History of Crawford County, Ohio, and representative citizens, Part 5

Author: Hopley, John E. (John Edward), 1850-
Publication date: 1912
Publisher: Chicago,Ill., Richmond-Arnold Publishing Company
Number of Pages: 1302

USA > Ohio > Crawford County > History of Crawford County, Ohio, and representative citizens > Part 5

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Lo, the poor Indian, whose untutored mind Sees God in clouds and hears him in the wind. -Pope.

The only good Indian is a dead Indian .- Mark Twain.

The Indians of the United States were a race who had no written history. They were principally forest wanderers, living on game and fish, and what little grain the Indian women cultivated, for no Indian warrior would demean himself by labor. In the early

history of the country a brisk trade existed by adventurers bringing colored men from Africa and selling them to the early settlers as slaves. The thrifty pioneers endeavored to secure slave labor cheaper by capturing In- dians, but in all the colonies where it was at- tempted it proved a failure. The Indians would not work, and although cruel and brutal punishment was inflicted it was useless. The Indians died under the lash rather than de- grade themselves by manual labor. They had,

HISTORY OF CRAWFORD COUNTY

as stated, no written language, the Iroquois being regarded as the most intelligent, as they could count up to -one hundred, many of the tribes being unable to definitely express num- bers above ten.

Long before the hunter and the trapper wandered through the great northwest, the Jesuit and Moravian missionaries, following on the heels of the early discoveries, became very friendly with the Indians. It is from records left by these men, the principal infor- mation of the Indians is obtained, but the early history given by them is much of it legendary. These missionaries learned from the older men of the Lenni Lenape (Delawares) that centuries previous their ancestors dwelt in the far west, and slowly drifted toward the east, arriving at a great stream, called the Namoesi Sipee (Mississippi) or "river of fish." Here they met the Mangwes (Iroquois) who had drifted westward to the Mississippi, far to the north, the Delawares having come east about the centre of the United States. The country east of the Mississippi was reported as being inhabited by a very large race of men, who dwelt in large towns along the shores of the streams. These people were called the Allegewi, and it was their name that was given to the Allegheny river and mountains. Their towns were strongly fortified by earth embankments. The Delawares requested per- mission of the Allegewi to establish them- selves in their territory, but the request was refused, although permission was given them to cross the river, and go through their coun- try to the east. When the Delawares com- menced crossing the river the Allegewi became alarmed at their numbers, and fell upon them in force and killed those who had crossed, threatening the others with a like fate should they attempt to pass the stream.

The legend indicates the Allegewi were not of the Indian race but the Iroquois were. The Delawares were indignant at the murder of their braves and the treachery of the Allegewi, so they took counsel with their Iroquois brethren, and they formed a compact to unite and drive the Allegewi beyond the Mississippi, and divide the country. The war lasted for years and great was the slaughter on both sides, until finally the Indians con- quered, and the Allegewi fled down the Mis-

sissippi, never more to return. The Iroquois then took the country along the great lakes, and the Delawares the country to the south. The two nations remained peaceful for many years, and the Delawares explored still further and further to the east, until finally they es- tablished their principal headquarters along the Delaware and Susquehanna rivers. The Iroquois covered the territory north of the Delawares and along both shores of the St. Lawrence. The Delawares, occupying land from the Atlantic to beyond the Mississippi river, became divided into various tribes, but they had grown in strength as the years passed and far outnumbered the Iroquois. Trouble arose between the two nations, and they went to war. To overcome the superior- ity in numbers of the Delawares the Iroquois resorted to stratagem. An Indian tribe is one family, and an injury done to one member is avenged by the entire tribe. All tribes had their war instruments marked with some pecu- liar design, or totem. The Iroquois murdered an Indian of one of the Delaware tribes and left at the scene of the murder the war club bearing the mark of another branch of the Delawares. This caused war between the two branches of the Delaware tribes. The

shrewd Iroquois soon had the Delawares hope- lessly divided, fighting and killing each other.

The treachery of the Iroquois was discov- ered and the Delawares called a grand coun- cil, summoning their warriors from the Atlan- tic to the Mississippi, with the intention of utterly exterminating the Iroquois. Then was formed by the Iroquois the Five Nations, or- ganized by Thannawaga, an aged Mohawk chief. It was an absolute alliance of the Mo- hawks, Oneidas, Onondagas, Cayugas, and Senecas, a form of Republic in which the leaders of the five nations consulted and acted as one. Under this powerful organization the Delawares were forced back to their own lands.

