History of Muskingum County, Ohio ; with illustrations and biographical sketches of prominent men and pioneers, 1794, Part 6

Author: Everhart, J. F; Graham, A. A., Columbus, Ohio, pub
Publication date: 1882
Publisher: [Columbus, O.] : F.J. Everhart & Co.
Number of Pages: 600

USA > Ohio > Muskingum County > History of Muskingum County, Ohio ; with illustrations and biographical sketches of prominent men and pioneers, 1794 > Part 6

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In a letter written by Captain Joseph Brant, the noted Indian warrior, to Colonel Timothy Pickering, relating to the Iroquois claim to the northern part of Pennsylvania, and dated at Niagara, December 30, 1794, he says : "The whole Five nations have an equal right, one with another, the country having been obtained by their joint exertions in war with a powerful na- tion formerly living southward of Buffalo Creek, called Eries, and another nation, then living at Tioga Point, so that by our success all the coun- try between that and the Mississippi became the joint property of the Five Nations. All other nations inhabiting this great tract of country were allowed to settle by the Five Nations."

The Indians who claimed the country ascrib- ing boundaries, however well acquainted with it as a haunt, have left us no map worthy of the name, and yet they have indicated boundaries with names of such significance as to settle the belief that they were familliar with the country.

The earliest approach to maps of the middle colonies came to Mrs. P. Mathiret, of Cleveland, Ohio, from her grandfather, formerly of Phila- delphia, subsequently of Nova Scotia; it was " published according to an Act of Parliament, by Lewis Evans, June 23, 1755, and sold by R. Dodsley, in Pall Mall, London." But we have only a description of the map. The heading is as follows :

" A general map of the Middle British Colo- nies in America, viz : Virginia, Maryland, Del- aware, Pennsylvania, New Jersey, New York. Conneticut and Rhode Island-of Aquanishuon- igy. the country of the confederate Indians, com- prising Aquanishuongy proper, their place of resi- dence ; Ohio Thuxsoxrentie, their deer hunting country ; Couxsaxrage and Skaniadrade, their beaver hunting country, of the lakes Erie, On- tario, and Champlain, and a part of New France, wherein is also shown the ancient and present seats of the Indian nations." The "deer linnt- ing " country was in northern Ohio and Michi- gan ; the "beaver lmnting" country in Canada and northern New York. "The Confederates, July 19, 1701, at Albany, surrendered their beaver hunting country to the English, to be de- fended for them by said Confederates, their heirs and successors forever. And the same was con- firmed September 14, 1728, when the Senecas, Cayugas and Onondagas surrendered their hab-

itations from Cuyahoga to Oswego, and sixty miles inland to the same for the same use."

"The Confederates, formerly five, now seven nations, called by the French Iroquois, consist of, Ist, the Conungues or Mohawks: 2d, the Onaguts ; 3d, the Onondagoes ; 4th, Cuyugaes ; 5th, Chemanoes, or Cenecas ; 6th, Tuscaroras ; 7th, Sississagoes." In a circular form around the West end of Lake Erie the following words are written : " These posts were by the Confed- erates allotted for the Wyandots when they were lately admitted into their league."

Across the head waters of the Wabash is the following sentence: "The Western league or Welinis, corruptly called Illinois by the French, consisting of Tawixtawix, Mineamis, Pian- kashas, Wawiaxtas, Piquas and Kuskiekis were seated till lately on the Illinois river and posts adjacent, but are all except the last now moved to the Ohio and its branches, by the express leave of the confederates about 164 years ago." The Miami river is called the Mineamic. Niagara Falls the "Oxniagara," Wheeling creek . Weel- ing" creek, Scioto "Sioto," and the country south of the Ohio river, as well as north, is called Ohio.

From the foregoing narration it is manifest that the aboriginal history pertaining to this county necessarily embraces the history included in the confederacy. The Iroquois and Delawares each have a tradition of an early eastward emi- gration from regions west of the Mississippi to the places where they were found by the Europeans. The period of our later Indian his- tory finds that wave returning towards the set- ting sun. It is therefore a period of commotion among tribes easily excited.

In 1748. Thomas Lee, with twelve other Vir- ginians, among whom were Lawrence and Augustine Washington, brothers of George Washington, and also Mr. Hanbury. of London. formed an association which was called the "Ohio Company," and petitioned the King for a grant of lands beyond the mountains. This pe- tition was approved by the monarch. and the government of Virginia was ordered to grant the petitioners half a million of acres within the bounds of that colony, beyond the Alleghanies, two thousand of which were to be located at once. This portion was to be held ten years free of quit rent, provided the company would put there one hundred families within seven years, and build a fort sufficient to protect the settle- ment, all of which the company proposed. and prepared to do so at once, and sent to London for a cargo suited to the Indian trade, which was to come out so as to arrive in November. 1749. This grant was to be taken principally on the south side of the Ohio river. between the Monon- gahela and Kanawha rivers.

