USA > Pennsylvania > Crawford County > Our country and its people. A historical and memorial record of Crawford County, Pennsylvania. > Part 13
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The old fort was situated upon the banks of the river within the limits of the present city of Detroit. It consisted of a stockade twenty feet high,
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OUR COUNTY AND ITS PEOPLE.
some two hundred yards in circumference, and inclosing seventy or more houses. The garrison, under command of Colonel Gladwin, was composed of the remains of the eightieth regiment of the line, reduced now to about one hundred and twenty men and eight officers. Two six-pounder and one three-pounder guns, and three useless mortars constituted the arma- ment of the fort, and two gunboats lay in the stream. Against this, Pon- tiac, with a smile on his face, but treachery in his black heart, came in per- son with fifty of his warriors on the first of May. He announced his pur- pose to come in a more formal manner in a few days for the purpose of brightening the chain of Friendship-which usually meant that the chiefs were ready to receive high piled up presents, and to renew pledges of lasting peace. As this was a ceremony of frequent occurrence Gladwin had no sus- picion of treachery. Tribes of the Pottawattamies and Wyandots dwelt a few miles below the fort, and at a short distance above, on the western side, the Ottawas, Pontiac's own tribe. The day was drawing near when the universal uprising, which had been agreed upon in council, should take place. Pontiac had laid his scheme skillfully, and as he thought there could be no possibility of failure. He had already been admitted to the fort, and had spied out its strength and appointments and had bespoken admittance with his warriors. He had agreed with his confederates that when he should rise to speak he would hold in his hands a belt of wampum, white on one side and green on the other, and when he should turn the green side upper- most that should be the signal for the massacre of the garrison. But, in savage as in civilized diplomacy,
The best laid. schemes of mice and men Gang aft a-gley.
A dusky maiden of the forest had formed an abiding friendship for Colo- nel Gladwin. She had often visited the fort, and had, with native art, executed pieces of her handiwork for the use of the Colonel. She had received from his hands a curious elk skin, from which she had wrought with her cunning art a pair of moccasins, and on the night previous to the contemplated mas- sacre she had visited the fort to carry the work and return the unused portion of the skin. So pleased was Gladwin with her skill that he asked her to take the skin and make him another pair, and if any were then left she might appropriate it to her own use. Having paid her for her work, she was sup-
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posed to have gone to her wigwam. But when the watchmen, whose duty it was to clear the fort and shut the gates, went at the evening signal gun, they found this maiden lingering in the enclosure, and unwilling to depart. On being informed of this Galdwin ordered her to be led to his presence, and, in answer to the inquiry why she did not go away, as had been her custom, she made the lame excuse that she did not like to take away the skin which the Colonel seemed to set so high a value on, lest some injury or destruction might come to it. When asked why she had not made that objection before, seeing that she must now disclose her trouble, she in- genuously declared. "If I take it away I shall never be able to return it to you." Inferring that something unusual was foretold in this answer, she was urged to explain her meaning. Whereupon she revealed the whole se- cret: that Pontiac and his chiefs were to come to the fort on the morrow, and while the dusky warrior was delivering his pretended speech of peace he was to present a white and green belt which, on being turned in a peculiar way, was to be the signal for the murder of the commandant and all the garrison. That the hostile intent might be entirely hidden beneath the garb of peace the ingenious savages had cut off a piece from the barrels of their guns, so that they could carry them concealed beneath their blankets. Hav- ing given the particulars of the conspiracy she departed.
Having been thus put in possession of the horrible purpose, Gladwin communicated the intelligence to his men, and sent word to all the traders to be on their guard. At night a cry, as of defiance, was heard, and the gar- rison anticipated an immediate attack. The fires were extinguished, and the men silently sought their places in readiness to meet the onset. But none came, and it was supposed that the chiefs were acting their parts by their camp fires, which they were to play on the morrow.
At the appointed hour Pontiac came, accompanied by thirty-six chiefs and a cloud of dusky warriors bearing his speech belt and the pipe of peace. Gladwin was prepared to receive him, his men all under arms, guns cleaned and freshly loaded, and officers with their swords. On entering the fort Pon- tiac started back uttering a cry of anguish, convinced that he had been be- trayed by the evidences of preparation about him; but there was no way of retreat now. When the number agreed upon had been admitted the gates were closed. When arrived at the council chamber Pontiac complained that the garrison was all under arms, a thing unusual in an embassage of peace.
