History of Sandusky County Ohio with Illustrations 1882, Part 12

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I soon discovered (says General Wayne, in his report of the battle), from the weight of the fire and extent of their lines, that the enemy were in full force in front, and in possession of their favorite ground, and endeavoring to turn our left flank. I therefore gave orders for the second line to advance and support the first, and directed Major-General Scott to gain and turn the right flank of the savages with the whole of the mounted volunteers, by a circuitous route. At the same time I ordered the front line to advance and charge with trailed arms and rouse the Indians from their cover at the point of the bayonet, and when up to deliver a close and well-directed fire on their backs, followed by a brisk charge so as not to give them time to load again. I also ordered Captain Campbell, who commanded the Legionary cavalry, to turn the left flank of the enemy next the river, and which afforded a favorable field for that corps to act in. All these orders were obeyed with spirit and promptitude; but such was the impetuosity of the charge by the first line of infantry, that the Indians and Canada militia and volunteers were driven from all their coverts in so short a time, that although

HISTORY OF SANDUSKY COUNTY.

every possible exertion was used by the officers of the second line of the legion, and by Generals Scott, Todd, and Barbee, of the mounted volunteers, to gain their proper positions, but part of each could get up in season to participate in the action; the enemy being driven in the course of an hour more than two miles through the thick wood already mentioned, by less than one-half their number. From every account the enemy amounted to two thousand combatants. The troops actually engaged against them were short of nine hundred. This horde of savages, with their allies, abandoned themselves to flight and dispersed with terror and dismay, leaving our victorious army in full and. quiet possession of the field of battle, which terminated under the influence of the guns of the British garrison. The bravery of every officer belonging to the army, from the generals down to the ensigns, merit my highest approbation. There were, however, some whose rank and situation placed their conduct in a very conspicuous point of view, and which I observed with pleasure and the most lively gratitude. Among these I must beg leave to mention Brigadier-General Wilkinson and Colonel Hamtramck, the commandants of the right and left wings of the legion, whose brave example inspired the troops. To these I must add Lieutenant Harrison, who, with Adjutant-General Major Mills, rendered the most essential service by communicating my orders in every direction, and by their conduct and bravery exciting the troops to press for victory.

The loss of the Americans in this action was thirty-three killed and one hundred wounded; that of the enemy was reported much greater, but the number is not given. It is said, however, the woods were strewn for a considerable distance with the dead bodies of the Indians and their white auxiliaries, the latter armed with British muskets and bayonets.

INCIDENTS OF THE BATTLE.

Contrary to the articles of peace between Great Britain and the United States in 1783, the British erected and garrisoned Fort Miami, on the Maumee River, on the present site of South Toledo. This was done within the acknowledged boundaries and jurisdiction of the United States, and no solution of the motive for the act but a determination on the part of the British to aid the Indians in their wars to drive the whites south of the Ohio River.

Wayne's troops had followed the retreating Indians under the guns of this fort, and expected to see them take refuge in it, but the gates were shut against them and the fort fired no gun. The day following the battle a spicy correspondence took place between Major Campbell, commander of the fort, and General Wayne, in which Major Campbell expressed his surprise that Wayne would deliberately insult his King and country by approaching so near the fort in a hostile attitude. Wayne replied, in substance, that he was no less surprised to find Campbell fortifying himself on American soil, and intimated that had the Indians taken refuge in the fort, or had a gun been fired from it, he could not have restrained his troops from an assault which would have carried it. In this sharp dispute both Wayne and Campbell seem to have been restrained from striking a blow which would have rekindled the war between Great Britain and the United States, and the question was referred to diplomacy between the two governments.

At the time Captain Campbell, under Wayne, was endeavoring to turn the left flank of the enemy; three Indians, hemmed in by the cavalry and infantry, plunged into the river and endeavored to swim to the opposite side. Two negroes of the army on the opposite bank concealed themselves behind a log to intercept them. When within shooting distance one of them shot the foremost Indian through the head. The other two took hold of him to drag him to the shore, when the second negro fired and killed another. The remaining Indian, being now in shoal water, endeavored to tow the two dead bodies to the bank. In the meantime the first negro had reloaded, and firing upon the survivor, mortally wounded him. On approaching them, the negroes judged from their striking resemblance and

HISTORY OF SANDUSKY COUNTY.

devotion that they were brothers. After scalping them they let their bodies float down stream.

