USA > Ohio > Defiance County > History of Defiance County, Ohio. Containing a history of the county; its townships, towns, etc.; military record; portraits of early settlers and prominent men; farm views, personal reminiscences, etc > Part 12
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Young Brickell was trained to hunt, and much of his time was out on hunting expeditions. These were generally to the streams of the Maumee in sum- mer, but in winter extended to the Scioto, the Hock- ing and Licking Rivers.
During his four years' sojourn here, two very im- portant events occurred-St. Clair's defeut, in 1791, and Wayne's victory, August 20, 1794.
As to St. Clair's defeat, he says: "The first fall after my adoption, there was a great stir in the town about an army of white men coming to fight the In- dians; the squaws and boys were moved with the goods down the Maumee, there to await the result of the battle, whilst the men went to war. They met St. Clair, were victorious, and returned loaded with spoils, when we felt we were a rich people."
In reference to Wayne's victory, he says: "In the month of June, 1794, two Indian men, a boy and myself started on a candle-light hunting expedition, to Blanchard's fork of the Auglaize. We had been out two months, when on returning to the towns in August, we found them entirely evacuated; but we gave ourselves little uneasiness, supposing the
Indians had gone to the foot of the Maumee Rapids to receive their presents from the British, as they were annually in the habit of doing. We encamped on the lowest island in the middle of a corn-field. Next morning an Indian runner came down the river and gave the alarm whoop, which is a kind of yell they use for no other purpose. The Indians answered, and at once were told the white men were upon us and we must run for our lives. We scattered like a flock of partridges, leaving our breakfast cooking on the fire. The Kentucky riflemen saw our smoke and came to it, and just missed me as I passed them in my flight through the corn. They took all our two months' work, breakfast, jerk, skins and all.
Anthony Wayne was then only four miles from us, and the van guard was right among us. I and the boy kept on the trail of the Indians till we overtook them. Two or three days after we ar- rived at the Rapids, Wayne's spies came right into camp boldly, and fired upon the Indians. Their names were Miller, McClelland, May, Wells, Mahaffy and one other whose name I forgot. Miller got wounded in the shoulder; May was chased by the Indians to the smooth rock in the bed of the river, where his horse fell and he was taken prisoner; the rest escaped. They then took May to camp. He had formerly been a prisoner among them, and ran away. They told him, " We know you. To-morrow we take you to that tree (pointing to a large burr oak near the British fort); we will tie you up and make a mark on your breast, and will try what Indian can shoot the nearest to it." It so turned out. The next day, the very day before the battle, they tied him up, made a mark on his breast, and riddled his body with fifty bullets. On the day of the battle, I was about six miles below with the squaws, and went out hunting. The day being windy, I heard nothing of the firing of the battle, but saw some Indians on the retreat, one of whom told me the Indians were beaten.
Many Delawares were killed and wounded. The Indian who took May was killed. He was much missed, being the only gunsmith among the Dela- wares. Our crops and every means of support being cut off above, we had to winter at the mouth of Swan Creek, perhaps where Toledo now stands. We were entirely dependent upon the British, and they did not half supply us. The starving and sickly condi- tion of the Indians and their animals made them very impatient, and they became exasperated at the Brit- ish. It was finally concluded to send a flag to Fort Defiance in order to make a treaty with the Ameri- cans. This was successful. Our men found the Americans ready to treat, and they agreed upon an exchange of prisoners. I saw nine white prisoners
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exchanged for nine Indians. I was left, there being no Indian to give for me. Patton, Johnston, Sloan and Mrs. Baker, were four of the nine; the names of the others I do not recollect.
On the breaking-up of spring we all went to Fort Defiance, and arriving upon the shore opposite we saluted the fort with a round of rifles, and they shot a cannon thirteen times. We then encamped on the spot. On the same day Whingy Pooshies told me I must go over to the fort. The children hung around me, crying, and asked me if I was going to leave them ? I told them I did not know. When we got over to the fort and were seated with the officers, Whingy Pooshies told me to stand up, which I did. He then arose and addressed me in about these words: " My son, these are men the same color with yourself, and some of your kin may be here, or they may be a great way off. You have lived a long time with us. I call on you to say if I have not been a father to you? If I have not used you as a father would a son ?" I said, " You have used me as well as a father could use a son." He said, "I am glad you say so. You have lived long with me; you have hunted for me; but your treaty says you must be free. If you choose to go with the people of your own color I have no right to say a word; but if you choose to stay with me your people have no right to speak. Now reflect on it and take your choice and tell us as soon as you make up your mind."
