USA > Ohio > Ohio annals : Historic events in the Tuscarawas and Muskingum Valleys, and in other portions of the state of Ohio > Part 9
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On the same day that the above letter was written, some whites killed several Indians, a short distance above Wheel- ing, and those who escaped fled to the Delaware towns for protection, at the same time threatening vengeance.
At a meeting held with the Indians at Pittsburgh, the 29th of June, 1774.
" Present : Captain Aston, Major McCulloch, Captain Crawford, Mr. Valen Crawford, Captain Nevill, Mr. Edward Cook, Mr. John Steveson, Rev. Mr. Whiteaker, Mr. Joseph Wells, Mr. James Innis, Mr. Kneas Mackey, Mr. Joseph Simmons; with a number of the inhabitants and traders.
"Indians : Captain White Eyes, Weyandahila, Captain Johnny, with sundry other young men.
"Captain White Eyes first informed us that he had re- turned from transacting the business which he had been sent upon by his brethren, the English, and that he now had the satisfaction to tell us that he had succeeded in his negotiations with all those tribes of the several nations of whom he had since seen and conferred with upon the un- happy disturbances which unfortunately arose this spring between the foolish people of both parties; and that he had found all nations fully disposed to adhere to their an- cient friendship and the advice of their wise men."
Here he delivered a paper from the chiefs of the Dela- wares, containing as follows:
"NEW COMERSTOWN, June 21, 1774. - Brethren: When the late unhappy disturbances happened, you desired us to be strong and to speak to the other tribes of Indians to hold fast the chain of friendship subsisting between the English and them. We now inform you that we sent for our
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uncles, the Wyandots, and our grandchildren, the Shawa- nese, and also the Cherokees, and we have desired them to be strong and to inform all other nations, and hold fast on the chain which our grandfathers made, and you may de- pend our king still continues to go on in that good work.
" As things now seem to have a good prospect, and peace likely to be restored again, brothers, we desire you to be strong; and also, on your parts, to hold fast the chain of friendship, as you may remember when it was made it was agreed that even the loss of ten men on either side should not weaken it. If for the future we are all strong and brighten the chain of friendship, our foolish young men will not have it in their power to disturb it. We can not inform you any more of our grandchildren, the Shawanese, than that they are gone, and intend soon going to Fort Pitt, to hear of the disturbances that had happened between your foolish people and theirs, when you will then hear from their own mouths what they have to say.
" Brothers : As things now seem to be easy, and all the nations have now agreed to hold fast the chain of friend- ship, and make their young men sit quiet, we desire yon to consider of what you have to say when our grandchil- dren, the Shawanese come to speak to you. The head men of the Shawanese are gone to Waketomica, and intend to send their king up to Fort Pitt, that he may himself hear what his brothers, the English, have to say.
" King Newcomer, Neolige,
" White Eyes, Killbuck,
" Thomas MeKee, Wm. Anderson,
" Epaloind, Simon Girty.
"To George Croghan, A. McKee and J. Conolly, Esq."
New Comerstown appears at that day to have been a ren- dezvous as well for noted white men as Indians. McKee, Anderson and Simon Girty, whose names are attached above, were whites, and we notice the fact that while Zeis- berger and Heckewelder at Schoenbrunn and Gnadenhutten were civilizing the Delaware Indians, the other Indians at
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New Comerstown were making savages of white men. Girty, McKee and Anderson were of Irish birth, their par- ents having settled along the Susquehanna at an early day.
Jonathan Alder, who knew Girty, says he was a friend to many prisoners, and that he knew of Girty having pur- chased several white boys from the Indians, and sent them to the British to be educated.
Heckewelder, in his narrative, gives the following ver- sion of the troubles of 1774, in the Tuscarawas valley :
" The year 1774 was a year of trial to the Indian congre- gations, on account of a war which broke out between the people of Virginia, and the Senecas and Shawanese tribes of Indians, in which, as it became well known, the white people were the aggressors. Of these latter, a number were settled on choice spots of land, on the south side of the Ohio River, while the Indians dwelt on the north side, then their territory. The sale of land below the Kanawah River had opened a wide field for speculation. The whole country on the Ohio River had already drawn the attention of persons from the neighboring provinces, who, generally forming themselves into parties, would rove through the country in search of land, either to settle on or for specu- lation ; and some, careless of watching over their conduct, or destitute of humanity, would join a rabble (a class of people generally met on the frontiers), who maintained that to kill an Indian was the same as killing a bear or a buffalo, and would fire on Indians that came across them by the way; nay, more, would decoy such as lived across the river to come over for the purpose of joining them in hilarity, and when these complied, they fell on them and murdered them.'