In the autumn of 1750, the agents of the Ohio Company employed Christopher Gist, a land sur- veyor and familiar with the woods, to explore their contemplated possessions. He kept a jour- nal of his proceedings, from which we extract the following : "A journal of Christopher Gist's

HISTORY OF MUSKINGUM COUNTY, OHIO.

journey, began from Colonel Cresap's, at the old town on the Potomac river, Maryland, October 31, 1750, continued down the Ohio within fifteen miles of the falls thereof, and from thence to Roanoke river in North Carolina, where he ar- rived in May, 1751." Mr. Neville B. Craig, as shown in . The Olden Time," thinks that Gist ascended the Juniata after crossing the Potomac, and descended the Kiskeminitas to the Alle- ghany, which he crossed about four miles above Pittsburgh and passed on to the Ohio. From the mouth of Beaver creek he passed over to the Tuscarawas or Muskingum river, called by him and the Indians Elk Eye creek, striking it on the 5th of December, or thirty-five days after leav- ing the Potomac, at a point about fifty miles above the present town of Coshocton, probably within the county of Stark. On the 7th he crossed over the Elk Eye to a small village of Ottawas, who were in the interest of the French. On the 14th of December he reached an Indian town a few miles above the mouth of White- woman's creek, called Muskingum, inhabited by Wyandots, who, he says, were half of them at- tached to the French and half to the English. "When we came in sight of it we perceived English colors hoisted on the King's house and at George Croghan's. Upon inquiring the reason I was informed that the French had lately taken several English traders, and that Mr. Croghan had ordered all the white men to come into town, and had sent expresses to the traders of the lower towns, and among the Piquatiners, and that the Indians had sent to their people to come into council about it."

From this passage it is evident that the Penn- sylvania traders had traversed the Indian vil- lages and had obtained the good will of their in- habitants in a considerable degree. George Croghan was apparently at the head of a trading party, and he and Andrew Montour accompanied Gist on his further exploration. The latter, who acted as an interpreter and was influential among the Delawares and Shawanese, was the son of the famous Canadian half-breed, Catharine Mon- tour, whose residence was at the head of Seneca Lake. in New York.

Heckewelder, in his History of Indian Nations (p. 77), says that the Cochnewago Indians were a remnant of the Mohicans of New England, who fled to the shores of the St. Lawrence, where they incorporated with the Iroquois and became a mixed race : a number of the Mohicans from Connecticut emigrated to Ohio in 1762, and their chief was "Mohican John."

Indian Trails .- An interesting appendix to Hutchins' History of Bouquets' expedition gives five different routes from Fort Pitt through the Ohio wilderness. The first route, which was N. N.W., after striking the Big Beaver at a place called Kuskeeskees Town, forty seven miles from Fort Pitt, ascended the east branch fifteen miles to Shaningo, and twelve miles to Pematuning, thence westward thirty-two miles to Mahoning on the east branch of Beaver (prob- ably Youngstown), thence ten miles up. said

branch (Mahoning river) to Salt Lick (near the junction of Meander and Mosquito creeks, in Weathersfield township, Trumbull county) ; thence thirty-two miles to the Cuyahoga river, just south of Ravenna, and ten miles down the Cuyahoga to Ottawa town (Cuyahoga Falls). The distance from Fort Pitt by the above route was one hundred and fifty-six miles.

The second route, W. N.W., was twenty-five miles to the mouth of Big Beaver, ninety-one miles to Tuscaroras (the junction of Sandy and Tuscaroras creeks at the south line of Stark county), fifty to Mohican John's, near Jerome- ville, on the east line of Ashland county ; forty- six to Junandot (Castalia, or the source of Cold creek, in Erie county ) ; four to Sandusky, at the mouth of Cold creek, twenty-four to Jungqu-un- duneh (Fremont, on the Sandusky river). The distance from Sandusky to Fort Pitt was two hundred and sixteen miles, from Fort Pitt to Sandusky river two hundred and forty miles.

The third route, W. S.W., was one hundred and twenty-eight miles to the forks of the Musk- ingum (at Coshocton) ; six to Bullets Town (on the Muskingum-Virginia township); ten to Waukatamike (near Dresden, Muskingum county ) ; twenty-seven to King Beaver's Town (near the sources of the Hockhocking) ; forty to the lower Shawanese Town (on the Scioto river) ; twenty to Salt Town (near the source of the Scioto ; thence one hundred and ninety miles northeast to Fort Miamis (now Fort Wayne, In- diana, on the Maumee river). The distance from Fort Pitt to Miamis being 426 miles.