The Five Nations having driven back the Delawares turned their attention to the French, who were forcing them south from their hunting grounds on the St. Lawrence. North of this river were the Hurons (Wyan- dottes) and although of the Iroquois branch of the Indians, yet they were now a separate nation and at enmity. Although Cartier had

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treacherously taken their chief to France on and schools all along the northern border of his first visit, Champlain, nearly a century later, had made friends with the Hurons and when the Iroquois began resisting the French inroads on their territory, Champlain or- ganized the Hurons and made a raid on the Iroquois in 1609, administering a crushing defeat, the Hurons returning to Quebec with fifty scalps. In 1610 another attack was made on the Iroquois by Champlain and his Huron allies, but they were driven back by the Iroquois. The French now abandoned further extensions to the south, and the Iroquois made an onslaught on their ancient enemies, the Delawares, and drove them from the Atlantic westward to the Alleghenies.

It was land the Five Nations had taken from the Delawares that they sold to William Penn in 1682. The Iroquois as early as 1609 became the inveterate enemy of the French, an enmity which continued with undiminished hatred for a century and a half. So when the French created this hatred by their attacks on the Iroquois, this, and an admiration the west- ern and northern Indians had for the French, made them allies. The Hurons were not as warlike as the Iroquois, but like all Indians they took up the cause of any insult to any member of their tribe. As a result the battles between the Iroquois and the Hurons were frequent, and they were ever inveterate ene- mies. To balance the Five Nation league of the Iroquois, the Hurons also united all that branch of the Algonquins in the north and west who were opposed to the Iroquois, the principal nation of the confederation being the Wyandottes.

After the French and Hurons had defeated the Five Nations on Lake Champlain, they re- mained quiet for some time. The Franciscan friars had done much missionary work among the Hurons and many had adopted the Cath- olic faith, and with religion came a less war- like spirit, and more cultivation of the soil. With the Iroquois the missionaries could do nothing, many losing their lives in the attempt.

The Jesuits followed the Franciscans, and found a fruitful field of labor among the Hurons. This was from 1625 on, and the en- ergetic Jesuits soon supplanted all over the west the quieter and less religiously aggressive Franciscans. The Jesuits established missions 2

the lakes, at Detroit, through Indiana, Illinois and Wisconsin, and along the Mississippi from its source to New Orleans. It is to be noted, however, that even these zealous Jesuits in going from Quebec, on the St. Lawrence, to Detroit, kept north of the lakes, as the more convenient route by way of the Niagara river and Lake Erie was controlled by the ferocious Iroquois, whose implacable. hatred of everything French had been started by Champlain. It is but just to the Jesuits to say some did visit the Iroquois, only to be horribly treated, sometimes tortured and burned at the stake; or, if allowed to return, maimed for life. One faithful missionary was sent home as a warning to others. The fiendish Iroquois had made holes through the calves of his legs; through these holes they had placed reeds filled with gun-powder. These were then set on fire, blowing the calves of his legs to pieces. It is stated that later on he again limped among them, and the Iroquois who, with all their cruelty admired bravery, let him alone. But he was the only French- man who was allowed to preach to the Iroquois. As the legend fails to state whether he made any converts among the Iroquois, it is probable he did not, much as they needed religious teaching.

For nearly forty years the warlike Iroquois remained quiet, except occasional marauding expeditions against neighboring tribes and treacherous attacks on the white settlers. They had made a treaty of peace with the New England settlers, and in 1648 made a treaty with the Dutch of New Amsterdam. Under this treaty the Dutch sold them arms and ammunition, which, prior to this time, the · Dutch had scrupulously refused to do. After two-score years of rest a new generation had sprung up, equally warlike and equally fear- less, and they concluded to try their new weapons on the Eries, another of the tribes of the Huron combination. The Eries then oc- cupied the southern shore of Lake Erie, in- cluding the territory now embraced by Crawford and adjoining counties. The Eries were entirely unprepared and the victory was so complete that the Eries never again became prominent. This led to a war between the Hurons and the Iroquois, and it raged with

HISTORY OF CRAWFORD COUNTY

undiminished fury for several years, until in 1659, the Iroquois crossed into Canada in great force, above the French settlements, and marched through the Huron territory, massa- cring. their enemies, burning their towns, de- stroying the missions and murdering the priests. The Hurons fled through lower Can- ada, across the river at Detroit, and into upper Michigan, and only found final refuge from their insatiable foes on the southern shores of Lake Superior, where the Chippewas came to their defense and drove the Iroquois back. The Iroquois were now in undisputed control from the Atlantic to the Mississippi and from the Lakes to the Ohio river.

