History of Shelby County, Ohio, and representative citizens, Part 4

Author: Hitchcock, Almon Baldwin Carrington, 1838-1912
Publication date: 1913
Publisher: Chicago, Ill. : Richmond-Arnold Pub. Co. ; Evansville, Ind. : Unigraphic Inc.
Number of Pages: 980

USA > Ohio > Shelby County > History of Shelby County, Ohio, and representative citizens > Part 4

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In 1764 General Bradstreet, who was in command 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 southeast of the present town of Upper Sandusky. Here a treaty of peace was made with the chiefs and leading men of the Wyandots.

This peace was fairly observed until in 1774, the Wyandots, Shawanese, Delawares and Mingoes made an attack on Point Pleasant, where the Kanawha joins the Ohio. They had a force of over a thousand warriors, under com- mand of Cornstalk. General Lewis was in command of Point Pleasant with 1, 100 men. The fight continued all day the English loss being two colonels, five captains, three lieutenants and 100 soldiers. besides 140 wounded. The Indian loss must have been severe, as during the night they retreated across the Ohio river and returned to their homes. Just before the battle they were joined by Simon Girty, who had been a scout for the English. He was an efficient scout, but in some altercation with General Lewis, the latter struck him with a cane over the head, inflicting a deep gash. Girty threatened ven- geance, and escaped from the fort, joining the Indians, and in the attack on the fort was as savage and bitter and cruel as any Indian warrior could desire. He remained with his new friends and ever after made his home with the Shawanese. Delawares and Wyandots. He declared he had foresworn his white blood and assumed the garb of the Indians with their painted flesh and feathered headdress.

After the Americans and English had succeeded in driving out the French in 1763, England for years pursued an unjust policy toward the colonies, which eventually culminated in the Revolutionary war. In the east all manu- factures which interfered with England were prohibited or crippled by severe laws. All goods must be bought in England : all products raised in America must be sold to England alone, and forwarded on English vessels. The Eng- lish commercial policy also affected the great Northwest. The French, by their

HISTORY OF SHELBY COUNTY

explorations, and by their trading posts all over this great territory had built up a large business in furs, of which they had a monopoly. The English merchants secured this trade, and it was so vast and profitable they wanted it continued. As a result they petitioned the King and Parliament: "It does appear to us that the extension of the fur trade depends entirely on the Indians being undisturbed in the possession of their hunting grounds, and that all colonizing does, in its nature, and must in its consequences, opearte to the prejudice of that branch of commerce." So George Third issued a procla- mation declaring the new territory, the Great Northwest from the Ohio to the Lakes and from the Alleghenies to the Mississippi, royal domain, and pro- hibited further settlement in this vast territory, or the purchase of any part of it from the Indians. This was in 1774, and the English statesmen, foresee- ing a coming contest, attached this territory to the Province of Quebec, and Ohio, Indiana, Illinois, Michigan and Wisconsin were a part of Canada.

Eight years later the Province of Quebec was the danger point in the treaty of peace between England and the United States. The American com- missioners were Benjamin Franklin, John Adams, John Jay and Henry Laurens. Their imperative instructions were that the independence of the United States must be recognized. Other matters were minor. France had been the ally of the United States and the treaty must be satisfactory to that nation. France had received from Spain practically all west of the Missis- sippi river, and desired to have her rights recognized by England. Spain was with France, and the two secretly arranged with England that the north boundary of the United States should be the Ohio river, basing the claim on the ground that the Great Northwest was a part of the Province of Quebec, and there was no question that Canada was to remain English territory. In the early part of the treaty, while this agreemnet vas not definitely reached, matters were tending that way. Franklin, as minister to France, conducted the earlier negotiations, and later, when John Adams and John Jay arrived, the boundary came up. The English were insistent ; Vergennes, the French minister, favored the English, until finally Adams and Jay positively declared they would submit to no boundary except the lakes. Laurens and Franklin stood by them solidly, and it was over a year before England finally yielded the point, and Ohio and the Great Northwest became a part of the United States. England probably thought the territory of far less importance than it was, having relegated all that vast region to a great hunting ground, with no higher conception of its future use than the protecting and raising of fur- bearing animals. How different the views of John Jay, who speaking of this territory in congress in 1777, prophetically said: "Extensive wildernesses, now scarcely known or explored, remain yet to be cultivated; and vast lakes and rivers, whose waters have for ages rolled in silence to the ocean, are yet to hear the din of industry, become subservient to commerce, and boast delight- ful villas, gilded spires, and spacious cities rising on their banks."

