History of Belmont and Jefferson Counties, Ohio, and incidentially historical collection pertaining to border warfare and the early settlement of the adjacent portion of the Ohio Valley, Part 26

Author: Caldwell, J. A. (John Alexander) 1n; Newton, J. H., ed; Ohio Genealogical Society. 1n
Publication date: 1880
Publisher: Wheeling, W. Va. : Historical Pub. Co.
Number of Pages: 728

USA > Ohio > Jefferson County > History of Belmont and Jefferson Counties, Ohio, and incidentially historical collection pertaining to border warfare and the early settlement of the adjacent portion of the Ohio Valley > Part 26
USA > Ohio > Belmont County > History of Belmont and Jefferson Counties, Ohio, and incidentially historical collection pertaining to border warfare and the early settlement of the adjacent portion of the Ohio Valley > Part 26

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HISTORY OF BELMONT AND JEFFERSON COUNTIES, OHIO.

purpose of holding a conference with them and avoid a war. In a few days a number of chiefs arrived, among whom were rep- resentatives of the Six Nations, Delawares, Shawanese, and other nations. After condoling with them, strenuous efforts were made to reconcile them to the wrongs that had been committed against them, and a general desire was expressed by the chiefs in attendance for the continuance of peace. But the confer- ence failed to accomplish the desired object with the savages in consequence of the influence of Logan. His wrath was kindled to such a degree that he could not be appeased with words. He must avenge the loss of his kindred, and could not be changed from his purpose.

After the Indian outbreak became imminent, preparation was immediately made by Virginia to raise an army, and an advance force was to be sent as quickly as possible from Wheel- ing to strike the Indian towns before the tribes could concen- trate in great numbers for offensive hostilities. But before this force could be raised small parties of the savages appeared along the frontier at various points and applied the tomahawk, the scalping knife, and the torch with relentless fury. One of the first of these bands which penetrated and struck terror into Northwestern Virginia was a party of eight Indians led by Logan. At the head of this party he traversed the country from the Ohio to the West Fork before an opportunity is said to have afforded him any great achievement of mischief. On account of their distance from what was supposed would be the theatre of war, the inhabitants of that section felt completely secure, and seemed to possess little apprehension for their safety. Relying on the expectation that the first blow would be struck on the Ohio, and that they would have sufficient notice of this to prepare for their own security before danger could reach them, many had continued to perform the ordinary work of their farms without interruption.

But terrible was the alarm when the first blow was struck by the enraged Logan and his savage followers. A reference is made to the first depredations by the Indians in the subjoined

LETTER OF WILLIAM CRAWFORD TO GEORGE WASHINGTON. "SPRING GARDEN, June 8, 1774.

"DEAR SIR: I received your letter by Mr. Christy dated 27th of May, and I am sorry you seem to be in confusion as well as us, as that renders our case more deplorable. Saturday last we had six persons killed on Dunkard's creek, about ten miles from the mouth of Cheat river, on the west side of the Monon- gahela, and there are three missing. On Sunday a man who left a party is supposed to be killed, as he went off to hunt somne horses, and five guns were heard go off. The horse he rode away returned to the house where the party was. They set out in search of enemies, found the man's coat, and saw a number of tracks, but could not find the man. Our whole country is in forts, what is left; but the major part is gone over the mountain. With much ado I have prevailed on about a dozen of families to join me in building a fort over against my house, which has been accomplished with much difficulty and a considerable expense to me. Valentine Crawford has built another at the same rate.

"It was with great difficulty any could be prevailed upon to stay, such was the panic that seized the people. If something is not done, I am much afraid the whole country must fall into the hands of the enemy. The Delawares seem to be on our side as yet, but on them there is not much dependence. I believe an Indian war is unavoidable. I have been on a scout- ing party as low as Grave creek since Mr. Johnston went down to Williamsburg, but could see no signs of any parties. How- ever, as soon as I returned, a party crossed the river that did that mischief. Fort Pitt is blockaded, and the inhabitants of the town are about picketing it in. They have about one hun- dred men fit for arms in town and fort, which I do not think sufficient to protect those places."

Valentine Crawford also wrote Washington on the 8th of June, from Jacob's creek, from which we make the following extract relative to Indian depredations that had just been committed :

"On Sunday evening, about four miles over Monongahela, the Indians murdered one family, consisting of six, and took two boys prisoners. At another place they killed three, which makes, in the whole, nine and two prisoners. If we had not had forts built there would not have been ten families left this side of the mountains besides what are at Fort Pitt. We have sent out scouts after the murderers, but we have not heard that they have fallen in with them yet. We have at this time at least three hundred men out after the Indians, some of whom

have gone down to Wheeling, and I believe some have gone down as low as the Little Kanawha. I am in hopes they will give the savages a storm, for some of the scouting company say they will go to their towns but they will get scalps."

