USA > Pennsylvania > Westmoreland County > History of Westmoreland county, Pennsylvania, Vol. I > Part 8
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St. Clair himself says that hundreds of settlers left the county and re- turned east. Others, at the first false alarm, would flee from their houses and take refuge in the forts or blockhouses. He says, further, that it was shameful, if not cowardly, for the people to flee from Connolly in this way. St. Clair probably knew better than the people that the threatened Indian raid was not against this section. On July II reports were circulated that a party of Indians was seen at or near Hannastown, and another on
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the Braddock road, south of that. He mounted a swift horse and found the reports to be unfounded, or, at all events, highly improbable. But he could not make the people believe it. In twenty miles' ride, he says, he met no less than two hundred families and two thousand cattle, all en- route for some fort. Nearly all the residents of Ligonier Valley moved into the stockade. They too were determined to leave the country. They had not then cut their harvests, and, had they gone, says St. Clair, they would undoubtedly have perished with famine.
About this time Dunmore's war was carried west, and the greater part of the real battling was done in the Ohio valley, near the Kanawha river. Dunmore, Connolly, Cresap, Simon Girty and Alexander McKee were all there, and peace reigned in Westmoreland. It also became apparent that there was no further danger of an Indian outbreak. But very shortly the war in the southwest ended, and Connolly returned and renewed his hostil- ities against the magistrates and the people. Even in Pittsburg many of the settlers contemplated leaving. In November a detachment of his army came to Hannastown, broke open the jail, and released two murderers who were sentenced to be hanged. Another party seized Mr. Scott, agent of the Penns, and made him give bail to appear at the next court to be held in Pittsburg for Augusta county, Virginia. In February, 1775, a raid was made on Hannastown; they broke open a blacksmith shop near by, took some large hammers and irons, and broke open the jail. They released all the prisoners, and told them to clear the country. This party was under Benjamin Harrison, a son-in-law of Judge Crawford, who opened the first courts in our county. Judge Hanna remonstrated with them from his upper window, but the outlaws only jeered him and the sheriff. On the 25th, Justices Hanna and Cavett, were arrested, for no offense what- ever but the general one of being magistrates under the Penns, and were confined at Pittsburg for three months.
The good people of neither Pennsylvania nor Virginia, took part in these outrages, but each side of the boundary question had its supporters, and on each side were most excellent people. John Gibson, father of the re- nowned chief justice of Pennsylvania, John B. Gibson, and a man of the highest character, sided with Virginia. No better man nor purer patriot lived than William Crawford, as he afterwards proved by giving his life in defense of the people. Yet he decidedly sided with Virginia, and when the Executive Council heard of it they advised the governor to dismiss him from the office of justice, and it was accordingly done.
Dunmore's war was now about ended, but still darker days were in store for our early settlers. The winter of 1774-75 was a very severe one. In the spring of 1774 crops, as we have explained, were not planted as they should have been, and many were not harvested, because of the savages and of Connolly and his men, and through fear of the Indian outbreak. Late in the fall, when safety was assured, hundreds who had gone east came
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back to Westmoreland, and of necessity came empty handed. All who had been away, either as soldiers or refugees, had been consumers and not pro- ducers. The stock of provisions in the county was scarcely large enough for those who remained, and, when the list of consumers was augmented by those who returned, famine almost stared them in the face. But the settlers, with an altruistic spirit which would have done credit to our day, even, divided their scanty store with those who were in distress. Never- theless many would have starved had it not been for the abundant supply of wild game in the woods. The actual supply of farm products, corn, rye and potatoes, was divided around. Yet it was but the beginning of long years of poverty and gloom, which culminated only with the close of the Revolutionary war.
