USA > West Virginia > Pendleton County > A history of Pendleton County, West Virginia > Part 5
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But still other settlers were here by this time or else they came quickly afterward. Jacob Zorn lived near Propst. He was seemingly the first settler to pass away. His estate was
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appraised in 1756 by Jacob Seybert, John Dunkle, Charles Wilson, and Christian Evick. In the inventory are men- tioned 55 items. Catharine, the widow of Zorn, seems to have been a sister to Jacob Ruleman, who also was most probably here as well as Mark Swadley and Henry Stone. Frederick Keister, still another son-in-law to Dyer, had come by 1757 and probably earlier. Michael and Jacob Peterson appeared to have settled near Upper Tract. In 1754 we find mention of Samuel Bright on Blackthorn, Joseph Skidmore and Peter Vaneman on Friend's Run. Skidmore and Vane- man were forehanded and enterprising, and became active in land transactions. Another man of this character was Jacob Eberman who was in Augusta by 1750, but may not have come to Pendleton for several years afterward. In 1756 Hans Harper had come from Augusta and was living near the head of Blackthorn. The Indians were now coming on, and until 1761 there was an entire letting up in the matter of survey- ing, except for the parcels taken by John and William Cun- ningham on Thorny Branch and those of James and Thomas Parsons between Trout Rock and the mouth of East Dry Run.
Meanwhile there were a few more changes within the Dyer settlement. In 1755 Jacob Seybert purchased John Patton's farm of 210 acres, and two years later William Stephenson sold his own place to Mathias Dice. In the latter year Roger Dyer fell into a term of ill health and made a will wherein he mentions 29 persons with whom he had had business dealings of one sort or another. It is quite impos- sible to draw the line between those who were living within Pendleton and those who were not. The persons named were Thomas Campbell, William Corry, John Cravens, Michael Dicken, Patrick Frazier, Michael Graft, William Gragg, Jesse Harrison, Johnston Hill, Peter Hawes, Frederick Keister, Joseph Kile, Arthur Johnston, James Lock, Daniel Love, Michael Mallow, John McClure, John and Jane McCoy, Hugh McGlaughlin, David Nelson, Matthew Patton, John, Nicholas, and Thomas Smith, William Semple, Herman Shout (Shrout?) John Saulsbury, Robert Scott and Robert Walston.
By the close of 1757, not less than about 40 families, or 200 individuals were living in what is now Pendleton county. They were not unequally divided between the South Branch and the South Fork, and they were most numerous toward Upper Tract and the Dyer settlement. Whether actual set- tlement had yet been made on the North Fork is uncertain.
We may picture to ourselves a primeval forest broken only by a few dozen clearings, nearly all of those lying on or near
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the large watercourses. In these clearings were the small houses, usually of unhewn logs. Around the house were small, stump-dotted fields of corn, grain, and flax. The pens for the livestock were strongly built, so as to protect the animals from the bears, wolves, and catamounts that were the cause of continual anxiety and occasional loss. The "broads" leading out from the settlements were simply bridle-paths, and commodities were carried on the backs of animals.
There was a little mill at the Dyer settlement and another at Upper Tract. Doubtless there was also a blacksmith in each valley. But there was neither church, schoolhouse nor store. In the Dyer settlement. judging by the character of its people, it is probable there was some makeshift to provide elementary instruction for the young people. Elsewhere it is not likely that anything was being done in this line, unless through direct parental effort.
But a time of trouble had now come and this episode next demands our attention.
CHAPTER VI
Period of Indian War
Jefferson tells us the Indian Claims in the Valley of Vir- ginia were purchased "in the most unexceptionable manner." At all events the few Shawnee and Tuscarora tribesmen were at peace with the whites until 1754. To that date the Shawnees remained on the South Branch. They often vis- ited the homes of the settlers and in this way learned to speak English quite well. When they appeared at a house they expected something to eat and were not backward in letting the fact be known. The Indian was himself very hospitable. He therefore expected something set before him, just as he was wont to provide the best he had when a stranger came to his own cabin. To boil their venison a hunting party would sometimes borrow a kettle, but they would bring some meat in return for its use.