On the same day Valentinc Crawford again wrote Washing- ton as follows :

"JACOB'S CREEK, June 8, 1774.

"DEAR SIR :- Since I just wrote you, an account of several parties of Indians being among the inhabitants has reached us. Yesterday they killed and scalped one man in sight of the fort on the Monongahela-one of the inmates. There were two men sworn that they yesterday saw thirty Indians. These men met about thirty of the scouts some five miles from the place where the savages were seen. The scouts immediately pursued them, but we have not heard further of them. The party that murdered the family, about which I wrote you in my other letter, was followed by a young man that Connelly appointed a lieutenant, with a party of about thirty men. They overtook the Indians, released some prisoners, and recovered sixteen horses and a good deal of plunder the savages had taken from people's houses, but they killed no Indians.

"There have been several parties of savages seen within these two or three days, and all seem to be making toward the Laurel hill, or mountain. For that reason the people are afraid to travel the road by Gist's, but go a nigh way by Indian creek, or ride in the night .* My brother and I have concluded to take all your men and servants into pay as militia, and keep our ground until. we can get help from below.f Your letter, which I have shown to several people, has been of infinite ser- vice to us, as it encourages many people to stand their ground in hopes of relief-from what you wrote. But there is one un- happy circumstance : our country is very scarce of ammuni- tion and arms. I have, therefore, taken the liberty to write to you to get me two quarter-hundred casks of powder and send them as far as Ball's Run to my mother's,¿ or Colonel Samuel Washington's or Keyes' ferry, where I can get them up here by pack-horses. I want no lead, as we have plenty."

The depredations referred to in the foregoing letters were the work of a party of savages headed by Logan. With a party of Mingoes and Shawanese from Wakatomica, an Indian town on the Muskingum, near the present town of Dresden, Ohio, Logan at this time was attacking the settlements on Ten-mile, Dunkard, Whitely and Muddy creeks-western tributaries of the Monongahela, in what was then considered by them as Vir- ginia territory. Up to the last of June, 1774, they had taken sixteen scalps in all-when the wrath of Logan, for the killing of his relatives, was somewhat appeased, but he soon appeared again upon the war-path.

In a letter from Arthur St. Clair to Governor John Penn, of Pennsylvania, dated June 22, 1774, (see vol iv. Penn Archives) is the following post-script : " Logan is returned with thirteen scalps and a prisoner, and says he will now listen to the chiefs."

A letter from Ænas Mackay to Joseph Shippen, dated July 8, 1774, (see Penn Archives, vol. iv. p. 541) contains the follow- ing : " We have no room to doubt that Dr. Connelly, by order of Lord Dunmore, sent.a speech to the Shawanese, importing that Logan and his party be immediately delivered up, with the three prisoners that he had taken."

"On the 12th day of July,S as William Robinson, Thomas Hellen and Coleman Brown were pulling flax in a field opposite the mouth of Simpson's creek, Logan and his party|| approached unperceived and fired at them. Brown fell instantly ; his body perforated by several balls, and Hellen and Robinson unscath- ed, sought safety in flight. Hellen being then an old man, was soon overtaken and made captive ; but Robinson, with the elasticity of youth, ran a considerable distance before he was overtaken ; and but for an untoward accident might have effected an escape. Believing that he was outstripping his pursuers, and anxious to ascertain the fact, he looked over his

"The " road by Gist's " was the thoroughfare well known as " Braddock's road," the road generally traveled by Virginians in going over the mountains. It ran south from Jacob's creek, crossing the Youghiogheny nt the home of William Crawford ; thenee " by Gist's," the Great Meadows, and so on, along the line nearly of the present National road, to the north branch of the Potomac. The route by Indian creek did not cross the Youghiogheny at Stewart's crossings, but continued nlong on the north side of that river.

+" From below ; " that is, " from east of the mountains, in Virginia."

#The mother of William and Valentine Crawford had long been a widow. Her maiden name was Onora Grimes. Crawford, her first husband, died when the two boys were young. She then married Richard Stephenson. Five sons and one daughter were born of the second marriage, when the second husband died. The mother, in her prime, wasa woman of un- common energy and great physical strength, yet kind in disposition and very attentive to her children. She died in 1776.

¿Withers.

"These were Mingoes.