Dunmore's war did not in itself settle the boundary line between Penn- sylvania and Virginia, though there were no further hostilities concerning i :. Dunmore and Connolly escaped into the British army with the breaking out of the Revolution. For years the names of both were most thor- oughly detested among our people. Had the question in dispute been left to honorable men, it could have been readily settled, but with a man like Dunmore proved to be reason was out of the question. Men like Benjamin Franklin, of Pennsylvania, or Thomas Jefferson, of Virginia, regarded these boundary disputes, as they were carried on, as unworthy of the citizens of either Pennsylvania or Virginia. On July 25, 1775, the delegates in the Continental Congress, among whom were Jefferson, Franklin and Patrick Henry, united in a circular asking the people of the disputed territory to use all mutual forbearance possible, and suggested that neither party should keep armed men. There was really no armed force except that of Virginia. On August 7, the Virginia convention directed Captain John Neville with a company of one hundred men to take charge of Fort Pitt. This was, at least, a display of hostility not sanctioned by the leading men of Virginia, and it is probable that the action was taken before the suggestion from the members of congress reached the Virginia convention. The Penns, willing to do anything for the sake of peace, permitted the matter to pass. The Revolution came at once, and Neville held the fort, not as a Virginian, but rather as an adjunct of the American army, though at first, at least, he was paid by the colony of Vir- ginia. He held the fort till 1777, under the direction of the Continental Congress, and purely in the interests of the colonies. The boundary ques- tion was forgotten when both Pennsylvania and Virginia were fighting for freedom in the Revolution. It was afterward brought up by Virginia and Pennsylvania unitedly and was settled as the Proprietaries always claimed it should be, in 1779-84, in the following manner: Three Pennsyl- vanians and two Virginians were appointed to permanently locate the boundary. The agreement was signed August 31, 1779. By its terms they were 5
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to extend the then well known Mason and Dixon's Line west five degrees of longitude from the Delaware river. From the end of this line a line ·directly north to Lake Erie should be our western line or border. It was further agreed that the rights of all persons should be secure, no matter in which state they fell, and that, in all disputes as to ownership, preference should be given to the older right or claim. The agreement was ratified by Virginia on June 23, 1780, and by Pennsylvania on September 23, 1780, and again, after certain amendments offered by Virginia, on April I, 1784. During 1784 the boundaries were surveyed and marked by stones set up, one every five miles. On the south side of each stone was cut the letter "V", and on the north side the letter "P". This then, finally and for- ever settled the boundary question, and, as settled then, it remains today.
CHAPTER VI
The Indians of Early Westmoreland.
Our early Westmoreland annals are so replete with references to the Indians that it is highly proper that we should now glance casually at their tribal history, their leading characteristics, and their modes of life. All over western Pennsylvania have been found relics in abundance which prove beyond doubt that they once roamed over our hills in great numbers. But even without these the beautiful Indian nomenclature of our rivers, mountains, valleys, counties, and towns, prove their former presence in this community.
Archaeologists and philologists have alike for a century speculated in vain as to the origin of this strange and pathetic people. It is idle to pre- tend that we know more of their early history and origin than that they were here when Columbus came to America, and that their name was given them by him because of his well known mistake in geography. Prior to 1750 Western Pennsylvania was inhabited by the Indian alone. It was never densely populated by them as we understand density now, for with their mode of life no section was capable of sustaining more than an ex- tremely limited number of inhabitants. As a people they lived very largely by hunting and fishing. Their women cultivated small patches of corn, a cereal which has since borne their name, and in addition to this many of them raised a few vegetables. They also raised large quantities of tobacco. To this end they cleared small tracts of land here and there, generally on the alluvial bottoms of large streams, many of which are yet pointed out as old Indian fields. They knew nothing of fertilizing land and when the soil was exhausted they abandoned their fields and removed to new sections. They knew something of the medicinal qualities of roots, herbs and flowers, which grew in the wildwood, and these they gathered and used in times of external injury with a considerable degree of success. They subsisted largely on the meat of wild game and for this reason it required thousands of acres to support even a small tribe. The land was necessarily public land so far as the Indians were concerned: A tribe it is true, exercised a temporary ownership over a certain section, but this they readily aband-