The fourth route, down the Ohio, was twenty- seven miles to the mouth of Big Beaver, twelve to Little Beaver, ten to Yellow Creek, eighteen to Two Creeks (just below Wellsburg, on the Virginia side), six to Wheeling, twelve to Pipe Hill (near to Pipe Creek), thirty to Long Reach (where the Ohio River is without a bend for a considerable distance), eighteen to the foot of Reach (near Newport), thirty to the mouth of the Muskingum, twelve to Little Kanawha River, thirteen to the mouth of Hocking River, forty to the mouth of Letarts Creek (opposite Letart township, Meigs county), thirty-three to Kiskemenetas (an Indian village otherwise called "Old Town," Gallatin county), eight to the mouth of Big Kanawha (or New River), forty to Big Sandy, forty to Scioto River, thirty to Big Salt Lick River (Brush Creek, Adams county), twenty to an island opposite Manchester (Adams county), fifty-five to Little Miami, thirty to Big Miami (or Rocky River), twenty to Big Bones (so called from the bones of an elephant found there), fifty-five to Kentucky River, fifty to the falls of the Ohio River, one hundred and thirty- one to the Wabash River, sixty to Cherokee (Tennessee) River), and forty to Mississippi. Total from Fort Pitt, 840 miles.

ENGLISH NEGOTIATIONS WITH THE WESTERN TRIBES.

The Virginians were very sensible that some form of assent by the Ohio Indians to their settle-

HISTORY OF MUSKINGUM COUNTY, OHIO.

ment in the territory was indispensable. Great efforts were, therefore, made to procure it, and at length representatives of the Western tribes were assembled at Logstown, seventeen miles below Pittsburgh, on the 9th of June, 1752. This was a favorable moment for the designs of the Eng- lish colonists, since the savages, even to the remote Twight-wees, were then inimical to the French, and favorably disposed towards the Eng- lish ; but the Virginia Commissioners-Messrs. Fry, Lomax, and Patton-had no easy task. They produced the Lancaster treaty, and insisted on the right of the Crown, under its grant, to sell the Western lands ; but " No," the chiefs said, "they had not heard of any sale west of the ' Warriors' road,' which ran at the foot of the Alleghany ridge." The Commissioners then offered goods for a ratification of the Lancaster treaty ; spoke of the proposed settlement by the Ohio Company, and used their persuasions to secure the land wanted. Upon the 11th of June the Indians replied. They recognized the treaty of Lancaster, and the authority of the Six Na- tions to make it, but denied that they had any knowledge of the Western lands being conveyed to the English by said deed ; and declined, upon the whole, having anything to do with the treaty of 1744. They were willing to give special per- mission to erect a fort at the fork of the Ohio, " as the French have already struck the Twight- wees," but the Virginians wanted much more ; and, finally, by the influence of Montour, the in- terpreter, who was probably bribed, the Indians united, on the 13th of June, in signing a deed confirming the Lancaster treaty in its full extent, and consenting to a settlement southeast of the Ohio.

The dissatisfaction of the Ohio savages with the proceedings at Logstown is very apparent from the fact that in September, 1753, William Fairfax met their deputies at Winchester, Virginia, where he concluded a treaty, with the particulars of which we are unacquainted, but on which; it is stated was an indorsement that " he had not dared to mention to them either the Lan- caster or Logstown treaty ; a sad commentary upon the modes taken to obtain the grants."

All attempts to secure any practical results from those treaties were postponed by the out- break and continuance of hostilities, and it was not until after the pacification of 1765 that the occupation of the lands west of the Alleghanies, otherwise than by the Indians, was agitated in any considerable degree.

The Royal proclamation of October 7, 1763, forbade all private settlement or purchase of lands west of the Alleghanies ; but as soon as peace was restored by the treaty of German Flats, settlers crossed the mountains, and took possession of lands in Western Virginia, and along the Monongahela. The Indians remon- strated ; the authorities issued proclamations warning off intruders ; orders were forwarded by General Gage to the garrison of Fort Pitt to dis- lodge the settlers at Red Stone, but all was inef- fectual. The adventurous spirits of the frontier

were not alone in their designs upon the wilder- ness. The old Ohio Company sought a perfec- tion of their grant ; the Virginia volunteers of 1754, who had enlisted under a proclamation offering liberal bounties of lands, were also clam- orous ; individual grants were urged. Sir Wil- liam Johnson was ambitious of being the Gov- ernor of an armed colony south of the Ohio. upon the model proposed by Franklin in 1754. and the plan of another company, led by Thomas Walpole, a London banker of eminence, was submitted to the English Ministry.

