USA > New York > Erie County > Buffalo > Address on the early reminiscences of western New York and lake region of country : delivered before the Young Men's Association of Buffalo, February 16, 1848 > Part 2
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After the events of 1759, the English abandoned the oldl French military works, and constructed another where the
. present cluster of buildings stands at the end of the road leading to Lewiston. The large chimney around which a small building is erected, belonged to the English mess-house,
* Phineas Stanton, a gallant soldier, then an Ensign in the militia, had command of the fatigue party; he was afterwards a Major in General Porter's Volunteers, and taken prisoner in the battle of Lundy's Lane, July 25th, 1814; and died a few years ago at his residence in Wyoming County, a Major General in the militia.
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as it was called, it was a large inconvenient structure, very high between joints ; the frame of this building was prepared at Fort Niagara, while in possession of the French, for a Catholic church at that place, the English hauled it over to Schlosser and put it up there. This was the residence of Judge Porter for several years after he removed to the Niagara frontier, and was burned down by the British when they invaded the country in December, 1813.
The English built a saw-mill at the Falls, removed the place of landing used by the French to a short distance above their new fort at Schlosser, where the water was deeper and access to it easier. They then opened the present road from Schlosser to the forks, before spoken of, where it intersected the olel French road. From that place to Lewiston, the course of the road has been very much altered and straightened since that time.
Some remains of the old French works can yet be seen in the old field near the bank of the river, but they have been ploughed over and levelled so much that but little remains of them. In this old field was a grave surrounded by pickets, for many years, said to be the grave of Captain Schlosser : all appearances of it are now gone. About one mile from the river on the new road opened by the English, they erected a stockade, the remains of which can now be seen. Some remains of the pickets of the old French stockade, built many years before this English one, were discovered on digging into the ground for the construction of Fort Grey.
The French in building their railway from the ferry at Lewiston to the brow of the mountain, it appears, did not level the ground where it was too high or fill up the hollows, as is now done in constructing similar works. Where the ground was level, hewn timber with a rabbet or shoulder projecting upwards from the outward edges, similar to log B
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railways in saw mills, connected with cross pieces, were laid upon and rested firmly on stones laid under them; in passing over hollows, instead of filling them up, stone pediments were built up to the proper level and the timber ways laid on them, and in this manner was carried to its completion. The power made use of for raising the cars was capstans or windlasses. When a boy, hunting squirrels and other game, I have often traced the line of this railway, where could be seen distinctly the timber lying, decayed to be sure, but for many rods in continuation, and the stone pediments were yet in many places quite perfect. Not having been over the ground for more than thirty years, I cannot say whether any vestiges of the line can now be seen or not.
Following up the bloody incidents which took place on this river, it is proper I should mention one which may be ranked amongst the most bloody, malicious and revengeful, it falls to the pen to record. This occurred.in the year 1763, several years after the French power and possessions in this country had been wrested from them. The same year that the Great Pontiac, who was always friendly to the French, made his powerful effort to drive the English from their newly acquired possessions in the upper or western country.
It is well known that for several years after the French had been dispossessed by the English, the strong influence and sympathy which they had succeeded in fixing upon the minds of the Indians in their favor, remained in full force, and they felt nowise disposed to be very friendly to the English. Although the French power had been destroyed and their troops withdrawn from the country, many Frenchmen remained and mingled with the Indians and kept alive the strong feeling and sympathy which they had succeeded in securing to such an eminent degree. This hatred to the English and strong attachment to the French was soon destined to be
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exhibited for no other purpose, it would appear, than the mere gratification of a desire for blood and plunder, and to manifest their hostile and revengeful spirit to the new comers.
The English on taking possession of the French works on this frontier, kept soldiers in the fort at Niagara, at the landing at Lewiston, Schlosser, and in the several stockades which they built along the portage road. They seemed to be fully aware of the hatred which the Indians entertained for them; and doubtless took every conciliatory means in their power to win their friendship, as well as taking every military precaution to prevent any injury resulting to them from the ill will of the Indians.
