The History of Wyandot County, Ohio, containing a history of the county, its townships, towns general and local statistics, military record, portraits of early settlers and prominent men etc, Part 27

Author:
Publication date: 1884
Publisher: Chicago, Leggett, Conaway
Number of Pages: 1072

USA > Ohio > Wyandot County > The History of Wyandot County, Ohio, containing a history of the county, its townships, towns general and local statistics, military record, portraits of early settlers and prominent men etc > Part 27

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"Seeing him recover and get up, I seized his gun, while he ran off howl- ing in a most fearful mannèr. I.followed him with the determination to shoot him down, but pulling back the cock of the gun with too great vio- lence, I believe I broke the mainspring .. I pursued him about thirty yards, still endeavoring to fire the gun, but could not; then going back to the fire, I took his blanket, a pair of new moccasins, his hatchet, powder-horn, bullet-bag, together with his gun, and marched off, directing my course toward the 5 o'clock mark. About half an hour before sunset, I came to the plains, which I think are about sixteen miles wide. I laid me down in a thicket till dark, and then by the assistance of the north star made my way through them and got into the woods before morning. I pressed on the next day, and about noon crossed the paths by which our troops had gone out. These paths were nearly east and west, but I went due north nearly all that after- noon, with a view to avoid the enemy.

"In the evening I began to be very faint, and no wonder. I had been six days a prisoner, the two latter days of which I had eaten nothing, and but very little the first three or four. There were wild gooseberries in abun- dance in the woods, but being unripe required mastication, which at that time I was not able to perform on account of a blow received from an In- dian on the jaw with the back of a tomahawk. There was a weed that grew in that place, the juice of which I knew to be grateful and nourish- ing. I gathered up a bundle of the same, took up my lodging under a large spreading beech tree, having sucked plentifully of the juice, and went to sleep. Next day I made a due east course, which I generally kept the rest of my journey. I often imagined my gun was only wood-bound, and tried every method I could devise to unscrew the lock, but never could effect it, having no knife nor anything fitting for the purpose. I had now the satisfaction to find my jaw began to mend, and in four or five days could chew any vegetable proper for nourishment, but finding my gun a useless burden, left her in the wilderness. I had no apparatus for making fire to sleep by, so that I could get but little rest for the gnats and mosqui - toes. There are likewise a great many swamps in the beech ridge, which

*The Doctor was a small sized man.

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occasioned me very often to lie wet. This ridge through which I traveled is about twenty miles broad; the ground in general is very level and rich, free from shrubs and brush; there are, however, very few springs, yet wells might easily be dug in all parts of the ridge. The timber on it is very lofty, but it is no easy matter to make a straight course through the same, the moss growing as high upon the south side of the trees as on the north.

" There are a great many white oak, ash and hickory trees that grow among the beech timber. There are likewise some places on the ridge, perhaps for three or four continued miles, where there is little or no beech, and in such spots, black, white oak, ash and hickory abound; sugar trees grow there also to a very great bulk. The soil is remarkably good, the ground a little ascending and descending with some rivulets and a few springs. When I got out of the beech ridge and near the River Muskin- gum, the land was more broken, but equally rich with those before men- tioned and abounding with brooks and springs of water. There are also several small creeks that empty into that river, the bed of which is more than a mile wide in places. The wood consists of white and black oaks, walnut, hickory and sugar tree in the greatest abundance. In all parts of the country through which I came, the game was plenty, that is to say, deer, turkeys and pheasants. I likewise saw a great many vestiges of bears and elks.

"I crossed the River Muskingum about three or four miles below Fort Laurens, and crossing all paths, aimed for the Ohio River. All this time my food was gooseberries, young nettles, the juice of herbs, a few service berries and some May apples, likewise two young blackbirds and a terrapin, which I devoured raw. When my food sat heavy on my stomach, I used to eat a little wild ginger, which put all to rights. I came upon the Ohio River about five miles below Fort McIntosh, in the evening of the twenty- first day after I had made my escape, and on the twenty-second, about 7 o'clock in the morning, being the 4th of July, arrived safe, though much fatigued." In 1784, Dr. Knight married Col. Crawford's half sister. He finally settled at Shelbyville, Ky., where he died March 12, 1838.

As shown in the foregoing narration, the Delawares, true to their savage and cowardly nature from time immemorial, and led on by the chiefs, Capt. Pipe and Wingenund, were the guilty authors of this terrible act of bar- barity. This most atrocious deed, connived at by British officers, was perpetrated, it is claimed, in the present township of Crawford, on the south- east bank of Tymochtee Creek, a short distance northeast from the present town of Crawfordsville, and distant about seven miles northwest from Upper Sandusky, county seat of Wyandot County.