In the Lake Superior region the bulk of the Wyandottes and Ottawas (another of the Huron branch) made their home for many years, until two French priests arrived among them, Jacques Marquette and Claude Deblon, and began organizing them in the interest of the French, and establishing a headquarters for all the Indian allies of the French at Mack- inac. This was in 1671, and here they re- mained for thirty years. In 1701 Cadillac, who had been in command of the French fort at Mackinac, established a new post at Detroit, which was called Fort Ponchartrain, later changed to Detroit, a name it ever after re- tained. When Cadillac moved to Detroit, at his request most of the Indian allies accom- panied him; they were joined by other In- dians, and new tribal relations established, and the Hurons took the name of their lead- ing tribe, the Wyandots,* the name meaning "Traders of the West."

The Wyandots were frequently attacked by their old enemies, the Iroquois, but the Indians around Detroit were all united; they received arms and ammunition from the French, and when necessary the French soldiers fought with them, and at the end of six years the Iroquois were compelled to give up the strug- gle and leave the French and Wyandots in control of lower Michigan and Canada north of Lakes Erie and Ontario.

But the shrewd Iroquois were not idle. They instigated the Fox nation to make an at- tack on the Detroit settlement. They chose ?

time when the Wyandots were away on a hunting expedition, early in May, 1712. Du Buisson was then in command of Fort Pon- chartrain, with only twenty-one men. He sent runners out to notify the Indians to re- turn. On the 13th an assault was made on the Fort, but the Foxes and their allies were held at bay. While the fight was going on the Wyandots returned, and drove the Foxes into the fort they had erected when they came to capture the French settlement. The French and Wyandots in turn attacked the enemy's fort, but were unsuccessful. For nineteen days the fighting continued, when the Foxes were compelled to flee, and hurriedly built a fortification a few miles north of Detroit. Here they were attacked by the French and their allies, the French bringing two small cannon to bear on the enemy. The fighting lasted three days more, when the Foxes were utterly routed, the Wyandots, and their allies, the Ottawas and Pottawatomies massacring eight hundred men, women and children, nearly wiping out the Fox nation, a few of those remaining joining their friends, the Iroquois, and the remainder removing to Wisconsin and the south shore of Lake Su- perior, where they became as bitter enemies of the French as were the Iroquois in the east. It was this same year the Tuscaroras, driven from North Carolina, came north and united with the Iroquois and the confederation be- came the Six Nations. While the battles at Detroit intensified the anger of the Six Na- tions and the Foxes against the French, it gave the latter the strong friendship of the Wyandots and all those Indians who sur- rounded the French settlement, a friendship which, to the credit of the Wyandots, they faithfully maintained through all the varying fortunes of war for the next half century, and when, in 1763, the flag of France fell be- fore the meteor flag of England, and the French retired from American soil, for some years after the treaty of peace between Eng- land and France was signed, the Wyandots with their western allies were at war against the British.

The Wyandots now gradually extended their hunting grounds along the southern shore of Lake Erie, the nearly half a century of war of the Iroquois with the French hav-

*The correct name was Wyandotte, but from this date the name is given according to the modern spelling.

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ing left that nation in so crippled a condition that they never again appeared west of the Alleghenies on a warlike expedition. The Wyandots are known to have been in this section as early as 1725, and, extending their territory, were soon in control from Lake Erie to the Ohio river. In 1740 the remnant of the once famous Delawares was driven from Pennsylvania by the Six Nations and by the advance of the Pennsylvania colonists, and the Wyandots gave them permission to occupy the Muskingum Valley. A number of the Shawanese also made their home along the Scioto, and the Ottawas had land between the Sandusky and the Maumee rivers, and from here, as allies of the French, they fre- quently made warlike excursions into Penn- sylvania and Virginia, surprising the settlers at dead of night, and massacring entire families, men, women and children, and when the expedition was in retaliation for some real or fancied wrong, returning with the prison- ers and holding a · war dance while the un- fortunate captives were horribly tortured until death alone relieved them of their suffering.

