Full text of "History of the Maumee River basin from the earliest account to its organization into counties"

See other formats

M.L

b/ 7.201
A-t5s
v.l
1143275

gene:al.ogv col.i_eci .on

"IjLEN COUNTY PUBLIC LIB

3 1833 00827 5114

GENEALOSY COLUEcTiON

HISTORY

OF THE

MAUMEE RIVER BASIN

From the Earliest Account to Its Organization
into c(junties

CHARLES ELIHU SLOCUM, M.D., Ph.D., LL.D.

Member of The American Historical A^shciatius. The New-England Historic GtiNEALociCAL
Society, The ' Old Northwest ' Gesealiigical Society, The Ohio State Akch-

.^OLOGICAL AND HISTORICAL SOCIETY. ThE MaUMEE VaLLEV PiONEER

AND Historical Association. Etc.

Illustrated.

BOWEN & SLOCUM

Indianapolis

ToLEpo

To His Friends

Of Many Years Continuance

This Bool< is Dedicated

By ttie Author

By chares ELIHU SLOCUM.

CONTENTS

For reference to Illustrations see the page figures followed with asterisk (*) in the In-
dex at the close of this volume. For Preface see page vii.

1113275

CHAPTER I. -»— ^ -i^^^rv . \j p^^^

Introductory with Table of Counties and Statistics 1

The Maumee River Basin distinguished from the Maumee River Valley —
Situation, Latitude and Longitude, Extent in square miles — The former Forest
— Topography — Climate — Products — Healthfulness — Counties, Principal

Towns, Population.

CHAPTER II.

Geology of the Maumee River Basin 6

Source of the Rocks — The Geologic Column in comparison with that of
other parts of Ohio, and elsewhere — Chart — Lacking in several strata — Tren-
ton Limestone — Natural Gas and Petroleum and theories of their Origin —
Wells and their Products — Process of Drilling — Rock Water supply — Eleva-
tions and Depressions of Rock Strata — Early Surface Conditions — Prehistoric
Drainage Channels — Age of Ice and Theories of Cause — Glacier Markings and
Extent of — Foreign Rocks brought by Glaciers — Glacier Phenomena and Ef-
fects— Glacial Lakes, and their Drainage Channels — Time and Duration of
the Ice Age — Benefits of the Glaciation.

CHAPTER III.
The Earliest Evidences Found of Prehistoric Man 47

Before, during and subsequent to the Age of Ice — Co-existent with the
Mastodon and other long-extinct Animals. Prehistoric Stone Implements — Pre-
historic Mounds and Circles of Earth — The Aborigines as first described — the
Fiercest Savages known to History.

CHAPTER IV.
The First Explorers and Cartographers, The French and British ... 75

Champlain — French Coureurs de Bois — Earliest French Maps — LaSalle
--Later French Maps — The British-French wars. Wars with the Aborigines,
and the Fur Trade as an ever-present Incitement — Conspiracy of Chief Nicholas
against the French — British and French purchase each other's Scalps — The
British Succession — Conspiracy of Pontiac against the British, and his Capture
of the western Forts — Armies of Wilkins, Bradstreet and Bouquet against the
Aborigines — Captives returned to Bouquet — Croghan's successful Peace Mis-
sion— Fort Miami and Detroit described. 1(J14-17<J6.

CHAPTER V.
Hostilities of Aborigines and British Against the Colonists 124

The Colonies Impoverished — Rebel against British Impositions — The Rev-
olutionary War — British form Savage War-parties against Pioneer American
Settlements, Furnish them Leaders and Supplies, and pay for American Scalps
brought by them — American Deserters and British Officers often with the Sav-
ages in their Maraudings — British remove the Less Savage Officers — American
successes in the Southwest, and Organizations for Civil Government — Futile

iv CONTENTS.

plans of Americans against Detroit the headquarters for this Basin — Americans
Massacre reputed Peaceful Aborigines — Close of Revolutionary War — Aborig-
ines not satisfied without continual supply of Intoxicants and Excitement — Con-
tinued Aggression of the British. 170(5-1783.

CHAPTER VI.
Organization of the Territorv Northwest ok the Ohio River 152

Cessions of Claims by States to the United States — Jefferson's plan for Div-
ision of the West Rejected — Desire for Land in the Territory — Hostilities of
the Aborigines and Expeditions against them — British Refuse to surrender the
western Forts according to Treaty at Paris — Treaties with Aborigines disregarded
by them — Unfriendly action of the Spanish in restricting Navigation of the Mis-
sissippi leads to Disaffection in Ohio and Kentucky — Further British Aggres-
sions— Civil and Military Activity — American Efforts for Peace with the Aborig-
ines prove futile — Gen. Harmar's Expedition against the Hostiles by the Mau-
mee and his Defeat by them — Further unsuccessful efforts for Peace — Gen. St.
Clair's Expedition against the Savages and his overwhelming Defeat. 1784-1791.

CHAPTER VII.

Preparations of the Aborigines, Aided bv the British, to Drive the Ameri-
cans BACK East of the Alleghenies, and for .Army to Resist Them . . . 170

Aborigines would not accept Peace — Gen. Wayne chosen to command
Northwestern Army — Hamilton County extended to embrace this Basin — More
unsuccessful Efforts for Peace, and more Savagery by the Aborigines — The
largest Councils ever held by the Aborigines, at the mouth of the Auglaise River
and by the lower Maumee, for Federating them under Direction of the British —
Advance of Gen. Wayne's army — Further Intrigues of the Spanish and French

— Wayne builds Forts Greenville and Recovery — British build Fort Miami by
lower Maumee — Battle of Fort Recovery — Wayne's successful Expedition to
and along the Maumee — Builds Forts Adams and Defiance — Great daring of
American Scouts — Yet further Efforts for Peace prove Unavailing — Battle of
Fallen Timber, a wholesome Defeat of the Aborigines and British — Return of
army and the Strengthening of Fort Defiance — Fort Wayne built. 1792-17514.

CHAPTER VIII.
General Wayne's Reports of his Maumee Campaign to the Secretary of War 207

Report of his March, Forts and Efforts for Peace — of Battle of Fallen
Timber — of Correspondence with British Commandant of F'ort Miami — Testi-
mony of Prisoners Criminating the British — Needs of the Northwestern Army —
of his and Colonel Hamtramck's Diplomacy in turning the .\borigines from the
British and Favorable to the Americans — Letters of Colonel Hamtramck from
Fort Wayne — The Aborigines' first Object-lesson in Fourth of July Celebrating

— The most Important Treaty at Greenville. 1794-179.1.

CHAPTER IX.

Treaties, Civil Organizations, Conspiracy of Tecumseh and the British . 230

Treaty with Spain counteracting Tendency to Secession from the Union of
Inhabitants west of the Alleghenies — Immigration — Colonel Hamtramck's
Letters from Fort Wayne concluded — Wampum and its Uses — The Military
Stations — The British Surrender their Forts in American territory — Scarcity
of Food — Wayne County Organized — Death of Gen. Wayne — Gen. Wilkinson
succeeds to Command of Northwestern Army — Court at Detroit for Wayne

CONTENTS.

County includingjthis Basin — Further Intrigues of France and Spain cause un-
rest— First Territorial Legislature — Ohio and Indiana Territories Organized —
Desire for Land, and Land Offices — Ohio Organized as a State — The Louisiana
Purchase quiets Secession tendencies — Fort Industry — Further Treaties with
Aborigines — Conspiracy of Tecumseh and the 'Prophet' aided by British against
the Americans — United States Trading Agencies among Aborigines — Battle of
Tippecanoe. 17!t.')-]S12,

CHAPTER X.

The First Year of the War of 1812 268

Gen. William Hull chosen to command Northwestern Army composed of
Ohio Soldiers — Builds Forts M'.\rthur. Necessity. Findlay and Miami (No. 6) —
Despoiled by British through his Thoughtlessness —Surrenders Army to British
without battle — Siege of Fort Wayne by Aborigines — Relieved by Gen. Har-
rison— Gen. Winchester appointed commander Northwestern Army — British
force Retreat before him — Forts Barbee, Jennings, Amanda, Winchester, Feree,
Ball and Stephenson built — Gen. Harrison succeeds Gen. Winchester in Com-
mand and appoints him Commander of Left Wing — Winchester's five Camps at
Defiance and great Scarcity of Food and Clothing at, with much Sickness and
Death — Gen. Harrison's Report — Winchester's Advance, and Defeat, with
Massacre, at the River Raisin — Fort Portage built.

CHAPTER XI.

The Second and Third (Final) Years of the War of 1S12 . .... 313

The Center and Right Wing of Northwestern Army drawn from to Protect
the Maumee region — Fort Meigs built — Military Supplies increase — Difficulties
in keeping Army Recruited — Large gathering of Savages by British — Fort Meigs
Besieged by British and their Savage Allies- Imprudence. Defeat, and Massacre
of many of Col. Dudley's troops — Siege of Fort Meigs abandoned by British —
Incidents of Array Life at Fort Meigs — Supplies — Much Sickness and Many
Deaths at Fort Meigs — Fourth of July Observance — Fort Seneca built — Second
(bloodless) Siege of Fort Meigs — Brilliant repulse of British at Fort Stephenson

— The Naval Squadrons on Lake Erie — Battle and Capture of Entire British
Squadron — Advance of Northwestern Army into Canada — Defeat of British
Army at the River Thames — Gen. Harrison goes to Niagara to aid the Army of
the Center, Returns to Ohio and Resigns Command - Proctor's Selfishness —
Report of Gen. Gano — More Sickness at Fort Miegs with short Supplies — Re-
port of Gen. M'Arthur — Treaty closing War of 1812 — All Forts in this Basin
Abandoned excepting Fort Wayne. 1813-1814.

CHAPTER XII.
The Aborigines, Treaties with, Missionaries Among, and Removal of . . 304

Again turn to Americans to be Fed — Important Treaties with — Expenditures
for — Number of — Difficulties in Civilizing them — Their Religion — Efforts to
keep Intoxicants from — Reservations for them and their Captives — Agents for

— Missionaries among the Aborigines, the F'riends, Presbyterians, Methodists,
and Baptists — Great Extent of Land Claimed by Aborigines — Wisdom in Con-
tracting their Range — Further Removal Treaties — United States pays Debts
for — Vaccination of against Smallpox — Descendants of the Aborigines in Gen-
eral and in Particular — Cannibalism of —Later Characteristics compared with
Former— Evil influences of the French and British — Many Fictions promulgat-
ed and perpetuated regarding — Their Misnaming and Mistraining — Linguistic

vi COMTEMTS'.

Stocks here Represented — Tribes — Had no right to claim Lands for their Con-
tinuance in Savagery. 1812-1840.

CHAPTER XIII.

The Present Drainage System of the Maumee River Basin 443

Peculiar Courses of the Nine Rivers, and the Causes — Character of the
Water — The Rivers as Early Thorofares — River Craft -Service of the Rivers
to the Aborigines and Early Settlers as Food Supply of Fish and Fowl — Changes
wrought by Clearing the Forest and by Mills — Present Service of for Water-
supply and as Resorts for Recreation and Pleasure — Description of the Maumee,
Auglaise, Little Auglaise, St. Mary, St. Joseph, Blanchard, Ottawa of the Au-
glaise, Ottawa of the Maumee, and of the Tiffin River — Origin of their Names —
Their Rapids, and former Mills by — Floods — Former Portages to and from —
Boat building by, and later Commerce along — Toledo Harbor the Best by the
Great Lakes -Its Shipping, and Shipbuilding.

CHAPTER XIV.

The First American Settlers, and the Organization of Counties . . . 512

First Settlers by the lower Maumee were Driven away by War of LSI 2 —
Reminiscences of— Claim Damages of United States for Destruction or Use of
Crops in the War — Survey of the United States Reservations and the Beginning
of Towns — First Masonic Lodges and Churches — First Newspapers — Wood the
first County Organized Waynesfield the Mother Township — Description of
Site of Defiance in 1792 — First American Settlers at Occupy buildings of Fort
Winchester — Organization of Williams County with Defiance as seat of Govern-
ment— Taxes paid by Bounty on Wolf-scalps — Center of Timber Industry in
Clearing the Forest — First Settlers and Organizations at Fort Wayne and north-
eastern Indiana, and elsewhere throughout the Basin — The Ohio-Michigan
Boundary Dispute. 17!>2-lS."iO.

CHAPTER XV.
Development of Communication, Public Lands, Schools, Libraries . . . 570
First United States Mailroutes and Postoffices — Public Roads. Ferries,
Bridges — Survey and Platting of United States Lands — Land Offices — The
Private and Public Schools —Colleges — The Miami and Erie and the Wabash
and Erie Canals — The Struggles for their Completion - Their Water-supply
from the River St. Joseph, the headwaters of the Wabash River, of Loramie and
Six-mile Creeks and from the Maumee River — Their Junction — Altitudes —
Importance of in Clearing the Forest and Developing the New Country — Great
amount of Freight and Passenger Traffic — As a National Military Highway —
Enemies of — Cost and Earnings of —Two United States Surveys for their En-
largement— Speculative and soon-abandoned Towns by — Abandonment of the
Wabash Canal — The First Railroads — Libraries, Public at Toledo, Perrys-
burg. Defiance, Fort Wayne, Bryan, Van Wert, Findlay, Lima, Paulding, and
Private Libraries at Fort Wayne, Defiance, and Toledo.

Iron, five inches lony. Found in Maumee River Basin many years a^o. Was used by Aboriyines
i'q spearing fish, and in battle. In Author's Collection.

PREFACE

Every river basin possesses characteristics that endow it with
special interest, and such is particularly the case with The Maumee
River Basin which is peculiar in its geology, remarkable in its past his-
tory, beautiful in its landscapes rivers and lakes, and interesting in its
possibilities. This book has been written to interest and inform those
dwellers herein who are not already well informed regarding its charac-
teristics and history, and that all consulting it may be better enabled to
appreciate the interests and merits appertaining to this favored region.

From the dawn of its history in the seventeenth century, and prob-
ably throughout the existence of man in northeastern America, the
principal rivers of this Basin have been great thoroughfares, within the
Basin itself and as the most direct route between the northeastern
Basin of the Great Lakes and the Basin of the Mississippi River. They
have also often been the scenes of much strife between different tribes
of Aborigines, even between those of the Iroquois Confederacy of New
York and the Miamis ol the Maumee and further west, the giants of the
Aborigines; and twice in the history of the United States this Basin has
been the headquarters of armies which turned the current of events fav-
orably to the Union, saving to it from the tightening grasp of Great
Britain the invaluable territory west of the Allegheny Mountains, to the
Mississippi River at least.

The Aborigines and their descendants give prominent coloring to
the most part of the chronicles, through the efforts of the Europeans to
involve them in all their quarrels, from the first coming of the French in
the first half of the seventeenth century, through the long-continued
British-French warrings, during the British succession, the American-
British wars, and until the removal of the tribes beyond the Mississippi
River in the first half of the nineteenth century. The later record of
these people here as elsewhere is far from being a pleasant one. It
continued to be full of savagery, of bloodshed, and of rendings of the
civilization that would have immeasurably improved their condition had
they accepted it; and the saddest part of the record is the aiding, abett-
ing and prolonging of this savagery by the French and the British partic-
ularly, and the entailing upon the United States of an evil heritage of
gigantic proportions in their confirmed evil habits. It has been the de-
sire of the writer to treat of all these people in the light of authentic
history rather than in the fictitious war of the sentimentalist. The
story of the Aborigines, for the one hundred and fifty years as told on
these pages, touches every phase of their life, including every phase of
individual and governmental dealings with them; and the thoughtful
reader will readily recognize the source gf the impulses actuating and

vu! . PREFACE.

continuing their antagonism to civilization and the source and transmis-
sion of the habit of inebriety which has been the prime factor in the
continuance of many of their descendants in squalor and wretchedness.
No other nation has done so much for the amelioration and radical bet-
terment of the condition of barbaric or savage people as the United
States has done in general and special efforts from the first for the civ-
ilization of these Aborigines, the worst of all savages. The most im-
portant treaties and dealings with them are here given in full as studies
in the history of the evolution of the ever magnanimous dealings with
them by the United States. These records, now long out of publica-
tion, will become of more interest and of greater value to the student
of Nations and Peoples as the time lengthens into the past.

The previous writings regarding some of the more common events
in this Basin have been abundant and often conflicting, involving diffi-
culty in discrimination. There has not been any desire with the pres-
ent writer to follow anyone among the vanities of fiction or undue sup-
position; or in the 'graphic' style for the rounding out of a 'good'
or oft repeated story to the distraction of the reader's mind from the
main point, or to the impairment of accuracy. So far as practicable
original documents and reports, not readily accessible to the general
reader, are literally presented as possessing a value that no recasting
can equal.* When necessary, notes or inserts are used to elucidate
obscure places in the documents and to give them local application.
Full references to authorities are given for the enquiring reader who de-
sires to confirm the statements or to pursue the subject further.
Events distantly relative are briefly treated.

The purpose of the work has been practical, and its method has
been largely in consonance with the sentiment of Francis Bacon as ex-
pressed in his writing on the Advancement of Learning, that "It is the
true office of history to represent the events themselves together with
the counsels, and to leave the observations and conclusions thereupon
to the liberty and faculty of every man's judgment."

The writer gratefully acknowledges the courtesy shown him by the
elderly people and those in charge of the different libraries East and
West from whom he has sought data for this work. He also disclaims
responsibility for its long rest in the press and for errors that have
thereby been committed.

The photographs reproduced in the engravings were generally
taken by the writer excepting when otherwise mentioned.

Defiance, Ohio. CHARLES E. SLOCUM.

■'It is probable that many other records of interest in the history of this first ' Northwestern Terri-
tory' will yet be brought to lieht from the British, French and Spanish archives, and possibly from the
bundles of MSS. saved from the British hre gf 1814 and now held by different departments ^t Washing-
ton,

THE MAUMEE RIVER BASIN

CHAPTER I.

Situation — Extent — Climate — Surface Features.

The Maumee River Basin — the territory within the watersheds
draining' through the Maumee River — includes all the regions that are
drained into the Maumee River through distant streams as well as the
lands drained directly by the Maumee ; in other words, it includes the
Maumee River Valley and the valleys of all streams the waters of
which immediately, and remotely through other streams, debouch into
the Maumee River.

It embraces Northwestern Ohio, Northeastern Indiana, and contig-
uous parts of Michigan, being situated between parallels 40° 23' and
42° 5' North Latitude, and between Longitude 6° 20' and 8'' 15' west
from Washington, and 83° 20' and 85° 15' west from Greenwich,
England.

Its greatest length and breadth are, from north to south about one
hundred and ten miles, and from east to west about one hundred miles,
with less extent and irregular outline between these points. The area
embraced within these limits is near 6500 square miles.

Previous to its clearing in the nineteenth centurv, this Basin was
quite generally covered with dense forest growths which, from the size,
solidity and variety of the timber, with its nearness to navigable water,
made it the most valuable of forest regions.

The conditions were then favorable for all kinds of wild animals,
large and small, then abounding in this latitude in America.'^

* The followlni: is a list of the animals that have become extinct, and the dates of their extinction :
Badger, Taxidea americana. lS7i): Bear, brown, black or cinnamon, Ursus americanus, 1^72; Beaver,
Castor fiber. 1837; Bison, 'buffalo,' Bison americanus. 1812; Cat, Wild, Lynx rufus. 1866; Deer, red,
Cariacus virginianus. ]dS9: Deer, larce. Wapiti, Cervus canadensis Erxleben. 1824; Elk, Alee aices,
1822; Fox, black and silver, and cross, Vulpes vulpes. varieties argentatus and decussatus. 1886; Fox,
gray, Urocyon cinereo-argentatus. 1896: Lynx. Lynx canadensis. 1840; Otter, Lutra hudsonica. now very
nearly or quite extinct; Panther, coujrar or puma, Felis concolor. 18,50; Rat, Wood. Neotoma floridana,
1880; Sable, pine martin. Mustela americana. 186.t; Turkey, Wild, Meleagris galiopavo, 1885; Wolf,
Canis lupus, 1865; Wolverine, Gulo gulo. about 1825, Probably the Moose also ranged through this
region. The prehistoric animals will be mentioned on later page, See the writer's check-lists of
mammals, birds, and lishes of The Maumee River Basin,

2 THE MAUMEE RIVER BASIN.

There are no hills within or surrounding this Basin, nor do its
horizons present any abrupt lines. The general surface is caljed flat by
persons coming from hilly regions. Its glacial plains are, however, in-
terspersed and abutted by moraines or low ridges which rise graduall\-
on the northwest rim of the Basin to an altitude of six hundred and
forty-seven feet above Lake Erie which liorders it on the northeast, and
into which it drains, while on the east the highest altitude is two
hundred and forty-five feet ; on the south three hundred and eighty-six
feet ; and on the west three hundred feet above Lake Erie, which is
five hundred and seventy-three feet above tide water. The varying
altitudes throughout the Basin, shown on the morainic map on a later
page, indicate sufficient slopes for thorough drainage, and to afford
variety of tieautiful landscapes even in its most level parts.

The climate is here less severe in winter tlian that experienced a
few miles to the north, and less variable than that be\'ond the divide to
the south. Cold waves and severe storms occasionally announced by
the United States Weather Bureau as advancing from the West and
Northwest, do not regularly extend to this region: and when they are felt
it is in moderated degree. The prevailing winds come from the South-
west. The snowfall is always moderate in quantity, a foot in depth
being of rare occurrence in the central jiart of the Basin, and fifteen
inches being the greatest de]3th experienced within the last third of a cen-
tury at least. Occasionally the fall has been greater near Lake Erie.
Within this period of time there have been several weeks of fair sleigh-
ing from frequent light snowfalls in some winters, with ice on the deeper
waters in extreme to the thickness of thirty inches, succeeded by other
winters when sleighs could be used liut little if at all, and some of these
winters so mild that ice did not form in sufficient thickness for storing
for summer use. The temperature observed some years ago for a period
of ten years showed a mean of 49.55 degrees Fahrenheit, average.
The mean average fall of rain and snow ( melted ) during ten years
observation has been 3H.90H7 inches. The last few years the precipita-
tion has not been so great. Careful observations during a great num-
ber of years may vary these records, as long cycles of time ma\- be
necessary to show all the extremes in any region.

The earlier tillers of the soil found it very wet. The clav and solid
subsoil, which abound in many parts, retained the water without ditches
and in forest shadows a long time, often throughout the year. On this
account much of this Basin was termed the Black Swamp, a name
which was in common ap]ilication to all of the more level surfaces
until the last few years. The clearing of the land and the digging of
large ditches with tributary tile drains, have dried and aerated the soil
and brought it into good condition for profitable cultivation. The

INTRODUCTORY. S

constituents of the soil are such as to make this a region of threat and
durable fertility, with quite uniform jiroduction of the varied crops usu-
alh' cultivated in this latitude, winter wheat, maize (corn), hav,
potatoes, oats, rye, and barley beinj;- the principal crops. Flax,
tobacco, broom-corn, sori^hum, sugar beets, etc., have also been proved
profitable for cultivation.

Good apples, peaches, pears, plums, and grapes are produced in
large quantities, and increasing attention is being given to the cultiva-
tion of various kinds of smaller fruits ; also to market gardening.

A goodly number of cattle, horses, hogs, sheep, and latterly goats,
have been bred, and the numbers are increasing Irom vear to vear,
showing that the soil and other conditions are well adajitc-d to stock
raising. Defiance, the central part of the liasin, has also become one
of the shipping points of the largest amount ot i)oultr\- to the New York
market.

Swamp miasms were rife from the first records of this Maumee
region and during the period of clearing awa}' the forest, the opening
of the ground to the direct rays of the sun, during the earlier turnings
of the soil in its cultivation, and in ]uiblic works. Ague - intermittent
fever — in its different forms, and the severer remittent fevers, were
quite general and severe until the year 1875 in most parts of the Basin ;
and in the less develojied parts these diseases continued for several
years later. The writer, in the practice of his profession, has treated
virulent types of these affections in many families where there was not
a member in good health to nurse those dangerously sick. These
diseases were most prevalent and severe in dry summers ; and the fol-
lowing winters inflammatory diseases were numerous and virulent on
account of the weakened condition ot the people from the malaria.
The death rate, although no higher than in other places throughout the
country, was greater those years than it has since been. In fact, since
the passing of the swamps and their miasms the healthfuluess of this
Basin ranks very favorably with that of any region in America. Most
parts have been comparatively free from the severer forms of contagi-
ous diseases, including tuberculosis. In later years longe\'it\ has
attained a high standard. The death rate averages comjiarativelv low,
it being by the thousand inhabitants in the year 1901 or 19()- as follows:

In Ohio for 1901: Ada, I'lAr.', : Bryan, 14.H7 ; Ottawa. K.«0 ;
Maumee, 9.16: Lima, 1;130 : Delphos, 14.17: Grand Raiiids, 9.11:
Napoleon, 7.97; Wauseon, 7.91: Fayette, 15.80: St. Marys, 13.25.

In Ohio for 1902: Defiance, 8.50: Van Wert, 9.87 '2: Findlay,
11.381; Toledo, 11.54,-J; Waytakoneta, 15.33'3.

In Indiana for 1902: Angola, 8.84ttt: Fort Wayne, 11,50,

THE COUNTIES COMPOSING THE MAUMEE RIVER BASIN.

Name

From Whom or
What Named

From What Taken

Attached to for
Government

Adams. Ind,
Allen, Ind.
Allen, Ohio
Auglaize. Ohio
Defiance, Ohio
De Kalb, Ind.
Fulton, Ohio
Hancock, Ohio
Hardin, Ohio
Henry. Ohio
Hillsdale. Mich.
Lenawee, Mich.
Lucas, Ohio
Mercer, Ohio
Noble, Ind.
Paulding'. Ohio
Putnam, Ohio
Seneca. Ohio
Shelby, Ohio
Steuben, Ind.
Van Wert, Ohio
Wells, Ind.
Williams, Ohio
Wood. Ohio
Wyandot. Ohio

Pres. John Adams
Col. John Allen
Col. John Allen
Auglaize River
Fort Defiance
Baron De Kalb
Robert Fulton
John Hancock
Col. John Hardin
Patrick Henry
Topography
Aborigine
Gov. Robert Lucas
Gen. Hugh Mercer

John Paulding
Gen. Israel Putnam
Aborigine Tribe
Gen. Isaac Shelby
Baron Steuben
Isaac Van Wert
William Wells
Daniel Williams
Col. Eleazer D. Wood
Aborigine Tribe

1836

Dec. 17, 1823
April 1. 1830

1848

March 4, 1845

1837

Feby. 28, 1850
April 1. 1820
April 1, 1820
April 1. 1H20

Randolph and Allen Counties

Randolph and Delaware

Aborigine Territory
Allen, Logan. Darke, Shelby,
Mercer and Van Wert

Williams, Henry and Paulding

Allen and Lagrange

Lucas. Henry and Williams

Aborigine Territory

Allen County

Mercer County

Wood County
Logan, Champaign
Wood. Williams

June , 1H35
April 1, 1820

Wood County
Aborigine Territory

Darke County

April 1, 1820
April i, 1820
April 1. 1820

1819

1837

April 1. 1820

Aborigine Territory
Aborigine Territory
Aborigine Territory
Miami County
Allen County
Aborigine Territory

Wood, Williams
Wood, Williams

Darke and Mercer

April 1, 1820
April 1, 1820
Feby. 3, 1845

Aborigine Territory

Aborigine Territory
Crawford, Hancock, Hardin
and Marion Cos.

Wood County

ffllllim

M^'-^^^ ^

^^™l^^

^^m

':i^k

i___^pS

^k1

W^' ''iM /^

^^^w^

^^£

<i;*S

AMERICAN BISON [Bison americanus).
Became extinct in this Basin about the year 1812.

WITH SOMETHING OF THEIR DATA. ARE AS FOLLOWS.

Population

Part

IN THE

Basin

Where
Governed

Organized

1820

1830

laio

18,50

1860

1870

1880

1890

1900

1H36

3.264

5,797

9,252

11, .383

15.385

20.181

23,332

3-4ths

Decatur

4,143

Dec. 17, 1»33

996

.5.942

16,919

29,328

43,494

.54.763

66,689

77.270

4-5ths

Fort Wayne

45,115

June , 1831

578

9.079

12,109

19,185

33,623

31.314

40,644

47,976

Entire

Lima

21,723

1H48

11.3.38

17,187

20,041

35.444

28,100

31,192

9-lOths

Wapakoneta

3,915

March 4, 1845

6,966

11,886

15,719

22,515

25.769

26.387

Entire

Defiance

7.6.57

1837

1,968

8,351

13,880

17.107

30,225

34.307

35.711

Entire

.Auburn

3.396

Feby. 28. 1850

7,781

14,043

17,789

21,053

32,023

32.801

Entire

Wauseon

2.148

April 7, 1828

813

9,986

16.751

22.880

23,847

27,784

42,563

41,993

3-4ths

Find lay

17.613

J any. 3, 1833

210

4.598

8,251

I3,.570

18,714

27.023

28,939

31,187

l-4th

Kenton

6.852

1824

262

2.503

3,434

8,901

14,028

20,585

25,080

27,283

19-30ths

Napoleon

3,639

7,240

16,1.59

25,675

31.684

31,695

30,660

39,865

1-3

Hillsdale

4.151

9,654

131,, 822

1,491

17,889

26,373

38.112

45,.595

49,324

48,448

48,406

I -5th

Adrian

June , 1835

9,.1S2

12,303

2.5.831

46.732

67,377

102.296

1,53„559

Entire

Toledo

April 17, 1824

1,110

8.377

7.713

14,104

17,254

21,808

27.230

38.031

3-4ths

Celina

2,815

3.703

7.946

14,915

30,389

23,950

23,3.59

23.533

1,324

3,08t;)

15
16

1839

161

1,034

1,766

4,945

8,.544

13,485

35.933

37.528

Entire

PauldiuK

1834

230

5,189

7,231

12,808

17,081

23.713

30,188

32.525

9-lOths

Ottawa

3,322

April 1. IHH

.5,1.59

1,8,128

27,104

30,868

30,827

36,947

40,869

41.163

l-30th

Tiffin

10,989

1819

2,106

3.671

13,1.54

13,958

17,493

20,748

24,137

34,707

24,625

1-lOth

Sidney

5,688

1837

2.578

6,104

10.374

12.854

14,645

14,478

15.319

l-4th

Anijola

2.141

1836

I. .577

4,793

10.338

15.833

23,028

39,671

30,394

Entire

Van Wert

6,422

1,822

6,1.52

10,848

13,.585

18,442

21,514

33,449

l-20th

Bluffton

4,479

April . 1824

387

4,465

8,018

16,633

30,991

33,821

24,897

34,953

Entire

Bryan

3,13!

April 1. 1820

733

1,102

5,.357

9,1.57

17,886

34,,596

34,032

44,392

61,5,55

I -3rd

Bowling Green

5,067

Feby. 3, 1845

11,194

15,596

18„5,53

32.395

21 732

31,125

l-15th

I'p'r Sandusky

3,355

THE MAUMEE RIVER BASIN.

CHAPTER II.

Its Ge<ilogv — Peculiarities-^Valuable Features.

It is not within the limits of this book to treat of the geology of the
Maumee River Basin in detail as discussed technically by geologists.
The object of the writer is to briefly outline the subject so that the local
reader, for whom this work is undertaken, even though he be as yet un-
interested and uninformed, may get somewhat of a desire, an impetus,
and A bibliography for further reading.

The historic period of this region occupies but a brief time in chro-
nologv in comparison with the great length of time which must have
elapsed during the formation of the topography as seen by the first
European explorers in the latter half of the seventeenth century.

The ocean is the mother of continents. The inland State of Ohio
bears unmistakable evidence of having been covered by the sea during
the long geologic periods that the rocks of her underlying strata, so far
as explored, were formed. The character of these rocks, including the
fossils found embedded by them, in common with similar formations in
other parts of the earth, plainly bespeak their epoch in the earth's geo-
logic historv. Animal life in the sea varied in different epochs as well
as life on the land. The remains were subjected to the continued action
of the waves, in the more shallow ]iarts, which washed some shells and
bones into plastic recesses, there to become petrified, while others were
ground into powder to be deposited and cemented to the accretion of
rock strata. The study and classification of the varying strata and their
fossils have shown results sufficient to enable geologists to name the
period of formation of even dislocated fragments of strata wherever
found. All the rock strata of this Basin were deposited from the
waters of a sea which is understood as having been an extension of the
Gulf of Mexico, as its most fossiliferous strata, the Upper Helderberg
or Corniferous Limestone for example, bear evidences of having been
deposited from clear waters of tropic warmth.'^

Study of the accompanying Chart will show the geologic relations
of the Maumee River Basin to the more complete parts of Ohio, to
those of other parts of North America, and of Europe. This Chart
shows that the geological column of this Basin is the shortest of the

* See the Geological Survey of Ohio. ISW. pane 45.

THE MAUMEE RIVER BASIN.

CHAPTER II.

Its Geolhgy — Peculiartties-^Valuable Features.

It is not within the limits of this book to treat of the geology of the
Maumee River Basin in detail as discussed technically by geologists.
The oliject of the writer is to briefl\- outline the subject so that the local
reader, for whom this work is undertaken, even though he he as yet un-
interested and uninformed, may get somewhat of a desire, an impetus,
and .a bibliography for further reading.

The historic period of this region occupies but a brief time in chro-
nology in comparison with the great length of time which must have
elapsed during the formation of the topography as seen by the first
European explorers in the latter half of the seventeenth century.

The ocean is the mother of continents. The inland State of Ohio
bears unmistakable evidence of having been covered Iiy the sea during
the long geologic periods that the rocks of her underlying strata, so far
as explored, were formed. The character of these rocks, including the
fossils found embedded by them, in common with similar formations in
otht-r parts of the earth, plainly besjieak their epoch in the earth's geo-
logic history. Animal life in the sea varied in different epochs as well
as life on the land. The remains were sul:)jected to the continued action
of the waves, in the more shallow parts, which washed some shells and
bones into plastic recesses, there to become petrified, while others were
ground into powder to be deposited and cemented to the accretion of
rock strata. The study and classification of the varying strata and their
fossils have shown results sufficient to enable geologists to name the
period of formation of even dislocated fragments of strata wherever
found. All the rock strata of this Basin were deposited from the
waters of a sea which is understood as having been an extension of the
Gulf of Mexico, as its most fossiliferous strata, the Upper Helderlierg
or Corniferous Limestone for example, bear evidences of having been
deposited from clear waters of tropic warmth.'^

* See the Geological Survey of Ohio. 1H90, pawe 4f).

o
o

«
<

o
o

3
K
U

<
I

H
<

f- =

a
'J

!?=>§

.^ = K a""

> - c := —

£ « == ** S

a I i

i I I

2 I s

o ^ .H

2 S -

'? _- a —

£ rt 3 o

_ » o w

= « 3

:•= .6

^ = <K

" a •-

QaS;2 «3a

V u m

4j a tfl* y

2Q w.=

■ - " o

u — —

■Aaviiaax-xsoj ao .\avNaaiavaO

•KVW dO aoV HHi

£-0.::,
a a <~

3 o o

SSgSE

rt rt

.gW>

•STvwwvw do aov

■'^aS:

&,^ y > aj a

•aou ^.iS A^
J — 2; rt o j^ 4) -—■— ~

3 O-^ O X ■- O • m ,.■
0. d. ::il U O O [I- S.2 rt ^

u * ^ ■ u- ■ ^S 1--^

a;s -a— &— o.t3 & "
o-o "- o o o Q-- 0*2
DO SOJOljSji

o rt -i: !fi

_3 aj o — -^

rt o 0

■sa^IXc^aa jio hov

•SKivj QKv swaajsoiONv JO aoy

•savDAO ao aoy

■OIOZOHDASd

AHVX>I31>!Vn5

OIOZONaD

AHVIlHaX

■0I0ZOS3IM HO AaVQNODaS

CCS

Cue

o >

J u 1) V a
1.3 5 o :

S^it- c
0"= rt o

ID rt

go?

n cj:
"-^ rt n

/JO'S
« rt o

J rt

■snoaaji
-NoaavQ-ang

•SNVIHIHdWV QNV SXNV^d TVOD

do aov ao snoaajiNoaavo

UtJd,

41 — rt a;

S^ ^ G a

flj^T3 E 4) ■

grt3j|«

3 a J

2 ^ S

O C C

■- C-- rt
E o a; o

0) a - „-
S » ^ .'Z

■^^ M-cO

« o 'AOS

;TI r] rt

O «-^ cS rt

^ C !

'Shhsiji dO aov ao NvmoAaa

rt rt

J2 S G

i--_ rt

=5S

c?S

I '•J

(J S 3

"^ "rt "
S X! C

3 ".£

fe.s

u.g c

Q o t- -t: fe o £ S rt
o« c 13 o <n o-^
3 M Q J J

« c ±-2

" c
ft E

> a K
S J w

_rt ajO

zzuS

3 ^- Sij
-c 2 2 c 5

Q rt n o.c
3.2.2-S'S

uzzDs

•Nviamis Ms-ufl

— rt —

C u o

2BT2

g2&

hmS

2 a rt
(fl 3C/3

w o u,
Sn =
Jo 2

J3 Slo

CJOU

•Nviamig aa.ttcri

a. s B s ' ffi
D S ^

■sssrmoK ao aov ho Nviaaais

•SMaooHoy -^o 3^V

Hvonv ao Hoy

"Diozoavavd ho AJivwiaa

PECULIARITIES OF THE GEOLOGIC STRATA. 7

comparatively short structure of Ohio. The principal rock strata miss-
ins^ in this Basin are the Sub-Carboniferous, the Carboniferous, Permian,
Triassic, Jurassic, Cretaceous, and the Tertiary. The cause for the ab-
sence here of the rocks of those periods in geolog"ic history is, that at,
or soon following, the close of the rock period now represented here,
this region was elevated above the sea by some internal agencv and
could not receive any more deposits therefrom, while other parts of the
continent with later rock strata, remained relatively longer submerged.
Exposures of the rock floor by water erosions and by excavations, and
of the various underlying strata by quarrying, and by deep drillings for
water, oil and gas, have demonstrated the absence here of the strata
elsewhere formed during the later geologic periods, and determined the
strata here existing.

These rock explorations have also brought to light, and to the con-
sideration of geologists and chemists, features and characteristics of the
rock strata here existing that have opened new pages in their marvelous
history. It is thus demonstrated that they have been subjected to vary-
ing changes, not alone by pressure and chemic action, but by elevation
and depression, during the epochs since their deposition, as is shown
by varying densities, crystallizations, by the fossillization of the shells
and bones that escaped comminution in whole or in part, and bv the
irregularity observed in the strata.

The lowest rock formation in Ohio exposed in quarrv is supposed
to be at Point Pleasant, Clermont County. Latterl\- the rock of this
quarry has been classed as of the Trenton Period.*

The discovery of unquestioned Trenton Limestone in Ohio, how-
ever, was made by drillings in this Basin where it lies from 1000 feet
on the east to 2000 feet on the northwest below the surface. The
Trenton is the lowest stratum that has been entered in Ohio. Wells
have been drilled into it in nearly every county in the Basin with varying
results as to depth and product. The results of these drillings to the
depth of and into the Trenton stratum have also been the source of
surprises to geologists from their yield of Petroleum and Natural Gas, as
in other particulars. The comparatively level surface of most parts oi
this Basin had led to the belief that the underlying rock strata were
also level: but these drillings have revealed the surprising fact that they
are characterized by a far greater irregularity of structure, and by
greater suddenness and steepness of dip than the strata of any other
portion of Ohio. The most marked irregularities have thus far been
found toward the east side of the Basin where the well records show
that the strata dip at some points at the rate of three hundred feet to

* See the Geological Survey of Ohio. vol. i, paue 437, and vol, vi, page 5.

8 THE MAUMEE RIVER BASIN.

the mile. The entire rock floor of this region bears evidence of
changed conditions from the elevations and depressions to which this

THk Lh\'KL LANDSCAPK.
Lookintr east of north from the Baltimore and Oliio Railway, and between Sections 25 and 26. Dela-
ware Township, Defiance County, Ohio, October .SOth, 1901. The white building to the left of the tall
tree is a United Brethren Church, and the building near the central distance is a School House, both
about 1% miles distant. The Maumee River flows from left to right on the proximal side of the large
building on the left in a channel about forty feet in depth. The road in the foreground is a private,
farm wagonway.

Basin has been subjected. It is not uncommon to find the strata
descending at an angle of from two to ten degrees, but the descent is
not generally long continued, and all irregularities are included in the
main dip to which they are subordinate.*

The data ' of drillings given on another page afford some
measurements for study of the irregularities of the rock strata in
dip and, also, in surface abrasion. The lower strata decline toward
the westward and the upper strata are exposed, mostly in water
courses and quarries, in the eastern half of the Basin. On the rim
of the Basin to the east, south and south-east, the Niagara or Lower
Helderberg formation is uppermost. Along the course of the Maumee
River to the western line of Lucas County, Ohio, and thence north-
easterly into Michigan the Hamilton Group, or Upper Devonian, is
uppermost. To the south of the Maumee for a varying width of from
twenty-five to thirty miles on the west to two or three miles on the
north, the Corniferous Limestone, or l^pper Helderberg, is the first
exposed. To the north and west of the Hamilton Group, overlying
all others is the Ohio Shale, the Huron Shale of the early geologic
surveys, and this is covered directly by the Glacial Drift of the
Quarternary Period.