Yet the feeling between the settler and the native was not cordial. The former would sooner do without the visits of the red man. The latter was not at all pleased with the per- sistent pressure of the tide of colonial settlement.
Killbuck, the chief of the little band of Shawnees, was an Indian of much ability and strong mental power. Peter Casey, a pioneer of Hampshire, once promised him a pistole ($3.60) if he would catch his run-away slave. The chief found and brought back the negro, but Casey quarreled about the reward, knocked down the Indian with his cane, and went back on his word. When Killbuck in his old age was visited by a son of Casey, he did not forget to tell the son that he ought to pay his father's debt.
The English and the French were rivals in America. They had already fought three colonial wars, and a life and death struggle for supremacy was now on the point of breaking out. That the weak, scattered settlements of the French beyond the Alleghanies were let alone by the Indians was because of the difference in habits between the French and English pio- neer. The former came not to clear the land but to trade for furs. He almost made himself a native when among the Indians, and if a trapper he took an Indian wife. The hunt- ing grounds were let alone and the Indian was benefited by the articles he received in return for his pelts.
But the English colonist had his own wife, and he felled the trees and cleared the ground as he came along. The
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game was thus scared away and the Indian had to fall back before him. Furthermore the Englishman did not go to the same pains to win and keep the will of the red man. Thus the Frenchman had much the greater influence.
In the fall of 1753 the Shawnees on the South Branch were visited by Indians from the Ohio river, who urged them to move out to their country. The invitation was accepted and the removal took place very abruptly the following spring. The Shawnees now sided with the French and with dire re- sult to the border settlements. By the defeat of Braddock in 1755, the frontiers of Pennsylvania, Maryland and Vir- ginia were left totally exposed, and during the next four years the entire line was harassed by raiding parties of the enemy. Sometimes the Indians acted alone, and sometimes they were accompanied by French soldiers. The damage in- flicted was very great and it was done by a comparatively small number of warriors. To make matters still worse white miscreants would disguise themselves as Indians and commit depredations on their own account. For aiding and abetting the Shawnees and trying to mislead the Cherokees, one Hugh McNamara was committed in April, 1753. Only a few months after the defeat of Braddock Washington reports 71 persons killed or missing within a few days and crowds of fugitives flying through the Blue Ridge.
In 1756 Virginia appropriated $33,333 for the building of 23 forts, these to comprise a chain extending from the great Cacapon in Hampshire to the Mayo in Halifax. Washington was sent to the frontier with his headquarters at Winches- ter. He was not given enough troops to cover his line of de- fense and his men of one county were not willing to aid in protecting another. His letters give a vivid idea of the dis- tressful times and show his irritation in having too weak a force. Thus he writes under date of April 15, 1756 : "All my ideal hopes of raising a number of men to search the ad- jacent mountains have vanished into nothing." A week later he has this to add : "I am too little acquainted with pathetic language to attempt a description of the people's distresses." Only two days later he writes as follows : "Not an hour, nay, scarcely a minute passes that does not produce fresh alarms and melancholy accounts." In another letter he says, "the deplorable situation of these people is no more to be described than is my anxiety and uneasiness for their relief." Or again : "Desolation and murder still in- crease." September 28, 1757 he writes these words : "The inhabitants of this valuable and very fertile valley are terri- fied beyond expression."
In 1757 there were 1873 tithables in Augusta. The
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following year the number had fallen to 1386, showing that notwithstanding the rangers who had been sent to watch the frontier, many of the people had fled to places of greater safety. No doubt some of the Pendleton pioneers took part in this general flight, yet so far as we can see they remained pluckily on the ground, even though in constant peril, except in the dead of winter when the Indians did not go out on the warpath. Their houses were made bullet proof and the walls were pierced with loopholes. Several houses of this charac- ter are yet standing, though of somewhat later date than the period under consideration. In time of alarm a family would seek the protection of the nearest fort.
The colonial government deciding to fight the foe with its own weapons, it offered in 1755 a bounty of 10 pounds ($33.33) for the scalp of any hostile Indian over 12 years of age, but making it a felony to kill a friendly Indian. This law was enacted for two years and was renewed with a fur- ther reward of $50 for taking a prisoner. But proving futile the measure was repealed in September, 1758. Cherokee allies were hired by the colony and a reward not to exceed $10,000 was voted them. In the fall of 1757 twenty of these allies brought in two scalps from the South Branch. That this sort of help was double-edged would appear from an act passed in the fall of 1758 taking account of the damage done by the Cherokees.