OUR COUNTY AND ITS PEOPLE.
Gladwin explained that the garrison was that morning holding a regimental drill. But Pontiac knew better than that. He commenced his speech with that air of dissimulation which he had the ability to command, and expressed the desire for peace and friendship with the English, which he hoped would be as lasting as the coming and going of the night and morning. But when he advanced to present the belt the officers grasped their swords and drew them partially from their scabbards. Seeing that his treachery was known, but not in the least disconcerted, he did not give the signal that he had agreed upon, and closed his speech in the most friendly and pacific tone.
When Colonel Gladwin came to reply he boldly charged the chieftain with his black-hearted perfidy. But the latter protested his innocence, and expressed a sense of injury that he should be suspected of so base a crime: but when Gladwin advanced to the nearest chieftain, and, pulling aside his blanket, disclosed his shortened gun with which each of them was secretly armed, his discomfiture was complete. He was suffered to depart; but unwisely has been the unanimous judgment of historians. Indeed, so little reliance has come to be placed on the word of an Indian, that it has been declared that "the only good Indian is a dead Indian." Hoping still to dis- arm the suspicions of the commandant, and gain admission to the fort through treachery. Pontiac came again on the following morning accon- panied by only three of his chiefs, and smoked the pipe of peace in the most innocent garb, and declared that his whole Ottawa nation desired to come on the following morning to smoke. But Gladwin declared that this was unnecessary, as he was willing to accept the word of the chiefs, and if they were so anxious to be at peace their own conduct would be the best pledge of their pacific intentions.
Seeing that his treacherous purposes were understood, and that he could not gain admission to the fort by any professions of friendship, he threw off the cloak of deceit, under which he had intended to slaughter the garrison and possess the post, and attacked the fort with all his warriors. The few English who were outside were murdered, all communication was cut off, death was threatened to any who should attempt to carry supplies to the garrison, and the keenest strategy was employed to tempt the troops to open combat. Carts loaded with combustibles were pushed up to the palisades in the attempt to burn them; but all to no purpose. Gladwin was wary, and met every artifice of the wily foe with a counter check. In one
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part the savages attempted to gain entrance by chopping down the picket posts. In this Gladwin ordered his men to assist them by cutting on the in- side. When these fell a rush was made by the Indians to enter; but a brass four-pounder, which had been charged with grape and canister, and so planted as to command the breach, was discharged at the opportune mo- inent, which effected great slaughter. Pontiac now settled down to a close siege. Unfortunately Gladwin had only supplies for three weeks. The sav- age chieftain, believing that he had learned something of civilized warfare, on the roth of May summoned the garrison to surrender. Gladwin asked for a parley, intimating, through the offices of a French emissary, that he was willing to redress any grievances of the Indians, not suspecting that the attack on him was a part of a deep-laid conspiracy reaching all the posts of the frontier. Pontiac consented, and Major Campbell and Lieutenant Mc- Dougal were sent. Hostilities were suspended and Gladwin improved the opportunity to lay in ample supplies for the siege, when he ended the confer- ence.
Embittered by the utter failure of his deep-laid schemes, Pontiac, who was the head and front of this far-reaching conspiracy, drew in from his tribe a heavy force of his best young braves, and watched closely for every opportunity to harass and compass the destruction of the garrison. On the 29th of July Captain Dalzell, with 200 men, marched to the relief of the garrison, and, taking advantage of the darkness of the night, succeeded in eluding the vigilance of the dusky warriors, and entered the fort. Over- confident, he marched boldly out and offered battle. He was defeated, los- ing fifty-nine of his men, including the bold leader.
The peace of Paris had been concluded in April, yet the French, on account of their hatred of the English, had still hope of driving them away through Indian warfare, which was still kept alive. But the stubborn de- fense of Detroit convinced the more considerate of the French that it was their best policy to submit. Accordingly, the French messenger, Neyon, informed Pontiac that no further assistance could be expected from the King of France, a tale of whose coming with a great army to annihilate the English having been persistently dinned into his ears, that peace had been concluded, that France had surrendered everything in America, and that the English were now the only rightful rulers. The sullen Pontiac received the tidings with disgust, broke the siege in no spirit of submission, and de-
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clared that he would return again in the spring and renew his warfare.
