USA > Ohio > Pioneer history : being an account of the first examinations of the Ohio valley, and the early settlement of the Northwest territory ; chiefly from original manuscripts > Part 22
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265
FAMINE IN 1790.
to enclose the field with a fence, while the year before it had been without one. A brush fence, from the Muskingum to Duck creek, had afforded a sufficient range for the sup- port of the stock then in the country. A frost on the 1st of October had seared the corn, when it was not fairly out of
that soft and succulent state called the milk. It was gathered and put away, and supposed by many that when it was fairly dried, it would make good bread; but when tried it almost invariably produced sickness and vomiting. Even the domestic animals could not eat it with safety. The effect was similar to that of the fungus grain, or "sick wheat," as it is usually called. Eatable corn rose from fifty cents to one dollar fifty, and two dollars a bushel. The poorest was a dollar.
By the middle of May the scarcity was felt generally. There were but few cows in the country to afford milk; no oxen or cattle to spare for meat, and very few hogs. The woods, which were full of game in 1788, were now nearly as bare of it as an old settled country -the Indians having killed, or driven away, nearly all the deer within twenty miles of Marietta. In this great scarcity it was wonderful how little there was of selfishness, and how generally kind- ness and good feeling abounded. Those who had more re- sources, lent, or gave, to those who had less; using, at the same time, the strictest economy themselves, that they might be more able to do so. Occasionally a turkey, or a piece of bear meat, was procured from the hunters, which was put into the kettle and boiled up with hominy or coarse meal. Those who had cows, divided the milk with their neighbors, especially where there were children. Sugar, or molasses, they had little of, as they had not kettles to boil the sap of the maple, which grew in great abundance on the rich lands, and would have afforded a valuable source of nourishment in the general scarcity. The river furnished a tolerable supply of fish, and aided much in preventing starvation, especially in very poor families. Nettle tops,
266
INDIAN HOSTILITIES.
and the tender shoots of pigeon-berry, or phytolacca decan- dria, as soon as they appeared, were gathered up and boiled with a little flour, or meal, and salt, and eaten by many persons. Potato tops were eaten in the same way. Salt was scarce, and sold, in small parcels, for fifty cents a quart. Spice-bush and sassafras afforded an alimentary drink, in place of tea and coffee. The Ohio company, with a liberality worthy of all praise, assisted many poor fami- lies with small loans of money, or the suffering would have been much greater : with this they could occasionally get provisions from boats descending the Ohio. Thus they struggled along, until the young beans and early squashes appeared ; then green corn and potatoes, which was consi- dered a perfect relief; and finally, the ripened corn, with a little wheat, ground in the hand mill, furnished bread that was thought a luxury. The matrons of the colony, in a lit- tle sober " chit-chat" over a cup of spice-bush tea, without any sugar, and very little milk, concluded if they lived ever again to enjoy a supply of wholesome food for their chil- dren and selves, they would never complain of their fare, be it ever so coarse and homely. The crop of that year was fine and abundant, and closed their fears for food from that day to this. It was long known to the inhabitants as " the starving year."
Indian hostilities.
In the spring of this year the Indians, chiefly Shawanees and Miamis, commenced a new species of warfare, by attacking boats on the river, generally owned by emigrants . on their way to Kentucky. Their chief rendezvous was near the mouth of the Scioto. One of their main devices to get possession of a boat, was to induce them to land, by means of a white man showing himself on the bank, and begging them to land and take him on board, as he had been a prisoner with the Indians, and just escaped ; if he fell again into their hands they would certainly put him to
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267
LETTER OF GOVERNOR ST. CLAIR.
death. In this way many boats were induced to land, when the Indians, who lay in ambush, instantly took pos- session of the boat, or shot down the crew from the shore. This decoy was sometimes an actual prisoner, whom they forced to aid them in this stratagem; at others a renegado white man who had voluntarily joined them to share in the plunder.
Letter from Governor St. Clair.
The following letter to the Secretary at War, dated at Marietta, September 19th, 1790, shows the state of the country during that summer. (Ist Vol. Indian Affairs.)