Notwithstanding such a fever of land specu- lation, it was still felt that a better muniment of title was requisite than the obsolete pretensions of Lancaster and Logstown ; and General Gage, having represented very emphatically the grow- ing irritation of the Indians, Sir William John- son was instructed to negotiate another treaty. Notice was given the various colonial govern- ments, to the Six Nations, the Delawares and the Shawanese, and a Congress was appointed to meet at Fort Stanwix (now Rome, New York). It assembled on the 24th of October, 1768, and was attended by representatives from New Jer- sey, Virginia, and Pennsylvania ; by Sir William and his deputies ; by the agents of those traders who had suffered in the war of 1763, and by deputies from all the Six Nations, the Delawares and the Shawanese. The first point to be set- tled was the boundary line, which was to deter- mine the Indian lands of the west from that time forward ; and this line the Indians, upon the Ist of November, stated should begin on the Ohio, at the mouth of the Cherokee (or Tennessee) River ; thence up the Ohio and Allegheny to Kittaning ; thence across to the Susquehanna, etc., whereby the whole country south of the Ohio and Allegheny, to which the Six Nations had any claim, was transferred to the British. One deed for a part of this land was made on the 3d. of November to William Trent, attorney for twenty-two traders, whose goods had been de- stroyed by the Indians in 1763. The tract con- veyed by this was between the Kenawha and Monongahela, and was by the traders named Indiana. Two days afterwards a deed for the remaining Western lands was made to the King, and the price agreed on paid down. There were also given two deeds in Pennsylvania-one to Croghan, and the other to the proprietaries of that Colony. These deeds were made upon the express agreement that no claim should ever be based upon previous treaties-those of Lancaster, Logstown, etc-and they were signed by the Chiefs of the Six Nations, for themselves, their allies and defendants, the Shawanese, Delawares. Mingoes of Ohio, and others : but the Shawanese and Delaware deputies present did not sign them.

The fact that such an extent of country was ceded voluntarily-not after a war, not by hard persuasion, but at once. and willingly. satisfies us that the whole affair had been previously set- tled with the New York savages, and that the Ohio Indians had no voice in the matter. The

HISTORY OF MUSKINGUM COUNTY, OHIO.

efforts to organize an immense land company, which should include the old Ohio Company, and the more recent Walpole scheme, besides recognizing the bounties of the Virginia volun- teers, were apparently successful by the royal sanction of August 14, 1774, but previously there were immense private appropriations of the re- gion south of the Ohio. Prominent among those interested in such speculations was George Wash- ington. He had patents for 32.373 acres-9,157 on the Ohio, between the Kanawhas, with a river front of thirteen and a half miles ; 23,216 acres on the great Kenawha, with a river front of forty miles. Besides these lands, he owned fitteen miles below Wheeling (587 acres), with a front of two and a half miles. He considered the land worth $3.33 per acre. [Sparks' Wash- ington, XII, 264-317.]

General Washington, after reciting his im- pressions in favor this region, says: "The In- dians who reside upon the Ohio-the upper parts of it at least-are composed of Shawanese, Del- awares, and some of the Mingoes, who, getting but little part of the consideration that was given for the lands eastward of the Ohio, view the set- tlements of the people upon this river with an uneasy and jealous eye, and do not scruple to say that they must be compensated for their right, if the people settle thereon, notwithstanding the cession ot the Six Nations. On the other hand, the people of Virginia and elsewhere are explor- ing and marking all the lands that are valuable, not only on the Red Stone and other waters on the Monongahela, but along the Ohio as low as the Little Kanawha, and by the next summer I sup- pose they will get to the Great Kanawha at least."

At a conference with the Ohio tribes, held by George Croghan, at Pittsburgh, in May, 1768, Nimwha, one of the Shawanese chiefs, who sub- mitted so reluctantly to the army of Boquet, thus expressed himself :

" We desired you not to go down this river in the way of the warriors belonging to the foolish nations to the westward ; and told you that the waters of this river, a great way below this place, were colored with blood ; you did not pay any regard to this, but asked us to accompany you in going down, which we did, but felt the smart of our rashness, and with difficulty returned to our friends (alluding adroitly to Croghan's unlucky capture at the mouth of the Wabash in 1765). We see you now about making batteaus, and we make no doubt you intend to go down the river. again, which we now tell you is disagreeable to all nations of Indians, and now again desire you to sit still at this place.

