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On the 9th of October, three white couriers, who had previously lived among the Indians as traders, arrived in Lewis' camp, bearing dispatches from Dunmore, to inform Lewis that he, Dunmore, had changed the plan of campaign, and would not attempt to join Lewis at Point Pleasant, and ordering Lewis to march directly to the Indian towns on the Scioto, where Dunmore would join him. It is believed that this order was given with the base hope that Lewis' command would encounter an overwhelming savage force and be destroyed. In such cases, it is the duty of the histo- rian to give matters of fact, without reserve, without endeavoring to dive into the motives.
It is charged by historians that Dunmore was now, and had long been, engaged in fomenting jealousies and feuds between the colonies, hoping thus to draw off their attention from the encroachments of the British Government upon their constitutional rights. He is also accused of encour- aging and inciting the savages to hostilities by his intrigues. And his pur- pose to take command of the force to rendezvous at Fort Pitt, is believed by them to have proceeded from a desire to allow, in his absence, the whole confederated Indian force to fall upon and annihilate Lewis. If
*The origin of that term was as follows : Little Eagle, a noted Mingo chief, in a rencontre, in the war of 1755, with some whites, under Col. Gibson, attempted to shoot the Colonel, but the ball missed the target. With the quickness and ferocity of a tiger, Gibson sprang upon his foe, and with one sweep of his sword, severed Little Eagle's head from his body. The Indians fled, and reported that the white captain had cut off their chief's head with a "long knife"-hence the term.
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such was his object, he was signally defeated through the gallantry of Lewis' forces. Thus strangely do events confound all the plans of man.
One of the scouts who came to Lewis from Dunmore was McCulloch, and, no doubt, the Major Samuel McCulloch afterwards so famous as a scout, hunter and warrior. McCulloch informed Lewis that he had re- cently left the Shawanese towns, on the Ohio, and gone to Dunmore's camp ; that the combination against the whites was formidable-composed of a larger number of men than under command of either Lewis or Dun- more, and all of them eager for the fray. " They will give you grinders, and that before long," said McCulloch, and repeating it, he swore " the whites would get grinders very soon." The express returned immediately to Dunmore, and the day after they left, the battle of the Point was fought.
On the night of the 9th, Gen. Lewis' scouts reported no Indians within fifteen miles, and preparations were made to break camp and commence the march westward on the next morning. The morning of October 10, 1774, had hardly dawned, however, before Lewis' force was startled by the report of rifles. The alarm was beaten, the enlivening strains rever- berating over the surrounding solitudes. Lewis' pickets came in rapidly, and reported the enemy advancing in force, one of them declaring that he had seen " a body of Indians covering four acres of ground."
Another scout declared the whole woods was swarming with painted warriors, armed with rifles, tomahawks, war clubs and battle axes, The rapidity with which Gen. Lewis formed his troops for battle alone saved the command from destruction. In this unexpected emergency, the ex- citement, the noise and confusion, Gen. Lewis was perfectly composed and, with the utmost coolness and presence of mind, took the necessary meas- ures to meet and repel the attack He ordered to the front the Augusta troops, under his brother, Col. Charles Lewis. He personally knew every man in this regiment-had known them from boyhood, and knew they could be depended on in the hour of danger. The Augusta regiment had hardly passed the outposts of the camp, when a furious onset was made upon them by an overwhelming force of Indians. Col. Charles Lewis fell mortally wounded at an early hour, but his brave troops kept up a stub- born resistance, until, overborne by superior numbers, they showed signs of being pressed back. At this moment, Gen. Lewis ordered forward Col. Fleming's regiment, which gallantly maintained the fortunes of the day until he, too, was struck down by a fatal shot, and was borne, dying, as his men believed, from the field. At this hour the aspect of affairs was ter- ribly gloomy, and less determined men would have been overborne and swept from the field. Gen. Lewis, who comprehended the critical situa- tion, (he was not more distinguished for the even tenor of his mind in ex- citement than for his intrepidity in action) determined to make a supreme effort. He immediately brought into action the entire reserve-men who
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rushed into the fray like bloodhounds cut loose from their leashes, and the fight raged from one end of the line to the other, both parties exhibiting the "stern joy which warriors feel in meeting foemen worthy of their steel." The barbarians, who thought their victory sure when they saw the whites waver after the fall of Cols. Lewis and Fleming, became frantic with rage as Fields' long-knives were seen advancing. "With convulsive grasp they seized their weapons, and would have rushed headlong upon the whites, had the latter not kept up a most galling fire, which had the double effect of thinning their ranks and cooling their rage." " The battle scene was now," says de Hass, " terribly grand. There stood the com- batants ; terror, rage, disappointment and despair riveted upon the painted faces of one, while calm resolution and the unbending will to do or die, were marked upon the other. Neither party would retreat, neither could advance. The noise of the firing was tremendous. No single gun could be distinguished-it was one constant roar. The rifle and tomahawk now did their work with dreadful certainty. The confusion and perturbation of the camp had now arrived at its greatest height. The confused sounds and wild uproar of the battle added greatly to the terror of the scene. The shouting of the whites, the continual roar of firearms, the war whoop and dismal yelling of the Indians, were discordant and terrific." About twelve o'clock the enemy's fire slackened, and Gen. Lewis detached the compa- nies of Capts. Stuart, Mathews and Shelby to turn their flank. This manœuvre was handsomely executed, and by four o'clock the barbarians commenced a good-ordered retreat under Cornstalk, and effected their escape across the Ohio.
