History of the County of Westmoreland, Pennsylvania, with Biographical Sketches of Many of its Pioneers and Prominent Men, Part 29

Author: George Dallas Albert, editor
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Among the earliest settlers in that part of the val- Jey were the Hayses, the Williamses, and the Har- mans. Some of the settlers in this part had come in in 1767 and 1768, and were of those few who first looked upon the remains of that singular structure which dates back to a prehistoric age. The remains of the Indian fort, as it was called, were still visible forty years ago ; it was, no doubt, but a burial-place of some of that race which, antiquarians say, followed or were coetaneous or identical with the historic mound-builders of the Mississippi Valley. The chief evidence of the existence of those people here is drawn from their mural remains; and the plow- share has turned up the bones and buried arms and trinkets from their stone crypts.

The Harmans were perhaps among those who had settled in violation of the laws of the Province, occa- sioned by the technical quibble as to the rights of property in the ancient lords of the soil. Here among rocks and beasts, and half hidden from the savages and from the light, the elder Harman, an emigrant from Germany, with his grubbing-hoe and rifle, built a hut against a rock, covered it with bark, and began a clearing. Some of those who came at that time saw no other white face than belonged to their own family for more than a year at a time, and often lived for a season on the greens growing in their "stony" gar- den, and on bewies from the woods. When more

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settlers came in, the settlements from each end of the valley began to meet ; but the times were, if anything, growing worse. Then came a time when they were continuously watching and fighting. For the greater part of several. years in the middle of the war the helpless children and some of the women were left in the block-houses or at stronger cabins away. In the winter the homes were deserted, and when a family was murdered and a cabin burnt, all flocked into the forts, till the hunters, like the dove of the ark, return- ing, brought word that the waters were subsiding.

The old man Harman, with three or four of his neighbors, as we have seen, was about 1777 killed when coming from the lower part of the valley. These were all buried where they fell but one, who, after he was shot, threw his arms about his horse's neck that the horse might carry him off out of the reach of the savages. They did not get the scalp of this settler, but he was found dead with his horse standing near him. The Indians took the horses of the others. The families can point out the graves of these buried men at this day.

The widow of Harman was left on the clearing of her husband, now a beautifully lying bottom-land along the creek, where the Laurel Run flows into it, on the main road from Greensburg to Somerset by way of Stahlstown. Then deadened trees stood through the little spots cleared, and stumps and piles of rocks were over more than half the ground. She had three boys,-Andrew, the eldest, fourteen years, and John and Philip. The widow and her children had been at the block-house, and when the spring opened she came back to the cabin with `them. One morning the widow heard or saw some neighbor's horses in the lot down next the curve of the stream, and she sent the two oldest boys out to drive them off. From behind the upturned roots of a large tree which. the water had washed and the storm had blown out there were three Indians watching. These were but a little way off the great Catawba trail running through the valley, and they were on their way north- ward. They lay in wait watching, and the boys came down directly towards them. When these were near enough the Indians jumped out and readily captured John, but Andy ran back towards the house as fast as he could. He was followed by one of the red men, and hearing him coming up close, he turned and saw the tomahawk as it glistened in the Indian's hand over his head. Andy threw his hands across his eyes to shut out the sight, expecting on a sudden the tom- ahawk in his head. The Indian secured him without hurting, took him back to John, and as they could talk a little English, told them not to call or make a noise or they would be killed.

The Indians took the boys, and climbing up the steep hill back of the creek, got to a place from which they could see the cabin and the mother near it, and from where they heard her calling the boys. They dared not answer; and the Indians asked them

if there were any men at the cabin. Andy said there were, but there was not. They would have attacked the cabin, pillaged it, and scalped the mother if they had known that she was unguarded. At length they left, and in a lot upon the bill near came upon a horse and mare belonging to a man named Jobneon, a neighboring settler. They secured the young horse, but the mare being heavy with foal, and of no use to them, they cut ber throat. They loaded the horse with some pelfry which they had along, noticeably a camp-kettle which they used for boiling their meat in when they had any. They began their journey, and on the same day killed a doe. Of the entrails of the doe they made a soup. Andy said he wes afraid they would offer some of the broth to him and his brother, but, on the contrary, they reserved this for themselves, eating every morel with avidity and relish. They cooked over the coals some of the flesh of the deer, which they gave the boys. The fires night they lay out on the Ridge not far from Fort Ligonier; they were near enough to hear a noise there, to which the Indians cautiously listened. They gare the boys a deer-skin to lie down on, and made moccasins for their feet out of the same material, for they were in their bare feet, and had left their tracks with those of the Indians in the sand along the creek when they were taken.

These Indians had with them some things which had belonged to the whites, and among these was seen a leather wallet. The boys thought they recog- nized it, and asked them some questions, or at least showed their curiosity. The Indian who had it then asked Andy if he knew it, and Andy said he did not. The Indian said he got it from a little old Dutchman they had killed the last year in the valley. It was the pocket-wallet of their father, and one of these, at least, was of the party which had waited for the whites and killed them.

When they came to the upper waters of the Sus- quehanna, which lay in their way, they had some diff- culty in crossing. They had a canoe, but only one of them could work it, and in swimming their horse and in the care of the canoe it happened that the boys were left on the one side together with the guns. Andrew said that they might have shot the Indians from where they were then, and perhaps have made their escape, if they had had the presence of mind to do so, but they did not think of it at the time, and of course made no effort.

They at length got to the town of the Senecas, or Cornplanters, as they were called, from the name of a prominent chieftain best known to the whites. This tribe at an early day had many among them who could talk in broken English. They were now under the influence of the British, but remaining on lands reserved by the Commonwealth to their use, their descendants became partly civilized, and Cornplanter, then a young chief, lived among them, and died at an exceeding great age, a friend of the whites. At that

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UPPER LIGONIER VALLEY DURING THE REVOLUTION.

ne there were many white, captives among them. e following summer John, the younger of the two, ed of a summer complaint which took off many hers, both red men and whites.

Andrew appears to have been one of the fortunate es. He was taken by a chieftain or prominent n of the nation-some saying by Cornplanter him- f-and kept in his family, in which there was young Indian of about his own age, and these be- me companions. The Indians; trying to call Andy his English name, called him " Andus," the name went by among them altogether. Being young d pliable, and having been brought up hardily, he sily fell into the habits and ways of the Indians, d was treated by them as of their own. His family adoption and some who liked him would not allow m to be ill treated or abused by the selfish ones.

It was during the second year of his captivity that e attack was made upon the villages and cornfields the tribes along the Allegheny by Brodhead and hers who led out the expeditions of that year from estmoreland. This occurring in the early part of evere season caused that improvident people much fering. At one time, possibly late in the long nter of 1780, they were totally without provisions ; d as the snow was deep and the weather severe, ey had poor opportunity to get game. "Andus" s kept with them, and he was one more mouth to d. They could not well dispose of him at the ne, and they did not want openly to kill him. But master wanted to get him out of the way in a anner unknown and unsuspected. One day, there- e, with this object uppermost, he sent his boy, the mrade of Andy, and Andy himself down the river

the frozen ice to another Indian town for corn. e chief was talking with his boy before they started, d Andy heard him say that when they should come a thin place in the ice, or an air-hole, to thrust dus in. Andy asked him what he had said, and e chief replied he was telling the boy to put down old dog which they had and which followed them out. Andy was on his watch, but the young war- r did not make any attempt to do as he was bidden. another time not far from this he was with his aster himself hunting. They were very successful, the man killed three deer and carried them to a ice together before he quit. He then, towards the ght, and at a distance away, gathered up one which had skinned, and took it upon his back to carry it to mp, leaving Andus with the others, and telling him at he would be back soon. It was bitter cold. Andy apped himself in the deer-skins, the deer having en placed out of the reach of wolves, and fell eep. He slept soundly, and in the morning was akened by the master kicking against him, expect- g to find him frozen dead. But under the snow dus was safe. After that, Harman said, he thought ey had made up their mind to treat him as them- ves, and not to kill him.

He said likewise that there was one of the Indians of that tribe who was something of a gardener, and that he always had the earliest squashes and cucum- bers "in the market." Squashes, it would appear, was this epicure's favorite dish. Andus, too, was fond of them, and the early ones would be a change of diet. So in the dusk of the evening, when the gar- dener was in bed, Andus went to the patch, and pulling up a mess brought them to the fire and cov- ered them up in the coals. He expected to get up in the morning before any of the others and make his breakfast on them. But man proposes, and so forth ; and while Andus slept a dog scratched out the squashes, and being a vegetarian feasted. When Andy got awake he saw the rinds lying about among the ashes and trampled upon. He picked out what he well could to keep them from the sight of the Indian. Nothing was said of it. The gardener soon, however, called Andus to him, having before the fire a nice heap of the forbidden fruit. He asked Andus if he liked squashes, who said he did. He told him to help him cook them. They were all prepared, the fire ready, and they were put on to cook. Andy did not suspect anything, but when he was engaged stoop- ing about the fire, the squashes nearly done, the Ar- eadian jumped upon his back, cudgeled him, grabbed him by the throat, and throwing him upon the ground choked and beat him so unmercifully that other ories interfered. With difficulty Andus got away, but he lay for a time almost dead. He said that the resent- ment of his master and some of the others was so great that if he had died under the beating he be- lieves they would have killed the gardener. And Andus did not wait for the squashes.

Andrew being young when he was captured, and being surrounded all the time by the red men, the knowledge of his home and relatives gradually be- came dimmer. He became in speech, in manner, and in habit an Indian. With them he feasted, hun- gered, fished, hunted. He remained with them for somewhat above two years, when he was traded to a British officer. The market perhaps being dull, and the Indian impecunious, his price was a bottle of "lum," the name by which they pronounced rum. By this officer he was carried to England, and re- mained in London for about two years. Then the peace occurring he was exchanged with other pris- oners and allowed to go at large. He left the vessel at New York and found his way back to Ligo- nier Valley. His mother was still living. He en- tered her cabin, and a woman who happened to be at the house of Widow Harman on that day related long after the scene which she then witnessed. The old mother, after recognizing her long-lost child, her eldest born, for whom she had for years given up the hope that he was walking among mortals, and who now stepped out, as it were, from the dead, seeing, she uttered a long shriek and fell into the arms of her boy. Her joy, mingled with grief, could not be con-

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trolled. In the words of the aged narrator, "she might have been washed in her tears." The news few fast that little Andy Harman, who had been carried off years ago, was now in his mother's house. On the next Sunday the lowly cabin was crowded the livelong day. From up and down the valley, from the cabins built like aeries on the rocks of the hills, men and boys and women came. The mother and ber son, who now took his father's place, lived long together. Andrew Harman, following his early habit of life, was content to pass most of his time in the woods. He was known as one of the best hunters in the whole region. He attended the numerous parties at wood-choppings and clearings, and it was his de- light, and the delight of the boys to have him do so, to imitate the wild red men in their war-dances. He would tie's blanket about his head, and taking a tomahawk in one hand and a butcher-knife in the other, would dance and yell and sing to the music of the violin, and at every distortion of his body strike the hatchet and knife till the sparks flew. He could not bear to have the Indians talked badly of. He always took their part, and it is said that he even longed to escape from civilization and rove a half- savage, living as they lived. It is not at all unres- sonable, for all experience teaches that it is easier to make an Indian of a white man than a white man of an Indian. In his gait, his style in the woods, in bis idioms and gestures one might discern the effect of the habit which makes second nature. These habits themselves remained with him till he died. He was, off and on, always in the woods till infirmity conse- quent on old age compelled him to take his last bed.

We may also notice that Jacob Nicely, a little child, son of Adam Nicely, a resident on the Four-Mile Run not far from the Loyalbanna, was taken by a squad of those Seneca Indians, but at a time somewhat later, perhaps not earlier than 1791. He was watched by them when he was going from the house, where he had got a light-cake from his mother, to the other children, who were picking berries in the meadow. The chil- dren reported of his capture, and the party was fol- lowed beyond the Kiskiminetas, but without avail. He had been gone so long that his parents and their friends never expected even to hear of him. Jakey, as the people always spoke of him, was about five years old when taken. He was raised by them and adopted into the tribe. He forgot almost everything about the whites, and could not pronounce his own name when he had heard it. Many years after, when all was peace, a person from the valley, recognizing a similarity between the features and build of this man and a brother, made inquiry, and found that he was an adopted white, and had been carried from Ligonier Valley. This was reported to the father, Adam Nicely, who after weeks of preparation started, about 1828, to see Jakey before he died, for he was now in old age. The mother, too, was still alive. The old gentleman made the journey in safety, and met and

lodged with his boy, now to all intents an Indian. He bad grown to manbood, had a squaw for a wife, was raising a family, and had abundance of horses. some land, and plenty of bunting and fishing "tools." The old man returned, and "Jakey" promised bim to come in the following year to see his mother. H. gave his father a rifle for a keepsake, and accompa- nied him for some distance on his way back. Jakey did not come in as he promised, and they never heard more of him. When the father spoke of him, "bie Jakey," tears always filled his eyes. But the motherly yearning of the mother ceased for her idol of a boy only when they laid her whitened bead on its earthly pillow to its last and sweetest sloop.

CHAPTER XXIV.

CAPTAIN BRADY AND HIS EXPLOITS.

Opt. Samuel Brady, the Hero of Western Penneytrente, fo cistioned et Pittsburgh in Cal. Brodhead's Regiasent -- When his Family is mesdered be swears to wage a War against the Indians long we be livee-Ho to sent to Sandusky to get Information for the Commander-in-Chief-B. gets within sight of the Town and watches the Indianenn Day-On bts way back he kille . Warrior, and envers Jenny Brupre and her CHM -His Compaulou, the Dutchman Phouts, and his pot Delaware-de and the Dutchman go up the Allegheny to get come Nowe-They follow an Indian Tiall-They capture an old Indias who tries to kill Phours, but who is killed by Mim-Brady ao Captain of the Rangers- Battle of Brady's Bred-Brady kille the. Bald Eagle, who had killed his Relatives-Brady watches in the French Oregk Coun- try-He and his Mon parque a Returning Party of Indiane-Brady's Leap-He follows up a Party which had entered the Sewickley Bet" tlement-llis Men attack o Party & Warriors and rout them-His Adventures with Wetzel and the Spies after the Goveral War, as well as all others which have been substantiated or corroborated by Com- current Accounts.

WE come now to take notice of the services of a man who attained great reputation for his acts of bravery and heroism, and who during many years was regarded as the guardian of the border of Westmore- land on the northwest. When, as the savages seemed to increase the more that were killed, when defeat followed defeat, when they had been emboldened, with the nature of the wolf, by success, then, when the men were out on some expedition or serving a term in the army, many a woman quieted the fears of the little ones by telling them that Capt. Brady and his rangers watched the Allegheny River between them and the country of the Indians, over which the red men could not cross while he was there. Brady was to our fron- tier what Boone was to the frontier of Kentucky, and what Kit Carson was to the California emigrants in the days of the Argonauts. He was the hero of West- ern Pennsylvania.

Samuel Brady was born at Shippensburg in 1758. In 1775, during the Revolution, he went from the West Fork of the Susquehanna with a company to Boston, where he at his young age displayed on ser- eral occasions that coolness and decision which carried him safely through many adventures, and which

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ed him to win a fame as enduring as the annals r Commonwealth, or as the history of the Indian

In 1776 he was appointed lieutenant in a com- raised in Lancaster County ; and after the battle Conmouth he" was promoted to a captaincy, and red with Gen. Brodhead to the headquarters of West, then Pittsburgh. Brady in the mean time stopping with his father, who himself was a cap- in the Continental army, and who having been ded at Brandywine was at home. While here eard of the death of one of his brothers at the Is of the Indians. He stayed with his father till beginning of 1779, when he joined his regiment ittsburgh. While here, not long after he came, eard of the death of his father, who had been lered in a horrible massacre by the Indians in 1, 1779. When the sufferings of his relatives, cially the delirium and intense agony of his ger brother in dying, came to his knowledge, he so filled with anguish and a longing for revenge it is said, he raised his hand towards heaven, wore "he would revenge the death of these, and while he lived be at peace with the Indians of ribe." And he never altered his mind.

1780, while Col. Brodhead was in command at Pitt, the country north and west of the Ohio and heny was in the possession of the Indians, and information came to Gen. Washington concern- he plans of the British agents and the intentions e Indians, he wrote to Brodhead to select a suit- officer and dispatch him to Sandusky to examine lace and ascertain the force of the British and uns assembled there, in order that preparations I be made against attacks expected from that . Brodhead sent for Brady, whom he knew, and ed him the letter and a draught of the country. appointment was accepted, and in May, 1780, y, with four Chickasaw Indians as guides and a oldiera, began his march. He was dressed as an n warrior, and with the utmost secrecy he led his in safety to near the Sandusky towns without g a hostile savage.

e night before they came to the towns he saw a and approaching found two squaws reposing be- t. He passed them by without harming. Get- now into intimate connection with the enemy, hickasaws deserted him, but he proceeded with est, and went on till he came to the river upon the principal town stood. Here he concealed en, and when this was done he selected one man companion, and this one remained with him in y all his future adventures. The two waded the to an island partially concealed, where they re- ed till the night. The next morning a heavy fog ver the land till the sun, towards the middle of ay, dissipated it, when the first sight observed vast body of Indians-they say several thou- -intensely interested in running or racing horses they had captured from the Kentuckians, upon

whom they had just made a reprisal. Brady noticed particularly a fine gray horse which beat everything against him. They kept the diversion up till towards evening, the gray still the victor of the turf, till when two mounted him at once he was first vanquished in the race.

Brady made all the observations he could during the day; at night he crossed from the island, collected his men, went to the Indian camp he had passed on his way out, and taking the squaws prisoners began his march back. The distance being longer than he had expected, the provisions and ammunition were exhausted. Brady shot an otter, but they could not eat it. They stopped at an old Indian encampment, where they found plenty of strawberries, which they ate and satisfied their hunger. They here saw a deer- track, and Brady, telling his men that he might get a shot at it, followed it. He had gone but a few yards when he saw the deer standing with its side towards him. The last load was in his rifle. When he pulled the trigger the powder flashed in the pan, and he had no more powder. He sat down, picked at the touch- hole, and started on. He was on a path which, at a short distance, made a bend ; here .he saw an Indian approaching on horseback, with a child before him and its mother behind, and some warriors marching in the rear. He thought of shooting the Indian, but as he raised the gun he observed that the child's head lolled with the motion of the horse. He saw also that it was sleeping and tied to the Indian. He stepped behind the roots of a tree, awaiting a chance to shoot the Indian without danger to the child or its mother. When he had a chance he fired. The In- dian fell to the ground, and the child and woman with him. Brady at the instant yelled to his men to surround the Indians; he himself jumped for the dead Indian's powder-horn, but he could not pull it off. The woman, from his dress and from his Indian yell, taking him for an Indian, said, " Why did you shoot your brother ?" He disentangled the child and caught it up as he said, "I am Capt. Brady, Jenny Stupes ; follow me." He caught her by the hand, and, with the child under his other arm, pulled her along into the woods. They were fired at but not harmed, and the Indians, fearing the approach of the whites, scattered and took to cover. They were, however, in no danger from these, for the men, having no ammu- nition, on the cry of the captain, themselves fearing massacre, ran away, and the squaws whom he had brought thus far from their camp near the towns, availing themselves of the hubbub, escaped. The men came into Fort McIntosh (Beaver) before the captain, who got in with the woman and child the next day.

Brady being desirous to see the savage he had shot, the officer in command sent out some men with him, and they went to search for the body. They were about quitting the place without finding it, when he heard the yell of his pet Indian, and following it up

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History of the County of Westmoreland, Pennsylvania, with Biographical Sketches of Many of its Pioneers and Prominent Men, Part 29

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

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