Col. William Crawford, a son of Scotch-Irish parents, was born in the region now known as Berkeley County, W. Va., in the year 1732. When about eighteen years of age, he became acquainted with George Washing- ton, who was of the same age with himself, and was at that time in the service of Lord Fairfax as surveyor. Crawford's early home was in the Fairfax grant, in which Washington was surveying, being in what was called the "Northern Neck of Virginia," or the northern portion of the since famous Shenandoah Valley. Their acquaintance soon ripened into warm friendship, which was never impaired or broken, or suffered the slightest in- terruption while life lasted. Crawford's whole life was passed upon the frontiers. Therefore, his education was limited, but his natural abilities, good judgment and knowledge of men were very remarkable. He was gener- ous in disposition, and in common with those of his lineage on the Pennsyl-

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vania and Virginia borders, possessed the most undaunted courage. He acquired a knowledge of surveying from Washington, and made it his busi- ness pursuit in part until the opening of the " old French and Indian war," when he joined a company of Virginia Rangers, and participated in Brad- dock's disastrous expedition as an Ensign. For gallantry on the battle-field, he was promoted to a lieutenancy. During the subsequent two or three years, he was employed in garrison duty, or as a scout on the frontiers. In 1758, he was commissioned Captain of a company of Virginia Riflemen, which was attached to Col. George Washington's regiment of Virginians, and performed efficient service during Gen. Forbes' successful campaign against Fort Du Quesne. Capt. Crawford remained in the service of the colony of Virginia until the close of the war mentioned.

In 1767, he moved to a point then and for years afterward known as "Stewart's Crossing" of the Youghiogheny, but afterward called New Ha- ven, a village opposite the present town of Connellsville, in Fayette County, Penn. Crawford was among the first to settle in that part of the present State of Pennsylvania, a region which was then claimed by the province of Virginia, and of which the Indian title was not extinguished until the fol- lowing year (1768). However, from Stewart's Crossing. Capt. Crawford kept up his correspondence with his old friend Washington, and to the close of his life (Washington having purchased from the Virginia authorities a large tract of land, lying in the present southwest quarter of Pennsylvania, west of Laurel Hill) served him as his land agent. In 1770, Washington and Crawford, with other gentlemen, voyaged together down the Ohio River, from Fort Pitt to the mouth of the Kanawha, and up that river, explor- ing with a view to the ultimate location and purchase of lands.

By an act of the General Assembly of the Province of Pennsylvania, passed on Saturday, March 9, 1771, Bedford was erected as the ninth county of the province. It embraced all of the settled regions lying west of the Tuscarora Mountain, or, in other words, the entire southwest quarter of the present State. On Monday, March 11, of the same year, John Fraser, Bar- nard Dougherty, Arthur St. Clair, William Proctor, Jr., Robert Cluggage, Robert Hanna, George Wilson, George Woods, William Lochry, William Crawford, Dorsey Pentecost, William McConnell, Thomas Gist, James Mul. ligan and Alexander McKee were appointed by the same General Assembly Justices of the Court of General Quarter Sessions of the Peace, and of the County Court of Common Pleas for the new county. Nearly all of these men were of Scotch or Scotch-Irish parentage, and all were stanch patriots during the Revolutionary war (which began four years later), a majority of them holding commissions high in rank.

The great extent of Bedford County, originally, the sparse and widely scattered settlements contained within it, together with the lack of high- ways other than those constructed years before by the armies of Braddock and Forbes, made it an extremely difficult matter to transact the public bus- iness, to assess and collect taxes, etc. Besides, as Virginia claimed all that part of the province lying west of Laurel Hill, and northward to and in- cluding Fort Pitt, and as the authorities of that province were issuing cer- tificates for land in the disputed region at the rate of only ten shillings per 100 acres, it was but natural that a majority of those who had obtained their homesteads so cheaply should espouse the cause of Virginia (from which province they had recently removed) as against Pennsylvania, and in conse- quence refuse to recognize the authority of the Bedford County officials, or to pay the taxes levied upon them.

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HISTORY OF WYANDOT COUNTY.

Regarding these difficulties, the following letters, written by two of the first Justices of Bedford County, will afford a partial explanation :

STEWART'S CROSSINGS, Augt. 9th, 1771.