In 1756 three bloody battles were fought in Hampshire and on January 4 of the same year Washington thus writes of the weak settlements in Pendleton : "I have now ordered Capt. Waggoner with 60 men to build and garrison two oth- ers (forts) at places I have pointed out high up the South Branch." August 16, he makes this further report: "We have built some forts and altered others as far south on the Potomac as settlers have been molested; and there only re- mains one body of inhabitants at a place called Upper Tract who need a guard. Thither I have ordered a party."
We have no account of any raids into Pendleton prior to 1757, and if any took place it would not appear that the loss or damage was serious. In February of the year raentioned Jacob Peterson, living on North Mill Creek near the Grant line lost six children by capture, one of them soon afterward escaping. On May 16 of the same year the Indians killed Michael Freeze and his wife, who lived close to Upper Tract. On March 19, 1758 there was another and more destructive raid upon the Upper Tract settlement. Peter Moser, who lived opposite the mouth of Mallow's Run, was shot dead while unloading corn at his crib. Nicholas Frank and John Conrad were also killed, George Moser and Adam Harper
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were wounded, and John Cunningham and two other persons were captured. These casualties happened the same day, though it is not certain that all of them took place at Upper Tract. It is rather strange that these two raids should have occurred so close to the fort if there was an efficient garrison in it at the time. It is very possible that a reenforcement was thrown into it shortly after.
It was perhaps the tragedy at the Freeze home that led to the commissioning, March 16, 1757, of Jacob Seybert as the first captain of militia for what is now Pendleton county. Captain Seybert had come from Frederick county, Maryland, four years earlier. He was one of seven brothers, natives of the very town in Germany that gave birth to Martin Luther. Some of these settled in the Shenandoah valley. Moses Sey- bert, a brother to the captain, sold the farm he there owned for $2500 and went to Guilford Courthouse, N. C., about the time the war of the Revolution broke out. He was still there at the time of the battle between Greene and Cornwallis, and the family had to stay in the cellar while bullets were flying. Noncombatants being allowed to depart the next day, Sey- bert hurried away and sought a new home in the natural fastness of the Fort Valley within the Massanutten. He thought an armed force not likely to disturb him here.
Fort Upper Tract and Fort Seybert appear to have been built in 1756. Where the former stood is not positively known. One tradition places it near the house of John S. Harman, but in view of the killing of Moser this would not seem probable. Another view places it on the very brink of the river a mile above Harman's. This spot is very advan- tageous, being at the angle of a bend in the river and the opposite bank much lower. The river bluff is steep and a ravine affords some protection on two other sides. The in- closed space is however very limited. A building once stood here and the foundation may easily be traced. But it disap- peared before the recollection of any person now living. The spot lies a mile south of Upper Tract village and on the west bank of the river.
Fort Seybert stood on what is now the houseyard of Wil- liam C. Miller, who lives a fourth of a mile south of the Fort Seybert postoffice. There was a circular stockade with a two-storied blockhouse inside. The diameter of the stockade was about 90 feet. According to the practice of the day, the wall was composed of logs set in contact with one another and rising at least ten feet above the ground. For going in or out there was a heavy gate constructed of puncheons. The blockhouse stood near the center of the circle, and was apparently about 21 feet square. From the loopholes in the
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upper room the open space around the stockade could be com- manded by the garrison. There is no evidence of a well to make the defenders independent of the fine spring then ex- isting within a walk of two minutes. Mr. Miller deserves the thanks of the public in preserving in its original site a foundation stone of the blockhouse, and in not obliterating the arc of a circle that shows where the wall used to rise. Among the relics he has found and preserved are bullets that present the appearance of having been chewed, as was the custom of the Indians.
Presumably Fort Upper Tract was built after much the same general plan, but as already observed its very situation is involved in some doubt. Such little fortifications would have been of no avail against a force of white men equipped with field guns, but as against a band of Indians a successful defense was little more than a question of resolute defenders supplied with food. water, and ammunition. The Indian thought it foolhardy to storm a fortified post, and he de- pended on blockade, fire, and stratagem.