* See the Geological Survey of Ohio. 1890, page 46.

NATURAL GAS AND PETROLEUM. 9

High pressure Natural Gas was discovered in the Trenton Lime-
stone at Findlav while drilling for water in November, 1884.*

Edge of the Petroleum District, Findlay, Ohio, one mile north of the Blanchard River. Looking
southeast 1st May, 1903. The Lake Erie & Western Railway in fore^;round. Manufactory of Fire-clay
Pots on riyht. Petroleum wells beinu pumped under the Derricks whicll serve as supports for the Drills.
Ward Scliool Buildint; to riyht of center, and tower of Findlay Colletje between cluster of Derricks and
teletirapli pole to left of center.

In May, 1885, Petroleum was first obtained in quantity at Lima,
also in the Trenton Rock, and soon thereafter both gas and oil were
found in great quantity. These products had been found before
in various strata, but not with sufficient pressure and cjuantit}' in
this Basin for profit. This large quantity of gas and oil from a Lower
Silurian Limestone was unexpected. Geologists in common with the
well-drillers were surprised at the discovery. t

It was sujiposed that the deep h'ing rocks were too dense to con-
tain any quantity of fluid. The drills, however, demonstrated high
degrees of porosity in places, which were estimated as equal to one-
tenth to one-eighth of the volume of the rock.+

'^Natural Gas pressure has been registered as hi>.'h as HiX) pounds to the s>iuare incli; and
other wells estimated as hiyh as 1000 pounds.

t See the Geological Survey of Ohio. 1890, page 106.

tThe Rock Waters of Ohio, Nineteenth Annual Report of the U. S. Geological Survey. 1897-98.
Part IV. Hydrography, page &40.

10 THE MAUMEE RIVER BASIN.

This porosity is due to chemic reaction and crystallization in the
rock, the later conditions requiring less space. Thus jiorosities,
caverns or pockets are formed, and their size or extent governs the
quantity of gas, oil or water obtainable. The drillers 'gas sand ' and
'oil sand' is com]iosed largely of fragments of this changed rock.
The elevations and depressions to which the rocks have been subjected
have, also, contributed fissures and cavities in which these products
mav be stored ; but generally, in this Basin at least, these products are
found in the natural (crystalline) porosities of the rock.

The great quantitv and value of Petroleum and Natural Gas found
in this Basin have endowed them and the Trenton Limestone with such
great interest and importance that further points in their story will be
briefly given. This limestone was given the name of the place of its
most picturesquely eroded outcrop at Trenton, New York. It gener-
allv lies deeply buried, but it has outcrops in different States. When
disintegrated l)v natural causes, such as rain, frost, heat, wind, etc., it
produces ver\- fertile soil — the Blue Grass region in Kentucky being a
well known illustration. The numerous deep drillings in this Basin
have demonstrated that Petroleum and Natural Inflammable Gas are
very widely distributed in the porosities of the different strata of its
rocks, as is the case in other countries. Gas is exhaled from shallow
water wells, and from the surface of the ground in numerous places,
even where the uppermost , stratum of rock is deeply buried. These
products have, however, as yet been found in this Basin in sufficient
quantitv for profit, onlv in the Trenton Limestone, and at the north-
eastern, eastern, and southern parts of the Basin — in Lucas, Wood,
Hancock, Allen, Auglaize, Mercer, and Van Wert Counties. It is dif-
ferent in other parts of Ohio, and in other States. In Fairfield County
gas is obtained with high pressure from the Clinton Limestone ; in
Pennsvlvania oil and gas are obtained from the Devonian formations ;
and the Tertiary formations yield these products in large quantity in
California, Italv, the Island of Trinidad, and al^out the Caspian Sea.

These products of the rocks are not of recent origin, nor of rapid
accumulation. Their formation has been going on during long geologic
periods, in different parts of the earth. The ruins of Babylon, Nineveh,
and many other places, evidence by the asphaltic mortar there found,
that Petroleum was known to the ancient builders thousands of years
ago. Marco Polo, the Venetian traveler, was probably the first to
mention, in his writings of the early part of the fourteenth century.
Natural Inflammable Gas ; and others soon thereafter described ' fire-
wells ' in the far east. The early white settlers in our .\ppalachian
Mountain regions and elsewhere were astonished, and apjialled, by
occasional explosive conflagrations when starting their fires in ra\ines,

ORIGIN OF NATURAL GAS AND PETROLEUM. 11

and by ' springs of water that would burn ' from the exhalation of gas
or oil, the origin and nature of which was not then understood. These
strange exhibitions were productive of superstitious fear, and served
to more deeply fix superstitious legends.

The discovery of high pressure Gas and Petroleum in great quan-
tities in America, and their extensive application to the use of man,
however, are of recent years. The increased supply and application
of the oil began in Pennsylvania about the year 1H60, and in West Vir-
ginia, Ohio, and California, from 1870 to 1875.

The Natural Gas of some regions is closely associated with Petro-
leum and consists largely of marsh gas (CH4), varying in different
localities from varying temperatures and its more or less association
with the lighter ingredients of the oil. The Gas from the Trenton
Limestone, however, presents more uniformity of constituent parts,
and It generally contains hydrogen sulphid (HS) which is indicative
of bituminous origin.

Petroleum Refinery and Stora^'e Tanks at Lima, Oliio. Looking south of west 1st May. 19U2. The
Petroleum is transferred to and from the Refinery and Tanks through under-ground Pipe Lines.

Several theories have been advanced regarding the origin of
Petroleuin and Natural Gas. A few persons have thought thev, or the
Petroleums particularly, are the jiroduct of chemic action among inor-
ganic substances under great pressure ■J'' others have contended that
they originate from chemic reactions of the ingredients of animal re-
mains ; and yet others have held that the chemic reactions producing
them are among vegetable remains. There are additional theories
regarding their origin. It seems most probable that thev result from
primary or secondary decomposition through Nature's process of
destructive distillation of both vegetable and animal matter that was
stored with the rocks at the time of their deposition. t The full nature

* See the writings of the French and Russian chemists Berthelot and Mendel^jeif.

t See the writings of Hans Hoefer of the Royal School of Mines, Leoben, Austria: of J. S.
Newberry, Geological Survey of Ohio, vol. i; of S. F. Peckham in the if. S. Census Reports 1880; of
T. Sterry Hunt: and G. P. Wells Report of the Trinidad Asphalt.

12 THE MAUMEE RIVER BASIN.

and detail of this process is not understood, nor the influences that
inorganic substances exert in the process, if any. The_v, or the
Petroleums, are complex combinations of chemic elements resulting
from the decomposition and transformation of organic matter probably
in connection with the inorganic, possibly as catalvtics.* They belong
to the bitumens and the hydrocarbons, with an average proportion of
the two elements in the mixture of carbon eighty-five and h\drogen
fifteen to the one hundred. Petroleum is thought to be the first pro-
duced in Nature's laboratory in the rocks. It is more complex and
unstable in composition than gas although the elements carbon, hydro-
gen and oxygen in var^'ing combinations form both, with occasion-
ally small quantities of nitrogen, sulphurous gas, (HS) and other
elements attending.

The present Petroleum business in northwestern Ohio has been
summarized as follows :T

During the first week in June, 1903, the number of wells com-
pleted in Wood County was 24; production of Petroleum from these
wells for the fragmentary part of the week, 710 barrels; number
of non-i)roducing wells, 2; in Hancock County, 21-H70-1 ; Allen, 27-
910-1; Auglaize, 1-20^0; Sandusky, 6-180-1; Lucas, 4-20-0; Mercer,
5-120-1; Van Wert, 12-310-1; Seneca, 2-45-0; Wyandot, 2-15-1;
Ottawa, 3-300-1. Total, 107 wells, yielding in the part of week of
their completion, 3480 barrels, with 9 'Dry Holes.'

Omitting Wyandot County, the activity in this field during the last
week in June was: Wells completed, 129; product of these wells,
4197 barrels: non-productive wells, 9. During this week Allen
County led with 28 wells with two dry, and 1120 barrels initial pro-
duction.

During the first week in July the report shows Wood County, 23
wells, 745 barrels, 2 dry holes; Hancock, 26-835-2; Allen, 32-1210-2;
Auglaize, 3-60-0: Sandusky, 17-310-2; Lucas, 5-105-0; Mercer, 8-
245-0; Seneca, 2-15-1; Van Wert, 12-390-2; Wyandot, 2-40-1; Otta-
wa, 3-110-1. Total, 133-4065-13.

For the second week of July, 1903: Wood, 40-610-4; Hancock,
35-1180-5; Allen, 31-960-2; Auglaize, 1-15-0: Sandusky, 8-65-1;

* Sabatier and Senderens reported to the Academy of Sciences, 26th May. 1902, a theory of subter-
ranean chemical action amoni; inorganic substances alone as the possible origin of Petroleum. In their
laboratory experimentations, startiny with acetylene (C2 H2l and hydroijen (H) they, by the aid of finely
divided nickel and its related metals, obtained a liquid similar to Petroleuni. It is only necessary to
admit that in the depths of the earth are found, diversely distributed, alkaline-earthy metals, as well as
the carbids of these metals. Water, coming in contact with the former, sets hydrotjen free; and with
the carbids acetylene is set free. These two tases. in variable proportions, meet nickel, cobalt, and iron
— metals widely diffused in nature — and fjive rise to reactions that produce the various kinds of Petro-
leum. This explanation is in harmony with the theories of Berthelot and Mendel<?jeff referred to above.
See Cosmos, 23rd May. 1903.

t From The Toledo Bee. June 7, 1903. and the Toledo Blade, of various dates in June and July.

PRODUCTION OF NATURAL CAS AND PETROLEUM. 15

Lucas, 3-45-0; Mercer, 6-120-1 : Seneca, 1-25-0; Van Wert, 8-205-1 ;
Wyandot, 2-15-0; Ottawa, 2-60-0. Total, 137 wells completed, with
8800 barrels initial flow of Petroleum, and 14 wells non-productive.

The process of drilling^ wells for Natural Gas and Petroleum, is as
follows: A derrick is erected (see illustration on page 9), and the
'big hole bit' is used to open the way through the Glacial Till to the
rock, when the ' drive pipe ' incasing this hole is settled on the rock.
The heavy drill is now set at work, it being elevated and dropped by a
rope working over a pulley at the top of the derrick and connected
with a beam near the ground which is worked by a steam engine some-
what removed from the well to avoid igniting the Gas and Petroleum
that may be found. Water is added to the hole from time to time if it
be too dry: and the drill is removed and the bailor is used as often
as desirable to take the comminuted rock from the hole. If a great
flow of water is encountered, or large opening in or between the
strata, a casing-pipe about six inches in diameter is intruded to make
the well whole and exclude the water, and the drilling is continued.
When the crystalline rock, forming the ' oil-bearing sand' and Petro-
leum are found, and the flow is not satisfactory, the well is 'shot' with
nitro-glycerine. This explosive is lowered carefullv to the bottom of
the well in from three to fifteen tin ' shells' each usually containing
twenty quarts. A heavy iron, shaped for the purpose, and stvled a
go-devil ' by the operators, is then dropped upon these shells. The
explosion which ensues, and which usually causes but little eruption
of water, stones, mud. Gas and Petroleum above ground, fissures the
rock and enlarges the chamber at the bottom of the well. This is
often followed by a good flow of Petroleum. Occasionally the gush is
so great as to throw the casing out and demolish the derrick, in which
case a great flood of Petroleum accumulates on the ground before the
well can l:)e recased and a head put on the casing to control the flow.
Generally, however, it is necessary to use a pump to obtain the Petro-
leum, even from many profitable wells.

The Petroleum and Gas Fields present a weird appearance at night
from the many large Gaslights, burning from pipes and casting deep
shadows of the derricks and their appurtenances. These lights often
burn during the day, also, from neglect, or want of convenient stops.

The magnitude of the Petroleum business of the Buckeve Pipe
Line Company from all of their wells in northwestern Ohio during
the first five months of 1903, is reported as follows: Januarv, 1,551,-
215 barrels shipped, 1,353,408 barrels run through pipes; February,
1,498,194-1,250,337; March, 1,526,041-1,393,348: April, 1,507,108-
1,803,415; May, 1,597,693-1,386,866. Total, 7,680,252 barrels of ship-
ments, and 6,687,374 of runs.

14 THE MAUMEE RIVER BASIN.

About 15,000 Petroleum and Gas wells have been drilled in Wood
County. Some of these were non-productive, and many were soon
apparently exhausted. In March, 1903, about HOOO of these wells
remained productive and yielding owners of the land at the rate of
^2,000,000 per year in royalties. The capital invested is about $10,000,000.

The numerous drillings for Gas and Oil have developed in places
excellent water supi)ly. It is regretted that more careful observation
and record were not, and are not, made of the character of the rock
waters and of the varying depths and conditions of their flow. Most
of these favorable opportunities for observation regarding water supply
were unsought, and the flow of water was a hindrance to be overcome
by casing as soon as possible. Rock strata to be water i:)roducing must
be porous, with large caverns or subways connected with porosities
or joints ; and a large supply of water at a higher level is necessary for
flowing fountains, and for continuous supply at the well. The Niagara
Limestone often affords a liberal supply of stored water. It has numer-
ous seams and joints open sufficiently for this purpose. The Onondaga
Limestone, however, accommodates some of the most noted springs
from its larger channels. The Devonian series also affords in places a
good quantity of water, but it is often highly mineralized by solution of
iron pyrites firon sulphid, FeS), calcium, sodium, aluminum, mag-
nesium, and potassium, carbonates and sul^jhates. The iron in the
Corniferous Limestone usually comes from the overlying Ohio Shale.
At greater depths, below 100 feet, and generally below 1000 feet for
quantity, the water often contains chlorids, sodium chlorid (table salt)
predominating in such quantity as to make the water unpotable. Par-
ticularly is this the case in the Trenton Limestone. Such water flowing
in quantity-, formerly stopped the drilling in quest of Petroleum ; but
pumping, or casing off the water, and deeper drilling sometimes secures
a good oil well. In the Gas and Oil regions the upper surface of the
Trenton Rock varies from about 1000 to about 140(.) feet below the
surface of the ground ; and many productive wells extend but a com-
paratively few feet into this rock — from "200 to 450 feet below the sur-
face of tide water (the level of the Atlantic Ocean).

The great increase in the number of Petroleum and Gas wells
about the city of Findlay, and particularly above and along the Blan-
chard River from which the water sui)])l\- has been largely obtained,
has led to intolerable pollution of the water in the ditches, creeks, and
river, by the pumpings from these deep wells of great quantities of
water highly charged with the mineral salts before mentioned, and by
impure Petroleum.

This pollution became so general that a new source of potable
and culinary water supply became imperative. Upon consideration of

THE GEOLOGIC STRATA AND POTABLE WATER. 15

the subject, the 'Limestone Ridj^e ' about ten miles southeast of
Findlay was chosen as the most practicable and desirable source for
this supply : and in the sisrinsj; of 1903, work began foi the laying of a
line of glazed cla\- pipe, thirty inches in diameter, from the F"indlav
Water Works southeastward to this Limestone Ridge for the pur-
pose of conducting to the cit\', liv gravity, water from wells at this
point.

This Limestone Ridge, which extends northeast-southwest
through Amanda and Big Lick Townships, Hancock County, as part
of the irregular spurs between the Defiance and St. Mary Moraines, is
but a few feet above the country to the eastward, and somewhat more
above the land to the westward and northwestward which was formerlv
swampy. It is based on the Niagara Limestone which is here upper-
most and affords good potable water, constantly flowing from springs
near the base of the Ridge and from wells on the Ridge of varx'ing
depths, from those to the level of the land to the west down to 150
feet. The water supply here is supposed to be sufficient : but the
place of its source, or fountain head, is unknown.

In the year 1S75 a persistent drilling for artesian water in the Court
House Square, Fort Wayne, Indiana, penetrated the following strata,
viz: Drift, 88 feet; Niagara Limestones, 8()2 : Hudson Shales, gray,
260 ; Utica Shales, black, 260 ; and into the Trenton Limestone, 1590
feet. The surface of the ground here is 772 feet above sea level, and
this well of 3000 feet dejjth e.xtends 2228 feet below sea level. Good
drinking water was obtained by means of a strong pump. From a later
well of far less depth drilled near the Maumee River, there has been a
constant flow of good potable water. Neither Gas nor Oil was obtained
from these wells.*

A well drilled in the }'ear 1886, in the Coe Run Glen at Defiance,
the center of the Basin, has the following strata record : Drift, 18 feet;
Ohio Shale, 60 ; Devonian and Upper Silurian Limestones, 850 ;
Niagara Shale, 52 : Clinton Limestone, 60 : Medina, Hudson River
and Utica Shales, 630 ; Trenton Limestone struck at 1670 feet, or
about 975 feet below tide water. A small quantity of Gas and Oil was
yielded. There has since been constant and full flow of clear, potable
water, slightly sulphureted. At Deshler, twenty-five miles east, a well
drilled in 1^86-87 ran through the strata as follows : Drift, 71 feet ;
Limestone, 610 ; Niagara Shale, 5 ; Clinton Limestone, 95 ; Shales,
700 ; Trenton Limestone found at 1485 feet, 765 below tide water.
This well was continued 115 feet into the Trenton Rock with but slight
vield of Gas.t

* See Sixteenth Annual Report Indiana Geology, page 127.
t See Geological Survey of Otiio. vol. vi. pages 253, 253.

16 THE MAUMEE RIVER BASIN.

Later wells have shown but little variation in thickness of strata
other than of Drift or Glacial Till which averages from forty to fifty
feet in thickness in the central part of the Basin.

The varying composition of the rocks may be stated as follows :
Calcium (lime) carbonate from 50 to 95 per cent; Magnesium carbon-
ate, from 0 to 50 per cent ; Silica (sand) generally physically blended,
and in cherty cryptocrvstalline (flinty) form, from 0 to 25 per cent;
Iron and Alumina from 0 to 7 per cent ; Insoluble Residue, from a
trace to 10 per cent.

Following its elevation from the sea this Basin evidently attained
a considerable altitude, estimated at from three hundred to four hundred
feet or more, higher than it is at present ; and it remained thus ele-
vated during a great length of time, as evidenced by deep erosions in
the rock — probably through the periods before mentioned to the
Ouarternary period.''

Whether these geologic periods occupied sixty million of years or
but fifty million, is material to us in this connection only to impress
our minds with the immensity of geologic time, and the consequently
great amount of rock disintegration, and erosion, that the elements had
time to effect. There were probably several elevations and depressions
during these and succeeding periods.!

As vet but little has been determined regarding the' character and
conditions of the surface of this Basin during the changing periods of its
elevations and subsidencies, and of the system of drainage channels.
Many careful and intelligent observations, and records, must needs be
made of drillings throughout the Basin, through the overlying mantle of

* See the Geologic Chart facing page 7.

t The many and marked changes in altitude that have occurred in different parts of the earth
have led to the theory that the exterior of the earth is but a comparatively thin crust, variously esti-
mated at from twenty-five to fifty or one hundred miles, surrounding a molten interior ; and that the
cooling of the inner surface of this crust causes its contraction which, in turn, produces depressions in
some parts of the exterior surface, and uplifts in other parts from lateral pressure. Other ceologists
hold to the theory that the earth is a solid. This process of corrugation is usually slow, but it is much
faster in some places and under certain conditions than others. Changes in tlie relative altitude of
different parts of the earth's surface is still being effected as formerly, sinking in some parts and rising
in others. It is estimated that the rock strata at the eastern end of Lake Erie are yet rising and that
the Lake is thereby inceasing in depth. It is evident that the Lake is now higher than formerly from
the fact of the submerged caves of its islands containing bones of land animals that undoubtedly once
lived therein ; and from the deep mouths of drowned river tributaries, the channels of which bear evi-
dence of running water erosions that could only have occurred at a lower stage of the Lake or during
elevation of the river valleys. (See articles regarding earth movement in this region by B. F. Taylor
in Proceedings of the American Association for the Advancement of Science, vol. 48, 1897; by G. K.
Gilbert in the 18th Annual Report of the U. S. Geological Survey, etc.) The land south of Hudson
Bay is now higher than when lirst records were made. The preglacial elevation of the Saguenay
region, Canada, appears from the depth of its fiord to have been at one time at least one thousand feet
higher than now. The depth of the submarine fiord at the mouth of the Hudson River indicates that
the vicinity of New York and Philadelphia at one time stood two thousand and eight hundred feet above
the present sea level, and that they afterward sank sixteen hundred feet. See the Appendix to The Ice
Age in North America by G. Frederick Wright, 1891; American Journal of Science, June. 18R,i. For
account of remarkable upliftings of land in Europe, see Prof. James Geikie's Prehistoric Europe,

PREGLACIAL DRAINAGE CHANNELS. 11

earth and into the underlying rocks before sufficient and satisfactory
evidence regarding this subject can be accumulated. The discovery of
large quantities of Petroleum in the southern part of the Basin, and the
impetus thereby given to well-drilling, has opened up the subject of
such early or pre-glacial drainage and its deep-channel erosions, in a
most interesting way by demonstrating the fact of a deeply eroded
channel in the rocks underlying Shelby, Auglaize and Mercer Counties,
Ohio, and Adams, Jay and Blackford Counties, Indiana. ' This deep
channel probably has further extensions to be determined in the future;
and other like channels will doubtless be discovered, and it is hoped
that most careful observations will be noted at every opportunity. The
northern branch of this buried channel is found at Anna south of Wapa-
koneta, with depth of five hundred and fourteen feet below the surface
of the ground, and in places about three hundred and seventy feet
deeper than the upper face of the rock within a mile to the north and
south of the channel. A southern branch exists a little west of Berlin.
Following their course northwestwardly, they are found to unite
under the large Canal Reservoir in Mercer County, and thence to continue
as one channel northward to Rockford on the St. Mary River, thence west
into Adams County, Indiana, thence southwest, crossing under the
Wabash River at about a right angle, and under Geneva, and thence
near Pennville, and on to near the center of Blackford County where a
tributary is received. The rock floor of this channel varies from about
fifty feet below the present water level of Lake Erie to something over
one hundred feet below in the channel's western explored part. There
may be several causes for the variation of this channel's apparent bed.
Rocks carried before the glacier the detritus of which filled this channel,
may have been taken as its true bottom; something of a pothole may-
have been entered by the drill in other parts, or a fissure of the dis-
turbed strata; or the floor of the channel mav have been unevenly
raised or depressed by the changes of the earth's crust. The walls of
this channel are generally sloping; but the drill discovered a nearU'
vertical wall near the City of St. Marys. The width of the channel
could be only approximately determined by the places drilled; but it
appears to be about one mile — with no place narrower than three-
quarters of a mile — and widening to one mile and a half under the Grand
Reservoir and at Rockford. The erosion of this channel at Anna
extends entirely through the Niagara and Clinton Limestones, and into
the Medina or Hudson Shales. t

*See the article on "A Deep Pre-Glacial Channel in Western Ohio and Eastern Indiana." by J. A.
Bownocker. in The American Geologist for March. 1899, vol. xsiii. page 178. Also the pamphlet
entitled The Preglacial Drainage of Ohio, Special" Print No. 3, Ohio State Academy of Science,
December, 1900.

t For mention of buried river channels in other parts of Ohio, see the Geological Survey of Ohio,
volumes i and ii.

18 THE MAUMEE RIVER BASIN.

This ancient water-way bears evidence of long-time erosion by a
considerable stream of rapid flowing water, and some data has been
adduced indicating that this was the ancient channel of the Kanawha
River. Water well drilling indicate.s a similar channel in the rock in
Delaware Township, Defiance County.*

The depth of soil accumulated within the territory of the present
Maumee River Basin in preglacial times, by the decomposition of the
rock surface from water, frost, sun, wind and other of Nature's agencies,
and the full character and extent of vegetable and animal life that existed
here during those long periods of time, will never be known.

In the Quarternary or Post Tertiary Period, a most remarkable and
important change occurred which again subjected different, and some-
what variant, parts of the earth's crust to like geologic conditions.
This Basin, in common \\ ith the northern and southwestern jiarts of Ohio,

Glacial Groovinyb in the Bed Rock of Kelley Island. Lake Erie. This small part, with uverlying
Drift, was saved from Rock Quarriers by the Western Reserve Historical Society, Cleveland. Ohio.

many other parts of North America, and of the Eastern Continent, was
overrun by heavy masses of ice. There is abundant evidence of this
powerful ice invasion in the vast quantities of finely ground and mixed
rock material of different kinds, in scratchings and groovings still
existing in the rock floor, in the presence of scattered granite, igneous,
or archaean boulders which are foreign to all rocks native to Ohio, yet
exposed as shown on the Chart facing page 7. These erratic, lost, or

* Persons desiring to study the effects of lon^; continued action of water, and weather, on rocks
should visit the plateau and canyons of the Colorado River, in Arizona. Before makini: this visit one
should read Explorations of the Colorado River of the West, by Messrs. Ives and Newberry. 1861 ; Ex-
ploration of the Colorado River of the West, by ]. W. Powell, K7^: and Tertiary History of the Grand
Canyon of the Colorado, by Captain Dutton in Monograph II U. S. Geological Survey. 1883. Also The
Preglacial Drainage of Ohio. Special Paper No. 3, Ohio State Academy of Science, December. 1900,

GLACIAL CROOVINGS AND GLACIAL EPOCHS.

foreign boulders are recosnized as haviny; been transported hundreds
of miles from the north and northeast. The most extensive and
remarkable groovings yet found in the rocks near this Basin, evidenc-
ing movement of a glacier bearing hard rocks firmly embedded in its
substance, is on Kelly Island in Lake Erie. But a small section of
these groovings has been preserved bv the Western Reserve Historipal
Society, Cleveland, from the destructive hands of rock quarriers. These
deep and extensive grooves may have been partlv formed by water
erosions, and the effects of the glaciers were to enlarge, mold and

Glacial Grooves in Granite Buulilei in lii^^h Channel ot Mauniee River. Detiance County. Ohio.
Lookins southeast. 18th October, 1901.

polish them to produce the remarkable result shown in the accompany-
ing engraving. Numerous other scratchings of less depth and extent,
and with varying bearings, have been exposed in the rock floor in dif-
ferent parts of the Basin; and many of the erratic boulders found above
and within the ground-up mixed drift, still bear evidence of the great
grindings and scratchings to which they were subjected.

Six Glacial Epochs, with alternating Interglacial Epochs, charac-
terize the past glacial succession. Ice Period or Age, of Europe.*

* The Great Ice Age. by James Geikie. 3rd Edition. 189fi. pace 607. In the United States Geolog-
ical Survey. Monograph XLI. Washinnton. 19('2. Eleven Epochs or Stages of the Glacial Period are
enumerated as having occurred in and surrounding this Basin.

THE MAUMEE RIVER BASIN.

These are evidenced by different glacial groovins's in the rocks,
water channel erosions between layers, changes in flora and fauna
according to the alternations of climate shown in buried forests and
animal remains in varying strata, peat bogs, etc. American geologists
are not entirely agreed regarding the number and character of the
Glacial Epochs in North America, particularly regarding the time and
extent of deglaciation in the interglacial epoch or epochs. The
area covered by the ice is vast, and the field work has been limited.
More time must be given to active workers in which to accumulate and
fully consider the evidences found in all parts of the glaciated area.
Much has already been accomplished, however, in a general way, and
careful work has been done in some local areas. The following group-
ings of Glacial Epochs, by Prof. T. C. Chamberlin,"^ embrace different
interpretations entertained by experienced geologic field workers who
believe in the differentiation of the Glacial Drift series. The upper
layer, at least, of the Drift in the Maumee River Basin has been
assigned to a dependency, glacial lobe, or retreatal oscillations, of the
Wisconsin stage, reference to which will be again made :

FIRST GROUPING ON A TWOFOLD BASIS

Unknown

1. Concealed under-series (theoretical)

2. Kansan stage of glaciationt

3. First interval of deglaciation

4. East-Iovvan stage of glaciation

5. Second interval of deglaciation

6. East-Wisconsin stage of glaciation

7. Retreatal oscillations of undetermined importance

■ Early glacial epoch

Chief interglacial epoch

- Later glacial epoch

Glacial
Pkriod

SECOND GROUPING ON A TWOFOLD BASIS.

1. Concealed under-series (theoretical)

2. Kansan stage of glaciation

3. First interval of deglaciation

4. East-Iowan stage of glaciation

5. Second interval of deglaciation

6. East-Wisconsin stage of glaciation

7. Retreatal oscillations of undetermined importance

Unknown

Earlj' glacial epoch

Chief interglacial epoch

(- Later glacial epoch

Glacial

PlililOD

GROUPING ON A THREEFOLD BASIS.

L Concealed under-series (theoretical).

2. Kansan stage of glaciation.

3. First interval of deglaciation.

4. East-Iowan stage of glaciation.
5.* Second interval of deglaciation.

6. East-Wisconsin stage of glaciation.

7. Later oscillations of undetermined

importance.

Unknown.
First (represented) glacial epoch
First interglacial epoch
Second glacial epoch
Second interglacial epoch
Third ylacial epoch
embracing possibly
a fourth glacial epoch

Glacial
PkuK)d.

* The Great Ice Age. by James Geikie, pages 773 and 774.

t This first stage is. probably, more properly termed the Illinoian. It reached its most southern
limit in that State. See T. C. Chamberlin's article in the Journal of Geology, vol. iv, ISOG. pa^es
872 to 876.

THE ICE AGE IN AMERICA AND ITS CAUSE. 21

The general conclusions regarding the Ice Age in America and
Europe, harmonize, and the above grouping of the ice period in
America on a three-fold basis runs quite closely parallel to the evidences
of successive stages of glaciation apparent in Europe. In both coun-
tries the maximum glaciation, in extent, occurred at an early stage of
the Period. "^

Louis Agassiz, late of Cambridge, Massachusetts, was the first to
announce a past Glacial Period in geologic history. This he did be-
fore the Helvetic Society of Natural History in 1837. In 1840 he pre-
sented the subject before the British Association for the Advancement
of Science and, later in the same year, before the Geological Society of
London. Since that time geologists have generally agreed regarding
the former existence of such Period in parts of the earth which have
long since been of temperate climate, and been sustaining large popu-
lations. Professor Edward Hitchcock, in April, l841,t was the first in
America to accept and apply the glacial theory to the Eastern United
States.

There have been, however, diversity of opinions regarding the
cause of the climate that jiroduced the glaciers that overran these
regions. That eminent English geologist, Sir Charles Lvell| advanced
the theory of changes in the distribution of land and water, and eleva-
tion of great expanses of land at or toward the North Pole, as the
cause of glaciers. Sir John Herschel in 1832, M. Adhemar in 1840,
and notably Doctor James Croll in 1864, suggested astronomic causes
for the variations in glacier accumulations and dissipations. The ele-
vation of the Northern lands that was in progress during the Tertiary
era is naturally a favorite theory with geologists in general in explan-
ation of the cause of the great glaciers that overran Ohio and other
States ; and adherents to the theor\- have probably been increasing in
number during late years that oscillations of the earth's surface was the
chief cause of the oscillations of these glaciers.il Doctor James Croll, §
Professor James Geikie,! and Sir Robert Ball,*"^ hold that it is more
probable that the relative changes in the land and sea level were due to
the alternate appearance and disappearance of the great snow-fields

* The Great Ice Age. bj' James Geikie, pape 774.

t In his address as retiring President at the second annual ineetine of the Association of American
Geologists and Naturalists, held in Philadelphia.

t Principles of Geology. 1830, chapters vii and viii. and Elements o; Geology, sixth edition. 1868,
chapters xi and xii.

II See the Ice Age of North America, third edition. 1891, by G. Frederick Wright; also his smaller
book on Man and the Glacial Period, second edition, 1896. D. Appleton & Co., New York.

§ In his books on Climate and Time, and Climate and Cosmology.

1i The Great Ice Age. third edition, 1896.

** The Cause of an Ice Age. 1897. D. Appleton & Company, publishers.

22 THE MAUMEE RIVER BASIN.

and ice-coverings ; that it is improbable that such vast portions of the
earth's crust were uplifted thousands of feet and equally depressed
again and again with sufficient frequency to account for the complex
alternation of cold and warm ejiochs, as is shown to have been the case
by the northern deposits of southern marine and other animal life, and
the growth of forests, during the interglacial epochs. In brief, their
theory is that the climatic changes of the glacial epochs resulted from
the combined influence of the precession of the equinoxes and secular
changes in the eccentricity of the earth's orbit.

According to the theory and comimtations of Doctor Croll, the last
great cvcle of eccentricity, to which he assigned the Glacial Period, be-
gan about 2-40,000 year? ago and lasted 160,000 years, thus terminating
about 80,000 years ago for the more strongly contrasted glacial and
interglacial epochs. Others have varied but little from these computa-
tions. G. K. Gilbert, G. Frederick Wright, Warren Upham and others
incline to the opinion, however, that the last ice sheet disappeared from
the lower lake region about six thousand to ten thousand years ago,
judging from the Niagara River Gorge, other gorges, the character of
certain glacial deposits, etc.; and that this recent time, together with
the want of evidence of glaciation in the Tertiary and former Eras,
militates against the astronomic theory of causation. Sir Robert Ball,
on the other hand, exploits the astronomic theory as the most complete
explanation of the cause and, in corroboration, advances an accurate
law' by which the distribution and retention of heat is regulated in the
alternation of climatic zones between the earth's hemispheres. By this
law he 'corrects and supplements' the theories of Sir John Herschel
and Doctor James Croll. None of the more definite, and more exclus-
ive, theories of causation, however, have fully borne the test of general
consideration. It is probable that the various elements affecting
climate, geographic, atmospheric and astronomic, are so well balanced
that untoward influences affecting and holding a comparatively slight
change or maladjustment might produce serious climatic effects, even
to a period of ice in our present temperate zone.*

All agree that a simple low temperature will not produce a glacier.
Snow in great quantity is necessary for such formation; in addition to
the shortened summer and increased length of winter there was a cold
under-current of air passing from North to South, and currents of
warmer, mist-laden upper strata of air passing from the South to the
North, causing an unusually great amount of snow — a quantity in ex-
cess of melting power of the sun, but which melted sufficiently during
the short summer of each year to aggregate the glaciers, and this great

* See Professor Herman L. Fairchild's Address, Proceedings of the Amerioan Association for the
Advancement of Science. 1898. vol. xlvii, pate 270 et sequentia.

THE GLACIATED AREA AND ITS SOUTH LINE. 23

amount of moisture thus congealed on the land, produced a change in
the ocean level by depressing the land or attracting the ocean from
southern latitudes, or both. Great accumulation of snow and ice from
its partial melting and its weight, has been in progress towards the
South Pole for many years, and theories of grave results to present
temperate latitudes have been adduced therefrom.

The area covered by these ice sheets is, in North America, about
four million square miles, and in Europe about one-half this extent.
Beginning in Labrador and south of Ffudson Bay, as probable chief
centers of the American ice distribution, the general course of the prin-
cipal glaciating mass was to the south and east in the Eastern States,
extending as far south as Long Island, to New York City, then the
extreme southern limit in the East, excepting narrow extensions down
drainage channels, and assuming a general northwesterly course through
New Jersey and Pennsylvania to near Southwestern New York, thence
in a general southwesterly course through Pennsylvania and the south-
ern edge, ranging through Ohio near Canton, Danville, Newark, Chilli-
cothe and Winchester to near the Ohio River, which is crossed from
Clermont County; thence extending near this river to Cincinnati, thence
southwest in a varying line which is crossed and recrossed by the Ohio,
to near Louisville, where the boundary turns to the northward at about
a right angle and extends to within a few miles of Indianapolis, where
it again turns to the southwest, crossing the Wabash River at New
Harmony into Illinois and reaching the most southern limit about fifty
miles north of Cairo, whence it again turns to the northwest, extending
nearlj- parallel to the Mississippi River and a few miles distant from it,
to within a few miles of St. Louis, where it crosses this river and ex-
tends westward along or within a few miles of the Missouri River, en-
tering Kansas a little south of Kansas City and continuing nearly west
a hundred miles to near Topeka, thence northward across Nebraska
approximating the Missouri River, and crossing the south line of South
Dakota near the mouth of the Niobrara River, thence along the west
bank of the Missouri to the mouth of the Cheyenne River, and thence
westward.*

The marks of the glacier, and rocks transported by it, are found
near, if not quite on, the top of Mount Washington, the present high-
est point in New England, 6347 feet above the sea, also at the tops of
the other highest mountains in its course. The question of the force
necessary to propel the ice over these great heights, if they were so
high at the time of the glaciers, and to propel it so far from the north-
ern places of distribution, has given rise to interesting inquiries regard-

* See The Ice Age in North America, by G. F. WriKht, third edition, 1891, page 120 et seq.

24 THE MAUMEE RIVER BASIN.

ing the thickness of the ice sheets and the character of the propelling
force. About the year 1861 Professor Louis Agassiz, in a conversation
with Professor J. P. Lesley, stated as his opinion, from studies of the
movements of existing glaciers, that such masses of ice could not go
over a barrier unless its extent above the crest of the barrier be at least
one-half of the height of the barrier.* It is readily seen that moun-
tains which bear on their summits glacial markings or rocks foreign to
the locality, serve as glaciometers, and are among the best means of
approximating the thickness of the ice sheet. This evidence with the
hundreds of miles distance to the terminal moraines and glacial mark-
ings south and west from the northern centers of the glacier distri-
bution, signify a necessary thickness of thousands of feet to the
northern ice. Estimated from slopes of existing glaciers, the thickness
of the glacier over Lake Erie has been computed to have been about
eleven thousand feet, and that part north of Lake Superior thirty thou-
sand feet.t Ice will move of its own weight, and particularly glaciers
composed of crystals or 'glacier-grains' formed as thej' are, from
snow. When the most solid parts of ice are exposed in a glacier to a
peculiarly violent strain, its limited plasticity necessitates the formation
of countless minute rents, and the internally bruised surfaces are forced
to slide over one another, simulating a fluid character in the motion of
the parts so affected. Reconsolidation of the bruised glacial substance
into a coherent whole may be more or less effected by pressure alone
similar to its effect upon granular snow, and upon ice softened by im-
minent thaw into a condition more plastic than ice at lower tempera-
ture.! Doctor Heimll has estimated that the average annual flow of
the glaciers of Switzerland and Norway, and the smallest of the Green-
landic glaciers, ranges between one hundred and thirty and three hun-
dred and thirtj- feet. The great glacial tongues that are protruded from
the inland ice of Greenland move on an average in summer not less
than fifty feet in twenty-four hours with often great declivity to the land
and the open sea as a strong frontal attracting force. In mountainous
countries the movement is accelerated by the declivity. Undoubtedly
the movement of the glaciers that invaded this level region was far
slower than the minimum above given. Doctor Geikie states that 'in
many cases glaciers flow no faster than from three or four to eighteen
inches a day, while in others the rate exceeds four feet in twenty-four
hours.'

* Second Geological Survey oj Pennsylvania, vol. Z. page xiv. Wright's The Ice Age of North
America, pace 167.

"t The Ice Age of North America, 3rd edition, page 173.

* See ]!Lmei D. Forbes' Occasional Papers on the Theory of Glaciers, page svi; The Great Ice
Age. by James Geikie, page 31 ; The Ice Age in North America, by G. F. Wright, etc.

11 Handbuch der Gletscherkunde. quoted in Geikie's The Great Ice Age. page 36.

PHENOMENA ATTENDING MOVEMENT OF GLACIER. 25

The phenomena attending the formation and movements of glaciers
are endowed with several of Nature's laws of great interest. They
have been studied by many geologists and physicists during later years
not only in the effects of the past glaciers, but in the active processes
of existing glaciers in Alaska, Greenland, the Alps, and others. From
these studies we understand that the center for the formation of the
glaciers that overran this region was on the most elevated points to the
north and eastward; that during their formation they became firmly at-
tached to the earth and rocks, which in much of the movements of the
ice worked upward through its heights; that as the ice volume increased
and advanced, filling the valleys and creeping up the hills and moun-
tains, the accumulation of crushed and resisting rocks increased; that

A Front of the Muir Glacier in Alaska a few years asjo. From Gates' Tours.

avalanches from the higher peaks and ridges brought frequent and
material additions of snow, ice, earth and rocks down upon its surface;
that it amassed to thousands of feet in thickness and, with its enor-
mous wxight, it was irresistibly impelled forward, carrying before and
under it ridges and hills of earth; grinding and mixing the softer rocks
into their component parts of lime, sand, gravel and clay; smoothing
and grooving furrows in and by the more solid parts ; filling deep water
ways with this broken and ground material and thus changing the for-
mer drainage systems : creeping up and over the hills and mountains
that withstood its force; dipping and scouring the bed of Lake Erie;
moving along over the rocky elevations to the south and westward and

26 THE MAUMEE RIVER BASIN. "

leaving in its course a litter of detritus from its mill-like and mixing
action, much being loosened by friction and by the melting of the ice
and by the water that trickled through its crevices, but principally by
the arrest of the glacier's progress and its dissipation by climatic
changes, as the forward part of the glaciers in level regions possessed
the greatest amount of detritus from their plowing and pushing every-
thing movable before them, and from the constant dropping of the ac-
cumulations from the melting ice above.

