History of the County of Westmoreland, Pennsylvania, with Biographical Sketches of Many of its Pioneers and Prominent Men, Part 18

Author: George Dallas Albert, editor
Publication date:
Publisher:
Number of Pages:

USA > Pennsylvania > Westmoreland County > History of the County of Westmoreland, Pennsylvania, with Biographical Sketches of Many of its Pioneers and Prominent Men > Part 18

Note: The text from this book was generated using artificial intelligence so there may be some errors. The full pages can be found on Archive.org (link on the Part 1 page).

these names only twenty-five were written in English, the rest in an ; and, perhaps with the exception of Lafferty and Archbold, they all of German lineage. The names are still preserved in Hemp- North Huntingdon, and Penn townships, but the spelling has un- ue a change, and "Kleyn" is now "Kline," and " Macklin" is hling."

imilar petition from the county, evidently signed at Hannastown, he following signatures :

bert Hanna, Alexander Thompson, William Jack, Joseph Kinkead, el Galloher, William Shaw, William Jenkins, William Dawson, J. e, Joshua Archer, John Guthery, Joseph McGarraugh, William

It is to be noticed that some of the names are re- peated in at least two of the petitions, and it has been suspected that a few of the names are not genuine ; that is, there was no one in proper person to stand for the signature. What is likewise observable is that the names repeated are those of a German original. Maybe more of them might write their names than their brethren the Irish; and it might be that the signatures were signed in good faith at different times by the petitioners, with the hope of moving the au- thorities by the unanimous array of names. But feel- ing a sympathy with them at this late day in their trying times, we cannot help professing astonishment at the peculiar ubiquity of our sturdy Dutch ancestors, which allowed them to be, in time of danger, at differ- ent places at the same time. We might be led to infer that they indulged in the pleasing delusion that, being "now here, now there, now everywhere" (like the ghost in Hamlet), they might, like Paddy at Trenton, surround the Indians.

McCutchin, James McCutchin, Jeremiah Lochrey, Joseph Brownlee, Robert Taylor, John Ould, William Riddle, Hugh Brownlee, James Leech, David Crutchlow, James Crutchlow, Peter Castner, David Crutch- low, Jr., John Cristy, Joseph Shaw, David Shaw, William Nelson, John Guthrey, James Dunlap, Robert Riddle, John Riddle, William Guthrey, Charles Wilson, Joseph Studybaker, William Darraugh, James Darraugh, William Thompson, David Dickie, John Thompson, John Glass, John Holmes, Charles Foreman, Samuel Miller, John Shields, Thomas Patton, John Taylor, Samuel Parr, James Case, Adam Maxwell, William Max- well, William Barnes, James Moore, John Moore, Thomas Burbridge, Mar- tin Cavanagh, Arthur Denworthy, David Larrimore, Thomas Freeman, William Freeman, James Blain, Alexander McClean, John Moore, John Nolder, William Moore, William Hamilton, Thomas Ellis, Mark Ellis, John Ellis, John Adam, Andrew McClain, Robert Bell, William Bell, William Bell, Samuel Craig, John Craig, Alexander Craig, John Cochran, James Wills, Henry McBride, Isnac McBride, James Bently, Jacob Round, Barnabas Brant, William Brant, Edward Brant, Samuel Whiteside, Samuel Leetch, Matthew Miller, Alexander Mers, George Kean, Charles Mc- Ginnis, William Kindsey, Thomas Jack, John McAllister, Alexander Thomas, Samuel Couper, John Gourla, Samuel Gourla, James Beatty, Samuel Henderson, John Bryson, Robert Crawford. Alexander Simerall, James McClelland, James White, Thomas Dennis, John Zurimpley, Rich - ard Jones, William Moore, Adam Oury, John Cunningham, Suun Muck- malon, Peter Stot, William McCord, Andrew Gordin, John Muppin, John Christy, Patrick Colgan, P. Russell, James Neilson, Abraham Pyatt, B. McGeehan, Joseph Thorn, Robert Frier, William Powel, William Carr, Joseph Erwin, John Brownlee, Thomas Lyon.