In transporting their supplies from the lower lake to their possessions in the upper country, teams of wagons drawn by horses and oxen, went in squads or caravans over the portage, accompanied with strong guards of soldiers. This practice was continued for several years, and from the extraordinary vigilance and precaution taken, and perhaps at the same time the mistaken idea entered into the minds of the English, that, by their vigilant as well as conciliatory course towards the Indians their strong feelings in favor of the French had begun to give way, and was turning in their favor, and that in future they were to apprehend no danger from them. In this they were soon to be undeceived. They were yet to learn, alas ! too fatally, that the Indians and French bided their time for revenge. Reposing in this false opinion, the English became less cautious and watchful, their teams and property con- tinued to pass the portage, but were guarded with less care.
The French who remained with the Indians, observing the careless and unsuspecting manner in which the English were conducting themselves, and the false security into which they
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had been lulled, awoke in the minds of the Indians a revival of the former good feeling between them, and suggested that the long wished for opportunity had now arrived, for taking revenge on their common enemies, the English. A scheme was soon planned, by which the Indians and French should waylay and destroy the teams and their guards when passing over the portage. Accordingly the Indians on the Buffalo Reservation, Genesee Flats, and other places, with the French amongst them, raised a force of several hundreds, and, unob- served by the English, passed through the woods to, and assembled at the place on the Niagara River, known as the Devil's Hole.
At this place they hid themselves amongst the trees and bushes and behind a ridge of land a little interior from the bank of the river, and lay in wait for the convoy of teams coming up from Lewiston. The morning of that fatal day, said to be the 24th of June, a large number of teams with their attendants, accompanied with a small guard of soldiers, the whole company numbering something less than one hundred persons, started from the landing at Lewiston for Schlosser, under the direction of William Stedman, who resided at Fort Schlosser, and was the superintendent or contractor for conducting the transportation business.
Approaching the Devil's Hole, from Lewiston, about half a mile before reaching it, the road descends a smart hill and runs upon a flat piece of ground of no very great width. The widest part is near where you first come upon it; it continues to narrow as you follow on, until opposite the Devil's Hole, it narrows to that degree as to leave only room enough for a wagon road to pass over a small spur of the ridge which bounds the eastern side of the flat; passing this spur you again enter another and smaller flat spot of ground through which runs a small brook, which, running a few rods, falls
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into the Devil's Hole. Such was the place selected for the accomplishment of the bloody tragedy which was so soon to take place.
The day was beautiful; the sun shone out in splendor- the birds were singing from the trees,-and all nature seemed reposing in serenity and peace- the lazy teams were plodding along carelessly-the guards were scattered, a perfect unconsciousness of danger having seized upon all-the whole party had descended into the first piece of flat ground, many had passed the spur of the ridge into the second, and crossed the small brook-when the sudden and appalling war whoop of the Indians pealed upon their ears from the woods around them, followed by a sudden rush of the Indians and French, and immediately an indiscriminate slaughter of men and animals and destruction of property took place.
It is said, so fiendish was the desire for spilling of blood, both of men and animals, that the water of the brook became discolored with it, and from this cause acquired, and yet retains the name of the "bloody run." The persons of the English party were sadly mutilated, and then thrown down the steep banks into the hole, as were such of the horses and oxen as had been killed, and likewise the wagons and much of the property.
Many years subsequent, after I had come to Lewiston, and previous to the war of 1812, with England, a man, whose name I now forget, passing over this flat, either with or soon after a wagon had gone along, which in its progress had run against and overturned the remnants of an old stump, he discovered something that drew his attention. And on making an examination he found a quantity of leaden balls; he gathered up some forty or fifty pounds and brought them to my father's house, who purchased them. Many is the squirrel and other game I have killed in my younger days, with these
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balls, shot from an old German yager rifle ; which a gentleman who was stopping a few days at Lewiston, and to whom I had done some boyish favor, such as going hunting with him, securing and carrying his game, and observing my fondness for shooting, gave to me.
