History of Washington County, Pennsylvania : with biographical sketches of many of its pioneers and prominent men, Part 27

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 27

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" Your best chance of success will be, if possible, to effect a surprise, and though this will be difficult, yet by forced and rapid marches it may, in a great degree, be accomplished. I am clearly of opinion that you should regulate your last day's march so as to reach the town about dawn of day, or a little before, and that the march of this day should be as long as can well be performed.

" I need scarcely mention to so virtuous and disinterested a set of men as you will have the honor to command that though the main

5 These directions were observed, Col. Williamson being designated as second, and Maj. Gaddis as third in command.

6 Yet the Moravian historians and their imitators have heaped nn- measured abuse on the brave men who composed this expedition. Heckewelder, in his " History of the Indian Nations," calls them a " gang of banditti ;" and Loskiel, writing in the same vein in his " His- tory of Indian Missions," said, " The same gang of murderers who had committed the massacre on the Muskingum did not give up their bloody design upon the remnant of the Indian congregation, though it was de- layed for a season. They marched in May, 1782, to Sandusky, where they found nothing but empty huts." The Rev. Joseph Doddridge, D.D., following the lead of these Moravian defamers, in his " Notes on the Settlement and Indian Wars of the Western Parts of Virginia and Pennsylvania," says (page 264) of Crawford's expedition, " This, in one point of view at least, is to be considered as a second Moravian cam- paign, as one of its objects was that of finishing the work of murder and plunder with the Christian Indians at their new establishment on the Sandusky. The next object was that of destroying the Wyandot towns on the same river. It was the resolution of all those concerned in this expedition not to spare the life of any Indiane that might fall into their hands, whether friends or foes. . .. It would seem that the long continuance of the Indian war had debased a considerable portion of our population to the savage state of our nature. Having lost 80 many relatives by the Indians, and witnessed their horrid murders and other depredations on so extensive a scale, they became subjects of that indiscriminating thirst for revenge which is such a prominent feature in the savage character, and having had a taste of blood and plunder, without risk or loss on their part, they resolved to go on and kill every Indian they could find, whether friend or foe." Does not the tenor of Gen. Irvine's instructions to Col. Crawford completely disprove the alle- gations of Loskiel, Heckewelder, and Doddridge? If further testimony is necessary it is found in a "History of Centre Church," written by Robert A. Sherrard, of Ohio, whose father, John Sherrard, was a volun- teer in Crawford's expedition, and present with it in its operations from the Ohio to the Sandusky and back to the Ohio. Mr. Sherrard says, " In my young days I was acquainted with six or seven of the men who were out in Crawford's campaign. They were volunteers from the neighborhood where I was raised, within four or five miles of Connells- ville, close to which place Col. Crawford dwelt. John Sherrard, Col. James Paull, John Rodgers, Daniel Cannon, Alexander Carson, and sev- eral others of that neighborhood arrived safe home. I have heard my father converse freely on that subject, and at a much later date I bave conversed with Col. Paull and John Rodgers about Crawford's defeat,

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HISTORY OF WASHINGTON COUNTY, PENNSYLVANIA.

" Should any person, British, or in the service or pay of Britain or their allies, fall into your hands, if it should prove inconvenient for you to bring them off, you will, nevertheless, take special care to liberate them on parole, in such manner as to insure liberty for an equal num- ber of people in their hands. There are individuals, however, who I think should be brought off at all events should the fortune of war throw them into your hands. I mean such as have deserted to the enemy since the Declaration of Independence."

The forces of Col. Crawford commenced their march from Mingo Bottom early in the morning of Saturday, the 25th of May. There was a path leading from the river into the wilderness, and known as "Wil- liamson's trail," because it was the route over which Col. Williamson had previously marched on his way to the Moravian towns. This trail, as far as it ex- tended, offered the easiest and most practicable route, but Col. Crawford did not adopt it,1 because it was a principal feature in his plan of the campaign to avoid all traveled trails or routes on which they would be likely to be discovered by lurking Indians or parties of them, who would make haste to carry intelligence of the movement to the villages which it was his pur- pose to surprise and destroy. So the column, divided into four detachments, each under immediate com- mand of one of the four field-majors, moved up from the river-bottom into the higher country, and struck into the trackless wilderness, taking a course nearly due west. The advance was led by Capt. Biggs' com- pany, and piloted by the guides Zane, Nicholson, and Slover.

On through the dark forest the troops moved rap- idly but warily, preceded by scouts, and observing every precaution known to border warfare to guard against ambuscade or surprise, though no sign of an enemy appeared in the unbroken solitude of the woods. No incident of note occurred on the march until the night of the 27th of May, when, at their third camping-place, a few of the horses strayed and were lost, and in the following morning the men who had thus been dismounted, being unable to proceed on foot without embarrassing the movements of the column, were ordered to return to Mingo Bottom, which they did, but with great reluctance.

On the fourth day they reached and crossed the Muskingum River, and then, marching up the western side of the stream, came to the ruins of the upper Moravian village, where they made their camp for the night, and found plenty of corn remaining in the

and I can assert positively that I never heard from either of these three the least intimation that to kill off the remainder of the Christian Mo- ravian Indians was at all the object of Crawford and his men ; but on the contrary I bave frequently heard these men say the main object was to chastise the Wyandots by killing as many as they could, burn their towns, and destroy their corn. This, and this only, was the object of these men in undertaking this campaign, and by that means to check the Indians from murdering, scalping, and plundering the white inhab- itants on the frontier settlements, as had been the case for two months before."

1 Dr. Doddridge, in his " Notes," says, "The army marched along Williamson's trail, as it was then called, until they arrived at the upper Moravian town." In this, as in many other parts of his narrative, Doddridge was entirely mistaken.

ravaged fields of the Christian Indians. This en- campment was only sixty miles from their starting- point on the Ohio, yet they had been four days in reaching it. During the latter part of their journey to this place they had taken a route more southerly than the one originally contemplated, for their horses had become jaded and worn out by climbing the hills and floundering through the swamps, and so the commander found himself compelled to deflect his line of march so as to pass through a more open and level country ; but he did this very unwillingly, for it led his army through a region in which they would be much more likely to be discovered by Indian scouts or hunting-parties.

Up to this time, however, no Indians had been seen ; but while the force was encamped at the ruined village, on the evening of the 28th of May, Maj. Brinton and Capt. Bean went out to reconnoitre the vicinity, and while so engaged, at a distance of about a quarter of a mile from the camp, they discovered two skulking savages and promptly fired on them. The shots did not take effect and the Indians fled, but the circumstance gave Col. Crawford great un- easiness, for, although he had previously supposed that his march had been undiscovered by the enemy, he now believed that these scouts had been hovering on their flanks, perhaps along the entire route from Mingo Bottom, and it was certain that the two savages who had been fired on would speedily carry intelli- gence of the hostile advance to the Indian towns on the Sandusky.

It was now necessary to press on with all practica- ble speed in order to give the enemy as little time as possible to prepare for defense. Early in the morning of the 29th the column resumed its march, moving rapidly, and with even greater caution than before. From the Muskingum the route was taken in a northwesterly course to the Killbuck, and thence up that stream to a point about ten miles south of the present town of Wooster, Ohio, where, in the even- ing of the 30th, the force encamped, and where one of the men died and was buried at a spot which was marked by the cutting of his name in the bark of the nearest tree.

From the lone grave in the forest they moved on in a westerly course, crossing an affluent of the Mohican, passing near the site of the present city of Mansfield, and arriving in the evening of the 1st of June at the place which is now known as Spring Mills Station, on the Pittsburgh, Fort Wayne and Chicago Railroad. There by the side of a fine spring they bivouacked for the night. In the march of the 2d they struck the Sandusky River at about two o'clock P.M., and halted that night in the woods very near the eastern edge of the Plains, not more than twenty miles from the Indian town, their point of destination. They had seen no Indian since their departure from the night camp at the Moravian Indian village on the Muskin- gum, though they had in this day's march unknow-

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THE REVOLUTION.

ingly passed very near the camp of the Delaware chief Wingenund.

On the morning of the 3d of June the horsemen entered the open country known as the Sandusky Plains, and moved rapidly on through waving grasses and bright flowers, between green belts of timber and island groves such as few of them had ever seen before. Such were the scenes which surrounded them during all of that day's march, and at night they made their fireless bivouac on or near the site of the present village of Wyandot, not more than ten miles from their objective-point, where (as they be- lieved) the deadly and decisive blow was to be struck.

Two hours after sunrise on the 4th the men were again in the saddle, and the four squadrons began their march, moving with greater caution than ever. A march of six miles brought them to the mouth of the Little Sandusky ; thence, having crossed the stream, they proceeded in a direction a little west of north, past an Indian sugar-camp of the previous spring (which was all the sign that they had seen of Indian occupation), and passed rapidly on towards the Wyandot town,1 the objective-point of the expe- dition, which, as the guide Slover assured the com- mander, lay immediately before them within striking distance. Suddenly, at a little after noon, the site of the town came in full view through an opening in the timber, but to their utter amazement they found only a cluster of deserted huts without a single in- habitant! The village appeared to have been de- serted for a considerable time, and the place was a perfect solitude. This was a dilemma which Col. Crawford had not foreseen nor anticipated, and he at once ordered a halt to rest the horses and give time for him to consider the strange situation of affairs, and to decide on a new plan of operations.

The guides and some others in Crawford's com- mand were well acquainted with the location of the Indian town. John Slover had previously been a prisoner with the Miamis, and during his captivity with that tribe had frequently visited the Wyandot village on the Sandusky. In guiding the expedition there he had, of course, expected to find the village as he had before seen it, and was, like the rest, as- tonished to find it deserted. The fact, as after- wards learned, was that some time before Crawford's coming, but how long before has never been definitely ascertained, the Indians, believing that their upper village was peculiarly exposed to danger from the in- cursions of the whites, had abandoned it and retired down the river about eight miles, where they gathered around the village of the Half-King, Pomoacan, and that was their location when the columns of Col. Crawford descended the Sandusky.

Contrary to the belief of the Pennsylvania and Virginia settlers that the mustering of their forces and the march of their expedition was unknown to the Indians, the latter had been apprised of it from the inception of the project. Prowling spies east of the Ohio had watched the volunteers as they left their homes in the Monongahela Valley and moved west- ward towards the rendezvous; they had seen the gathering of the borderers at Mingo Bottom, and had shadowed the advancing column along all its line of march from the Ohio to the Sandusky. Swift runners has sped away to the northwest with every item of warlike news, and on its receipt the chiefs and war- riors at the threatened villages lost not a moment in making the most energetic preparations to repel the invasion. Messengers were dispatched to all the Wy- andot, Delaware, and Shawanese bands, calling on them to send in all their braves to a general rendez- vous near the Half-King's headquarters, and word was sent to De Peyster, the British commandant at Detroit, notifying him of the danger threatening his Indian allies, and begging that he would send them aid without delay. This request he at once acceded to, sending a considerable force of mounted men, with two or three small pieces of artillery. These, however, did not play a prominent part in the tragedy which followed.

The Indian scouts who had watched the little army of Crawford from the time it left Mingo Bottom sent forward reports of its progress day by day, and from these reports the chiefs at the lower towns on the San- dusky learned in the night of the 3d of June that the invading column was then in bivouac on the Plains, not more than eighteen miles distant. The war par- ties of the Miamis and Shawanese had not come in to the Indian rendezvous, nor had the expected aid arrived from the British post at Detroit, but the chiefs resolved to take the war-path without them, to harass and hold the advancing enemy in check as much as possible until the savage forces should be augmented sufficiently to enable them to give battle with hope of success. Accordingly, in the morning of the 4th of June, at about the same time when Col. Crawford was leaving his camp-ground of the previous night to march on the deserted Indian town, the great Dela- ware chief, Capt. Pipe, set out from his town with about two hundred warriors, and marched to the ren- dezvous, where his force was joined by a larger party of Wyandots under their chief Ghaus-sho-toh. With them was the notorious white renegade, Simon Girty, mounted on a fine horse and decked out in full Indian costume. The combined Delaware and Wyandot forces numbered in all more than five hundred braves, -a screeching mass of barbarians, hideous in their war-paint and wild with excitement. After an orgie of whooping, yelling, and dancing such as savages were wont to indulge in before taking the war-path, the wild crowd relapsed into silence, filed out from the I place of rendezvous, and glided away like a huge ser-

1 The location of the old Wyandot town was three miles southeast of the present town of Upper Sandusky, or five miles below by the course of the river, and on its opposite bank.

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HISTORY OF WASHINGTON COUNTY, PENNSYLVANIA.

pent across the grassy plain towards the cover of the distant belt of forest.

In the brief halt at the deserted village Col. Craw- ford consulted with his guides and some of the officers as to the most advisable course to be adopted under the strange circumstances in which he found himself placed. John Slover was firm in the opinion that the inhabitants of the village had removed to a town situ- ated a few miles below. He also believed that other villages would be found not far away from the one which had been abandoned, and that they might be surprised by a rapid forward movement. Zane was less confident, and not disposed to advise, though he did not strongly oppose a farther advance into the Indian country. The commander, after an hour's consideration of the embarrassing question, ordered the column to move forward towards the lower towns. Crawford's army and the combined Indian forces under Pipe and Ghaus-sho-toh were now rapidly ap- proaching each other.

Crossing the river just below the abandoned village, the Pennsylvania horsemen pressed rapidly on in a northerly direction to the place which afterwards became the site of Upper Sandusky. There was no indication of the presence of the foe, but the very silence and solitude seemed ominous, and the faces of officers and men grew grave, as if the shadow of ap- proaching disaster had begun to close around them. A mile farther on, a halt was ordered, for the gloom had deepened over the spirits of the volunteers, until, for the first time, it found expression in a demand from some of them that the advance should be abandoned and their faces turned back towards the Ohio River. At this juncture Col. Crawford called a council of war. It was composed of the commander, his aide- de-camp, Rose, the surgeon, Dr. Knight, the four ma- jors, the captains of the companies, and the guides. Zane now gave his opinion promptly and decidedly against any farther advance, and in favor of an im- mediate return ; for to his mind the entire absence of all signs of Indians was almost a sure indication that they were concentrating in overwhelming numbers at some point not far off. His opinion had great weight, and the council decided that the march should be con- tinued until evening, and if no enemy should then have been discovered, the column should retire over the route by which it came.

During the halt Capt. Biggs' company, deployed as scouts, had been thrown out a considerable distance to the front for purposes of observation. Hardly had the council reached its decision when one of the scouts came in at headlong speed with the thrilling intelligence that a large body of Indians had been discovered on the plain, less than two miles away. Then, "in hot haste," the volunteers mounted, formed, and moved forward rapidly and in the best of spirits, the retiring scouts falling in with the main body of horsemen as they advanced. They had proceeded

nearly a mile from the place where the council was held when the Indians were discovered directly in their front. It was the war party of Delawares, under their chief, Capt. Pipe, the Wyandots being farther to the rear and not yet in sight.

When the Americans appeared in full view of the Delawares, the latter made a swift movement to oc- cupy an adjacent wood, so as to fight from cover, but Col. Crawford, observing the movement, instantly dismounted his men, and ordered them to charge into the grove, firing as they advanced. Before this vigor- ous assault the Delawares gave way and retreated to the open plain, while Crawford's men held the woods. The Indians then attempted to gain cover in another grove farther to the east, but were repulsed by Maj. Leet's men, who formed Crawford's right wing. At this time the Wyandot force came up to reinforce the Delawares, and with them was Capt. William Cald- well, of the British army, dressed in the full uniform of an officer in the royal service.1 He had come from Detroit, and arrived at the Indian rendezvous a little in advance of the main British force, but after Pipe and Ghaus-sho-toh had set out with their braves to meet Crawford. He now came up to the scene of conflict, and at once took command of both Indian parties. On his arrival he immediately ordered the Delaware chief to flank the Americans by passing to their left. The movement was successfully exe- cuted, and they held the position much to the dis- comfort of the frontiersmen, who, however, could not be dislodged from their cover. But they had no great advantage of position, for the Indians were scarcely less sheltered by the tall grass of the plains, which almost hid them from view and afforded a consider- able protection against the deadly fire of the white marksmen.2.

The fight commenced at about three o'clock, and was continued with unabated vigor, but with varying success, through the long hours of that sultry June afternoon. Through it all the villanous Simon Girty was present with the Delawares, and was frequently seen by Crawford's men (for he was well known by many of them), riding on a white horse, giving orders and encouraging the savages, but never within range

1 Capt. Caldwell was the commanding officer of the entire force which De Peyster had sent from Detroit in aid of their Indian allies, viz., the mounted detachment known as Butler's Rangers and a company of infantry from the garrison at Detroit. Naturally, it would be supposed that the mounted Rangers would arrive first on the ground, and why they did not is not clearly explained, but they were yet several miles in the rear during the fight of the 4th of June. Capt. Matthew Elliott, of the British, was also present with the Indians in this battle, but he was only a Tory officer in the royal service, and could have no command in presence of Caldwell, who was a captain in the regular British army.

2 " Some of the borderers climbed trees, and from their bushy tops took deadly aim at the heads of the enemy as they arose above the grass. Daniel Canon (brother of Col. John Canon, of Canonsburg) was conspic- uous in this novel mode of warfare. He was one of the dead shots of the army, and from his lofty hiding-place the reports of his unerring rifle gave unmistakable evidence of the killing of savages. 'I do not know how many Indians I killed,' said he, afterwards, 'but I never saw the same head again above the grass after I shot at it.' "-Butterfield.

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THE REVOLUTION.

of the white men's rifles. The combined forces of the Wyandots and Delawares considerably outnumbered the command of Col. Crawford, but the latter held their own and could not be dislodged by all the arti- fices and fury of their savage assailants.1 When the shadows of twilight began to deepen over grove and glade the savage hordes ceased hostilities and retired to more distant points on the plains.

The losses in Col. Crawford's command during the afternoon were five killed and twenty-three wounded, as reported by the aide-de-camp, Rose, to Gen. Irvine. One of the killed was Capt. Ogle, and among the officers wounded were Maj. Brinton, Capt. Ross, Capt. Munn, Lieut. Ashley, and Ensign McMasters.

The losses of the Indians were never ascertained. Though doubtless greater than those of the whites, they were probably not very heary, because the sav- age combatants were to a great extent hidden from view by the tall grass which grew everywhere in the openings. · A number of Indian scalps were taken by Crawford's men, but no prisoners were captured on either side. The British captain, Caldwell, was wounded in both legs, and was carried back to Lower Sandusky in the night succeeding the battle. Upon this the command of the British force that was on the way seems to have passed to his lieutenant, John Turney, as a report of their subsequent operations in the campaign was made by him to De Peyster, the commandant at Detroit.

At the close of the conflict of the 4th of June the advantage seemed to be with the white men, for the foe had retired from their front and they still kept possession of the grove,2 from which the red demons had tried persistently but in vain for more than four hours to dislodge them. The officers and men of Col. Crawford's command were in good spirits, and the commander himself felt confident of ultimate victory, for his volunteers had behaved admirably, exhibiting remarkable steadiness and bravery during the trying scenes of the afternoon. But the Indians were by no means dispirited, for they had suffered no

actual defeat, and they knew that their numbers would soon be augmented by the Shawanese and other war parties who were already on their way to join them, as was also the British detachment which had been sent from Detroit.3 The night bivouac of the Wyandots was made on the plains to the north of the | battle-field, and that of the Delawares at about the same distance south. Far to the front of the Indian camps, lines of fires were kept burning through the night to prevent a surprise, and the same precaution- ary measure was taken by Col. Crawford. Out- lying scouts from both forces watched each other with sleepless vigilance through the hours of darkness, and frontiersmen and savages slept on their arms.

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History of Washington County, Pennsylvania : with biographical sketches of many of its pioneers and prominent men, Part 27

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