USA > Pennsylvania > Pennsylvania, colonial and federal : a history, 1608-1903, Volume One > Part 32
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and several of the white men were killed, besides four or five drowned in retreating across the river. The same day, or the next, the enemy crossed the Susquehanna, and killed many people, from Thomas McKee's down to Hunter's mill. But the people of Tulpehocken and Heidelberg townships, Berks county, who marched with Conrad Weiser, could not meet any one to whom to give battle. The gathering at Shamokin was to inform the In- dians there that the Delawares on the Ohio had taken the hatchet against the English, and to warn all who would not join them to move away, and go up the North East Branch to Nescopecken. In council Paxanosa of Wyoming, chief of the Shawanees, spoke boldly in favor of the English. The Delawares at last told him that if he said any more they would knock him on the head. A certain Delaware spoke against the French, but was silenced, and it was agreed to go to Nescopecken, which accordingly became the headquarters for those on the war path. Those faithful to the English feared not only the Ohio Delawares, but the frontier inhabitants of Pennsylvania, and so about thirty retired to Wyo- ming. Governor Morris had no arms or ammunition to give to the people of Berks or Lancaster county, who were ready enough to defend themselves. Weiser and others on October 31, con- veying a report that the people at Aughwick and Juniata had been cut off, wrote: "If we are not immediately supported, we must not be sacrificed, and therefore are determined to go down with all that will follow us to Philadelphia, and quarter ourselves on its inhabitants, and wait our fate with them." Parsons reported murders just over the mountains from his place. Harris and others at Paxton, at 12 o'clock of the same night that Weiser wrote, summoned "all His Majesty's subjects in Pennsylvania and elsewhere" to repair to the frontiers, to intercept the whole body of Indians actually encamped this side of Gabriel's on the Susquehanna, ready to strike within three days, while a French fort was about to be established at Shamokin, with the consent of the Indians there. A few days afterwards, the settlements at
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the Great Cove were reduced to ashes, and numbers murdered or taken prisoner ; about two-thirds of the people in the Conegohege Valley fled. One hundred men and women went for succor to the Sheriff of Cumberland county. No Frenchmen were among these Indians, who were Delawares and Shawanees commanded
Moravian Bake Oven, Northampton County
Built about 1760; from negative made by J. F. Sachse in 1895
by Shingass. John Armstrong wrote from Carlisle that nothing but a chain of block houses along the south side of the Kittatinny mountains from Susquehanna to the temporary line, would secure the lives and property of even the old inhabitants of the county, the new settlements being all deserted except those in Sheerman's Valley, which might suffer very soon. All this being laid before the Assembly, the latter only answered with a request to the Gov-
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ernor to inform the House if he knew of any injury which the Delawares and Shawanees had received to alienate their affec- tions, and whether he knew the part taken by the Six Nations in relation to this incursion. On November 7, an address of some of the Quakers, signed by Anthony Morris and twenty-two others, was presented to the Assembly, expressing willingness to con- tribute towards the exigencies of government, and their desire that proper funds be raised to cultivate friendship with Indians, to support fellow subjects in distress, and for such like benevolent purposes, but apprehension that the putting of money in the hands of committees who might apply it to purposes inconsistent with the peaceable testimony professed by the petitioners, might neces- sitate many among them to suffer, rather than consent by paying such tax. By a vote in which James Pemberton, Joseph Trotter, Joshua Morris, Thomas Cummings, William Peters (not the brother of the Rev. Richard), Peter Worrall, and Francis Parvin were in the opposition, the House the next day passed a bill grant- ing 60,000l. from a tax on estates, whereby the question of the taxation of the Proprietary estates was left to the King. The councillors unanimously opposed accepting this. At this juncture Scarrooyady came to town, and asked if the people of Pennsyl- vania would join him in fighting, yes or no; if they would not, then he and his 300 friends would go elsewhere for protection, there was no time to lose. The Governor explained that the As- sembly had the power to decide the question; and later explained how the controversy with that body stood, and that he did not know what to do. Scarrooyady heard this with amazement, and said that it would cause the absolute defection of the Delawares, but, as for his own services, he still offered them, and desired the Governor not to be cast down, but to keep cool. Finally, Morris sent Scarrooyady to the Six Nations to report the conduct of the Delawares; and then pointed out to the Assembly that the King's practice was to approve or reject an act as a whole, and suggested that they make the taxation of the Proprietary estate
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the subject of a separate bill, the assessment to be not by the assessors, but by commissioners, to be chosen by the House and himself, and named in the bill. This proposition was rejected, after Indians had come through Talihaio Gap in the Kittatinny mountains, and killed several persons on guard there, and at- tacked a company at Tulpehocken, eighteen miles from Reading.