Another circumstance shows with what obstinacy the conflict was waged by in- dividuals of both armies. A soldier who had become detached a short distance from the army, met a single Indian in the woods, when they attacked each other, the soldier with his bayonet, and the Indian with his tomahawk. Two days after they were found dead, the soldier with his bayonet in the body of the Indian-the Indian with his tomahawk in the head of the soldier.

Several months after the battle of the Fallen Timbers a number of Pottawatomie Indians arrived at Fort Wayne, where they expressed a desire to see "The Wind" as they called Wayne. On being asked for an explanation of the name, they replied that at the battle of the 20th of August he was exactly like a hurricane, which drives and tears everything before it.

General Wayne was a man of most ardent impulses, and in the heat of action apt to forget that he was a general and not a private soldier. When the attack on the Indians who were concealed behind the fallen timbers was commenced by ordering the regulars up, the late General Harrison, then being Lieutenant with the title of Major, addressing his superior, said:

General Wayne, I am afraid you will go into the fight yourself and forget to give me the necessary field orders. Perhaps I may, replied Wayne, and if I do, recollect that the standing order for the day is, Charge the d-d rascals with the bayonet.

As a further illustration of Wayne's im- petuosity in battle, which Harrison seemed to understand, the writer will give an inci- dent related to him by his father, who heard the circumstance from one who was in the battle. The narrative was briefly, that when General Wayne saw his regulars

obey his order to charge with the bayonet and shoot afterwards, the General, seeing the promptness and effect with which his order was obeyed, became so excited that he was about to dash personally into the conflict and do duty as a common soldier; his attendants, seeing a strange fire in his countenance, and that he reined up his horse for a dash, two men seized his reins near the bridle bits, and held the bounding, foaming horse, while Wayne, grinding his teeth and driving his spurs into the horse's flanks, frothing at the mouth with rage, hissed from between his grinding teeth, "Let me go, d-n them; let me go! Give it to them, boys," etc., etc. This incident gave him the appellation of "Mad" Anthony, a name which ever after struck terror to the Indians, collectively and in- dividually.

After the battle, an Indian being asked if he did not think General Wayne a good general and great man, replied, "He no man, he Devil." No doubt the Indians, after the battle of the Fallen Timbers, entertained a superstitious dread of "Mad" Anthony, which exercised a powerful influence over them in making treaties of peace and grants of land afterwards.

We quote further from General Wayne's report of the battle. He says:

We remained three days and nights on the banks of the Maumee, in front of the field of battle, during which time all the houses and cornfields were consumed and destroyed for a considerable distance, both below and above Fort Miami, as well as within pistol shot of the garrison, who were compelled to remain tacit spectators to this general devastation and conflagration, among which were the houses, stores, and property of Colonel McKee, the British Indian agent, and principal stimulator of the war now (then) existing between the United States and the savages. The army returned to this place (Fort Defiance) on the 27th of August, by easy marches, laying waste the villages and cornfields for about fifty miles on each side of the Maumee. There remains (he says) yet a great number of villages and a great quantity of corn to be consumed or destroyed, upon Auglaize and Maumee, above this place, which will be effected in a few days.

HISTORY OF SANDUSKY COUNTY.

General Wayne, after strengthening his works at Fort Defiance, on the 14th of September established Fort Wayne, now in Indiana, of which, on the 22d of October, 1794, he placed in charge Colonel Hamtramck, who so distinguished himself in the battle of the Fallen Timbers. Meantime, the troops suffered greatly from sickness and want of provisions, such as flour, salt, and whiskey. Whiskey sold at eight dollars a gallon, and salt was held at six dollars a pint. THE LEGION RETURNS TO GREENVILLE.

The legion began to march back to Greenville on the 28th of October, 1794, the volunteers, who had become dissatisfied and troublesome, having been started for that place on the 12th of that month for dismissal.