Of the whole English party but two escaped. One was a drummer boy, who was either thrown, or jumped down the bank into a tree top: his drum straps caught in the branches and arrested his fall ; he extricated himself from his perilous position, descended the tree, traversed the bottom of the hole, chasm or dell to its open side on the river, from whence and under cover of the river bank, he crept back to the landing at Lewiston. This man, Matthews was his name, was alive when- I came to Lewiston, and resided near Captain Isaac Swazy's, an old New Jersey tory, on the bank of the river, about two miles from the present village of Niagara, in Canada; and followed the business of making split bottom chairs. Mr. Joshua Fairbanks, now living at Lewiston, established himself at Chippawa, in Canada, in 1793, and was well acquainted with Matthews, for many years.
If I had not the positive evidence I have, that this man Matthews, who escaped from the massacre in 1763, was alive in 1807, the fact is not at all improbable nor anywise likely to be untrue. I well remember an old gentleman, Major Maxwell, (the brother of Colonel Hugh Maxwell, who served through the Revolutionary war, who came into western New- York in 1788 or 1789 as a surveyor in the employ of Mr. Phelps) about seventy years of age, a very intimate friend of General James Miller, who distinguished himself by his charge on the British cannon at Lundy's Lane, near the Falls, on the 25th of July 1814.
This Major Maxwell when quite a young man, was in the battle of Bloody Bridge, near Detroit, in July 1763, the time
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Pontiac was besieging that place. This old gentleman at the time I knew him was hale and hearty, and was employed in our army as an assistant wagon or forage master in 1814; and while the army was in Canada that summer, he went into the country to procure forage, and was captured by the British. After the war, I understood he returned Michigan, and has been dead many years.
The other person, William Stedman, who was fortunate in making his escape, and the manner in which he effected it, is .thus related : Being mounted on a very fleet mare, the bridle reins were seized by one or two Indians, and forced out of his hands, they intending to push him and his horse over the bank into the hole. One story says he took out his knife and cut the reins, another, that he cut the throat-latch and slipped the bridle from the animal's head, immediately clapped his spurs into his mare's sides, and under a shower of rifle balls from the Indians, struck off directly into the woods an easterly course, at a right angle with the river, and continued on until he came to a small stream called Gill creek. He then followed the course of this creek to where it discharges into the Niagara river about a mile above Fort Schlosser, and soon reached that place in safety.
Stedman afterwards went to England and died. Some time after his death, persons in this country, pretending to be his agents, laid claim to the whole district of country, from the Devil's Hole at the spot where he began his retreat from the massacre, taking his route through the woods to Gill creek, down the creek to the river, then following the course of the river to the place of starting, embracing the Falls and all the water power on the American side, It was pretended the Indians gave him this property, and that the gift was ratified by the British Government before the Revolution.
The reason assigned for this extraordinary gift, was, his
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miraculous escape from a slaughter, in which it was supposed all his companions had become victims. That the Indians struck with such a remarkable intervention of the Great Spirit in his behalf, it was a clear indication to them that he was a highly favored being. That the Great Spirit in thus saving his life, and the extraordinary route he took in making his escape, made it manifest to their minds that the land thus encompassed by him was to be his, and accordingly gave it to him. For many years, and even down to quite a recent period this claim has been asserted, and great efforts have been made to have it established.
The appearance of the Devil's Hole has altered very much within the last forty years. Then it was a very deep chasm near the bottom of which a fine cool spring issued. I have several times descended to that spring. There was a tall cedar tree which grew out of the loose stones towards the bottom, it was very straight and close along side, and nearly reached the top of the bank. We used to creep down the bank and get into the top of this tree, and using the limbs, descend it like a ladder to its roots, then clamber still farther down over the loose rocks to the spring, keeping a sharp watch all the time against rattlesnakes, as there were a great many then in and about the rocks and loose stones. Pieces of old iron and parts of wagon hubs were often found near the bottom. In later days a saw mill has been built on " bloody run," near the hole, and in constructing the heavy stone wall around fort Niagara, since the last war, the large stones for it were taken from a quarry opened on the highest part of the bank around the hole. From this quarry large quantities of small stones, dirt, and other rubbish have been thrown down, the spring has been covered up, and the depth of the hole or chasm much reduced.