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oned if a locality more promising for the pursuit of wild game presented itself, or when fire wood was well nigh exhausted. All Indians were prompt to help each other in distress. Some families were poor and improvident, while others were prosperous. Yet while any member of the tribe had food, the indigent and shiftless did not suffer, and the results of a successful hunting expedition were shared with their less fortunate friends if they stood in need of them. Originally they made all their own implements of war- fare and of the chase. Their bows and arrows were made of wood. The former were stiffened with the dried tendons and thongs of the deer or buffalo, and the latter were tipped at the points with flinty stones known in modern times as arrow-heads. Their bowstrings were of raw-hide made from the skins of animals. They also made rude axes from stone, and with these and by the aid of fire, they were able to fell trees and to hollow out their huge trunks, thus converting them into canoes. However, when first known to Westmoreland pioneers, they were provided with iron and steel implements and in part at least, with firearms. Some of these they had captured or stolen from the whites, others were furnished them by thought- less and unprincipled traders in return for skins and furs. But the union formed between the French and Indians and still later between the Eng- lish and Indians, had aided them still more, in the acquisition of scalping knives, tomahawks and guns, and also in teaching them how to use these weapons to the best advantage.
It must not be supposed, however, that the introduction of firearms among the Indians induced them to abandon the bow and arrow. The best firearm known or used then was a flintlock which was discharged by a spark made by a flint in the hammer striking a projection on the gun barrel. This spark fell into the "pan", where a small amount of powder called "the priming" was placed after the gun was loaded. When this was ignited by the spark it communicated its flame with the powder in the gun, and the latter was instantly discharged. As may be readily imagined, the least dampness or rain would render the flintlock useless, but not so with the bow and arrow. This the Indian always kept with him, and so skillful was he in its use that he rarely ever missed his mark when at short range. In the hands of an expert Indian it was more to be feared than a firearm, for the wound was more painful and the arrow was directed with scarcely less unerring certainty. Not infrequently has it been found that an arrow from the bow of a strong armed savage had penetrated and passed entirely through a large horse or buffalo. Furthermore, its discharge made no re- port, and the unwary pioneer or the herd of deer had little or no knowledge of the whereabouts of their hidden enemy. It was a weapon, indeed, peculiarly suited to an enemy whose strength lay largely in the stealthy manner in which he approached his foe. It was used by the In- dians in all of our earlier wars with them. In General St. Clair's battle
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with the Indians in 1791 it is on record that the arrow wounds were more galling and more feared by the American troops than the wounds from gun shots.
The Indians inhabiting the eastern part of the United States with whom our early settlers came most in contact are usually designated as the "Six Nations," viz. : the Mohawks, Oneidas, Onondagas, Cayugas, Senecas and Tuscaroras. Each of these nations had a rude form of government, and their unwritten laws were well understood by the Indians and were binding even on the humblest members of the race. Francis Parkman says that they lived together by thousands with a harmony which civilized nations might envy. Each of these six nations was composed of smaller tribes of from two to five hundred members. These tribes were separated widely from each other, so that each could have unbounded miles of hunt- ing territory. Each tribe had its chief, who exercised great power over all his subjects. On the death of the chief the office did not generally descend to his son, but to his sister's son or to the dead chief's brother. But if the rightful heir was a weakling or a coward, or was otherwise in- capacitated for leadership, the tribe did not hesitate to discard him and select another. The son of a chief, while he could not inherit the office from his father, could earn it by deeds of daring courage. Capt. John Smith discovered and made a note of these customs even in his day among the early tribes of Virginia.
They had a marriage ceremony which was generally celebrated with songs and dances, and their marital relations were comparatively well kept. though divorce was obtainable on the arbitrary caprice of either party. The relationship of father, grandfather, cousin, nephew, etc., were clearly defined among them, and no Indian youth was allowed to marry a squaw of his own immediate tribe, because of the possible relationship which might exist between them. The average Indian was tall and straight with rough features, high cheek bones, Roman or aquiline nose, coarse straight black hair, dark penetrating eyes and beardless face. He had a swarthy complexion, much darker than the darkest of our race, which had a tinge of red or brown in it, and this gave him the well known name of red skin, thought it is at best something of a misnomer.