Ridges of this ground up or transported material left by glaciers
are called Moraines; and it is readily understood from the former state-
ment that, later action of water being equal, the Terminal Moraine or,
rather, the place where the front of the glacier rested the longest,
would be the highest. The last glacier, usually connected with the last
(often called Wisconsin ) stage, that covered the Huron-Erie region
was divided along its southern border into five lobes, tongues or
fingers, which projected from the main mass.* The Western Erie or
Maumee and Wabash lobe, which covered, and formed, the Maumee
River Basin, moved in a southwesterly direction as shown by scratch-
ings and groovings in the bed rocks. Markings of four distinct ice
movementst have been observed on the islands in the west part of
Lake Erie, but only those attributed to the third movement will be
mentioned here, further than a few intersecting. The direction of
these grooves vary somewhat according to the obstructions met and
the flexibility of the ice. The table on opposite page shows location
and direction of the principal groovings observed by members of the
Ohio Geological Corps. +

The Terminal Moraine of this Erie or Maumee Basin Glacier was
thought bv G. K. Gilbert in 1871 to be the St. Joseph-St. Mary
Moraine || shown on the map page 28; but Professor T. C. Chamber-
lin's survey § locates the Terminal Moraine proper, or extreme limit of
this glacial lobe, near the southwestern border of Indiana. The highest
moraines near the Maumee River Basin are those forming its north-
western and western borders, in Hillsdale County, Michigan, and in
Steuben and De Kalb Counties, Indiana. There are in this region a
confusion of moraines from the contact and blending of the northwest
side of the Erie Glacial Lobe with the southeast side of what has been

* These glacial lobes have been yiven the names of the rivers now coursiny most nearly in the
direction of their trend, viz: 1. The Grand and Mahoning at the east; '2. The Sandusky and Scioto; 3.
The Great Miami — all in Ohio; 4. The White River in Indiana, and 5. The Maumee and Wabash. See
T. C. Chamberlin's Preliminary Paper on the Terminal Moraine of the Second Glacial Epoch.

t See The Ice Age in North America. 3rd edition, pages 235, 236.

^ Geological Survey of Ohio. vol. i, pajje 53S: vol. ii, pases 9, 10.

II Geological Survey of Ohio. vol. i, page .542.

S United States Geological Survey, Third Annual Report, pane 291.

GLACIAL MOVEMENT. ANDlMORAINES.

County

Place

Rock

No. OF
Obs.

Bearing

Erie

Kelly Island

Corniferous Limestone

S. 78° W.
S, 80° W.
S. 60° W.

Ottawa

Putin-Bay Island

Waterlime

S. 80° W.

intersecting

S. 15° W.

South Bass Island

Many

S. 80° W.

intersecting

S. 15° W.

West Sister Island

Many

S. 80° W.

intersecting

Lucas

Sylvania

Corniferous

S. 50° W.

Monclova

Waterlime

S. 62° W.

Fish's Quarry

Corniferous

S. 55° W.

Whitehouse

S. 50° W.

Defiance

Ohio Shale

S. 45° W.

Paulding

Junction

Corniferous Limestone

S. 45° W.

Allen

Lima
Amanda

Waterlime

S, 35° W.
S. 35° W.

Van Wert

Middlepoint

S. 15° W.

Hancock

Kindiay

Niagara

S. 45° W.
S. 40° W.

Amanda

S. 33° W.

Putnam

Blanchard

Waterlime

S. 28° W.

Suuar Creel<

S. 50° W.

Auglaize

Corniferous

S. 48° W.

Seneca

Waterlime

S. 23° W.

intersecting

S. 5°E.

Wyandot

Crawford
Crane

1
1

S. 20° W.
S. 5° W.

Marseilles

Niagara

1
1
1

S. 10° W.

S, 10° E.

N. S.

Wood

Portaye

Waterlime

S. 50° W.

Otsego

Corniferous

S. 68° W.
S. 60° W.

OBSERVATIONS OF GLACIAL GROOVINCS IN BED ROCK.

termed the Saginaw Glacial Lobe, thus forming the Erie-Saginaw Inter-
lobate Moraine.* The Saginaw Glacier is recognized as having been
the lesser lobe or edge of these two, and the first to disappear. The
survey of the western and northwestern border of this Basin, shows
considerable complexity in its glaciation. The accompanving map
shows five morainic loops of the Maumee-Wabash Glacial Lobe, divided
into North and South sections by the Maumee River and the Wabash
and its tributaries, viz: the Defiance Moraine, the St. Joseph-St. Marv,
the Wabash-Aboite, the Salamonie and the Mississinewa. The two last
named are so blended in northeastern Indiana with the Saginaw as to

* See the 16lh Report of Indiana Geology, 1888, pages 119.126, and the 17th Report. 181)2 pages
115 lo 118.

THE MAUMEE RIVER BASIN.

MAOMEE RIVER BilS

AND ADJACENT WATERSHEDS,
Shuuinc TiiF MORAINES; BEACHES
'■"■; GLACIAL LAKES MACMI
WHITTLHSEY «r, WARREN, ,n>,
DEFIANCE GLACIAL BAY; the DR 4
AG1-. SYSTEM; MILITARY ROADS >
KlRTS.

'|H»: nnUKEis. OTHr-K THAN OATKN, INI.H«
ALTITL)>K> APOVK TIPF WATER.

KNORAvri) FOR Dr. Ciias. K. Slocum's

UlifTORT OF THF MaL-MEK RfVEB B*81M
10113

GLACIAL LAKE MAUMEE AND ITS OUTLETS. 29

be indistinKuishabk- to other than skilled Lclaciaologists. North of
Maumee Bay there are two other moraines extending northward.

It is still an unsettled question whether the different glacial evi-
dences were separated by long intervals of mild climate, marking
distinct glacial epochs, or whether there were a continuity of oscilla-
tions— advances and recessions — of the ice with only a modifiud
glacial climate during its recessions of, perhaps, one, two, three hun-
dred years, or more. Both theories have able advocates..! A further
description of these moraines will be given in the chapters on the
Glacial Drift, and the rivers.

The causes leading to the melting of the glaciers were but the
reversal of the causes that produced them. Theories of the subsidence
or great depression of the glaciated area ( perhaps from the great weight
of the ice ) and theories of ocean elevation, and of astronomic varia-
tions, have been ad\-anced as causes of the modification of the glacial
climate.

Wherever the drainage ways in front of an advancing glacier
were not sufficient at lower levels, bodies of water formed and accumu-
lated in relative quantity from the constant melting of the ice. As the
glacier advanced from the northeast the drainage channels of the areas
of the present great lakes and tributaries, were dammed and the accu-
mulating waters from them, and from the glacier, found outlet through
the preglacial channels to the southward and southwestward. When
the glacier finally stopped on the borders of the present Maumee River
Basin the waters from the melting ice were discharged through the St.
Joseph River which, cutting through the moraines southwestward from
its present mouth, flowed into the Wabash River near Huntington, In-
diana. Other points of discharge were southeastward into the Scioto
River and southward into the Miami. As the glacier receded, by melt-
ing, there was formed between its front and sides and the St. Joseph-
St. Mary Moraines, a body of water which constantly increased in
extent as the ice disappeared. This body of water has been designated
as the Maumee Glacial Lake. It had outlets southeastward through
the Tymochtee Gap, 912 feet above tide water, to the Scioto River ;
southward near Lima and Wapakoneta, at an elevation of about 900
feet and later, at the formation of the River St. Marj- and its junction
with the St. Joseph at P'ort Wayne, southwestward, at present erosion

t For a discussion of the latter theory see The Ice Age in North America. -Srd edition, 1891, and
P4an and the Glacial Period. 2nd edition, 1896, both by G. Frederick Writ;ht. Reparding the former
theory see The Qreat [ce Age in which the author, James Geikie, discusses six distinct glacial epochs
in Europe. In 1899 Dr, Albrecht Penck, in a pamphlet published in Vienna, recognizes four distinct
epochs of placiation in the Alps, instead of three as heretofore recorded. This subject, as well as others
may be found more fully discussed in the proceedings of geological and other scientific societies, and
serial publications, a number of which are referred to by name in this work.

THE MAUMEE RIVER BASIN.

level of 767 feet, to the Wabash River: and still later, until the glacial
ice dam melted in the Mohawk River Valley, New York, and in the St.
Lawrence Valley, the drainage of the Maumee Glacial Lake was north-
ward to the Thumb of Michigan, and thence southwestward south of
Saginaw Bay, at an altitude of something over 700 feet above tide
water, through the Grand River to Lake Michigan, and thence through
the Illinois River to the Mississippi.

With the melting of the ice the great number of granitic boulders,
large and small, the immense quantity of finely ground rock material
of different kinds, forming clay, gravel, sand, and lime, and all
kinds of debris and detritus that had been received and gathered in
its course, became liberated to settle to the bottom of the water or

'^^^8

■ -i ■

'*^^^^

/A idy

I^bH

^^w*~ • '

* ' '^^

I'ehance Glacial Bay Beach in Foret;rouii(l, and Crest of Dehance Moraine in the liistance. Look-
ing east, 24th October, 1902, in Richland Township, three miles east of the Defiance Court House, and
one mile south of the Maumee Water Gap. A very fertile country.

drifted to the shores. Iceliergs and icefloes were broken from the
glacier b\' the processes of fissuring and undermining, and either soon
became fixed on the bottom to melt and deposit their loads of earthy
material in a limited area, or were drifted about to its wider disperse-
ment. The Maumee Glacial Lake gradually subsided into the present
Lake Erie.

As the lake level declined the waters of the Rivers St. Joseph
and St. Mary followed the receding lake, thus originating and forming
the Maumee River. Following its continued recession the Defiance
Mcwaine became the western and southwestern shore of the Maumee
Glacial Lake, leaving to the westward and southward a baj-, named
Defiance Glacial Bay in the year 1899 by Frank Leverett assistant in
the United States Geological Survey, at the suggestion of Charles E.
Slocum of Defiance. This Bav in its full e.xtent was about 1100

DEFIANCE BAY. LAKES WHITTLESEY AND WARREN. 31

square miles in area, somewhat crescentic in form with its north and
south points and concave shore lines to the eastward, with altitude of
near 170 feet above the present level of Lake Erie, and 743 feet above
the sea. Much of its shore lines may now be seen with more or less
distinctness at or near the following named places : Beginning at
Ayersville, five miles southeast of Defiance and at the Bay's principal
connection with the receding Lake Whittlesey, and extending north-
ward along the convex west side of the Defiance Moraine to
Archbold, Fulton Count}', Ohio, the most northerlj' point ; thence
irregularly in a general southwesterly course along the slope east of
Bryan, Williams County, and of Hicksville, Defiance Countv, to
Antwerp, Paulding County, where it turns southeast to Scott, and
near Delphos, Allen County, thence in a curving northeasterly course
to near Columbus Grove and Pandora, Putnam County, thence north
to Leipsic and Belmore, and thence northwest through Henry County
to the mouth of the Bay opposite Ayersville. Its deepest part was at
Defiance. Four lake beaches have been noted in this Basin by G. K.
Gilbert,* by whom it was first surveyed. The first beach, the western
shore of Glacial Lake Maumee, marks a water level of 220 feet above
the present level of Lake Erie ; the second at 195 feet, and the third
at 170 feet, being the level of Defiance Glacial Bay, and Lake Whittle-
sey on the east side of the Defiance Moraine. The fourth beach lines
record a slow descent from the eastern shore of Lake Warren, 90 feet
to 65 and 60 feet above the fifth beach or present shore of Lake Erie,
which is recorded as 573 feet above tide water.

With the subsidence of the glacier and its waters, the Maumee
River Basin became defined; and it was quite well drained before the
present Niagara River had origin. It was not until the breaking away
of the glacial ice dams in the Mohawk River Valley, and in the valley
of the St. Lawrence River, and the settling of Lake Ontario below
the level of the land thirty-eight feet above the present Lake Erie, that
the Niagara River began to form a channel; and as that level of Lake
Ontario subsided, the Falls of Niagara had a beginning at the escarp-
ment of Lewiston. With the erosions of the overlying till and the
softer underlying eighty feet of shale, the upper eighty feet of lime-
stone was undermined and broken to fall in fragments and be carried
down the channel by the increasing height and force of the Falls and
current. Thus the Falls receded and the Gorge was formed accord-
ingly. This Niagara Gorge has been recognized by geologists for
several years as the best practical measure of the time that has elapsed
since the subsidence of the glacial waters that is convenient for their

' Ohio Geological Survey, vol. i. page 549. Also see Map. page 28.

62 THE MAUMEE RIVER BASIN.

studv. From the studies given to the erosions by the Falls, diverse
opinions have, however, been advanced. R. Bakewell, jr., in the j-ear
1H29, after consulting residents of the vicinity of forty years duration,
estimated the recession of the Falls at three feet a year. E. Desor
later estimated the recession as probably nearer three feet a century
than three feet a year, making the time for the wearing of the Gorge
1,232,000 years. Prof. James D. Dana* estimated the more probable
time as 380,000 years. Sir Charles Lyellt concluded that ' the aver-
age of one foot a year would be a much more probable conjecture' or
35,000 years. American geologists of later years have, also, variously
read this chronometer, some deducing a period of time for the erosion
as low as 7000 years, while Professor James W. Spencer in 1894,
sums up the time necessary for this stupendous work of water at 32,000
j-ears. In this estimation it is necessary to take into account different
facts and agencies once potent, but not now apparent in the local
stud\'. There was far more moisture in the air and the ground, for-
merly than now, and then for a long period (estimated by Professor
Spencer at over 17,000 years) the upper lakes were drained through
Georgian Bay and the French River to the Ottawa and St. Lawrence,
and onl}' about three-elevenths of their water passed through Lake
Erie and over Niagara Falls. It is, also, probable that more water
passed over the Falls during the Champlain periodll than at present.
And again, little of definite evidence has been obtained regarding the
extent of the preglacial erosions above the occluded whirlpool channel
and their effect on the present erosions. In this connection it is inter-
esting to note that N. H. Winchell's studies of the post glacial erosion
of the Falls of St. Anthony, Minnesota, have led him to the opinion
that it has required a period of 8000 years for the results there shown.
The Ohio River is a preglacial stream, with its present bed at least one
hundred and fifty feet above its preglacial bed, the channel having
been much filled during the glacial period and since then eroded, in a
somewhat wandering course to the present level. The trough of the
Ohio River affords interesting opportunity for further study in this
inquiry, and in fluvial history. S

* Manual of Geology. 2nd edition, 1875. pane 591. Dr. Dana, in his last (4th) edition, 1896, con-
tents himself with quotinK the deductions of later ceoloirists, and inclining to lower estimates than
formerly.

t Travels in North America, vol. i, pace 32; vol. ii, pace 93; Principles of Geology, vol. i, page
358.

II See Geological Chart, facing page 7.
% See Geological Survey of Ohio. vol. ii, page 13.

A writer in McClure's Magazine for .August, 190', vol. xvii, page 304, estimates the age of tho
earth in vears, counting from the surface downward so far as known, as follows :
• Recent, Post Glacial, and Glacial . 500.000

Pliocene, Miocene, Eocene .... 2.8tX*,000

Chalk, Jura, Trias 14,300.000 (Continued on

Permian, Cambrian, Laurentian . . 100,000,000 page 55.)

BENEFICIAL EFFECTS OF THE GLACIERS. 33

It is to the Glaciation and the Drift or Glacial Till that this Basin,
in common with other glaciated regions, is indebted for its admirable
topography, from an agricultural and commercial standpoint, and for
its variety of fertile soils. Its study in connection with unglaciated
regions will place this highly favored Basin in pleasing contrast. The
more uneven parts of Southeastern Ohio and contiguous parts of West
Virginia, Kentucky and Pennsylvania, that are south of the glaciers'
course, although interesting in their relation to this subject, do not
afford, in their additional geologic strata and their relation to the Appa-
lachian chains of mountains, good illustrations of the topography that
would now be exhibited in this region but for the mountains of ice that
were moved over it. There is a limited unglaciated area embracing the
northwestern part of Illinois, the northeastern part of Iowa, and the
southeastern part of Minnesota, which presents in comparison with
contiguous and other glaciated regions of these States, excellent illus-
trations of the great benefit now being derived from the results of the
glaciers. Notwithstanding the fact that the ice passed around the cor-
ners of the three States here mentioned, an area of several hundred
square miles in extent, and for several hundred miles beyond it,
there are no well marked evidences of glaciation within its borders, nor
of till, to obscure the contrast with other parts of those States; but it
did receive a flow of loess or porous clay rich in carbonate of lime,
from one of the later sheets of ice drift thus being modified, and im-
proved, by the near passing of the glacier.

Although the diggings and borings through the Till with careful
notings, have not been numerous enough thus far to demonstrate the
system of preglacial drainage, it is probable that this Basin, being the
first of its vicinity elevated above the sea and therefore the oldest on
the surface in its preglacial history, became deeply and sharply chan-
neled in the rock by the larger streams, and latterall}' by their tribu-
taries. Gorges of great breadth and depth must have abounded in the
rock beside multitudinous and diverse inequalities from the unequal
decomposition and wear of the layers of varied and varying degrees of
hardness of the rocks, by the rains, the drouths, the sun, the freezings,
the thawings and by the floods. There were not only rugged cliffs
abutting the streams and their vallevs, but narrow gorges, isolated high

Still greater length of time has elapsed, in the estimation of others. See McClure's Magazine for
I October. 1900. vol. xv, page 514.

"On the contrary, the present tendency both among astronomers and geologists, is to diminish
estimates of geological time in almost every period. The hundreds of millions of years claimed not
long ago as necessary for the deposition and metamorphism of geological strata, and for the elevating and
eroding forces to produce the present contour of the earth's surface have on geological evidence, been
reduced to much more moderate limits. Thirty million years is now shown to be ample for the deposi.
tion. by forces still in operation, of all the sedimentary strata of which we have knowledge." The Icq
Age of North America, by G. F. Wright. D. Appleton & Co., .Srd ed. page 449,

THE MAUMEE RIVER BASIN.

points of harder rock, and a general ruggedness throughout the entire
surface. The comparative short time that has elapsed since the melt-
ing of the last glacier has sufficed for our sluggish streams to erode
considerable valleys through the Glacial Drift, and, in many places,
through the shale and several feet into the rock. The far greater
length of the preglacial time during which the rocks were probably ex-
posed to the changes mentioned above, must have resulted in producing
a topography rougher than our imaginations can well portray it. Trav-
eling" across such an irregularly eroded region, if possible, would be

Glaciated Granite Boulders in ilicll channel of Mamnee River, south part of Section :il', Noble
Township, Defiance County, Ohio. Looking eastward, IHth October, 1901. This reyion, and the low
channel half a mile below, afford the best display of such boulders in tlie lart;er streams of the Maumee
River Basin. Small and more or less polished pieces are found alontr all streams.

attended with at least many difficulties and inconveniences. Tlie way
would be verv tortuous and exhausting from man}- descendings and as-
cendings, and with many bridgings of chasms. Cultivation of the soil,
where possible, would be in restricted areas, uncertain on account of
the drouths, and laborious to prevent undue washings of the soil in wet
seasons. The glaciers were like huge planes in their effects, leveling '
the high points, pushing everything breakable and movable before
them, or crushing, grinding and triturating all between the basic rocks
and the ice floors studded with granitic and softer rocks, and leaving
all the old channels filled that were not otherwise obliterated. Here

THE GLACIAL DRIFT DEPOSITS OR TILL.

was the comminuting and commingling processes of the different rocks
— of the argillaceous, the limestones, the feldspars of the granites
with, generally, just enough of their silica to preserve the good degree
of congruitv that distinguishes much of the inexhaustible soil of this

Basm. 1113275

During the melting of the glaciers and the deposition of the Drift,
the effect of water was great upon the superglacial and englacial Till ;
and the subglacial was more or less washed and reasserted in the loca-
tions of subglacial streams of water. Above the First Beach, west

Looking do^vn the Auylaize River in Jackson Township. Putnam County, Oliio, :28tli May. 19lt2, in
low stage of water. The Corniferous Limestone Boulder seen beyond the boat is the largest seen in
the river channels of the Basin. Before it was drilled and blasted into three pieces a few years ai,'0.
its height above the ground was fifteen feet.

and northwest particularly, Erie Clay still lies in undulations, un-
changed only by subsecjuent natural washings, showing that the
Maumee Glacial Lake, if it really covered this region following the
subsidence of the glacier, must have soon receded to the First Beach,
a distance in some places of twenty miles with a fall of about two
hundred feet. The glacial deposits within the beach lines were sub-
jected to great and continued washings by which there was much of
sortings, rearrangings and levelings of the inequalities. The present
surface is largely independent of the underlying native rock surface,
which is of itself irregular and the thickness of the Drift varying from

36 THE MAUMEE RIVER BASIN.

nothing to 550 feet, varies both from irregularity of its deposition and
irregularity of its sulisequent washings. The chief constituent of the
Drift is a finely laminated clay, the Erie Clay of the earlier geologists,
containing generally more or less sand, gravel and boulders. The
latter are of various kinds and sizes up to twenty feet in diameter,
many of them being smoothed on one side and showing straight and
nearlv parallel scratches received from their fellows during the move-
ments of the glaciers. The channels of the larger rivers afford the
best exhibition of these boulders, though some fields contain occasional
outcroppings of them. The Drift or Till is best seen, for study of its
irregularlv stratified and specially washed conditions, in the precipitous
banks of the rivers and in the deeper and more extensive cuttings for
private and public works. Examination of a goodly number of small
stones found in different later washings and in different parts of the Till,
leads to the conclusion that the Laurentian rocks ( metamorjihic rocks,
those intruded or foreign to Ohio in their origin and brought by the
glaciers) are most numerous in the upper portions of the Drift, and the
sedimentary rocks (of the character of those native to this Basin) pre-
dominate in the lower portions, while the middle portion exhibits a
more even division of both kinds.'

Flowing water is the best of separators. Wave action sejiarated
the sand and cast much of it upon the shores of the glacial lakes and
ba\s. The finer material of the Drift, generally free from sand and
much of it known as Lacustrine Clay, settled to the bottom and now
forms the level country between the ridges or lake and bay beaches.

Another form of clay, more delicately assorted, is found in defined
areas, of considerable extent. Its character is attractive on account of
its smooth and unctious surface when cut with a sharp instrument; its
compactness, being susceptible of a glass-like polish; its great tenacity
when wet to a certain consistency ; and its impalpableness, being suit-
able as a fine polishing agent. Its color is generally light gray, dark-
ening a little on exposure to the air. This is of the finest comminutions
of the glacial grindings. Its chemic composition is quite like that of
the coarser sediment above mentioned, viz: Silica 37.32 per cent;
Alumina 29.85; Calcium carbonate 15.00; Combined water 11.47;
Ferric oxid 4.52; and Magnesium carbonate 1.84 per cent. (Dryer).

The Till, or Drift in general, is often peculiar in its arrangement,

* The erratic stones, or those brought from a trreat distance from the north and east by the glaciers
and distributed here, are denominated chlorite schist, 'inartzite ( of which there are white, gray and
flesh colored), Kneiss (in color eray to pink, with less mica than hornblende \ and greenstone. Those
belonging to the Ohio column of rocks have been detached from the upper layers, including the Ohio
Shale with varying size nodules of crude iron pyrites, or iron sulphid, Corniferous Limestone with some
chert or impure flint, Waterlime near and below its exposures, and some Sylvania Sandstone near the
Michigan line in Lucas County, Ohio. See Geologic Chart, pag-e 7.

MORAINES. LATERAL. INTERLOBATE AND TERMINAL. 57

affording cause for several tfieories regarding tfie mode of its deposi-
tion, none of which is entirely satisfactory to all geologists.

Several haltings of the Maumee-Wabash (lobe of the last) Glacier
are marked by Moraines within, bordering on, and near to the southern
and western sides of this Basin. These several Moraines were probably
each deposited by the glacier, not altogether in its advance movement
but when arrested in its recession by melting by a return for a time of
the glacial climate. This being the opinion, they will be mentioned in
the order of their formation from the west towards the east. The
Mississinewa Moraine lies along the right ( north ) bank of the river of
like name, and the Salamonie Moraine along the right bank of the
river of its name. North of the Wabash River these two moraines are

Luokint; soulh of west, 8th June, 1902. across the Valleys of Little River and of the Wabash one-
half mile above their junction, from the slope of the Wabash Aboite Moraine to the Salamonie Moraine,
See Map, pa^ie '2H. This was the great early drainakre channel of the Maumee Glacial Lake.

intimately blended with a moraine of the Saginaw Glacial Lobe, thus
exhibiting a confused Interlobate Moraine. The culmination of this
impingement and blending is seen at the head of James Lake in
Jamestown Township, Steuben County, Indiana, and eastward there-
from for twenty miles. The United States surveying corps erected a
column near the northeastern angle of this high point, the ground
having an altitude here of 114L5 feet above the sea — it being about
the highest point in Indiana; and northeast in Hillsdale Countv, Mich-
igan, near Reading, is the highest point in the lower peninsula of
Michigan. The Grass Lake region to the west of these points is
thought to mark the boundary between the Mississinewa and the Sag-
inaw Moraines, but no distinctness exists. The western slope of this
Interlobate Moraine drains into the St. Joseph River of Lake Michigan,
and the eastern slope north of Allen County, Indiana, drains into the

THE MAUMEE RIVER BASIN.

St. Joseph River of the Maumee Basin. The next moraine to the
eastward is the Wabash-Aboite Moraine, lying along the north (right)
bank of the headwaters of the Wabash 'River and, from St. Marys,
Ohio, northwestward, forming the southwestern boundary of the
Maumee River Basin. North of Fort Wayne this moraine lies west of
the St. Joseph River into which it drains. The most prominent parts
of the Wabash-Aboite Moraine are near the line between Hillsdale and
Branch Counties, Michigan, and the two tiers of the eastern townships

The Crest of Moraine dividing the Headwaters of llie River St. Joseph of the Maumee from those
of the St. Joseph of Lake Michit'an, between Hillsdale Cit,v and Bankers Villat-e. Michiiian, Lookjnii
soiitltwest, 6th June, 1902. In addition to the Stone Fence alone the Public Hiyhway in tlie foretiround.
two others are seen dividint; the fields in the distance. These fences are composed of t'ranite boulders
fathered from the Glacial Till here. A small section of country here and another in Steuben County.
Indiana, are the only parts of this Basin where such Stones can be found in sufficient quantities for
fences.

of Steuben County, Indiana. The irregularity and variety of the
physical features of these chief morainic regions invest them with much
of beauty and charm. The numerous lakes — over one hundred on the
map of Steuben County alone — varying in size, depth and setting, and
abounding with fish of good quality, often with good bottoms for bath-
ing, with pure atmosphere and wholesome material surroundings,
make this otherwise interesting morainic region a healthful and choice
summer resort which will become more and more appreciated as the
years go by.

FORMATION AND OBLITERATION OF GLACIAL LAKES. 39

These lakes resulted from the irregular depositions of the glacial
clay till, leaving ridges and depressions. Where the till or wash was
of a gravelly or sandy character, permitting the waters of wet season
to percolate, the depressions are dry. Occasionally kettle holes' or
drv, round holes are seen."^ One th<*ory of their formation is the
grounding of clear icebergs or fragments of the glacier, and the wash-
ing" and forming of the gravel and sand around them to so remain
after the melting of the ice. The obliteration of glacial ponds and
lakes of clav or non-leaking bottoms bv washings, bv the encroachmt'nt

ll.

^^mm^^:^^

JSk^. .„_

r^^tijMiii

- " 1. 1 .•■ •■■' ■■ ■" '.'',■■■

L. -'^-i-^^

-' .1

lEUH^HHH^^^BK.

A Vicnv of Commingled Moraines June tUli, 11HI2, lonkinn noitli in the nnrtluvest ]iat t nf \'o[-k Tuwn-
sliip, Steuben County, Indiana. The tree at the Crest to the right of the Road, one and three-fourths
miles distant, is at Page Postofifice. beyond which the drainage is into the River St. Joseph of Lake
Michigan.

and decay of vegetation and the formation of peat, with other of
Nature's accumulations, is a subject of interesting study. The moraines
}'et afford many instructive illustrations of Nature's ways of forming,
and reforming, such features of the earth. The last stage of such lakes
is often a cranberry marsh or a tamarack swamp. The areas of differ-
ent lakes are now undergoing the final stages of transformation into
excellent farms in Farmer and Milford Townships, Defiance Countv,
Ohio. In some of these small lakes of great depth, a great length of

* Kettle holes may yet be seen in the St. Joseph Moraine, particularly in the southwestern part of
Williams County. Ohio.

THE MAUMEE RIVER BASIN.

time is necessary for the solidifying by nature's process of the deep
strata of the filling. The companies building railways over and along
these moraines have encountered 'sink holes' which required great
quantities of gravel and earth to be deposited for the necessary stability
of the tracks. The builders of the Baltimore & Ohio Railway through
Eastern Indiana, met with such difficulty in 1873, those of the Wabash
Railway near Montpelier, Ohio, in 1901, and the other companies were
anno}'ed more or less at the time of their building. It has even been
thought necessary to change the line and build on one side of the
sink hole.'

The first moraine fully within this Basin, and which has been
probabh' improperly called the Terminal Moraine, is the St. Mary-

Clear Lake, Clear Lake Townsliip. Steuben County, Indiana. Looking north of west 6th June,
1902, in the rain. There are summer hotels on the Commin^jled Moraine of the distant shore.

St. Joseph Moraine, lying along the right (north) bank of the River St.
Mary, and along the left (south) bank of the River St. Joseph. In
Hillsdale, and part of Lenawee County, Michigan, it is blended with
the Saginaw Moraine before mentioned, and forms the beginning of the
Interlobate Moraine that increases in volume to the southwestward.*
The next moraine to the east is the Defiance Moraine with northern
point near Adrian, Michigan, curving southwestward and forming the
eastern side of the Valley of the Tiffin River. It is cut through at the
apex of its curve by the Maumee River three miles below Defiance,
and thence curves southeastward forming the east valley of the lower
Auglaize River and, eastward, the north valley of the Blanchard River.

* For a more detailed description of these moraines see Dr. Charles R. Dryer's survey in the
ixteenth Report of Indiana Geology, page 119 e(. set;.

THE GRADUAL SLO PINGS OF THE MORAINES.

All of these moraines are nearly ^parallel, and much curved with the
concave sides to the eastward, facing the direction of the advent and
departure of the glacier. At the northern inlets of Maumee Bay, in
the northern part of the Basin, is the point of a small moraine extend-
ing northward, being parallel outside the Basin to a like moraine.
Reference to figures on the map on page 'IH will show the altitudes of
these moraines, and of many of the intervening parts. The highest
point is 568 feet above Lake Erie at a distance from Maumee Bay of

Hamilton ( Fish ) Lake, Olsetio Township, Steuben County, Indiana. Looking northwest from
top of tobocEan slide at Cold Sprintr. early and wet mornint- 7th June. 1902. Moraine on distant shore.

75 miles in direct line; but the draina.ge waters of this high point flow
three times this distance or more. The approach to the moraines is of
such gradual ascent that they scarcely impress the traveler — in fact
the average traveler crosses and recrosses the moraines within the
Basin without thought of the elevation or, at most, of there being but
'a slight ridge.' The crest of the several moraines vary materially- in
their width. A popular public road 'the evolution of an early trail
through the forest) still winds along the crest of the Defiance Moraine
for much of its exteqt, both north and south of the Maumee River, and
is commonh' known as the North and the South Ridge Road. In

THE MAUMEE RIVER BASIN.

places along this crest the ground declines perceptibly from both sides
of the narrow roadway, but in most of its course the travelers' view is
over a level country.' A continuous series of undulations, of very
moderate variation in altitude, exist in the St. Joseph Moraine and
still higher on the watershed west of the St. Joseph River, and to
lesser heights in other moraines within the Basin; but the inequalities
are more marked to the northwest just without these limits. The soil
of these moraines is very fertile. It is generallv of sandy loam, and
quick to res]iond to the worthy husbandman's efforts with bounteous

Luokim; south at Bankers, Cambria Townshiu Hillsdale County. Miciiiuan. Jnne tl, I'.Xli. Bit; Bear
Lake, one of the sources of the River St. Joseph. cHmpsed in the distance. The middle ground shows
vegetation that is fast encroachine upon and tiHini. in the upper part of this lake. The greatest altitude
in lower Michigan is but a few miles to the rifht.

returns. It is of a good degree of thickness, easy to cultivate, not
prone to wash away and, on account of the favorable subsoil, it never
misses a crop. In wet seasons the surplus water readily disperses,
largely through the subsoil, and in seasons of drouth the ground water
is well attracted to the needs of vegetation. Proper underdraining and
tilling are rapidly producing these favorable and certain results in the
more distinctive clay soils of all levels.

There are, further, some ridge and mound formations bv the last
glacier, or deposited in and by its crevicing or its supra or sub-water-

RIDGES OF EARTH. ESKARS AND KAMES.

ways, called osars or eskars, and kames.''' A numbt-r of these interest-
ing formations are found on the westerly part of the St. Mary Moraine
and near its southwestern border. The first eskar to be mentioned
forms the western wall of the Six-Mile Creek Gap in Section l."i, Adams
Township, Allen County, Indiana.! It is composed of gravel in anti-
clin?.l stratification, is 20 feet high, about 330 feet wide, and half a mile
long. An eskar and kame are situated on the crest of the St. Marv
Moraine in the eastern part of the City of Fort Wayne. The eskar
was a broad, sandy ridge extending from the east line of Section 7,
Adams Township, westward one and- a quarter miles. The freight
yards of the Penns^'lvania Railroad occupy a leveled portion of it.
The kame is just west of this point and rises conically to a height of
30 feet. A little to the north of this eskar, and parallel with it, is

Lony Lake. lookiriL' north of oa^^t tioin Cioar Lake Township. Steuben (.ount.v, Indiana, to the
Michigan shore, Hillsdale County. 0th June. ]9<>3. This lake is near the highest altitude in these two

another of symmetrical form and one-fourth mile in length. Another
extends from near the crossing of the River St. Mary by the N. Y., C.
& St. L. Railwa\- (the 'Nickel Plate'.) to the southward one and one-
half miles as a massive ridge. It has been much excavated as a gravel
supply. Another rises 30 feet as the west river bank and curves and
branches irregularly across the Allen Countv Infirmary farm to the

"^ There has been much confusion in tiie use of these names, and mucn discussion recardint: the
process of formation of the prominences thus named. Qsar is the old European name for ridges of
gravel and sand of varying lengths that cannot be attributed to the action wholly of the ice, or to the
action of running water without aid similar to that a glacier might afford, nor to the wave action of
a lake. Eskar is the term latterly used by geologists to the displacement of osar. A mound or conical
prominence constructed by the glacial streams, generally in immediate relation to the edge of the
ice, is the later signification of the term kame.

t See account of the survey of Dr. Charles R. Dryer in the Sixteenth Report of Indiana Geology.
page 116.

THE MAUMEE RIVER BASIN.

southward, a mile in length. Several other eskars are discernible in
this vicinity; and associated with this series are several small island-
like prominences in the broad drainat^e channel of the Maumee Glacial
Lake through which the Wabash Railway, and electric cars, run south-
westward from P'ort Wayne. On the largest of these prominences,
known as Fox Island, is the most symmetrical and graceful eskar of
this system. It is curved like the letter S. in slighter degree, and
is three-c]uarters of a mile in length. It is 25 feet in height and its
sides are 'as steep as sand can be piled.'

t ir't "i llie St. Joseph Moraine. Looking; west in the west pai t of Hicksville Towiisliii). Ut-liance
County, Ohio. 30th October. 1902. Showing the Baltimore and Ohio Railway tracks as lowered durint;
the years 1900-01-02. A very fertile country.

A very interesting serpentine eskar is situated in Highland Town-
ship, Defiance County, Ohio, six miles southeast of the City of Defiance
and one mile south of the hamlet of Ayersville. This is the most
extensive in the Basin. It is named Highland Eskar by the writer. It
was formed in part by direct deposit by the .glacier, and by the running
water in the melting glacier at the time the Defiance Moraine wa's laid ;
and it is now a much more prominent feature of the landscape than
anv part of the moraine in its vicinity, which has suffered materialh'
from washings.

When the Maumee Glacial Lake had receded to have the Defiance

HIGHLAND ESKAR AT MOUTH OF DEFIANCE BAY. 45

Moraine for its westurn and southern shore, the northwestern, western,
southwestern sides of the Highland Eskar were washed liy the Defiance
Bay, and its northeast side faced the connection of this Bay with the
Lake, it lieing a prominent island in other words, at the mouth of the
Bay. Its northern end lies one-fourth mile in the southwestern quar-
ter of Section 10, extending to the south line of this Section where
the public road rises to and follows its crest eastward and southward
for three-fourths mile across the northwest quarter of Section 15, and
the northeast quarter of Section 14, where it turns south and extends
one-half mile, and then turns southwest, ending beyond the south i^iart
of these Sections and along the line between them. Its length is
about two miles. Its highest part is 35 to 40 feet in the northern third

m^--si^'

iM'l^^Si

|p^U

i-s^^,jr2#5

^'^^1

•^

fi^^^^J

^smiw^Bsami

Mf! '^: . -^ \\k

■'Wm

^^^^

■ ■ ""^^iifflii'?

'^.fi

--.1 - ' ■ "'1 J

m..^^

^^M

-aoi'iwSiiF*

.^^

Hii

itf^^H

■'i

■^Bl

Bwmij

Defiance Moraine Glen, in north bank of the Mauniee Water Gap. thruu niilcc, ca^t*ul tliu .City of
Defiance, lookint; north, 15th October, 1901.

of its length. It is generally narrow in body, and ridge, so narrow in
places that there is just width enough for the public road tliat winds
along its ridge the entire extent, excepting the north one-fourth mile.
There are six farm residences, with the other usual farm buildings,
occupied by old settlers or their descendants, along the crest of High-
land Eskar; also a Freewill Baptist church building with its churchyard
cemetery. The base of this eskar is composed of clay to varying
heights above the level surrounding country overlain with gravel, and
then with sandy loam of great fertility, affording the best of gardens and
small orchards on its crest and sides. Wells have been made on its
sides near the base and supply good water at a depth of 12 to 14 feet ;
and at its northern end there is a spring of excellent water which is not
exhausted in dry seasons. Excavations on this eskar have brought to
view parts of trees and other vegetation that quickly crumbled to dust

THE MAUMEE RIVER BASIN.

on exposure to the air, evidencing;' their burial in tlu- remote past,
probably at the time of the formation of the eskar. The views from
the crest of this eskar in all directions are over well-tilled and highly
fertile farms, bri};htened with comfortable homes, on the 'elm' lands
that were formerly the bottom of the Maumee Glacial Lake, and later,

Map of Hiphland Eskar in the Mouth of Defiance Glacial Bay at the Ancient Water Gap in the
Defiance Moraine, six miles southeast of the City of Defiance. The squares are Land Sections, each
one mile square, in northeast Hiiihland Township. The dots mark the situation of houses.

of Defiance Bay, from the waters of which the rich soil was deposited.
Thus, in the ideal topography of this Maumee River Basin, and in
the due admixture of the best of soil ingredients, so commingled and
conditioned in its Drift as to retain their vitality' from dissii)ation by
undue oxidation, washing, or leeching, do we realize the beneficent
results of its Glaciation.

The Hichland Eskar in northeast Hiiihland Township. Defiance County. Ohio. Looking south
26th October, 1901.

EVIDENCES OF PREHISTORIC MAN. 47

CHAPTER III.

Evidences of Prehisthrh' Man — the Aborigines as First Seen.

The American or WustL-rn Continent has been designated by good
authority* as the oldest of continents: and the aboriginal man in
America has been classed among the Mongoloids, or earliest of people,
antedating Adam.T

There have been many speculations and theories regarding the
length of time that man has existed. The earliest Stone Age in
Europe has been recorded + as beginning probably more than 1(10,000
years in the past, and juThaps many hundred thousand years.
Other writers regard the beginning of the first Stone .A.ge as probably
not earlier than 4400 to ."lOOO years ago, but admit that man probably
existed prior to that time and left no evidence of his handiwork.