The settlers, supposing that the French, having surrendered in good faith, and that the Indians would not dare to continue the war on their own account, hastened back in fancied security to their cabins. But the decree of Pontiac disappointed all their hopes and made the summer of 1763 the most bloody of all the seven. The whole country in Pennsylvania west of Shippensburg became the prey of the fierce barbarians. They set fire to houses, barns, corn, hay and everything combustible. The wretched inhab- itants whom they surprised at night, at their meals or in the labors of the fields, were massacred with the utmost cruelty and barbarity, and those who fled were scarce more happy. Overwhelmed by sorrow, without shelter or means of transportation, their tardy flight was impeded by fainting women and weeping children. Shippensburg and Carlisle became the barrier towns. On the 25th of July, 1763, there were in Shippensburg 1,384 of poor, dis- tressed, fleeing inhabitants, viz .: men, 301; women, 345; children, 738, many of whom were obliged to lie in barns, stables, cellars and under old, leaky sheds, the dwelling houses being all crowded.
A concerted attack was arranged by the Indians on the 22d of June. Presque Isle, Le Boeuf and Venango fell. At Fort Pitt the demand for surrender was boldly made by the dusky warriors. But the commandant, Ecuyer, was of sterner stuff, and he made answer: "I will not abandon this post; I have warriors, provisions and ammunition in plenty to defend it three years against all the Indians in the woods. Go home to your towns and take care of your women and children."
The siege was now pushed with redoubled vigor, digging holes by night and running their trenches close up to the walls of the fort, and keep- ing up a galling fire of musketry and fiery arrows from their safe hiding places. For the relief of the fort, Colonel Boquet was dispatched with frag- ments of Forty-seventh and Seventy-seventh regiments of Highlanders. At Bushy Run, twenty-one miles from Fort Pitt, he was suddenly attacked by an unseen foe. A charge upon the attacking party sent them fleeing, but when pushed in one direction they appeared in another, until they had the little force of Boquet completely surrounded. He accordingly formed his forces in a circle facing outward, and drew up his trains in the center. Seeing that the savages were eager to rush forward whenever they saw the least disposition of the troops to yield, he determined to feign a retreat. He
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accordingly ordered the two companies occupying the advance to retire within the circle, and the lines again to close up, as if the whole force was commencing the retreat. But he posted a force of light infantry in ambus- cade, who, if the Indians should follow the retreating troops, would have them at their mercy. The Indians, seeing the troops retreating and the feeble lines closing in behind them, as if covering the retirement, rushed forward in wildest confusion and in great numbers. But when the Grena- diers, who had been posted on either side, saw their opportunity they ad- vanced from their concealment and charged with the greatest steadiness, shooting down the savages in great numbers, who soon broke in confusion and disorderly flight. But now the companies of light infantry, which had been posted on the opposite side, rose up from their ambush and received the flying mass with fresh volleys. Seized with terror at this unexpected disaster, and having lost many of their best fighting men and war chiefs, they became disheartened, and seeing the regulars giving close pursuit. they broke and fled in all directions. All efforts of their surviving chiefs to rally and form them were unavailing. They could no longer be controlled, but breaking up they fled singly and in parties to their homes, many of them not pausing till they had reached the country of the Muskingum.
General Gage, who had succeeded General Amherst in supreme com- mand of the English in America, sent two expeditions in 1764, one under command of Colonel Bradstreet to advance by Niagara, Presque Isle and Sandusky; and another under Colonel Boquet, by way of Fort Pitt and the country of the Muskingum. At Detroit, Bradstreet was met by the Ottawas, Ojibwas, Pottawattamies, Sacs and Wyandots, who made treaties of peace; but they were either unable to control their young warriors, or they never meant to comply with the terms they had agreed to, and the whole campaign proved fruitless, Bradstreet returning to Niagara and Gage issuing orders to annul all his treaties.