The Indian has been widely represented as of a silent and morose dis- position, and this, says Washington Irving, is in some degree erroneous. When alone in helpless captivity among the whites, whose language he did not understand and whose motives he distrusted, he was invariably taciturn but certainly not more so than the white man would have been under like circumstances. Parkman describes them as continuously visiting, chat- ting, joking and bantering each other with sharp witticism. When among themselves in their smoky wigwams or around their blazing camp fires, they were exceedingly loquacious and mirthful. Deeds of valor, feats of
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strength and agility, narrow escapes from captivity and death when on the war path, the successes or failures of the last hunting expedition, and amus- ing incidents at the expense of the white man, constituted very largely the younger Indian's conversation, while the older members of the race regaled the youthful warriors with the oft-repeated heroic tales of incidents long gone by.
The average Indian had, indeed, more endurance, and could run faster than the average white man, for his entire life's training tended to fortify him in these feats of strength; while, on the other hand, the heavy labor incident to pioneer life destroyed the white man's fleetness of foot, and rendered him less agile and less able to cope with his Indian enemy in this direction. In war, when equally opposed, the Indian was almost invincible. He never of his own volition fought in the open, but took advantage of every possible method of ambuscade. Familiar with all phases of forest life, he sought to match the superior numbers or strength of his enemy by a thorough concealment of his own whereabouts in battle. The military training of the English and American soldiers stood for but little when confronted by a foe who could fire and almost instantly disappear from view. Indeed, the serried columns of the drillmaster rather assisted the Indian in ambush, and only when his methods of warfare were learned and somewhat adopted was the American soldier even comparatively success- ful in his contests with him. The Indian did not adopt this method through fear or cowardice, for when forced to fight at bay he proved himself not lacking in bravery by fighting with a desperation found only in infuriated wild beasts. His leading principle in warfare was self-preservation. He thought it foolhardy to needlessly expose himself in battle, as foolhardy as though the contest were between himself and a ferocious animal. His war parties only received the highest meed of praise when they returned not only with an abundance of scalps but without the loss of a warrior. He employed every subterfuge and stratagem possible with him to entice the white man into danger. He so successfully imitated the gobble of the wild turkey that the unsuspecting hunter was lured within reach of his arrow. He removed the bell from a domestic animal and by gently shaking it enticed the pioneer or his children to his hiding place and to captivity or death. His people had for centuries hunted wild animals by stealth and he adopted the same methods of ridding himself from the new and more dangerous enemy which, in countless numbers, came upon him from the East.
When 'first known to the white man they were not necessarily a savage race. They went to war among themselves, but were not particularly hostile to our people until we began to displace them and to interfere, as they thought, with their vested rights in the natural products of the wilderness. They thought it their duty to exterminate the white man, and
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the latter thought it no greater crime to kill an Indian than a rattlesnake. If he seldom ever spared the life of a wounded or conquered adversary the Indian, on the other hand, asked no quarter when he himself was taken captive. It is quite probable that for obvious reasons, the early settler in his combats with the Indians met oftenest the larger and stronger speci- mens of the tribe. This led to the impression that they were as a race phy- sically much superior to our own. This is entirely erroneous. Our men compared well with them in size and strength, and, considering all circum- stances, there was perhaps but little advantage on either side. Our women were, all things considered, equal to theirs in strength, and greatly superior to them in physical beauty. The attractive Indian maiden of modern fiction is a poetical creation rather than one found in real life. The Indian woman was homely, and one of average comeliness was a rare exception, and this quality the race has preserved even to this day. But the Indian standards of aesthetics differed from ours, and to his eye the maiden of his race may have been richly dowered with personal loveliness and beauty.