In November there arrived from Nova Scotia 168 men, women, and children, who claimed to be neutrals in any war be- tween England and France, having been of French birth or descent, but who were suspected of giving information and provi- sions to the French and Indians, and so considered dangerous in that colony. Morris ordered the vessels bringing these to lie below the city, and placed guards upon them to prevent any escape, and furnished provisions. Subsequently these unfortunates were distributed through the counties to be cared for and supplied with the means of earning a livelihood.
On November 20 the Assembly sent to the Governor a militia bill, entitled "An act for the better ordering and regulating such as are willing and desirous to be united for military purposes within this Province," which, notwithstanding its unsatisfactory terms, was accepted by the Governor as better than nothing, and under which companies of volunteers were rapidly formed.
On November 21 the Indians came as far as the Moravian village of Gnadenhutten in Northampton county, killed six per- sons, and burned the dwelling houses, meeting-house, and other buildings, with all the grain, hay, horses, and about forty head of cattle under cover. About fourteen Christian red men dwelling there fled with their wives and children to Bethlehem.
While William Moore of Moore Hall, Chester county, holding a commission as colonel, was writing word that 2,000 inhabitants of that county were preparing to come to Philadelphia to compel the Governor and Assembly to pass laws for defending the Prov- ince, and Weiser was sending information of a considerable num- ber ready to come from Berks County, a letter, dated October 4,
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arrived from Thomas Penn, enclosing an order on the Receiver- General for 5,000l., as a gift for the public service, to be paid to such persons as the Assembly and Governor should agree upon, in lieu of taxes upon the Proprietary estates. This was accepted, while the Indians were burning the Moravian village at Mahanoy, and killing all the white people there but two. Penn desired the tax bill to say nothing about the gift, but simply exempt the estates, but Morris overlooked this, and passed the "act for grant- ing 60,000l. to the King's use, and for striking 55,000l. thereof in bills of credit," etc., which declared that, in consideration of the 5,000l., the Proprietary estates should be exempt from the tax thereby levied. The expenditure of the money was to be by the Governor and a majority of the commissioners, viz. : Norris (the Speaker ), Hamilton and Mifflin of the Governor's Council, and Franklin, Joseph Fox, John Hughes, and Evan Morgan, assem- blymen. Ravages continued in Northampton county in Decem- ber, laying waste the country to within twenty miles of Easton. A guard of forty men, erecting a fort at Gnadenhutten, was at- tacked and nearly annihilated, and seven farm houses between that place and Nazareth burnt, on the Ist of January, 1756. Franklin, as commissioner, later in the month, marched with several companies to Gnadenhutten and completed the fort, which was called Fort Allen. It was the advance post in that direction of a line of forts and blockhouses which the commissioners estab- lished along the foot of the Blue mountains from the Delaware river to the Maryland line. There were then over 500 militiamen in Northampton County, besides about forty regular soldiers sent by General Shirley. About forty more regulars were at Reading. Certain of the Conestoga Indians, having been friendly, were allowed to remain on the manor of that name, while to some belonging to the Six Nations a home was given on Pennsbury manor. The House, on March 19, passed an act by which pro- vincial volunteers serving with regulars should be liable like them to the terms of the act of Parliament regulating them, but no
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court martial should put any one to death without submitting the case to the Governor. The Delawares, forcing even John Shick- calamy to go against the English, sent representatives to the Six Nations to justify their conduct, but were condemned and ordered to desist. On hearing this, and seeing that it so far had not deterred the enemy, the Lieutenant-Governor, to meet barbarity with barbarity, gave a hatchet to Scarrooyady, as a declaration of war against the Delawares, and obtained an offer in writing from Commissioners Fox, Hamilton, Morgan, Mifflin, and Hughes to pay as a reward for every male Indian prisoner over ten years old $150 ; for every female Indian prisoner over ten or male under ten, $130; and for the scalp of every male Indian over ten, $130; and