It was throughout a terrible scene -- the ring of rifles and roar of mus- kets, the clubbed guns, the flashing knives-the fight hand-to-hand-the scream for mercy, smothered in the death-groan-the crashing through the brush-the advance-the retreat-the pursuit, every man for himself, with his enemy in view-the scattering on every side-the sounds of battle, dying away into a pistol shot here and there through the wood, and a shriek-the collecting again of the whites, covered with gore and sweat, bearing trophies of the slain, their dripping knives in one hand, and rifle- barrel bent and smeared with brains and hair in the other ;- no language can adequately describe it.
The calamity of our loss on that day was heightened by the death of Col. Charles Lewis, who abandoned himself too much to his passion for glory, and forgot that there is a wide difference between an officer and a private. Instead of confining himself to giving orders, he sought to exe- cute them also. Rushing headlong into the fray, a more than ordinarily conspicuous object by reason of a scarlet waistcoat which he wore, against the remonstrances of his friends, he fell early under the enemy's fire. Not inferior to his brother, the General, in courage, intrepidity and military
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genius, he surpassed him in some respects. He knew how to oblige with a better grace, how to win the hearts of those about him with a more en- gaging behavior. He, consequently, acquired the esteem and affection of his men in a remarkable manner. To perpetuate the memory of his public and private virtues, his eminent services in the field, and his heroic fate, the General Assembly of Virginia, in 1816, named Lewis county in his honor.
The following is a list of our killed on this oocasion-a very incomplete list it is-as many subalterns and privates were slain whose names could not be obtained ;
Colonels-Lewis and Field.
Captains-Morrow, Buford, Wood, Murray, Cardiff, Wilson, and Robt. McClenachan.
Lieutenants-Allen, Goldsby, and Dillon.
The historian can scarcely do adequate justice to these heroes. Accord- ing to some accounts, Col. Christian's force did not reach the Point until the day after the battle. Others are to the effect that he came upon the ground about mid-day, and aided in routing the barbarians.
Among the men in this battle who subsequently became distinguished were; Gen. Isaac Shelby, first Governor of Kentucky ; Gen. Wm. and Col. John Campbell, heroes of "King's Mountain;" Gen. Evan Shelby, of Tennessee; Col. Wm. Fleming, acting Governor of Virginia during the Revolution ; Gen. Andrew Moore, U. S. Senator; Col. John Stuart, of Greenbrier; Gen. Tate, of Washington county; Col. Wm. McKee, of Kentucky ; Col. John Steele, Governor of Miss .; Col. Chas. Cameron, of Bath; Major John Lewis, of Monroe ; Gen. Wells, of Ohio; Gen. George Mathews, Governor of Georgia.
At the commencement of the Revolution, Washington considered Lewis the foremost military man in America. His energies were in 1776, however, much impaired by disease and age-premature old age from illness and sufferings.
The Indian army comprised the pick of the northern and western con- federated tribes. Cornstalk, King of the Northern Confederacy, was commander-in-chief, supported by Blue Jacket, Red Hawk, a Delaware chief, Scoppothus, a Mingo sachem, Elinipsico, son of Cornstalk, Chiyawee, chief of the Wayandottes, and the celebrated chief of the Cayugas, Logan. All of these warriors performed prodigies of valor during the battle, and above the din, the loud voice of Cornstalk was heard encouraging his men. In the heat of battle, seeing one of his men retreating, he slew him him with a stroke from his tomahawk.