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I have endeavored to trace the age of the large stone building called the mess house, in Fort Niagara. I remember hearing it said soon after I came to Lewiston, that it was not far from a hundred years old; and also recollect there was a stone in the front part with the year in which it was built cut into it. I wrote a letter to Sergeant Leffman, who has charge of the post, to copy the date on the stone and send it to me. He writes that he has examined every part of the building but cannot find it, he says some old people about there tell him the date was 1725, which tallies well with the earliest accounts I had of its age. The building has been frequently whitewashed, and was much battered by shot during the last war, and the stone has probably been covered up or destroyed.
When I first came on to this frontier, traditionary stories . were plenty in regard to scenes and events that had taken place on the banks of the Niagara river for a century previous. As I was young at that time, their recital only created an interest with me while they were being related. I did not fix them firmly in my mind and they are lost to me forever.
Nothing of a very remarkable character from the time of the massacre at the Devil's Hole occurred on this frontier, until after the commencement of the American revolution. Previous to which and subsequent to their obtaining possession of the country, the English had been very assiduous in their efforts to secure the confidence and good will of the Indians. Being at that time the only European power on this part of the continent, the Indians having none other to tamper with? gradually acquiesced in the government of the English. At length a strong friendship was established between them, and the Indians were ready and willing to do any thing that might be required of them. During the continuance of the revo- lutionary war, the influence which the English had over the
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Indians, was the cause of much unnecessary blood-shed and suffering to the American frontier settlements of New York, Pennsylvania and Virginia. And subsequent to the close of the revolution in 1783, for many years, its effects were sensibly felt in the blood that was shed along the Ohio river, and in the now State of Kentucky.
Fort Niagara was a central and prominent point from which plans were laid, supplies furnished and expeditions started, to murder, devastate, and lay waste the country as far as possible. Minnisink in Orange County, Schoharie, Cherry Valley, the settlements on the Mohawk river, and other places in this State, and Wyoming in Pennsylvania, witnessed the power and clemency of the English, through their accredited agents, the Indian expeditions headed by British officers, from this post.
It became necessary for Congress to arrest these alarming and destructive expeditions : accordingly a large army under the command of General Sullivan, was sent into Western New York in the summer of 1779, to chastise the Indians, destroy their towns and means of subsistence. General Sullivan marched from Wyoming, in Pennsylvania, in July, to Tioga Point, in this State. Here he was joined by another large force on the 22d of August, headed by Gen. James Clinton, who came by the way of Cooperstown. The army then commenced its march up the Tioga river, and on the 29th of August, came to battle at Newtown, (now Elinira) with the combined forces of English and Indians, who had assembled and fortified themselves strongly at that place, in the hope of arresting its farther progress. A severe and decisive battle took place, in which the Indians and their allies were defeated -the loss on the part of General Sullivan was small, and that of the Indians could never be fully ascertained. But so severely had this day's work impressed the minds of the Indians with their utter inability of contending against General
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Sullivan, that they never afterwards attempted to meet his army, although some skirmishing did take place with small parties.
Sullivan followed up his victory by moving forward into the country, destroying on his march the Indian settlement of Catharine Town, (named after an Indian Queen called Catha- rine) and others around the heads of the Cayuga and Seneca lakes. Continuing his route, he passed down between these lakes, and crossing the outlet at the Northern end of the Seneca lake, near where Geneva now stands, encamped his army at a place known as the Indian Castle, nearly two miles a little North of West from Geneva. From this point he sent out smaller expeditions and destroyed all the Indian settle- ments in that vicinity. On the 9th of September, a detach- ment of riflemen was sent up the West side of the Seneca lake to Cashong creek, the place of my nativity, distant seven miles from Geneva. At this place was a large Indian settle- ment, with extensive fields of corn growing, and great numbers of apple trees. The wigwams and corn were entirely des- troyed, as was every other eatable substance and creature that could be found ; large numbers of the apple trees were cut down, but many were left standing and uninjured.