for the scalp of every Indian woman, $50! A fort was to be built at Shamokin, as a rallying place for Scarrooyady's followers. Captain Alexander Culbertson and about fifty men attacked In- dians going with captives taken from McCord's Fort, and lost many killed and wounded, on April 9. On April 12 an address from Quakers was presented to the Governor, signed by Samuel Powell, Anthony Morris, John Reynell, Samuel Preston Moore, Israel Pemberton, and John Smith, at the request of many of their brethren, beseeching that before war were declared, some further attempts be made by pacific measures to reduce the Indians to a sense of duty. William Logan asked for a full meeting of the Council that evening ; and ten members came, of whom all but three had been brought up as Quakers, and all but four still con- sidered themselves such : yet all except Logan agreed to war with- out delay. Scarrooyady was drunk for two days. A great body of the inhabitants of the back counties were assembling at Lan- caster to come to Philadelphia and force the passage of the laws which they thought were called for by the exigency of affairs. With difficulty were they deterred. Proclamation of the war was made April 14. Then Scarrooyady announced, to the dis- appointment of the government, that he and all the Indians with him except three would go to the Six Nation country to leave the
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women and children there, and return with warriors after the completion of the Shamokin fort. Some of the Quakers, talking to Conrad Weiser, the Provincial interpreter, were confirmed in their surmise that some dissatisfaction respecting land had tended to alienate the affections of the Delawares, and that it was still possible to make peace with them, Weiser afterwards recommend-
itì
First American Home of John James Audubon
Mill Grove Farm, Montgomery County; built 1762. Engraved for this work from a negative by D. E. Brinton
ing a certain Indian living in New Jersey as a messenger to them. Israel Pemberton conveyed to Governor Morris an offer to send such messenger at the expense of himself and co-religionists, as their private undertaking. With Morris's consent, several of the chiefs of the Six Nations then in town, with Weiser and Montour, who was the other Provincial interpreter, and Daniel Claus, secre- tary to General Johnson, dined with some of the Quakers at the house of one of them, and were made acquainted with the prin- ciples of the Society of Friends as to war, and this project, in
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pursuance of those principles. Scarrooyady was pleased with it. Weiser advised calling together as many survivors as possible of the first settlers, men who had so long lived in amity with the Delawares, to have another meeting, and give a belt of wampum. Morris was asked to direct the proceeding. About twenty per- sons had further conferences with the Indians, and it was agreed to send three messengers to the Delawares, to induce them to lay down their arms and send back their captives, after which the Quakers would act as mediators with the government. Those who were urging peace were vindicated by news from Johnson that the Six Nations had succeeded in bringing the Dela- wares to compliance with their orders and readiness to surrender captives. So the three Indians whom Scarrooyady left behind, Newcastle and Jagrea of the Six Nations and William Lacquis, a Delaware, were sent in the Governor's name to the Delawares on the Susquehanna, and held a meeting with them at Tioga, or Tiaogon, and received an apology. Johnson, Superintendent of Indian Affairs, raised to a baronetcy for his victory over Dieskau in September, 1755, thought Morris's declaration of war im- politic; and, by proclamation of June 3, repeated several times, hostilities were suspended except as to the Delawares on the Ohio.
A petition having been forwarded to the King about the end of the year 1755, setting forth the distressed and defenceless state of the Province, and praying His Majesty to take it into con- sideration, and interpose his authority that so important a Prov- ince, situated in the center of the American dominions, might be put into a posture of defense, it came before the Lords of Trade and Plantations ; they were attended by Paris, solicitor for the petitioners, with his counsel, York and Forrester, and by Joshua Sharp, solicitor for the Assembly of Pennsylvania, with his counsel, Henly and Pratt, and by the agents of the Province, and by several of the Society of Friends. Argument was pre- sented that the Proprietaries had by the charter power to defend the Province, as well as the plea for the Assembly that 55,0001.