No witness of this battle, no one acquainted with the conduct of the red men in war, could doubt of their Asiatic origin. In all their habits they resemble the wandering Tartars ; support, with astonishing fortitude, hun- ger, cold, fatigue, and all the hardships of war. In battle, they exhibit
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the same want of discipline, the same fury to attack, the same readiness to fly from and return to the attack, and the same disposition to slaughter when they are conquerors.
The battle was no sooner won, and the Indians in flight, than General Lewis, with that enthusiasm which is peculiar to great minds, took steps to reap the fruits of victory. He ordered preparations for pursuit, and, while these were progressing, had the wounded cared for, the dead buried, and himself laid off a rectangular stockade fort, eighty feet long, with block- houses at two of the corners. It was built for the protection of the sick and wounded. The next morning he crossed the Ohio with his fighting men, and proceeded, though deep ravines and impenetrable thickets impeded his progress, by forced marches for the Pickaway Plains. The savages, who fled before him or hung upon his flanks, now regarded with admira- tion and terror his spirit and energy ; and, notwithstanding the losses of Lewis at the battle of the Point, he appeared to them as more formidable and more powerful than ever. They saw the folly of opposing such a man, and made up their minds to sue for peace. Thus this great soldier and wise man not only shaped the opinions and directed the conduct of his own men, but those of his enemies. At the Plains, Lewis was met by a courier from Dunmore, ordering him to halt, as he, Dunmore, was nego- tiating a peace with the barbarians. Lewis indignantly disregarded this order, and pushed on. Hereceived a second order from Dunmore, which he equally scouted, and continued his march until within three miles of Dunmore's detachment. Dunmore, alarmed, proceeded, with a barbarian chief called White Eyes, to visit Gen. Lewis, whom he peremptorily ordered to halt. The fury of Lewis' men, at what they considered the treachery of Dun- more, was such that Lewis only, with great difficulty, preserved his life.
Gen. Lewis' orders were to return to Point Pleasant, and thence to Greenbrier, where his forces were to be disbanded. Dunmore retired to his camp, concluded a treaty of peace with the barbarians,-the treaty of Camp Charlotte,-and returned to Williamsburg. It was on this occasion that the famous Mingo chief, Logan, made his celebrated speech. He would not oppose the treaty negotiated by Dunmore, and yet would not meet the whites in council. Dunmore, feeling the importance of securing his assent to the treaty, sent Col. Gibson to Logan, who was in his tent brooding in melancholy silence over his accumulated wrongs. Col. Gib- son returned without Logan, but with the following speech, which has given its author an imperishable immortality, though not a few doubt its authenticity. Jefferson regarded the speech as one of the most eloquent passages in the English language, and said of.it, "I may challenge the whole orations of Demosthenes and Cicero, and of any more eminent orators, if Europe has furnished more eminent, to produce a single passage superior to it." It was in these words :
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" I appeal to any white man to say if he ever entered Logan's cabin hungry, and he gave him not meat ; if ever he came cold and naked, and he clothed him not. During the course of the last long and bloody war, Logan remained idle in his cabin, an advocate of peace. Such was my love for the whites, that my countrymen pointed as they passed and said, ' Logan is the friend of the white men.' . I had even thought to live with you, but for the injuries of one man. Colonel Cresap, the last Spring, in cold blood and unprovoked, murdered all the relations of Logan, not even sparing my women and children. There runs not a drop of my blood in the veins of any living creature. This called on me for revenge. I have sought it; I have killed many ; I have glutted my vengeance. For my country, I rejoice at the beams of peace; but do not harbor a thought that mine is the joy of fear. Logan never felt fear. He will not turn on his heel to save his life. Who is there to mourn for Logan ? Not one."
Though the peace thus secured continued through the year 1775, there were occasional symptoms of awakening hostility on the part of the Shaw- anese and other confederated tribes, which were instigated by the British, who saw that a contest between the mother country and her colonies was impending. With a view to coming events, the English sought, in May, 1774, and with too much success, to bring over to their side the Six Na- tions. Consequently, during the Revolution, no one outside of a fort was safe on the frontiers of Virginia and Kentucky ..
The following letter, fortunately found by the author some years since, and communicated to the public through a Richmond paper, is thought worthy of insertion at this point :
THE BATTLE OF POINT PLEASANT.