The site of this Indian town, and about seven hundred acres of land in one body, my father, when about eighteen or nineteen year's of age, purchased not many years after Sul- livan's destruction of the Town, from a Frenchman of the name of Poudre,' who had married a squaw-for which the Indians gave him the land. In payment for this land he gave all the money and property he had, even to part of the clothing he had on his person. This purchase and sale was subsequently ratified by the State, and he was confirmed in the quiet possession. He met with great opposition in getting the purchase ratified. The great kindness and essential aid
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rendered to him by Gov. George Clinton in this matter, he always remembered and spoke of most gratefully.
From the Indian Castle the army moved west and came as far as the flats at the head of Conesus lake, where it encam- ped. From this place a small detachment was sent forward during the night under the command of Lieutenant Boyd, with an Oneida Indian as a guide, to reconnoitre and obtain information. This party found the Indian village on the east side of the Genesee river, deserted by the Indians, they having retired to Little Beard's town on the opposite side. The party found two Indians, one they killed, and the other made his escape ; and being unable to obtain all the information they sought, commenced their return march to the main camp. On their way back, and when within one or two miles of the camp, they were intercepted by a superior Indian force, and a severe and sanguinary fight ensued. Lieutenant Boyd and private Parker were taken prisoners, and nearly his whole party destroyed.
The prisoners were taken by the Indians to Little Beard's town and delivered over to Brandt, who was a Free Mason, and Boyd being one, he made an appeal to Brandt in a man- ner understood by the fraternity, and Brandt promised to save his life. Brandt being obliged to go away on some pressing business he placed the prisoners in charge of Col. Butler, an English officer. Butler made enquiries of him as to the number, situation and intentions of Sullivan's army, and upon Boyd's refusing to give him the information required, Butler delivered the prisoner over to the Indians, who subjected the Lieutenant to great torture. After tying him to a sapling, they made an opening in his abdomen, and taking out one of his intestines which they made fast to the sapling, they untied him and drove him round, until the whole of his intes- tines were drawn out, and finally put him to death by cutting
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his head off. Parker did not undergo the tortures applied to Boyd, but his head was likewise cut off. In 1841, some citizens of Rochester, and others along the Genesee river, removed the remains of Lt. Boyd and his companions from the place where they were first interred, and deposited them in the Cemetery of Mount Hope, near Rochester.
Sullivan, with his army, passed on to the Genesee River, and crossed over. The Indians made no attempt to defend their place, Little Beardstown, but fled and left it altogether unprotected. He sent out detachments up and down the river, and in all directions where Indian settlements werc. All the buildings were destroyed, the corn cut up, some burned and some thrown into the river; all the hogs, horses and cattle found were killed, fruit trees cut down, and every thing that could afford sustenance to a human being was destroyed. So complete was the desolation, that Mrs. Jemi- son, in the published account of her life, says, there was not a mouthful of any kind of sustenance left, not even enough to keep a child one day from perishing with hunger. A most severe winter followed; the ground was covered with snow to the depth of four or five feet; and many of the Indians died from cold and starvation, as also did much of the game in the woods.
Sullivan did not come on to the Buffalo Reservation, but returned from the Genesee River upon the same route he came into the country. On reaching a place near the south end of the Seneca Lake, since known as the "Horse Heads," many of the horses used by the army, suffering for want of forage, (everything of the kind being destroyed on his outward march,) became worn out, diseased, and unfit to travel. A great many were shot at this place ; and in after years, when settlers began to come through that route, the number of horse heads found gave a name to the place.
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