History of Washington County, Pennsylvania : with biographical sketches of many of its pioneers and prominent men, Part 23

Author: Crumrine, Boyd, 1838-1916; Ellis, Franklin, 1828-1885; Hungerford, Austin N
Publication date: 1882
Publisher: Philadelphia : H.L. Everts & Co.
Number of Pages: 1216

USA > Pennsylvania > Washington County > History of Washington County, Pennsylvania : with biographical sketches of many of its pioneers and prominent men > Part 23

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About the same time Lochry captured a party of nineteen deserters from Clarke's force. These he afterwards released, and they immediately joined the Indians. The savages had before been apprised of the expedition, but they had supposed that the forces of Clarke and Lochry were together, and as they knew that Clarke had artillery, they had not attempted an attack. But now, by the capture of Shearer's party, with the letters, and by the intelligence brought to them by the deserters, they for the first time learned of the weakness and'exposed situation of Lochry's command, and they at once determined on its de- struction.

Collecting in force some miles below the mouth of the Great Miami River, they placed their prison- ers (Shearer's party ) in a conspicuous position on the north shore of the Ohio, near the head of Lochry's Island, with the promise to them that their lives should be spared if they would hail Lochry's men as they came down and induce them to land. But in the mean time, Col. Lochry, wearied by the slow progress made, and in despair of overtaking Clarke, landed on the 24th of August, at about ten o'clock in the morning, on the same shore, at an inlet which has since borne the name of Lochry's Creek,1 a short

distance above the place where the Indians were await- ing them. At this point the horses were taken on shore and turned loose to feed. One of the men had killed a buffalo, and all, except a few set to guard the horses, were engaged around the fires which they had kindled in preparing a meal from it. Suddenly a volley blazed forth on them from a wooded bluff, and simultaneously a large force of Indians appeared and rushed to attack them. The men, thus surprised, seized their arms and bravely defended themselves as long as their ammunition lasted. Then they attempted to escape by their boats, but these were unwieldy, the water was very low, and the party, too much weakened to avail themselves of this method of escape, and being wholly unable to make further resistance, sur- rendered to the savages, who at once proceeded to the work of massacre. They killed Col. Lochry and sev- eral others of the prisoners, but were restrained from further butchery by the timely arrival of their chief,2 who declared that he disapproved of their conduct, but said he was unable wholly to control his men, who were eager to revenge the acts of Col. Brodhead against the Indians on the Muskingum a few months before.

The party which Col. Lochry surrendered to the Indians consisted of but sixty-four men, forty-two having been killed. The Indians engaged numbered over three hundred of various tribes, but principally those of the Six Nations. They divided the plunder among them in proportion to the numbers of each tribe engaged.

On the next day the prisoners were marched to the Delaware towns, where they were met by a party of British and Indians, who said they were on their way to the Falls of the Ohio to attack Gen. Clarke. The prisoners were separated and taken to different places of captivity at the Indian towns, and there they remained (excepting a few who escaped) until the close of the Revolutionary strug- gle. After the preliminary articles of peace had been signed (Nov. 30, 1782) they were ransomed by the British officers in command of the Northern posts and were sent to Canada, to be exchanged for British prisoners in the hands of the Americans.8 In the

1 This creek empties into the Ohio, nine or ten miles below the mouth of the Miami. Lochry's Island, near the head of which the prisoners were placed by the Indians to decoy their friends on shore, is three miles below the creek.

2 It has been stated that the chief in command of this Indian party was the famous Capt. Brant, and that he afterwards professed much re- gret for the massacre of Lochry and his men.

8 The following memorial of escaped prisoners belonging to Col. Loch- ry's command was presented to the Supreme Executive Council, ad- dressed to President Moore, and indorsed July 3, 1782, viz .:

"SIR,-We, the subscribers, inhabitants of the County of Westmore- land, beg leave to represent to your Excellency and Council that we had the misfortune to be made prisoners of by the Indians on the 24th of August last and carried to Montreal, and there kept in close confine- ment till the 26th of May last, when we were so fortunate as to make our escape, and after a long and fatigueing march through the Wilderness we got to this city yesterday at three o'Clock. As we are at present destitute of both Money and Cloathes, without which we cannot go home, We pray your Exc'y and Council to take our case into Considera- tion, and order us our pay from the time we were made prisoners to this. We were under the command of Colo. Loughery when taken, and have a list of all those, both officers and privates, who are now prisoners

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THE REVOLUTION.

spring of 1783 they sailed from Quebec to New York, and from there returned home by way of Philadel- phia, having been absent twenty-two months. But more than one-half of those who went down the Ohio with Col. Lochry never again saw their homes.