Heckewelder continues :
"It is indescribable how enraged the relations of the murdered became on seeing such abominable acts con- mitted without cause, and even by some white men who always pretended to be their friends. The cries of the rela- tions of the sufferers soon reached the ears of the respec-
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tive nations to whom they belonged, and who quickly resolved to take revenge on the long knives; (for, said they) ' they are a barbarous people.' Some, however, con- sidering the difficulty of meeting the perpetrators, proposed killing every white man in their country, until they should believe themselves amply revenged for the valuable lives lost by the long knife men (Virginians). Nothing could equal the rage of the Senecas, in particular, and it was impossi- ble to foresee where the matter would end. Parties after par- ties came on, the missionaries had to keep within their houses, the enraged Indians insisted that every able man should do his utmost to take revenge. They kept on the look ont for traders, to kill them, but these had already generally fled the country, while some were taken under protection by friendly Shawanese Indians, who afterward conducted them safely to Pittsburgh. These good people however, oh! shameful to relate! were, on their return, waylaid by some of those white vagabonds, fired upon, and one man shot in the breast, in which situation he, with his wound bleeding, fortunately reached Schoenbrunn, where it was dressed, and all possible attention paid him.
" A Mr. Jones, who followed trading, and was at the time coming with two men in a canoe up the Muskingum, being ignorant of what had happened, was happily apprised of his danger, and the risk he was running, by an In- dian woman, who discovering him, advised him, without a moment's delay, to leave the canoe and take the woods direet for New Comerstown, where he would be safe. On the second day of their traveling in this manner, having accidentally hit upon the path leading to the Shawanese towns, at Waketameki, one of Jones' men, named Camp- bell, feeling himself so fatigued by traveling in the woods, declared he would not leave the path again, and from which resolution he could not be persuaded. Scarcely had these two men got to the ridge when they heard the scalp yell in the direction they supposed the man to be. The fact was, a large party of Senecas, relations to those who had
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been murdered on the Ohio, and now on their way to Waketameki, meeting this man, murdered him, and in their rage cut up the body and stuck the pieces on the bushes, marching off in triumph. Captain White Eyes, who lived some distance from the path, hearing the yell, run instantly in that direction, where he found the man- gled body, which he collected and buried. The party, however, on returning the next day and finding what had been done, tore up the grave, and scattered the pieces at a greater distance. White Eyes, now on the watch, discov- ering what they were doing, repaired to the spot a second time, and succeeding in finding every part of the mangled body, carefully dug a grave in a more secure place, and interred the whole.
"Next, a Mr. Duncan, well known to almost every In- dian in the parts, was sent out from Pittsburgh, to endeavor to procure from the enemy a cessation of hostilities un- til government could hold a conference with them. But before he reached Waketameki, having Captain White Eyes for his conductor, he was fired upon, and had a very narrow escape. The enemy now renewed their threats against the Delawares, declaring that if they did not join in the conflict they should pay for it.
" A report being in circulation that the governor of Vir- ginia was marching troops against the enemies' towns on the Scioto and Muskingum, and the inimical Indians hav- ing, for the purpose of fighting them, all moved westward of the Christian Indian towns, it was thought a proper time to conduct the missionary Rothe, with his wife and child, to a place of more safety, while the other missionaries were determined to hold out to the last. Accordingly the former were taken to Pittsburgh, from whence they proceed- ed to Bethlehem; while those remained, together with the Christian Indians, who were holding themselves in readi- ness to depart and proceed up the river to Cuyahoga should the Virginia troops be beaten, which, however, was not the case, for after the battle at or near the great Kanawah, the
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enemy sued for peace, promising to deliver up all the pris- oners in their possession. In the course of the expedition the Shawanese towns at Waketameki had been destroyed by the white troops, while the orders given by their com- manders were, not to pass through any of the Christian Indian towns, nor in any manner to disturb those Indians.