The existence of man before, or during the Glacial Period, has been
quite well established in the opinion of many scientists, both by the
discovery of his fossilized bones and of stone implements of his shap-
ing buried in the Glacial Drift. It is very seldom that fossilized bones
of any animal are found notwithstanding the myriads of mankind, and
of larger lower animals that have existed through the multiple ages.
This is not strange when the facility of their destruction, and the
exacting conditions of Nature for their preservation, are considered. §

• Louis Agassiz in the Atlantic Monthly, vol. \i, pace :)73 ; Geological Sketches, page 1.

t Preadamites. by Professor Alexander VVinchell. LL. D., paj:es 66, 304.

t Haeckel's Natuerliche Schoep ungsgeschichte. pane 595. Preadamites. 431.

SThe process of fossilization, or chancinc to stone, consists in the replacement and solidification of
each cell with minute particles of calcium or silica which are held in solution by the water coverinc the
bones. This process is one of Nature's very slow, delicate, and all-exactinc methods of preserving the
oreanic form while replacing or modifying the organic structure of very hard tissues. Soft tissues can-
not become petrified on account of their ready putrefaction.

Casts of the human form are sometimes made by the body being rapidly encased in fine lava or
inaterial that readily adapts itself to the form and quickly hardens. A mold is thus formed which may
become filled by a semifluid that will harden. Casts have thus been made in the oldest molds found —
those at Pompeii of persons, and dogs, overwhelmed by the volcanic eruption of Mount Vesuvius in
A. D. 49.

Also in favoring conditions of temperature, moisture and ingredients, the soft parts of an animal
body may become changed to adipocere iadeps. fat, and cere, wax), or ammonia margarate. An occa-
sional human body, exhumed after a few score years for burial elsewhere, has been found in this con-
dition—the most notable instances being at the Cemetery of the Innocents. Paris, in 1786-87. and later
in New York City, the College of Physicians and Surgeons of that city yet possessing the body. There
is, also, a later specimen of this character in the Wistar Museum of Comparative Anatomy of the Uni-
versity of Pennsylvania, Philadelphia. These specimens, however, possess nothing of stony hardness
and are crumbling. Comparatively few fossilized bones have been found, which proves that even the
hardest parts of mankind and the lower animals generally return to their native elements with great
facility.

48 THE MAUMEE RIVER BASIN.

The most important discoveries vet made of this character are as
follows: A human skull found in a cave at Engis near Liege, Bel-
gium, in 1833, and a like skull found in iS'iT by workmen in a lime-
stone quarrv in the valley of the Neander"^ a small stream near Diissel-
dorf, Germany, which have become known as the Engis and the
Neanderthal skulls.

Part of a human skull was found in February, 1866, in gold-bearing-
gravel in Sonora Table Mountain, Calaveras County, California; and it
is thereby known to archaeologists as the Calaveras Skull. Other
human bones, and stone implements chipped by man, were also
found in this deposit of gravel which Prof. Josiah D. Whitney classed
in the Pliocene of the Tertiary age.t Some of the geologists of the
United States Survey, however, have classed these gravels in the
Quarternary Period.

Other ancient remains have been recorded in this species of evi-
dence in different countries, including different parts of America: but it
should be admitted that most of them have not well withstood the tests
of scientific investigation. Human footprints have, also, been found
indelibh- impressed and hardened in Post- Pliocene stratum, one of the
most noted being found in Nicaragua. +

The most numerous, and the most probable of the evidences thus
far discovered of man's existence in the Glacial Period, however, are
stone implements that were moved and covered by a glacier. The
observing and persevering archaeologist, M. Boucher de Perthes, dis-
covered during the years 1841 and subsecjuently, chipped stones which
were evidently shaped by man for cutting purposes. These rude
knives were found in glacial gravel which had apparentl\' remained
undisturbed since the ice placed it on a high terrace in the valley of
the River Somme at Abbeville, North France. The sciences of
geology and anthropology were then in their infancy, and the branch
archasolog\' had then hardly a beginning.

Account of these implements and of the depths at which they were
found, were published by their discoverer in 1847, and additional
accounts of the discoveries by his iiu])il. Doctor Regillot, of Amiens,
were soon thereafter given to scientists : but it was not until 1858-59
that other French and English geologists visited this locality and
became convinced of the jirobablx' true character of the implements
and of the stratum in which they were found. This conjoined inves-
tigation and discussion led to a more enlightened search and to addi-
tional discoveries elsewhere. Peculiar stones that had been found in

* See Dr. Schwalbe's lecture mentioned in the American Review of Reviews. Jan. 1904, p. 111.
t Memoirs of the Museum of Comparative Zoology, of Harvard University, vol. vi.
i American Philosophical Society's Proceedings, xxiv. 1887, page 4:^7.

EVIDENCES OF EARLIER MAN JN OHIO. 49

England in the iHth century and preserved with the bones of an extinct
species of elephant were, upon reconsideration, declared to be palaeo-
lithic, or palanthropic, or shaped by man in the earliest Stone Age.

In April, 1873, Dr. Charles C. Abbot discovered similarly formed
knives in the glacial gravel at Trenton, New Jersey,* and later finds
in the same jilace have been j)ublished by him and by others. t The
correctness of the published deductions regarding the age of these
implements has been doubted, however, hv different writers. +

The first evidence thought to be decisive of the presence of man
in Ohio previous to, or during the Ice Age, was found in October, 1885,
by Dr. Charles L. Metz, at Madisonville, eight feet below the surface
in the gravel of the Little Miami River Valley one mile back from the
river terrace. This find is a crudely shaped black-fiint knife about the
size and form of one of the same material found at Trenton, above
mentioned. Doctor Metz found another knife in b^HT, thirty feet below
the surface in coarser undisturbed gravel one-fourth mile from the river
at Loveland, Ohio, twenty-five miles above Madisonville. Petrified
bones of a mastodon were also found in the immediate vicinity : and
the contiguity of similar fossils and relics m othir localities are con-
sidered in favor of the validity of the evidence that man existed in the
same geologic era as the mastodon.

In 189(3 a grooved axe was found by a well digger near New
London, Huron County, Ohio, twenty-two feet below the surface of
the ground, under thirteen feet of tough cla\'.§

Since the year 1887, numerous other like implements have been
found in Ohio and other States under conditions thought b\' their dis-
coverers to be Well authenticated for their great antiquity, even beyond
the Ice Age. Great care is necessary, however, that articles of later
prehistoric times, and even those chipped and artificiallj; ' weathered '
in the present generation, be not sold, and recorded, by imposters and
incompetent judges, to the confusion of legitimate and commendable
efforts. Careful and well-attested description of the conditions sur-
rounding every implement of unusual character found should be sent

* The American Naturalist, vol. \ii. pace "204 ; vol. x. paue 329. Winsor vol. i, patie 38:1

t Tenth Annual Report of the Trustees of the Psabody Museum of American Archaeology and
Ethnology, vol. ii. pat^e^ 3it. 22rt. Winsor's Narrative and Critical History of America, i, 834.

I See the American Journal of Anthropology 1^92 ; Science. November. 1H92 ; Journal of
Geology, 1893; The Meeting Place of Geology and History, 1894, wherein William H. Holmes and
Sir J. William Dawson claim that the evidence of age is not satisfactory from a geological point of
view, as the implements found at Trenton were not taken from undisturbed gravel, but from a talus of
loose debris ; and that they resemble the rougher tools and rejectamenta of the descendants of the
aborigines. The trustees of the Carnegie Institution made a grant of $20(X1 in 19t)3 to the Director of the
Bureau of .American Ethnology, Washington, for further investigation regarding the early history of man
in America. See Year Booli : also Science, December 2."), 1903,

Si See the American Geologist, November, 1896, and the Fifth Annual Report of the Ohio State
Academy of Science.

THE MAUMEE RIVER BASIN.

with the implement, to the nearest University possessing a well-ordered
department of archaeology, and every facility should be afforded the
chief of this department for his personal investigation.

There are in the writer's collection of prehistoric imjalements a
number of rudely chipped flint knives which exhibit on their surface
the evidence of great age,'^ and which are not unlike in appearance the
palaeoliths, or palanthrops, mentioned above. The accompanying
engraving shows one of them of medium size. They have been found
in different parts of the Maumee River Basin, some of them not widelv
separated from fossil remains of the mastodon : but the character of
their surroundings when found are not sufficiently attested to warrant
their classification as belonging to the Age of Ice.

Prehistoric Flint Knife, full i=ize. Found in the Maumee River Basin. It resembles some of the

' Palffioliths.' Author's Collection.

While excavating a tunnel into the loess of the Missouri River
Valle}' in February, 1902, near Lansing, Kansas, remains of two human
skeletons were found, one of which being better preserved is treasured
as of great archaeological value. Warren Upham, in the magazine
Records of the Past for September, 1902, vol. i, page 273, estimates
the age of this skeleton at 12,000 years, which he regards "as no more
than an eighth part of the whole duration of the Ice Age in its success-

* The degree of weathering or chanpe produced b.v time in flint, ordinary stones, or in any article
may and generally does depend upon the character of the article itself, the dryness, moisture, heat, cold'
lime, soda, sulphur, atmosphere, or other surroundings and conditions to which it has been subjected'
When conditions are favorable there may be little if any change, consequently the condition of an
article does not necessarily signify the time that has elapsed since it was shaped or used by man. The
character of the substance of the article itself, its form, the character of its surroundings and the proba-
ble changes that have occurred in them if any, should all be taken into the estimation.

REMAINS OF EARLIER MAN AND HIS WORKS. 51

ive Alberton, Aftonian, Kansan, Helvetian (or Buchanan), lowan and
Wisconsin stages. ... It can scarcely be so little as 10,000 years,
and may indeed, according to estimates by other glacialists for the date
of the lowan stage, have been even 20,000 years, or more. At the
most, it can be only a small fraction of the antiquity of man in Europe,
where he seems surely to have been coeval with the beginning of the
Ice Age." T. C. Chamberlin, in the American Journal of Geology
for October and November, 1902, accords this Lansing skeleton 'a very
respectable antiquity, but much short of the close of the glacial inva-
sion.' W. H. Holmes, in the American Anthropologist for October-
December, 1902, also ])laces these remains in the Post-Glacial Age. In
the April, 1903, Records of the Past, George Frederick Wright states
that "while the glacial age of this skeleton may, therefore, be confidently
accepted, it should be kept constantly in mind, for the relief of the
anthropologist, that there is increasing evidence that the closing stages
of the Glacial period in North America did not long precede that of
the high stages of civilization brought to light bv recent explorations
in Babylonia. Hilprecht and others would carry that date back to
9000 or 10,000 years, which would be within 3000 years of the date
assigned by Mr. Upham to the deposition of the lowan loess."*
In September, 1902, the engineers in charge of the construction
of the St. Louis Belt Railway, found a granite axe five inches long and
three and one-half inches wide, three-quarters grooved and well finished,
under fourteen feet of loess, a half mile northwest of Clayton, Missouri.
Cyrus A. Peterson, M. D., who describes and pictures this axe in the
Records of the Past for January, 1903, regards this discover}' as evi-
dence of the preglacial existence of man and his advancement in
handiwork.

Prehistoric Mounds of Earth.

Europeans, upon their advent into the Maumee River Basin, found
little beside the wandering Aborigines, the wild animals, and other pro-
ducts of Nature, to attract their attention, or to stimulate investigation.
As the years passed, bringing an ever increasing population and the
clearing of the forest, some persons there were who recognized in cer-
tain tumuli, or mounds, the work of a people of whom the Aborigines,
as seen at the beginning of the written records of the region, knew
nothing, even by tradition. These mounds of earth, a very few crude
articles sometimes found therein, and stone weapons, implements, and
ornaments, in use when the existing Aborigines were discovered by
Europeans, constitute all the works of man of a prehistoric character
that have been discovered in this region.

* See also proceedings of the Congress of Americanists. New York meeting, 1903 ; of the Amer-
ican Association for the Advancement of Science ; the Pooiiar S:/snC3 Monthly ioT March. 1903; ar.d
N. H. Winchell in the Bulletin of the Geological Society of America, 1903.

THE MAUMEE RIVER BASIN.

Different writers fiave estimated the number of prehistoric earth
mounds In Ohio at from ten to thirteen thousand. Probalily the
authentic number, great as it certainly is, is not so large as this.

By far the larger number of these mounds are situated in the
southern portion of the State. They were probably made for differ-
ent uses: for burials, for defense, and perhaps, for religious cere-
monies. Many are large and required great labor in their construction
which may have been performed by prisoners of war subjected to
slavery.

Earth mound in the Northwest Onarter ot Section iH, Uetiance 'rownship. (.)flen erroneously
called the work of Prehistoric people — The Mound Builders. Looking northeast across the valley of
the Maumee River, 35th October. 1901.

The number, and size, of similar mounds lessens materially
toward the northern portion of Ohio ; and, probably, many of the
prominences in this Basin that have in later years been called the work
of man in the far distant past, are due wholly to natural agencies,
such as the glacial or subsequent deposits, or erosions of water.
The mounds, however, that are composed of different layers of earth
separated in a suggestive way from their kind, with ashes, charred
wood, etc., and with some anciently formed weapon or ornament of
stone, or fragment of ancient pottery, found in definite arrangement,
thus evidence their formation by mankind.

While the Basin of the Maumee River was probably not the head-

FEW MOUNDS IN THIS BASIN: THEIR BUILDERS. 53

quarters of so great a number of early peoples of somewhat sedentary
or settled habits as was the country to the south and southeast, it is
probable that the Maumee River and its larger tributaries were great
thoroughfares of travel by the prehistoric peoples, as they were by the
historic Aborigines from the time of the advent of the Europeans up to
the time of the removal of the last tribe to its western reservation in
1843. Some of those early people also here heaped the earth in low
conical mounds above the bodies of certain ones of their dead.

The fact that so few artificial mounds are now found in this Basin
is probal)h- due to several causes, among which may be mentioned the
sparse, or absence of, fixed population. This may have been due in
part to the dense forest and the general flatness of the country conducive
to great moisture and softness of the soil and to much of miasm and dis-
ease in dry seasons; second, to this region lieing often patrolled by the
Five Nations of the east, and its being the middle or enforced neutral
ground between the wilder tribes to the northward and the more peace-
ful or stronger, and consequently, more advanced people to the south-
ward who were represented here only by occasional wandering bands
that had few deaths and buried shallow from want of time, lapse of
inclination, or fear of desecrations by their foes; third, to man\' of the
smaller mounds, containing single or few bodies, becoming obliterated
by the natural forces, or the plows of the early white settlers; fourth,
to most of the bodies of those killed in battle, or dying of disease, not
being interred.

The belief has become quite general among archaeologists that the
Mound Builders were the ancestors of the Aborigines as seen by Euro-
peans, or of the Chereokee tribe particularly, and perhaps of the
Shawnees also, and that they were distinct from their descendants only
by their greater advancement toward civilization, they having had more
fixed haliitations which conserved their energy to the interdependent
study and practice of peaceful arts.

It can readily be imagined that the Mound Builders met defeat by
their distant cousins, the tribes to the northward who had remained in
wildness and savagery, surging down upon them, like a horde of rapa-
cious vandals that they were, and putting to death all who could not
flee from their merciless attacks ! This is the probable mode of their
vanquishment. Their complete overthrow, ejectment or captivity may
have been accomplished in one year, or it may have been the result of
repeated attacks through a series of years.

Southern Ohio and the Cumberland River Valley, Tennessee, are
among the regions containing the mounds and graves which have
thus far yielded hammered native copper, chased gorgets and other
ornaments that show the greatest advancement in handiwork of the

THE MAUMEE RIVER BASIN.

prehistoric people of the more Northern United States of this
meridian. '

Undoubtedly the number was increasing among them, who were
turning awa}' from the wandering and warring habits of their ancestors
to a more settled, peaceful and happier life, improving in handiwork
and trade in village, or in tilling the soil near by. Their numbers, and
the influence of their peaceful work, were extending northward ; but
there was not time allowed them to assume a firm and stable hold upon
Northern Ohio before the irresistibly fatal invasion swept them away
with all the evidences of their advancement excepting their fortresses
and burial mounds, and such articles as were preserved therein or were
lost on the surface to be covered for centuries and then to be turned up
by the plows, or like their relics in the mounds be excavated, by a
different and much further advanced people. The savage, victorious

Location of Prehistoric Mounds and Circles of Earth in Northern Ohio and Northeastern Indiana.

invaders constructed few, if any mounds, nor did they undertake so
much work as was necessary to destroy those of the vanquished.

The writer's record embraces something over fifty mounds and
earthworks in this Basin that can properly be classed as the work of
prehistoric man. Their situation is on high ground, in small groups
widely scattered.

About twenty mounds have been noted in DeKalb and Steuben
Counties, Indiana. Mastodon remains, some very large and complete,
have also been found in a half dozen places in DeKalb near some of
these mounds. In section 27, of Smithfield Township, the remains of a
Mastodon were found in good preservation at a depth of four feet in
blue clay, whereas such preserved bones are usually found in muck or
peat where the animal mired and met its death by asphyxiation or star-

* See The Antiquities of Tennessee and the Adjacent States, by Gates P. Thruston, 2nd
edition. Report on the Mound Explorations of the Bureau of Ethnology, by Cyrus Tliomas, Washing-
ton, 1894. Archaeological History of Ohio, by Gerard Fowke, Columbus. 1902.

PREHISTORIC MOUNDS AND THEIR CONTENTS.

vation. The mounds in this vicinity contained considerable charcoal.
In one near Waterloo the charcoal was several feet in thickness, and
covered the remains of twenty-five or more persons, whose bodies were
deposited irregularly as though hastily and indifferently.*

Nine mounds of earth have been reported in Allen County,
Indiana.! Four of these are on high land between Cedar and Willow
Creeks and near the Fort Wayne branch of the Lake Shore and Michi-
gan Southern Railway. Two are situate about forty feet apart in north
and south line, and the other two fifteen rods east about the same dis-
tance apart in east and west line. They were explored many years
ago and found to contain human remains, charcoal, something of
crudely hammered copper ornaments, and of the ordinary chipped flint
points. A large oblong mound exists four miles southward of the

Type-forms of Prehistoric Flint Knives (Nos. 1, 3), Arrow and Spear Points, Perforators (Nos. 17. 18).
and Scrapers (No. 16). They vary much in size. Of the 'Points' about 5tX)0 to 1 are beveled to the left,
as shown here in the tliick Number 11.

above named: and at Cedarville, near the St. Joseph River, are three
mounds about one hundred feet apart parallel with the river in north-
east line.

A single small mound existed on the east bank of the river about
four miles north of Fort Wayne, and this is the most southern part of
Allen County at which prehistoric earthworks have been determined.

Nine mounds have been determined on the high banks of the
Maumee River. Two of these mounds are in Indiana near the Ohio
line, four also on the south bank at Antwerp, Ohio, the first of which
is one mile west of this village, the second in the park within the cor-
poration, the third one-half mile, and the fourth one mile eastward.

A mound was found on the high south bank of the Maumee River,
a few rods west of the middle north and south line of Section twentv-

* See the Sixteenth Report of Indiana Geology, page 104.

t By Colonel Robert S. Robertson, reported in the History oj Allen County, and to the writer.

THE MAUMEE RIVER BASIN.

seven of Defiance Township, (nearh- a half mile above the present
Water Works pumping station) by Joshua Hilton, who purchased the
farm embracing this land in January, 1822. This mound was about
four feet above the surrounding land, about thirty feet in diameter, and
was covered with oak trees 18 to 20 inches in diameter. Mr. Hilton
and his son, Brice, who gave the writer this information, opened this
mound in the year 1^24. A small quantity of bony fragments were
found which readily crumbled between the fingers on being handled.
Human teeth were found, some of which were of large size. Some

Richt Bank of the Auylaize River. luokiIl^; iiortli, 19th September, 1901, from tlie southwest corner
of Section 3, Defiance Townsliip, Ohio, at tlie mouth of Garrnan Run. Low stat;e of water. The Glacial
Till somewliat stratified. To the riyht of the central distance a Prehistoric Burial Mound is beini,'
undermined by the high waters and freezings. This Mound formerly contained eijzlit liuman bodies in
sitting posture. The bones disintegrated some years ago.

dark stone gorgets were also found, about four by two inches in size,
pierced with slanting holes of ', goose-quill' size. This mound was
excavated and used as a cellar li\- the famil\-. the first house, built of
logs, being at convenient distance from it. The site of this mound
was undermined by the river manv vears ago.

The other two mounds along the Maumee were on the north bank
on the farm of Captain Clayton W. Everett, just above the line of the
City of Toledo. In leveling one of these mounds in the summer of

ARTIFICIAL MOUNDS BY THE AUGLAIZE RIVER. 57

1900, a bar or pick-shaped amulet, of dark, fine-grained slate, was
found which measures eighteen inches in length, the longest on record.
This has been deposited in the museum of the Ohio State Archaeological
and Historical Society, Columbus.

Along the Auglaize River, five mounds have been determined; two
in the western part of Putnam County, near Dupont, and three in Defi-
ance Township. One, situated on the high east bank near the south
line of Section 8, about four miles southwest of Defiance Court House,
is now nearly obliterated bv infringement of the public road and under-
mining by the river. ( See engraving. ) This mound was opened by
curious neighbors previous to 1870. Decaying bones of eight or ten
persons who had evidently been buried in sitting posture, were found
with charcoal.

A smaller mound, about two feet high and fourteen feet in diameter,
was situated on the high west bank of the Auglaize, near the middle
north and south line of Section 34, two and one-fourth miks southwest
of Defiance Court House. It was explored in the summer of lb78.
About six inches below the surface of the central part a circular group
of stones varying from two to five inches in diameter were found that
had been taken from the river channel near by. They rested u])on a
layer of clay two inches thick, like the surrounding land in quality,
which had been subjected to great heat while wet and was, conse-
quently, very hard and brick-like. Beneath this layer of clay was a
layer of ashes two inches thick, and eight or ten sticks of thoroughh-
charred wood about two feet long and two or more inches thick in their
largest parts. With the ashes were, also, bits of charred flesh and
small bones, perhaps of some animal, but the kind could not be deter-
mined, and small fragments of crude jiottery which easily crumbled.
Upon removing the ashes and about one foot of hardened earth, human
bones were found in an advanced stage of decomjiosition, consisting of
parts of the calvarium and long bones of one person, head lying a
little east of north. With these bones was found only one plain gorget
four inches long, one and three-eighths inches wide and one-half inch
thick, tapering" on the sides toward the ends, and with two holes one
and a half inches apart and equidistant from the ends. These holes
are of one-fourth inch diameter on one side and taper gradually and
smoothly to one-eight inch on the opposite side. The gorget is of Ohio
Shale such as is seen in the bed of the Auglaize River nearby. About
forty rods north, also on the high bank overlooking the river, was
another mound of like size and contents, excepting the gorget.

The only mound, however, that has been generally known and
talked about as the work of the Mound Builders near Defiance, has
been considered by the writer as a natural mound, caused bv erosions

THE MAUMEE RIVER BASIN.

of thf river around. It is situate toward the southeast side of Blodgett
Island (see ent;raving') eastward from the two mounds last described,
it being near the east line of Section thirty-four in Defiance' Township,
and a little north of the center of the south-east (|uarter of the Section,

Prehistoric Articles made and used by tlie Aborigines. Found daring later years in tlie Maumee
River Basin, and now in the .Author's Collection. Nos. 1 to 6, Fragments of Pottery; 7, Turtle shaped
Granite; 8, 10, Plumbet and Half-alobe of Haematite; 9, Double Discoid of Granite: 11 to 16, Tobacco
Pipes; 17, 18, Bird-form Amulets of Slate ; 19, 34, 2.5, 33, 34, Banner Stones of Slate; 31, 23, Awls of Deer
Bones; 33. 26. 27, 28, 30, Gorgets of Slate; 29, Pendant; 31, 32, Bar Amulets of Granite; 3,5, 36. ,S7, Wam-
pum of Shells; 3H, Part of Elk Horn used in Planting Corn; 39, Celt, 'Thunderbolt' or Tomahawk of
Granite; 40. Pestle and Rolling Pin, also 41, 44, Pestle and Stone Base (uncommon), for Cracking and
Grinding Corn; 42, Axe, K Grooved. Weight, &^ lbs., Length, 9'4 inches; 43, Axe, Full Grooved, for
twisting around Withe Hai^dle; 45, Ball for Games. The articles last named are of the hardest Granite,
and some of them show long time weathering.

and forty rods northwest of the present Cement Works. This mound,
in the summer of 189S, was thirty-five feet above the ordinary summer
level of the river, twenty-five above the land immediately to the south,

NATURAL MOUNDS ON AND NEAR BLODGETT ISLAND. 59

and twenty feet above that a few rods to the north. -It is somewhat
elliptical in outline, its longest diameter being a little north of east
bv south of West, and measures 55x40 feet from points midwav
from base to summit from which jioints the slopings are
gradual, below and abo\'e, being rather more abrujit on the
south side, against which the current strikes in high stages
of the river. This mound was covered with trees, the same as
parts of the island and the river banks in the vicinity, until the year
1874 when it, with the land around not then under culti\'ation, was

Blodcett Island in the Auglaize River, Defiance Townsliip. Looking west, 3nd November, liX)2. The
main branch of the River is by the distant trees. The lar^ie Monnd toward tlie rii;ht has been called [he
work of the Mound Builders, but it is of the same formation as the neij^hborin^i liigh places and is, prob-
ably, a natural monadnock like the peculiar triani^ular eminence at the mouth of Powell Creek a few
hundred feet to the left. This island is sixty acres in extent.

cleared, and the island was planted with corn. It has been regularlv
cultivated since, occasionally wheat being the croj), to the north ])ar-
ticularly. The plowing has been extended upward on the sides of the
mound each time and this and the washings of rain have materially
modified its outline. It was partially opened many years ago with
negative result. In 1895 the writer obtained permission from Adam
Wilhelm, for many years its owner, to excavate it; but in the winter it
was found that some persons had surreptitiously dug into its eastern

60 THE MAUMEE RIVER BASIN.

summit a hole six feet square to the depth of about eight feet. y\gain,
in the winter of 1897-98, an excavation was made by the same persons
two feet to the southwest of the other, eight feet square and to a depth
of ten feet or more. These oiK-nings were not seen by the writer until
heavy rains had washed their sides and caused much filling. The
ground material thrown out by these diggings was the same as that
composing the high banks of the river in the vicinity, with nothing of
the alluvium covering the other parts of the island.

This work of excavation was done bv ignorant persons with the
hope of finding material of commercial value, and, i^ossiblv the chest
of money which rumor many vears ago said was buried in this direction
from Defiance. The tradition of buried money has been perpetuated
in nearly every section of the country. In and about Defiance belief
in this tradition has been strong, and the desire for great gain has
induced many persons to dig into many prominences in field and woods
without regard for archaeological considerations.

At the eastern edge of the second glacial lake beach, on the head-
waters of Bad Creek, in Pike Township, ten miles northeast of Wau-
seon, Fulton County, Ohio, there were early discovered on the Howard
farm eleven mounds of small size, arranged in somewhat of circular
form. Nearly all of these mounds were dug into soon after their dis-
covery by persons actuated by curiosity, or the more serious desire for
articles of commercial value. A few human bones, some charcoal, and
a few (to the vandals) indifferent articles of flint and slate, were the
result of their work. In the year 1884, Judge William H. Handy, then
a resident of Wauseon, led an exploring party to these burial places,
with somewhat better results. They called several of them sacrificial
mounds on account of patches of earth, hardened by fire, which they
termed altars.

Such places of baked cla\' in the earth mounds of ancient people
were called altars by Squier and Davis, in the first volume of the Smith-
sonian publications. But, if they were altars, they do not necessarily
imply the custom of human sacrifice ; nor does the finding of charcoal
so generally in these mounds, imply cremation of their dead. Fire was
used in these places possibly as a funeral rite ; but these places were
probably used for camps in wet seasons, and the fire was used for heat-
ing and cooking ; also the smallest bones found thereabout are proba-
bly of the animals there eaten.

The finding in Tennessee of adult skeletons in stone graves too
small for the complete body, has been interpreted as reburials of the
bones after the flesh had disai>peared. Likewise skeletons of numerous
bodies, found in separated and promiscuous condition under ashes,
baked clay, charcoal, etc., with charred posts, leads to the inference

EXTINCT ANIMAL REMAINS: CIRCULAR EARTH RIDGES. 61

that the prehistoric people buried their dead under the floor of their
hut, like some of the later aborigines ; or had a charnel house, and
when for any cause a change of location was desired the}' burned the
house and sometimes threw u]) a mound over the remains.

Mastodon -\nii Opher Extinct Animal Remains.

The petrified remains of several mastodons have also been found
in Fulton County, the most complete and perfect being in York Town-
ship eight miles southeast of Wauseon. In the southeastern part of
the Basin like remains have been found as well as in the western part
before mentioned; also in Auglaize County, Ohio, parts of eight
mastodon skeletons have been found, and the remains of the giant
beaver, both of which animals were co-existent with man in the Mau-
mee River Basin following the subsidence of the glacial waters.

Pre-Histdric Circles anm Semi-Circi.es ok Earth Ridges.

Earth enclosures also abound In Ohio and in other States. In
form these vary from square to more or less octagonal and circular.
Their uses have been discussed as hill forts, geometrical enclosures,
as sacred and as defensive walls, forming partial enclosures. "^

Of circles, the writer has record of three in the Maumee River
Basin; also of four semi-circles. It is regretted that full and accurate
surveys were not made of these ancient earthworks before their obliter-
ation; but authentic data of their existence, situation and approximate
size, have been gathered by the writer from elderly persons residing
near, and from various other sources.

Beginning in the northwestern part of the Basin and following
down the streams, we note first, a circular ridge of earth on the
moraine in the northeastern and highest part of Smithfield Township,
DeKalb County, Indiana. The ridge is rather indefinite in part, with
indications of possibly two original openings, while in other places it is
yet near three feet in height. Its diameter is about 200 feet. Another
circle is situate about four miles northeast of Hamilton, Steuben
County, in Richland Townshi]i. It is locally known as the Mystic
Circle, is 68 yards in diameter, and averages between three and four
feet in height with a breadth of 12 feet at the base of the earth wall or
ridge. Both of these circular earthworks show an entrance opening of
12 to 14 feet wide, a little west of south. Many large trees are grow-
ing in and around both these circles.

The third circular earthwork, now nearly obliterated bv cultivation

* For a full discussion of Prehistoric Mounds and Enclosures, see the Twelfth Annual Report of
the Bureau of Ethnology. Washincton. 1894. 4to, pages XLVIlI-l-742. Also Archaeological History of
Ohio, by the State Society, Columbus, 1902, etc.

THE MAUMEE RIVER BASIN.

of the land, was situated on the east (left) bank, in a bend of the River
St. Joseph, in the northern part of St. Joseph Township, Allen County,
Indiana.

A few miles below, on the west bank, 'opposite Antrap's mill,'
is a semi-circular ridge with opening" to the river. The earthwork is
about 600 feet in arc, and is \et about two feet high, with a well de-
fined ditch on the outside. Very large trees which have grown on
the embankment have fallen and gone to decay.' "'

Three semi-circular ridges of earth were found along the lower
Maumee River. The first was observed between the years 1837-46,
and the bookf from which the accompanying engraving is made, was
published in 1848 as the first volume of the Smithsonian Contributions

to knowledge. The description given at
that time reads that

This work is situated on the right bank of the
Maumee River, two miles above Toledo, in Wood
Count)', Ohio. The water of the river is here deep
and still, and of the lake level ; the bluff is about .3.5
feet high. Since the work was built, the current has
undermined a portion, and parts of the embankment
are to be seen on the slips, a, a. The country for
miles in all directions is flat and wet, and is heavily
timbered, as is the space in and around this inclos-
ure. The walls, measuring from the bottoms of the
ditches, are from three to four feet high. They are
not of uniform dimensions throughout their e.\tent ;
and as there is no ditch elsewhere, it is presumable
that the work was abandoned before it was finished.
Nothing can be more plain than that most of the re-
mains in Northern Ohio are military works. There
have not yet been found any remnants of the timber
in the walls ; yet it is very safe to presume that
palisades were planted on them, and that wood posts and gates were erected at the pas-
sages left in the embankments and ditches. All the positions are contiguous to water ;
and there is no higher land in their vicinity from which they might in any degree be
commanded. Of the works bordering on the shore of Lake Erie, through the State of
Ohio, there are none but may have been intended for defense ; although in some of
them the design is not perfectly manifest. They form a line from Conneaut to Toledo,
at a distance of from three to five miles from the lake, and all stand upon or near the
principal rivers. . . . The most natural inference with respect to the northern
cordon of work is, that they formed a well-occupied line, constructed either to protect

f^fi'swn hu Col VJl.;nl«stu

Prehistoric Earthwork at Eayle Point,
near Toledo.

"•' The two last named earthworks were but l)riefiy mentioned by Col. Robert S. Robertson, of Fort
Wayne, in a contribution years atto to one of tlie newspapers (name and date not known to the writer) of
his city, with the title Prehistoric Remains. A clippin^i is preserved in his scrap book, now in pos-
sesion of the writer, who is further informed that no definite survey was inade of the enclosures or
mounds mentioned above.

^Ancient Monuments of the Mississippi Valley, hy E. GeoTue Squiei: and Dr. E. H. Davis, Wash-
ington, 1848.

PREHISTORIC SEMI-CIRCULAR FORT EARTHWORKS. 65

the advance of a nation landing from the lake and moving southward for conquest ; or,
a line of resistance for people inhabiting these shores and pressed upon by their southern
neighbors. The scarcity of mounds, the absence of pyramids of earth, which are so
common on the Ohio River, the want of rectangular or any other regular works at the
north — all these difterences tend to the conclusion that the northern part of Ohio was
inhabited by a distinct people.

The writer quoted above prepared a pamphlet later, which was
published for the Western Reserve Historical Society, descriptive of
this line of earthworks'^ showing the one here engraved as the most
westerly of the series.

About two miles below the above mentioned semi-circle, another
of similar form was later described. t It was situate also on the east
bank of the Maumee a little above the present Fassett Street Bridge
and back of the present Cincinnati, Hamilton, and Davton Railroad
Grain Elevator, in Toledo. When surveyed by Grove K. Gilbert
the ridge of earth was little less than two feet above the surface,
and ditches existed within and without. Its diameter was 387 feet,
its curve irregular as though its location had been influenced by
the position of trees. At one point, jsrobably the entrance, a
second short ridge e.xisted inside the principal one. The northern end
rested on the river bank a few yards south of the present Fassett
Street. When Elias Fassett settled at his present residence nearby,
previous to the year 1850, the site of this inclosure was covered with
large sugar maple trees. Not a vestige of this ancient earthenwork,
nor of the one above described, now remains. There are in the
vicinity of the site of the one last described two small streets named
Fort and Crescent, suggestive of its use and form.

The- last prehistoric earth-
work of this series remaining to
be described, was situated on the
south bank of Swan Creek, a few
squares altove its entrance into
the Maumee River. It included
the present crossing of Oliver and
Clayton Streets, Toledo, as shown
in the acconqianying engraving.!
At the time of its survey in
1>^71, it had been nearh' obliter-
ated by the gradin.g of the streets,
but was restored in this drawing
by aid of old citizens familiar

Prehistoric Earthwork in Toledo. ^^,^lj Jjg outlines. ItS shorteSt

* Ancient Earth Forts of the Cuyahoga Valley. Ohio, by Col. Chas. Whittlesey, Cleyelaiid, 1871.
t Geological Survey of Ohio, Geology, volume i, page 586.

64 THE MAUMEE RIVER BASIN.

diameter was 400 feet, and its walls extended down the bluff to
the former channel of the creek which has wandered northward a
S(iuare or more, evidently since this inclosure was built, leaving' a
small flood-plain throuj;'h which a channel was cut for lake boats about
the year 1H70.

A few pieces of pottery and stone implements have been found in
and about these inclosures; but they are not authentic as relics of
those who constructed the earthworks, nor of their early occupants.

The later Aborigines, and the early French fur buyers also occu-
]iied some of them, if not all. The latter probably erected stockades
on their ridges to protect their stocks of brandy and trinkets for trade.
The number and situation of these earthworks make it improbable
that the early European traders built them.

At the dawn of history in this Basin, and for many years there-
after, the Iroquois or Five Nations of New York were at war with the
Miamis and the Illinois tribes, and it is probable that those aggressive
and generally successful warriors used these inclosures, if they did not
build them, as rallying jioints, and as means of defense when hard
pressed, on their long campaigns. The three by the lower Maumee
were well situated to guard their route against their enemies to the
northward; and those in northeastern Indiana to guard against the
Miamis, whose headquarters at the head of the Maumee were within
easy reach of the two lowest enclosures hy the St. Joseph River. If
defeated at one rallying point, retreat to the next one could be
easily made.'^

Similar circular ridges of earth in Southern Ohio, and farther
south, have been termed sacred enclosures; the smallest ones hut
rings, and the largest ones lodge sites or walls embracing and pro-
tecting a collection of lodges, to the number of even one hundred. t

The Aborigines as First Described.

The American Aborigines when they first saw Europeans were
awe-struck by the size of their ships, and by the accouterments,
conduct and general appearance of their visitors; and for a time the
foreigners were treated with native reverence begotten of fear and
wonderment. A short-time association, however, demonstrated to the
Europeans the savage nature of these primitive people.

Perhaps the best all-sided glimpses we get of some of the first

* The Iroquois had circular forts with stockades in New York in 1615; also the Wyandots ( Hurons ).
The Jesuits advised the latter to build tlieir forts in square form so that the Frencli ar'iuebuses at two
diattonal corners could protect the entire enclosure. The palisaded forts were probably built after the
suiifiestion of Europeans who supplied the metal axes for the work. See Parknian's Pioneers of
France in the New World, pa^'e 403. Also The Jesuit Relations.

^Eleventh Report of the Peabody Museum, vol. ii. pajies 347, 348.

CHARACTER OF THE ABORIGINES WHEN FIRST SEEN. 65

historical Aborigines whose descendants infested the Maumee River
Basin in later times, are from the Jesuits'^ who, from the year 1610,
traveled along the St. Lawrence River, north and south, and along the
Great Lakes. Their altars, chants, robes, and their kindly demeanor
made a great impression at first upon these Aborigines and, although
several priests later suffered great violence and death at the hands of
these savages, they were generally afforded good opportunities for
observing the characteristics and the wretched state of these children
of the wilds; and the refined spirits of these priests enabled them to
write forbearinglv of the multiform barbarities they could not prevent,
and which thev were compelled to witnt-ss and sometimes personally
experience.

While it is given to but few of the civilized and somewhat cul-
tured people to rise very high above childhood's estate, in many ways,
there was not one of these primitive people but who was childish in
the extreme, in most respects throughout life, although at times
exhibiting the ferocity of a tiger. The early record of them, given in
the writings of these missionaries, is but a continued series of contra-
dictions, with a great preponderance of unbridled savagery springing
from their primitive impulsive sensuousness. In most respects they
were but little above the savage wild beasts surrounding them, and in
some of their exuberances they were generally fiendish. While they
were at times somewhat amiable, they were licentious and impure.
They were lazy, rude, egotistical and boastful. At times generous and
liberal, they were generally improvident, selfish and full of banter.
With something of fortitude they were cowardly, importuning and with
much of inconstancy. Their fidelity was opposed by craftiness and
treachery : their charity by ingratitude, hypocrisy and deceit : their
modesty by assertions of their superiority. Their moods were
very changeable, but not so their filthy habits, pride and arrogance,
suspicion and jealousy : and among a long list of other indict-
ments are those of covetousness, thievishness, foulness of language,
ingratitude, malice, noisiness of manners, contempt for strangers,
faithlessness, with much of cruelty and ferocity and, often, worse
than the savage beasts in their want of natural affection for their
sick and afflicted progeny and aged kinsfolk, who were often either
killed outright, or left to starve and die alone and unprotected.

Thev were styled savages by the missionaries ; and a late writer
stvles them the fiercest savages known to history, and the most
wretched of the races of man.T

* Jesuit Relations of Travels and Explorations of the Jesuit Missionaries in New France.
1610-1791. Cleveland. I896-1W2, seventy-three volumes, 8 vo.

t The Jesuit Relations, Cleveland, 1896, vol. i, pages viii and 38,

66 THE MAUMEE RIVER BASIN.

Their bodies were generally of good height, well-proportioned,
lithe and vigorous, as no deformed or weakling one was permitted to
survive childhood. " Their complexion," wrote Rev. Joseph Jouvency,
"is the same as the French, although they disfigure it with fat and
rancid oil, with which they grease themselves : nor do they (the men)
neglect paints of various colors, by means of which they appear
beautiful to themselves, but to us ridiculous. Some may be seen with
blue noses, but with cheeks and eyebrows black ; others mark fore-
head, nose and cheeks with lines around the eyes and in different
directions and with various colors derived from earths, roots, etc., all
mixed with grease, so that one would think he beheld so many hob-
golilins. Others paint the entire body so as to resemble clothing at a
distance, or otherwise. Thev believe that in colors of this description
they are dreadful to their enemies, and that likewise their own fear in
line of battle will be concealed as by a veil ; finally, that it hardens the
skin of the body, so that the cold of winter is' more easily borne."
Some of them also indelibly tattooed the neck, chest, arms and cheeks
with powdered charcoal, by means of thorns, tlius portraying rude
outlines of birds or animals, such as the snake, eagle, toad, etc.
Occasional deaths were noted from this practice, probabl\' by blood-
poisoning from the impure rancid greases and other filth with which
the charcoal was mixed, and from their general uncleanly habits.