SIR: I understand by Capt. John Harding, the Bearer of this, that there is an Agreement inter'd into be a Number of the inhabitants of Monongahalia and Read- stone, ho has Entered into a bond or Articles of an Agreement that Each man will Joyn and Keep off all Officers belonging to the Law, and under the Penalty of fifty pounds for to be forfeited by the party refusing to Joyn against all Officers whatsoever.

I understand this was set on foot by a set of People who has maid a breach of the Law by Driving out a man from his home, for which there was a King's warrant Ishued against them, together with a notion Propegated by Coll. Croghan, that them posts would not fall into Pensilvania, he told me it was the Opinion of some of the best Judges that the Province Line would not Extend, by Considerable, so far, as it would be settled at 48 Miles to a Degree of Longetude which was the distance of a degree of Longitude allowd at the time the Charter was granted to Mr. Pen, and has since told those People that they had no right to Obay any presept Ishued from Pensylvania.

He has run a Line from the mouth of Rackoon up the Ohio to Fort Pitt, and from thence up Monongahalia Above Pigeon Creek, and from thence Across till it strikes Rackoon Creek. ten Miles up it, and he Says he has one more grant of 100,000 acres more to lay of in a parelele with that. Many sirways he had cut to peaces and sold to sundry People that has bin returnd into your Office, some of mine which is not above 3 or 4 Mile from Fort Pitt; one of mine he has and many others; it is a great Pity there is not a Stop put to such Proceedings, as it will be attended with very bad Con- sequence.

I am informd there is a Large Number of Signers all redy to the paper, when I see it I will give you more Distinkt Account.

Sir, I am with great respect, your most Huml. Servant,

W. CRAWFORD.

To JAMES TILGHAM, ESQR, at Philadelphia.

Per CAPT. JOHN HARDING.

We supplement Col. (then known as Capt.) Crawford's communication with one written on the same topic by his colleague, Col. Wilson, not be- cause of any pertinency to our subject, but by reason of the courage shown by the writer, and his quaint way of expressing his ideas.

MY DEAR CAPT: I am Sorey that the first Letter I ever undertook to Write you Should Contain a Detail of a Greivance so Disagreeable to me; Wars of any Cind are not agreable to aney Person Posesed of ye proper feelings of Humanity, But more Especially intestin Broyls. I no Sooner Returned Home from Court than I Found pa- pers containing the Resolves, as they Called them, of ye inhabitants to ye Westward of ye Laurall hills, ware handing fast abowt amongst ye people, in which amongst ye rest Was one that they Were Resolved to oppose everey of Pens Laws as they Called them, Except Felonious actions at ye Risque of Life, & under ye penelty of fiftey pounds, to be Recovoured, or Leveyed By themselves, off ye Estates of ye failure. The first of them I found Hardey anugh to offer it in publick, I Emeditly ordered into Custodey, on which a large number Ware assembled as Was Seposed to Resque the Prisonar. I indavoured, By all ye Reason I was Capable of to Convince them of the ill Conse- quences that would of Consequence attend such a Rebellion, & Hapely Gained on the People to Consent to Relinquish their Resolves, & to Burn the peper they had Signed. When their forman saw that the Arms of His Contrie, that as hee said Hee had thrown himself into would not Resque him By force, hee Catched up his Rifle, Which was Well Loded, Jumped out of Dors, & swore if aney man Cam nigh him hee would put What Was in his throo them; the Person that Had him in Custody Called for assistance in ye King's name, & in pirtickelaur Commanded myself. I told him I Was a Subject & Was not fit to Command if not Willing to obay, on which I watched his Eye untill I Saw a Chance, Sprang in on him & sezed ye Rifle by ye Muzle and lield him, So as he Could not Shoot mee, until more help got in to my as- sistance, on which I Disarmed him & Broke his Rifle to peeses. I Res'd a Sore Bruze on one of my arms By a punch of ye Gun in ye Strugle. Then put him under a Strong Guard, Told them ye Laws of their Contrie was Stronger then the Hardiest Ruffin amongst them.

I found it necesery on their Complyance & altering their Resolves, & his prom- ising to Give himself no more trouble in the affair, as hee found that the people Ware not as hardey as hee Expected them to be, to Relece him on his promise of Good Be- havour.

I am affraid Sum Who Have Been too much Countenanced By their King & ye province of Pensallvania are Grate accesoreys to those factions, & God knows where

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they May Eind. I have, in my Little time in Life, taken the oath of Alegence to His Majestie seven times, & always Did it with ye Consent of my whole Heart, & am Determined in my proper place to Seport the Contents thereof to ye outmost of my power, as I look on it as my Duty to Let those things be Known to Government & my acquaintance at Philladelphia is none. I expect you will Communicat those things to them, that the Wisdom of Government may provide Remedies in time. as there are numbers in the Lowr parts of ower Settlements still incressing ye faction.