HISTORY OF BELMONT AND JEFFERSON COUNTIES, OHIO.

shoulder, but before he discovered the Indian giving chase, he ran with such violence against a tree, that he fell, stunned by the shock and lay powerless and insensible. In this situation he was secured with a eord; and when he revived, was taken back to the place where the Indians had Hellen in confine- ment, and where lay the lifeless body of Brown. They then set off to their towns, taking with them a horse which belonged to Hellen.

"When they had approached near enough to be distinctly heard, Logan (as is usual with them after a successful scout) gave the scalp halloo, and several warriors came out to meet them, and conducted the prisoners into the village. Here they passed through the accustomed ceremony of running the gaunt- let, but with far different fortunes. Robinson, having been previously instructed by Logan (who from the time he made him his prisoner, manifested a kindly feeling towards him), made his way, with but little interruption, to the council house ; but poor Helien, from the decrepitude of age, and his ignorance of the fact that it was a place of refuge, was sadly beaten be- fore he arrived at it; and when he at length came near enough, he was knocked down with a war club before he could enter. After he had fallen they continued to beat and strike him with such unmerciful severity, that he would assuredly have fallen a victim to their barbarous usage, but that Robinson (at some peril for the interference) reached forth his hand and drew him within the sanctuary. When he had, however, recovered from the effects of the violent beating which he had received, he was relieved from the apprehension of further suffering by being adopted into an Indian family.

A council was convoked to determine the fate of Robinson. A description of what occurred will be found in Robinson's statement, taken from Jefferson's Notes on Virginia, given in another part of this chapter.

The place where Logan struck the first blow on the west fork of the Monongahela, was then called West Augusta county, and, as related by Withers, was a part of the country where no one expected to see an enemy. He had left the settlenients on the Ohio river undisturbed, notwithstanding every one had ex- pected that they would be the first to feel the burden of war, and he had gone, instead, where no one expected him, where no one was prepared to receive him, and where his blows would be most keenly felt and most disastrous.

Robinson in his statement concerning his capture of himself and Hellen says: "The principal Indian of the party which took them was Capt. Logan, who soon manifested a friendly disposi- tion to this subscriber (Robinson), and told him to be of good heart; that he would not be killed, but must go with him to his town, where he would probably be adopted in one of their fami- lies; that when he had been condemned and tied to a stake to be burned, Logan saved him, tied a belt of wampum around him as a mark of adoption, loosed him from the post, and carried him to the cabin of an old squaw, where Logan pointed out a person who, he said, was this subscriber's cousin, and he after- wards understood that the old woman was his aunt, and the two others his brothers, and he now stood in the place of a warrior of the family who had been slain at Yellow creek."

The meaning of this is that he doubtless stood in the place of Logan's brother, who fell in the massacre at that place.

As will be scen by Robinson's statement, Logan got him to write a letter, (the ink for which was made of gunpowder) which the chief stated he meant to carry and leave in some house where he should kill somebody. Robinson says he signed the letter with Logan's name, and that the latter then took the letter "and set out again to war."

It is a curious circumstance that on the 2d of March, 1799, nearly twenty-five years after that letter was written, Judge Harry Innes, of Frankfort, Kentucky, transmitted to Mr. Jef- ferson a letter in which appeared the following paragraph :

"In 1774, I lived in Fincastle county, now divided into Washington, Montgomery, and part of Wythe. Being intimate in Colonel Prescott's family, I happened, in July, to be at his house, when an express was sent to him, as the County Lieu- tenant, requesting a guard of the militia to be ordered out for the protection of the inhabitants residing low down on the north fork of Holston river.

" The express brought with him a war-club and a note which was left tied to it, at the house of one Robertson* (whose family was cut off by the Indians, and gave rise to the application to Colonel Prescott), of which the following is a copy, then taken by me in my memorandum book :

"'CAPTAIN CRESAP-What did you kill my people on Yellow creek for ? The white people killed my kin at Conestoga a great while ago, and I thought nothing of that. But you killed my kin again on Yellow creek, and took niy eousin prisoner. Then I thought that I must kill, too ; I have been three times to war sinee ; but the Indians are not angry-only myself.

" CAPTAIN' JOHN LOGAN."

"July 21, 1774."

It will be seen how completely William Robinson's testimony was confirmed by Judge Innes' communication to Mr. Jefferson ; and it will be seen also that Logan was prosecuting hostilities against the whites on his individual account, without connee- tion with others, either of his own or any other tribe.

But from all the evidence presented in this chapter in the discussion of the Captain's connection with the murders at Yellow creek, the reader will, we think, conclude that the weight of testimony goes to show that Logan was mistaken in making the charge against Cresap.