For a quarter of a century, from their forest fastnesses on the Sandusky, they made raids hundreds of miles distant, on the un- suspecting stockade or lonely cabin, pillaged, massacred and burned and were off again, lost in the trackless woods, where it was im- possible to follow them. There are remains today of Indian trails all over the southern portion of Crawford county, on which the Indians stealthily marched in single file, to and fro on their murderous expeditions. From the lake at Sandusky to the Ohio river their water route was up the Sandusky, across to the Scioto and down that stream to the Ohio, one of their portages being through the south- west portion of Dallas township.

In 1755 all of the coast states were. British colonies; the French were in control of all west of the Alleghenies and north of the Ohio, they had fortifications all along Lake Erie ; one at Fort Duquesne ( Pittsburg) another at Erie, Pennsylvania; at Detroit; two at the mouth of the Sandusky, others in Indiana and Illinois, and the Indians in all this great north- west were their friends and allies. The French claimed the territory, and justly, by right of discovery ; the English claimed through chart-

ers of British rulers, granted to companies for so many miles along the Atlantic "and ex- tending west to the Pacific ocean." The sec- tion of the state where Crawford county is located came under a charter granted Virginia, this charter's northern line being the present northern boundary of Crawford county. The country from the northern boundary of Craw- ford to Lake Erie was claimed under the charter granted to Connecticut. England further claimed Ohio from the fact that in a treaty with the Iroquois (Six Nations) she had bought of them all their territory north of the Ohio river and west of the Alleghenies to the Mississippi. While there is a dispute as to whether the Six Nations ever did ex- tend their conquests beyond the Cuyahoga river, and whether the Six Nations ever did own by conquest that part of Ohio where Crawford county is situated, England always recognized the claims of the Iroquois and the Americans acquiesced.

In 1744, when the war occurred between France and England, practically all the Indians of the northwest gave their services to the French. They attacked the frontiers of Penn- sylvania and Virginia; some went down the St. Lawrence, reported at Montreal, where they were given arms and ammunition, and attacked the settlers of New York, and even extended their depredations across the Hind- son to massacre settlers in far-off New Eng- land. They were as loyal to their French friends as they were bitter and implacable in their hatred of the English and the Iroquois, who, after a hundred years, were still the loyal friends of the English. In 1745 a French commandant's record in Canada shows the number of Indians reporting for duty in the war against England, among them the Wyan- dots. Other records show that in one year at least twenty of these blood-thirsty murdering bands were sent out by the French, frequent mention being made of the part taken by the Wyandots in the wholesale butcheries which followed in these bloody raids.

In 1748 a treaty was patched up between England and France and comparative quiet was maintained until 1754, but as the French still remained in possession of the great north- west, and England was determined to have the territory, war again broke out. In the

HISTORY OF CRAWFORD COUNTY

spring of 1754 a company of French soldiers from Fort Duquesne, while extending their explorations southward, were attacked by some Virginia rangers under Lieut. Col. George Washington. A fight for the owner- ship of the great northwest between the French and English was so inevitable that during the winter of 1754-5 England and the colonies on the one side and the French on the other organized for the coming struggle, which commenced in 1755, and lasted for seven long years, England and the extreme eastern colonies marching to Canada, and the Virginia and Pennsylvania militia joining with the English soldiers in the battles in the north- west.

In this section the war commenced with the attempt of Gen. Braddock in command of the English, and Col. George Washington in command of the militia, to capture Fort Duquesne, situated at the point where the Allegheny and Monongahela unite to form the Ohio. The French sent an army from Detroit, and they were joined in their march by the Wyandots, and through the forests and over the plains of Crawford they hurried to the battle ground. The Wyandots then were the leading nation of the northwest, the most numerous, and in bravery were the equals of the Iroquois. They were a fighting nation, every man a warrior, with their pride of brav- ery raised to so high a pitch that not one ever surrendered, and for more than half a century to come it is doubtful if a single Wyandot was ever captured. They were among the Indian troops who were secreted in the woods and poured the deadly fire on the ambuscaded Americans and English. The French loss was four killed, and the American and English 300. Among the slain was Gen. Braddock, who had refused advice as to Indian warfare, and who paid the penalty with his life, leav- ing Washington in command to save what he could from the slaughter.