TO THE EDITORS OF THE STANDARD :
Gentlemen, -- Many years since, when making some researches in the British Museum, I came across the following letter (without the writer's signature), dated at Williamsburg, Va., November 10, 1774. It gives, obviously from hearsay, a brief and incomplete, but, I imagine, a generally accurate account of the battle of Point Pleasant. You will probably con- sider it of sufficient interest to justify publication in "The Standard." Some of the names of the killed and wounded are inaccurate. Captain Blueford is doubtless intended for Buford. The letter appears in Vol. XLV of the "Gentleman's Magazine," page 42-that is to say, in the January number for the year 1775. Yours truly, J. L. PEYTON.
Staunton, February 10, 1882.
" WILLIAMSBURG, November 10, 1774.
"On the Ioth of October last a battle was fought on the Ohio, of which the following are the particulars; On Monday morning, an hour before sunrise, two of Captain Russell's company discovered a large party of Indians about a mile from the camp, one of which men was shot down by the Indians, the other made his escape and brought in the intelligence; in two or three minutes after, two of Captain Shelvey's men came in and con- firmed the account.
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"Colonel Andrew Lewis being informed thereof, immediately ordered out Colonel Charles Lewis to take command of 140 of the Augusta troops, and with him went Captain Dickenson, Captain Harrison, Captain John Lewis, of Augusta, and Captain Lockridge, which made the First division ; Colonel Fleming was ordered to take the command of 150 more of the Botetourt, Bedford and Fincastle troops, which made the Second division.
"Colonel Charles Lewis' division marched to the right, some distance from the Ohio, and Colonel Fleming, with his division, on the bank of the Ohio, to the left.
"Colonel Charles Lewis' division had not marched quite half a mile from the camp, when, about sunrise, a vigorous attack was made on the front of his division by the united tribes of Shawanese, Delawares, Min- gos, Tawas, and of several other nations, in number not less than 800. In this heavy attack, Colonel Charles and several of his men fell, and the Augusta division was obliged to give way to the heavy fire of the enemy. The enemy instantly engaged the front of Colonel Fleming's division, and in a short time the Colonel received two balls through his left arm and one through his breast, and, after animating the officers and soldiers, retired to the camp.
"His loss in the field was sensibly felt, but the Augusta troops being shortly after reinforced from the camp by Colonel Field with his company, together with Captain McDowell's, &c., the enemy, no longer able to maintain their ground, was forced to give way. In their precipitate retreat Colonel Field was killed. During this time, which was till after 12 o'clock, the action continued extremely hot. The close underwood, many steep banks, and logs, greatly favoured the retreat of the Indians; and the bravest of their men made the best use of them, whilst others were throw- ing their dead into the Ohio, and carrying off their wounded.
"Soon after 12 the action abated, but continued, except at short inter- vals, sharp enough until sunset, when they found a safe retreat.
" They had not the satisfaction of carrying off any of our men's scalps, save one or two stragglers, whom they killed before the engagement. Many of their dead they scalped, rather than we should have them; but our troops scalped upwards of twenty men that were first killed. It is beyond doubt their loss in number far exceeded ours, which is considera- ble
" The following is a return of the killed and wounded in the above bat- tle : Killed, Colonels Charles Lewis and John Field, Captains John Mur- ray, R. M'Chenechan, Samuel Wilson, James Ward, Lieutenant Hugh Allen, Ensigns Cantiff, Bracken, forty-four privates-total killed, fifty- three.
" Wounded, Colonel William Fleming, Captains Joe Dickenson, Thomas Blufford, J. Skidman, Lieutenants Goldman, Robinson, Lard, Vance, sev- enty-nine privates-total wounded, eighty-seven; killed and wounded, 146.
" The account further says that Colonel Fleming and several others are since dead of their wounds."
CORNSTALK.
It is to be regretted that those early writers who treated of the discovery and settlement of our country have not given us more frequent and can- did accounts of the remarkable characters that flourished in savage life.