As we have already stated, the settlers along the frontier, before the actual opening of hostilities, sent an express to Wil- liamsburg, the then seat of government of Virginia, communi- cating intelligence of the uneasiness of the Indians, and of the evident certainty of the commencement of an Indian war at an early day, and appealing for protection.

The General Assembly was in session when the express from the western frontier reached Williamsburg ; and there appears to have been little delay in securing the necessary means for the effectual protection of the settlers as well for the suppression of any general uprising among the Indians, which the latter might attempt.

The war carried on by the savages against the scattared set- tlers lasted several months, and fearful barbarities were perpe- trated upon men, women, and children.

Logan is said to have made incursion after incursion, pene- trating the frontier where least expected, and carrying his vengeance far into the interior, creating consternation, and causing many settlers to flee for safety to the forts, or beyond the reach of his vindictive warfare.

He was undoubtedly engaged in consolidating the several tribes in the struggle; was active, both in couneil and in the field; was a leading spirit in the battle of Point Pleasant, in which the great warrior Cornstalk so highly distinguished him- self. After this he refused to attend the council in which his countrymen concluded a peace with the Earl of Dunmore, Gov- ernor of Virginia, who had led an army against the homes of the Shawanese near Chillicothe, on the Scioto river, or to as- sent to the treaty when it had been concluded.

As will appear in the history of the Dunmore war, Virginia was prompt in her measures to raise an army of sufficient strength to severely punish the Indians, although considerable time was necessarily consumed in gathering and marching such a force, with its supplies, across the mountains and through the wilderness to the scene of action.

It will also be seen that the vigor with which the war was prosecuted by the Virginians, under Lord Dunmore, soon brought the Indians to terms, and they made overtures of peace. To seeure this Lord Dunmore appointed a council on the Scioto in 1,774, and invited all the hostile chiefs to be present, Logan among the number. He refused to attend the council, but sent by the messenger the reply which has been preserved in history, become famous as a specimen of Indian oratory, and known as the celebrated speech of Logan.

In Mr. Jefferson's "Notes on Virginia," while speaking of the In:lians of America, he has the following remarks:

"The principles of their society forbidding all compulsion, they are to be led to duty and to enterprise by personal influ- enee and persuasion. Hence eloquence in council, bravery and address in war, become the foundations of all consequence with them. To these acquirements all their faculties are directed. Of their bravery and address in war we have multiplied proofs, because we have been the subjects on which they were exer- cised. Of their eminence in oratory, we have fewer examples, because it is displayed chiefly in their own councils. Some, however, we have of very superior lustre. I may challenge the whole orations of Demosthenes and Cicero, and of any more eminent orator, if Europe has furnished more eminent, to pro- duce a single passage superior to the speech of Logan, a Mingo chief, to Lord Dunmore when governor of this State. And, as a testimony of their talents in this line, I beg leave to intro- duce it, first stating the incidents necessary for understanding it.

"In the spring of the year 1774, a robbery was committed by some Indians on certain land adventurers on the Ohio. The

*It has been stated positively by those who were personally acquainted with the family, and who remembered the circumstances, that this is an error-the name was " Roberts," they say, and not " Robertson."

HISTORY OF BELMONT AND JEFFERSON COUNTIES, OHIO.

whites in that quarter, according to their custom, undertook to punish this outrage in a summary way. Captain Michael Cresap, and Daniel Greathouse, leading on these parties, sur- priscd at different times, traveling and hunting parties of the Indians, having their women and children with them, and murdering many. Among these were unfortunately the family of Logan, a chief celebrated in peace and war, long distin- guished as the friend of the whites. This unworthy return provoked his vengeance. He accordingly signalized himself in the war which ensued. In the autumn of the same year a de- cisive battle was fought at the mouth of the Great Kanawha, between the collected forces of the Shawanese, Mingoes and Delawares, and a detachment of the Virginia militia. The In- dians were defeated, and sued for peace. Logan, however, dis- dained to be seen among the suppliants. But lest the sincerity of a treaty should be disturbed, from which so distinguished a chief absented himself, he sent, by a messenger, the following speech to be delivered to Lord Dunmore:

LOGAN'S SPEECH.

"I appeal to any white man to say if ever he entered Logan's cabin hungry and he gave him not meat, if ever he came cold and naked and he clothed him not. During the course of the last long and bloody war Logan remained idle in his cabin, an advocate for peace. Such was my love for the whites that my countrymen pointed as they passed, and said, 'Logan is the friend of the white men.' I had even thought to have lived with you, but for the injuries of one man. Colonel Cresap, the last spring, in cold blood, and unprovoked, murdered all the rela- tions of Logan, not even sparing my women and children. There runs not a drop of my blood in the veins of any living creature. This calling on me for revenge, I have sought it; I have killed many ; I have fully glutted my vengeance ; for my country I rejoice at the beams of peace. But do not harbor a thought that mine is the joy of fear. Logan never felt fear. He will not turn on his heel to save his live. Who is there to mourn for Logan ? Not one."