The victory at Fort Duquesne excited the Indians' thirst for blood, and nearly every Wyandot warrior took to the war path. Along the borders of Pennsylvania they left a trail of death and desolation; they were with Mont- calm in Canada, where the French were de- feated; then on to Ottawa, which fell into the hands of the British; returning to Fort

Niagara they received another repulse; every- where the English and Americans were slowly but surely driving back the French. Bravery, endurance and fortitude were characteristic of the Wyandots, but adversity they could not stand. Their belief in French superiority was becoming shattered, and by degrees they drifted back to the banks of the Sandusky, disappointed and discouraged, and took no further hand in the struggle. It ended in 1763 when France relinquished Canada, and all her possessions in the United States east of the Mississippi to the English.

It is probably better for civilization that the result was as it was, but when one reflects that cold and calculating England had confined her settlements to the easily reached shores of the Atlantic, while the French for two hun- dred years had explored the boundless forests, navigated streams unknown, erected trading posts, gone where the foot of the white man had never trod, the opinion is almost inevitable that although it was probably for the best, it was not the right that triumphed. The French had made all the explorations, experienced all the hardships of travels in an unknown coun- try; their explorers had suffered torture and death in harmonizing the savage tribes, and just as the land is ready for settlement, and the harvest of her years of toil is reached, England, by the force of arms, seizes the prize. But why mourn for the French or criticise the English. "For time at last sets all things even," and justice, though slow, is sure, and before England could reap the fruits of her shrewdness, the American nation rose in its might, as one man, and the Great Northwest, stolen from the French, became free and in- dependent, and later the garden spot of the United States with today more than twenty millions of people.

While the French were receiving their re- verses, Pontiac an Ottawa chief (Huron branch of the Indians) organized practically all of the Indians of the northwest to seize every English outpost, probably twelve in number. In the Great Northwest they failed only at Detroit, where the siege lasted for many months, by which time the English had regained their forts and relieved Detroit, and peace was declared. In this peace Pontiac re- fused to join, but retired with his Ottawas to

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Illinois. The capture of the different forts was arranged for May 7, 1763. The Wyan- dots captured the Fort near the mouth of the Sandusky. Here Ensign Paully was in com- mand, and on May 16 he was approached by seven Indians with a request for a conference. He admitted them without hesitation, when he was seized, bound and the fort captured, the garrison being taken unawares. Nearly all the garrison, eleven in number, were mas- sacred and the fort was burned. Ensign Paully being reserved for torture. He was tied to the stake, and just as the fagots were about to be fired an Indiaw squaw, whose hus- band had been killed, claimed the prisoner to take the place of her dead husband. Paully consented, and was liberated, but at the first opportunity made his escape, leaving the widow doubly bereaved.

Pontiac in Illinois remained the inveterate foe of the English, and in 1769 he was mur- dered by an Illinois Indian. The Wyandots, who had for some years been living quietly, on learning the news, accompanied by the Ot- " tawas and other tribes marched to Illinois and avenged the chief's death by the almost wip- ing out of the Illinois tribe.

In 1764 Gen. Bradstreet, who was in com- mand at Detroit, with a force of men "ascended the Sandusky river as far as it was navigable by boats." The point reached was probably the old Indian town of Upper Sandusky on the river about three miles south- east of the present town of Upper Sandusky. Here a treaty of peace was made with the chiefs and leading men of the Wyandots. Among those who accompanied Gen. Brad- street was Israel Putnam, then a major in command of a battalion of Americans.

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History of Crawford County, Ohio, and representative citizens, Part 5

Author: Hopley, John E. (John Edward), 1850- Publication date: 1912 Publisher: Chicago,Ill., Richmond-Arnold Publishing Company Number of Pages: 1302

Author: Hopley, John E. (John Edward), 1850-
Publication date: 1912
Publisher: Chicago,Ill., Richmond-Arnold Publishing Company
Number of Pages: 1302