The hair was worn in different stvles. Some disposed of it from
the sides of the head and tied the central remaining part together so as
to stand upward ; others trained the hair downward over the temples.
All persistently pulled out the beard. Men and women alike, pierced
the lobes of their ears, and some their noses, making the holes as
large as practicable, and wore therein mollusk shells or whatever of
bright objects they could get.

Winter clothing was nearly alike for men and women. It was
composed of skins of animals fastened together with animal tendons
or strips of skin, and suspended from the shoulders or over one
shoulder and under the other and it extended generally to about the
knees. A belt was often worn and the robe was pouched over the
stomach thus forming a receptacle for personal belongings. Leggings
and moccasins were also worn out of doors; and sleeves, which were
large at the shoulders and nearly came together at the back. These
limb coverings were removed by all on entering the lodge ; and the
men usually disrobed to nudity excepting a piece of bark or skin sus-
pended from the waist in front which was their only summer covering.
Seldom was any covering worn on the head. Belts, necklaces and
l>racelets made of round clam shells or quahaug ( Venus mercenaria) or
from quills of the porcupine, were valued highly.

HABITATIONS AND FOODS OF THF ABORIGINES. 67

They moved from place to place with yreat facility. The women,
assisted by the children, did all the heavy work including the drawing
or carrying of all their meager belongings and the putting up of a
lodge or wigwam, when one was necessary in cold weather. The}'
would put up a teepee f tipi ) in from half hour to two hours by gather-
ing poles, sticking them in the ground, fastening the top ends together,
and covering the sides with skins, bark, branches of trees, moss or
mats made of rushes or tough grass. A hut was even more readily
built in the forest. An opening was left at the top for the smoke of
the fire to escape, which it did but imperfectly, causing much irritation
and injury to the eyes of the inmates with additional repulsiveness to
their general appearance and odor. Foliage of trees and grass was
sometimes laid on the ground and alone used, or covered with skins or
• mats for beds. A piece of bark or a suspended skin served as door if
such was thought necessary as a protection against cold winds. For
summer use, if to remain in one place for some length of time, broader
and longer cabins were sometimes built in form of arbors, bark and mats
being used for covering. These were often large enough to accommo-
date several families — as many as twelve being mentioned by Cham-
plain, two families using one fire in common. They had no chairs nor
other furniture and sat on the ground with their heels close to the body
and knees close to the chin.

They obtained fire by striking two hard stones together with glanc-
ing strokes ( one piece of iron pyrites and one piece of flint were pre-
ferred) over the dried skin of an eagle's thigh w'ith the down left on,
or over spunk or pulverized baik, which caught the sparks and served
as the first kindling. They also made fire by the friction method of
rotating a dry stick rapidly liack and forth between the hands, one
end being pressed against a dry stone or stick.

Their food, in winter particularly, was largely of meat obtained by
hunting, trapping and fishing, in which the men generally took the
lead, often making long and tedious journeys and suffering much from
hunger in the chase. Here, also, the women generally gathered dead
limbs of trees and made the fire, found the water, prepared the food,
preserved the meats by smoking and drying them, prepared the skins
and made the clothing, did much of the fishing, made and repaired the
canoes, snow shoes and utensils, and went for the game to the place
where their lords had killed and left it. The meat of the bear was
preferred on account of the large quantity of grease it contained. Eggs
of wild fowls were eaten, also wild fruits, berries, beans, nuts and
roots in their season. These people were, however, improvident, and
dire hunger sorely distressed them in unfavorable seasons. When not
pressed by enemies, some maize (corn, zea mays) was cultivated liy

68 THE MAUMEE RIVER BASIN.

the women, then either roasted on the ear, or pounded, wet with water
and baked between heated stones. The succotash, composed of corn,
beans and sometimes vegetables, boiled together, was a later dish after
the receipt of metal utensils from Europeans. Receptacles were made
of bark ( they possessed no metal utensils until supplied by Europeans )
in which meats and other food were placed with water and then more
or less cooked by means of heated stones dropped into the mess. They
had no salt for their food. Their meager culinary utensils were, like
their game, never cleaned — the more saturated they were with grease
the better — and they ])artook of the general filthiness of the lodge or
camp. They ate from their hand direct; and the hands of the men
and women, when dripping with grease, were wiped on their hair or
clothes. When otherwise particularh' or obnoxiously covered the
hands were wiped on the shaggy hair of a dog or rubbed with powdered
rotten wood or whatever was most convenient. Their nails were never
cut, nor particularK' cleaned. Water for bathing was not in favor:
vermin abounded on their persons and were eaten when caught.

These people were bred to savagery and war A slight offense
or injury, real or imagined, inflicted on any member of a band or
tribe would excite a desire for revenge, and war would generally
result. These conflicts were waged by small bands, by the entire
tribe or by a combination of tribes, according to circumstances
and conditions. Their weapons for warfare and against the wild
beasts were bows and arrows, javelins or spears and, for closer com-
bat, stone axes, stone tomahawks and clubs of wood or stone heads.
Their bows were made of hickory, oak, ash, and sometimes of softer
woods, often reinforced along the back with rawhide. These bows
were operated with strings of rawhide or twisted hemp bark (cannabis
sativa). The arrows were feathered at the heel and often pointed at
the head with flint or bone. Possibly some of these points were some-
times dipped in the juices of poisonous plants and then dried, for use
against their enemies: but the general uncleanly conditions were suffi-
cient to account for all inflammations and lilood poisonings authenti-
cally recorded from their use. The weapons were generally carried in
belt or skin quiver. The axes and tomahawks were hafted with withes
wrapped around them and, later, covered with wet rawhide which
shrunk, on drying, and formed a stiff, serviceable handle. Firm wood
was sometimes shaped as handles by burning to the desired length and
then scraping with flints. Occasionally one protected himself against
enemies by a shield made of bark covered with rawhide. A few
warriors also wore for a time armor for body and limbs made of dried
rawhide or of braided twigs, strips of bark or hemp. Probably the
idea of armor and of shield was obtained from the earlier Europeans.

■ THE FIERCEST SAVAGES KNOWN TO HISTORY. 69

Both shields and armor were but little emploved on account of their
interfering with their movements through the woods and the free use
of their bodies in battle. All their jiowers of deception, stealth and
treachery were employed in their campaigns against and in the attack-
ings of their enemies. The chief desire was to surprise, by ambush or
stealthy approach, the party they wished to assail, and in the confusion
and panic that followed to slay or capture as many as possible. No
attempt was made to maintain a regular order and line of battle: in
fact the war-chief, like their other nominal leaders generally, had little
if any control after the combat began. Those of the enemy slain, or
wounded so they could not walk well, were scalped.

Captives were generally very desirable for slaves or, if particularly
obnoxious enemies, they were subjected to the most fiendish tortures
according to the convenience, mood and degree of frenzy of the captors
and their women or friends. They were generally stripped of clothing
and forced to run the gauntlet between rows of their tormentors who,
armed with whips, thorns, sharp sticks, clubs, and other articles,
goaded, beat and lacerated the limbs and body until the poor victim
often fell bleeding and exhausted; when he was left to revive, to be
again beset with new tortures — his nails torn from his fingers by their
teeth, the fingers crushed or cut off, his limbs broken, his scalp re-
moved, his limbs pierced by sharji sticks and the nerves drawn out,
his wounds burned by live coals of fire and blazing torches which were
applied to the most sensitive parts. Pieces of roasted flesh would be
cut or torn from the limbs, eaten by the jiersecutors and their children,
or thrust down the throat of the sufferer. If he showed great fortitude
and endurance the torment was continued from day to day intermit-
tingly ; his blood was applied to freshly made openings in the skin of
his tormentors that they might therefrom become imbued with his forti-
tude; he was made to walk through fire; his flesh was lacerated and
burned in new places ; he was tied to a stake and a slow fire kindled
under him and more of his flesh distributed and eaten. Finally, when
the victim was exhausted and could be made to suffer no more, his
heart was torn out and eaten that the\' might thereby receive his
braverj' and endurance.

Each individual and tribe endeavored to exceed the others in their
atrocities. The women generally entered into these fiendish acts with
high glee ; and while women captives were generally treated with less
atrocity, and were often adopted into the tribe and married by their
captors, they occasionally suffered the same fate as the men.

Captive children, if strong, were generally kept, and the youths
and less obnoxious captives were also sometimes saved from mutilation

10 THE MAUMEE RIVER BASIN.

and death and subjected to slavery or adopted. The stronger tribes
increased in numbers materially by such captures. M

The scalps of enemies were considered great trophies. They were M

at first suspended from the belts of their takers, and then dried, painted
and displayed by the women inside the lodges, or outside on poles, that
all members of the camp, young and old, might continually be im-
pressed with the jirowess of the possessors of the largest number.

The heads of the vanquished were sometimes severed as trophies
and their limbs were occasionalh' removed and carried away for food,
as all of these warring tribes were cannibals.

There was no tendenc}- among these Aborigines toward the better-
ing of their very low, savage condition at the time of the coming of the
Europeans early in the seventeenth century. They possessed nothing
that could be called government in general. Individualism and im-
pulse were the rule, ever varying with the condition and mood. There
were no laws, no magistrates, no regular marriage ceremony, no code
of ethics or of morals. Their social relations were meager, consisting
mostly of their loose combinations for war, feastings and dances.

Their industries were of the most primitive kind. The forming of
canoes from bark represented their most skillful handiwork. Some
there were who fashioned snares and traps for wild animals, including
fish, of strings and mats. They were not workers of metals other than
of native hematite or blood iron ore, fragments of which they dressed
as they did stones, and of native copper fragments which they pounded
by stones into somewhat of the forms desired ; but of these there were
comparatively few articles.

Their weapons and implements, other than of wood and bones of
lower animals, were of flint and other hard stones (see ante page 58 ).
Some of the knives, tools, implements and weapons of the Stone Age
used by them were well formed; but whether the better class of these
articles were made by these tribes or whether they were obtained from
the southern tribes by trade or conquest, is not definitely known. But
few utensils were made, and the ever-ready bark of trees, in various
kinds and thicknesses, was the principal material employed. Recep-
tacles for carrying smaller articles were made of skins of animals as
well as of bark. Occasional pieces of rude pottery were in use, but
their generally broken condition and the few fragments found here have
led to the inference that these articles, like their better stone articles,
were brought from the more sedentary people to the southward.

Ornaments of stones, shells, bones, birds' claws, etc., were also
used. These articles, like their weapons, were quite uniform in
material, form and finish, as found throughout the States, north, south,
east and west, during later years, which indicates that their manufac-

THE DOG. AMD AMUSEMENTS OF THE ABORIGINES. 71

ture was carried on by the more mechanical tribes to the southward,
and that the tribes had remarkable wide range, perhaps both in trade
and conquest alternately. Their stone articles were gradually dis-
carded at the coming of Europeans with metal weapons, utensils,
and ornaments, to trade for furs.

Thev had no svstem of writing; but there was in occasional use
something of a code of communication by means of small sticks, indi-
cating number or direction, left in the probable track of following
friends; and in imitation of south-western peoples or, later, in imita-
tion of the Europeans. There were also crude efforts in pictography
on pipes, rocks, skins, etc.

The only domesticated animal they possessed was a shaggy,
wolfish dog. It was kept in considerable numbers, was serviceable in
the hunt, particularly^ of the bear, and was used sometimes by the
women to assist in drawing on poles their belongings from one camp-
ing place to another. These dogs were generally close attendants and
often supplied the family meat by their own bodies, both in times of
feasting and of scarcity in the hunt.

Their peaceful hours were mostly passed in recovering from the
fatigues of battle or the chase, or from the ill effects of the feasts.
Badgerings of one another were often indulged in, and games in which
the gambling phase was uppermost. The game of straws was a favor-
ite one and was played with great dexterity and vivacity. The straws
employed were of three lengths, the greatest length being about ten
inches. The game appeared at times something like that of jack-
straws, but generally Europeans did not gather an understanding of it.
A game, designated crosse by the Jesuits, was also frequently played,
and this is the source of the modern game Lacrosse. A game of
dish was another common one. It was played with plum seeds, about
six in number, one side of each being darkened. They were caused to
bound and turn by striking the bark dish containing them on the
ground, and the player having uppermost the greatest number of a
certain color was the winner. The fascination of the gambling feature
in these games often led to the complete impoverishment of one or more
players at each game bv the loss of his weapons, clothing and trinkets.

Fastings were compulsory by nature, following their engorgements,
and at times on account of their improvidence in years of plenty against
the severe seasons when they could not hunt, or when there was a
dearth of game and of vegetable products.

Feastings and dances were common when food was obtainable, to
celebrate any event or to work off any exuberance of spirit, and glut-
tony was habitual. Their 'eat-all' or 'leave-nothing' feasts resulted,
in times of plenty, in the great gorging and distress of the partakers.

72 THE MAUMEE RIVER BASIN.

for he who could eat the most was the greatest among them. These
feasts were great drains on the possessions of their givers.

The feast of all most generally and widely participated in, was
called the feast of the dead. The bones of their deceased friends and
of animals, on account of their enduring nature, were endowed with
superstitious beliefs of their future rehabilitation, and these supersti-
tions gave rise to various forms of their deposition, and peculiar rever-
ence to them and to the place of their deposit. The flesh, on account
of its ready decay, was an obnoxious substance to be gotten rid of as
soon as possible. At first the body was enveloped in furs and liuried
in a shallow grave, often in their sitting posture with heels and knees
close to the body ; or sometimes placed in a tree. On the battle-field,
or near the enemy, their slain were hurriedly secreted and covered with
leaves or whatever was most convenient. At irregular intervals feasts
of the dead were proposed by the older persons, and as many influ-
enced to participate in them as practicable, even of other tribes when
good will existed. On these occasions, ever}' eight, ten, twelve or more
years, the dead, wherever buried, were brought together at the central
point agreed upon. The flesh still present was stripped from the
bones and cast away, and the bones were carried into the family lodge
or assembled in the largest cabin to await the return of the most distant
bodies. The bones of as many as one hundred deceased persons were
thus seen gathered for the final leave taking of the friends ; and some-
times the emotion there displayed was in great contrast to the indiffer-
ence manifested at other times in the abandonment of the sick or aged to
wild beasts or to starvation. The ceremonies at these feasts consisted
of examination and leave-taking of the bones, the giving of presents,
athletic contests, dances in which the women often led in song and,
finally, in the deposition of the bones in one place, either in a pit or on
the ground, rather y)romiscuously, and then the covering of them,
sometimes fiy a mound of earth like the prehistoric mounds described
on previous pages. These were great occasions in the longer intervals
of peace when the food supply was plentiful, and many joined in the
ceremonies with liberal presents to the dead, many of which presents
were retained by the chief managers and others were distributed by
throwing them high to be scrambled for by the multitude. Rude drums
and rattles were sometimes the accompaniments to their dancing and
chanting.

The mortality of these savage people from exposure and disea'se
was great, particularly among children. The mothers were generally
prolific, liut, having all the heavy work to do and being at a great dis-
advantage in their nomadic life and from the indifference of the men,
many accidents and willful mishaps befell them. It was estimated

THE SORCERERS AND MEDICINE MEN.

that not one child in thirtx lived throut;li childhood. From their gor-
mandizing and other excesses, diseases were common among the adults.
There were neither nurses nor delicacies for those seriously or long-
sick. The only attention they received was from the sorcerers, who
were wholly ignorant regarding diseases and of the science and art of
medicine for their cure. Their following was wholly from superstition.
Their efforts for the cure or advice of their patrons consisted of the
crudest jugglery and generally hastened the death of all persons weak-
ened by disease. These sorcerers were called priests, prophets,
diviners tiy dreams from something of hvdromancx', necromancv and
pyromancy; soothsayers, magicians, etc., of primitive type. They
were considered more intelligent than the generality of their people
and were chiefs in most affairs. They invented the legends and
repeated as much of the traditions as suited their desires. Their
words were listened to with awe. They were vaguelv and varioush'
religious: and they were made more awe-inspiring bv the displa\" of
peculiarly shaped articles of stone and slate, or of unusual lirightness,
also by hideous attire and trappings, monotonous movements or

Piehisluric Tubes, luund aluiwi tlie banks wi tlu Mauiiiee and Aui^laize Rivtrs jiear Detiance.
There are several theories reuardinn their use. Perhaps they were used by the sorcerers in their
incantations. The shortest one has been called a tobacco pipe. Like most of the otiiers, it is a good
whistle. The hour-class form is very rare. It is of line-erain uranite, and the others are of slate. In
the Author's Collection.

THE MAUMEE RIVER BASIN.

dances ' accompanied by intonations of the most unmeaning sem-
blance of words that came to the tongue and which none of the users,
even, understood. In these and other ways these sorcerers hypnotized
their auditors to a degree and nourished the superstition in which their
influence consisted. With grotesque accouterments, incantations and
ceremonial olijects they sought or pretended to relieve the sick by
driving or drawing the pain or maladv away, by sucking or blowing
through tubes, by tappings with crescentic articles of slate ; or by
efforts to exorcise it with ridiculous tricks, or hideous noises that were
very prostrating and disastrous to one in low jihysical condition. Ex-
tremes of sweatings and then of dashings of or into cold water were
sometimes employed after seeing the bathings of Englishmen. Also,
after viewing the medicine chests of the Europeans and witnessing their
administration of medicines to their sick, the Aborigine sorcerers pre-
pared and administered compounds without reason or formula, but as
an addition to their ever varying pretences. Generous payment in
furs and other articles of trade was expected and received by these
l)retenders.

'<^i'

•*:

.11: !

mmmm %

AN ABORIGINE MEDICINE MAN.
(From Catlin)

EXPLORATION OF SAMUEL DE CHAMPLAIN.

CHAPTER IV.

Explorers — Cartographers — Aborigines — The British Succession.

1615 TO 1766.

Frenchmen began to explore the shores of the Great Lakes early
in the seventeenth century. In the year 1615 Samuel de Champlain
visited the Wyandots (Hurons) at Lake Huron, and passed several
months among them and in visiting other tribes during that summer
and the following winter. He probably traveled in winter along the
western and southwestern shores of Lake Erie, and thus obtained a
better understanding of some of this lake's tributaries and of the
Aborigines than of the breadth of it, which he represented too narrow
in his map as published in 1632. While the lakes of the central part
of this map, here shown, are out of proportion, the reader will readily
recognize what was drawn for the Maumee and its tributaries.

£ iro w ^ J

2 iS ^ 2 jA/ 2i 7 / xti/ 2 ff f 2 <fc, / 1^/ / i<r^ , i .y? ' f ^^ 2 <?j-

-.J 2^,5 . 3/^ j^O

Central part of Champlain's Map published in 1632. ' Mer Douce' is Lake Huron.'

*This map and the next eight maps of Lake Erie and the Maumee River, are taken from Winsor's
Narrative and Critical History of America, vohime iv. by permission of Houghton, Mittln and
Company, publishers, Boston.

This map is also given in The Documentary History of the State of New York, volume iii.
Albany, 1850.

THE MAUMEE RIVER BASIN.

Probably Champlain did not explore all these regions in person,
but gathered his information largely from the imperfect description
given b\' the Aborigines. The very meager and untrustworthy descrip-
tions given by the Aborigines may account for manv of the imperfec-
tions, including disproportions, of the early maps of this broad forest
region. The rejiresentations of Aborigine lodges, and swamps, and
the shadings of Champlain's work, are omitted from the outline repro-
duction of this very interesting map.

Carte CenSrale des Gostes de f Am^rique, by Covens and Mortier, 16.')4-5.5 ? Tlie Afer Douce
at the left is Lake Huron, and southward are sketched Lake Erie and tlie Maumee River.

Another map without name or date, but probably drawn between
the vears 1640 and l(i50, shows Lake Erie in better form than does

Sanson's Map. 1656.

THE FIRST FRENCH MAPS.

Champlain's map, but Laku Huron is too widely separated, and dis-
connected. This map like many others of early times, omits portages
or the proximity of headwaters.

A General Map of the Coasts of America was published in Amster-
dam, Holland, by Covens and Mortier in the year 1655 or before. It
is here reproduced in outline.

Nicolas Sanson, Royal Geographer of France from IfUT to 1H67,
made a map bearing date 1656, a part of which is here reproduced.

Pere du Creux, whose name
is often written Creuxius, ]iro-
duced a map in 1660 which also
shows Lake Erie and its tribu-
taries.

Soon after this date if not
before, the Jesuits sketched a
ma]i in which the Maumee River
is prominently shown as the
only tributary to the southwest-
ern part of Lake Erie. '

It appears probable that the
intrepid and illustrious French
explorer Sieur de la Salle not
only passed up the Maumee

Map by Creuxius. 166(1. Central part. River and down the Wabash tO

his discovery of the Ohio and
Mississippi in the fall of 1669,
but that he returned along these
rivers during the winter, spring
or summer of 1670, thence along
the western shore of Lake Erie,
and northeastward to the Ot-
tawa River in Canada, where
the voyageur writer Nicolas Per-
rot saw him that summer. t
The maps of this new coun-

The Jesuits' Earl.v Map. Central part,

trv produced soon after this

date show important changes, and evidence the above claims regarding

* See Francis Parkman's La Salle and the Great West, paue 4.^2.

tThere has been much of research and speculation by writers reKardinn the whereabouts of
La Salle duriny the autumn of 1669, and the year or two next following'. The reader who desires to
pursue this subject is referred to those writincs, and to the Ohio Archaeological and Historical Quar-
terly for .^pril. 1903, volume xii. paye 107 et set?., where Charles E. Slocuin has gathered evidence of
La Salle's travel along the Maumee and Wabash.

THE MAUMEE RIVER BASIN.

La Salle. The Ohio River is in them first traced, but near enough
to the Maumee for easy iiortage. This is the case in Joliet's smaller
ma]) of XWi'l, and in an anonvmous map of the Basin of the Great Lakes

of al)out the same date.
Sketches of the central
parts of these maps are
here given.*

The Wabash River
was traced on Jean Bap-
tiste Louis Franquelin's
map in 1682, showing
its origin in a lake near
the Maumee, according
with statement in the
preserved fragment of
one of La Salle's letters,
and with the swampy
condition of the early
drainage channel of the
Maumee Glacial Lake
southwest of Fort
Wayne, Indiana, which
swamp remained un-
drained until the latter
half of the nineteenth
century. This map by
Franquelin, however,
traced the Wabash into the Illinois River, an error that was corrected
in his map of 1684, which map is more in detail and quite accurate
in many respects.

The next year (1685) Minet published his Carte de la Louisiane
which, though not accurate, shows the Maumee River, the portage
southwest, the Wabash River springing from a lake, and the route to
the Mississippi. J Other maps were published during the latter part

RENE ROBERT CA\'ELIEK, SlEl'R DE LA SALLE. t

Born 25 November, 1643, at Rouen, France. Was assassinated
19 March. 1687, in Texas.

"^ The legend in Joliet's map was written below the Ohio River at a much later date than the
making of the map. The figures in the map of the Great Lakes refer to a written list of explanations,
samples of which are here given, viz: 21, Riviere Ohio ainsy apelike par les Iroquois a cause de sa
beaut^ par ou le Sr. de la Salle est descendu. 22, Les Illinois [Aborigines]. 23, Baye des Kentayentoga
[Water-way of the Kentucky .^boriginesl. 24, Les Chaouenons. 25, Cette riviere baigne un fort beau
pays ou Ton trouve des pommes, des grenades, des raisins et d'autres fruits sauvages. Le Pays est
decouvert pour la plus part, y ayant seulement des bois d'espace en espace. Les Iroquois ont d^truit
la plus grande partie des habitans dont on voit encore quelques restes. Narrative and Critical History
of America. Houghton, Mifflin, and Company, Roston, 1884, volume iv, page 216.

t From Harper's Encyclopedia of United States History, volume v, copyright, 1901, by Harper
& Brothers.

t Narrative and Critical History of America, volume iv. page 237.

THE LATER FRENCH MAPS.

of the seventeenth century and early part of the eighteenth, showing
more or less of these features, particularly the maps by Raffeix in 1688,

by Hennepin in 1HSI7, and by La
Montan in 1703 and 1709.

Previous to this time the
British had no special carto-
graphers in America. The 2Hth
November, 17 0 0, Richard
Coote Earl of Bellomont, Gov-
ernor of New York, in his re-
])ort to the Lords of Trade in
London, stated that

The French have mightily impos'd

Basin of the Great Lakes, 1672. Central part ot
the Map.

on the world in the mapps they have
made of this continent, and our Geogra-
phers have been led into grosse mis-
takes by the French mapps, to our very
great prejudice. It were as good a
work as your Lordships could do, to
send over a very skillful surveyor to
make correct maps of all these planta-
tions and that out of hand, that we may
not be cozen'd on to the end of the
chapter by the, French.

This suggestion was favor-
ably acted upon after further
evidence from 'Doc' Cadwalla-
der Golden Surveyor General
of New York who, in a Memoir

Joliefs spialler map, 1672. Central part. The le-
i;end under the Ohio River is of later date.

on the Fur Trade of 10th No-
vember, 1724, wrote that 'the
French have been indetatigable
in making discoveries and car-
rying on their commerce with
Nations of whom the English
know nothing, but what they
see in the French Maps and

FraiiQuelin's Map of 1682. Books. '

The Cdureurs de Bois.

These early maps prove conclusively that Frenchmen passed up
and down the Maumee River in the seventeenth centurv of whose

* See London Docuinents XIII and XXIII, New York Colonial Documents volume iv. pape 796,
and volume v, page 727.

THE MAUMEE RIVER BASIN.

Sv^E .-T/f i

journevinsis no other record than these majis has been preserved. Prob-
ably the swarms of French cour-
eurs de bois, bush or forest rang-
ers'"' were the first to pass along
the lake shores and the larger
rivers, in every direction, with
brand\- and small stocks of
trinkets to trade with the Abo-
rigines for their more valuable
furs, even long before the rec-
ords of the missionaries began.
On account of the prohiliit-
ing of trade to all others than a

Fianquelin's Map of 16H4. Central part.t

licensed company or two, and of the many other monarchical require-
ments of State and the restrictions of the Church, many of the early
French immigrants preferred life in the forests with the Aborigines, unre-
strained by any of the proprieties of civilization. Reversion to barbar-
ism, to turn traitor to civilization, is far easier to many persons than to
keep step with the rigid, virtuous demands of advancing civilization.
The character of manv of these early immigrants had been bad
in their native land, of many of the coureurs de bois and soldiers par-
ticularly-, prison doors having been opened to people these forests;
and the open forest ways to libertinism, with the Aborigines who
knew no morals, were very attractive. These people at once advanced
to popularity with the savages who soon became addicted to their
brandy and granted them every privilege. Their communication with
the Aborigine women of every tribe and band was without restaint;
and thus the French blood was early and freely mixed in the succeed-
ing generations. Thev became defiant and the Government, and the
Church, could neither control nor restrain them. J

'■^ More commonly called in New England and New York bushlopers and swampiers and. by the
Hollanders, bos loopers. In the year 17(X), it was lamented by some British officials that they had no
such representatives in the forests. London Doc. XIII, N. Y. Col. Docs. vol. iv, paize 650.

t This map, and the precedinc eipht maps showinir Lake Erie and the Maninee River, were taken
from the Narrative and Critical History of America, vol. iv, published by Honshton, Mifflin, and
Company, Boston.

t M. Talon, in his Memoir to King Louis XIV, under date of 10th November. 1670, writes regard-
inn the coureurs de bois as follows: The edict enacted relative to niarriaces has been enregistered.
and, proclaiming the intention of the King, I caused orders to be issued that the volunteers (whom on
my return, I found in very great numbers, living in reality like banditi ) should be excluded from the
1 .aborigine! trade and hunting; they are excluded by the law also front the honors of the Church, and
from the Communities I Commt/naufesI if they do not marry fifteen days after the arrival of the ships
from France Iwith women for this purposel. I shall consider some other expedient to stop these vaga-
bonds; they ruin, partially, the Christianity of the Aborigines and the commerce of the French who
labor in their settlements to extend the Colony, It were well did his Majesty order me, by lettre de
Cachet, to fix them in some place where they would participate in the labors of the Communaute. Paris
Document I, N. Y. Col. Docs. vol. ix. page 65.

COUREURS DE BOIS: BRITISH-FRENCH WARS. 81

Their numbers increased and, as the strictures of the authorities
became more rigidly enforced in the French market, they carried their
accumulations of peltries to the English markets which caused new and
great alarm to the French companies and Government. Efforts to
restrain them from this practice led to something of an organization
among them, and to special rendezvous. It was also soon learned by
the authorities that a brother-in-law of their leader Du Lhut was near
the Governor, and an officer in his guards.'^ Force proved a damage
to the Government and the palliative method was adopted. Amnesty
was afterwards granted them and, as the population increased and the
comjianies' trade extended in all directions further into the forests,
they were eniitloyed as guides and voyageurs to and through the wilds
before visited by them. They had (ireviously penetrated everj' region,
near and remote; had dwelt among the Miami Aborigines, the Illinois,
the Sioux, and even the AssiniboinsT < in the present Canadian
province of Assiniboia) some having been absent one year, others
two, three, and more years on their private explorations.!

The British, being now largely deprived of the trade of the coureurs
de bois, deemed it the more necessary to urge their own traders with
the Aborigines to extend their range : and they employed the Five
Nations also. The result of this aggressive action contributed a local
coloring to the British-French wars that continued to be frequentl}'
waged, with North America, constantly increasing in importance, as
the prize to the victor.

The British-French Wars from 1013 to 1747.

The British have alwavs been an aggressive people, in new coun-
tries particularly; and the French have not always been behind in
urging their own claims, and in disiniting the claims of others. Wars
between these nations, and between people of these nationalities in
America, were frequently the rule for many years. France claimed
the right to central North America from her claim of being the first to
discover it in the voyages of John Verazzano who sailed from her jiort

* Paris Document 11, New York Colonial Documents, volume ix. page 131. Ilbld. pane 1.53,

- The general stimulus to individual, and clandestine, fur trade is described by Cadwallader
Golden in 1724 as follows; The Barrenness of the Soil and the coldness of the Climate of Canada,
obliges the greatest number of the Inhabitants to seek their living by travelling among the Aborigines
or by trading with those that do travel. The Governor and other officers have but a scanty allowance
from the King. & could not subsist were it not by the perquisites they have from this Trade, Neither
could their Priests find any means to satisfy their ambition and Luxury without it. So that all heads
& hands are employed to advance it and the men of best parts think it the surest way to advance
themselves travelling among the Aborigines and learning the Languages even the Bigotry A: Enthusiasm
of some hot heads has not been a little useful in advancing this commerce, N. Y. Col. Docs, volume
V, page 737, Compare, also. Volney, 371; the Jesuit Relations, volumes 69. 70. etc.

82 . THE MAUMEE RIVER BASIN.

in the years 1523-24. In this claim they ignored the claim of the
British from the voyages along the Atlantic coast from the Carolinas
to Labrador in 1497-98 by John and Sebastian Cabot who sailed from
Bristol, and whose reports of Newfoundland and its Banks induced
English, Breton and Norman fishermen to ply the'ir vocation there
long before Verazzano's voyages. There were, consequently, disputes
between the British and French regarding America from their first
meeting here. January 2, ItilS, the French complained of outrages
committed by the English on the coast of Canada. At the organiza-
tion by Richelieu of the Comjianx' of New France in 1627, four armed
vessels convoyed a fleet of eighteen transports laden with 135 cannon,
soldiers, supplies and emigrants, to reinforce and fortify Quebec.
They were captured bv an English fleet that was already on the way
to destroy the French settlement there. The capture of the town was
delayed until lUth July, 1629: but it was soon restored to the French
on account of the treaty between these nations 24th April, 1629,
which was not then known to the commander of the distant fleet.
Notwithstanding treaties, each nation continued anxious to extend its
domain m America and continued to infringe on the settlements estab-
lished bv the other. The French claimed not only Canada, but the
country of the Iroquois (Five Nations.) in -New York, and southwest-
ward to the Gulf of Mexico. The British desired to restrict them to
the country north of the St. Lawrence River and the Great Lakes.
King Louis XIV of France became alarmed at the success of the
English in acquiring New Netherlands from the Hollanders by con-
quest and, upon the English declining to exchange this territory with
the French or to restore it to the Dutch, the first formal war to materi-
ally affect these nationalities in America was declared by France against
England January 29, 1666. Chevalier de Courcelles Governor of
New France (Canada) liad invaded New York to punish the Mohawk
Aborigines, and it was there that he learned from his pickets of the
reduction of the Dutch i)rovince to English rule, whereupon he
exclaimed 'the King of England does grasp at allAmerica.' It is not
known that this war had any effect upon the F"rench then wandering
through the lake region or upon the natives surrounding them. It spent
its force in the provinces of the East and at sea. It closed with the
Treaty of Breda, proclaimed January 1, 1668 •. but the French persisted
in claiming the Iroquois and their country, and in their efforts to re-
duce them to their subjection, which resulted in many retaliations by the
British. Lord Howard, Governor of Virginia, visited Albany in 16S4
and made a treaty with the Five Nations (Iroquois) of New York and
received from them title to their well sustained ( by might ) claim to
the country along Lakes Erie, St. Clair and Huron, and westward to

QUARRELS BETWEEN THE BRITISH AND FRENCH. 83

the Illinois; and subsequent treaties confirmed this grant, and the
subjection of these tribes to the British.*

A further glimpse of the increasing desire to retain the favor of
the Aborigines by keeping them free from the influence of the rival
nation, and of the temper of the chief English official in America, is
found in Governor Thomas Dongan's letter from Albany, New York,
22nd May, 1686, to M. de Denonville, then Governor of New France,
which reads in part as follows :

I have sent for the five nations of the Aborigines that belongs to this Government
to meet me at this place, to give them in charge, that they should not goe to your side
of the great lakes, nor disturb your Aborigines and traders, but since my coming here I
am informed, that our Aborigines are apprehensive of warr. by your putting stores into
Cataract [Niagara] and ordering some forces, to meet there ; I know you are a man of
judgment, and, that you will not attack the King of England's subjects, being informed,
that those Aborigines with whom our Aborigines are engaged in warr with are to the
west, and southwest of the great lakes, [in part in the Maumee River Basin], if so. in
reason you can have no pretence to them, it is my intention that our Aborigines shall
not warr. with the farr Aborigines, whither they do or not it does not seem reasonable,
that you should ingage yourself in the quarel of Aborigines ; we pretend, too, against our
own Aborigines, whither these territoryes belong to our or the French King, is not to be
decided here, but, by our masters at home, and your business and mine, is to take mapps
of the Contry so well as wee can and to send them home for the limits to be adjusted
there. I am likewise informed that you are intended to build a fort at a place called
Ohniagero on this side of the lake within my master's territoryes without question. (I
cannot beleev it) that a person that has your reputation in the world, would follow
the steps of Monsr Labarr, t and be ill advised by some interested persons in your
Governt to make disturbance, between our Masters' subjects in those parts of the world
for a little pelttree [furs] ; when all those differences may be ended by an amicable corre-
spondence between us. If there be anything amiss, I doe assure you it shall not be my
fault, tho' we have suffered much, and doe dayly by vour people's tradeing within the
King of England's territoryes ; I have had two letters from the two fathers [priests] that
lives amongst our Aborigines, and I find them somewhat disturbed with an apprehension
of warr. which is groundless, being resolved that it shall not begin here, and I hope
your prudent conduct will prevent it there, and referr all differences home as I shall
doe.+

The French now (1686) numbered 17,000 in Canada, 3000 of
whom could be called upon to bear arms, and they became more watch-
ful against the British. This year twent>-nine 'Christians' (British
traders) and five friendly Aliorigines were arrested liy the French and
Ottawas along Lake Huron and 'jilundered of all the goods and mer-
chandizes which they had with them, which accordin.g to their compu-
tation would have purchased there about eight thousand Beavers.'

* London Document v, N. Y. Col. Docs., volume iii. pages 394. 417. 443. Plain Facts, Philadelphia
1781. pages 32, 23. Pownall's Administration of the Colonies. Narrative and Critical- History of
America, i. .304.

t Le Fevre de la Barre. the former Governor of New France who persisted in invading the
English territory and alienating the Iroquois natives of New York.

i London Document V. New York Colonial Documents volume iii. page 455.

84 THE MAUMEE RIVER BASIN.

The French and Ottawas about fifteen hundred in number, while tak-
ing these prisoners towards the east end of Lalve Erie, met Captain
MacKreRory with his troop consistinjj; of twenty-nine Christians, six
Aborigines, and eight jirisoners whom, by threatening to kill and putt
to the sword ettc' they also took prisoners, and 'all their goods and
merchandizes were also plundered . . which by cominitation would
have purchased to that troop eight or nine thousand Beavers.' .

One member of this last party caiitured, was shot b\ the French
on account of his being of French birth and a British subject. The
others were taken 'to a fort beyond the lake' (Ontario) where they
were obliged to work hard in strengtht'ning the fort. Later they were
sent to yuebec where they were ' put out to farmers and others for to
work for their victuals.' They were to be held as jirisoners until
Governor Dongan desisted from trading with the far Aliorigines and
from supplying the Senecas with ammunition and giving them assist-
ance against the French."

A treaty of neutrality for America between France and England
was entered into November 16, 16H6.

In 1689 the 'merchants and adventurers to and in New York and
the Colonyes adjacent' petitioned the King for the appointment of
Colonel Slater to the office of Governor of New York, and for soldiers
and supplies against the French, alleging that they have already
taken away a great part of our Bever trade, which is the only profitable
trade of those parts, and if they debauch the five nations of Aborigines
from us, as the want of a sufficient force to protect them will readily
tem])t them to, the whole Bever trade will be lost, and the province
of New York not able to subsist, but in a short time will fall into the
hands of the French. 't

In this year ( 16H9 ) another formal war began between Great
Britain and France and, although originating principally from home
causes, it materially affected their colonies in America. The French
emboldened by the success of their former plans, became more aggres-
sive even to the invasion of British settlements for the purpose of
retaliating for former real or imagined infringements of trade with
Aborigines, or for direct injuries sustained by marauding bands of

''' London Doc. V. N. Y. Col. Docs, volume iii, payes 436-37. Governoi- Uoniian reported to the
Privy Council as follows; I am sending a Scotch Gent, called McGrecer (that served formerly in
France) along with our people. Hee has orders not to disturb or meddle with the French, and I hope
they will not meddle with him. These expeditions were undertaken for the purpose of carrying back
the captive Aborigines taken by the Iroquois ' in order to the restoring them to their liberty & bury
their Hatchetts with those of their enemys, by which means a path may bee opened for these far Aborig-
ines to come with safety to Trade at Albany, and our people goe thither without let or disturbance' . .
Ibid, page 39.5. Colonel Patrick Magregorie was taken prisoner to Montreal; and was liberated by
orders from France in 1687 when he returned to New York.

1 London Document V, New York Colonial Documents, volume iii, page 6.52.

DIFFERENCE BETWEEN FRENCH AND BRITISH. 85

Aborigines supposed to be favorable to the British. The latter became
so annoyed by these incursions as to declare that the French 'must be
rooted out of America.'

The efforts of the Aborigines were the great source of the peltry
supply, and the competition in this trade was but a competition for
the friendship of the greatest number of them. The fickleness and
treacher}' of these savages had much to do in causing the bitterness
and clashings between the rival European nations. May 30, 1696,
Governor Fletcher reported to the English Lords of Trade that
'sculking partys of French and Aborigines disturb the people in their
husbandry who live upon the Fronteer but our Aborigines do revenge
that-part with better success upon the French.''