Upon the abandonment of the expedition by Gen. Clarke at the Falls of the Ohio, the men composing the force made their way as best they could through the wilderness to their homes, encountering many perils and hardships, and being more than two months on the weary homeward journey. The ar- rival of a part of them, as also the terrible disaster to Col. Lochry's command, was announced by Gen. Irvine (who had in the mean time succeeded Col. Brodhead in the command of the Western Depart- ment) in a letter to Gen. Washington, dated Fort Pitt, Dec. 2, 1781, as follows :

" ... Capt. Craig, with the detachment of artillery, returned here on the 26th inst. [ult ?] ... A Col. Lochry, of Westmoreland County, Pa., with about one hundred men in all, composed of volunteers and a company raised by Pennsylvania for the defense of that county, started to join Gen. Clarke, who, it is said, ordered him to unite with him (Clarke) at the mouth of the Miami, up which river it was previously designed to proceed ; but the general, having changed his plan, left a small party at the Miami, with direc- tions to Lochry to follow him to the mouth of the Falls." Sundry accounts agree that this party, and all of Lochry's troops to a man, were waylaid by the In- dians and British (for it is said they had artillery), and all killed or taken, not a man escaping, either to join Gen. Clarke or to return home. When Capt. Craig left the general he would not be persuaded but that Lochry with his party had returned home. These misfortunes throw the people of this county into the greatest consternation, and almost despair, particularly Westmoreland County, Lochry's party being all the best men of their frontier. At the present they talk

of that party, which, together with such information as is in our power, we are ready to give for the satisfaction of your Exc'y and Council. " We have the Honour to be

" Your Excellency's Hble Servts,

" ISAAC ANDERSON,

" Lieut. Capt. Sheerer's Company Rangers. " RICHARD WALLACE, " Late Quartermaster to Colonel Lochry."

A similar petition was presented to Council Jan. 6, 1783, by prisoners from Lochry's command, then returning (not escaped) from Canada, as follows :

"We, the Subscribers, would beg leave to represent the situation of Henery Dungan, Sergt of Captn John Boyd's Company, and Robert Wat- son, John Marrs, and Mich. Hare, of Capt. Thos. Stokely's Com'y of Rangers of this State, that they have been Captured by the Savages in the Summer of Eighty-one, and are now on their return from Canada, being Destitute of Money, and allmost Cloathing, would beg that Coun- cil would take their Situation under Consideration, and grant them such supply's as they in their wisdom shall think necessary. '

(Signed)

" JOHN BOYD,

" Capt'n of Rangers S. P. " THOMAS STOKELY,

" Capt. of Rangers S. P."

of flying early in the spring to the eastern side of the mountains, and are daily flocking to me to inquire what support they may expect."

While Gen. Clarke's expedition was in progress, and long before the intelligence had been received of its disastrous termination, another expedition was projected, its object being identical with a part of Clarke's plan, viz., the capture and destruction of the Indian towns on the Sandusky River. The en- terprise was conceived and fostered by Cols. Brod- head and Gibson at Fort Pitt, and by Hays, Marshel, and other officials of the Pennsylvania counties on both sides of the Monongahela. Undoubtedly mili- tary jealousy had much to do with the advocacy of the plan by Col. Brodhead and other officers at Fort Pitt, but they, as well as Marshel, Hays, and other Pennsylvania officials, also believed, or affected to be- lieve, that Clarke's campaign was prosecuted wholly in the interest of Virginia, and with the ulterior ob- ject of establishing the claims of that State to territory in the West.

As early as the 23d of August, Col. Brodhead men- tioned the proposed enterprise in a letter of that date addressed to the president of the Council, viz. : " An Expedition against the Sanduskies is in Contempla- tion, and I wish to promote it, but what can be done with naked and starved men, unless the Country will afford a generous supply, you will easily Determine." The expedition was to be under the command of Col. Gibson, of the Seventh Virginia Regiment, and the rendezvous was ordered at Fort McIntosh on the 5th of September. A considerable number of volunteers were recruited, including many of the leading citizens of Washington County. But the same difficulties were encountered in the raising of supplies which Brodhead had previously met in the prosecution of his campaign against the Delaware towns, and he made little if any progress towards the desired result during the short time that he afterwards remained as commandant at Fort Pitt.

On the 24th of September, 1781, Brig .- Gen. William Irvine received orders to supersede Col. Brodhead in the command of Fort Pitt and the Western Depart- ment. He at once repaired to his post of duty, and began the arduous task of having the work put in a tolerable condition for defense, and of bringing the troops under his command there up to as near a state of efficiency as was practicable. The Eighth Penn- sylvania and Seventh Virginia Regiments at Fort Pitt had been reduced to a mere remnant, sufficient men remaining in each to form two full companies, 1 but no more, and they were reorganized in that way, and the supernumerary officers sent elsewhere. Of the condition of the soldiers at the fort Irvine wrote Gen. Washington : " I never saw troops cut so truly deplorable a figure. No man would believe from their appearance that they were soldiers ; nay, it was diffi- cult to determine whether they were white men."

-Penn. Arch., 1781-83, pp. 738-34.

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HISTORY OF WASHINGTON COUNTY, PENNSYLVANIA.

Under such circumstances and in view of the al- most impossibility of obtaining supplies, Gen. Irvine did not encourage the projected expedition to the Sandusky towns, and it was accordingly abandoned for that year. He ascertained that the post at Wheel- ing (Fort Henry) was occupied by a garrison of one Continental officer and fifteen privates, but he could not spare any of the soldiers from Fort Pitt for their relief, and he found some difficulty in obtaining else- where even the small number of men necessary. On the 14th of November he wrote James Marshel, county lieutenant of Washington, asking him to furnish vol- unteers for the relieving party. Marshel replied, two days later, "I cannot comply with your requisition of engaging a number of men for the defense of Fort Wheeling, as I am heartily tired out with volunteer plans ;" but he added, " I shall order out, according to class, the number of militia you have demanded, and order the officer to wait on you for instructions." He did so, sending Lieut. John Hay in command of one sergeant and fifteen privates of the Washington County militia. The officer waited on Gen. Irvine as ordered, and on the 28th of November received his instructions " to proceed to Wheeling with the de- tachment under his command, there to relieve the garrison of Continental troops, taking upon himself the charge of the post." Lieut. Hay and his detach- ment occupied Fort Henry until the 2d of February following, when the officer and garrison were relieved by another lieutenant and a detachment of equal num- bers from the Washington County militia, and these remained garrisoning the post until about the 1st of April following.

Williamson's Expeditions .- In November, 1781, after the proposed campaign against Sandusky had been given up for that year, a small expedition was sent against the Moravian towns on the Muskingum River. The reason for this movement against the peace- ful Moravians was that many of the borderers believed, or professed to believe, that they (the Christian In- dians) were secretly in league with the warlike savages who lived farther to the northwest, that even if they did not take active part in the frequent raids and butcher- ies, they did at least at their isolated towns-situated midway between the Ohio River frontier and the hos- tile villages on the Sandusky-give shelter, subsist- ence, and information to the Shawanese and Wyan- dot warriors when engaged in their bloody forays ; and some even believed that the Moravians them- selves mingled with the war parties and wielded the knife and tomahawk. It was not intended, however, in this expedition to use fire and sword against the Indians of the Moravians towns, but to induce them, if possible, to remove farther away from the Ohio, or, failing in this, to take them as-prisoners to Fort Pitt.

The expedition numbered between seventy-five and one hundred men, and was made up of volunteers from the country west of the Monongahela River, principally from Washington County. The com-

manding officer (Col. David Williamson) was of the same county and one of its prominent citizens.

The organization of the expedition was effected with but little delay, for the enterprise was one in- volving little danger to deter volunteers, and it was not necessary for its probably short term of service to accumulate a large amount of provisions. Having no artillery, camp equipage, or supply trains to im- pede his progress, Col. Williamson moved his force rapidly to the Ohio, and thence to the towns on the Muskingum ; but in the mean time he had been fore- stalled in his projected work by a large force of hos- tile savages,1 who charged the Moravians with being in league with the whites, and on this plea had visited their towns, broken them up, driven the people away to Sandusky, and carried the white Moravian mis- sionaries residing among them prisoners to Detroit.

On his arrival at the towns, Williamson found them deserted, except by a small party of the Mora- vians, who had been driven away, but who had been allowed by their captors to return for the purpose of gathering some corn which had been left standing in the fields near the villages. This party he took pris- oners and marched them to Fort Pitt, where, however, they were soon after set at liberty by Gen. Irvine, the commandant.