On the breaking out of the Revolutionary war, the Wyandots and their neighbors at first saw no reason to take any hand in the contest. In the east the British had secured the assistance of the Six Nationals, the Mohawks being

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then the chief tribe, but by 1777 the English had succeeded in enlisting the Wyandots and other Ohio tribes on their side, and under British pay they made onslaughts on the western borders of the colony, attacking the settlers in Pennsylvania and Virginia. Many joined the British army, and a number of Wyandots joined the army of General Burgoyne, in New York state, but did little beyond burning a few houses of settlers, stealing their stock and murdering a number of the pioneers. In an excursion with Burgoyne into New Hampshire, a number of Wyandots were killed, and they blamed the British general for the loss, claiming the warriors were needlessly sacrificed. This, and the fact that Burgoyne endeavored to restrain their ferocity and cruelty, disgusted the Wyandots, and most of them returned to their home on the Sandusky; but still under the pay of the English, continued to harass the frontier, destroying, burning and murdering. The English had a trading- post at the Indian village of Sandusky, where settlement was made, and at this point nearly all the Indian tribes were paid for the scalps taken.

Their first expedition was in 1777. The renegade Girty was thoroughly conversant with affairs along the Ohio river, and at his suggestion 500 war- riors, Delawares, Wyandots and Shawanese, started on an expedition against Fort Henry, near where Wheeling now is, on the Ohio river. The British had supplied them with arms and ammunition, and the Indians made their way through the dense forests, along their trails, crossed the Ohio and sur- rounded the fort with its garrison of forty men, and a number of women and children. Col. David Sheppard was in command, and rumors had reached the fort that 500 warriors had started from the Sandusky region on some murdering expedition, destination unknown. On the evening of September 26, 1771, settlers reported Indians in war paint had been seen lurking in the neighborhood. Cabins were abandoned, and all sought safety in the fort. Colonel Sheppard sent out two men to reconnoitre ; one was killed and the other returned to the fort wounded; the colonel then sent out 14 men, and as they were proceeding cautiously down the river they fell into an ambush, and II were instantly killed, the others escaping in the dense forest. Hearing the firing, the colonel sent 12 more men to relieve the imperiled party; cight of these were promptly killed. The fighting force in the fort was now reduced to a dozen men. The Indians made constant attacks, but were as constantly driven back. It was during this engagement that, when the powder gave out, Elizabeth Zane bravely went to the storehouse, sixty yards away, and brought back the powder in safety. She volunteered for this service, saying that no man could be spared for this perilous trip under the direct fire of the enemy. Night coming on, the Indians retired until morning. During the night a dozen men arrived from a neighboring settlement, and succeeded in gaining entrance to the fort. In the morning 40 more rangers arrived, and the Indians now regarded it as useless to continue their assault on the fort. They therefore destroyed everything they could, set fire to the houses, and killed or carried off 300 head of cattle. They had killed 21 men, with several others wounded. Their own loss, however, was over a hundred. They returned to Sandusky with 21 scalps for which cash was paid by the British agent.

HISTORY OF SHELBY COUNTY

While the Wyandots were allies of the English, as well as the other tribes of Ohio, on an eastern branch of the Muskingum in Tuscarawas county were several hundred Moravian Indians, of the Delaware tribe, who constantly refused to take part in the war ; they had become Christian Indians, had three settlements in Tuscarawas county, and had cleared considerable land, devoted their time mostly to farming and kept up constant business relations with the Americans at Pittsburg, about 60 miles distant, which was the headquarters of the American forces in the west. They refused all the overtures and bribes of the British. Finally, in the fall of 1781, Colonel Elliott, of the British forces, who was stationed at Upper Sandusky, took with him two chiefs and 300 warriors, and marched to the Moravian settlements, their route being through Crawford, crossing the Sandusky at a point one mile south of the Tod township line, and passing through Bucyrus township in the direction of New Winchester and in a southeasterly direction toward the Kilbuck in Holmes county and on to the Tuscarawas settlements. The three Moravian towns, all on the Tuscarawas river, were Schonbrunn, two miles south of the present town of New Philadelphia, seven miles further south was Gnaden- hütten and five miles further Salem.