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had been granted to the King's use, and a militia law been passed for regulating those willing to enlist. The Lords reported March 3, 1756, that there was little room to hope that the words "other purposes for the King's use" would be construed to include mili- tary measures by those who had the sole disposition of the money, that is, a committee of an Assembly principled against war ; and that the prohibition of minors enlisting, and the restriction against the companies being compelled to go more than three days' march beyond the inhabited parts of the Province, were, with the volun- tary and elective and insubordination features of the militia sys- tem, mischievous; the legislature of Pennsylvania was not ex- empted from the general law of nature and society to defend the government and those who were its subjects, but was obliged by the charter to the Proprietaries' father to assist them in so doing ; but there was no reason to hope that proper measures would be taken while the majority of the Assembly consisted of persons. representing not one-sixth of the population, not bound by any oath, principled against military service, and even declaring it a violation of the Constitution to compel persons to bear arms, or provide for those who did; therefore, there was no remedy in the Lords' opinion but an act of Parliament, as suggested by the Attorney-General and Solicitor-General in 1744, for depriving those who held such views of their power to control the legis- lature. Accordingly, a bill was prepared excluding from seats in any legislative assembly in America all persons who refused to take an oath prescribed in the bill. Members of the Society of Friends induced the government not to push this through Parlia- ment that session, applying to a prominent peer, who assisted them upon the condition, which he suggested, that the utmost en- deavors be used with the Pennsylvania Quakers to induce them to decline being chosen to the Assembly during what was then the situation of affairs. This the Meeting for Sufferings in London communicated to the brethren in Philadelphia, even sending over two visiting Friends to use their influence. Meanwhile, on June
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4, 1756, James Pemberton and Joshua Morris, members from Philadelphia county, William Callender from the City, William Peters from Chester county, Peter Worrall from Lancaster, and Francis Parvin from Berks, resigned their seats in the Assembly,
Henry Bouquet
Soldier; cooperated with General Forbes against Fort Duquesne, 1758; with his command re- lieved Forts Ligonier, Bedford and Pitt, 1763. Photographed especially for this work from a painting by Benjamin West
giving as a reason that many of their constituents seemed of opinion that the situation of affairs called upon their representa- tives for services "in a military way," which, from a conviction of judgment after mature deliberation, they could not comply
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with. At the October election, however, Mahlon Kirkbride and William Hoge of Bucks county, and Peter Dicks and Nathaniel Pennock of Chester county, although of the same religious per- suasion as the seven, were returned. This was without solicita- tion on the part of these four, and, to avoid all question, they resigned.
On July II, 1756, Sir William Johnson received the submis- sion of the head of the Delawares on the Susquehanna, in presence of the deputies of the Six Nations, and his promise to surrender captives, and to endeavor to withdraw from the French those of his nation who had gone to live in the neighborhood of Fort Duquesne. He and Paxanosa, head of the Shawanees, received the war belt from Johnson, and solemnly danced the war dance.
The King of England, having appointed the Earl of Loudoun as commander-in-chief of the forces in North America, and or- dered two regiments of foot and a train of artillery to embark for the defence of the colonies, undertook to fill up another regi- ment with recruits from America, calling it the Royal American Regiment, and recommended that out of the funds raised for the public service, masters should be repaid the purchase money paid by them for the labor of servants who might enlist. On May 27, 1756, he formally declared war against France, an act which was not known in Pennsylvania until about two months after- wards. The retirement of the seven Quakers from the Assembly destroyed the opposition to war, but left the question of popular rights and the poor man's interests to stand in the way of pro- viding money to prosecute it.
The 60,000l. being spent, the Assembly passed an act to raise 40,000l. by a tax which was leviable upon the Proprietary estates. but Morris rejected it, as well as an act to continue the excise, because in the latter there was not the provision required by the eleventh instruction from the Proprietaries that the Governor should have a joint power with the Assembly in disposing of the money.
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The Indians continued their depredations in Cumberland county. Captain Jacobs, one of the heads of the Delawares on the Ohio, and several Frenchmen with a number of savages at- tacked Fort Granville (now Lewiston), commanded by Lieuten- ant Armstrong, and took it on August Ist, after several days' siege and set it on fire ; the garrison had been two days without water, and the brave Armstrong, who had often refused to sur- render, had been killed. Most of the country was evacuated, and York county became an exposed frontier, where if the enemy came. he would find subsistence to supply many thousand men. Never had there been a more abundant harvest. The people of Cumberland, guarded by detachments of troops, had been reaping it, when they heard of the taking of Fort Granville, and left to rot whatever they had not gotten in. Fort Shirley at Aughwick was threatened with a larger attacking force : it had no well, get- ting its water from a stream at the foot of a high bank to the eastward. Captain Jacobs said he could take any fort that would catch fire, and would make peace with the English only when they had taught him to manufacture gunpowder.