"On the joyful news of peace being concluded between the contending parties, the Christian Indians set apart the 6th day of November as a day of thanksgiving and prayer, which was celebrated with solemnity, offering up thanks and praises to the Lord for his gracious protection.
" The war being now ended, which, although of short duration, was dreadful in its nature for the time it lasted, the general wish of the Christian Indians was that a dur- able peace might follow.
"In other respects this year (1774) had been remarkable to the Christian Indians. First, the chiefs of the nation, both on the Muskingum and at Cuscheushke, had unitedly agreed and declared that the brethren should have full liberty to preach the gospel to the nation wherever they chose, and this resolution they also made publicly known. And, secondly, these seeing that their friends and relations pursued agriculture, and kept much cattle, they enlarged the tract of land first set apart for them, by moving their people off to a greater distance, and consulting their uncles, the Wyandots, on the subject (they being the na- tion from whom the Delawares had originally received the land), these set apart, granted, and confirmed all that coun- try lying between Tuscarawas (old town) and the great bend below New Comerstown, a distance of thirty miles on the river, and including the same to the Christian In- dians. Two large belts of wampum were on this occasion delivered by the Wyandots and the chiefs of the Delaware nation to the Christian Indians, who in return thanked them for the gift, both verbally and by belts and strings of wampum.
"The peace and rest enjoyed by the Indian congregation
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throughout the year 1775 was favorable to visitors, who came in numbers to hear the gospel preached, so that the chapel at Schoenbrunn, although large, was too small to contain them. The heathen preacher, Wangomend, had also in this year come on from Goschgoshink, to see if he could succeed in propagating his foolish doctrines, but the Indian brethren bid him go to their children and learn of them.
"Toward the fall of this year two valuable, worthy, and exemplary national assistants departed this life-the one John Papunhank, a Delaware, and the other Joshua, of the Mohican tribe. Both were, at their respective places, wardens of the congregation, the former at Schoenbrunn, and the latter at Gnadenhutten. Joshua was one of the first Indians baptised by the brethren in 1742."
LEGEND OF THE WHITE WOMAN, AND NEW COM- ERSTOWN.
"Near the junction of the Killbuck and Walhonding rivers, a few miles north-west of the present Coshocton, lived, as early as 1750, Mary Harris, a white woman. She had been captured in one of the colonies, by the Indians, between 1730 and 1740, and was then a girl verging into womanhood. Her beauty captivated a chief, who made her his wife in the Indian fashion of that day.
" The Indian tribes were being crowded back from the castern colonies, and the tribe of Custaloga had retired from place to place before the white frontier men, until about 1740 it found a new hunting ground in this valley, where the white woman became one of the inhabitants with her warrior, and where they raised a wigwam which formed the nucleus of an Indian town near the forks of the stream above named. Mary Harris had been sufficiently
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long with the Indians to become fascinated with their no- madie life and entered into all its romantic avenues, follow- ing Eagle Feather, her husband, to all the buffalo, elk and bear hunts in the valley, and whenever he went off with a war party to take a few scalps, she mixed his paint and laid it on, and plumed him for the wars, always putting up with her own hands a sufficiency of dried venison and parched corn for the journey. She was especially care- ful to polish with soap-stone his 'little hatchet,' always, however, admonishing him not to return without some good long-haired scalps for wigwam parlor ornaments and chignons, such as were worn by the first class of Indian ladies along the Killbuck. So prominent had she become that the town was named 'The White Woman's Town,' and the river from thence to the Muskingum was called in honor of her, 'The White Woman's River.'
" In 1750, when Christopher Gist was on his travels down the valley hunting out the best lands for George Wash- ington's Virginia Land Company, he stopped some time at White Woman's Town, and enjoyed its Indian festivities with Mary Harris, who told him her story; how she liked savage warriors ; how she preferred Indian to white life, and said the whites were a wicked race and more cruel than the red man.