It Givs mee Grate Pleasure that my nighbors are Determined not to joyn in the faction, & I hope the Difirant Majestrits in this side ye Mountains will use their influ- ence to Discorage it. I understand Grate thrates are made against mee in partikolaur if possible to intimidate mee With fear & allso against the Sherifs & Constables, & all Ministers of Justice, But I hope the Laws, ye Bullworks of ower nation, will be seported in Spight of those Low Lifed trifling Raskells.

Give my Complements to Mr. George Wood, Mr. Doherty & Mr. Frazor, and Ex- cept of myn to your Self,

Who am, with Respect, Your most obt Hble Sert G. WILSON .*

Springhill Township, Augt 14th, 1771. To ARTHOR ST. CLAIR, +Esq.

In 1773, when the county of Westmoreland was organized from Bedford, Capt. William Crawford was the senior Justice of the Peace, and for that reason became the presiding officer of the courts of the new county. At the same time, Capt. Arthur St. Clair was commissioned as the first Pro- thonotary Clerk of courts, etc., of the new jurisdiction. The latter resided at Fort Ligonier, the former at Stewart's Crossing, and both within West- moreland County as then formed. In 1774, Capt. Crawford received another Captain's commission from the Governor of Virginia for service against the hostile Indians. He at once raised a company and served through the campaign known as "Dunmore's war." While the main body of the army was lying at Camp Charlotte, he was sent out with a force for the purpose of destroying some Mingo towns up the Scioto. The object of the expedition was successfully accomplished, and a consider. able number of Indians were captured and taken to Ft. Pitt.

When the Revolutionary war began, Virginia had not yet relinquished her claim to the southwest part of the present State of Pennsylvania-a region which, as before mentioned, and had been largely settled to that time by natives of or immigrants from the Old Dominion. Hence, when volunteers were called out to defend their country against British arms, hired mercenaries and Indians; a majority of the men enlisting from the territory lying west of Laurel Hill, very naturally attached themselves to Virginia companies and regiments. Thus did it happen that in the year 1775, Col. William Crawford entered the American army as Lieu- tenant Colonel of the Fifth Regiment of the Virginia Line. Soon after he was commissioned Colonel, and commanded his regiment in the battle of Long Island, in the retreat through New Jersey, the crossing of the Delaware River with Gen. Washington on Christmas Day, 1776, and in the battle of Princeton, fought January 3, 1777. The next year he was in command of the Continental troops and militia at Fort Pitt. He also, during a part of the year 1778, commanded a Virginia regiment in service in the Western Military Department under Gen. McIntosh. At the time he assumed command of the ill-fated Sandusky expedition, it appears that he was not in active service, but was living in comparative retirement at his home at "Stewart's Crossing."

*Died at Quibbletown, N. J., in February, 1777, while serving as Lieutenant Colonel of the Eighth Reg- iment of the Pennsylvania Line.

+Then known as Capt. St. Clair, and serving as the first Prothonotary, Clerk of courts, etc., of the county of Bedford. He was afterward famed as Maj. Gen. St. Clair, Governor of the Northwest Territory, etc.

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Says a recent writer, Smucker: "Col. Crawford was cool, brave, patri- otic, and fitted by nature to be a commander. He was a man of mark, a leader, a man of courage and judgment, who rendered essential services to his country, especially to the West. He was greatly esteemed as a soldier, as a civil officer, and as a citizen, and as already remarked, his cruel death excited the sympathies of the entire country, and Gen. Washington was deeply moved by the awful death of the friend of his early years. His language shows the intensity of his feelings. He wrote: 'It is with the greatest sorrow and concern that I have learned the melancholy tidings of Col. Crawford's death. He was known to me as an officer of much care and prudence; brave, experienced and active. The manner of his death was shocking to me.' And no marvel! We can not fully estimate, and have not language adequate to express, the sum total of the agony and suffering endured by the noble Crawford; and when the terrible story of his torture was told in the border settlements among his kindred and friends who knew him well and esteemed him so highly, and when the frontiersmen came to realize that the brave soldier's life was tortured out of him by the slow burning fires kindled by the fiendish savages, and that the agony-rent soul of that pure patriot-hero, left his fire-crisped, charred, blistered body amidst the blazing flames of the stake, there was experienced such heart- rending anguish of soul as cannot be expressed in words. A gloom was spread in every countenance. Sympathy and commiseration went out from every heart. All keenly felt the tortures inflicted upon the heroic patriot soldier. Every one sorely lamented, with the Father of his Country, the melancholy, sad, sorrowful ending of the noble life of the brave companion in arms and friend of Washington. All hearts were moved by the tender- est sympathy when the announcement was made that there was such a sor- rowful termination to the valuable life of the brave pioneer of the Youghi- ogheny."