A petition from John Shields, on the Loyalhanna, about six miles from Greensburg, of the same date, 1774, has the following names:

John Shields, John Nolder, John McIntire, David Henen, Henry Heathly, Manual Gallahan, Isaac Parr, James Parr, Samuel l'arr, Arthur Denniston, Archibald Trimble, John Denniston, Lorance Irwin. John Moore, Isaac Youngsee, Daniel McManame, Patrick Butler, Daniel Mc- Bride, James Blain, John Thompson, James Wills, Andrew Wills, Robert Bell, William Bell, Alexander McClain, Charles McClain, Thomas Bur- bridge, Andrew McClain, William Brant, Samuel Craig, John Craig, Alex- ander Craig, James Burns, John Cochran, David Shields, Thomas Free- man, Barnabas Brant, Edward Brant, James Bently, Jacob Round, John Moore, William Barns, William Cooper, William Hamilton, James Hall, David Loramer, John Loramer, Alexander Barr.

Another, dated Hannastown, but evidently signed by residents south of that place, contains, among others, Joseph McGanaugh, William Brown, William McGlaughen, Samuel McKee, John McDowell, David McKee, Robert McKee, James Paul, William Sampson, John Brown, Adam Morrow, John Giffen, Isaac Keeth, Dennis McConnel, George Nelson, James King, John Canan, William Shaw, Archibald Leach, James Boveard, Robert Haslet, Joseph Shaw, James Westley, John Cal- houn, John Lent, Stephen Groves, John Adams, John Hays, Charles Sterret, Robert Hays, and John Gothery, Jr.

Digitized by

Google

HISTORY OF WESTMORELAND COUNTY, PENNSYLVANIA.

CHAPTER XV. DUNMORE'S WAR.

Denmore's War began by the Murder of were Friendly Indians oper- lally Logan's Family-Virginian Army orgaulard-Danmore at Pittsburgh with Conbully-Great Gathering and Organization of the Indian Triles-The Campaign of 17it-The Hopes of our People in Col. Lewis-Dunmore and Contuilly want to see the Army defeated and the Indiane on the Froutiers-Lewis gaine the Battle of Print Pleasant -- Dunmore's Treaty -- Indictment : The People os. Dunmore -- Dunmore through Connolly still tyrannizes over the Pennsylvania Settlers, many of whom talk of leaving their Clearinge-Condition of the People in 1575-Leaders in Westmoreland in 1776-The Military Spirit.

IT is now time to return to the war itself, which, we have seen, was gathering upon the frontiers in the early part of 1774. Although, as we have said, Dun- more's war was not carried into our county, yet so intimately are our affairs connected with it that to have an understanding of them at all clear a re- hearsal of it cannot be omitted. We shall, in as few words as consistent, briefly relate the whole cam- paign. We know, first, the apprehensions of the settlers in the Southwest. In the latter end of April a party of land adventurers, fleeing from the dangers which threatened them, came in contact with some Indiana at the mouth of Captina Creek, sixteen miles below Wheeling. At about the same time happened the affair at Yellow Creek, midway between Pitts- burgh and Wheeling. At this time there was a large party of friendly Indians encamped at Yellow Creek. The surrounding inhabitants prepared to flee. A party of these meeting together at the house of one Joshua Baker fired upon some Indians collected there. Among those who were killed were the brother and daughter of Logan. This it was that drove this great warrior to take the war to himself. Hearing the coming storm, such settlers as could go fled to places of safety, and all the block-houses between the Ohio and the Laurel Hill were filled. When this news reached the East the colonial government of Virginia speedily organized a command for the de- fense of the frontier. An advance force penetrated into Ohio, but as they could not be supplied with necessary provisions they had to retire. The Indians followed, and the time following was a miserable one to the helpless. Logan's actions were imitated by the rest. This renowned Indian did not go with the larger bodies of Indians, but he headed a party of eight Cayuga warriors, and these had mercy on no- thing before them. He himself said afterwards that he had fully glutted his vengeance. What the fron- tiers of Virginia suffered never was and never will be told. Those even in the forts were in a confinement compared to which the confinement of a prison would be liberty. But during this time preparations were going on for the organization and forwarding of the expedition intended for their relief by the House of Burgesses.

divided into two divisions. In September the first division, under Col. Lewis, consisting of eleven bun- dred, marched from the mouth of the Little Kanawha. After a march of nineteen days through the wilde they erected their camp on the Ohio where the Big Kanawha empties. This place was called Point Pleasant. Here the other division of the army under the immediate command of Dunmore himself was to form a junction with the former. For reasons best known to Dunmore and his advisers it failed to do so. While Col. Lewis was awaiting word from the East, he received different news than he had expected. Lewis had reached this point about the Ist of October, and on the 9th he got word that Dunmore, instead of advancing to unite their armies, intended to proceed across the country directly to the Shawanese town, for Dunmore had on organizing his forces proceeded to Fort Pitt. He bere consulted with Connolly, and had in his service such men as Simon Girty and Al- exander McKee, recognized afterwards as notorious Tories, and while here at this time it was that he further attended to the organization of bis civil affairs in these parts, as has been noticed before.