" The depredations on the Wabash and Ohio still conti- nue. Every day, almost, brings an account of some murder or robbery ; and yesterday a number of horses were taken from this settlement. Not long ago, a boat belonging to Mr. Vigo, a gentleman from post St. Vincennes, was fired upon near the mouth of Blue river. This person the United States have been very much obliged to, on many occasions, and is in truth the most disinterested person I have ever seen. He had three men killed, and was obliged, in con- sequence, to fall down the river. This party it seems had been designed to intercept me, for they reported that they had had three fair discharges at the governor's boat, and expected they had killed him. In descending the river, Mr. Vigo's boat fell in with Mr. Melchor's, returning from Ten- nessee, and attempted, in company with him, to ascend the Wabash. Here they were attacked again. Melchor escaped, and fell down to the Ance de la graisse; but the savages possessed themselves of Vigo's boat, which they plundered of all his and the crew's personal baggage and arms; but as she was navigated by Frenchmen, they suf- fered them to depart with the peltries, telling them that if they had not been in company with Americans they would not have injured them; and that if they found them in such again, they would put them to death. Captain McCurdy
268
SKETCH OF COLONEL VIGO.
was also fired upon between Fort Washington and this place, and had five or six men killed and wounded."
Colonel Vigo.
At the time of the conquest of Kaskaskia and the Illinois country, by Colonel George Rogers Clark, Francis Vigo was a merchant, or Indian trader, living at St. Louis. He was by birth a Spaniard, and St. Louis at that period, July, 1788, in possession of the Spaniards, who where at peace with England as well as with the United States. As soon as Mr. Vigo heard of the capture of Kaskaskia, he visited that place, and unsolicited made an offer of his services and means to Colonel Clark, not only in keeping possession of the country, but also in the conquest of the British post at Vincennes. For this purpose he made a visit to that place, accompanied only by a single servant. Before reaching there he was taken prisoner by a party of Indians, plundered, and carried before Governor Hamilton, the com- mander of "the post." Here he was detained for some- time, but finally set at liberty, at the urgent request and remonstrance of the French inhabitants of that place, who were well acquainted with, and held him in high estima- tion. The information he took back of the strength, position, &c., of the garrison, enabled Colonel Clark to succeed so wonderfully as he did in its capture.
The honorable John Law, in his address before the His- torical Society of Vincennes, in February, 1839, and from whom the most of these facts are obtained, says, " that its conquest, and subsequent attachment to the Union, was as much owing to the counsel and services of Vigo, as to the bravery and enterprise of Clark."
Francis Vigo was born in 1747, and at the time of this attack was forty-three years old. He still continued the hazardous and laborious pursuit of a trader in peltries along the western waters, from St. Louis to Pittsburgh, and was acquainted with the officers in Fort Harmer and other
269
COL. MEIGS'S MISSION.
frontier posts, which he often visited in his voyages up and down the Ohio river. His home was at Vincennes, where he passed the latter years of his life. He was a man whose name ought to be better known to the American people, and especially those of the western states.
The last of September, Governor St. Clair sent a dispatch to the governor of Detroit, informing him that the contem- plated expedition under General Harmer was not intended to molest any of the British posts or possessions, but solely to chastise the Indians, whose outrages and cruelties had become intolerable. He also said that he expected the governor would not suffer any under his command to afford assistance to the hostile tribes by furnishing them with mili- tary stores.
This letter was committed to the care of R. J. Meigs, jr., Esq., then in the prime of life, and a practicing attorney in the courts of the territory. He possessed courage and ac- tivity, both needed in this hazardous enterprise. His com- panions were John Whipple, a son of Commodore Abraham Whipple and a sprightly Indian, named Charley, who had loitered in the vicinity of Marietta since the treaty. He could speak some English and a little French. The region they had to traverse, after leaving the settlement at Water- ford, was an entire wilderness. The journey was chiefly performed on foot, as they had but one horse to carry their provision and baggage, which was stolen by the Indians when about half way on the route. They proceeded, with- out serious molestation, to a friendly Delaware town, on the heads of the Sandusky. While there a deputation ar- rived from the hostile Miamis to the Delawares and Wyan- dots, urging them to unite with them against their common enemy, the whites ; and, also, saying that General Harmer had been driven from their country, after a severe engage- ment with their warriors. While here passing the night, the Miamis heard of the two white men on their way to Detroit, and threatened to kill them if they could find them; and
270
RETURN OF COL. MEIGS.
were only prevented by the kind offices of the Delawares, who conducted them in the night out of the village, and so far on the way the next day as to be out of danger. Char- ley, their Indian guide, here left them, being threatened with death by the Miamis if he proceeded any further in convey- ing their enemies.