A most severe blow now befell the weak settlements of Pendleton. The defense of Fort Upper Tract was intrusted to Capt. James Dunlap, who had commanded a detachment in the Big Sandy expedition. A band of French and Indians appeared in the valley, and on April 27, 1758, they captured and burned the fort and killed 22 persons, including Dunlap himself .* No circumstantial account of the disaster seems to have been written, and we have no assurance that any of the defenders were spared. If the massacre were complete, it would go far to explain the silence of local tradition. So exceedingly little in fact has been handed down in this way that some Pendleton people have thrown doubt on the exis- tence of the fort, to say nothing of the burning and killing. There is documentary proof, however, on all these points.
The tragedy at Fort Seybert took place on the following day-April 28, 1758. In this case our knowledge is far more ample. There were survivors to return from captivity and re- late the event. The account they gave us has been kept very much alive by their descendants in the vicinity. In the course of a century and a half some variations have indeed
The names of the slain were as follows : Captain John Dunlap, Josiah Wilson, John Hutchinson, Thomas Caddon, Henry McCullom, John Wright, Thomas Smith, Robert McNulty, William Elliott, Ludwig Falck and wife, Adam Little, --- Brock, John Ramsay, William Burk, --- Rooney, William Woods; John McCulley, Thomas Searl, James Gill, John Gay, and one person unknown.
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crept into the narrative. Yet these divergencies are not very material. Through a careful study and comparison of the var.ous sources of information it is possible to present a fairly complete account of the whole incident.
The attacking party was composed of about 40 Shawnees led by Killbuck. There is a vague statement that one French- man was among them. This force was doubtless in contact with the one that wrought the havoc at Upper Tract. But since the recollections of Fort Seybert are nearly silent as to anything that happened at Upper Tract, it is probable that Killbuck took an independent course in returning to the In- dian country. The only mention of Upper Tract in the Fort Seybert narrative is that an express was sent there for aid, but turned back after coming within sight of the telltale col- umn of smoke from the burning buildings.
The number of persons "forting" in the Dyer settlement was perhaps 40. Very few of these were men, several hav- ing gone across the Shenandoah Mountain the day previous. Some of the women of the settlement also appear to have been away. There was a fog shrouding the bottom of the South Fork on this fateful morning, and the immediate pres- ence of the enemy was unsuspected.
Eastward from the site of the stockade the ground falls rapidly to the level of the river bottom. At the foot of the slope is a damp swale through which was then flowing a stream crossed by a log bridge. A few yards beyond was the spring which supplied water for the fort. A willow cutting was afterward set near this spring. It grew into a tree four and a half feet in diameter and dried up the fountain. A woman going here for water was unaware at the time that an Indian, supposed to be Killbuck himself, was lurking un- der the bridge. The brave did not attempt a capture, prob- ably because the bridge was in sight of the fort and also within easy shooting distance.
The wife of Peter Hawes went out with a bound boy named Wallace to milk some cows. While following a path toward the present postoffice they were surprised by two In- dians and captured. Mrs. Hawes is said to have had a pair of sheep-shears in her hand and to have attempted to stab one of the Indians with the ugly weapon. It may have been the same one who sought to tease her, and whom Mrs. Hawes, collecting all her strength. pushed over a bank. Re- appearing after his unceremonious tumble, the maddened redskin was about to dispatch the woman, but was prevented by his laughing comp inion who called him a squaw man. Bravery, wherever shown, hasalways been admired by the American native.
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William Dyer had gone out to hunt and was waylaid near the fort. His flintlock refused to prime and he fell dead pierced by several balls. The presence of the enemy now being known, Nicholas Seybert, a son of the captain and about fifteen years of age, took his station in the upper room and mortally wounded an Indian who had raised his head from behind the cover of a rock in the direction of the spring.
This seems to be the only loss the enemy sustained. It is said a horseman was riding toward the fort, but hearing the firing and knowing that something was wrong, he hastened to spread the alarm among the more distant settlers.