John Nelson, who had had twenty-six years experience with the
French in America, four and-a-half years as a prisoner, in a memorial
to the same Lords of Trade under date of 24th September, 1696, stated
the difference between the English and French modes of dealing with
the natives, and the cause of the latter's greater success as follows:
The Great and only advantage which the enemy [French] hath in those parts doth
consist chiefly in the nature of their settlement, which contrary to our Plantations who
depend upon the improvem' of lands. &c theirs of Canada has its dependance from
the Trade of Furrs & Peltry with the Aborigines, soe that consequently their whole
study, and contrivances have been to maintaine their interest and reputation with them,
which has been much augmented by that late foolish, and unhappy expedition from
New England by S"^ William Phips . . . wherein by fatall experience we may la\'
it downe as a maxime. That those who are masters of the Aborigines, will consequently
prevail in all places where they are neglected as we have too much done ; the French are
so sensible of this, that they leave nothing unimproved in this regard ; as first by season-
able presents; secondly, by choosing some of the more notable amongst them, to whom
is given a constant pay as a Lieutenant or Ensigne, &c, thirdly by rewards upon all execu-
tions, either upon us or our Aborigines, giving a certaine sume pr head, for as many
Scalps as shall be brought them fourthly by encouraging the youth of the Countrey in
accompanying the Aborigines in all their expeditions, whereby they not only became
acquainted with the Woods, Rivers, Passages, but of themselves may equall the
Natives in supporting all the incident fatigues of such enterprises, which they performe,
by advancing upon any exploite, the most forward and deserving, unto some office
amongst the regular troops. ... I have known one of this nature which did create
such an emulation, that if the Earl of Frontenac had not restrained their forwardness
for fear of leaving the Country naked, the whole body of their Youth would have per-
petually been out in parties, &c. Fifthly, but the great and most effectual means they
have taken for the confirming their Aborigines, and for the subverting or corrupting of
ours, is that for some years ever since the war, they have from time to time transported
into France some of the most eminent and enterprising Aborigines (not only of their
own, but of ours whom they have happened to take their prisoners) for no other intent
than to amaze and dazzle them with the greatness & splendour of the French Court
and Armie where the King hath so thought it worth his countenancing as to send them
into Flanders, where the ,\rmies have been expressly mustered before them to show

' London Document X, New York Colonial Documents, volume iv, paye 1.50.

86 THE MAUMEE RIVER BASIN.

their greatness, at the same time they are not wanting to insinuate to them our weakness,
poverty, and incapacity of protecting them, which they readily believe, not having any
other notion or Idea of Our Nation, force and strength then what they see from our poor
Settlements about them.*

Thus, in divers ways of seeking the alliance and trade of the
Aborigines, these two nationalities were kept in an almost constant
state of war in America which often assumed general and dire propor-
tions. Colonel Ingoldsby, in his statement to the Commissioners for
Trade and Plantations 16th July, 1697, wrote: . . 'This War
ruins the people; the Inhabitants are decreased in number. The
English and Aborigines were in very good Correspondence: But the
French outdo us much in caressing them.' . . The French were not
only active but ingenuous in their aggressiveness and warfare. It was
even charged against them that they instructed some of their natives in
the ways of poisoning natives friendly to the English, and they often
adopted the modes of warfare of the natives. They insinuated them-
selves into the favor of the powerful Iroquois to the degree that Gov-
ernor Earl Bellomont Vvas assured that 'the French have to the full
as many friends among the Onandaga Nation as we have.'

The British were also active in cultivating the friendship of the
Five Nations. Colonel Peter Schuyler, Dellius, and Major Wessells
made report to Governor Benjamin Fletcher of New York September
28, 1697, in part as follows:

Three Sachims and sevH Capt* of the Coyougers [Cayuga] Nation come to
Albany and made ye following proposalls : 'Brethren, Wee come here to lay before
you our poverty and that wee are menaced by the French and Tvvightwicks [Miami]
Aborigines, both our enemies. Wee beg that you'l please to assist us with powder and
lead that we may be capasitated to defend ourselves and anoy ye enemy (They lay down
two otters and four beavour skins). Brethren, Wee are sorry to have to tell you the loss
of our brethren the Sinnikes [Senecas] suffer'd in an engagement w'li ye Twichtwichts
[Miami] Aborigines ; our young men kill'd severall of the enemyt but upon their retreat
some of their Cheife Capts were cut off. You know our custome is to condole ye dead
by wampom, therefore we desire you to give us some for these Beavours' (see laid down
ten Beavr skins). The wampum was imediately given them for the said skins, and the
day following appointed for a conferance upon the first proposition made by them for
powder & lead &c+.

About this time another peace was declared from the Treaty of
Ryswick in 1697. But this peace was not to be operative for long in
America. The French, being now free to distribute their soldiers,
extended their lines of forts and posts. Their Post Miami, at the head
of the Maumee River, built about 1680-86, was re-built or strengthened

*Londoii Uocument X. New York Colonial Documents Volume iv. pa^'es 207, 20H.

t These tribes were at war in this Basin at the time of its discovery, and for many years there-
after.

t London Document X, New York Colonial Documents volume iv, page 294.

FRENCH FORTS AND BRITISH TRADERS BY THE MAUMEE. 87

in 1697 by Captain de Vincennes, who was very expressly forbidden
to trade in beaver.' *

The French also courted anew the favor of the Aborigines in this
western country, and invited them to a council and treaty in Montreal
in 1701, when they were feasted and confirmed in their friendship. The
first fort at Detroit, Fort Pontchartrain, was built this year by Antoine
de la Mothe Cadillac.

In 1702 Captain de Vincennes again passed through this Basin
establishing Posts, military or trading, along the Maumee River, and
along the Wabash as far southwest as Vincennes. Posts already
existed by the Maumee, but they required repairs, were not favorably
situated, or were not sufficient in number.

British traders had also been among these Aborigines, quietly;
also messengers from different Governors of New York inviting them
to visit Albany and council regarding trade.

Oueen Anne's War was declared against France Hth March, 1702,
from home causes, and was participated in by the American colonists
with great energy; nor did the war stop here with the Treatv of
Utrecht 11th April, 1713, which closed the war at home. The natives
of the East early entered into a treaty of neutrality with the British,
but the French induced them to violate it and, rallying in accumulating
numbers with the French, they perpetrated a long list of savage
butcheries including children, women, and members of the Societv of
Friends who had lieen especiallv friendly to them.

The British had become more alive to their trade interests in
regard to the far natives ' and had sent deputations among the Miamis
and other tribes of this Basin with favorable effect. The French had
claimed these Aborigines as their own for over half a centur\- and now,
desiring their aid, sent special presents to them in 1704 for this pur-
pose. They, however, continued to treat and trade with the British
whereupon M. de Cadillac moved against them with soldiers in 1707
and intimidated them, ayiparently, to the French cause. The following
year, however, found them again in Albany to council with Governor
Lord Cornbury and to deal with the British traders. This transit and
traffic became so regular that, in 1712, Captain de Vincennes was
again sent among the Miamis ' as a messenger of peace or war'
whereupon they again promised loyalty to the French. They could
not, however, yet resist the temptations of higher prices paid for
peltries and lower prices charged for goods offered by the British
traders who continued to entice them.

In. the year 1712 the Outagamie or Fox Aborigines, aided by the
Kickapoos and Mascoutins, attacked the post at Detroit and contin-

* Paris Document V, New York Colonial Documents Volume ix. paye 676.

S8 THE MAUMEE RIVER BASIN.

ued the siege with vigor for some days. The Ottawas, Wyandots,
Pottawotamis, Menominis, Illinois and Osages, friendly to the French
rallied to their aid and saved the post. The French charged that this
attack was instigated by the British, and they sought to retaliate in
every opportunity, and with widespread success.

The proclamation of the close of Queen Anne's War 11th April,
1713, stopped the more open hostilities of the French in the northeast
and enabled them to more quietly gain in other regions for their loss
of Acadia. Their widespread operations in this way against the
British are shown in Colonel Caleb Heathcote's letter to Robert
Hunter Governor of Virginia under date of 8th Juh', 1715, which
reads in part as follows :

It is undoubtedly by the management of the French that the fire is kindled in Caro-
lina, & they'le not be wanting in their endeavours to spread the (lame through the whole
Coast. . . the mischief is intended general. . . It is my opinion that it would be
very proper, with as little loss of time as may be, for your Excellency to desire a meeting
or congresse at some convenient place, of all or as many of the Governours on this conti-
nent as can with conveniency come & attend it ; where it may be considered &
resolved on, what measures to take for extinguishing the fire already begun, & to pre-
vent its increase ; for as every part of North America is struck at, so all our interests
are the same, & what number soever is wounded or hurt, the whole ought to reckon
themselves agrieved, and not carelessly suffer the French to angle us away, province by
province, till at last all will be gon ; and as it is impossible that we & the French can
both inhabit this Continent in peace, but that one nation must at last give way to the
other, so tis very necessary that, without sleeping away our time, all precautions
imaginable should be taken to prevent its falling to our lotts to remove.* .

In the year 17I() Sir Alexander Spotswood Governor of Virginia
opened a road over the Blue Ridge Mountain to Ohio lands, and in
this year the route, known and used by the French for fifty years or
more, up the Maumee River and down the Wabash was more openly
published as the most direct and best wav to the southwest ; but the
British were yet few in numbers who went so far from their eastern
settlements.

In September, 1717, the Illinois country was joined to Louisiana.
The activity of the French was now greatly increased, and several
times their successes in alienating the natives from the British, even
those natives immediately surrounding the British towns was so great
that the necessity for active retaliation seemed iiniierative. The Rep-
resentation of the Lords Commissioners for Trade and Plantations
to the King upon the State of His [Britanic] Majesties Colonies &
Plantations on the Continent of North America' dated September the

*London Doc. XX, N. Y. Col. Docs, vol, v, pane 430. This letter contains the second suu^'estion
we lind for united action of the British Colonies, Plantations or Provinces. ' A Briefe and Plaine
Scheam . . by Mr. IWilliani I Penn ' . . January S, 1697, for this purpose, is tlie first suyyestion.
Ibid, iv, 390.

TRADE COMPETITION BETWEEN BRITISH AND FRENCH. 89

8th, 1721, shows that the French had won the friendship of nearly all
the Aborigines from New Ham|)shire to the Carolinas, excepting the
Iroquois of New York, whose alliance they several times nearly
secured. The Lords of Trade and Plantations realized the dangers of
the situation, and a paragraph in their report reads as follows :

Thus, by one view of the Map of North America. Your Majesty will see the
danger your subjects are in, surrounded by the French, who have robbed them of great
part of the trade they formerly drove with the natives, have in great measure cut of
their prospect of further improvements that way, and in case of a rupture, may greatly
incommode, if not absolutely destroy them by their native Allies. And although the
British Plantations are naturally fortified by a chain of Mountains that run from the
back of South Carolina as far as New York, passable but in a few places, yet should we
not possess those passes in time, this would rather prove destructive than beneficial
to us.* .

The full knowledge of their danger begot the lueans of their sal-
vation. The increase in number of the British in .\merica was greater
than that of the French. They also rallied to the necessity of giving
more and more attention to the Aborigines in general from the iiolicy
of both jirotection and trade. In greater numbers and to farther
distances thev followed the French along the water courses. Their
presents, their increased prices for peltries and their cheaper prices for
the goods exchanged for them were attractions for the natives that the
French could not fully continue to meet. The British looms had been
kept at work on various fabrics of the brightest colors expressly for
the American Aborigines. The French Comjianies could not bu\- their
goods as cheap as could the British, and 'the Duty the French Com-
pany is obliged to pav to the King . . enabled the Traders of New
York to sell their Goods in the .'Vborigine Country at half the price
people of Canada can, and reap twice the profit they do.'T Strouds
were sold at /Mbany, New York, for f 10 that commanded £'2o at
Montreal. In 17-4 British merchants of New York 'allow Traders
with the Aborigines double the Price for Beaver that the French
Company allow.' . . The prices had been advanced from three
shillings until five shillings New York money, or three shillings ster-
ling, were paid per pound for skins in New York, while in Montreal
the price was two livres or eighteen pence. + The French not being
able to keep the British traders from the natives in Central \\'estern
Ohio, endeavored to remove the Aborigines to the north and west, but
were not successful.

France declared war against Great Britain March l;"i, 1744, again
from European causes, and the British Colonists in America, now more

^London Document XXII, New York Colonial Documents volume v, page 623.
t London Doc. XXVII, New York Colonial Documents, volume v, page 730,

i The Chapter on the Maumee River cives tin thei klinipses of the increased activity of the British
throutih this Basin.

90 THE MAUMEE RIVER BASIN.

conscious of their strength, readily entered into the contest here under
the name of the War of King George II, and with a greater feeling of
local justification. In Europe this was known as the War of the
Spanish Succession. This vear the British effected another treaty with
the Six Nations at Lancaster, Pennsylvania, wherein was confirmed
their cession in 1684 of claims to lands along the southern shore of
Lake Erie and to the southwest. They also effected several other
treaties about this time, including one with the Ohio Aborigines.*
On account of the increased traffic and trade, the Maumee River
Basin experienced more of this war than of the others that had been
waged between these contending nations. In fact Ohio had become
the center for Aborigine warriors, and the increased peaceful successes
of the British with these Aborigines was becoming a more stjrious matter
with the French; and wherever traders of the former were reported,
parties or troops of the latter were dispatched for their arrest or dis-
lodgment. At the beginning of King George II's War, M. de Longueuil
commandant at Detroit, passed up the Maumee River with his body
guard and a company of Ottawas on their way to capture British
traders by the White River, Indiana. Many of those western tribes
were yet friendh' to the French and, in the summer of 1746, eight or
ten of the tribes were represented by warriors at Montreal ready to
enter upon any savage work to which the French could direct them.

The Conspiracy of Nicholas Against The French.

A number of the western tribes of Aborigines, however, were not
active with the French, and other tribes were divided. The Miamis of
the Maumee were not largely represented at Montreal at this time. The
Iroquois of New York were again divided, and the British by the
friendly members sent war-belts of wampum to the Hurons (Wyandots)
and the war-chief Nicholas with his band accepted the overture. From
the Paris Documents IX and X which are the French records of occur-
rences during the years 1747—48, the following statements relating to
the widespread influence of Nicholas in this Basin and its vicinit\'
are extracted, largely in the words there given, viz:

The Wyandots under Nicholas killed five Frenchmen who were on their return
from the post at White River [in the present Indiana] and stole their furs ; and all the
natives of the neighborhood, except the Illinois tribes have formed the design to destroy
all the French of Detroit on one of the holidays of Pentecost, and afterwards go to the
fort and subject all to fire and sword. Some Hurons having struck too soon, the plot
had been discovered by a Huron squaw who came to give M. de Longueuil, Commandant
of Detroit, notice of it. . . . Other Hurons came to assure him that they had no
share in the misconduct of Nicolas' people . . who have attached to them several

'■' Narrative and Critical History of America volume i, pages 3tX\ S0.5; also volume v, pages 487,
566, with notes and other references.

FRENCH REPORT OF THE CONSPIRACY OF NICHOLAS. 91

families of vagabond Iroquois, Loups, Sauts, etc. . . We are informed that all the
[western] Nations in general continue to be ill disposed to the French . . that those of
the Lake, Sauteurs and Outaouas [Chippewas and Ottawas] are on the eve of attacking
Detroit ; . . that the fort has lost almost all the cattle ; and fears that the garrison
will perish, being all at the discretion of the enemy.

A party of Miamis have come to dance the Calumet at the fort [Detroit] and
another section have been to visit Nicolas at Sandusky. The ceremony attendant on
the former has been very expensive ; their reception, the good cheer for the space of
fifteen days, and the presents which have been made to them with a view both to destroy
unfavorable impressions amongst them, and to protect the lives of the French who are
in their village, have cost a great deal.

Such was the state of affairs at Detroit on the 2.ith August, 1747. . The Mon-

treal convoy arrived safe in Detroit on the 'I'ind September, escorted by about l.iO men
including the merchants and their servants. This relief is the salvation of Detroit, and
has apparently made an impression on the Nations [tribes of Aborigines]. The Miamis
[of the Maumee River] and perhaps also the Ouyatanons [of the Wabash] are in dis-
order. The former allowed themselves to be gained over by the Belts of Nicolas, who
represented to them that Detroit had been razed by the Lake tribes ; that consequently
they could no longer defer killing the French who were among them. The Miamis have
listened to this message. They first seized eight Frenchmen who were in the fort of
that post [Fort Miami at the head of the Maumee] whom, however, they did not injure ;
they afterwards seized the property and burnt a portion of the buildings. Two of the
eight Frenchmen whom the Miamis had allowed to leave uninjured, arrived at Detroit
on the 7th of October, 1747. . . There are a great many peltries at Detroit, which
cannot be brought down [to Montreal] until next year. . . These nations [the Ottawas.
Chippewas and Pottawatamis] are only endeavoring to get their supplies out of us,
and to discover a favorable opportunity to betray us irrecoverably. Mr. de Longueuil
is consequently, obliged to ask us for a reinforcement of men and provisions, at
the very opening of spring. . . There are not provisions at Detroit for any length
of time.

M. Longueuil not being able to send any Traders to the Miamis until the Nation
return to its duty, sends back to Montreal Ensign Douville, who commanded at that post
[at the head of the Maumee] and who was at Detroit at the time the natives com-
mitted the pillage. . . The Miamis, who had formerly pillaged the fort and seized
the Frenchmen have sent [fall or winter of 1717] one of their principal chiefs to M.
de Longueuil to request him to send back some Frenchmen to them, and not to deprive
them of their indispensable supplies, promising him that order would be restored in a
short time. That officer yielded to their solicitation, with a view to deprive the enemy
[British] of the liberty of seizing a post of considerable importance. Ensign Dubuisson
whom he sent thither [at the head of the Maumee] is to form only a small establishment
there to winter in. He has been supplied with thirty Frenchmen to maintain himself
there, and is accompanied by thirty others destined for the Ouyatanons trade [down the
Wabash], with orders to the latter to rejoin Sieur Dubuisson in the spring, so as to
return together to Detroit.

Nicolas. Orotoni and Anioton, chiefs of the Huron [Wyandot natives] traitors,
came there [Detroit] to sue for peace, and to surrender the belts [of Wampum] which
have been the cause of this treason ; they have made speeches to which M. de Longueuil
has given an answer, but he doubts their sincerity. . . The post at Detroit will, it is
feared, run short of provisions in consequence of the great number of tribes continually
there, and who are to come from all parts this spring [1748]. A Frenchman has been
killed at the gate of the fort of the Miamis [at the head of the Maumee] it is supposed
by some Iroquois.

92 THE MAUMEE RIVER BASIN.

Nicolas' conduct is not free from equivocation ; the English of Philadelphia visited
him twice during the winter [1747-48], to trade, and they were well received. The scalp
belonging to the Frenchman who was killed near Fort Miamis, has been carried thither
[to Sandusky]. . The posts of the Miamis and at the River [St. Joseph] are not

in want of goods. . . The messages and proceedings of Nicolas are too suspicious to
be relied on. . . Presents are sent [from Detroit] by Cold Foot, a Miami chief, who
appears trustw-orthy.

Count de la Galissonniere [Governor of New France] writes to the commandants
of the posts of the Miamis, Ouyatanons, River St. Joseph, Sec. respecting what con-
cerns them ; and adds, that they ought to keep an exact and circumstantial journal of the
occasions wherein they are obliged to incur expenses for presents to natives. . . He
sends these officers a list of the voyageurs who are wintering with the natives, and of
the Coureurs de bois in order to their being sent back, so that they not return any
more to the Upper country.

Kinousaki had returned, on the 7th of .■\pril [1748], from the Miamis [Maumee]
River, whither he had gone to bring back the Hurons [Wyandots] who had deserted
from the village of Ostandosket [Sandusky] and reported that Nicolas, with 119 warriors
of his nation, men, women and baggage, had taken the route to the White River, after
having burnt the fort and the cabins of the village ; that the Outauas [Ottawas] had
given him (Kinousaki) a cool reception, and that a portion only of them would consent
to return to Detroit, the remainder wishing to settle at the lower end of the Miamis
[Maumee] liiver, where the Hurons had promised them the English would supply their
wants. . . The natives in and around Detroit have all sworn fidelity and obedience
to Chevalier de Longueuil . . who by four Belts, [of Wampun] put moccassins on
the feet of all the warriors so that they may be ready at a minute's warning.

Numerous war parties were fitted out in Montreal and at the west-
ern posts, for incursions against the British and their native allies; and
manv scalps, from one to twenty-five or more per war party, were
lirought in and payment for them collected. Further i^limpses of the
horrors of such ignoble warfare that was sometimes repugnant to the
savages are excerpted from the rejiorts to superior officers made at the
time, viz: 'June 22, 1748. Thirty-four Iroquois of the Saut have been
outfitted for a war party, and ordered to divide themselves into two or
three small sections : but having manifested some repugnance, thev
were authoritatively, told that they were to submit to orders and
obey.' This policy sometimes acted like a two-edged knife : and the
definition of murderer hinged upon the relationship of the V'arty killed,
for instance:

June 2~nh. All these natives [the Sauteurs or Chippewas near Detroit] have
very urgently demanded mercy for the murderers; they were answered, that it was
mercy to detain them so as to prevent them continuing their bad conduct ; that the people
of their nation ought to have confidence in their Father's [the French Governor's,
through the commandant of the fort] benificence. . . July Sth. The Outaoua
[Ottawa], Huron, and Pouteouatime [Pottawotami] chiefs at Detroit have requested
some young men to go on a war excursion [against the British], as well to afford proofs
of their fidelity as to repair past faults, whilst they, the chiefs, would return home to
promote peace [toward the French]. The first portion of their request has been
approved ; the young men have, consequently, been equipped, but the chiefs have been
given to understand that they ought not to think of returning before speaking [inflicting

BRITISH AND FRENCH PURCHASE EACH OTHER'S SCALPS. 93

injuries] to the Five Nations, who were daily expected. The different Michilimackinac
Nations made similar requests to those of Detroit. Ninety of these natives, fifty domi-
ciliated natives and twenty-si.\ Canadians have all been equipped under the command of
Chevalier de Repentigny, who is accompanied by several military cadets.
July Kith. Twenty-four Outaouas and Pouteouatamis of Detroit have been likewise
fitted out for a war excursion. . . Nine Sauteurs of Detroit have been equipped
to go on a war excursion. Sieur Blondeau, a volunteer, commands them.
August 10th. Chevalier de Repentigny, who went out with a party of natives to fight'
arrives from Montreal ; he made an attack near Corlac and took eleven prisoners and
twenty-five scalps.

If the British inflicted less injury than they experienced by this
horrible mode of warfare it was less from their desire than from their
liinited success in enlisting the savages as their allies. Governor
George Clinton in a letter dated Ne\v York ifith April, 1747, wrote to
Colonel William Johnson that 'In the bill I am Koing" to pass, the
council did not think pro]ier to put rewards for scali:)in!J', or taking iionr
women or children prisoners, in it; but the asseml)ly has assured me the
money shall be paid when it so happens, if the natives insist upon it.'

On May oOth Colonel Johnson wrote to the Governor that 'I
am quite pestered every day with parties returning with prisoners and
scalps, and without a penny to pay them with. It comes very hard
upon me, and is displeasing to them I can assure you, for they expect
their pay and demand it of me as soon as they return.""

Governor Clinton reported to the Duke of Newcastle, with date
•23rd Jul\ , 1747, t that

Colonel Johnson who I have employ'd as Chief Manager of the .Aborigine War
and Colonel over all the natives, by their own approbation, has sent several parties of
natives into Canada & brought back at several times prisoners & scalps, but they
being laid aside last year, the natives were discouraged and began to entertain jealousies,
by which a new expence became necessary to remove these jealousies & to bring them
back to their former tempers ; but unless some enterprize be undertaken, which may
keep up their spiritts, we may again loose them. I intend to propose something to our
Assembly for this purpose that they may give what is necessary for the expence of it, but
I almost despair of any success with them when money is demanded.

I must likewise inform your Grace that by this last trip to Albany, I have got two
native NationsJ to join us, who are numerous & who were formerly alhvays in the
French interest. They have actually fallen upon several French trading parties. They
may be of singular use to distress the French trade & to cut oft all communication
between the French in Missesipia tiiver & Canada.

The Treaty of Aix-La-Chapelle, in April, 174H, closed King Geor.ge
II's War in Great Britain, but settled nothing between the American
and French Colonies further than to restore to the French possession
Louisburg and Cape Breton captured by the British in 174.".

* History of Detroit and Michigan, by Silas Farmer, volume i; and Michigan Pioneer and
Historical Collections.

t London Document XXVIII, New York Colonial Documents, volume vi, paye .3,58.
i Probably the Wyandots, and the Mianiis of the Mauniee River Basin,

94 THE MAUMEE RIVER BASIN.

The Last British-French War in America. 1754 to 1760.

King George II's War exhibited the increasing strength of the
British in America, and their increasing desire to extend the borders of
their settlements according to former grants and treaties. It had been
a good training school for the simple, brawny colonists in the ways of
war and they had shown themselves equal to the task of coping with
the best French regular troops. Further, the home government had
taught the Colonies the lesson of self-reliance. They had been com-
pelled to sustain themselves and the armies with food, and to protect
their borders with comparatively little aid. They had been well
informed regarding the cause of French successes with the Aborigines
and, following the treaty of peace at Aix-la-Chapelle, which was but
another truce, thev were relieved of the task of guarding their co^st
towns against French warships and the invasion of French troops.
The results were soon observed by the French in the extension of
British settlements and traders with the Aborigines. The Governors
of Pennsvlvania and Virginia also sought to confirm their purchase of
Ohio lands at Lancaster in 1744, and the treaties with different tribes,
bv inviting the Six Nations, Delawares, Shawnees, Nanticokes (a
band of Delawares) and the Miamis to a council 19th July, 1748,*
when the chiefs and warriors assembled ( Kequenackcpia, father of
Little Turtle (?) and two other chiefs, Assapausa and Natoecoqucha,
for the Miamis) fully committed their tribes to the direction and pro-
tection of these Colonies. To draw the Miamis and their neighboring
bands away from the French influence, the British traders had built a
stockade by the Miami River at the mouth of Loramie Creek in the
present Shelby County, Ohio, and had been succeeding in gradually
attracting the tribe thither. This station was sometimes called Tawix-
twi and Twightwees ' 'the British name for the Miamis) town, and
sometimes Pickawillany.

The French were quick to yierceive the developing aggressiveness
of the British and, smarting from their apparently weakening prestige
among the natives, redoubled their efforts along the borders for the
purpose of obstructing the advance of British company land grants,
traders and settlers. Hostilities of more or less moment continued
along the old, and the constantly increasing, lines of travel to the
westward regardless of the treaty.

The grants of land in 174H to the British colonists forming the
Ohio Company and others, made a new route of travel to the Ohio

■' Alfred T. Goodwin wrote that this treaty was held at Lancaster. Pennsylvania. Journal of
Captain William Trent, Cincinnati, 1871, pages 22, 40, 95.

FRENCH EFFORTS TO KEEP BRITISH FROM OHIO. 95

River desirable as the former routes were well guarded by the
French. The French had foreseen this and had established forts in
the vicinitv of the probable routes ; and now they saw the necessity of
adopting increased precautions to prevent the inroads of their enemies,
the British. In 1749 the Marquis de la Gallissonniere, then Governor
in chief of New France, sent Captain Pierre Joseph de Celoron* to Ohio
for this purpose. This command of two hundred French and thirty
Aboriginest left Quebec the Ifith June, 1749, arrived at Niagara the
6th July, and at the junction of the Miami River with the Ohio if^th
August, where Celoron buried the sixth, and last, lead plate stamped
with the notice that France had taken formal possession of the country.
Tin plates bearing the same notification were nailed to trees, and
every other means taken to proclaim this event. The 13th September
the expedition arrived at the mouth of Loramie Creek, the site of
Pickawillany stockade built b\- British traders about the year 1740.
At the time of the coming of Celoron there was here a village and fort
of a Miami chief of the Piankeshaw band called la Demoiselle (the
Young Ladv ) on account of his display of dress and ornaments.
Celoron requested the chief to take his band, which British traders had
enticed away from the French, back to Fort Miami at the head of the
Maumee River. This he promised to do later. At this time there was
in this village of forty to fifty Aborigine men, but one English trader
(others had departed on their approach); but a number of others were
met on the route from the headquarters of the Ohio River to this
point, whom Captain Celoron ordered out of the Ohio country; and
he reported their promises to go.

Captain Celoron burned at Pickawillanx' the canoes with which
his command had ascended the Miami River, and marched across the
divide and along the right bank of the River St. Mary to its mouth at
the head of the Maumee.

He found Fort Miami in \-ery bad condition ; most of the palisades were decayed
and fallen into ruin. Within, there were eight houses — or, to speak more correctly,
eight miserable huts, which only the desire of making money could render endurable.
The French there numbered twenty-two ; all of them, even to the commandant, had the
fever [probably the ague]. Monsieur Raimond [the commandant] did not approve the
situation of the fort [see No. .") on the accompanying map], and maintained that it should
be placed on the bank of the St. Joseph River, distant only a scant league from its pres-
ent site [see No. <i on map]. He wished to show me that spot, but the hindrances of

* There has been some confusion regardinc this ofticei 's name. In the New York Colonial Docu-
ments it is given as Captain Bienville de Celoron. In another writing it is shown as Blainville the
name of an ensign present at the taking of Fort Massachusetts; and others give it as Celoron de
Bienville. The Reverend Father Bonnecamps accompanied this Ohio expedition, and the name is here
given as recorded by him in The Jesuit Relations. Cleveland edition.

t London Document XXIX, New York Colonial Documents, volume vi, page 533.

96 THE MAUMEE RIVER BASIN.

our departure prevented me from going thither. All that I could do for him was to trace
the plan of his new fort. The latitude of the old one is fl° 20'.*

We bought pirogues and provisions and, on the afternoon of the 2Tth [September,
1 Tl'.l ] we set out en route for Detroit.!

A new Fort Miami was built hv Commandant Comtt- dc Raimond
aftur the visit of Captain Celeron, in 1749 and during- the year 1750.
It was located on the east bank of the River St. Joseph, and the old
Fort on the right bank of the St. Mary over a mile to the southwest,
was abandoned.

The British were again stimulated to increased activity by Captain
Celoron's expedition. The Ohio Land Company, formed in Virginia
in 174H, sent Christopher Gist to Ohio in 1750, and Governor James
Hamilton of Pennsylvania sent George Croghan, to explore the coun-
try and to conciliate the Aborigines unfriendl\- to the British. Pres-
ents of rum, paint, blankets, etc., were carried along as necessary ways
and means to the end desired. Fealty was promised, and manifested
while the agents were present by the Miamis refusing to receive the
friendly wampum, tobacco and brandy, i)resented by four Ottawas di-
rect from the French at Detroit.! Many presents were also sent to
the Aborigines in Ohio by the 'Governor of Philadelphia' including
twelve barrels of gunpowder &c' with captivating assertions for
better prices for peltries and cheaper prices for goods, all made prac-
tical, and tangible, by the convivial effects of the freely flowing rum,
which was represented as better than the French brand\- while far
cheaper in price. §

'Valuable presents' from the French followed those from the British
in the spring of 1750; and these presents were soon followed by French
threats to destroy the tribes who continued to favor the British. Evi-
dences of an impending final struggle were fast gathering, and Ohio
was the skirmishing ground. The Aborigines were fickle and waver-
ing, with the tendency always toward the side that most freely and
continuously offered the greater inducements in presents of gaudy
trappings, intoxicants and weapons; and while the French and British,
each in turn, acknowledged exhaustion from such apparently necessary
policv. We also catch glimpses from their records of fatigue, and even
of disgust, occasionally manifested by the Aborigines at the continu-

* This computation is but twenty minutes in excess of the autliois computation for the site of Gen-
era! Wayne's fort shown on the accompanyinc map, and illustrates that the early, and ready, means of
computing latitude was fairly satisfactory.

t From Father Bounecamp's diary of Captain Celoron's expedition through Ohio in 1749, The
Jesuit Relations, volume Ixix, pace IHo et seq.

t London Doc. XXIV, N. Y. Col. Docs, volume vii, panes 267 to 271, Colonial Records of Penn-
sylvania, volume v. Olden Time, volume i, Dinwiddle Papers. For the Journal of Mr, Gist's journey,
see Pownall's Topographical Description of North America, London, 1776.

S Compare London Document XXIX, New York Colonial Documents volume vi, page 549.

STRUGGLES FOR THE FRIENDSHIP OF THE ABORIGINES. 97

ous solicitations, liribery and threats of force b\- these European
invaders of the forests to keep the Aborigines involved in their long
continued contests for supremacy. It was but a phase of the old storv
of the a-ggressiveness and persistency of the Anglo-Saxon people in
their conquest of the world.

The Six Nations of New York, now much reduced in number and
efficiency t)y past wars, still claimed and held the country to the east
end of Lake Erie and, notwithstanding treaties and purchases, vet

I.W F» Wa isMir^QTON B° 10'

claimed along its southern border and were \et very desiralile allies.
Their influence and assistance were still claimed by both the French
and the British. The temper of the situation is shown in the follow-
ing excerpts from the letter of Marquis de la Jonquiere, Governor of
New France, to George Clinton, Governor of New York, under date
10th August, 1751, viz:

You. very unadvisedly, and in opposition to your own understanding, call the
Five Nations subjects of the King, your Master. They are ho such thing, and you
would be very careful not to put forth such a pretension in their presence. You treat
them with much more circumspection. . It must be concluded that your excellency

has had no authority to object against the post [in New York] I have caused to be
established. It has been erected with the perfect knowledge of the Iroquois of the Five

98 THE MAUMEE RIVER BASIN.-

Nations, who alone are competent to complain of it. They did not oppose it ; they con-
sented to it.

You are not ignorant, Sir, of the expedition Mr. de Celeron made in the
year 1 74'.l. , . I had the honor to write to you myself on the 7th March, 1750, on that
subject, and to request your Excellency to issue an order forbidding all the subjects of
New England to go and trade on the territory of the King, my Master. In the same
letter I had the honor to express to you my just sensibility at all the secret movements
of the English to induce the Aborigines, who, from all time, have been our closest allies,
to destroy the French. . . But the result has undeceived me. The English, far
from confining them.selves within the limits of the King of Great Britain's possessions,
not satisfied with multiplying themselves more and more on Rock River [the Miami],
with having houses and open stores there, have, more than that, proceeded within sight
of Detroit, even unto the fort of the Miamis [at the head of the Maumee]. This pro-
ceeding, following so many unneighborly acts, the evil consequences we but too sensibly
feel, have placed Mr. de Celoron, the commandant at Detroit, under the necessity of
ordering these Englishmen to be arrested. . . The capture of these four English-
men ought not to surprise you : . . as for John Pathin, he entered the fort of the
Miamis to persuade the Aborigines who remained there, to unite with those who have
fled to the Beautiful river [the Ohio]. He has been taken in the French fort. Nothing
more is necessary. . . John Pathin could enjoy the same freedom [as the others],
but he is so mutinous, and uttered so many threats, that I have been obliged to imprison
him at (Juebec.

Governor Clinton replied in a long letter that, 'The Gov"" of
Canada, by his answer of 10th of August, confesses the things com-
plained of to he true, does not deny them to be infractions of
the Treaty of Utrecht [in which the French were not to enter the
country of the British Aborigines], but advances a number of facts
groundless and false in themselves. . . This seems to be
treating his Britanick Majesty and the Treaties of Utrecht and
Aix-la-Chapelle with contempt. . . The French possession of
Detroit was not till after the peace of Ryswick . . and these
incroachments were grieviously complained of by the Five Nations
to the Gov^ of New York.' . . James Hamilton, Governor of
Pennsylvania, wrote to Governor Clinton 18 September, 1751, that
'The Gov"" of Canada's letter . . is indeed a singular piece of
argumentation, but though its reasonings are everywhere false, as
might lie easily proved, yet I think it will be to no purpose to confute
them, since little regard will probably be had to anything that can be
said on this side of the Water.'

In th(.- fall of 1750 the British enlarged and strengthened the stock-
ade at Pickawillany, which was made necessary by the increase of
population and business. Christopher Gist, at the time of his sojourn
there, wrote in his Journal (see ante, jiage ilti) February, 1751, that
this place was daily increasing and was accounted one of the strongest
Aborigine towns on the continent. The stockade was then being-
strengthened. During the winter of 1750-51, thirty Miamis were killed
bv the French and their St. Lawrence -Vborigine allies. In 1751 the

FRENCH CAPTURE OF PICKAWILLAMY. CANNIBALISM. 99

French captured near the Maumee River Luke Arowin, Joseph Forti-
ner, Thomas Borke and John Pathen, Pennsylvania traders with the
Aborigines whom they held as prisoners. Retaliation was sought, and
was accomplished the following spring by Fifteen French traders fall-
ing victims of the Miamis.

Marquis de la Jonquiere Governor of New France ordered Captain
Celoron, now commandant of Detroit, to attack and reduce Picka-
willany: but he could not or would not obey. The threateiied condi-
tion of French affairs at this time in and contiguous to this Basin are
further told by the report of Comte de Raimond, commandant of Fort
Miami at the head of the Maumee, that

My people are leaving me for Detroit. Nobody wants to stay here and have
his throat cut. All the tribes who go to the English at Pickawillany come back loaded
with gifts. I am too weak to meet the danger. Instead of twenty men. I need five
hundred. . . We have made peace with the English, yet they try continually to make
war on us by means of the Aborigines ; they intend to be masters of all this upper
country. The tribes here are leaguing together to kill all the French, that they may
have nobody on their lands but their English brothers. This I am told by Coldfoot, a
great Miami chief, whom I think an honest man, if there is any such thing among
Aborigines. If the English stay in this country we are lost. We must attack and

drive them out.* .

War belts of wampum were sent from tribe to tribe until St. Ange
commandant at Vincennes became alarmed. In the winter and spring
of 1752 small-pox disabled many soldiers at Fort Detroit and Baron de
Longueuil, acting Governor, wrote that 'it is to be wished that it
would spread among our rebels; it would be fullv as good as an
army.t • . We are menaced with a general outbreak, and even
Toronto is in danger. . . Before long the English on the Miaini
will gain over all the surrounding tribes, get possession of Fort
Chartres, and cut our communications with Louisiana.'

A force of about two hundred and fifty Chippewas and Ottawas
was gathered at the north and, led by Charles Langlade, were
reinforced at Detroit by M. St. Orr (St. Our?) with a few French
regulars and Canadians, and all passed rapidly across Lake Erie, up
the Maumee and St. Marv, and across the porta,ge to Pickawillany
where they attacked the town and fort early in the morning of 21st
June, 1752. Most of the Aborigines were distant, and after a sharp
battle the town and fort were surrendered to the assailants. One
Englishman was wounded, then stabbed and partly eaten. Five

* Francis Parknian's Montcalm and Wolfe, Boston, 1898, volume i, page H2.

Commandant Raimond was, soon after this report, succeeded at Fort Miami by M. de Villiers
See Paris Document X. N. Y. Col. Docs. vol. s, page 246.

t The Miamis were afflicted with small-pox in the winter of 17f>i-r}2. but the writer has no definite
evidence of it having been intentionally propagated among them. Chief Coldfoot and his son. and
other chiefs, died at this time of this disease.

100 THE MAUMEE RIVER BASIN.

Englishmen were taken prisoners, and two, Thomas Burney and
Andrew McBryer, escaped to tell the particulars. Fourteen Miamis
were shot, including /a Demoiselle (called by the British traders Old
Britain and Piankeshaw King) whom thev boiled and ate. Seventy
years of missionaries had not weaned them from cannibalism.''^

Possibly the French soldiers stopped at Fort Miami, as one report
mentions but two Frenchmen in the attack. But the French were
responsible for it: and this may well be called the first prominent overt
act in the last British-French war in America which was destined to
result in the complete overthrow of the French. It awed the Miamis.
They fled from the region and soon went again to the French,
attracted by the spectacular display and presents of M. de Longueuil
in the tall, not regarding treaties, including the recent one at Logs-
town a few miles below the present Pittsburg", and the visit and
presents of Captain William Trent to Pickawillany one month after
the attack of that place under French direction. Virginia, in effort to
win back the Miamis, sent presents to their chiefs; and appropriations
were made by the Legislature for their benefit. In May, 1753, the
Legislature of Pennsylvania voted 'the sum of two hundred pounds
as a present of condolence to the Twightwee [Miami] nation, on the
melancholy occasion mentioned in the governor's message of the 16th
of October last' it being their loss of lives at Pickawillany. The
assembly also voted six hundred pounds for distribution among the
Wyandots, Senecas, Shawnees, and other western tribes. These
Aborigines were a]oprised of the appropriations and, upon invitation,
were represented the following autumn in council at Winchester and
at Carlisle, where they treacherously professed great 'love and affec-
tion' for the British. Their fealty to the French was determined,
however, before the presents were delivered, and fortunately so on
account of the designed presents consisting largely of powder and
lead.

With the building of the French forts Presque Isle, Le Boeuf
and Venango in 175'2-54 by the water courses and portage from the
present Erie, Pennsylvania, to the head of the Ohio River, and the
bloodless surrender of Fort Duquesne 17th April, 1754, the British
were practically shut out of Ohio, notwithstanding the favorable
treaties before mentioned.

The breach was rapidly widening, however, between the British
and French and the determination of both parties boded ill to the
weaker when the imjiending general resort to arms should be sounded.
Already greater secrecy had been enjoined from London, 30th March,

■^Reports of Longueuil and DuMuesne; Colonial Records of Pennsylvania, v. 599; Captain
William Trent to Governor Robert Dinwiddle; and Parknian's Montcalm and Wolfe.