On their arrival at Detroit, Mr. Meigs was received with great coolness by the governor. He, however, after some time, condescended to answer the message, and kindly in- formed him that he could not return again in safety through the Indian territory, as they would certainly put him to death, without any regard to the flag of truce which he had borne in his way out. At the same time, he offered him a passage down the lake to Presque Isle in a packet vessel, then about to sail.
While staying here a few days for the schooner to get ready, a young chief of the hostile tribes, learning who he was, aimed his rifle at him as he stood on the shore looking at the vessels in the harbor. Unconscious of his danger, he would certainly have lost his life had not a white man, who was standing near, observed the act, and instantly snatched it from his hands and shook out the priming, at the same time threatening him with punishment if he again made the attempt. The vessel soon after sailed, and landed them at Presque Isle, from whence they passed down the old route by Venango, French creek, and the Alleghany river, to Pittsburgh, and thence to Marietta.
It was an enterprise of great danger, and performed to the entire satisfaction of Governor St. Clair; but in its re- sults was unproductive of the least good to the United States ; the British agents, after this, supplying the hostile tribes with arms and ammunition in fivefold abundance ; and encouraged them in every way to prosecute the war with that detested people, who had renounced their king, and threatened to deprive them of their trade with the Indians.
271
FRENCH EMIGRANTS.
French emigrants.
On the 16th of October, 1790, the inhabitants of Marietta were much gratified at the arrival of a large company of French emigrants, composed of men women and children, amounting in all to more than four hundred souls. Their outlandish dress, foreign language, and wooden shoes of the lower classes, were a matter of rare interest to the dwel- lers in the wilderness, especially as at that day the deluge of foreign emigration, which has since flooded the country, had had not commenced. They had descended the Ohio in six Kentucky arks, or flat boats. A large portion of them were from the city of Paris, who were equally surprised at the vast forests and broad rivers of the new world, of which they had heard, but could form no adequate conception. This company of adventurers had purchased land of Joel Barlow, the accredited agent of "the Scioto land com- pany." Their agent rather prematurely sold out a portion of their lands to the French people, before they had com- pleted their purchase from Congress. The contract ulti- mately failed, and the poor emigrants were left without lands for a home. Many of them were destitute of money; the little they once had being spent in the pur- chase, and in the voyage and journey out. In the contract with the company, they engaged to build them comfortable dwelling houses on the lands, and to furnish them a year's provision, until they could clear fields, and raise crops of their own. General Putnam was employed by William Duer of New York, the principal man in the Scioto com pany, to build the houses for them, and to furnish provision. This he kindly undertook, and accomplished, at an expense of more than two thousand dollars ; which money he finally lost, as Duer soon after became a bankrupt, and the company dissolved. In the summer of that year, he employed Cap- tain William Burnham, with forty men under his charge, to perform the work of clearing the land, and putting up two
272
SETTLEMENT OF GALLIPOLIS.
long rows of dwelling houses, on the bank of the Ohio, three miles below Big Kenawha. The village of Gallipolis, as the new town was called, when the houses were white- washed, made a very neat appearance from the Ohio, in the midst of the surrounding wilderness. The land on which the village stood belonged to the Ohio company, who finally sold it to the occupants at a moderate price.