Not so with Boquet, who knew the Indian tactics better. At Fort Pitt he had received a message from Bradstreet informing him that treaties of peace had been concluded with all the western tribes, and that it would be unnecessary to proceed further. But Boquet knew that the colonel had been duped, and pushed forward with his army. He here learned that the messenger whom he had sent to Bradstreet had been murdered, and his head had been set up upon a pole in the road. The chiefs of the Delawares,
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Senecas and Shawnees waited upon him and advised peace, and that he proceed no further, alleging that their young men had committed the ont- rages charged without authority. Boquet boldly charged faithlessness, and asked why they did not punish their young men if they disobeyed. Disre- garding their entreaties, he marched boldly on down the Ohio into the very heart of the Indian country, and so stern were his words and so summary his threats, and the taste of his fighting had inspired such dread, that the tribes sent their chiefs to sue for peace. Boquet met them in the midst of his army. He charged them with constantly breaking their promises. "I give you," was his demand, "twelve days to deliver into my hands all the prisoners in your possession without any exception: Englishmen, Frenchmen, women and children, whether adopted in your tribes, married or living amongst you under any denomination or pretense whatsoever." The stern tone of the brave colonel had the desired effect. By the 9th of November. all the captives had been brought and delivered up, Virginians, thirty-two males and fifty-eight females; Pennsylvanians, forty-nine males and sixty-seven females.
The long captivity of many of those who were brought in had effaced from their minds recollection of former relatives and friends, and they pre- ferred to remain with the savages, having now come to know no other way of life. The savages religiously observed their promises, bringing in all their captives, even to the children who had been born to the women during their captivity. So wedded were many of the captives to the Indians, that the Shawnees were obliged to bind many of them in order to bring them in. Some, after being delivered up, escaped and returned to their life in the woods. The Indians parted with their adopted families not without many tears. Many affecting scenes transpired when the captives were brought, and those who had lost friends and relatives recognized their own after long separation. The children who had been carried away in tender years and had grown up in savage life, knowing no other, could not recog- nize their own parents, and timidly approached them. The Shawnee's chief gave those who had recovered children some good advice: "Father, we have brought your flesh and blood to you; they have all been united to us by adoption, and, although we now deliver them up to you, we will always look upon them as our relatives whenever the Great Spirit is pleased that we may visit them. We have taken as much care of them as if they were
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our own flesh and blood. They are now become unacquainted with your customs and manners, and therefore we request that you will use them tenderly and kindly, which will induce them to live contentedly with you."
Many of the Indians who had given up captives whom they loved fol- lowed the army back, that they might be with them as long as possible, bringing them corn, skins, horses and articles which the captives had re- garded as their own, hunting and bringing in game for them. A young Mingo had loved a young Virginia woman and made her his wife. In defiance of the dangers to life which he submitted himself to in going among the exasperated settlers, he persisted in following her back.
"A number of the restored prisoners were brought to Carlisle, and Colonel Boquet advertised for those who had lost children to come to this place to look for them. Among those that came was a German woman, a native of Reutlingen, in Wittemburg, Germany, who with her husband had emigrated to America, where two of her daughters, Barbara and Regina, were abducted by the Indians. The mother was now unable to designate her children, even if they should be among the number of the recaptured. With her brother, the distressed, aged woman lamented to Colonel Boquet her hopeless case, telling him she used, years ago, to sing to her little daughters hymns of which they were fond. The colonel requested her to sing one of the hymns, which she did in these words:
Allein, und doch nicht ganz alleine Bin ich in meiner Einsamkeit; Dann wann ich gleich veriassen scheine, Vertreibt mir Jesus selbst die zeit: Ich bin bei ihm und er bei mir, So hommt mir gar nichts einsam fir.
Alone yet not alone am I, Though in this solitude so drear; I feel my Savior always nigh, He comes my dreary hours to cheer- I'm with Him and He with me Thus I cannot solitary be.
And Regina, the only daughter present, rushed into the arms of the mother. Barbara, the other daughter, was never restored."
Though Pontiac still persisted in his hostility in the Detroit country, yet he could have no prospect of success. Official notice by the French court was given of relinquishment of all power in Canada. De Noyen, the
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commandant at Fort Chartres, "sent belts," says Bancroft, "and peace pipes to all parts of the continent, exhorting the many nations of savages to bury the hatchet, and take the English by the hand, for they would never see him more. The courier, who took the belt to the north, offered peace to all the tribes wherever he passed; and to Detroit, where he arrived on the last day of October, 1764, he bore a letter of the nature of a proclama- tion, informing the inhabitants of the cession of Canada to England; another, addressed to twenty-five nations by name, to all the red men, and particularly to Pontiac, chief of the Ottawas; a third to the commander, expressing a readiness to surrender to the English all the forts on the Ohio and west of the Mississippi. The next morning, Pontiac sent to Gladwin that he accepted the peace, which his father. the French had sent him, and desired all that had passed might be forgotten on both sides.