I was silent for a few minutes, in which time I seemed to think of most everything. I thought of the children I had just left crying, I thought of the Indians I was attached to, and I thought of my peo- ple, whom I remembered; and this latter thought predominated, and I said, "I will go with my kin." The old man then said, " I have raised you. I have learned you to hunt; you are a good hunter. You have been better to me than my own sons. I am now getting old and I cannot hunt. I thought you would be a support to my old age. I leaned on you as on a staff. Now it is broken-you are going to leave me and I have no right to say a word, but I am ruined." He then sank back in tears to his seat. I heartily joined him in his tears, parted with him, and have never seen or heard of him since.
SPENCER'S INDIAN LIFE AT DEFIANCE.
O. M. Spencer, a Cincinnati boy of eleven years, was taken whilst a little way from his home on the 7th day of July, 1792, and also having undergone many hardships, reached the mouth of the Grand Glaize, with his two Indian captors, in six days, be- ing about fourteen months later than Brickell's ar- rival. His captor was a Shawnee, but he shortly transferred his rights to his companion, Waw-paw-
waw-qua, or White Loon, the son of a Mohawk chief. At their arrival at the confluence of the Au- glaize and Maumee, after disposing of their furs to a British Indian trader, they crossed over to a small bark cabin near its banks, and directly opposite the point; and leaving him in charge of its occupant, an old widow, the mother-in-law of Waw-paw-waw-qua, departed for their homes, a Shawnee village, on the river about one mile below.
Cooh-coo-che, the widow in whose charge young Spencer had been left, was a princess of the Iroquois tribe. She was a priestess to whom the Indians ap plied before going on any important war expedition. She was esteemed a great medicine woman. Her husband had been a distinguished war chief of the Mohawks, who after their disastrous defeat by the colonists, 1770, removed from the St. Lawrence, and settled with his family at the Shawnee village one mile below the mouth of the Auglaize. He was killed in battle in 1790, at the time of Hardin's defeat. After his death, his widow chose her residence and erected her cabin immediately opposite the point, on the north bank of the Maumee; and soon thereafter, at the " feast of the dead," with pious affection re- moved the remains of her late husband from their first resting place and interred them only a few rods above the dwelling near to the war path. Buried in a sitting posture, facing west, by his side had been placed his rifie, tomahawk, knife, blanket, moccasins, and everything necessary for hunter and warrior; and his friends had, besides, thrown many little articles as presents into the grave.
The site of her cabin was truly pleasant. It stood a few rods from the northern bank of the Maumee, with its side fronting that river, on an elevated spot. On the south side of the Maumee, for some distance below its mouth, and extending more than a mile up the Auglaize to an Indian village, the low, rich bot- tom was one entire field of corn, which being in tas- sel, presented a beautiful appearance.
And this was young Spencer's home during the eight months of his captivity.
His full narrative in brief exhibits a little frontier opening at Cincinnati; a dense wilderess at the north filled with Indians, with their villages occasionally along the streams until, coming to the Maumee at its junction with the Auglaize, we find numerous towns of these Indians clustered about. A town of the Shawnees was on the east side of the Auglaize, a mile from its mouth; another on the north side of the Maumee a mile below. And not far away was Snake- town (Florida), and Oc-co-nox-ees village (Charloe), and one at Delaware Bend. On the point where , a few years later, Anthony Wayne erected his Fort Defiance, was, however, the principal village, and here were
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located the Indian traders. The principal of these was George Ironsides, whose wife was the daughter of the Indian widow with whom young Spencer made his home. And here we find the renegade, Simon Girty, and some brothers, and English Indian agents; also other American prisoners running at large. Among these are William Moore, a fellow-townsman of Spencer's, who had been taken a few months ear- lier, and Henry Ball, a soldier of St. Clair's unfort- nnate army; also Ball's wife, and Mr. Welsh, a pris- oner at large, who gave such information to the commandant of Fort Vincennes of Spencer's condition and whereabouts as led to his redemption and return to his friends and home.
Whilst hunting and war seem to have been the chief employment of these Indians, they had exten- sive fields of rich bottom lands in cultivation, from which they raised large quantities of corn. They also manufactured maple sugar, and gathered grapes and wild honey. Like the ancient Greeks, they had their " Oracles," and their athletic games and sports, and like the Jews, their "feasts," and rightly may we think they had a common ancestry with these an- cient people.
It was on the last day of February, 1793, that young Spencer was redeemed from his captivity by Col. Elliot, British Indian agent acting under direc- tions of the Governor of Canada, on the solicitation of Gen. Washington, who had been appealed to by his friends. The ronte chosen for him to reach his home with the time occupied, and scenes passed through equals in interest, and affords more for thought and reflection than the account of his cap- tivity.
His journey commenced in an open pirogue down the Maumee to the lake; thence he was paddled along the shore to Detroit by two Indian squaws, where he was detained a month waiting for the sailing of a ves- sel easterly. It was on the 30th of March he suc- ceeded in securing passage on a vessel called the Felicity, for Fort Erie. Arriving the middle of the next day at Put-in-Bay Island, they remained over night, and early Friday morning, the 1st day of April, sailed down the lake; but during the ensuing night were driven by head-winds that became almost a tempest, back, and again and again, four successive efforts were made, and each time the vessel was driven far back to its Put-in-Bay asylum. In this way two weeks were consumed ere the desired haven was reached. From Erie, some soldiers rowed him to Fort Chippewa, thence to Fort Niagara. He re- mained here a week, when Governor Simcoe sent him over to Newark, where Thomas Morris, Esq., of Can- andaigua, kindly proffered to take him along with him on his return home, the ensuing day. They set out
early the next morning on horseback. Traveling rapidly. and stopping only an hour at noon, they rested at night at an Indian village, and on the next day arrived at Canandaigua. Here he remained till the middle of June, waiting an opportunity to go to New York, at which time Mr. Chapin, Indian agent for the Senecas, having collected a large quan- tity of furs, bear and deer skins sufficient to load a pretty large bateau being ready to set out to replenish his stock of goods, at the request of Mr. Morris, con- sented to take him along.
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Mr. Chapin's bateau lay in the outlet, about three miles north of the north end of Canandaigua Lake, to which point there was sufficient water for navigation. From here, having loaded with peltries conveyed in wagons from the village, they proceeded slowly down the narrow winding outlet, sometimes being obliged to stop and cut away trees that had fallen across it, and sometimes to get out and drag the flat-bottomed boat over the riffles. In this way they proceeded for nearly four days, passing. however, the several out- lets of the Seneca, and Cayuga, the Owasca, and other lakes, the streams gradually became larger, and the obstructions fewer. On the fourth day they arrived at the mouth of the Oneida outlet, distant from Can- andaigua by land sixty miles, but not less than one hundred by water. Ascending the outlet, they crossed the Oneida Lake, about thirty miles in length to the mouth of Wood Creek, up which small crooked stream with much difficulty they forced their bateau to within a mile of the Mohawk, whence transporting it across the ground where Rome now stands, they proceeded down the river to Schenectady. From this place they rode in wagons to Albany; whence having stayed a day or two, they embarked on a Dutch sloop for New York, where they arrived on the 2d of July. Here young Spencer took leave of Mr. Chapin, and on the next day, taking passage in an open ferry boat across the bay arrived at Elizabeth- town, N. J., where he remained with friends until the 14th of September, 1795. At this time, in company with a Mr. Crane and the late Gen. Schenck, he set out on horseback for Pittsburgh, where he arrived in ten days, and there putting their horses on a flat-boat, descended the Ohio, and arrived at his home in Co- lumbia, now Cincinnati, about the middle of October.
To reach Cincinnati, less than 200 miles away, a trip is now made in seven hours, a journey is here un- dertaken of 2,000 miles, and a period of two years consumed in its accomplishment, though under the protecting auspices of the President of the United States and the Governor of Canada, and the leading Statesmen and Generals of our Nation. And except for this united protecting care the journey proba- bly could not have been made at all.
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HISTORY OF DEFIANCE COUNTY.
CHAPTER VII.
GEN. WAYNE'S EXPEDITION -- DAILY JOURNAL OF WAYNE-GEN. WAYNE- TREATY OF GREENVILLE.