Very few of these emigrants were cultivators of the soil. They were generally artisans and tradesmen of different kinds, such as are found in cities ; and some were broken down gentlemen, bred to no particular calling, so that on the whole they were a very helpless company. A few of the more wealthy adventurers had a number of men in their employ, whose passage money and expenses they paid, to be refunded by their labor here. Among them was a mar- quis and a viscount, his son, who were the principal leaders. A few of the French spent the winter in Marietta, and be- came permanent settlers, but the larger portion went down to Gallipolis. In the spring the marquis returned to France. They suffered much during the Indian war, which broke out that winter, from want of food and privations of various kinds. The hostile Indians learning that the new village was occupied by Frenchmen, scarcely molested them at all, having an old and lasting friendship for that people ever since the travels and adventures of La Salle, in the valley of the Mississippi, in the year 1678. In the year 1795, Congress took notice of the wrongs of these much injured colonists, and gave them a tract of land on the Ohio river, commencing about a mile above the Little Sandy, and extending down the Ohio eight miles and back, so as to include twenty thousand acres. It was a noble act of justice, and in some measure atoned for the cupidity of their countrymen. A few of the emigrants were educated men, and have held judicial offices in the republic, and seats in the halls of legislation. A number of their descendants yet live in Gallipolis, and own the cherished homes of their
273
TOWNSHIPS ORGANIZED.
forefathers ; while a large portion of the donation tract, or " French grant," has passed into other hands.
Organization of townships.
At a meeting of the court of quarter sessions, on the 20th day of December, 1790, they, for the first time, exercised the authority given by law, of establishing the boundaries, and organizing townships. The three following were the first established in the territory north-west of the river Ohio.
Marietta.
" Resolved, that townships No. 1, 2 and 3, in the eighth range, and townships No. 2 and 3 in the ninth range, be, and they hereby are incorporated and included in one town- ship, by the name of Marietta."
Town officers -- Anselm Nye, town clerk; Joseph Gil- man, Esq., and Colonel William Stacey, overseers of poor ; B. J. Gilman, constable.
N. B .- Mr. Gilman declined acting, and Christopher Bur- lingame was appointed in his place.
Belpre.
" Resolved, that townships No. 1 and 2, in the tenthi range, and No. 1, in the ninth range, be, and they hereby are incorporated, and to be included in one township, by the name of Belpre.
Town officers-Colonel E. Battelle, town clerk ; Waton Casey, overseer of poor; Colonel Nathaniel Cushing, con- stable.
Waterford.
" Resolved, that the seventh and eighth townships in the eleventh range, the fourth and fifth townships in the tenth range, and mile square, No. 33, in the fourth township of the ninth range, be, and they hereby are incorporated and included in one township, by the name of Waterford.
Town officers -Captain Ebenezer Gray, town clerk; Noah Fearing, overseer of poor; Dean Tyler, constable.
18
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274
INDIAN WAR BEGINS.
CHAPTER XIII.
Indian war begins .- Massacre at Big bottom .- Action of the court on the news .- Spirited resolutions of the directors for the defence of the colony .- Letter to Governor St. Clair, who is absent .- Soldiers raised .- Garrisons built .- Eleven thousand dollars expended by the Ohio company .- Improve- ment of public squares ; to be ornamented with trees .- Trustees appointed to take charge of them .- Letter of General Putnam to General Washing- ton on the state of the colony .- Remarks on the war .- Company of United States rangers .- Dress of these men .- Captain Rogers killed .- Escape of Henderson .- Alarm of the inhabitants at the event .- Mathew Kerr killed. - Discipline at Campus Martius .- Cattle shot by the Indians .- Attack on a party at Duck creek mills .- Alarm at news of Indians .- Some killed at Little Muskingum .- Incidents attending that event .- Ohio company raise more men .- Wisdom of their transactions .- Funds for religious instruction. - Surgeons appointed .- News of the defeat of General St. Clair .- Emi- grants from Nova Scotia .- Providential escape of W. R. Putnam .- Nicholas Carpenter and four others killed.
Indian war.
THE war broke out very unexpectedly to the settlers, and found them poorly prepared for such an event. Few of them had any considerable store of provisions, or money to support their families, or to go on with the clearing of their lands, during an actual state of hostilities, which they did not know how long might continue. It was a sad reverse of fortune. They had trusted in the treaty recently made, to preserve them in peace with the Indians. The policy pursued by the United States was pacific ; but the frontier inhabitants of Pennsylvania, Virginia, and Kentucky, were always at war with the Indians, and killed and plundered them whenever they could find a fitting opportunity. They also disliked to see new settlements forming on the north side of the Ohio. But above all, they were now irritated
275
RESOLUTIONS OF OHIO COMPANY.
and vexed at the campaign of General Harmer into the ter- ritories of the Shawanees and the Miamies. They were also encouraged to pursue the war from the disastrous ter- mination of that campaign to the American troops. On the 2d day of January the war commenced in earnest in the Ohio company's purchase, by the attack on the block house at "Big bottom," by which fourteen persons were killed and four carried into captivity, as will be more fully related in the history of Waterford.