Thus ended the conspiracy of Pontiac, a warrior unexcelled by any of his race for vigor of intellect and dauntless courage. His end was ignoble. An English trader hired a Peoria Indian, for a barrel of rum, to murder him. The place of his death was Cahokia. a small village a little below St. Louis. He had been a chief leader in the army of the French in the battle against Braddock at Monongahela, and he was held in high repute by the French general, Montcalm, and at the time of his death Pontiac was dressed in a French uniform presented to him by that commander.
CHAPTER XI.
CRAWFORD COUNTY SETTLED.
N O PERMANENT settlements had been made west of the Alleghany Mountains previous to 1768. The colonial governments held that settlers had no right to occupy any lands that had not been formally purchased of the Indians, and the purchase been confirmed by treaty stipu- lations. During the pendency of the operations under Colonel Boquet against the Indians in the Pontiac war, the King of Great Britain had issued his proclamation, in the hope of pacifying the Indians, forbidding settle- ments, in these words: "Whereas, It is just and reasonable, and essential to our interest, and the security of our colonies, that the several nations or tribes of Indians with whom we are connected, and who live under our protection, should not be molested or disturbed in the possession of such parts of our dominions and territories as not having been ceded to, or pur- chased by us, are preserved to them, or any of them, as their hunting grounds; we do, therefore, with the advice of our privy council, declare it to be our royal will and pleasure that no Governor nor Com- mander-in-chief of our other colonies or plantations in America do presume for the present, and until our further pleasure be known, to grant warrants of survey or pass patents for any lands beyond the heads or sources of any of the rivers which fall into the Atlantic ocean from the west or northwest, or upon any lands whatever, which, never having been ceded to or purchased by us, are reserved to the said Indians and we do hereby strictly forbid, on pain of our displeasure, all our loving subjects from making any purchases or settlements whatever or taking possession of any of the lands above reserved without our special leave and license for that purpose first obtained. And we do further strictly enjoin and require all persons what- ever who have either wilfully or inadvertently seated themselves upon any lands within the countries above described, or upon any other lands
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LAKE ERIE
Fun from the Chited States
MAP SHOWING THE VARIOUS PURCHASES FROM THE INDIANS.
E. NIE/192.
WARREN
POTTER OF
TIOGA 17 84
BRADFORD
CRAWFORL
FOREST
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MANGO
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CAMERON
SULLIVAN
WYOMING
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CENTRE E
UNION
BUTLER
ARMS2
BRAYER
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BLAINI
MIFFLIN
IUNIATA
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ALLEGHENY
LEBANON
WESTMORELAND
WASHINGTON
RIZA
1682
OF
CHESTER
F
PHILADELPHIA!
ADAMS
YORK
GREENE
SOMERSET
REDFORD
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PURCHASE OF 1758
SNYDER
SCHUYLKILL PURCHASE OF HANY VROD
WALKING PUR
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CUMBERLAND
ANTHA
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CARBON
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11.68
FMERCER
CLINTON
LYCOMING
FRANKEN PUR CHASE
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OUR COUNTY AND ITS PEOPLE.
which are still reserved to the said Indians, forthwith to remove themselves from such settlements." It will thus be seen that settlement on any land west of the summits of the Alleghany range was forbidden by royal proclam- ation. But so tempting were the fine lands about the tributaries of the Ohio that venturesome frontiersmen were willing to brave the displeasure of the King on his throne and the savage arts of the roving red men of the forest that they might possess their pick of the fat acres along the margins of these beautiful streams. At the opening of the legislative session of 1768 the Governor of Pennsylvania called attention to these irregularities, and called upon the assembly to pass such a law as would effectually remedy these provocations, and the first law of the session was one providing that if any person settled upon lands not purchased of the Indians by the Proprietaries, shall refuse to remove for the space of thirty days after having been re- quested so to do, or if any person shall remove and then return, or shall settle on such lands after the notice of the provisions of this act shall have been duly proclaimed, any such persons on being duly convicted shall be put to death without benefit of clergy.
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