" They are also uneasy to see you think your- selves masters of this country, because you have taken it from the French, who, you know, had no right to it, as it is the property of the Indians. We often hear that you intend to fight with the French again ; if you do, we desire you will re- move your quarrel out of the country, and carry it over the great waters, where you used to fight, and where we shall neither see or know anything of it."

The peaceful Delawares met the encroaching upon their hunting grounds by slowly retiring before the advancing column of emigration, con- centrating their villages more and more within their wilderness home, north of the Ohio, until in 1774 the smothered flame of hostility, which had been long kindled among the Shawanese, burst forth.

The wanton murder of Logan's family imme- diately leagued the bands of Mingoes, or Senecas, with their neighbors on the Scioto in the work of vengeance. The result of this uprising, and account of Dunmore's expedition in a general way, are recited in several histories of the United States with minuteness ; but as this outbreak, and the ensuing bloody struggle, hinged on the re- venge for Logan's loss, and yet was in reality the slogan that called the red man to the defense of his home and all that was dear to him, the reader will pardon a recital here of that which may be familiar :

" As Dunmore approached the Scioto, the In- dians besought him to send an interpreter. John Gibson was sent by Lord Dunmore. He has stated, in an affidavit annexed to "Jefferson's Notes," that on his arrival at the towns, Logan, the Indian, came to where the deponent was sitting with the Cornstalk and the other chiefs of the Shawanese, and asked him to walk out with him. They went out into a copse of wood, where they sat down, when Logan, after shedding abundance of tears, delivered to him the speech related by Mr. Jefferson in his "notes on the State of Virginia ;" that he. the deponent, told him that it was not Colonel Cresap who had murdered his relations, and although his son, Captain Michael Cresap, was with the party that killed a Shawanese chief and other Indians, yet he was not present when his relations were killed at Baker's, near the mouth of Yellow Creek, on the Ohio ; that this deponent, on his return to camp, delivered the speech to Lord Dunmore, and that the murders perpetrated as above were considered as ultimately the cause of the war of 1774, commonly called "Cresap's war."

Of this speech, or message, there are besides that of Jefferson, two versions, at least : one con- tained in a letter from Williamsburgh, Virginia, dated February 4, 1775, and preserved in the American Archives, volume I, p. 1020, and an- other, which was published in New York, on the 16th of February (same year), as an extract from Virginia. Jefferson adopted the latter. Probably Gibson noted down the expressions of Logan, as uttered by him in his simple English, and on his return to Lord Dunmore's camp, the officers, in taking copies, may have modified an occasional expression. The different versions are presnted for comparison :

LOGAN'S SPEECHI.

WILLIAMSBURGH, February 4, 1775.

"I appeal to any white man to say that he ever entered Logan's cabin but I gave him meat ; that he ever came naked but I clothed him.

HISTORY OF MUSKINGUM COUNTY, OHIO.

"In the course of the last war, Logan remained in his cabin an advocate for peace. I had such an affection for the white people that I was pointed at by the rest of my nation. I should have ever lived with them, had it not been for Colonel Cresap, who, last year, cut off in cold blood all the relations of Logan, not sparing wo- men and children. There runs not a drop of my blood in the veins of any human creature. This called on me for revenge. I have sought it, I have killed many, and fully glutted my revenge. I am glad that there is no prospect of peace on account of the nation ; but I beg you will not entertain a thought that anything I have said proceeds from fear ; Logan disdains the thought. He will not turn on his heel to save his life. Who is there to mourn for Logan? No one."

That dated New York, February 16, 1775, is so very similar that it is omitted ; another, credited to Jefferson, in 1781-2, is given :

" I appeal to any white man to say if he ever entered Logan's cabin hungry, and he gave him not meat ; if he ever came cold and naked, and he clothed him not. During the course of the last long and bloody war Logan remained 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 re- lations 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 called 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. He will not turn on his heel to save his life. Logan never felt fear. Who is there to mourn for Logan? Not one." Of this production Mr. Jefferson says :

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History of Muskingum County, Ohio ; with illustrations and biographical sketches of prominent men and pioneers, 1794, Part 6

Author: Everhart, J. F; Graham, A. A., Columbus, Ohio, pub Publication date: 1882 Publisher: [Columbus, O.] : F.J. Everhart & Co. Number of Pages: 600

Author: Everhart, J. F; Graham, A. A., Columbus, Ohio, pub
Publication date: 1882
Publisher: [Columbus, O.] : F.J. Everhart & Co.
Number of Pages: 600