The news of this startling and mournful event reached Marietta in the forenoon of Monday the 3d; the messen- gers sent out by Captain Rogers having deviated from the right course in the darkness of the night. The court of quarter sessions had just opened when the message ar- rived. As many of the jurors and witnesses were from Belpre and Waterford, it was directly adjourned that they might immediately return to their homes for the protection of their families, whom they had every reason to fear had shared the same fate, for they were living in cabins, and generally unprepared for resistance or defense. As they approached their homes, many a stout heart trembled lest they should see the smoking ruins and bleeding bodies of their wives and children. But a merciful and overruling Providence had preserved them, by inclining the minds of the savages to return to their own homes, without proceed- ing any further at that time against the defenseless settlers of Waterford and Belpre. The inhabitants of Marietta were in a better state of defense.
Doings of the Ohio company in 1791.
The agents and proprietors held a meeting on the 3d of January, and adjourned. On the 5th they met again, and continued daily until the 10th. At these meetings the di- rectors, with General Putnam at their head, passed a num- ber of spirited and salutary resolutions for the safety and protection of the colony. Governor St. Clair being absent
276
GOVERNMENT AID SOLICITED.
at Philadelphia, where Congress were in session, they ad- dressed the judges of the court, as the representatives of the governor, requesting them to represent the present de- fenseless condition of the country to him, and through him to the President of the United States, asking such aid of troops, &c., as the exigency demanded. They say, " the most of our settlers are encumbered with families, many of which are numerous, and having been prevented for several years from getting a subsistence by their labor, have al- ready exhausted their property, and now can support them- selves only by cultivating their lands. If they contract their settlements and garrison themselves for defense, they must eventually starve. If they do not, they are mas- sacred. We have no resource but in the humanity of the general government, and persuade ourselves that, on a pro- per representation made by your honors, we shall receive such assistance as will enable us to live in quietness." The court met on the 7th of January, and appointed Charles Greene, Esq., to go on to Philadelphia as an express, with this address and their own views on the state of the country.
Their condition was very alarming. News had recently reached them of the disastrous termination of General Harmer's campaign, and that in place of humbling the In- dians, it had only exasperated them; and that they had openly threatened, "that before the trees had again put forth their leaves, there should not remain a single smoke of the white man north-west of the Ohio river." Under these trying circumstances, the old veterans of the revolution acted with their usual firmness and discretion, by preparing themselves for the worst that might happen. They could not expect any aid at present from the adjoining states, as the governor, who only had authority to call on them in case of necessity, was absent. The troops at Fort Harmer had nearly all been withdrawn by General Harmer, and only one small detachment remained under Captain Zeigler. With these facts before them, they turned to their
277
GARRISON BUILT.
own resources. The remote settlements, at the forks of Duck creek, Wolf creek mills, &c., were evacuated, and the inhabitants quartered at Marietta, Belpre and Waterford; thus concentrating their strength, and establishing a regular system of defense. New block houses were ordered to be built at those places, and the settlers to live as compact as possible. A large portion of these defenses were built at the expense of the Ohio company. Colonel E. Sproat was directed to detail sixty men from the militia, with proper officers, to garrison these posts, and to assist in building the new fortifications, who were to receive regular pay and rations until otherwise provided by the United States. To encourage the men to enlist, their pay was made double that of the regular service, or eight dollars a month. Six of the best hunters, familiar with the backwoods, were em- ployed as scouts or spies, to watch the approach of the enemy and prevent a surprise, at such pay as the com- mandant should be able to procure them, and was estab- lished at one dollar a day. These were divided so as to furnish two for each garrison. The directors were ordered by the agents to keep a separate and accurate account of their expenses in the defense of the colony, with the expec- tation of its being repaid by Congress. They spent more than eleven thousand dollars, none of which was repaid, but remained a dead loss to the Ohio company. In March, the agents authorized Colonel Sproat to put the houses in Campus Martius in the best state of defense, and surround the works with an outer protection of palisades and abattis.
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