On reaching the Moravians the Indians urged their brethren to stand by them in their war against the Americans; the English colonel offered them presents, but the Moravians stood firm. Failing in peaceful persuasions the Indians insisted they should accompany them to the banks of the Sandusky. claiming they were too near Pittsburg, and the Wyandots were afraid they might ally themselves with the detested Americans. Expostulations were use- less and the peaceful Moravians were forced to leave their crops ungathered. and accompany their captors in the long and weary march to the banks of the Sandusky. The Moravians were taken to Sandusky and from there their missionaries were sent to Detroit as prisoners. Some writers place the Morav- ian winter quarters on the river southwest of Bucyrus, but Butterfield fixes it near the old Indian town, three miles southeast of the present town of Upper Sandusky. Here they passed the winter, suffering great hardships. as the Indians make no provision for the future, and the addition of several hundred to the Indian villages along the Sandusky was beyond their means of support. After a severe winter a number were allowed to return to their vil- lages to gather the crops of the fall previous. About 150 of them, men with their wives and children, made the journey to their former homes, and resumed their work on the clearings, dividing their force so as to look after all three of the villages.

While the Moravians had spent the winter suffering on the banks of the Sandusky the Wyandots had not been idle, but had made marauding expedi- tions on the settlers of Pennsylvania and Virginia, with their usual burning and killing.

The settlers of the upper Ohio and the Monongahela determined to admin- ister a lesson that would be a warning to the Indians, and a corps of 100 mounted men was organized, and under command of Colonel Williamson started for the Moravian towns. They knew the Moravians had spent the

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winter on the Sandusky, the point where all the brutal, murdering expeditions were organized; they knew they had again returned to their villages on the Tuscarawas. In what follows, the most lenient might concede they did not know the peaceful Indians had been taken there against their will, but this is not borne out by history. The rangers under Williamson reached Gnaden- hütten after a forced march of two days, and at this village found the Indians gathering corn on the west bank of the Tuscarawas. A boat was secured and sixteen of the men crossed the river, but found more Indians there than they had expected. Then the rangers certainly learned that their visit to San- dusky had been an enforced one, for they sympathized with them for the cruel treatment they had received and were assured of their friendship and that they had come to see in what way they could protect the Moravians. They further assured them that another expedition would come from the Sandusky region, and they would again receive the same cruel treatment, and that their friends at Pittsburg had advised them to go to that place where they would receive protection. Knowing the settlers of Pittsburg had always treated them with the greatest friendship, and being Christian Indians, they did not doubt what the men told them, and placed themselves under their protection. The trusting Indians also sent a messenger down the river to the village of Salem to notify the Indians there of the kindness of their new- found friends, urging them to join them at Gnadenhütten. They crossed the river with the rangers and gave their guns into their hands, after which they were ordered into houses and a guard placed around them. Colonel William- son sent a party of men down the river to the village of Salem, but on the way they met the Salem Moravians coming up the river to join their brethren at Gnadenhütten. The Salem Indians arrived and they, too, were deceived into giving up their arms after which they were imprisoned. Colonel Wil- liamson then called a council of war, and put the question for the men to decide, as to whether the Indians should be taken as prisoners to Fort Pitt (Pittsburg) or whether they should be put to death. There were 18 who favored the minor outrage of carrying them away as prisoners and 82 voted for immediate death.

No sympathy was manifested by the majority. They resolved to murder the whole of the Christian Indians in their custody. They were ordered to prepare for death. But the warning had been anticipated. Their firm belief in their new creed was shown forth in this sad hour of their tribulation, by religious exercises of preparation. The orisons of these devout people were already ascending to the throne of the Most High. The sound of the Christ- ian's hymn and the Christian's prayer found an echo in the surrounding woods, but no responsive feeling in the bosoms of their executioners. With gun, and spear, and tomahawk and scalping knife, the work of death pro- gressed in these slaughterhouses, till not a sigh or moan was heard to proclaim the existence of human life within. All perished save two. Two Indian boys escaped as by a miracle, to be witnesses in after times of the savage cruelty of the white man toward their unfortunate race.

