians performed by the Missourians after their own homes were safe. "The troubles that Daniel Boone and Cooper and the other early settlers had around here with the Indians were pretty much over when I came to Fayette. Along in 1812 there was a good deal of fighting in this and in Boone and Cooper counties. They had forts near Fayette. But when we came in
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1818 it was pretty safe right around here. I commenced studying law in 1819 in old Judge Tompkins' office and was licensed by the supreme court in 1824 to practice. In 1823 the county seat was moved from Franklin, on the river, to Fayette, and I was appointed county clerk, I held that office for ten years. In '24 they elected me a colonel of militia, and in '27, brigadier-general. That meant service in those days. In 1832 the Black Hawk war broke out. The governor ordered me to take a regiment of mounted men and go under General Scott. We were out three months and must have had forty battles. Scott was fighting Black Hawk and his forces over in Illinois. I was ordered to keep along the west bank of the Mississippi and prevent the Iowas and other tribes from crossing over to join Black Hawk. They kept trying and we were in for a fight almost every day. That service lasted three months. I received a bullet in the foot, a wound in the head and a broken leg before I saw the end of it."
The Northwest Pivot Man.
Major Daniel Ashby pushed the frontier line beyond the Boone's Lick country. He came in 1818; and when he raised his cabin on the bluffs of the Chariton, "there was no white man between him and the Rocky Mountains on the west, and there was none between him and the Lake of the Woods on the north." He called himself "the northwest pivot man of the settlements of the United States."
The Ashbys were of Virginia, moving to Kentucky and settling on Salt river, near Harrodsburg. True to the family form for pioneering, Daniel Ashby, when he had married Casander Leeper and tested his nerves by acting as sheriff of Hopkins county, moved westward. He brought with him a group of adventurous spirits including Pleasant Browder, James Leeper, Thomas Shumate and Abraham Sportsman. As capital for his venture in Missouri Ashby drove along 375 stock hogs. His first enterprising effort was to learn the Indian language. In a few weeks he was able to talk to the Iowas. He became an Indian trader. Duff Green, the Chariton and Franklin merchant, supplied the goods. Ashby did the trading and divided the profits with Green. For five years this trading went on. And then Ashby became the man of acknowledged influence with the Indians and leadership among the settlers on the Chariton border. Of some of his adventures with the Indians in the twenties, Major Ashby left this narrative which is in the possession of Perry S. Rader :
"The Indians in the country were generally friendly, but we would occasionally have difficulties with them, often arising from misconduct of the whites, who would trade them whiskey or cause trouble by cheating them in some way. An Indian will steal; they even celebrate the act as one of bravery. I have been at their celebrations or festi- vals. They set up a pole with snags on it to hang things on. Around this they clear off the brush or grass forming a ring, about which they dance, sing and beat their little " drums with one stick; one fellow will come in and hang on the pole, for instance, a bear skin, and if there is any brave there who thinks he is a better bear hunter than the one who hung up the skin he will take it down. Then the crowd or referees make inquiry as to which has achieved the greatest exploits in hunting, capturing and killing the bear. Then the evidence of the other Indians is taken, and the one in whose favor the contro- versy is decided again hangs up the skin.
"Then they dance round the pole and beat their drums, singing in celebration of the lucky brave who has been decided the greatest bear hunter of the tribe or nation. Just so with stealing. One will come in and hang a bridle on the pole, and if no one disputes
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his rights he is praised and conceded to be the greatest horse thief of the tribe. And so on with the most trivial articles. The squaws take no part in the dances, but sit around and look on smiling, but are not allowed to laugh aloud. If a squaw happens to laugh aloud at any of the performances she has to leave the ring and is not allowed to return during the festival. They generally conclude their ceremonies and exercises by some man bringing in a boy pappoose, when the mother is permitted to join in the jollification, and a great one it is. When present, as I often was, I was always invited to participate with them, and in some instances I have done so. On one occasion I hung on the center pole a large buck skin, meaning to claim that I was the best deer hunter.
The Laws of the Iowas.
"They had some kind of laws between themselves, which they enforced. On one occasion there was a party of Indians hunting in the settlements of the whites, and being scarce of meat, killed a hog. The owner went to the agent who was with the Indians, and made complaint about his hog. He called the chiefs together, and they, sitting as a court, heard the evidence and decided that each one of the party participating in the offence should receive forty stripes with a good- switch, to be administered by White Cloud, a very large chief. While the culprits were having the punishment adjudged inflicted on them, the agent went to the scene of the whipping and just as he got there Wynoneway hauled off his blanket and took his seat, and hugged the sapling to receive his forty lashes. Now Wynoneway, or in English, 'Turkey,' was known to be the best Indian in the nation and was not one of the party that stole the hog, and in reality was one of the best men of the nation. On seeing this the agent told them to hold on and asked what Wynoneway had done that they were going to whip or 'hiwassey' him, for so whipping is called in the Iowa tongue. They explained that some years before a man had died, leaving a boy whom he requested Wynoneway to raise for him. The boy had been with the guilty parties and being too small to whip, Wynoneway was going to receive it in his stead, and when the boy got large enough, then Wynoneway would give it to him. The agent told Wynoneway to get up and put on his blanket, that it was not necessary for him to receive the lashes, but to remember it and deal with the boy as he thought right hereafter.
Major Ashby's Foot Race with a Chief.
"Those Indians were very ambitious, wishing to excel all others in anything they did. In shooting with a rifle, running foot races and similar sports they especially ex- celled. It was not until I had won several packs of skins from them that they were will- ing to admit my superiority as a marksman. Whenever an Indian does anything of this kind, or has any kind of a contest, he invariably bets something, if no more than a pipe, blanket, skins or pony. They cannot do without betting; nevertheless, if they stake any- thing on the result of a contest and are beaten, they will give up honorably. After I had beaten many of them running I went to Mr. Robidoux's trading house for the pur- pose of getting some of my neighbors' horses that had been stolen by the Indians. While there I observed a large, fine looking chief examining me very closely, and after a while an acquaintance named Jim came to me and told me that the big chief Watchemoney, wanted to run a race with me; that some of the men had been telling him that I was the muckeman that had beaten so many of the Iowas running races. I told Jim to tell the chief that I would run with him. We prepared for the race; Watchemoney put up a very fine, large pipe, beautifully ornamented with beads, porcupine quills and feathers. I put up a bridle with plated hits and buckles. We ran, and, as I had anticipated, I won the fine pipe. I took it, loaded it up and began smoking. After smoking awhile I got ready to leave, when I went up to the chief, gave him back his pipe, shook hands with him and left. I saw a great change come over the chief's countenance when I gave him the pipe. He shook my hand very cordially and exclaimed, 'Good muckeman.'
"Muckeman Run Like a Muncha."
"There was an Indian who came in with a large party, who, as I ascertained from 'Iowa Jim,' had come expressly to beat me running. So we put up a pack of skins worth
THE TOWN CRIER
Scene at Third and Plum Streets. Lost child advertised. The crier carried circulars, rang his bell to attract attention and made announcements. A St. Louis custom about 1840. From a painting by Matt. Hastings in the Missouri Historical Society collection.
Vol. 1-32
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about ten dollars and ran one hundred yards. I beat him some fifteen feet. The crowd of Indians who had come with him jumped up and down, hallooed and made all kinds of rejoicing. I was surprised at these demonstrations, as the Indian I beat I supposed was a member of their tribe; but Jim told me he was an Ottoe Indian that had been amongst the Iowas, and on returning to their grounds they told him there was a muckeman (white man) that had beaten all the fast Iowas. The Ottoe bragged and said he could beat all the muckemen, and kept up this boasting during the entire trip down; he would show by his hands how the race would be, always making the hand representing himself beat a long distance. His defeat appeared to do the Iowas more good than it did me.
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