T HE destructive expedition of Gens. Scott and 1 Wilkinson into the Lower Wabash region dur- ing the summer of 1791, added to the efforts of Gen. Harmar in 1790, had inspired the Northwestern In- dians with the belief, stimulated by the British, that the Government policy was to exterminate the race and seize their lands. This belief was fully confirmed by the campaign of St. Clair. Inflamed with jeal- ousy and hatred, and elated by the result of this last fierce victory, Indian depredation and barbarities threatened the terrified frontier settlers. The inhab- itants proceeded to provide every possible means of defense, while the Government adopted the earliest practicable measures for recruiting a military force adequate to the successful encounter of any possible combined Indian force, and sufficient for the estab- lishment of the proposed military stronghold at the Miami villages. After deliberately balancing the peculiar military qualifications necessary in such an expedition, and the abilities of Gen. Wayne, Wash- ington assigned him the command.
In June, 1792, Gen. Wayne proceeded to Pitts- burgh to organize his army; and in December, the "Legion of the United States" was assembled at Le- gionsville, about twenty miles below Pittsburgh. Here they encamped till April, 1793, when, passing down the Ohio, it landed at "Hobson's Choice" (the only point passable in consequence of high waters), near Ft. Washington, where, remaining until the 7th of October, the legion left Cincinnati.
Below is given, with the editor's comments a jour- nal of the march, taken from Cist's Cincinnati Mis- cellany.
Aside from the freshness of this species of narra- tion, written down on the spur of the moment, which, in the hands of an intelligent writer, is sure to inter- est, there are some points worthy of notice.
The first is, that distances are described by the "five mile spring," "seventeen mile" and "twenty-nine mile tree," which serves to point out the little iu- provement which the Miami country at that period afforded, as waymarks on the march. But the latter is especially valuable, as a testimony from beginning to end of the untiring vigilance, and press-forward spirit of Anthony Wayne, which afforded a presage from the first day's march of his peculiar fitness for
the hazardous and responsible service on which he was detached by government.
CAMP, SOUTHWEST BRANCH MIAMI, October 22, 1793.
DEAR SIR: Agreeably to promise, I have seized the first opportunity of writing you, and to be methodical in the busi- ness, I shall give it to you by way of journal.
October 7 .- Our first day's march was great, considering that the army had not got properly in their gears. I think it was about ten miles. Our second, the 8th, was greater-it reached Fort Hamilton. Many of the men were exceedingly fatigued, and it was pretty generally believed hard marching, though the General thought otherwise, and it must be so.
October 9 .- Our third day's march was to the Five-mile Spring, advance of Hamilton. Observe, we fortified our camp every night, and were very vigilant, or ought to be so.
October 10 .- Our fourth day's march we encamped about the Seventeen-mile Tree, and nothing extraordinary happened, excepting that our line of march extended for near five miles, owing to the rapidity of the marching and the badness of the roads for our transportation, superadding the straggling sol- diers, worn down with fatigue and sickness, brought up by the rear guard, whom they retarded considerably.
October 11 .--- We proceeded on to the Twenty-nine-mile Tree, fortified as usual, aud occupied a fine commanding ground, aud nothing of consequence happened bere.
October 12 .- The roads were very bad and some of our wagons broke down; but as the General's orders declared there should be no interstices, the line of march was not im- peded, and we made, say, ten miles this day.
October 13 .-- We advanced by tolerably quick movements until we came within a mile or so of Fort Jefferson, and this day furnished a good deal of sport, for as the devil would have it, Col. Hamtramck was maneuvering his troops, and had a sham fight, which was construed by the whole army as an attack upon our advance guards or flankers. It really frightened a good many; but we all said let them come, for we are ready for them. We had marched hard this day, and, I think, not so well prepared. However, it was at length dis- covered to be a sham fight, and everybody knew it then. Oh, it was Hamtramck's usual practice, said they. But it was all in my eye, they never thought of Hamtramck.
October 14 .- We marched past Fort Jefferson without even desiring to look at it ; indeed, some of us turned our heads the other way with disdain, and it has been threatened (as report says) to be demolished entirely. This day's march brought us to where I am now sitting, writing to my friend. We fortified our encampment very strong and feel very se- cure.
October 15 .- The wagons were sent back to Fort St. Clair for stores, provisions, etc., with an escort of two subalterns and between eighty and ninety men. And nothing happened extra this day.
October 16 .- The devil's to pay; Col. Blue, with near twenty of the cavalry, went out to graze the horses of the troops, and after some time Blue discovered something crawl- ing in the grass, which he at first thought was turkeys, but
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immediately found them to be two Indians, and ordered a charge: himself, two Sergeants and a private charged, the rest ran away; the consequence was, the two Indians killed the two Sergeants -Blue and the private escaped. The leader of the rascals who behaved so cowardly was imme- diately tried and condemned, but pardoned the next day.