"In her wigwam, the white woman was the master spirit, and Eagle Feather was ignored, except when going to war, or when she desired to accompany him on his hunting expeditions, or was about to assist at the burning of some poor captive, on which occasions she was a true squaw to him, and loved him much. All went along as merrily as possible until one day Eagle Feather came home from be- yond the Ohio with another white woman, whom he had captured, and who he intended should enjoy the felicities of Indian life on the Killbuck with Mary in her wigwam. She, however, did not see happiness from that stand point, and forthwith the advent of 'The New Comer,' as Mary called her, into that home, made it, as Pomeroy used to
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say, 'red hot' for Eagle Feather all the time, her puritan idea of the marital overtopping the Indian idea of domes- tic virtue. Hence, Eagle Feather, whenever he tendered any civilities to the 'new comer,' encountered from Mary all the frowns and hair-raising epithets usually applied by white women to white men of our day under similar sur- roundings, and he became miserable and unhappy. Fail- ing to appreciate all this storming around the wigwam, he reminded Mary that he could easily kill her; that he had saved her life when captured; had always provided her bear and deer meat to eat, and skins of the finest beasts to lie upon, and in return she had borne him no pappooses, and to provide for her shortcomings in this respect he had brought the 'new comer' home to his wigwam to make all things even again, as a chief who died without young braves to succeed him would soon be forgotten. So say- ing he took the new captive by the hand, and they depart- ed to the forest to await the operation of his remarks on Mary's mind. Returning at night, and finding her asleep on her buffalo-skins, he lay down beside her as if all were well, at the same time motioning the 'new comer' to take a skin and lie down in the corner.
"He was soon asleep, having in his perturbed state of mind partaken of some whisky saved from the last raid in Virginia. On the following morning he was found with his head split open, and the tomahawk remaining in the skull-erack, while the 'new comer' had fled. Mary, sim- ulating, or being in ignorance of the murder, at once aroused 'The White Woman's Town' with 'her screams. The warriors were soon out at her wigwam, and compre- hending the situation, at once started in pursuit of the flee- ing murderess, whom they tracked to the Tuscarawas ; thence to an Indian town near by, where they found her. She was claimed as a deserter from 'The White Woman's Town,' and, under the Indian code, liable to be put to death, whether guilty of the murder or not. She was taken back while Gist was at the town, and he relates in his journal
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that after night a white woman captive who had deserted, was put to death in this manner: 'She was set free and ran off some distance, followed by three Indian warriors, who, overtaking her, struck her on the side of the head with their tomahawks, and otherwise beat and mutilated the body after life was extinct, then left it lying on the ground. Andrew Burney, a blacksmith at 'The White Woman's Town,' obtained and buried the body.
" Mary Harris insisted that the 'new comer' killed her husband with his own hatchet, in revenge for being brought into captivity, while she, as tradition gives it, alleged that Mary did the wicked work out of jealousy, and intended dispatching her also, but she was defeated in her project by the flight of 'new comer.' Be that as it may, Eagle Feather was sent to the spirit-land for introducing polyga- my among white ladies in the valley, and as to the 'new comer,' the town to which she fled was thence forward called 'The New Comer's Town' by the Indians as early as 1755. When Netawatwes, chief of the Delawares, took up his abode there about 1760, he retained the name, it corresponding with his own in English. When Colonel Boquet, in 1764, marched down the valley and deposed Netawatwes, he retained the name on his map. When Governor Penn, of Pennsylvania, sent messages to the In- dians in 1774, he retained the name in his official paper. When Brodhead, in 1780, marched down to Coshocton, he called it by the same name. In 1827 the good old Nicholas Neighbor, when he laid it off in lots, saw that it would pay him to retain the old name, and did so.
" Mary Harris married again, had children, and removed west about the time Pipe Wolf's tribe removed to Sandusky, in 1778-9. After that she became oblivious in history ; but the river from Coshocton to the mouth of Killbuck is still called 'The White Woman's River.'"
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THE REVOLUTION-PIPE AND WHITE EYES.