At the close of the Revolutionary war, the treaty of peace gave to the United States the Northwest Territory, which included the State of Ohio, but English troops continued to hold Detroit and various other posts for years thereafter, and, as a natural result, the Wyandots, with other tribes of this section, were still under their baneful influence.

However, on the 21st of January, 1785, a treaty was concluded at Fort McIntosh with the Wyandot, Delaware, Chippewa and Ottawa Indians, by which the boundary line between the United States and the Wyandot and Delaware nations was declared to begin "at the mouth of the river Cuya- hoga, and to extend up said river to the portage, between that and the Tus- carawas branch of the Muskingum, thence down that branch to the crossing place above Fort Laurens, thence westerly to the portage of the Big Miami, which runs into the Ohio, at the mouth of which branch the fort stood which was taken by the French in 1752; then along said Portage to the Great Miami, or Omee River (now known as the Maumee), and down the south side of the same to its mouth; then along the south shore of Lake Erie to the mouth of the Cuyahoga River, where it began." The United States Government allotted all the lands contained within said lines (which the reader will observe embraced the territory now forming Wyandot County) to the Wyandot and Delaware nations, to live and hunt on, and to such of the Ottawa nation as lived thereon; saving and reserving for the establishment of trading posts, six miles square at the mouth of the Miami, or Omee River; and the same at the portage, on that branch of the Big Miami which now runs into the Ohio; and the same on the lake of Sandusky where

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the fort formerly stood, and also two miles square on each side of the lower rapids of Sandusky River.

On the 9th January, 1789, another treaty was made at Fort Harmer, between Gov. Arthur St. Clair and the sachems and warriors of the Wyan- dot, Chippewa, Pottawatomie, Sac and other nations, in which the treaty at Fort McIntosh was renewed and confirmed. But it did not produce the favorable results anticipated. The Ohio and Michigan Indians still hated the Americans who were moving westward in a resistless column of emigra- tion, and were continually encouraged in this feeling by the British officials. They were also equipped with guns and ammunition obtained at the British post at Detroit. Therefore, as might have been expected, the Indians the same year assumed a hostile attitude, and'again all the horrors of a relent- less, savage warfare were re-enacted along the line of the American border settlements. Block-houses were erected by the settlers in each of the new settlements, and in June, 1789, Maj. Doughty, with 140 men from Fort ·Harmer, commenced the building of Fort Washington, on a site now within the limits of Cincinnati. A few months afterward Gen. Harmer arrived with 300 men, and assumed command of the fort.

Again efforts were made to effect a peace with the hostile tribes, but by reason of British influence they proved unavailing, and as a last resort Gen. Harmer was directed to attack and destroy their towns. He marched from Fort Washington in September, 1790, with 1,300 men, of whom about one- fourth were regular troops. When near the Indian towns, on the Miami of the Lake, in the vicinity of what is now Ft. Wayne, Ind., an advanced de- tachment of 210 militia fell into an ambush and was defeated with severe loss. Gen. Harmer, however, succeeded in burning the Indian villages, and in destroying their standing corn. The army then commenced its march homeward. They had not proceeded far when Harmer received intelligence that the Indians had returned to their ruined towns. He immediately de- tached about one-third of his remaining force, under the command of Col. Hardin, with orders to bring them to an engagement. Hardin succeeded in this early the next morning; the Indians fought with desperation, and the militia and regular troops alike behaved with gallantry. However, more than one hundred of the militia, and all the regulars except nine were killed, and the rest were driven back to the main body. Dispirited by this misfortune, Harmer immediately marched to Fort Washington or Cincin- nati. Thus the object of the expedition in intimidating the Indians was wholly unsuccessful.

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The History of Wyandot County, Ohio, containing a history of the county, its townships, towns general and local statistics, military record, portraits of early settlers and prominent men etc, Part 27

Author: Publication date: 1884 Publisher: Chicago, Leggett, Conaway Number of Pages: 1072

Author:
Publication date: 1884
Publisher: Chicago, Leggett, Conaway
Number of Pages: 1072