October 17 .- Lieut. Lowry, Ensign, formerly Dr. Boyd, with the escort of ninety men guarding the wagons, were at- tacked by a party of thirty or forty Indians, who rushed on with savage fury and yells, which panic-struck the whole party (excepting the two officers and fifteen or twenty men, who fell a sacrifice to savage barbarity), and they all fled, and have been coming into Fort St. Clair, by twos and threes, ever since. The Indians plundered the wagons and carried off with them sixty-four of the best wagon horses in the army, killing six horses at the wagons in the defeat. Mr. Hunt has been a considerable loser, his wagon was plundered also. Col. Adair pursued the Indians and found several horses dead, which he supposed had been tired and they killed them, a proof that their flight was very rapid. In this attack we have lost two promising, worthy and brave officers and about twenty men, mostly of Capt. Shaylor's company, for his and Capt. Prior's formed the escort and are both now rather in disgrace.
We have been led to believe that this place would have been made the grand deposit until this day. We now learn that there will be a forward move in the course of ten days, nine miles further into the Indian country, to a place called Still Water; the reason I can't surmise, but they say they are very cogent ones. I have no business to pry, but if I should accidentally find it out, you shall be informed. In the mean time believe me to be, very sincerely,
Your friend, JOHN M. SCOTT.
Late in October, Gen. Wayne established his win- ter headquarters about six miles north of Ft. Jeffer. son, and there erected Ft. Greenville, the present site of the town of that name in Darke County.
On Christmas Day, 1793, a detachment re-occupied the ground which had been rendered memorable by the disastrous defeat of St. Clair three years before, and there built a stockade work, which was signifi- cantly called Ft. Recovery. During the progress of this work, he offered a reward for every human skull found on the battle ground. Six hundred of these relics of carnage were collected and entombed be- neath one of the block-houses.
Providing an adequate garrison, Gen. Wayne placed the fort in charge of Capt. Alexander Gibson, and during the early months of 1794 actively engaged in preparations for the anticipated blow. He had already been admonished by incidents of the march, and the vigilance of his numerons spies, that an ac tive, dexterous and powerful enemy were in the wil- derness surrounding him.
The Government, always anxious to avoid the car- nage of war, had exhausted every means to obtain an amicable adjustment of the difficulties, although the fact that five different embassies were sent, offering most generous terms of peace to the hostile tribes at- tests the sincerity of the expressed design on the part of the United States authorities to render full justice
to the aborigines. But the Indian successes, with promised British and French Canadian assistance, rendered them insensible to pacific overtures-all of which were more or less directly rejected, and three of the ambassadors-Freemen, Truman and Col. Har- din-were murdered.
On the morning of the 30th day of June, 1794, an escort consisting of ninety riflemen and fifty dra- goons, commanded by Maj. McMahon, was attacked by a "numerous body of Indiaus under the walls of Ft. Recovery .* The Indians, who were probably as- sisted by a small number of British agents and French Canadian volunteers, made several attacks on the fort within the space of about twenty- four hours, when they retired. In these attacks, the Americans lost twenty-two men killed, thirty wounded, and three missing. They also lost 225 horses, killed wounded and missing. Among the officer killed, were Maj. McMahon, Capt. Hartshorne, Lieut. Craig and Cornet Torry. Capt. Alexander Gibson (who was commandant at Ft. Recovery), Capt. Taylor, of the dragoons, and Lieut. Drake of the infantry, were distinguished for their gallant conduct. The Indians left eight or ten warriors dead on the field; although they were employed during the night, which was dark and foggy, in carrying off their dead and wounded by torchlight."t
It would also appear that the British and savages expected to find the artillery that was lost on the 4th of November, 1791, and hid by the Indians in the beds of old fallen timber, or logs which they turned over and laid the cannon in, and then turned the logs back, in their former berth. It was in this artful manner that we found them generally deposited. The hostile Indians turned over a great number of logs during the assault, in search of these cannon, and other plunder, which they had probably hid in this manner, after the action of November 4, 1791. I therefore have reason to believe that the British and Indians depended much upon this artillery to as- sist in the reduction of the fort; fortunately, they served in its defense."
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