The Indians in the mean time had not been idle. They had organized a large and terrible army, com- prised of many nations gathered under one chieftain. These were the flower of the Indian tribes along the Ohio,-the Shawanese, Mingoes, Delawares, Wyan- dotts, and Cayugas. In number they perhaps ex- ceeded the Virginians. They were all under the command of Cornstalk, a chief of the Shawanese, and king of the Northern Confederacy. He had hesitated long in taking arms against the whites. He was an eloquent man, of great foresight and judgment, and as a warrior is acknowledged on all sides to have been the most consummate Indian commander ever in arms against the whites. The plan of this battle was such as to reflect the highest credit on any general who had made an assiduous study of the science of war. And his arrangements were executed under his eyes with the utmost vigilance and bravery. He had brought his warriors with such secrecy and dispatch as to occupy a large half-circle across the opening where the two rivers flowed to meet each other. He then, under cover of the darkness, stretched his line of red-skinned warriors across the base of this triangle, in which triangle was the army of Virginians. Thus far without the knowledge of the whites, the savages did not count on anything but decisive victory, for their leader did not give his enemy a chance to escape, only by winning the battle. He intended to drive them into the decreasing point, and either to anni- hilate them before they could cross the rivers, or to cut them to pieces in the retreat. As for his own men, so much did he count on their bravery that he threatened to kill with his own hand any who should attempt to run back, unless he ordered them to do so, feigning themselves defeated. This was his plan, but

The Virginia army raised for the war of 1774 was " he had not, in truth, fully secured his position,-not

Digitized by Google

DUNMORE'S WAR.

ugh to begin the battle, -till the Virginians were ned; for when intelligence had been received by is that Dunmore did not intend to advance to his port, he hastened to break up his camp, and, in suance of Dunmore's orders, to march to meet him he Indians' own country. The next morning, the of October, 1774, he commenced preparations to sfer his army to the opposite side of the Ohio. uts were early sent out along the bank of the r. Two of these, at the distance of a few miles, e surprised by a great body of Indians. One shot dead, and the other returning reported that savages covered acres of ground. The army was mediately ordered out, and no sooner were they hed into line of battle than they received the ;k of the onpouring savages. Some of the most ninent of the subordinate officers falling early in battle, the main body fell back towards the camp. line of the enemy now extended almost from r to riyer, a gap of a small space remaining on side next the Kanawha. But when it appeared the Indians were the victors, a bold movement unately executed by the whites saved them and aged the fortune of the day. While the Indians e advancing they protected themselves by piles of and brush, in some places rolled before them. y held the ground thus secured all day till evening. Col. Lewis had latterly sent out three companies er cover of the high banks of the Kanawha to fall n the rear of the enemy. These succeeded in so g. The Indians, intently engaged on the front, ived with tremendous effect the fire behind. aking that the reinforcements from the settle- ts, which they knew to be coming, had now ar- d, the Indian lines gave away. As the sun went n they retreated across the Ohio to their huts on Scioto. The Virginians suffered a loss in dead wounded amounting to almost one-fifth of their le number, and it was believed the loss of Indians in number not much less. The battle was the ing of the war, and in its results effective, for ther battle was fought till Dunmore treated with chiefs at that memorable council where Logan, is Patroclus (Jefferson), so eloquently spoke in own defense.

early bought as was the victory, yet the complaints loud that Dunmore made it of no avail; for hat he gained by the conquest, which he claimed ly as his own, were the closing of the war, an ange of prisoners, and many liberal promises h no more than the promises of an Indian. re was the usual amount of talk about burying hets, brightening chains, smoking pipes, setting , dear.brethren, " sweet voices;" but the frontier le, who knew whereof they spoke, said that he it to have destroyed the Indian towns on the rs, and pushed the tribes back into the far West, h he had in his power.