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The scanty anecdotes that have reached us are full of peculiarity and in- terest ; they furnish us with nearer glimpses of human nature, and show what man is in a comparatively primitive state, and what he owes to civili- zation. There is something of the charm of discovery, in happening upon those wild, unexpected tracts of human nature; in witnessing, as it were, the native growth of moral sentiment, and perceiving those generous and romantic qualities which have been artificially wrought up by society, vegetating in spontaneous hardihood and rude magnificence. In civilized life, where the happiness and almost existence of man depends so much upon public opinion, he is forever acting a part. The bold and peculiar traits of native character are refined away or softened down by the level- ing influence of what is termed good breeding, and he practices so many amiable deceptions, and assumes so many generous sentiments for the purposes of popularity, that it is difficult to distinguish his real character from that which is acquired or affected. The Indian, on the contrary, free from the restraints and refinements of polished life, and living, in a great degree, solitary and independent, obeys the impulses of his inclina- tion or the dictates of his individual judgment, and thus the attributes of his nature, being freely indulged, grow singly great and striking. Society is like an artificial lawn, where every roughness is smoothed, every bram- ble eradicated, and the eye is delighted by the smiling verdure of a velvet surface. He, however, who would study nature in its wildness and variety, must plunge into the forest, must explore the glen, must stem the torrent, and dare the precipice. Such reflections arise on reading the accounts of the outrages of the savages upon the early settlers ; how the footsteps of civilization in our country may be traced in the blood of the aborigines ; how easily the colonists were moved to hostility by the lust of conquest ; how merciless and exterminating was their warfare. The imagination shrinks at the idea of how many intellectual beings were hunted from the earth; how many brave and noble hearts, of nature's sterling coinage, were broken down and trampled in the dust.
Such was the fate of Cornstalk, an Indian warrior, whose name was once a terror throughout Virginia and the west. He was the most distinguished of a number of cotemporary sachems, who ruled over the Shawanese and other northwestern tribes the latter part of the eighteenth century-a band of native, untaught heroes, who made the most generous struggle of which human nature is capable ; fighting to the last gasp for the deliver- ance of their country, without a hope of victory or a thought of renown ; worthy of the age of poetry, and fit subjects for local story and romantic fiction, they have left scarcely any authentic traces on the page of history, but stalk, like gigantic shadows, in the dim twilight of tradition.
This Shawanese chief was king of the northern confederacy, and was born in that portion of the County of Augusta now comprehended within
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the limits of the county of Greenbrier, about the year 1747. He was first heard of when about sixteen years of age, when, in 1763-'64, he took an active part in the massacres of Muddy Creek and Big Levels, in Green- brier. The savages were received as friends, and provisions given them with confidence. Unprovoked, as we have seen, they suddenly massacred the men and took the women and children prisoners. Cornstalk accom- panied the party to the mouth of the Falling Spring, on Jackson's river, thence to Kerr's creek, and, in the same year, crossed the North mountain and committed some depredations near Staunton. The massacre on Kerr's creek was, says Foote, terribly visited on Cornstalk, when a defence- less hostage, after the lapse of more than twenty years. All savages seem alike, as the trees in the distant forest. Here and there one unites in his person the excellence of the whole race, and becomes the image of savage great- ness. Cornstalk was gifted with eloquence, statesmanship, heroism, beauty of person, and strength of frame. In his movements, he was majestic ; in his manners, easy and winning. Of his oratory, Col. Wilson, an officer in Dunmore's army, says : "I have heard the first orators in Virginia, Patrick Henry and R. H. Lee, but never have I heard one whose power of de- livery surpassed that of Cornstalk."
The whole savage race was alarmed at the attempts of the whites to occupy Kentucky, and the preparations to lay off the bounty lands for the soldiers of Braddock's war, near Louisville, at the falls of the Ohio, drove them to exasperation. A confederacy was formed, at the head of which Cornstalk was placed. Mutual aggravations on the frontiers, followed by plunderings and murders, of which the whites would no more say they were innocent than the savages, brought on the war. In April, 1774, Col. Angus McDonald, of the Valley of the Shenandoah, led a regiment against the Indians on the Muskingum. He destroyed their towns and secured some hostages ; and the hope was indulged that the frontier would be safe. The Indians, fully convinced that acting by tribes, or small companies, they would all share the fate of the Muskingums, made the last effort of savages, and acted in concert. Virginia had now no alternative but to meet the Indians with an adequate force. When he learned of the prepa- rations of the Virginians, in 1774, to invade the Indian territory, under Gen. Lewis and Lord Dunmore, and he had, through his spies, early in- telligence of the proposed campaign, Cornstalk organized his forces, and planned an attack upon the whites with great skill and ability. He saw the advantage which would result from defeating the separate columns be- fore their junction at Point Pleasant, and accordingly advanced, by forced marches, against Gen. Lewis, and reached the Point about the same time with him. He lost no time in ascertaining the position of the Virginians, but, crossing the Ohio in the night, attacked the whites, who were taken by surprise, and with the disastrous result to himself as related.
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