This treaty of peace was concluded with the hostile Indians in the month of November, 1774, on Sippo creek, a branch of the Scioto river, where the Earl of Dunmore was then en- camped; but Logan indignantly refused to go to the camp for such a purpose, or to have anything to do with such a treaty. "Logan is no counselor; Logan is a warrior," he said, and con- tented himself with sending by a messenger the speech which has sinee become so celebrated the world over.

As Mr. Jefferson said, "Logan disdained to be seen among the suppliants" when the Indians sued for peace; and General John Gibson, who was formerly an Indian trader, but then was a member of Governor Dunmore's staff, and, as such, was sent into the village to receive the submission of the Indians and to conclude a treaty with them, has left a deposition in which he said "that on his arrival at the towns, Logan, the Indian, came to where this deponent was sitting with the Cornstalk and the other chiefs of the Shawanese, and asked him to walk out with him; that they went into a copse of wood where they sat down together .* Here, after shedding abundance of tears, the grieved chieftain gave vent to his feelings and told his pathetic story. Gibson repeated it to the officers, who caused it to be published in the Virginia Gazette of that year. Mr. Jefferson was charged with making improvements and alterations when he published it in his "Notes on Virginia;" but from the concurrent testi- mony of Gibson, Lord Dunmore and several others, it appears to be as close a representation of the original as could be obtained under the circumstances. The translation is literally the same as the copy given in Mr. Jefferson's Notes, page 124, and is doubtless the version given out by himself at the time. The authenticity of the ideas, and, if not the words, at all events the style, is in some degree sustained by the other picee of Logan's composition, written by the prisoner, William Rob- inson, at his dictation, and which was found tied to a war club at the house of Robertson, or Roberts, in Fincastle county, Va., after the massacre of his family by the Indians, as already described.

The speech has been repeated throughout North America as a lesson of eloquence in the schools, and copied upon the pages of literary journals of Great Britain and the continent. This brief effusion of mingled pride, courage and sorrow, elevated the character of the native American throughout the intelligent world, and can never be forgotten so long as touching eloquence is admired by men.

The poet has versified it thus:

"Nor man, nor child, nor thing of living birth ; No! not the dog, that watched my household hearth, Escaped that night of blood, upon our plains.

All perished ! I alone am left on earth ! To whom nor relative nor blood remains, No! not a kindred drop that runs in human veins."

Nearly half a century after the publication of this specimen of untutored eloquence by Mr. Jefferson, in his "Notes on Vir- ginia," the speech was wrought into poetry by being put into the mouth of Outallissi, in Campbell's "Gertrude of Wyoming."

In 1797, for the first time, not only the entire transaction re- specting the part which Logan had had in the war, and in the conclusion of the treaty, was stated to be false, but the speech itself was said to be a forgery by Mr. Jefferson, to aid him in proving that the man of America, physically and mentally, was equal to the man of Europe. Possibly this charge against Mr. Jefferson was prompted by the bitterness of political par- tisanship, which at that time was exceedingly violent; but whatever may have been its inspiration, the accused bravely repelled the assault, aptly remarking, "Wherefore the forgery? Whether Logan's or mine, it would still have been American," leaving the original argument, which it was intended to illus- trate entirely unimpaired. But the evidence which was called out by the accusation completely established the fact that Lo- gan did decline to participate with Cornstalk in the estalish- ment of the peace; that he did deliver to General Gibson- subsequently an honored judge of Allegheny eounty, Pennsyl- vania-the speech which was attributed to him; that that speech was delivered by General Gibson, in Logan's behalf, to the Earl of Dunmore; that by the latter and his officers "it was given out" in the camp, published in the official Gazette of the colony, and thence scattered over the entire civilized world.

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History of Belmont and Jefferson Counties, Ohio, and incidentially historical collection pertaining to border warfare and the early settlement of the adjacent portion of the Ohio Valley, Part 26

Author: Caldwell, J. A. (John Alexander) 1n; Newton, J. H., ed; Ohio Genealogical Society. 1n Publication date: 1880 Publisher: Wheeling, W. Va. : Historical Pub. Co. Number of Pages: 728

Author: Caldwell, J. A. (John Alexander) 1n; Newton, J. H., ed; Ohio Genealogical Society. 1n
Publication date: 1880
Publisher: Wheeling, W. Va. : Historical Pub. Co.
Number of Pages: 728