hose who say that Dunmore was at this early day

bidding for the assistance of the Indians as against the colonists, and instigating war for mercenary and unjust purposes, produce these facts, from which they adduce their reasons : While at Fort Pitt he associated with himself such men as Connolly the Tory, Girty the renegade, McKee the deserter; he failed to make the junction with Lewis, which was part of the plan agreed upon ; he had knowledge of the intended at- tack upon Lewis, but neither sent him word nor made an effort to assist him ; he drew all the honor of the subsequent treaty of peace between him and the con- federate chiefs to himself, although it was apparent that it was owing to the victory of Col. Lewis that they were compelled to accept terms, and not to any act of Dunmore ; that the war being but half finished, it did not gain anything, whereas the desire of the fighting men was to destroy the Indian villages, and to leave them not a harboring-place in Eastern Ohio ; from the subsequent defection of his chief and most intimate associates, as well as of himself, and the al- liance of the Indian tribes with Britain in the war which he helped to effect with the colonies ; from the action of Connolly in the year following, 1775 ; from the known attitude of the colonies and of England, one towards the other; for many instances cited in which Connolly tried to make the Indians believe that the Pennsylvania colonists were their enemies, and-in which he appositely encouraged the whites and the Indians, regardless of consequences, to be in covert war against each other.

It was late in the fall before those settlers who re- mained in Westmoreland knew they were saved from an Indian war. But their situation was truly pitiable. No sooner had Connolly returned than he continued his tyrannical acts with the magistrates and the people. So unbearable had he become that some of the ad- herents of Penn about Pittsburgh thought of leaving that place and settling at Kittanning. In November a number of armed men, under Connolly's orders, seized a Mr. Scott, acting under authority of Penn, and carried him to Brownsville, where he was required to enter bail for his appearance at the next court to be holden at Pittsburgh for Augusta County. In November another party of armed men, under Con- nolly, went to Hannastown, and breaking open the jail, released two prisoners confined under sentence of execution ; and in February of 1775 a third party went to Hannastown, again broke open the jail, and released three prisoners. Connolly was not in com- mand of this last party, for a few days before he had started for Williamsburg, the capital of Virginia ; but it was under command of Benjamin Harrison, a son- in-law of William Crawford.

There was by this time a distinctive line drawn be- tween the jurisdiction and the claims of the two col- onies, and each of these had its adherents. Many of the most prominent had not given up the hope that the disturbances would be settled without difficulty, attributing that the most of the present troubles came

Digitized by

Google

HISTORY OF WESTMORELAND COUNTY, PENNSYLVANIA.

from some hot-headed and rash men. But in the state of affairs getting still more complicated, and which had called demands from the Council of the king, and advices from the Continental Congress, it was not unreasonable that men of high character in every respect should be held by the ties which bound them under every consideration to their own colony. We are, therefore, not surprised to know that as atren- uously as Penn's settlers and his agents advocated their rights and his claiins, so as strenuously on the other side and as naturally did such men as Crawford and Gibson take the side of Virginia. In January of 1775 the Executive Council of Pennsylvania having, had information that William Crawford, the president judge of Westmoreland, sided with the Virginians in opposing the justices of Pennsylvania, the Council advised the Governor to supersede him in the office of judge, which was done forthwith.

But of the troubles of the settlers during the fall and winter of 1774 and 1775 these were of the least. During the preceding summer the crops had been neglected, and winter found them unprepared, At the termination of Dunmore's war a goodly number, as was always the case on the frontier, had returned to their former homes, and this accession of inhabit- ants, who were consumers and not producers, had a distressful effect. They could not have come in a worse time, for the amount of provisions gathered was barely sufficient for those that had remained. The harvest of 1774 at best had been scanty ; along the southern border it had not been gathered at all. This season came very near to what the preceding year had been to Western Virginia, a year which in their annals was long remembered as the "starving year." But with that generosity which was a noble and a prominent trait among the early settlers, each assisted the other. During this winter many must have per- ished had they not resorted to hunting, and got from the woods enough game to keep them from want. Their small supply of corn, rye, and potatoes they divided among each other. And this was but the prelude to a long era of want and privation, necessity, and constant alarm, which was terminated only with the war which secured the independence of the colo- nies.

Readers of general history are well conversant with the affairs which were taking place in Massachusetts and at Philadelphia in the early part of 1775. We will pass them over with observing that they were sympathetically responded to and closely watched by our colonists. Already were some, by more ways than one, controlling the actions of all.