After committing this cruel and cowardly act, the buildings containing

HISTORY OF SHELBY COUNTY

the mutilated bodies of the murdered Indians were set on fire, and the flames of the heavy logs soon reduced to crumbling ashes all that remained of the Christian Indians.

Having thus removed all traces of their inhuman act, the men started up the river for Schönbrunn to murder the Moravians there, but the Christian savages had learned of the sad fate of their companions and fled to the forest, and were beyond pursnit. The number murdered was 96; of these 62 were grown persons, about 42 men and 20 women; the remaining 34 were children.

It was only a part of the Moravians who had been murdered; the larger number were still on the banks of the Sandusky, and to this same retreat fled the 50 Christian Moravians who had escaped from Schönbrunn. Immediately on Williamson's return, arrangements were made for a new expedition to go to the fountain-head of all the trouble-the headquarters on the Sandusky -and administer a blow that would leave the settlers in peace. The massacre of the Moravians took place May 3, 1702, and on May 7 the decision was reached to attack Upper Sandusky, the seat of the Wyandots, not that the Wyandots alone were guilty of all the murdering and massacring, butcher- ing and scalping of the unfortunate settlers and their families, but because Upper Sandusky was the headquarters of the Wyandots, Ottawas, Delawares, and Shawanese, and here was their rendezvous, where they gathered to start on their raids. Volunteers to the number of 480 were secured, all mounted and well armed, all from two or three counties south of Fort Pitt. Monday, May 20, was the time set for their assembling and the place chosen was Mingo Bottom, on the west bank of the Ohio, about seventy-five miles below Pitts- burg, and about two miles below the present city of Steubenville. They began assembling on the 21st, and on the 24th the last man had reported. A vote was taken as to who should command the expedition, and Col. William Craw- ford received 235 votes, and Col. David Williamson, who had commanded the expedition against the Moravians, 230. Colonel Crawford was therefore selected as commander with Colonel Williams as senior major, and second in command. Besides the two commanding officers there were three other majors : Gladdis, McClelland and Bunton, with Daniel Leet as brigade major, and Dr. John Knight as surgeon. John Slover and Jonathan Zane accom- panied the expedition as gnides. There were 18 companies, the captains, as far as known, being McGeehan, Hoagland, Beeson, Munn, Ross, Ogle, Briggs. Craig, Ritchie, Miller, Bean, and Hood.

The Williamson expedition against the Moravians was a private affair of the settlers. The expedition against the Wyandots was a government affair, under direction of General Irvine, who commanded the western depart- ment of the United States, and Lieutenant Rose, a member of his staff, accom- panied as his representative.

Saturday morning, May 25, 1782, the expedition started for the Sandusky Plains, about 150 miles distant, but to avoid the Indian trails, so the savages would have no knowledge of the attack, their course was through the unbroken forest, to the Tuscarawas, on the banks of which were the destroyed Moravian towns, and it took them four days to cover the 60 miles, although Williamson's

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men, over the traveled route, had made it in two days when on their mission of murder. They encamped at the ruined town of Schönbrunn, and two offi- cers, reconnoitering, saw in the distance two Indian warriors, who had been spying on their movements. After a forced march through the wilderness of Holmes county, they encamped May 30, about ten miles south of the present site of Wooster, just south of the Wayne county line. From here they went almost due west, passing north of Odell's lake, and on to the Mohican, fol- lowing up the river until near where Mansfield now is they turned west and encamped on June Ist at Spring Mills, eight miles east of Crestline. The next day, June 2, about one o'clock, they entered Crawford county and continued west to the Sandusky river at the mouth of a small creek called Allen's Run, near the present town of Leesville. They reached the Sandusky river south of the Wyandot trail, which the Indians used on their excursions from the Sandusky towns east to Pittsburg. In the last five days they had made 85 miles, and were now about 25 miles due east of the Indian town. A little to the southwest were extensive plains reaching to their destination. Early on the morning of June 3d they entered the plains, and the open sunlight, after the long and dreary march through the dense woods, was a pleasing relief to all. Passing about four miles south of Bucyrus, they journeyed west to an Indian trail skirting the west side of the Sandusky which they followed into Wyandot county, and made their final encampment near the present town of Wyandot, within ten miles of their destination.

On reaching the old Indian town of Sandusky, on the east bank of the river, about three miles southeast of the present town of Upper Sandusky, they found it deserted. The officers and guides were astonished and a halt was called. The volunteers feared a mistake had been made and that there was no village short of Lower Sandusky ( Fremont ) 40 miles down the river. through a section known to be covered by roving bands of Indians, for they were now in the heart of the Indian country. The army had but five days' of provisions left, but it was decided to move forward in search of the Indians. They crossed the river to the west side, continuing along the trail up the west bank to the site of the present town of Upper Sandusky; they continued a mile further, with no sign of Indians and the troops became anxious, and for the first time expressed a desire to return home. Crawford promptly called a halt and a council of war. Colonel Crawford and Guide Zane both favored an immediate return, as further progress was dangerous, and the final decision was made to continue that day and if no Indians were discovered they would return. The march was continued, and the troops had gone but a short dis- tance, when one of the light-horse scouts, who in the open prairie were gen- erally a mile in advance, returned at full speed announcing the Indians were in front of them. The Volunteers were now enthusiastic and the whole army moved forward rapidly.

The Indians had kept trace of the army ever since it had left Mingo Bot- tom, and had sent warriors to the Shawanese, in the Miami valley, and to the Wyandots and Delawares on the Sandusky to prepare for an attack. The various tribes gathered and when Crawford left the Tuscarawas in a north-

HISTORY OF SHELBY COUNTY

westerly direction, it was known the Sandusky Indians were the objective point. Pomoacan, Wyandot chief, sent special messengers to Detroit, notify- ing DePeyster, the English commandant at that point, of the intended attack. DePeyster acted promptly, and started Butler's rangers, a mounted troop, to Lower Sandusky (Fremont) by boats to assist their allies ; special messengers were also sent by the Wyandots to the Shawanese on the Miami, and 200 warriors started on their march of 40 miles from Logan county to help their brethren. In the meantime the Delawares, under Pipe, had assembled 300 warriors at his town on both sides of the Tymochtee, about one and a half miles northeast of the present town of Crawfordsville, Wyandot county, near the place now marked by the monument erected on the site where Colonel Crawford was burned at the stake. Zhaus-sho-toh was the Wyandot war chief, and the village of Pomoacan, the "Half King," was five miles north- east of Upper Sandusky, in Crane township, on the Sandusky river. Here he had 400 warriors.

The Americans had advanced about two miles north of Upper Sandusky, and were one mile west of the river, when they met the enemy, the Dela- wares, being in the front line of battle, under Pipe, his assistants being the renegade Simon Girty and Chief Wingenund, the latter having joined the Delawares from his village about two and a half miles northwest of the present site of Crestline, Crawford county. The Delawares had taken posses- sion of a small grove called an "island," and from this they were promptly driven by the Americans. The Wyandots under Zhaus-sho-toh, with whom was the British Captain Elliott, came to the support of the Delawares. Elliott took command of both tribes, and the Delawares occupied the west and south sides of the grove, and the Wyandots the north and east. The firing began at four o'clock, and the battle lasted until dark. As the Indians exposed themselves when skulking through the grass they were picked off by the American sharpshooters. The day closed decidedly favorable to the Ameri- cans; their loss was five killed and 19 wounded. Indian losses were never known, but their killed and wounded far exceeded the Americans. Although the Americans were in full possession of the field, the Indians were not dis- pirited. Desultory firing was resumed at six o'clock in the morning and continued until noon, the Americans believing the Indians had not recovered from their defeat of the day previous, and plans were discussed by the Ameri- cans to attack the enemy in force: the Delawares were drawn up south of them and the Wyandots north.

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History of Shelby County, Ohio, and representative citizens, Part 4

Author: Hitchcock, Almon Baldwin Carrington, 1838-1912 Publication date: 1913 Publisher: Chicago, Ill. : Richmond-Arnold Pub. Co. ; Evansville, Ind. : Unigraphic Inc. Number of Pages: 980

Author: Hitchcock, Almon Baldwin Carrington, 1838-1912
Publication date: 1913
Publisher: Chicago, Ill. : Richmond-Arnold Pub. Co. ; Evansville, Ind. : Unigraphic Inc.
Number of Pages: 980