The Indians were terribly defeated and disorganized by the battle of Fallen Timbers. Their crops and provisions for the coming winter were destroyed, and starvation was before them and they would have promptly made sincere overtures for a treaty of peace but for British influence, which was at once brought, to bear against such a movement.

BRITISH EFFORTS' TO PREVENT A TREATY.

Governor Simcoe, of Canada, Colonel McKee and Captain Brant, met at Fort Miami September 30 of that year, and at once began plotting to prevent a treaty of peace. They invited the hostile chiefs Blue Jacket, Backongelies, the Little Turtle, Captain Johnny, and other chiefs of the Delawares, Miamis, Shawnees, Tawas, and Pottawatomies, to meet at the mouth of Detroit River about the first of October, 1794, and together they set off for that place, about eighteen miles below Detroit.

It appears that about the 10th of October the Indians did meet the British at Big Rock, and were advised that their

griefs would be laid before the King of England, and, in connection with this, as General Wayne learned from the friendly Wyandots, Governor Simcoe insisted that the Indians should not listen to any terms of peace from the Americans, but to propose a truce or suspension of hostilities until spring; that a grand council would then be held of all the warriors and tribes of Indians for the purpose of compelling the Americans to cross the Ohio. He also advised every nation to sign a deed or conveyance of all their lands on the west side of the Ohio River to the King of Great Britain, in trust for the Indians, so as to give the British a pretext or color for assisting them in case the Americans refused to abandon all their posts and possessions on the west side of that river, and which the Indians should immediately warn them to do after they, the Indians, had assembled in force in the spring, and then call upon the British to guarantee the lands thus ceded in trust, and to make a general attack upon the frontiers at the same time; that the British would be prepared to attack the Americans also in every quarter, and would compel them to cross the Ohio and give up the lands to the Indians.

The wily Captain Brant also told the Indians to keep a good heart and, be strong to do as their father (Simcoe) had advised them, and he would return home with his warriors and come again early in the spring with an additional number so as to have the whole summer before them to fight, kill, and pursue the Americans, who could not stand against such numbers as would be brought against them; that he had been always successful and would ensure them victory. But he, would not attack the Americans at this time, as it would only put them upon their guard and bring them upon the Indians in this quarter during the winter; therefore

HISTORY OF SANDUSKY COUNTY.

he advised them to amuse the Americans with a prospect of peace until they could collect in force, and fall upon them early in the spring and when least expected. That, agreeably to this plan, the hostile tribes would frequently send

flags with propositions of peace during the winter to put the Americans off their guard.

The British then made large presents to the Indians, and continued from that time to furnish them with provisions from Colonel McKee's new stores at the mouth of the Miami of Lake Erie (Maumee River), where all the Indians whose towns and property had been destroyed by Wayne's army were located in tents and huts, and where those who promised to sign away their lands and in all respects comply with the British proposition, were kept.

WAYNE COUNTERACTS THE BRITISH INFLUENCE.

Several causes operated to counteract the British influence and finally to prevent the execution of their plans. First, the fort at Maumee had been built and garrisoned by the British while at peace with the United States, for the express purpose of aiding and protecting the Indians in their war against the Americans. The Indians, in good faith, believed that if they should be compelled to retreat before Wayne's army they would find shelter, and protection in Fort Miami; but when they did retreat and were pursued under the guns of the fort, they found the gates shut and not a gun fired for their protection. A large part of the Indians who saw this treacherous. act of Major Campbell, the British commander, lost faith in all British promises of protection and assistance, and would not sincerely listen to subsequent overtures. Thus the influence of the British over the Indians was broken by their own perfidy. If Major Campbell

had fired a gun at Wayne's forces the act would have been cause for another war between the United States and Great Britain; or if he had opened his fort to protect the enemies of the United States, the same result might have followed. The responsibility for such an act was too grave to be hastily incurred, and beside this, Wayne was at his gates with a victorious army, which if once assailed by the British was able to, and would have taken good care that that fort and those within would not again make aggressive war on the United States. These powerful reasons compelled him to an act of treachery to the Indians which finally brought an end to the war.