The American colonies having a congress, in 1775, ap- pointed commissioners to convene the chief's of the western Indians at Pittsburgh, for the purpose of explaining the dispute between the English government and the colonies, and to enlist the tribes on the side of the latter. Hecke- welder relates that after the chiefs of the Delawares re- turned to the Tuscarawas, they proceeded to explain the cause of the dispute to their tribe, and did it as follows:
"Suppose a father had a little son whom he loved and indulged while young, but growing up to be a youth, be- gan to think of having some help from him; and making. up a small pack, he bid him carry it for him. The boy cheerfully takes this pack up, following his father with it. The father finding the boy willing and obedient, continues in this way; and as the boy grows stronger, so the father makes the pack in proportion larger; vet as long as the boy is able to carry the pack, he does so without grumb- ling. At length, however, the boy having arrived at man- hood, while the father is making up the pack for him, in comes a person of an evil disposition, and, learning who was to be the carrier of the pack, advises the father to make it heavier, for surely the son is able to carry a larger pack. The father, listening rather to the bad adviser than con- sulting his own judgment and the feelings of tenderness, follows the advice of the hard-hearted adviser, and makes up a heavy load for his son to carry. The son, now grown up, examining the weight of the load he is to carry, ad- dresses the parent in these words: . Dear father, this pack is too heavy for me to carry, do pray lighten it; I am will- ing to do what I can, but am unable to carry this load.' The father's heart having by this time become hardened, and the bad adviser calling to him, whip him if he dis- obeys, and he refusing to carry the pack, the father orders
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his son to take up the pack and carry it off or he will whip him, and already takes up a stick to beat him. 'So,' says the son, 'am I to be served thus for not doing what I am unable to do? Well, if entreaties avail nothing with you, father, and it is to be decided by blows, whether or not I am able to carry a pack so heavy, then I have no other choice left me, but that of resisting your unreason- able demand by my strength, and thus, by striking each other, learn who is the strongest.'" Such (Indian reports stated) was a parable given them for the purpose of ex- plaining the nature of the dispute.
They further reported, " that the commissioners had told them that, as the dispute did not concern them, it would be highly wrong in them (the American people) were they to ask the aid of their Indian brethren in bringing the dispute between them and the parent to a close; for, by so doing, they would be made parties to the quarrel, which might involve them in difficulties and dangers, particularly as it could not be foreseen in whose favor the quarrel would terminate. That were they to ask the assistance of their brethren, the Indians, and they together should fail in gain- ing what they sought for, they would have to suffer with their white brethren; and so, vice versa, the case would be were they to join the other side. That therefore they would advise them to sit still until the contest should be over, be friends to both sides, and not take up the hatchet against either; for by taking the hatchet up to strike either side, they must infallibly create to themselves an enemy, who, should it so happen that he became the conqueror, would punish them, take their land from them, &c. And, fur- ther, that as, in the course of the war it might happen that their brethren, the Americans, would not have it in their power to supply them with all that they might want, they, not having taken up arms against the British, would con- sequently be supplied from that side, with such articles as they stood in need of; that their American brethren sought their welfare, and having land enough of their own, did
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not wish to deprive them of theirs, but sought to secure their constant friendship as brothers, who had sprung up together from one and the same soil; that they wished to make them a great people, and that they would do so to every nation and people that should take the advice here- with given them; yet that they must tell them, that what- ever nation should take up the hatchet and strike them, such nation must abide the consequence should they, the American people, become conquerors. Lastly (the reporters added), that in consequence of the good advice given them by their American brethren, the chiefs of the Delawares present at this treaty, had for themselves, and in the name of the whole nation, declared to the commissioners that they would remain neutral during the 'contest between the parent and the son, and not lift up the hatchet against either side.'"
About this time (says Heckewelder), while a number of Senecas were at Pittsburgh, perhaps more for the purpose of learning the disposition of the western nations, partien- larly that of the Delawares, with regard to the side they should take during the contest, they had an opportunity of hearing Captain White Eyes deliver his sentiments, openly declaring in favor of the American people and their cause, which so chagrined them that they thought proper to offer a check to his proceedings, by giving him, in a haughty tone, a hint, intended to remind him what the Delaware Dation was in the eyes of the Six Nations (meaning that it had no will of its own, but was subordinate to the Six Nations), when Captain White Eyes, long since tired of this language, with his usual spirit, and in an air of disdain rose and replied, that "he well knew that the Six Nations considered his nation as a conquered people, and their in- feriors. 'You say,' said he, 'that you had conquered me; that you had cut off my legs; had put a petticoat on me, giving me a hoe and corn-pounder in my hands, saying, ' Now, woman, your business henceforward shall be to plant and hoe corn, and pound the same for bread for us men
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