0H[0 DESIRABLE AS A BRITISH COLONY. 101

1752, to the Governors in America by the Earl of Holderness Secretary
of State, in the following communication: 'Whereas it may happen
that circumstances of a very hijj'h and ini])ortant nature may arise
which ma\' require the utmost secrecy, it is the King's pleasure that if
any such should occur within the district of your Government you
should forthwith with the utmost diligence and exactitude, transmit an
account thereof to one of His Majesty's Principal Secretaries of State
o^l3^ And you are in such case to follow all orders and Directions
which His Majesty shall think proper to direct one of His principal
Secretaries of State to transmit to \ou in consequence thereof.'

The British Colonies had been discordant. The people were poor
and, generally having little or no interest in hunting or trading with
the Aborigines for furs, had given their attention to clearing the land
and cultivating it for their livelihood ; but something •more decisive
must be done to destroy the embarrassing aggressiveness of the French
who were continually inciting or abetting the Aborigines to resent the
cultivation of the settlers' land.

For the purpose of formulating uniform action for winning the
Aborigines against the French, the Lords Commissioners of Trade and
Plantations, in London, requested the Colonies to send delegates to
Albany, New York, in June, 1754. But little immediate good resulted
from this meeting, further than it was educative for a uni(in that
eventually bore full fruit in confederation. Soon after this meeting
Benjamin Franklin wrote for Thomas Pownall, member of the Colonial
Congress, a description of the Ohio country and its desirabilitv as
a colony for Great Britain.*

Major George Washington's journey late in 175;! from Governor
Dinwiddle to the French forts before mentioned to warn the French
to desist in their aggressions, proving of no avail, he was sent in May,
1754, with a small force against Fort Duquesne at the head of the Ohio
River, whicli was the I'rench bar closing the Ohio countr\' to the
British. The moderate success of his effort at Great Meadows late in
May, has been termed the first contest in the final British-French W'ar
(often called the French and Aborigine War) in America, regardless
of the massacre at Pickawillany in 1752. Washington's surrender at
Fort Necessity occurred 3rd July, 1754. Then followed a series of
British defeats from unprejiaredness, the slowness of the Colonies in
getting properly into action from the dictations of, and the deferring
to, the home government (Great Britain) and the sending of European
officers and regular troops untrained, and unable, to cope with the
French and their Aborigine allies in the wilderness. General Edward

■ Papers of lienjamiii Franklin, by Jared Sparks, volume in.

102 THE MAUMEE RIVER BASIN.

Braddock's defeat in 1755 while attempting to break the French lines
on the upper Ohio, is an illustration of the latter.

This, the first British-French War relating mostly to American
affairs was formalh' declared by Great Britain in May, 1756, about two
years after continued hostilities. It was but the natural culmination,
as has been seen in the foregoing, of the increasing population and the
continued aggressiveness of both nationalities. The result of this war
was the fulfillment of the prophecy of Colonel Caleb Heathcote in his
communication to Governor Robert Hunter of New York, 8 July, 1715,
that 'it is impossible that the British and the French can both inhabit
[rule] this Continent in peace but that one nation must at last give
way to the other.'

At this time as heretofore the chief travel and events in the
Maumee Basin occurred along the Maumee River, and the reader is
referred to the chapter on this river in this book for many details. No
great battle was fought in this Basin between the distinctively British
and French troops. The contest here was between the British agents
and traders among the Aborigines and the French agents who were
often accompanied by French soldiers and distant Al^origines. Each
in turn put forth strong efforts to reclaim the unstable Aborigines and
to more closely ally them to the interest represented. Special induce-
ments had also been offered by Captain de Celoron for French farmers
to settle in this western country with Detroit as the more northern
center, and it was hoped that about two hundred and fifty families from
the lower settlements along the St. Lawrence would accept the terms,
viz : Each family to receive free transportation at the King's expense;
and every settler to receive as free gift one gun, hoe, axe, plowshare,
scvthe, sickle, two augurs large and small, a sow, six hens, a cock, six
pounds of powder, twelve pounds of lead, and many other favors.
Onh' about twelve families consented to remove.'''

War parties were again formed by the French among the Aborig-
ines and sent after British agents and disaffected tribes. Aborigines
from this Basin were again frequently at Montreal. They were present
at the capture of Fort William Henry in 1757, and at many other
]5oints in the East where their services were wanted by the French.

But the time had matured for a change in the 'home government'
and a reversal of the series of British disasters. The great friend of the
American Colonies, William Pitt 'the Great Commoner' was chosen
Secretary of State and his change of leaders in America to those imbued

* Ordinance of 2nd January. 1750. The more permanent population of Detroit and vicinity in
1750 is recorded as four hundred and eiulity-three persons. During the followinj: two years a consider-
able number of young men came voluntarily, and Captain Celoron wrote to Montreal foi yirls to marry
tlie;n. Compare Parkinan's Montcalm and Wolfe, page 77.

TRIUMPH OF BRITISH OVER FRENCH. THE ABORIGINES. 103

with his vigorous and well-defined policy, broujiht honor and success

to the British arms. French rule in Canada and around the Great

Lakes vanished with the capitulation of Montreal 8th September, 1760;

and British rule then established, was confirmed at Versailles 10th

February, 1763, by the ratification of the Treaty of Paris. The nearly

one hundred and fifty years of almost constant struggle between the

Colonists of these two nations in America was ended at last, excepting

in local and more clandestine ways through French influence with the

Aborigines.

The British Succession.

Fort Detroit, to which this Basin had been immediately subject,
was peaceably surrendered to the British Major Robert Rogers 29th
November, 1760, with seventeen British prisoners held by the French.
Soon thereafter Ensign Holmes with a detachment of British soldiers
was sent to take possession of Fort Miami at the head of the Maumee
River, and of the posts further to the southwest: and this fall and
winter a few Colonists again turned their faces Ohioward.

Comparative quiet now pervaded this Basin for a period of two
years. Mischief, however, was again germinating. The savages, from
their nature and their sanguinary training by the French and British
through five or six generations, could not for long remain quiet or free
from maraudings and the shedding of blood. With the declaration of
peace the great promises, the large quantities of presents, and the
free flow of intoxicating beverages, formerly dealt out alternatingly by
the contending parties, ceased. The Aborigines were at the close of
the war sore of foot and weary of body from their continued long
marchings, and cloyed of spirit from the long continued series of
skirmishings and subsequent debauchings to which both the French
and British had urged them. But they soon rallied. Their habitual
revelings in carnage, like their habitual thirst for intoxicants, could not
long be inwardly repressed. They were spoiled children under the
adroit and politic management of the French ; and now came the cooler
headed, less versatile English who from conquest claimed their sub-
jection as a right, and free from the expense of continued present-
giving and from a continuous and liberal free flow of rum.

The Aborigines had been confirmed by the French in the belief
that the territory between Lake Erie' and the Ohio River, with an
indefinite stretch eastward and westward, belonged irrevocably to them,
and that they should resist the encroachments of the British who, dif-
ferently from the French, would crowd them out and clear the land to
make farms for themselves.

As Major Robert Rogers and his two hundred rangers were encamped
for the night about midway on the southern shore of Lake Erie in

104 THE MAUMEE RIVER BASIN.

November, 1760, while making their way to receive the capitulation
of Fort Detroit and this western country, a rising- power among the
Aborigines confronted them in the form of a band led by Pontiac, an
Ottawa chief, who demanded to know why they dared to enter his
country without permission. Major Rogers tactfully appeased him,
and Pontiac in turn allayed the belligerence of the Aborigines on the
route, awaiting a more opportune time to make his demands. The
British, and the Colonists, ere long saw the necessity of making more
direct and serious overtures to the savages to quiet their increasing
restlessness. The)' were becoming more and more displeased with the
transfer of the western posts to the British who gave few presents, and
at irregular intervals.

The disaffection spread and General Sir Jeffrey Amherst sent Col-
onel William Johnson the experienced Superintendent of the Six
Nations to Detroit. He arrived there September 3, 1761, accom-
panied by Major Henry Gladwin and three hundred light infantry, and
according to previous invitation about five hundred representatives of
the different tribes of Aborigines were there (they never could resist
such invitation ) to attend a ' council ' and to receive the customary
presents with which the distinguished Sir William was now bountifully
supplied. The feastings and the drinkings, were to their full satis-
faction.

But hunger and thirst soon re-asserted themselves — and the
liberal giver had departed, taking with him most of the troops.
Further supplies were not immediately forthcoming : in fact the
finances of Great Britain, and of the Colonies, were exhausted and the
alreadv great debts were increasing. Now a reversion to the hunt
became a necessity: and soon new questions of supply and demand
harrassed the thoughtless savages who could not understand why there
should be any fluctuation in market prices. When competition was
strongest between the British and French traders, the former advanced
the price of furs and lowered the price of articles given in exchange.
Now when external competition was ended the price of their furs
was depreciated and the price of articles they received was appreci-
ated. From their unbounded selfishness and their ignorance of busi-
ness relations they could not understand the increased duties levied on
trade for the war debts, and the changed relations making greater
profits necessary to the dealers whose taxes were increased therefrom.
And now, also, the question of claims to the land assumed new import-
ance. The wild game, for meat and peltries, was becoming scarcer
and the Aborigines felt therefrom more keenly the encroachments of
British settlements on their hunting grounds.

THE ABORIGINE-BRITISH WAR.

105

The Conspiracy of Pontiac Against the British.

Pontiac schemed for freeing the Aborigines from all their increasing
difficulties according to his desires. He had long been an interested
observer of French operations, and his plans demonstrated his posses-
sion of a master mind among his peo]ile. His plan, first ])romulgated
by the French, was nothing less than to confederate all the trilbies, east
and west, and to exterminate the British and their Colonists at least in
all parts of the country which he desired for his people. The\' were to
begin at a certain phase of the moon in May, 1763, against all the small
and feebly garrisoned forts, then devastate the frontiers, and then con-
centrate against the more populous centers. Had it not fieen for the
unstable and perfidious impulses then, as generalh-, actuating the sav-
ages, the result would have been generally disastrous to the Colonists.
Pontiac was born by the Maumee River at the mouth ot the

Auglaize (according to
the statement of the Mi-
ami chief Richardville )
aliout the year 171'J, of
an Ottawa father and a
Miami mother. He was
unusnalh' dark in com-
plexion, of medium
height, powerful frame,
and of haughty bearing.
He was further descrili-
ed as subtle, patient in
planning, cruel in ex-
ecution, and with much
more than the ordinary
mental and methodical
abilit\- of the Aborigines
while possessing all of
their few good qualities
and most of their many
bad ones. Previously
he was but little known
outside his tribe, the Ot-
tawas. He aided the
French against an attack
of Detroit bv Aborigines in 1746, and aided the Aborigines in the defeat
of General Braddock in Pennsylvania in 1755.

"^^

fj^^jp '

l^^^v^

^^p^

FUNTIAC.-^
Born oil the site of the present Defiance. Oliio, about the
year 1712. Was assassinated at Cahokia. Illinois, in 1 76S>.

^From Harper's Encyclopaedia of United States History. Copyright. 19(.ll, by Harper ik Brotliers.

106 THE MAUMEE RIVER BASIN.

In his conspiracy against the British forts, Pontiac sought and
obtained aid from the French. The authorities in New York did not
obtain information regarding the great extent and full significance of
the conspiracy until 16th February, 1764, and then by ship from New
Orleans, where the French Governor D'Abbadie, who had early
apprisement of it, gave Major Loftus a British officer, "A very bad
account of the disposition of the Aborigines toward us. . . that
Pontiac, the famous Chief of the Detroit, had declared his designs to
commence hostilities, and had made a demand of supplies of ammuni-
tion from M. de Neyon [commandant at Fort Chartres, on the Missis-
sippi ninety miles above the mouth of the Ohio River]. . . There
is reason to judge of Pontiac not only as a Savage, possessed of the
most refined cunning and treachery natural to the Aborigines, but as a
person of extra abilities. He keeps two Secretaries, one to write for
him, and the other to read the letters he receives, & he manages them
so as to keep each of them ignorant of what is transacted by the
other. "'^ .

The conspiracy had been many months in maturing. Near the
close of the year 1762 Pontiac sent messengers to the different Abo-
rigine tribes. "They visited the country of the Ohio and its tribu-
taries, passed northward to the region of the upper lakes, and the
borders of the River Ottawa : and far southward towards the mouth
of the Mississippi. Bearing with them the war-belt of wampum, broad
and long, as the importance of the message demanded, and the toma-
hawk stained red, in token of war, they went from camp to camp, and
village to village. Wherever they appeared, the sachems and old men
assembled to hear the words of the great Pontiac. Then the chief of
the embassy flung down the tomahawk on the ground, and delivered,
with vehement gesture, word for word, the speech with which he was
charged. It was heard everywhere with approval; the belt was
accepted, the hatchet snatched up, and the assembled chiefs stood
pledged to take part in the war."t

This work was carried on with great secrecy to avoid its being
communicated to the British. But early in March, 1763, Ensign
Holmes, commandant of Fort Miami at the head of the Maumee, was
informed by a friendly Miami that the Aborigine warriors in the near
village had lately received a war-belt with urgent request that they
destrov him and his garrison, and that they were preparing to do so.

* Letter of General Thomas Gaue to the Earl of Halifax Secretary of State. London Document
XXWl. N. Y. Co!. Docs. vol. vii. 619, 620. Tradition says that Pontiac issued as money, pieces of birch
bark bearing rude sketches of his totem, the otter; and it further says that he faithfully redeemed tliem.
There is no statement regarding his ways and means of redemption, however. This fiction is noticed
here to illustrate the fabulous qualities ascribed to the Aborigines by some writers.

t The Conspiracy of Pontiac. by Francis Parkman. volume ii, page Iy6.

ABORIGINE PLOT AT FORT MIAMI: AT DETROIT. 107

This information Ensign Holmes communicated to his superior,
Major Gladwin at Detroit. This was followed by another letter from

him reading' in part as follows :

Fort Miamis, March liOth, lHui.
Sir ; Since my last Letter to You, wherein I Acquainted you of the Bloody Belt
being in this Village, I have made all the search I could about it, and have found it out
to be True; Whereupon I Assembled all the Chiefs of this Nation [the Miamis] & after
a long and troublesome Spell with them, I Obtained the Belt, with a Speech, as you will
Receive Enclosed ; This Affair is very timely Stopt, and I hope the News of a Peace*
will put a Stop to any further Troubles with these Aborigines who are the Principal Ones
of Setting Mischief on Foot. I send you the Belt with this Packet which I hope You
will Forward to the General [Sir Jeffrey .Amherst], t .

Major Gladwin was incredulous regarding jsreparations of the
savages for serious hostilities, and so he remained until Pontiac began
the work of a determined siege of Fort Detroit, notwithstanding a
general council of the savages held near Detroit 27th .\pril, 1763, and
the advice of friends who could appreciate the different indications of
gathering mischief. He was aroused to jireparation, however, bv a
Chippewa girl who called at the fort 6th Mav to deliver to the Major
moccasins she had made for him, and who hesitatingly told himt of
the coming to the Fort the next day of Pontiac with sixty other chiefs,
ostensibly for a friendly council, but each would carry under his
blanket a gun filed off to the length of about one yard with which thev
were to shoot the officers at a given signal, and the outside hordes,
variously estimated at from six hundred to two thousand, would there-
upon assail the Fort. The next day the chiefs appeared as foretold,
and Major Gladwin received them with the garrison ready for action.
This display of preparedness disconcerted the visitors and the council
passed without incident. The chiefs were permitted to depart without
being searched for the shortened guns thev carried. Earlv the next
morning Pontiac again appeared at the fort with three chiefs and a
calumet, or sacred piv>e of peaceS which was smoked as a sign of their
love and loyalt\'; and to further allay the apjirehensions of the garrison
an exciting game of ball was played by the savages during that after-

* Treaty of Paris 10th February, 1763, foriiiaUy closing tile war of the British succession.

t Parknian's Conspiracy of Pontiac. volume i, paL'e 1H9. Michigan Pioneer and Historical Col-
lections.

i- Compare the St. .Aubin and Gouin MSS. accounts, quoted in Parkman's volume i, patie 218 et
seq., with Roi,'ers' Journal ; the Gladwin MSS.: the Pontiac Diary in the Michigan Pioneer and Histor-
ical Collections, volume viii. Also for a good review of the evidence up to 1867, showinn the Chippewa
cirl as a myth, see the late Colonel Charles Whittlesey's Conspiracy of Pontiac in the Firelands Pioneer
volume viii, page 9 et seq.

^ The savages claimed that the Caluutet should be used only on occasions of peace-makint:. The
bowl of this pipe was generally of the ' sacred ' pipestone ( Catlinite ), the stem, from two to four feel in
length in sections, was generally made from a young ash, the pith being worked out with a smoothed
split of hard wood or, later, a wire. It was abundantly trimmed with quills and feathers from an eagle.
It was generally kept disjointed and carefully wrapped, as an article of great value. See engraving.

108 THE MAUMEE RIVER BASIN.

noon near the fort. The following dav Pontiac with his chiefs again
sought a council within the fort enclosure with their warriors at their heels,
but entrance was denied them. Then began the murdering of English-
men living without the enclosure, by marauding bands, followed by a
general firing from a distance of muskets at the fort, whereby five
members of the garrison were wounded.

Food supplies were becoming short and Major Gladwin, hoping to
stop the firing and increase his supply from the near farms, sent
friendly Frenchmen to enquire of Pontiac why they thus assailed him.
The reply was that he desired Captain Donald Campbell, second in
command, to visit and talk directly to him. This veteran officer who
had heretofore possessed a peculiar influence over the Aborigines
desired to go and do what he could to allay hostilities. Accompanied
by Lieutenant George McDougall and some Frenchmen, he went to
Pontiac's camp, where they were retained as prisoners. Lieutenant
McDougall afterward escaped to the Fort ; but Captain Camiiliell was
murdered, with torture, and eaten.

The siege was continued from day to day, and the food sujii^ly
dwindled with no hope of relief but from the arrival of supplies that
had been sent from the East b\' the slow and uncertain small sloop.
The 3l)th of May a sentinel discerned boats coming up the river, and
soon the weary and hungry garrison was alert and joyous at the sup-
l)osed arrival of relief. But this joy was of short duration. It was
soon to be succeeded h\ a deeper gloom than had before settled over
the fort, now apparently doomed to utter defeat. The boats and sup-
plies were in the hands of the Aborigines who had captured at Point
Pelee all of the convoy excepting two boats, after killing and capturing
about sixtv of the ninety men in charge. Yet another month was des-
tined to jiass before the suffering garrison at Detroit received any
relief; and this month brought much of sadness and discouragement
to the nearly exhausted garrison, and much of exultation to the besieg-
ing savages and the war-parties sent out by Pontiac.

May 16th Fort Sandusky was captured and liurned b\- Wyandots ;
and Ensign Paully with the members of the garrison not killed out-
right, were taken prisoners to the Aborigine camp near Detroit where
a worse fate awaited the most of them, Paully escaping. The 2iith of
May Fort St. Joseph was captured by Pottawotamis. Ten of the
garrison were killed, and the other three including the commander
Ensign Schlosser were taken to Detroit.

May 27th Ensign Holmes was decoyed from Fort Miami at the
head of the Maumee by his mistress, a young Miami woman, ostensibly
to render medical aid to a sick Aborigine nearby, when he was shot to
death by two Miamis lying in ambush for that purpose. His sergeant

SAVAGES CAPTURE MIAMI AND OTHER FORTS. 109

unwisely stepped outside the u'ate to learn the cause of the tiiini;, and
was taken prisoner. The remaininjj four or five (the Gladwin MS.
reads eight ) men comprising the garrison, surrendered the fort to the
savages at the demand of one Jacques Godefroy and other P'renchmen
from Detroit who were in league with Pontiac. Five days later Fort
Ouiotenon on the Wabash, near the present Lafayette, was captured:
and the next day, June 2, the garrison of Fort Michillimackinac was
also deceived and captured by the Chippewas who killed over twenty
and took all others of the garrison prisoners. June 15th Fort
Presqu'ile, at the present Erie, Pennsylvania, was assailed by about
two hundred Aborigines from Detroit and its garrison of twenty-seven
men surrendered the 17th. - Within a few davs Fort Le Bceuf and Fort
Venango, also on the route from Lake Erie to the head of the Ohio
River were also in the hands of these widespread conspirators.

The garrison at Detroit was generally apprised of the loss of these
forts by the return of war-parties with seal])?, prisoners and plunder
from the British, and their reception with great uproar by the Aborigine
women and childen generally within sight and hearing of the garrison.
A few of these prisoners were offered at the fort in exchange for
Aborigines there held, and a few captives held by them escaped: but
by far the greater number were put to death in the most horrible
manner.* Demands from Pontiac for surrender of Fort Detroit were
refused.

Anchored in the river at the nearest point to Fort Detroit were,
from the first of Pontiac's gathering of the enemy, two armed and
manned schooners which did good service in aid of the garrison, and
which successfully resisted all attempts of the savages to burn them
by fire rafts and otherwise. When the Fort's supplies began to get
low, the smaller schooner was ordered to hasten to Niagara for relief.
She returned to the west end of Lake Erie near the last of June and,
starting up the river, met attacks of the besiegers adroitl\- and bravely.
She was manned by sixty men, and her cargo was composed of ammu-
nition and provisions. There was also brought by this vessel an
account of the signing of the Treaty of Paris which was soon communi-
cated to the French by Major Gladwin : and fort\' of their numlier at
Detroit under James Sterling volunteered to assist the tort. This
should have put an end to the hopes, and of the stories to the
Aborigines detailed b\- many Frenchmen, that armies of their country-
men were on their wa\' to drive the British from America.

About the middle of Jul\' the Wyandots and Pottawotamis deceit-
fully made peace with Major Gladwin and surrendered their British

* Compare Loss of the Posts MS. Diary of the Sie^e. Gladwin MSS. Parkinan's Conspiracy.
and Michigan Pioneer and Historical Collections.

no THE MAUMEE RIVER BASIN.

prisoners. Still brighter days to be followed by many sad ones, were
about to dawn on this brave garrison of one hundred and twenty-two
soldiers, eight officers, forty fur traders and a few assistants. July
29th the long hoped-for relief came in the form of twenty-two barges,
bearing two hundred and eight\' men, several small cannon, and a
fresh supplv of provisions and ammunition.' These boats were fired
upon by the same Ottawas and Pottawatomis who, two weeks before,
sued for peace at the fort, and fifteen were killed and wounded by their
guns.

Captain Dalzell, a former companion of Israel Putnam and more
recently aide-de-camp to General Amherst, was in charge of these
reinforcements, and he determined to 'strike an irremediable blow' at
Pontiac's forces; and about two o'clock in the morning of July 31st a
detachment of two hundred and fifty soldiers well-officered, including
Major Robert Rogers, marched against the savages. Some Frenchmen
within the palisades informed the enemy of this proposed attack, and
they were ready in ambush at a narrow bridge over Parent Creek, later
known as Bloody Run. Here, and near, the British force was repulsed
and with difficulty they returned to the fort with a loss of fifty-nine men
killed and wounded. The enemy's loss was estimated at but fifteen to
twenty ; and their exultation was unbounded. Runners were sent out
'for several hundred miles' to spread the news of British defeat; and
additional Aborigines daily swelled the number of Pontiac's already
large force. Manv days, however, passed with comparatively few shots
by the savages at the watchful garrison.

The smaller schooner, named the Gladwin in honor of the brave
commandant of Fort Detroit, was again dispatched to the east end of
Lake Erie with requisition for supplies. The night of September 3rd
she entered the Detroit River on her return, having a crew of ten
Americans beside Captain Horst and Mate Jacobs; also with six New
York Iroquois supposed to be friendly to the British. At their request
the Iroquois were set ashore the next morning; and probably they told
the hostile savages of the small number in charge of the schooner.
That night thev were compelled to anchor about nine miles below the
fort, and there they were attacked in the great darkness by about three
hundred and fiftv Aborigines who silently drifted to the schooner with
the current, undiscovered until thev were about to climb on board.
One cannon was fired by the guard and crew, then a volley from their
muskets when a hand-to-hand encounter became necessary. The crew
was about to be overwhelmed by numbers when Mate Jacobs gave a
loud command to explode the magazine. Fortunately this, command
was understood bv some of the assailants who communicated it to the
others, whereupon a panic ensued among the Aborigines and all

BRITISH RALLY. SUGGEST SMALLPOX. TWO ARMIES. Ill

instantly disappeared in the water, and were not again seen around the
boat. The savages continued alert, however, on shore, their numbers
making frequent changes and constant watchfulness of the fort a
pastime for them, as also their shooting whenever a soldier was seen.

Meantime reports of Pontiac's Conspiracy, the general uprising of
the Aborigines, the capture of the frontier posts, and the devastation
of frontier settlements, were as soon as possible conveyed to the
authorities in New York. Those most active for relief were Sir
William Johnson Agent and Superintendent of Aborigine Affairs,
Lieutenant Governor Cadwallader Colden of New York, General Sir
Jeffrey Amherst, and General Thomas Gage afterwards his successor:
between all of whom and the Lords Commissioners for Trade and
Plantations, with office at Whitehall, London, correspondence became
more and more frequent and s\-stematic.

As heretofore stated, the regular troops were largely withdrawn
from America after the capitulation of the French in 1760, and the
frontier posts, even Detroit from which Fort Miami and others drew
their garrison and supplies, were left with a scarcity that was nothing
less than criminal on the part of the authorities. The home govern-
ment in London yet desired to dictate the conduct of everything while
making it obligatory upon the Colonies to pay the expenses. The
continuous efforts necessary to protect the centers of population, and
to pay the officers of the government imposed upon the Colonies by
the King, kept the Colonial treasuries drained. And, in addition, the
easy-going British officials, some of whom knew little about the savages
and often apparently cared less than they knew, were loth to believe
that serious outbreak was threatened : and it required a long time for
them to understand that the greatest of all Aborigine wars was being
relentlessly waged. Some had become wearied by the former continu-
ous demands of the savages for valuable presents; and now General
Amherst felt particularly annoyed by the reports of their treachery.
He called them a despicable enemy ' and he wrote in July, 1763, asking
Colonel Henry Bouquet "if it can not be contrived to send the Small
Pox among those disaffected tribes of Aborigines? We must on this
occasion use every stratagem in our power to reduce them. . . You
will do well to try to inoculate them by means of blankets, as well as
to try every other method that can serve to extirpate this execrable
race."

The depredations had been so severe and oft repeated in western
Pennsylvania and Virginia, and farther east, that the necessity for
strong suppressive measures became imperative. With great efforts two
armies were organized in the early summer of 1763, with a few regular
soldiers, colonist volunteers and whilom friendly Aborigines, to make

112 THE MAUMEE RIVER BASIN.

a decisive campaign aj^ainst the hostiles of Ohio and Detroit. Colonel
Henry Bouquet of Berne, Switzerland, who had been more than seven
years in America in command of the 'Royal Americans' composed
larj^'ely of Germans in Pennsylvania, was directed l)y General Amherst
to cross the mountains and relieve Fort Pitt which was invested by the
savages, and which with Fort NiajJ'ara and Fort Detroit were the only
western posts remaining uncaptured h\' them. Colonel Bouquet's com-
mand increased on the march, and August 1^, 1763, when nearing
Bushy Run, about twent\-tive miles from Fort Pitt now Pittsburg, this
command was violently and persistently assailed by the savages who
had been harassing the Fort, and only by well-conceived and well-
e.xecuted strategy were they saved from destruction more complete than
that of General Braddock's army eight years before. This Battle of
Bushv Run has been termed one of the best contested battles ever
fought between Europeans, Colonists and the Aborigines.* It de-
pressed the great and increasing confidence of the Aborigines in their
ability to exterminate the Colonists, and it revived the hopes of the
latter. It also aided in gaining recruits for advance in the Ohio Coun-
trv upon recommendation of rewards for savage scalps inasmuch as
the Colonies refused regular pay to militiamen when outside their dis-
tinctive limits.

The other army of six hundred regulars and others under Major
John Wilkins had been collected from different parts of the Colonies
with great effort for the purpose of relieving Detroit ; but it was
doomed to disaster. Before getting out of the Niagara River they
were driven back by the enemy with loss ; and in September their boats
were wrecked by a storm on Lake Erie about ninety miles from
Detroit, where three officers and over seventy privates were drowned,
and their cannon, ammunition and supplies were lost or spoiled;
whereupon the others returned to Niagara.

The reports of the organization of these armies had depressing
effect upon Pontiac as well as ujion his followers. They had been
encouraged by Frenchmen in different places telling them that French
armies were on their way to America to drive the British out and,
later, that one of these armies was already ascending the Mississippi
River. M. de Neyon French Commandant of Fort Chartres had been
instructed after the French surrender in 1760, to retain that post until
relieved by a British garrison. To him Pontiac repeatedly appealed
for soldiers and munitions of war. Finally, upon demand of the British
General Amherst, M. Neyon sent letter September 27th to the
Aborigine tribes requesting peace and informing them that no assist-

*C/a/Ae's Historical Series, vokiine i; Parkmairs Conspiracy of Pontiac volunie ii, etc.

PONTIAC RETIRES TO THE MAUMEE. THE DELAWARES. 113

ance could be ex]iected by tht-m from the French. Ifpon receiving this
notification Pontiac's duplicity at once asserted itself, and he immedi-
ately sought the fortjiveness of Major Gladwin and General Amherst,
and their favor by telling the former that ht- would send requests to all
Aborigines engaged in the war, to bury the hatcht-t.'

In regard to the armies forming for the war, the expression to
'bury the hatchet' was not sufficient for the British in power; but
Major Gladwin wrote to General Amherst that

It would be good policy to leave matters open until spring wfien the Aborigines
would be so reduced in powder there would be no danger that they would break out
again, provided some examples are made of our good friends, the French, who set them
on. . . No advantage can be gained by prosecuting the war, owing to the difficulty
of catching them [the Aborigines]. Add to this the e.\pense of such war which, if con-
tinued, the ruins of our entire peltry trade must follow, and the loss of a prodigious con-
sumption of our merchandize. It will be the means of their retiring, which will reinforce
other nations on the Mississippi whom they will push against us and make them our
enemies forever. Consequentlv it will render it extremely difficult to pass that country,
and especially as the French have promised to supply them with everything they want.

They [the Aborigines] have lost between eighty and ninety of their best warriors :
but if your Excellency still intends to punish them for their barbarities, it may be easier
done, without any expense to the crown, by permitting a free sale of rum which will destroy
them more effectually than fire and sword. But on the contrary if you intend to accom-
modate matters in spring, which I hope you will for the above reasons, it may be neces-
sary to send up Sir William Johnson.* .

About the 1st November, 1763, Pontiac with a few tried followers
removed their camp from Detroit to the Maumee River to nurse their
disappointed expectations. Following their removal comparative
quiet prevailed for several months.

This turn in affairs produced a favorable effect upon the ever
wavering and dreaded Senecas of the Six Nations. Sir William John-
son took the opportunity of their mollified temper to yet further gain
their friendship by offering them fifty dollars for each principal Dela-
ware Aborigine chief captured by them, 'in which case they must either
bring them alive, or their whole Heads.' . . They succeeded in sur-
rounding and capturing alive a camp of about forty Delawares, embrac-
ing the dreaded chief 'Captain Bull.' These captives were taken to
the common jail in New York City where they were kept until a time
favorable for their release.

The fall and winter of 1763-64 was a time of turmoil in Pennsyl-
vania, particularly, with strenuous efforts toward readjustment of com-
munities and encampments holding antagonistic views regarding vital
questions of conduct when life or death, government and possessions
temporal and spiritual teachings, were involved. The sufferers and

'■'■■ Gladwin MSS. page 675, quoted in The Northwest under Three Flags, by Charles Moore,
Harper and Brothers, 1900. Compare with Parkman's Conspiracy of Pontiac.

]]4 THE MAUMEE RIVER BASIN.

active participants in this mixed series of contests were primarily, the
Aborigine marauders, murderers and burners of frontier settlements,
the survivors of those settlements adherents of the Presbyterian church,
the Friends (Quakers) and, to a less degree, the civil authorities.*

The militarv authorities did not remain entirely idle. General
Amherst was given leave of absence to visit England, but he was suc-
ceeded in the fall of 1763 bv Major-General Thomas Gage next in com-
mand. Preparations were made to again send two armies against the
Aborigines of the West the following spring. Sir William Johnson the
Agent to the Aborigines, was also active in sending invitations to the
savages for a general council to be held at Fort Niagara. To this
invitation there was a favorable response, over two thousand warriors
gathering at that fort in July, 1764. Here Colonel Johnson did his
usual good service in receiving and effecting treaties with the different
tribes individually, he undergoing much fatiguing routine and disagree-
able work to that end. The more northern army, under command of
Colonel John Bradstreet, numbering about eleven hundred regulars,
volunteers and Aborigines, was present at this council to impress the
various tribes with the power of the British.

About the 8th of August Colonel Bradstreet's command embarked
upon Lake Erie against the vet hostile savages in northern Ohio and
the southwest. He was accompanied by two hundred and fifty Aborig-
ines! many or most of whom soon deserted with the presents that had
been given them at Niagara. At Fort Prescjue Isle, site of the pres-
ent Erie, that was captured and ruined the year before by Pontiac's
warriors, the Colonel was deceived into a farcical treaty by members of
the Delaware and Shawnee tribes which had been particularly aggres-
sive and savage.

Colonel Bradstreet was also deceived by like Wyandots, Ottawas
and Miamis at Sandusky. Here he took prisoner the Frenchman
Jacques Godefroy who, in May, 1763, was the leader in the murder of
Ensign Holmes and the capture of Fort Miami at the head of the
Maumee in the interest of Pontiac. This man expected severe punish-
ment, if not death, at the hands of Colonel Bradstreet; but just at this
time Captain Thomas Morris was about to start from the encampment
as an ambassador of peace to the Aborigines along the Maumee,
Wabash and Illinois, and was offered Godefroy as a servant and inter-
preter by Colonel Bradstreet who enjoined the culprit to take good
care of the Captain. Morris accepted the offer, and Godefroy, think-

* For a comprehensive view of tliis reniarliable contest of readjustment between advancing civiliz-
ation and savagery, the reader is referred to the publication of divers collections, sermons and docu-
ments, by the Penns.vlvania Historical Society.

1 London Document XXXVII. New York Colonial Documents, vol. vii, pace 657.

EXPERIENCES OF CAPTAIN MORRIS ALONG MAUMEE. 115

ing that the Captain thus saved his life, accompanied him to save the
life of his benefactor, as the sequel proved. They passed up the
Maumee by boats to, probably, the site of the present Defiance. From
an Ottawa chief they obtained three horses for the journey- to Pontiac's
camp situate five or six miles from the river, probably on the Defiance
Moraine to the northeast. As they neared the camp. Captain Morris,
Godefroy and another Canadian attendant riding the horses, and their
escort of Aborigines carrying the British flag in advance, they were
met by Pontiac's guard, several hundred in number, which surrounded
them, crowded between to separate them, beat the horses and made
other exhibitions of disrespect. Pontiac stood at the edge of the
encampment and also showed signs of disfavor, beside refusing to
shake hands. "Here, too, stood a man in the uniform of a French
officer, holding his gun with the butt resting on the ground, and assum-
ing an air of great importance : while two Pawnee slaves stood close
behind him. He proved to be a French drummer, calling himself St.
Vincent, one of those renegades of civilization to be found in almost
every camp of Aborigines. He now took upon himself the office of a
master of ceremonies. He desired Morris to dismount, and he seated
himself at his side on a bearskin. Godefroy took his place near them;
and a throng of savages, circle within circle, stood crowded around.
Presently came Pontiac and squatted himself after his fashion oppo-
site Morris. He opened the interview by observing that the English
were liars, and demanding of the ambassador if he had come to lie to
them, like the rest."*

A letter directed to Pontiac and purporting to have been received
by way of New Orleans, was shown. It read as though coming from
the King of France, and its statements were well contrived to incite the
savages to continue their hatred of the British. It read, further, that
'Your French Father is neither dead nor asleep; he is already on his
way, with sixty great ships, to revenge himself on the English and
drive them out of America.' On account of the excitement produced
by this reading, St. Vincent adroitly escorted Captain Morris to his
own wigwam.

A council was held next day at which Captain Morris' statement
of the relations existing between Great Britain and France was received
with ridicule. The chiefs would have killed him but for the influence
of Pontiac who told them that the life of an ambassador should be con-
sidered sacred. 'His [Pontiac's] speech did him honor, and showed
that he was acquainted with the law of nations.' Pontiac said quietly

* From Captain Morris' Miscellanies in Prose and Verse copied into Parl<man's Conspiracy of
Ponliac, volume ii. pace 1^7, Boston. 1897. Captain Morris" little book was reprinted by The Arthur
Clarke Co. of Cleveland in 1904.

116 THE MAUMEE RIVER BASIN.

to Godefro}' I will lead the nations to war no more. Let them be at
peace if they choose; but I will never be a friend to the English. I
shall be a wanderer in the woods; and, if they come there to seek me,
I will shoot at them while I have an arrow left.' This was uttered
with assumed despair, and with evidences of desire to be courted.

A Mohawk chief who accompanied Captain Morris' Company stole
everything within his ])ower, including the Captain's supply of rum,
two barrels in quantity, which he sold to the Ottawas ; and the next
day he ran away. The drunken orgies that followed the distribution of
the rum boded evil to the ambassador. An attack was made on him
but Godefroy warded off the knife aimed at his heart, and he ran into
a field of corn where he evaded his pursuers. After comparative quiet
had been restored he returned to the camp where 'Little Chief ex-
changed with him for gunpowder, a volume of Shakespeare, the spoil
of some slaughtered officer.'

With Pontiac's consent. Captain Morris and his company resumed
their journev up the Maumee. He had much to write about the diffi-
culties of the journey on account of a low stage of water, and the push-
ing and drawing of their boat over the stony shallows. On the fifth
day from Pontiac's camp they met a savage riding a handsome white
horse which, they were told, belonged to the ill-fated General Braddock
and was caught by the Aborigines at the field of his defeat in 17f)5.

Two days later they arrived at the head of the Maumee and the
party started up the left bank of the River St. Joseph to Fort Miami,
leaving Captain Morris seated in his canoe reading Antony and Cleo-
patra in the copy of Shakespeare he had obtained in Pontiac's camp.
His men were met short of the fort bv the savages with bows and
arrows, hatchets, spears and sticks, to torture or kill 'the Englishman.'
He not being immediately found in the party, and the chiefs exerting
their influence for delay, their ire was somewhat abated. He was soon
found, however, conducted with many indignities to the fort buildings,
now for over a vear without a garrison and tenanted by some French-
men and Aborigines, where he was forbidden to enter any of the
Frenchmen's cabins situated within the stockaded area. Two warriors,
carrying tomahawks in their hands, took him by the arms and led him
through the shallow St. Joseph River, he at first fearing that they
intended to drown and seal]) him. When nearing the great Miami
village, a little distance from the west shore, they endeavored to take
off his clothing, but became impatient at the task when he ' in rage
and despair tore off his clothes himself.' Using his own sash, they
liound his arms behind him and drove him before them into the village
where he w-as immediately surrounded by hundreds who began violent
disputes as to what should be done with him. Godefroy, who had

SUFFERINGS OF CAPTAIN MORRIS AMONG THE MIAMIS. 117

accompanied him and ^nven words of cheer, induced a nephew of
Pontiac to make a speech in the Captain's favor; and Godefroy told
them if they killed him the English would kill the Miamis then held
prisoners at Detroit. Chief Swan of the Miamis then actively took
the part of Captain Morris by untying his arms, and giving him a pipe
to smoke. Chief White Cat snatched the pipe away, and bound his
neck to a post. Captain Morris afterward wrote "I had not the
smallest hope of life, and I remember that I conceived myself as if
going to plunge into a gulf, vast, immeasurable: and that, in a few
moments after, the thought of torture occasioned a sort of torpor and
insensibilit}-. I looked at Godefroy, and, seeing him exceedingly dis-
tressed, I said what I could to encourage him; but he desired me not
to speak ( I suppose it gave offense to the savages ) and therefore was
silent. Then Pacanne, chief of the Miami nation, and just out of his
minoritx', having mounted a horse and crossed the river, rode up to me.
When I heard him calling to those about me, and felt his hand behind
my neck, I thought he was going to strangle me out of pity; but he
untied me saying, as it was afterwards interpreted to me, I give that
man his life. If you want English meat, go to Detroit, or to the lake,
and you'll find enough. What business have you with this man's flesh,
who is come to speak with us?' I fixed my eyes steadfastly on this
young man, and endeavored by looks to express my gratitude."
Another pipe was given to Captain Morris, but he was soon thrust out
of the village with blows. He was permittid to make his way back to
the fort, receiving a stroke from a whip by a mounted Aborigine on
the way. Godefroy and St. Vincent who had accompanied him from
Pontiac's camp, did what they could to ward off dangers. A French-
man at the fort, named I'Esperance, lodged him in his garret, and the
other Canadians showed kindness; also two young sisters of Chief
Pacanne, as he understood. But those who had bound him were yet
watching to kill him; and a large band of Kickapoos, who arrived just
before him and built their lodges near the fort, declared they would
kill him if the Miamis did not.