Another cause was, that while the Indians were suffering under the sore distress which before the fight Wayne plead with them to avoid, by meeting and preparing for peace, he again made and kept before them the same kind offer of peace and protection.

Another, and perhaps the most potent of all considerations which operated to destroy British influence over the Indians at this time, was a superstitious fear of "Mad" Anthony. They had found his cunning superior to their own; they realized that he thoroughly understood their character and mode of warfare, that he could not be baffled or deceived by any of their devices; they witnessed his personal bravery and his awful fierceness and passion in battle; they were starving and dying under the consequences of his wrath, and their superstitious minds clothed him in many instances with supernatural powers.

The circumstances above mentioned so operated on the minds of the Indians that on the 28th and 29th days of December, 1794, proffers of peace were made by the chiefs of several tribes. Messages were sent to Colonel Hamtramck at Fort Wayne, from the Chippewas, Ottawas, Sacs, Eel Rivers, Kickapoos, Kaskaskias, Pottawatomies,

HISTORY OF SANDUSKY COUNTY.

and Miamis. The result of these overtures was a meeting of the chiefs and sachems of the above named tribes, and three other tribes, namely: the Delawares, Wyandots, and Shawnees, with General Wayne at Greenville, en the 24th of January, 1795. At this meeting preliminary articles for a treaty of peace were entered into. The basis of the intended treaty was that hostilities should cease and prisoners be exchanged.

TREATY OF GREENVILLE.

About the 16th of June, 1795, the tribes began to gather at Greenville to make a complete treaty of peace. They had become convinced that they could not successfully resist the American arms, and General Wayne dictated the terms of the treaty, although there was much debate, and at times the Indians manifested much angry excitement while talking of their wrongs. But while General Wayne knew he had the tribes in his power, and could compel them to almost any terms, he was eminently just and humane in his demands. The conference lasted until the 3rd day of August, when the treaty was engrossed and signed.

By this treaty the Indians ceded to the United States small parcels of land, evi- dently wisely selected by Wayne for military posts, covering most of the advantageous points for such purpose in various parts of the Northwestern Territory, and stretching with intervals from Lake Huron eastward to Lower Sandusky (now Fremont). "Two miles square at the lower rapids of the Sandusky River," is the language of the treaty as to this parcel of land. Excepting the Maumee and Western Reserve road land, this two miles square was the first land within the present limits of Sandusky county ceded by the Indians to the United States. The tract was afterwards surveyed by the United States and the

lines of that survey are now the boundary lines of the city of Fremont.

In this treaty the United States engaged to protect the Indians against the aggressions of other nations, and also in the enjoyment of their other lands. The closing articles are as follows:

ARTICLE 6. The Indians or United States may remove and punish intruders on Indian lands.

ARTICLE 7. Indians may hunt within ceded lands.

ARTICLE 8. Trade shall be opened in substance. as by the provisions of the treaty of Fort Harmar.

ARTICLE 9. All injuries shall he referred to law, not privately avenged, and all hostile plans known to either shall be revealed to the other party.

ARTICLE 10. All previous treaties are annulled.

TITLE TO OTHER LANDS; TREATY OF MAUMEE.

The title to the other lands in the Northwest, including Sandusky county, had first been claimed by France on the ground of discovery by the pioneer Jesuits sent by the church of that Nation. But in the war between England and France about the possessions, preceding the Revolutionary War, England had obtained all the title France had. The United States, by the treaty of Paris in 1783, after the Revolution, had obtained the British title to all the vast Northwestern Territories. But the red men were in possession, and each country claimed subject to the Indian title, and each in succession undertook to protect the Indians in the enjoyment of these great hunting grounds. The United States held them, therefore, subject to the same encumbrance. Wayne's treaty of Greenville, August 3, 1795, recognized the rights of the Indians as the rightful owners of the soil. Therefore it was only by treaty or purchase that the United States could honorably obtain title to the vast domain. To effect this, many treaties and purchases have been made at different times and places. To mention all of these would be foreign to the object of this

HISTORY OF SANDUSKY COUNTY.

work. But in giving a history of our land titles in Sandusky county, which shall be satisfactory to the conscience of the present enlightened occupants of the land, it seems proper here to state the following further facts in the chain of title. About seventeen years after the treaty of Greenville above mentioned, the war commonly called the War of 1812, between the United States and Great Britain was declared.