From notice of foregoing statements it will be ob- served that the whole people, as a body, at these early times may readily be separated into two classes, be- tween which was a prominent line of demarkation. Although we alluded incidentally to this distinction before, at no other time is it more suitable to recall it than now. And this distinction is noticeable all

through our early affairs, and indeed is noticeable at all times and among all people. We may call them respectively, aristocrats and plebeians, gentry and commonalty ; they are, in reality, the leaders and the followers. The class of which the county justices were the most prominent representatives, together with others who, in a military station, were equally promi- nent, deserves more than a passing notice. These were the ones who shaped the measures which received the approval of the people. As to these justices, we can at almost all times bear testimony to their integrity, and to their good, sound common sense. They reflect honor upon their lineage in the capacity of judges, the arbiters of right and wrong. But besides this knowl- edge, which it is certain they possessed, an accompa- nying and an indispensable qualification for a promi- nent man was that he have some knowledge of arms. Nearly every man of that day distinguished as a leader in civil affairs was also a military man. Indeed, from the incessant wars, to be a mau dis- tinguished above the others was to be one who com- manded the respect of his followers by having dis- played more than ordinary bravery or knowledge of warfare. Of this class of men St. Clair, Capt. James Smith, Capt. Proctor, Col. Lochry were fitting ex- amples with us; while of those at Pittsburgh, Cols. Crawford, John Neville, John Gibson may be no- ticed. To have acquired a scat in the Assembly, or a nomination as a justice of the peace, or of the quorum, was about as much as to say that the one so specially favored was, or had been, a leader in the militia.

The military organization of the Province had been early attended to, and no less from necessity was it than from a desire of glory that every citizen had a tincture of the manual of arms and of camp disci- pline. The justices of the peace were usually officers in the militia. St. Clair, Smith, Crawford, Neville had won a sort of pre-eminence in service before they were recognized as leaders in the civil affairs. The ideas of these men at the head of our county at this conjuncture had been enlarged by connection with the more prominent men of the colonies, had been improved by observation, by travel, by reading, and by experience. So they were in manners, in informa- tion, in the possession of peculiar privileges and fran- chises bestowed by the colonial authorities, far above the great body of the people who came hither to earn their bread by drudgery, and clear a patch and rear a thatched cabin to shelter the heads of their ragged offspring ; for these people, as a class, were poor to impoverishment. They had made little advancement in refinement, they were of different and distinct nationalities. Of all the early settlers they had no special claim above the others to the boasted liberty of those born under the common law of England. But it is with a peculiar satisfaction that the West- morelander of to-day contemplates the proceedings of his ancestors in 1775.

Digitized by Google

WESTMORELAND'S DECLARATION OF INDEPENDENCE, 1775.

CHAPTER XVI.

ESTMORELAND'S DECLARATION OF INDE- PENDENCE, 1775.

Rs and Ticonderoga-Westmoreland listening to the Guns at Ington Common-Meeting held at Pittsburgh and at Hannastown, 16, 1775-What they said at Pittsburgh-What they did at Han- own-Westmoreland's Declaration of Independence-Spirit of the Intions Adopted -who wrote them -Similarity between the aration and the Resolutions in Expression and in Sentiment-The tary idea of Resistance-Observations aud Remarks on the Paper estinoreland's Great Glory-The Regiment of Associators.

HAT occurred in Massachusetts after the passage e bill by Parliament which closed Boston Har- when Gen. Gage was reinforced by British sol- , and when minute-men were enlisting in every ge, are matters of general notoriety. On the of April, 1775, the men at Lexington Common bare their breasts to the bayonets of the soldiers reat Britain, the representatives of an empire which the sun never went down. The cracking e rifles of those yeomen " was heard the world nd." When it echoed through these woods it hed the ears of a people who had been suffering r an indirect British oppression, and who were y to fly to arms for a principle which they recog- das dear to them as their very existence, and for h they were as ready to battle as for their hearths. brill of sympathy went indeed through all the lish-speaking people when this act was witnessed; here were many who, to the last moment, could believe that actual war was imminent, and trusted the differences between the mother and her off- g would be satisfactorily adjusted without the vention of arms. Now it was too late for either tract or recede from their position without sacri- g on the one side their pretensions, on the other their demands.

hen the people spoke. On the same day on which gress met from adjournment, May the 10th, 1775, Ethan Allen demanded the surrender of Ticon- ga. The organized committee had by this time nded from the North to the South. Virginia, as as Massachusetts, was a unit in the cause of the nies. The spirit of freedom extended to here and e most remote colonies in the West. From the tions of those men, who lost for a while all local udices and forgot all personal interests, the West, ost unanimously, was carried for the cause of ty.

Need help finding more records? Try our genealogical records directory which has more than 1 million sources to help you more easily locate the available records.

History of the County of Westmoreland, Pennsylvania, with Biographical Sketches of Many of its Pioneers and Prominent Men, Part 18

Author: George Dallas Albert, editor Publication date: Publisher: Number of Pages:

Author: George Dallas Albert, editor
Publication date:
Publisher:
Number of Pages: