USA > Pennsylvania > Westmoreland County > Old Westmoreland : a history of western Pennsylvania during the Revolution > Part 7
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3 Morgan to the Delawares, August 12, 1778, MS. in Pittsburg Car- negie Library.
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OLD WESTMORELAND.
On the Saturday forenoon when the conference began, General Lewis offered the friendship of the United States and presented to the Indians a belt of white wampum, em- blematic of peace. He praised the Delawares because they alone, of the many Indian tribes, had been faithful to their treaties ; and in token of this fidelity he presented a broad belt of white wampum, having worked into it, in black, the figures of a white man and an Indian, connected by a black line, denoting a road or path. He then proposed a formal alliance, giving another white belt, showing a white man and an Indian clasping hands.
General Lewis stated the intention of sending an armny against Detroit, and asked the permission of the Delawares for a passage through their territory. The Delawares claim- ed control over the country bounded on the east by the Al- legheny and Ohio rivers, and on the west by the Hocking and Sandusky. Lewis expressed a desire that the western expedition might be so conducted as to cover and protect the Delaware towns in the Muskingum valley.
Chief White Eyes gave thanks for the offer of friend- ship and alliance. It was to form such an alliance that he and liis comrades had come into council. He promised a prompt consultation and an answer in the afternoon. At this conference all the talking for the Indians was done by White Eyes. The speeches of this chief, on all occasions, were notable for their directness, force and clearness. He did not indulge in that metaphorical verbiage and tiresome prolixity by which Indian oratory is characterized. He had mingled much with white men, had studied their ways and imitated their style of speech.
In the afternoon there was no meeting, for another delegation of Indians arrived in camp, with firing of guns and beating of tom-toms, and the ceremonies of their recep- tion occupied the time. They were led by Wingenund, the Delaware wise man, and by Nimwha, chief of a small band of Shawnees who lived with the Delawares at Coshocton.
It was on a fair Sunday that the conference was re- sumed. White Eyes announced the readiness of the In-
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THE ALLIANCE WITH THE DELAWARES.
dians to accept the alliance. "We have taken fast hold of the chain of friendship," he said, "and are determined never to part the hold, though we should lose our lives." The commissioners then announcing that they would write out and submit the words of the treaty, White Eyes said : "Bro- thers, we are become one people. The enemy Indians, as soon as they hear it, will strike us. We desire that our brethren would build some place for our old men, women and children to remain in safety whilst our warriors go with you."
On Monday the articles of confederation between a civilized and a savage nation were interpreted and explain- ed to the Indians. There was a heavy rainstorm on Tuesday, which prevented a meeting, but on Wednesday White Eyes accepted the treaty on behalf of the Delawares and the Ma- quegea branch of the Shawnees.
It was a momentous event in the life of this Indian chief and he delivered an affecting address, a brief outline of which has been preserved for us. "We now inform you," he said, "that as many of our warriors as can possibly be spared will join you and go with you." Thus he pronounced his own death warrant. "We are at a loss to express our thoughts, but we hope soon to convince you by our ac- tions of the sincerity of our hearts. We desire you not to think any of our people will have any objection to your marching through our country ; on the contrary, they will rejoice to see you."
He requested that Colonel John Gibson be appointed Indian agent, saying : "He has always acted an honest part by us, and we are convinced he will make our common good his chief study, and not think only how he may get rich." It appears that some of the Indian agents had the same weak- ness then as now .*
4 This request of White Eyes was, of course, a reflection on Colonel Morgan, then Indian agent. Morgan was in Philadelphia at the time of the treaty and when he learned its terms he denounced it as im- proper and villainous. See Taylor's History of Ohio, Cincinnati, 1854, p. 291. Killbuck, who succeeded White Eyes as chief sachem of the Delawares, sent word to Morgan that he had not agreed with White Eyes in asking for the appointment of Gibson.
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OLD WESTMORELAND.
"When we were last in Philadelphia," White Eyes con- cluded, "our wise brethren in Congress may remember, we desired them to send a schoolmaster to our towns to in- struct our children. As we think it will be for our mutual interest, we request it may be complied with."
The petitions of this wise Indian concerning Gibson and the schoolmaster were both neglected by the continen- tal government.
On the following day, Thursday, September 17, 1778, the articles of confederation were signed in triplicate, one copy for Congress, one for the Delawares and one for Gen- eral McIntosh. There were six articles, to the following effect . First, all offenses were to be mutually forgiven ; second, a perpetual peace and friendship was pledged, each party to assist the other in any just war; third, the Dela- wares gave permission for the passage through their coun- try of an American army, agreed to. sell corn, meat and horses to that army, and to furnish guides and a body of warriors, while the United States bound themselves to erect and garrison, within the Delaware country, a fort for the protection of the old men, women and children; fourth, each party agreed to punish offenses committed by citizens of the other only by trial by judges or jurors of both parties, according to a system thereafter to be arranged; fifth, the United States pledged the establishment of a fair trade un- der the control of an honest agent.
The sixth article was the most remarkable. It guar- anteed the integrity of the Delaware territory, so long as the nation should keep the peace with the United States, and concluded with the following provision, apparently drawn rather hastily :
"And it is further agreed on between the contracting parties that, should it, in future, be found conducive to the mutual interest of both parties, to invite any other tribe who have been friendly to the interest of the United States to join the present confederation and to form a state, whereof the Delaware nation shall be the head, and have a represen- tative in Congress; provided nothing contained in this ar-
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THE ALLIANCE WITH THE DELAWARES.
ticle be considered as conclusive until it meets with the ap- probation of Congress."
This is certainly as strange a proposition as ever was made to a savage nation. Of course, it never went any far- ther than the piece of parchment on which it was written. It was probably never intended to go any farther.
The treaty was signed by the several deputies, Andrew and Thomas Lewis, White Eyes, the Pipe and John Kill- buck, the Indians making their marks. The following sig- natures were attached as those of witnesses : Lachlan Mc- Intosh, Brigadier General, Commander of the Western De- partment ; Daniel Brodhead, Colonel of the Eighth Penn- sylvania Regiment ; W. Crawford, Colonel ; John Campbell, John Stephenson, John Gibson, Colonel of the Thirteenth Virginia Regiment; Arthur Graham, Brigade Major; Lachlan McIntosh, Jr., Brigade Major ; Benjamin Mills, Joseph L. Finley, Captain of the Eighth Pennsylvania Regiment, and John Finley, Captain of the Eighth Pennsyl- vania Regiment.
On the succeeding day presents were given to the Dela- wares on behalf of Congress and the Indians then departed for Coshocton, to make preparations for joining the expe- dition against Detroit.
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OLD WESTMORELAND.
CHAPTER XIII.
FORT LAURENS.
In the notice of General McIntosh, in the "Dictionary of American Biography," is to be found this statement : "In a short time he restored peace to the frontier of Pennsyl- vania and Virginia." Unfortunately for the frontier, he did not do anything of the sort. He was as much a fail- ure on the border as his predecessor, Hand, not because of his own lack of ability, but because of the want of men and supplies for the accomplishment of his plans. Immediate- ly after the conclusion of the treaty with the Delawares, in the middle of September, 1778, McIntosh prepared to cxe- cute his design against Detroit. He had already summon- ed the militia from the frontier counties of Pennsylvania and Virginia. Westmoreland county failed to contribute, as her own borders were almost daily harried by savage bands. The Virginia counties, Yohogania, Monongalia and Ohio, furnished nearly 800 men, but they gathered at Fort Pitt slowly and provisions for the long campaign were collected with difficulty.
About October I the army, consisting of 1,300 men, of whom 500 were regulars of the Eighth Pennsylvania and the Thirteenth Virginia, moved from Fort Pitt down the Ohio, constructing a road along the southern bank of the river to the mouth of the Beaver.
Four weeks were occupied in the building of a fort on the high bluff overlooking the Ohio, on the western side of the Beaver river. The site of this fort was within the
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FORT LAURENS.
present town of Beaver, just above the station of the Cleve- land and Pittsburg railroad. It was built under the di- rection of Colonel Cambray, a French engineer and chief of the artillery in McIntosh's army. The walls were of heavy logs, filled in with earth, and on them six-pound can- non were mounted. The fort contained barracks for a regi- ment of soldiers. The commander designed Fort McIn- tosh as an advanced depot for munitions and provisions. It was the most western point to which supplies could be con- veyed with ease by water, but from the mouth of the Bea- ver onward the expedition must go entirely by land.1
While Fort McIntosh was building, the general was trying to get forward his stores, in preparation for the march into the wilderness. But things moved slowly over the bad roads of the frontier. Every delay was annoying to the Scotch commander. The fine days of autumn were slip- ping by and Detroit was still far away. The Delaware In- dians, of whom a band of 60 warriors accompanied the army, could not understand why so much time was spent in building a fort which would not be needed when Detroit was captured, and some of the American officers considered the month passed at the mouth of the Beaver as that much time wasted.
On November 3 a herd of lean cattle, driven over the mountains, arrived at Fort McIntosh, and two days later the army began its march westward through the Indian country. The pack horses and cattle were so poor and weak that they could not make more than five or six miles a day, and it was November 19 when the force reached the Tuscarawas river, at the site of the present town of Bolivar, near the line between Stark and Tuscarawas counties.
According to the pledge contained in the treaty with the Delawares, to erect a fort in their country for the pro- tection of their women and children, it was the intention of General McIntosh to build a stockade at the Delaware cap- ital of Coshocton, at the junction of the Tuscarawas and the
1 Fort McIntosh and Its Times, monograph by Daniel Agnew; Wash- ington-Irvine Correspondence, p. 23, etc.
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OLD WESTMORELAND.
Walhonding, but several things conspired to thwart this plan.2 During the march to the Tuscarawas the Delaware chief, White Eyes, was "treacherously put to death." The exact manner of his killing is unknown, but it is believed that he was shot by a Virginia militiaman.3 His death caused dismay among his warriors and most of them de- serted the American force and returned to Coshocton. It became thereafter uncertain whether the Americans would be received kindly at the Delaware capital. A march south to Coshocton would take the army far out of its way. Be- yond all, the season had now become so late that Detroit was out of the question. A winter campaign through the land of the savages was not to be considered.
With great reluctance McIntosh was driven to the con- clusion that he could not continue his campaign during that season. He was not willing, however, to retire without ac- complishing something. He decided to build a stockade fort at Tuscarawas, where the army was then encamped, to hold that place during the winter and from it to set forth in the spring on another attempt against Detroit. Such a fort would fulfill the pledge of the treaty to build a place of refuge in the Delaware country, and McIntosh hoped to send out war parties from it to strike the towns on the Sandusky river. Even this hope was ruined by the gen- eral's failure to bring forward sufficient provisions.
The fort at the Tuscarawas was built on the west bank of the river, about half a mile below the present village of Bolivar. It was a small thing, enclosing only about an acre of ground. High embankments of earth were raised and topped with pickets, consisting of logs set upright and pointed at the top. Colonel Cambray superintended the building of this fort, which was named Laurens, after the president of the Continental Congress.4
While this work was going on, McIntosh found that he could not get forward sufficient provisions to maintain
2 Ft. Pitt, p. 234.
3 Crumrine's History of Washington County, Pa., note on p. 220.
4 Albach's Western Annals, p. 300; Pennsylvanla Archives, First Series, vol. vil., p. 131.
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FORT LAURENS.
his large force in the Indian country long enough even for an expedition against the Sandusky towns. The commis- sary department seems to have been managed miserably, al- though it contended with great difficulties.5
The time of the Virginia militia ran only until the end of the year. The weather began to grow cold, and to pre- vent starvation and disaster in the snows, McIntosh was forced to return with his army to the Ohio. He left at Fort Laurens 150 men of the Thirteenth Virginia, under Colonel John Gibson, the stout-hearted and active frontiersman. Colonel Brodhead, with a detachment of the Eighth Penn- sylvania, formed the winter garrison of Fort McIntosh, while General McIntosh took up his quarters in Fort Pitt, and there brooded over his disappointments.
A terrible winter was spent by the little garrison of Fort Laurens. Colonel Gibson did not have sufficient food to last him until spring, and hunting in the woods was soon stopped by the appearance of hostile Indians. The savages began to prowl about the post early in January, 1779. The erection of this fort, almost in the heart of the Indian country, greatly provoked the savages of the Wyan- dot, Miami and Mingo tribes, and they plotted its destruc- tion.®
McIntosh had promised to send back provisions, and about the middle of January Captain John Clark, of the Eighth Pennsylvania, was sent from Fort McIntosh with 15 men to convoy pack horses, with flour and meat, to the lit- tle post on the Tuscarawas.
Captain Clark reached the fort in safety on January 21 and two days later set out on his return to the Ohio. Three miles from the fort he was ambushed by Simon Girty and 17 Mingo Indians, who killed two of the soldiers, wounded four and captured one.7 Captain Clark was driven back to the fort, but a few days afterward he again started and went
5 Frontier Forts, vol. ii., p. 489; Pennsylvania Archives, First Series, vol. viii., pp. 109, 405.
6 Zeisberger to Morgan, January 20, 1779, MS. in Pittsburg Carnegie Library.
7 Pennsylvania Archives, First Series, vol. vii., p. 173.
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OLD WESTMORELAND.
through without molestation. Girty carried his prisoner to Detroit, where he raised a much larger force and return- ed to the vicinity of Fort Laurens.
About the middle of February the wilderness post was surrounded by a band of 200 Indians, mostly Miamis and Mingoes, led by Captain Henry Bird and Girty.8 Gibson succeeded in sending a messenger through the savage lines, who carried the news of the situation to General McIntosh, with this word from Gibson :
"You may depend upon my defending the fort to the last extremity."
On February 23 the garrison suffered a severe loss. Early in the winter the men had cut a lot of firewood and piled it in the forest not far from the fort. On the day men- tioned a wagon was sent out, under an escort of 18 soldiers, to haul some of the wood into the stockade. At about half a mile from the fort the little party passed by an ancient In- dian mound, and behind that mound a band of savages lay hidden. As the white men went along one side of the mound the Indians burst upon them, both in front and rear, took them completely by surprise and quickly killed and scalped every member of the party except two, who were taken prisoners.
The Indians now laid regular siege to the fort and en- deavored to starve it into surrender. The camp fires of the savages were seen at night in the bleak woods, and in the daytime the warriors showed themselves on the adjacent hills, shaking their guns at the fort and waving aloft the scalps of the slain soldiers. The food of the garrison grew so scanty that Colonel Gibson cut down the daily ration to a quarter of a pound of flour and the same weight of meat. Gibson sent another messenger for help, a courageous fel- low, who eluded the watchful Indians and reached Fort Mc- Intosh on March 3. At once the general set about to gath- er a relieving force, but it was two weeks before he collected enough men to do any good.
8 The Westward Movement, Justin Winsor, p. 138; The Girtys, p. 94.
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FORT LAURENS.
In the meantime the straits of the garrison grew des- perate. A sortie in force was contemplated, but this was given up when a count was made of the besieging savages. The Indians paraded over the crest of a hill within plain sight of the garrison, and about 850 warriors were counted. This kept the garrison closely within the walls. It was learned years afterward that there were not more than 200 Indians, but they had exaggerated their real strength by marching around the farther base of the hill and showing themselves in long single file, four or five times over, within sight of the white men.
Captain Bird, after this stratagem, sent in a demand for surrender, promising safe passage for the soldiers to Fort McIntosh, but Gibson sternly refused. The Indians then promised to withdraw if Gibson would furnish them with a barrel of flour and a barrel of meat. Bird believed that the garrison was reduced to its last provisions and would re- fuse the request. In such an event, he felt certain that star- vation would bring the white men to terms in a few days. Gibson had but a few barrels of food, and that in bad con- dition, but he quickly complied with the demand, sent out the two barrels and said that he had plenty left. The sav- ages were discouraged, for they were almost without food themselves. The snow was so deep that they were not able to replenish their larder. They had a feast on the flour and pork, and on the following day left the vicinity and return- ed to their towns in Northwestern Ohio.
On March 23 General McIntosh appeared with his re- lieving force of 300 regulais and 200 militiamen, escorting a train of pack horses with provisions. The joy of the gar- rison was excessive. For more than a week the men had been living on roots and soup made by boiling rawhides.
The famished men sallied forth with their rifles and fired a volley to express their gladness. The shooting frightened the pack horses and they stampeded through the woods, scattering their provisions in every direction. Some of the horses were never recovered and not more than half of the food was gathered up.
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OLD WESTMORELAND.
General McIntosh remained only two or three days at Fort Laurens. Colonel Gibson and his hungry Virginians were relieved and returned with the general to Fort Pitt, while Major Vernon and 100 men of the Eighth Pennsyl- vania were subsituted as the garrison of the wilderness post.
In February, before going to the relief of Fort Laurens, General McIntosh had concluded that he was a failure as a frontier officer, and had written to General Washington asking to be recalled. The Commander-in-Chief acceded to the request, with evident chagrin, and named Colonel Daniel Brodhead, of the Eighth Pennsylvania, as com- mander of the Western Department The nomination of Brodhead was communicated to Congress on March 5 and was approved by that body. On his return to Fort Pitt, April 3, McIntosh received the notification of his release from command, and soon afterward departed for Philadel- phia, while Colonel Brodhead went from Fort McIntosh to Fort Pitt and took charge of affairs.º
In writing of McIntosh, under date of February 20, 1779, General Washington said : "I wish matters had been more prosperously conducted under the command of Gen- eral McIntosh. This gentleman was in a manner a stranger to me, but during the time of his residence at Valley Forge I had imbibed a good opinion of his good sense, at- tention to duty and disposition to correct public abuses, qualifications much to be valued in a separate and distinct command. To these considerations were added (and not the least) his disinterested concern with respect to the dis- putes which had divided and distracted the inhabitants of that western world, and which would have rendered an of- ficer from either Pennsylvania or Virginia improper, while no one could be spared from another state with so much convenience as McIntosh. He is now coming away, and the second in command, Brodhead (as there will be no military operations of consequence to be conducted), will
9 Washington-Irvine Correspondence, p. 35.
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FORT LAURENS.
succeed him. But once for all, it may not be amiss for me to conclude with this observation, that, with such means as are provided, I must labor."10
Brodhead was one of the officers who believed that the building of Fort McIntosh was useless and the erection of Fort Laurens foolish. During April and May the soldiers in Fort Laurens, though free from serious Indian attacks, suffered great privations through the shortage of food. A few deer were killed by Delaware Indian hunters and sold to the garrison, but in the middle of May Brodhead order- ed the greater part of the force to return to Fort McIntosh to escape actual starvation. Major Vernon remained with only 25 men until August 1, part of the time being reduced for food to herbs, salt and boiled hides. It was impossible to keep the place provisioned so far in the wilderness. The fort was finally dismantled, by Brodhead's orders, and the last little handful of men returned to Fort Pitt. The stock- ade remained for many years, falling into decay slowly. Fifty years ago some of the pickets were standing, and even now the outlines of the embankments can be made out on the western bank of the Tuscarawas river.11
10 Magazine of American History, vol. iii., p. 132.
11 Historical Collections of Ohio, vol. ii., p. 693.
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OLD WESTMORELAND.
CHAPTER XIV.
SAMUEL BRADY'S REVENGE.
General Washington excused the appointment of Col- onel Brodhead to the command of the Western Department on the plea that no important operations were to be under- taken in that quarter. Brodhead did not understand the matter in that light. He had his own ideas about the de- fense of the frontier and proceeded actively to put them in- to execution ; and although not much was expected of him, he proved to be the most vigorous and the most successful in punishing the savages among all the commanders at Fort Pitt during the Revolution, including his two successors as well as two predecessors.
In the beginning of April, 1779, McIntosh transferred to Brodhead 722 men, regulars and militia.1 Most of these troops were at Forts Pitt and McIntosh, but small parties garrisoned Fort Henry, at Wheeling; Fort Randolph, at Point Pleasant, and Fort Hand, near the Kiskiminetas, three and a half miles southwest of the site of Apollo. About the middle of April, Lieutenant Lawrence Harrison, for- merly one of Gibson's Lambs, but now connected with the Thirteenth Virginia, was sent to occupy Fort Crawford, a small stockade built by Colonel William Crawford at Par- nassus, during the preceding summer. Forts Hand and Crawford were intended to protect the northern border of Westmoreland county from the raids of the Iroquois who
1 Pennsylvania Archives, First Series, vol. xii., p. 106; Frontier Forts, vol. ii., p. 327.
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SAMUEL BRADY'S REVENGE.
lived on the upper waters of the Allegheny river, but they were not altogether effective.
With the first mild weather of spring the incursions of the savages began. The Senecas and Muncys descended the Allegheny in canoes until within striking distance of the Westmoreland settlements, hid their canoes in the thickets and scattered in little bands through the country. They burned cabins, killed and scalped the men, carried off the women, children and household goods, regained their ca- noes and ascended the river before they could be overtaken by the soldiers or aroused settlers. It was almost impos- sible for regular troops to accomplish anything in this kind of predatory warfare. The movements of the Indians were secret and swift. Except when snow was on the ground, they usually left no trail that could be followed save by the most experienced woodsman. The spring and early sum- mer of 1779 present a terrible record of Indian depredations on the border, and the northern portion of Westmoreland county, between the Forbes road (nearly the present line of the Pennsylvania railroad) and the Kiskiminetas river, was almost depopulated.
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