Of the smaller tribes the ones most commonly known to our early pioneers were the Cornplanters, Delawares, Cherokees, Mingoes, Shawnees. Munsies, Hurons, Ojibwas, Miamis, Pottowatamies, etc., and some of them are yet represented in the remnant Indian tribes of the west. The Indian incursions made on our early Westmoreland settlers invariably originated with one or more of the tribes above mentioned. They were then scattered all over the country west of the Susquehanna and north of the Ohio rivers, with a few stragglers farther south and east. The Cornplanters and the Delawares were the tribes with whom our early settlers came most in contact.
The Indians built towns, but not as places of permanent abode, for the reason that they were compelled to wander over a large territory and often to remove when game was scarce, from one locality to another to subsist at all. They lived in small houses made of poles, and covered with the skins of animals and with the bark of trees to protect them from the cold and rain. These houses were called wigwams. They were generally circular in shape at the ground, and the poles, standing on their ends, were drawn nearly together at the top, thus presenting a conical form, with a small opening at the apex for the emission of smoke. The conical shape of the wigwam made it less liable to be blown over by the storm. In our part of the state each family had a separate wigwam, though in some tribes several families lived in the same habitation. They usually built their wigwams in a valley or on the sheltered side of a mountain or hill, and near to a good stream of water. Sometimes the wigwams were long and narrow, even as long as one hundred feet or more, and each one served for many families. There was always an opening at the top for the escape of smoke, but they were invariably filled with soot. Living almost constantly in
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smoke, many of the Indians had inflamed eyes in winter time, and a result- ant blindness in old age was not infrequent. They had rude fortifications around their towns made by digging trenches and surmounting the ground thrown from them by logs, stones, bark, etc. In these rude habitations they cooked, ate and slept in the winter time, using leaves and dried. twigs covered with the skins of animals for beds. The wigwams were so poorly constructed that they decayed and were gone in a few years after they were abandoned.
The white race in Western Pennsylvania practically came first in con- tact with the Indians in purchasing furs and skins from them. The Indian was naturally a child of the wilderness, and excelled in hunting wild an- imals. As a result the Indian towns abounded with the skins of the buffalo, bear, deer, wolf, beaver, otter, mink, fox, raccoon, etc. They shot these animals with bows and arrows or with firearms. They speared fish, or caught them with rude hooks made of bone, or drove them into ponds screened with small rods. They also fished with rude nets, made from the twisted fiber of wild hemp. Both animals and, fish and all game birds were then extremely plentiful. The life the Indian led had developed his senses of sight, hearing and smell to a degree which amazed even the shrewdest woodsman among our early settlers. He knew the habits of all wild animals, and could detect their slightest movements in the forests, movements invisible to the eye of one unaccustomed to the woods. With these qualities he easily surpassed the average hunter in procuring skins and furs and wild game.
Upon the women of the tribe devolved all the hard labor, including rais- ing corn, skinning wild animals and carrying heavy burdens of skins and dried meat when they were making long journeys. Their squaws were at best little better than beasts of burden. Their hard lives shriveled them and made them appear older than their years. They were hideous, neglect- ed and despised in latter years, and, as a result, became more fierce, cruel and vindictive than were the men of the tribe. In explanation of this cus- tom concerning the Indian women it may be said that such duties were invariably performed by women in all nations of the world when in that stage of civilization. Their Indian household duties, as may be readily imagined, were necessarily very few. The warrior, whether hunting wild animals or on the warpath, needed agility, a steady nerve, and great strength above all things else, and these would all have been impaired by hard labor or by carrying heavy burdens. The Indian boy. was taught from childhood to run, jump, swim, fish, shoot and fight, but not to work. They were taught to go hungry and endure all manner of hardships and pain without complaint, preparing them in that way for what they might expect in after life. With such training it is not to be wondered at that he scorned and laughed at the wails of agony of his victim who felt
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