Killbuck called on the defenders to give up, threatening no mercy if they did not but good treatment if they did. Captain Seybert took the extraordinary course of listening to this de- ceitful parley. Whether the fewness of adult men or a shortage in supplies and especially ammunition had anything to do with his resolve is not known. A thoroughly vigorous defense may not have been possible, but there was nothing to lose in putting up a bold front. Voluntary surrender to a savage foe is almost unheard of in American border war. There was the more reason for resisting to the very last ex- tremity, since Killbuck was known to have an unenviable name for treachery in warfare. It is certain that the com- mander was remonstrated with, but with what looks like a display of German obstinacy he yielded to the demand of the enemy, which included the turning over of what money the defenders possessed.
Just before the gate was opened an incident occurred which might vet have saved the day. Young Seybert had taken aim at Killbuck and was about to fire when the muzzle of his gun was knocked down, the ball only raising the dust at Killbuck's f et. Accounts differ as to whether the aim was frustrated by the boy's father or by a man named Rob- ertson. Finding the surrender determined upon, the boy was so enraged that he attempted to use violence on his par- ent. He did not himself surrender and was taken by being overpowered.
As the savages rushed through the open gate, Killbuck dealt the captain a blow with the pipe end of his tomahawk, knocking out several of his teeth. After the inmates were secured and led outside, the fort was set on fire. A woman named Hannah Hinkle, perhaps bedfast at the time, perished in the flames. Taking advantage of the confusion of the moment, the man Robertson managed to secrete himself, and as soon as the savages withdrew, he hurried toward the river, followed a shelving bluff that his footsteps might the less easily be traced, and made his way across the Shenan-
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doah Mountain. He was the only person to effect his escape.
The captives appear to have been halted on a hillside about a quarter of a mile to the west. Here after some delibera- tion on the part of the victors they were gradually separated into two rows and seated on logs. One row was for captiv- ity, the other for slaughter. On a signal the doomed per- sons were swiftly tomahawked, and their scalps and bleeding bodies left where they fell. Mrs. Hawes fainted when she saw her father sink under the blow of his executioner, and to this circumstance she may have been indebted for her own ex- emption. James Dyer, a tall, athletic boy of fourteen years, broke away, and being a good runner he attempted to reach a tangled thicket on the river bank, a half mile eastward and the same distance above the present postoffice. He nearly succeeded in reaching and crossing the river, but was finally headed off and retaken.
It was now probably past noon, and the Indians with their convoy of 11 captives and their wounded comrade borne on an improvised litter, began the climbing of South Fork Moun- tain. A woman whose given name was Hannah had a squall- ing baby. An Indian seized the child and struck its neck into the forks of a dogwood. The mother found some con- solation in the belief that her infant was killed by the blow and not left to a lingering death. Greenawalt gap, nine miles distant, was reached at nightfall by taking an almost airline course regardless of the nature of the ground. Here the disabled Indian died after suffering intensely from a wound in his head. He was buried in a cavern 500 feet up the steep mountain side. Until about 60 years ago portions of the skeleton were yet to be seen. The next halt was near the mouth of Seneca. and without pursuit or mishap the raiding party returned to its village near Chillecothe in Ohio.
The people slain in the massacre were 17, some accounts putting the number at 21 or even more. Among them were Captain Seybert, Roger Dyer, and the bound boy Wallace, whose yellow scalp was afterward recognized by Mrs. Hawes. It is the brunette captives that Indians have preferred to spare.
Including William Dyer, the four names are the only ones now remembered. It is worthy of note that apart from Seybert and the two Dyers none of the heads of families in the region around appear to be missing. Possible exceptions are John Smith, William Hevener, and William Stephenson. Even the wives of Ruger and William Dyer were not among the killed. The infant son of William Dyer was with its mother's people east of Shenandoah Mountain.
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Of the captives the only remembered names are those of Nicholas Seybert, James Dyer, the wives of Peter Hawes and Jacob Peterson, and a Hevener girl. This girl either es- caped or was returned, and she counseled the settlers to be more careful in the future in exposing themselves to the risk of capture. A brave took pity on Mrs. Peterson and gave her a pair of moccasins to enable her to travel with greater comfort. It is not remembered whether any of the captives returned except the two boys mentioned, Seybert and Dyer, and the Hevener girl.
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