Teedyuscung, living at Tioga Point, and vested with some- thing like vice-regal authority, was the chief of the Delawares who, according to John Shickcalamy, had stirred up the Indians. The messengers sent at the instigation of the Quakers brought him back with them as far as Bethlehem, he selling an English female prisoner for a horse to make the journey. The messengers induced Morris to meet him in council at Easton, and informed the Quakers active in the matter that their presence also was necessary. Owing to the low state of the public funds, and the refusal of the Proprietaries' agents to contribute, the Quakers raised a considerable sum, and followed Morris to Easton, and at Morris's lodgings met Teedyuscung, who expressed his con- fidence in them, and his unwillingness to proceed to business with- out their attendance. The council arranged for a larger one. On July 30, the presents were delivered, and it was explained that
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part came from the Quakers as a testimony of their regard, and of their desire to promote peace. A large entertainment was given to the fifteen chiefs, etc., and was attended by the officers of the Royal American Regiment, as well as of the Provincial forces, and the magistrates and freeholders and Quakers, to the great delight of Teedyuscung. After dinner, the Quakers went home. Morris authorized Teedyuscung and Captain Newcastle to sum- mon all the Indians they could for the later treaty. After setting out, Teedyuscung returned to the neighborhood of Bethlehem, bought liquor, and was constantly drunk, and told Indians there that other Indians would come in three weeks, and destroy them and the white people, and not to let the white people know. Finally he started for Tioga Point.
William Denny, an army officer, assumed the duties of Gov- ernor on August 20, Morris having asked to be relieved. Upon appointment Denny gave the Proprietaries a bond in 5,000/. pen- alty to comply with their instructions. These, among other re- strictions forbade him from passing any act whereby the interest from loans of paper money or the revenue from excise should be applied except to the purposes of the act, or by a vote of Assembly approved by the Governor ; moreover, he was not to add more than 40,000/. to the 80,000l. paper money outstanding. Any land tax was to be created only for one year, and laid upon the annual rent or yearly value only, calling three per cent. of the selling value the yearly value of lands occupied by the owners; and all unoccupied and unimproved lands and all Proprietary quit rents were to be exempted, and the rate not to be more than 4s. per l. of such annual value. It seems strange that the Proprietaries could make themselves believe that such a tax by being honestly levied would yield the amount for which the British generals were clamoring.
An expedition had been planned by Morris against Kittan- ning, the headquarters of the Delawares on the Ohio, where Shingass and Captain Jacobs were leaders. There the prisoners
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from Fort Granville were taken, and one of them at once burnt. Morris had given the command to Colonel John Armstrong, under whom were to serve the companies of Hans Hamilton, Hugh Mercer, Edward Ward, and James Potter. These started from Fort Shirley on the last of August, and arrived before Kittanning on the night of September 7, without being discovered, leaving a few miles back a dozen men under Lieutenant Hogg with the horses and knapsacks, under orders to attack at daybreak some Indians seen around a camp-fire. When morning came, Arm- strong with most of his men, being on the Allegheny below the town, attacked the lower end of it and the cornfield, and, with considerable loss, set fire to most of the buildings, and caused the explosion of quantities of gunpowder, and the unaimed discharge of loaded cannon. Captain Jacobs fell killed out of his garret window. Numbers of Indians were shot or blown up, and goods sent by the French destroyed, while captives escaped. Arm- strong was wounded, and, learning that a body of Indians had not long previously left the town and that two batteaux of French were expected that day, was afraid that not only his retreat would be cut off, but that Lieutenant Hogg's force would be over- whelmed; and so the victors, with a dozen scalps, started back with their wounded. Captain Mercer, who early in the action had been wounded in the arm, and about twelve men became separated from the rest. It was found that the Indians whom Hogg was to attack turned out to be a large force, and three of his men had been killed, the rest running away, while he, three times wounded, had afterwards died, the horse he had been put upon carrying him some miles away. Those who were left of Armstrong's army, most of the horses being lost, kept close to- gether, daily expecting attack, until they reached Fort Littleton. Mercer moreover lived to become distinguished.
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