During the winter of 1781-82 the people of the frontier settlements looked forward with dread and painful foreboding to the time of melting snows and springing grass, the time when the lifting of winter's embargo would permit the Western savages to come out from the shelter of their towns and carry devas- tation across the border from the Ohio to the Monon- gahela. The months of December and January were exceedingly and continuously cold, but at the begin- ning of February the weather became unusually mild ; and this sudden and remarkable change proved to be the opening of spring. In a few days the snow had disappeared, and the season seemed like April rather than February. The savages on the Sandusky at once availed themselves of the unusual circum- stance, and took the war-path. A party of them en-

! The hostile Indians and British, being suspicious that the Moravians had been secretely working in the interests of the Americans, resolved to drive them from their towns on the Muskingum. An Indian force was therefore gathered for this purpose, composed of Wyandots, Dela- wares, and Shawanese, in all amounting to more than three hundred warriors. The first of the Indian parties-a body of one hundred and forty Wyandots under their Half-King, and accompanied by Matthew Elliot, a Tory, holding a captain's commission in the British service- reached the Muskingum on the 10th of August, 1781. The Upper San- dusky Delawares, under Capt. Pipe and Wingenund, came in soon after, and by the 14th the whole force was gathered at the Moravian towns, where they remained for nearly a month. On the 11th of September they left on their return to Sandusky, forcing the Moravian Indians to accompany them, abandoning their villages, cattle, and crops. The war parties also made prisoners of Heckewelder, Zeisberger, and other missionaries found at the villages, and sent them to the British at Detroit, where they were tried as spies, charged with holding correspondence with the Americans. They were soon afterwards acquitted by the British court-martial at Detroit, and allowed to rejoin their Indian converts in the vicinity of Sandusky.

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THE REVOLUTION.

tered Virginia as early as the 8th of the month, and murdered a young man named John Fink at the Bu- chanan settlement. This was the opening act of the Indian hostilities of the memorable year 1782.

On the 10th1 of February a war party of Shawanese attacked the house of Robert Wallace, on the waters of Raccoon Creek, in the present township of Han- over, Washington County. The husband and father was away from home at the time of the attack, and the Indians having killed his cattle and hogs, and committed all the depredations possible except that of burning the house, took Mrs. Wallace and her three children prisoners, and moved as rapidly as possible with them towards the Ohio, evidently an- ticipating a prompt pursuit. When Wallace returned in the evening and saw the desolation of his home he at once understood the cause, and during the night roused the neighboring settlers, and formed a party to start at dawn on the trail of the savages, and rescue the prisoners from their hands if possible. The party, determined on revenge, set out as pro- posed, but there came a light fall of snow which con- cealed the trail, and compelled them to return with- out having accomplished their object.

Within a few days of the time when the Shawanese attacked Wallace's house,2 another party of Indians appeared in the west part of Washington County, and captured a man named John Carpenter, who lived on the waters of the Dutch Fork of Buffalo Creek.8 They also took his two horses, and with these and their prisoners they made their way to and across the Ohio, swimming the somewhat swollen river, and nearly losing the horses in doing so, and proceeded rapidly to the Muskingum. At the end of the first day's journey beyond that river the horses were hob- bled and turned loose to feed. In the morning Car- penter was sent to bring them in, and finding them attempting to make their way back over the trail of the previous day, he suddenly resolved that he too would make the attempt, though he well knew that his fate would be a terrible one if he should fail. Freeing the horses from their hobbles he mounted one of them, and made his way as rapidly as possible to the Ohio, which he reached in safety near Fort McIntosh. Thence he went to Fort Pitt, reported the events of his captivity to Col. Gibson, and came back to his home in Washington County.

Upon his return Carpenter reported in the settlement that his savage captors were six in number, and that among them were two who called themselves Mora- vian Indians and spoke in good Dutch. These two, he said, had appeared particularly vindictive towards the whites, and treated him much more severely than

did the others. The settlers had already become aroused, and were preparing to form an expedition to invade the Indian country as their only means of safety and peace. 'But when they received the intel- ligence brought by Carpenter, they at once concluded that the atrocities then recently committed were the work of the Moraviane. Even before this they had been strongly inclined to hold the so-called Christian Indians responsible for the atrocities which had been committed, for it was known that some of the Mora- vians had returned from their enforced exile and were reoccupying their former homes ;‘ and, as the frontiersmen said, it was not likely that the hostile savages from far-off Sandusky would have reached the border settlements so early in the season ; or if in fact they were the perpetrators of the outrages, they must have made the Muskingum villages the base of their operations, and in such case the blame was charge- able on the Moravians. There were some who dis- sented from this view of the case, but when the story of Carpenter's capture and captivity was told, it was agreed by nearly all that the Moravians had at least given aid to the murdering savages by furnishing them with a refuge and subsistence, if indeed they had not also actually accompanied the war parties and taken active part in their work of massacre and devastation. It was therefore the general sentiment of the people that an expedition should be sent at once to the Moravian towns to compel their final and permanent evacuation by the Moravians, to burn the houses so that the place could no longer be used as a shelter and base of operations for war parties, and to take bloody vengeance on all hostile savages who might be found there ; but it does not appear that in the inception of the enterprise there was any inten- tion (at least among the leading men) to kill any of the really peaceable Moravians, or to do them any violence beyond compelling them (by force if need be) to vacate the villages and remove either to a re- mote part of the Indian country or to the vicinity of Fort Pitt, where they could be kept under the sur- veillance of the military authorities.