In this struggle for "free trade and sailors' rights," as Henry Clay denominated it in his great speech, the British hired and enlisted all the Indian tribes of the Northwest they could induce to join them. Under the lead of Tecumseh and the Prophet, his brother, a powerful force of Indians joined the British in that war, and made it, on the frontier settlements, most bloody and cruel. At the battle of Fort Stephenson, August 2, 1813, there were, according to history, five hundred British and eight hundred Indians. The Indians formed a large part of the forces encountered at Fort Meigs, at Tippecanoe, and at the battle of the Thames, in Canada, where Tecumseh fell and General Harrison obtained a decisive victory, October 5, 1813. These two victories, with Perry's victory on Lake Erie, September 10, 1813, virtually settled the War of 1812, which was closed by General Jackson's victory at New Orleans, January 8, 1815, although virtually settled before the last named battle. After the close of the War of 1812, which brought a cessation of Indian hostilities, the white settlers began to push for new homes in the West, and it was difficult to keep the peace between the white pioneers and the Indians, as the former often encroached upon the lands of the latter. The necessity for extinguishing the title of the Indians to Western lands became daily more urgent and apparent to the United States Government.

To accomplish this a commission was appointed on behalf of the United States, consisting of Lewis Cass and Duncan McArthur, who met the chiefs and sachems of the tribes occupying the Northwestern Territory, at Maumee, and, after due deliberation, a treaty was there signed on the 29th day of September, 1817. By the agreement there made the United States purchased from the Indians all Northwestern Ohio, except a few parcels reserved by some of the tribes. Among these reservations was one of the Seneca tribe, of forty thousand acres, located east of the Sandusky River, and on the south part of Sandusky and north part of Seneca counties, as since surveyed and named.

The Senecas sold this reservation and moved West about the year 1832. This reservation was soon after surveyed and sold by the United States, and is now a wealthy portion of the counties in which the lands were situated.

The other lands were surveyed and put in market about 1820, and all have since been sold to individuals, who directly or indirectly derive their titles from the United States, with the exception of two parcels.

THE WHITTAKER AND THE WILLIAMS RES- ERVATIONS.

These two reservations were located nearly three miles north of Fremont, the Whittaker on the west and the Williams on the east side of and both bounded by the Sandusky River. The persons who held these reserves in fee simple were not to sell the land unless consent of the President of the United States should be first obtained.

The Whittaker Reserve, originally con- taining twelve hundred and eighty acres, long since passed to purchasers, and is now owned by several persons in distinct and separate parcels.

The Williams Reserve, of one hundred

HISTORY OF SANDUSKY COUNTY.

and sixty acres, is still occupied by de- scendants of the original owner.

There is an interesting narrative con- nected with the last two reservations, which will be found in a sketch of the Whittaker family in another part of this history.

Thus we have traced the general title to the lands in Sandusky county from the aborigines to the United States, and from the United States the present owners have derived their title, excepting the Williams Reserve, and Maumee and Western Reserve Road, and the lands given for its construction, which latter will form the subject of another chapter.

SURVEYS.

The first surveying in this then wilderness was done by William Ewing, Deputy Surveyor, in 1807, who surveyed the reser- vation, or rather grant, by the Indians at Greenville to the United States. The two miles Square was then by him divided into sections, as other lands were surveyed, but afterwards, in 1816, the reservation was divided into tracts, running from the river each way to the line of the two-miles square: This method of subdivision did not, however, include , the whole square. The northeast part was then surveyed into in-lots and out-lots for city purposes, and as such put on sale by the United States. This survey was called the town of Croghansville, (pronounced Crawnsville,) and now forms a part of the city of Fremont.

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History of Sandusky County Ohio with Illustrations 1882, Part 12

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