So unanimous among the settlers was the senti- ment in favor of such an expedition that its ranks could have been easily and quickly filled with volun- teers, but Col. James Marshel, who as county lieu- tenant of Washington had entire control of the mili- tary of the county, was entirely opposed to that method of raising men, being-as he had previously expressed himself in an official letter to Gen. Irvine- "heartily tired out with volunteer plans." He had re- ceived authority from the Supreme Executive Council of Pennsylvania (in circular instructions to lieuten- ants of the western counties, dated Jan. 8, 1782) to

1 Butterfield's and some other accounts erroneously give the 17th as the date of the attack on Wallace's house.

" It was about the 15th of February that Carpenter was captured. Some accounts have it " early in March," but this is a mistake. He had escaped and returned to the settlements before the 25th of February.

8 Doddridge in his " Notes" says Carpenter lived in Virginia, not far from Wellsburg.

+ " Having received intelligence that the Indian towns on the Mua- kingum had not moved, as was supposed, a number of men, properly provided, collected and rendezvoused on the Ohio opposite the Mingo Bottom, with a design to surprise the above [Moravian] towns."-Penn- sylvania Gazette, April 17, 1782.

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HISTORY OF WASHINGTON COUNTY, PENNSYLVANIA.

call out the militia of his county at will on any emergency which in his opinion rendered it necessary, and he now promptly exercised that authority by calling out from the militia of the county the number of men which he thought necessary for the success- ful accomplishment of the object in view. The force, which consisted of about one hundred and sixty men,1 all of Washington County, and all, or very nearly all, of whom were mounted, was placed under command of Col. David Williamson. It left the county on the 3d of March, and in the morning of the 4th crossed the Ohio River to the Mingo Bottom, which was on the western bank of the stream, about two and a half miles below the present town of Steu- benville.

When the Shawanese war party who destroyed the home of Robert Wallace, on Raccoon Creek, made their rapid retreat to the Ohio with their prisoners, in the night of the 10th of February, they found Mrs. Wallace and her infant child to be serious impedi- ments to the rapidity of their march, and so, soon after crossing the river, these two helpless ones were ruthlessly murdered,2 the mother scalped, and her

1 Butterfield, in his " Historical Account of the Expedition Against Sandusky under Col. William Crawford in 1782," gives the strength of this force as ninety men only ; and Doddridge (page 248) places it at " between eighty and ninety men ;" but this is undoubtedly an error. Most of the accounts which bear the appearance of authenticity state the number to have been one hundred and sixty. One of the apparently most reliable of these accounts is the " Relation of Frederick Linebach," which is found in the Pennsylvania Archives of 1781-83, page 524, and is given farther on in this narrative. It embraces the account given of the expedition by two persons living near Easton, Pa., but who were present on the frontier at the time Williamson's party returned from the campaign. In a few days thereafter they left the frontier and re- turned to Eastern Pennsylvania, where they related the facts as given. The number of Williamson's men was stated by them as one hundred and sixty. The statement of men who were on the border at the time, who heard all the facts related, and very likely saw the forces of the ex- pedition, is of more value than any account written years afterward from recollection or tradition. It is true that Dr. Doddridge was also living on the frontier at the time, but as he was then only about twelve years old, it is not to be supposed that he would of his own knowledge have any definite information as to the number of men composing the expedition.

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History of Washington County, Pennsylvania : with biographical sketches of many of its pioneers and prominent men, Part 23

Author: Crumrine, Boyd, 1838-1916; Ellis, Franklin, 1828-1885; Hungerford, Austin N Publication date: 1882 Publisher: Philadelphia : H.L. Everts & Co. Number of Pages: 1216

Author: Crumrine, Boyd, 1838-1916; Ellis, Franklin, 1828-1885; Hungerford, Austin N
Publication date: 1882
Publisher: Philadelphia : H.L. Everts & Co.
Number of Pages: 1216