Captain Morris learned from his Canadian friends that the severe
treatment he received was due to Delaware and Shawnee messengers
who arrived before him with fourteen war-belts of wampum to incite
the Aborigines to renewed hostilities against the British. They told
the Miamis of the Captain's coming and urged them to put him to
death; and they had continued their journey southwestward down the
Wabash and to the Illinois, the route laid out for him by Colonel Brad-
street. Notwithstanding all this he inclined to continue the journey,
until convinced by the evidence of those friendly to him and by the
demonstrations of the Aborigines that to attempt onward movement

118 THE MAUMEE RIVER BASIN.

would surely result in his death. Reluctantly, he decided to return
and, choosing a favorable hour, he started down the Maumee. Nor was
this return journev to be free from danger. The remaining savages
who accompanied him from Sandusky, finding him bereft of all luxuries
and presents, exhibited great disrespect and forsook him when their
services were needed in procuring food and propelling the canoe.
Captain Morris described their chief as a 'Christian' Huron (Wyandot)
from the Mission of Lorette near Quebec, and the greatest rascal I
ever knew.' Godefroy remained constant, and with little other help
they arrived at Detroit 17th September, 1764, suffering on the way
greatly from want of food and from fatigue. Colonel Bradstreet and
his coinmand had visited Detroit while Captain Morris was up the
Maumee, had left a fresh garrison there, and had returned to Sandusky
to further parley and dally with the deceitful savages having occa-
sional headquarters there.

From ' Colonel Bradstreet's thoughts on Aborigine Affairs ' sent to
General Gage December 4, 1764, the following is extracted :

Here I must take notice, that from the Govern' of Pennsylvania all the Shawanese
and Delawar Aborigines are furnished with rifled barrel Guns of an excellent kind, and
that the upper Nations are getting into them fast, by which they will be much less de-
pendent upon us on account of the great saving of powder, this Gun taking much less
and the shot much more certain than any other gun, and in their carrying on war. by
far more prejudicial to us than any other sort.

Of all the Savages upon the continent, the most knowing, the most intriguing, the
less useful, and the greatest Villians, are those most conversant with the Europeans, and
deserve most the attention of Govern' by way of correction, and these are the Six
Nations, Shawanese and Delawares ; they are well acquainted with the defenseless state
of the Inhabitants who live on the Frontiers, and they think they will ever have it in
their power to distress and plunder them, and never cease raising the jealousy of the
Upper Nations against us by propagating amongst them such stories as make them be-
lieve the English have nothing so much at heart as the extirpation of all Savages. The
apparent design of the Six Nations is to keep us at war with all Savages but themselves,
that they may be employed as mediators between us and them at a continuation of
expence, too often and too heavily felt, the sweets of which they will never forget nor
lose sight of if they can possibly avoid it. That [the design] of the Shawanese and
Delawares is to live on killing, captivating [capturing] and plundering the people
inhabiting the Frontiers ; long experience having shown them they grow richer, and live
better thereby than by hunting wild Beasts.*

The effect of Colonel Bradstreet's dealings with the savages during
his exjsedition, was not to curb their maraudings but, rather, to increase
their self-esteem and to stimulate their marauding propensities. He
early wrote to Colonel Bouquet, who was advancing from Pennsyl-
vania with the other army, that his treaties with the hostiles would
make safe a disbandment of Colonel Bouquet's armv of about six

* London Document XXXN'II, New York Colonial Documents volume vii, pa^re 692.

RETURN OF WHITE CAPTIVES TO COLONEL BOUQUET. 119

hundred men: hut the latter was constantly seeing the deceitfulness of
the promises of the savages to Colonel Bradstreet, and pressed forward
into Ohio with a, to the savages, new style of warfare. He held
hostages, sent others with letters to Detroit with positive commands
that they feared to disobey, and marched to the haunts of the most
hostile bands of Senecas, Delawares and Shawnees who had refused to
attend the council at Niagara; declaring to them that his army should
not leave them until they had given ample assurances of better be-
havior in the future; and "giving them twelve days in which to
deliver into m}- hands all the prisoners in your possesssion ; English-
men, Frenchmen, women and children, whether adopted into your
tribes, married, or living among you under any denomination or pre-
tense whatsoever. And you are to furnish these prisoners with
clothing, provisions, and horses to carry them to Fort Pitt. When
vou have fuUv complied with these conditions, you shall then know on
what terms you may obtain the peace you sue for." As hostages for
their compliance with this demand, he held the principal chiefs of each
tribe. His ambassadors proceeded to Sandusky with his demands, now
more strict since his should-be coadutor. Colonel Bradstreet, had
started homeward leaving the impression among the savages that thev
had triumphed over him and could continue their savagery.

A detachment of Colonel Bouquet's command also passed to the
Shawnee towns on the Scioto River ' which savages had been particu-
larly active and atrocious) and to and along the right bank of the River
St. Mary to Fort Miami at the head of the Maumee.* Soon thereafter,
bands of Aborigines began to arrive at Colonel Bouquet's encamp-
ment which he had taken the precautions to fortify, bringing with them
the captives of the white settlers to the number of thirty-two men and
fifty-eight women and children from Virginia, and forty-nine men and
sixty-seven women and children from Pennsylvania, which thev had
accumulated during their manv raids. There were many with Bou-
quet's command who had been thus bereft, soldiers and women, and
the emotional scenes witnessed at the meeting of the captives with
their relatives has been described with much of sentiment and pathos
by different writers,"!" some of whom have enlarged upon the profes-
sional wailings of the Aborigine women at the loss of their captives,
fictitiouslv comparing their demonstrations to the grief of civilized

'-'■'' See map by Thomas Hutchins, assistant enijineer. Reproduced for Parkman's Conspiracy of
Pontiac. volume ii.

t See Parkman's Conspiracy of Pontiac. vo\iiine ii : Harper's Montfily Magazine, volume xxiii,
October. 1861. pages .577-593; Rnd Pennsylvania Historical Collections. Colonel Bouquet's Papers were
deposited in the British Museum Library with the Haldimand Papers. Many of both of these Papers
have been copied for the Dominion [or Parliament] Library at Ottawa, Canada. Parts of them may also
be found in the Michigan Pioneer and Historical Collections.

120 THE MAUMEE RIVER BASIN.

people. Some of the younger women, who had been longest captives
and were married to the Aborigines, escaped from the military lines
and returned to their forest homes in preference to going back to their
kinsfolk. This is in evidence of the fact that reversion to barbarism is
strong in the lives of many persons in every civilized community;
otherwise civilizing influences would make greater progress. The
Aborigines were also made to understand that they must soon visit Sir
AVilliam Johnson, agent of their affairs, and give him assurances of
their iuture good behavior, as he, Colonel Bouquet, would not treat
with them, informing them that his duty was to conquer them by force
of arms. The 18th November, 1764, Colonel Bouquet's command,
and his rescued captives, started on their return to their Pennsylvania
and X'irginia homes, by way of Fort Pitt.

December 26, 1764, Sir William Johnson wrote to the Lords of
Trade regarding the two military expeditions in part as follows:*
"The result of this Expedition [by Colonel John Bradstreet] is, that
after loosing near one half of the great boats [in a storm on Lake Erie
on his return] the Troojis are returntd in a most shattered scituation,
many have jierished in tile Woods, and above forty are now daily fed
by the Senecas, 'till they become able to march, neither are all my
Officers or Aborigines yet come in, haveing been turned a drift without
any provision on Lake Erie, together with several hundred of the
troops. . . . On the other hand Coll. Bouquet under all the disad-
vantages of a tedious & hazardous land march, with an Army little
more than hall that of the other has penetrated into the heart of the
Countr\' of the Delawares lS: Shawanese, obtained above 200 English
Captives from amongst them, with 14 hostages for their coming here,
and entering into a peace before me in due form, S:"^^ & I dailv exjiect
their cliiefs for that jmrpose."

The 24th May, 1765, Sir ^Villiam further rei)orted his treaty of
peace with nine hundred Aborigines of different tribes, including those
obligated by Colonel Bouquet. He also reported renewed hostilities
of the Miamis, they having captured a soldier who strayed a short dis-
tance from the garrison at Detroit, and maltreated some French per-
sons st'nt along the Maumee by the commandant to secure his release.
The Miamis, ami the tribes to the westward, were yet imbued with
Pontiac's iik'as ol resisting the British, which ideas were nourished in
the continued rejiort by Frenchmen in the southwest and along the
Maumee, that French armies would soon come to their assistance.
' Several French Familys of the worst sort live at y<^ Miamis "...
wrote Sir William in his report. This influence was still objecting to the
occupation of the Maumee, Wabash and Illinois countries bv the British.

'* London Document XXW'H, New York Colonial Documents, volume vii. pav:e 686.

AMBASSADOR CROGHAN ALONG WABASH AND MAUMEE. 121

To pacify this opposition Sir William Johnson sent Colonel Geort^e
Croghan amoni^ these western tribes in the spring of 1765. This
sagacious ambassador left Fort Pitt May ir)th and, visiting the lodges
by the Scioto River, induced the Shawnees there to deliver to him the
French traders in their midst seven in number who had been influenc-
ing them against the British. There were seven other such traders
among the Delawares, all of whom were taken or sent to \'incennes to
prevent their trading with and further influencing the Ohio Aborigines.
Colonel Croghan and his escort of fourteeen men were fired upon June
8th near the mouth of the Wabash River by Kickapoo and ' Musquat-
tamie ' warriors. Three were killed and several were wounded, includ-
ing the Colonel. They were taken prisoners to Post \'incent where
there was a French village of eighty houses, and a Piankishaw village.
Here Colonel Croghan met several Aborigines \vhom he had liefriended
in former years and whose influence on his captors was favorable to
him. Thev were taken up the Wabash to Ouiotenon where other
Aborigine friends of the past were met ' who were extremely civil to me
& my party. '"^

At Ouiotenon a Frenchman arrix'ed ' with a Pijie and Speech' from
the Illinois through the Ivickaiioos and ' Musquattamies ' to have Col-
onel Croghan put to death by lire; but his presents and personal ad-
dress prevailed and after several conferences with all of these tribes he
was fortunate enough, not onl\' to influence them to save his own life,
but "to reconcile these Nations to his Majesties Interest & obtain their
Consent and Approbation to take Possession of any Posts in their
countr\- which the F"rench formerly ]iossessed, & an offer of thi-ir
service should any Nation opi^ose our taking possession of it, all of
which they confirmed by four large Pipes. . . On July 13th The
Chiefs of the Twightwees [Miamis] came to me [Colonel Croghan at
Ouiotenon] from the Miamis [Maumee River] and renewed their
Antient Friendship with His Majesty & all His Subjects in America &
confirmed it with a Pipe."

On the 18th July, 1765, this industrious and successful deputy
agent of Aborigine affairs started for the Illinois country, accompanied
by the chiefs of all the tribes with whom he had been treating. They
soon met the renowned Pontiac with the deputies of the Six Nations of
Irofjuois, and Delawares and Shawnees who had accompanied the
Colonel down the Ohio River on this mission, and from whom he had
l")een separated. They returned to Ouiotenon where were delivered in
general' council tht speeches sent from the ' four nations' or trilies of
the Illinois country. Pontiac and the others accorded with the former
agreement of the other chiefs, and all was confirmed by pipe-smoking

■■' London Document XXW'III. New York Colonial Documents, volume vii, paye 7^0,

/22 THE MAUMEE RIVER BASIN.

and belts of \vam]ium. Erroneous reports and misconceptions were
corrected, prisoners held by them were surrendered and, accompanied
by many of the chiefs, Colonel Croghan and party started up the
Wabash and passed across the Portage to the head of the Maumee
River. He wrote in his journal that

Within a mile of the Twightwee [Miami] Village I was met by the chiefs of that
nation who received us very kindly. The most part of these Aborigines knew me and
conducted me to their village, where they immediately hoisted an English flag that I had
formerly given them at Fort Pitt. The next day they held a council after which they
gave me up the English prisoners they had, then made several speeches in all of which
they expressed the great pleasure it gave them to see the unhappy differences which em-
broiled the several nations in a war with their brethren (the E;nglishl were now so near a
happy conclusion, and that peace was established in their country.

The Twightwee village is situated on both sides of a river called St. Joseph. This
river where it falls into the Miame [Maumee] River, about a quarter of a mile from this
place, is one hundred yards wide, on the east side of which stands a stockade fort, some-
what ruinous. The Aborigine village consists of about forty or fifty cabins, besides nine
or ten French houses — a runaway colony from Detroit during the late .Aborigine [Pontiac]
war. They were concerned in it, and being afraid of punishment, they came to this post
where ever since they have spirited up the Aborigines against the English. All the
French residing here are a lazy, indolent people, fond of breeding mischief, and spiriting
up the Aborigines against the English, and should by no means be suffered to remain
here, 'f^he country is pleasant, the soil rich and well watered.

After several conferences with these Aborigines, and their delivering me up all the
English prisoners they had, on the 2.1th July [(jth August ?] we set off for Detroit down the
Miamee [Maumee] River in canoes, having settled everything with these several Nations
to the Westward, & was accompanied by several chiefs of those Nations which were going
to Detroit to meet Colonel Bradstreet agreeable to his invitation to them last winter by
Mr. Maisonville. As I passed by the Twightwee [Miami] and the Ottawa villages on the
Miamis [Maumee] River, they delivered me all the English prisoners they had & I found
as f passed by those towns that several of the Aborigines had set off for Detroit.*

This river [the St. Mary] is not navigable till you come to the place where the St.
Joseph joins it and makes a considerably large stream. Nevertheless we found a great
deal of difficulty in getting our canoes over shoals, as the water at this season was very
low. The banks of the river are high, and the country overgrown with lofty timber of
various kinds ; and the land is level and the woods clear.

About ninety miles from the Miamis of Twightwee [head of the Maumee] we came
to where the large river [the Auglaize] that heads in a lick, falls [meets, debouches] into
the Miami [Maumee] river. This they call the forks, The Ottawas claim this country,
and hunt here where game is very plenty. From hence we preceded to the Ottawa village
[site of the present Providence, Lucas County]. This nation formerly lived at Detroit,
but is now settled here on account of the richness of the country, where game is always
found to be plenty. Here we were obliged to get out of our canoes and drag them
[occasionally] eighteen miles on account of the the rifts which interrupted navigation.
At the end of these rifts we came to a village of the Wyandots who received us very kindly,
and thence we proceeded to the mouth of the river where it falls [debouches ; there are
neither falls nor rapids] into Lake Erie. From the Miamis [villages near the head of the
Maumee] to the Lake it is computed one hundred and eighty miles [the distance is nearer

*London Doc. XXXVIII, New York Colonial Documents, volume vii, pages 779, 7H1. Annals of the
West, pases 184-85, and Butler's History of Kentucliy.

FIRST BRITISH TROOPS AMONG WESTERN ABORIGINES. 123

one hundred and sixty miles], and from the entrance of the ri\er into the Lake to Detroit
is sixty miles — that is forty-two miles up the Lake and eighteen miles up the Detroit River
to the garrison [Fort] of that name.

On the 17th [August] in the morning we arrived at the Fort, which is a large stock-
ade inclosing about eighty houses. It stands on the west side of the river on a high bank,
commands a very pleasant prospect for nine miles above and nine miles below. The
country is thickly settled with F'rench. Their plantations are generally laid out about
three or four acres in breadth on the river and eighty acres in depth. The soil is good,
producing plenty of grain. All the people here are generally poor wretches, and consist
of three or four hundred French families, a lazy, idle people, depending chiefly on the
savages for subsistence. Though the land with little labor produces plenty of grain, they
scarcely raise as much as will supply their wants, in imitation of the Aborigines whose
manners and customs they have entirely adopted and cannot subsist without them.

Colonel Croghan and Colonel Campbell commandant of Fort De-
troit, held repeated councils with the Aborigines there assembled,
embracing those of the Miamis, Ottowas, Ouiotenons, Piankishaws,
Pottawotomis, Kickapoos, ' Muscjuatomis ' Chippewas, Six Nations,
Delawares, Shawnees and Wvandots. And thus was cleared the way
for the complete British occujiation of the Maumee, Wabash and
Illinois counties. Colonel Croghan so reported to Fort Pitt and a
compan\- of the 4"2nd Regiment of Highlanders under Captain Thomas
Stirling proceeded thence down the Ohio River to, and K.lth October,

1765, received welcome possession of. Fort Chartres from commandant
St. Ange. These were the first British troops to enter the Illinois
country. Major Arthur Loftus early in 17()4, with four hundred regulars,
ascended the Mississippi from New Orleans about four hundred miles
when six of his men were killed and six wounded by Aborigines in
ambush, whereupon he returned to Pensacola. ''

Pontiac and other chiefs visited Sir William Johnson July 24,

1766, at Ontario, New York, according to invitation and promise given
at Detroit the preceding \ear. They were laden with presents and re-
turned to the Maumee apparently satisfied.

* Narrative and Critical History of America, volume vi. paee 70,5. For account of George
Croghan's journals, see Ibid, page "04; Hildreth's Pioneer History: New Yoric Colonial Documents ;
Butler's History of Kentuclty. etc.

124 THE MAUMEE RIVER BASIN.

CHAPTER V.

Hostilities of British and Aborigines — Revolutkwary War.

176fi TO 1783.

The Aborigines had become convinced that no more reHance could
be placed on the French, and that their wants would be best supplied
by their becoming, and remaining', friendly to the British; and the
British, throug'h the Secretary of State the Earl of Halifax, the Lords
Commissioners of Trade and Plantations, and of Sir William Johnson
of Johnstown, New York, the able Superintendent of Aborigine affairs
for the Northern District of America, had broadly planned for the
control of the Aborigines." These jilans and their firm application
to the binding" of the Aborigines to the dictation of the British, were
destined to cost the American Colonists many hundreds of additional
lives and an untold amount of suffering and treasure during their many
vears of struggle for independence from the other unjust imjiositions
of the mother country.

Previous to this time the Colonies had lost thirty thousand of their
citizens, and incurred an expense of sixteen million dollars in their
efforts for protection against the French and their Aborigine allies. Of
this sum the British parliament had re-imbursed them atiout one-third.
A large indebtedness had accumulated, and the rates of taxation had
become very l^urdensome. The British debt had increased during the
French wars about one hundred and forty million pounds sterling.
Parliament attempted to tax the struggling" Colonists to help pa\" the
home indebtedness. Attempts were also made to restrict the liberty
of the Colonists in different ways which led to various expressions by
them of disapproval. John Adams declared that American Indepen-
dence was liorn at the time of the action and expressions of James Otis
against the Writs of Assistance, in Boston as early as February, 1761.

Following the Stamp Act Riots in New York, Sir William Johnson
wrote to the Lords of Trade under date of 31st January 1766, that "The
Disorders occasioned by our Riotous People here, it is not my business
to enlarge upon, the Aborigines have heard of it, & desired to know the
cause. I have given them an answer with the utmost caution, well
knowing their Dispositions, & that they might incline to Interest them-
selves in the affair, or fall upon the Inhabitants in revenge for old

''* The Plan for the Future Mana^iement of Abori^fiue Attairs is given in full, in forty-three sections,
in London Document XXXVII. New York Colonial Documents, volume vii. pages 6,S7 to &11 ; also Sir
William Johnson's recommendations for the modilication of the same, on pages 661 to 666, These plans
were prepared from much experience and consideration. They show but the beginnings and fairer out-
lines of the methods by which, with ever-increasing savagery, the British obtained, and maintained,
their wonderful hold upon the savages within American borders until after the War of 1S13.

THE BRITISH DEFRAUD THE ABORIGINES.

125

frauds which they cannot easily forjiet." . . It yet required constant
attention and no little diplomacy of Sir William, the Superintendtnt, to
keep the restless spirit of the Aboriffines constant to the British. ''' The
French settlers in the Illinois Country a^ain became aj^t^ressive in trade,
and in sending' l^elts and sentiments inimical to the British, to the dit-
ferent tribes.

The desire for lands also increased amonsi the Colonists. The
Superintendent wrote to the Earl of Shelburne, Secretary of State,
London, with date 16th December, 1766, that

The tfiirst after tfie lands of the Aborigines, is become almost universal, the people,
who generally want them are either ignorant of or remote from the consequences of dis-
obliging the Aborigines, many make a traffic of lands, and few or none will be at any pains
or expence to get them settled, consequently they cannot be loosers by an Aborigine War,
and should a Tribe be driven to despair, and abandon their country, they have their de-
sire tho' at the expence of the lives of such ignorant [innocent] settlers as may be upon
it. . . The majority of those who get lands, being persons of consequence [British] in
the Capitals who can let them Ive dead as a sure Estate hereafter, and are totalh' ignor-
ant of the Aborigines, make use of some of the lowest and most selfish of the Country
Inhabitants to seduce the Aborigines to their liouses, where they are kept rioting in
drunkenness till they have effected their liad purposes.

Ml-.r.AI. ToM.AH.AWKS

Early traded to the Aborigines for peltry by the French and British. They were iosc by llie .Abori-
gines, and many years afterward were found by American farmers. No. 1 was found in .Allen county.
Ohio: 2, 3 and 6 at Fort Wayne; No. 2 is a hoe, 'siiuaw-ax' or adz. a useful implement and dangerous
weapon — the sharp pike of its head was coiled backward in later years; No. 3, is tempered copper. No. 4.
found in Williams County. Ohio, has a pipebowl as head, the stem of the pipe passing along the handle.
No. 5 was found in Paulding county, and Nos. 7 and 8, to the south and southwest. Part of the .Author's
collection.

Fraud was also practiced ujion the Abori^nnes by certain British
traders. The latter part of 176H one of them was convicted liefore a
court of inquiry of officers at Detroit, to which post this Basin was

* sir William Johnson remained considerate to the Colonists to the time of his death which oc
curred Ilth July. 1774; and he was. also, a firm friend to the Aborigines,

126 THE MAUMEE RIVER BASIN.

tributary, of bting one-fifth short in his \veii;"hts of powder and lead.
And a more serious charge was lirought, viz : 'Yet such is the conduct
of several English and the greater pari of the French, that they are
endeavoring all in their power to make the Aborigines Quarrel "...
This was in January, 1767; and in this communication to the Lords
of Trade, a 'Post or Mart' was suggested for the Maumee River, also
one by the Waliash, whereas three years before he thought the post at
Detroit sufficient for this territory. In his report to the Secretary of
State London in Septemlier, ]7(J7, the Superintendent, Sir William
Johnson, reported among other matters that

Sandoiisky whicli has not l:>eeu re-established [since its capture by Pontiacs savages]
is not a place of much consequence of Trade, it is chiefly a post at which several Penn-
syh'ania Traders embarked for Detroit. St. Joseph's [ near Lake Michigan] and the
Miamis [ at the head of the Maumee River] have neither of them been yet re-established,
the former is of less consequence for Trade than the latter which is a place of some im-
portance. . . At the Miamis there may be always a sufficiency of provisions from its
vicinity to Lake Erie, and its easiness of access by the River of that name at the proper
season, to protect which the Fort there can at a small expence be rendered tenable
agst any Coup du mains. . . this would greatly contribute to overcome the present
excuse which draws the traders to rove at will and thereby exposes us to the utmost
danger. *

Sir \\'illiam Johnson again suggested December 3, 17ti7, that re-
ligious missionaries 'would have hajipy effects.' The question of sup-
plying" the Aborigines with inissionaries had been suggested at different
times, but no appropriation for this purpose was made further than for
those formerly sent aiuong the Six Nations to neutralize the infJucnce
favorable to France exerted by the French Jesuits.

The question of a boundary line to the Aborigine domain, beyond
which European settlers for agriculture should not go, had been oc-
casionallv talked about, and from 1765 was mentioned liy the Superin-
tendent of such affairs as the Ohio River from Kittanning to near its
mouth for this western region. This was practically in consonance with
the former influence of the French who desired to shut out the British
from Ohio : and this boundary question, although never definitely agreed
upon bv the British in their dealings with the savages, was made much
of by them later to incite and to keep alive the savage antipathy of the
Aborigines to the Colonists from the beginning of the Revolutionary
War even down to the close of the War of 1H12.

Early in 176H the French to the southwest joined their brethren of
New Orleans in revolt against the Spanish authority and formed a gov-
ernment of their own, which endured l")Ut a year or two; and this revival
of the French national siiirit at St. Louis and the Illinois country, at-

■" London Document XL New York Colonial Documents volume vii. paces 974, 975. Over twenty
volumes of the Sir William Johnson MSS. are in the New York State Library, Albany.

BRITISH ANXIETY REGARDING THE SAVAGES. 127

traded the French and Aborigines of this Basin again to the detriment
of the British. In June, 1769, this stir became sufficient to cause alarm,
and the strengthening of the fortification at Detroit. Also the 14th
August, 1770, Sir William Johnson wrote to the Earl of Hillsborough,
Secretary of State that

The Aborigines of Ohio and the southwest are at present in a state of uncertainty
as to what course they shall take. . . I have taken measures to be informed as early
as possible with the proceedings & issues of the Congress which they are about this time
to hold at the great plains of Sioto near the Ohio, where some are endeavouring to
form Confederacys for \'erv bad purposes, secretly countenanced and supported by
French Traders. Renegadoes and all those Aborigines who have not hitherto been
heartily attached to the English, but with wonderful! art have for a time past endeav-
oured to shake the fidelity of the Six Nations, thro the means of some of the Seneca
Towns who are most dissatisfied with our conduct.* .

In further illustration of the state of affairs on the eve of the Revo-
lutionary War, and of the very great power the Aborigine allies of the
British exerted against the Colonists when fully marshalled for the work,
the following excerpts are made from Sir William Johnson's letter to
the Secretary of State 18th Feliruary, 1771, viz :

The apprehensions which I long since communicated of an Union between the North-
ern & Southern Aborigines and which your Lordship makes particular mention of in Vour
letter No. 14 is really a matter of the most serious nature, for if a verry small part of
these people have been capable of reducing us to such straits as we were in a few years
since, what may we not expect from such a formidable alliance as we are threatened
with, when at the same time it is well known that we are not at this time more capable
of Defence, if so much, as at the former period. This is in some measure the conse-
quence of their becoming better acquainted with their own strength and united capacity
to preserve their importance & check our advances into their country. t .

Nothing seriously inimical to British interests, however, was con-
summated by the Aborigines at tht'ir large meeting at Scioto, nor
resulted from the proposed alliance here mentioned. The frequent
councils held with Sir W^illiam Johnson by the Six Nations durin.g this
and succeeding years, and the emissaries from these tribes in British
employ, together with British deputies, kept the western tribes from
actively warring against the British. .Mexander M'Kee, who in later
years exerted a cruel influence against ,\mericans in this Basin and
southward, was a Deputy Superintendent of Aborigine Affairs, and
' Resident on the Ohio' 8th March, 1774. At first he was active to
keep peace between the Aborigines and tlie settlers ; but after the
commencement of the Revolutionary War he was as active in inciting
the savages against the Americans. June 20, 1774, Sir William John-
son wrote to the Secretarv of State, that

* London Document XLII, New York Colonial Documents, volume viii, paize 227.

t The British dreaded the confederation of the savaces against them by the French: but, early
rccognizinc them as the best of allies for themselves, they used their best endeavors to federate them
against the Americans, with much success in later years.

128 THE MAUMEE RIVER BASIN.

For more than ten years past, the most dissolute fellows united with debtors, and
persons of wandering disposition, have been removing from Pensilvania & Virginia &ca
into the Aborigine Countr\-, towards lV on the Ohio. & a considerable number of settle-
mts were made as earl}- as 1 Tli.') when my Deputy [George Croghan] was sent to the
Illinois from whence he gave me a particular account of the uneasiness occasioned
iimongst the Aborigines. Many of these emigrants are idle fellows that are too lazy to
cultivate lands, & invited by the plenty of game they found, have employed themselves
in hunting, in which they interfere much more with the Aborigines than if they pursued
agriculture alone, and the Aborigine hunters (who are composed of all the Warriors in
each nation) already begin to feel the scarcity this has occasioned, which greatly in-
creases their resentment.

The Earl of Dartmouth, Secretary of State, did not approve of
this westward migration, and julv (hit he wrote to the Superintendent
of Aborigine Affairs as follows :

I received a few days ago from Lord f)unmore [Governor of Virginia] that some
persons. Inhabitants of Virginia, have purchased of the Illinois Aborigines a very large
tract of land extending thirty leagues up the River, and I wish that this Transaction had
met with such Discouragement from that Government as the nature of it deserved. There
are many reasons urged by Lord Dunmore in favor of this measure, but they have no
weight with me. and as I shall continue of opinion that such a proceeding cannot fail
of being attended with the most dangerous and alarming consequences.

Loval British subjects, however, were not to suffer such dire con-
sequences as was feared by the Secretary. Such sufferin}^ was to come
to pioneer Americans who sought homes in the West, and joined their
countrymen in the East aijainst unjust impositions of the mother coun-
try. Earl\' in 1774 the Ohio Aborigines renewed their murderous raids
upon the \'irginia frontier. The settlers retaliated and, without full op-
portunity or desire for discrimination, they took the lives of some non-
combatants. Some friends of the Seneca Chief Logan, of the Mingo
band, were among this number and he thereupon entered upon a course
of revenge with dire effect, particularly upon the innocent. Governor
|ohu Murray Earl of Dunmore was ur.ged by his I't'Oiile to raise an
armv to suppress the savages."' Accordingly, late in the summer, he
marched against them with an army of aliout three thousand men, starting
in three divisions. Two ol these soon came together to form the left
under General Andrew Lewis: and this division was attacked at the
mouth of the Great Kanawha River lOth October by one thousand to
twelve hundred savages of the Western Confederacy led by the noted
Shawnee Chief Cornstalk. In the fierce battle that ensued the Virginians
lost fiftv-two privates and half their commissoned officers killed, and
one hundred and forty odd were wounded, while the Aborigine loss was
pr<jl)ably about one hundred and thirty in both killed and wounded : but
one writer at least gives the number as a full hundred more.

^See American Archives IV. volume i; Hraniz Mayer's Logan and Cresap : Magazine of Ameri-
can History, volume i ; and Roosevelt's The Winning of the West, volume i, G. P. Putnam's Sons, 1897.

THE QUEBEC ACT. REVOLT OF THE COLONISTS. 129

This division proceeded to the Shawnee towns by the Scioto River,
according^ to the orders of Governor Dunmore who was there in com-
mand of the right division, and who there arranged terms of peace with
the savages.'^ These terms, however, were not to benefit the Americans,
even of this army for long, as during the march homeward meetings of
the suliordinate officers, and of the privates, were held and resolutions
were passed declaring that they would no longer submit to British
domination.

The Revolutionary War.

Sir William Johnson died 11th July, 1774; and his chief deputy,
and son-in-law. Colonel Guy Johnson, immediately succeeded to the
British office of Superintendent of Aborigine Affairs. He immediately
adopted measures to assure the different tribes of Aborigines that there
would not be any change in the relation of the British Government
toward them. But the rapidly changing events, culminating in the out-
break of the Revolutionary War, made it necessary for him to flee from
his country seat near Johnstown, New York, to Canada in May, 1775,
where, in Montreal, he yet endeavored to preserve the friendship of the
savages for the British. He went to London, was confirmed in the
superintendency, and came to New York City where he co-operated with
General William Howe. His last effective work in this office was done
with the Six Nations at Niagara. He was succeeded 23rd March, 1782,
by Sir John Johnson, son of the late Sir William. Meantime the active
work with and by the western Aborigines was directed by the western
military posts, Detroit being the principal one.

Under the French regime, and until after the Revolutionary War
under the British, the commandant of the military post at Detroit, to
which this Basin was subject, exercised the functions of both a civil
and a military officer with absolute power. The 22nd June, 1774, under
the Quebec Actt (which was so obnoxious to the Colonists as to be
cited in the Declaration of Independence) a civil government was first
provided for the territory which centered at or was subject to Fort
Detroit — including all the Territory Northwest of the Ohio River at
least. This Act vested the legislative power in the Governor, then Sir
Guy Carleton who was afterward Lord Dorchester, in the Lieutenant
Governor, or Commander in Chief, and in a Council of not less than
seventeen nor more than twenty-three persons to be appointed b^- the
King. The criminal law of England was presumed to be the guide;
but, generally, the law was but the will of the commandant, or of the

*For a description of these combatants, and of this most severe combat, see The Winning of the
West by Theodore Roosevelt, volume i Chapter ix. based on the American Archives. 4th series volume i,
and Whittlesey's Fugitive Essays.

t For copy of the Quebec Act see the American Archives. Fourth Series volume i. page 216,

150 THE MAUMEE RIVER BASIN.

notary or justice of the peace of tiis appointing. This was more par-
ticularly the case as the lines of war became more rigidly established.
Governor Carleton proclaimed martial law June 9, 1775, and the culti-
vated savagery of the Aborigines was then systematically and forcefully
directed against the American frontier settlements, the murdering par-
ties being generally led liy British officers.

The notorious tory Doctor John Connelly, who had been for about
three years in collusion with Earl Dunmore against Pennsylvania and
against the patriots generally, in July, 1777, endeavored to enlist volun-
teers among Americans in the western country to operate with the
savages against loyal Americans. They were to be supplied with mu-
nitions from Detroit. Congress became apprised of such movements
and instituted measures to prevent disaffection among the frontier
people. Connelly was soon captured by the loyal Americans.

The Americans also desired the help of the Aborigines, or at least
their neutrality. To obtain this result Congress appointed Judge James
Wilson of Pennsylvania, General Lewis Morris of New York and Doctor
Thomas Walker of Virginia, commissioners to treat with them. Arthur
St. Clair, afterwards first Governor of the Northwest Territory, was their
secretary ; and he enlisted nearly five hundred volunteers to march against
Detroit if the neutrality of the Aborigines could be secured. This neu-
trality could not be obtained, and the suggested march, like many other
projects of these times, was not entered upon ; nor did the efforts of the
commissioners to the Aborigines result in much favor to the Americans.

The ofiice of Lieutenant Governor and Superintendent of Abo-
rigine Affairs was created by the British for Detroit, the Maumee
region, Vincennes and Michilimackinac. Captain, afterwards Colonel,
Henry Hamilton of the 15th Regiment of British troops, was appointed
to this office for Detroit where he arrived 9th November, 1775: and he
was deferred to regarding the other posts. He proved tactful, cruel
and remorseless. It appears that the British had been preparing the
Aborigines for war against the Americans on the former French plan
against the I^ritish, jirevious to this date, and that councils had been
held with different tribes at Detroit for this inirpose. War belts of
wampum were sent to every tribe with invitations to visit Detroit.
There councils and feastings were repeatedly held in which rum flowed
freely with every incitement calculated to inflame the savages against
the Americans who were endeavoring to crowd them from their lands,
and now had rebelled against the good King, their father, who was dis-
tributing so many presents and kindnesses to his Aborigine children."

Earl\- in September, 1776, Hamilton wrote to Lord George Ger-
main " that the Ottawas, Chippewas, Wyandottes and Pottawatomies,
with the Seiiecas would fall on the scattered settlers on the Ohio and

BRITISH SAVAGE WAR-PARTIES AGAINST AMERICANS. 131

.;,fj^s-»«<^^, • ■ , V;

its branches . . . whose arrogance, disloyalty and imprudence has
justl\- drawn upon them this deplorable sort of war.'"^. . . Gover-
nor Carleton, who
was a good disci-
plinarian and
prompt to o b e y
the orders of his
superior officer,
enjoined Hamilton
6th October, 1776,
'to keep the Abor-
igines in readiness
to join me in the
Spring, or march
elsewhere as they
m ay be most
wanted.'! War
jiarties of savages
were thoroughly
(_' ( 1 u i \y p e d and,
commanded l)v
British officers +
were sent out from
Detroit, first to the
eastward and later
to the south and
southwest also,
wherever they
could find the most defenseless American settlements in Ohio, Penn-
sylvania and Kentucky', to murder and plunder.

Fort Henr\-, at the site of the present Wheeling, was attacked by
one of these parties which, though finally driven away, inflicted loss of
life upon the small garrison. Harrodsburg, Kentucky, was assailed
loth March, 1777, but its Itrave and efficient defenders repulsed the

THE SAVAGE AND HIS VICTIM

(From Schoolcraft)

* Secretary Germain had complained of Governor Carleton for hesitatinR to employ the savages
against tlie Americans toward whom Germain was very vindictive; and he reproved every
commander who slrowed signs of mei"cy in his conduct of this business. He found in Hamilton a ready
agent in carrying out his cruel schemes — Harper's Encyclopaedia of United States History volume iv,
page 64. Some writers date Hamilton's communication one year later than the above.

1 Haldimand Papers. The Papers relating to the Revolutionary War preserved by General Sir
Frederick Haldimand. of most interest to the historian, number one hundred and sixty-four volumes.
In 1857 they were presented to the British Museum Library by his nephew William Haldiman. They
have been copied largely for the Parliament or Dominion Library at Ottawa. Canada. Other papers of
great interest to the student of history may also be there found.

i The term British is applied by the writer to all those persons engaged in the interests of the
British Government, whether English, Scotch, Irish, French or American born.

152 THE MAUMEE RIVER BASIN.

savages, who met like successful opposition at Boonsboro 15th April
and again 4th July. Four were wounded including Captain Boon.
Logan's Station was also attacked and one man killed and two others
mortally wounded while guarding women who were milking the cows
outside the stockade.

Governor Hamilton reported to Secretary Germain under date
27th July, 1777, that he had sent out fifteen war parties composed of
two hundred and eighty-nine savage warriors with thirty British oiScers
and rangers. The 26th September, Hamilton was given full control of
this western country, he having passed the probationary period in his
worse than barbarous work satisfactorily' to the British Government.
He rei^orted to Governor Carleton 15th January, 177w, that "The
parties sent from hence have been generally successful, though the
Aborigines have lost men enough to sharpen their resentment : they
have brought in 28 prisoners [Americans] alive, twenty of which they
presented to me, and 129 scalps."*.

Daniel Boon, pioneer of Kentucky, with twenty-six companions
were captured February 7, 1778. While making salt at the Blue Licks
they were quietly surrounded by eighty or ninety Miamis of the Mau-
mee led by two Frenchmen named Baubin and Lorimer. With his
usual discretion Boon decided it best to surrender on condition of being
well treated. They were taken to Chillicothe and then to Detroit
where Hamilton offered the Aborigines one hundred pounds for Boon.
They refused to sell him for this price. The 10th April they took him
into Ohio where he further ingratiated himself in their favor, and they
adopted him into the tribe. At Chillicothe in June he saw a war part\-
on its way against Boonsboro, and he escaped thither. He made the
journey of one hundred and sixty miles in four days, with not to exceed
one meal of food on the way. He was tried by court-martial for sur-
rendering at Blue Licks, was acquitted, and promoted to the rank of
major.

August H, 177H, between three and four hundred Shawnees and
Miamis, led by their chiefs. Captain Daigniau de Ouindre (written
Duquesne by Major Boon) and eleven other Frenchmen, appeared be-
fore the stockade at Boonsboro with both the British and French flags,
and demanded surrender in the name of his Britannic Majesty, George
HI. Upon request Major Boon was granted two days in which to de-
cide, and he lost no opportunity meantime to gather the live stock and
other necessaries within the jialisades. There was further parlej-ing,
with dangerous deception on the part of the enemy, followed by the
besieging of the place for nine days. The casualties to the Kentuck-

'*History of Detrcit and Michigan, hy Silas Farmer, volume i, 1889; From Michican Historical
Collection^.

HORRIBLE SAVAGE WORK INSTIGATED BY BRITISH. 133

ians were two killed and four wounded ; and the enemy suffered but
little more.* August 20th the enemy withdrew, and Boonsboro was not
again seriously attacked during the war. The marauding parties sent
against the frontier settlements were usually much smaller than the
one last mentioned. August 25th, fifteen Miamis were started ; Sep-
tember 5th, thirty-one Miamis ; September Uth, one Frenchman, five
Chippewas, and fifteen Miamis, are the statements of a few of the indi-
vidual reports. Hamilton reported 16th September that his parties
had taken thirty-four prisoners, 17 of which they delivered up, and
eighty-one scalps." T

Major Arent Schuyler De Peyster, at different times commandant
of Detroit, reported a form of presentation to Lieutenant Governor
Hamilton on return of the savages who had been sent on marauding
expeditions, as follows: "Presenting sixteen scalps, one of the Dela-
ware chiefs said, Listen to your children, the Delawares who are come
in to see you at a time they have nothing to apprehend from the enemv,
and to present you some dried meat, as we could not have the face to
appear before our father empty." +

All scalps were paid for ; and at the starting out of the savages for
their raids, the governor, and sometimes the commandant, encouraged
them b\- singing the war song, by the gift of some weapon, and by pas-
sing their weapons through his own hands, thus 'taking hold of the same
tomahawk ' to show full sympathy with them in their murderous work.
On their return to Detroit they were sometimes welcomed by firing the
fort's cannon. Hamilton was also charged with having standing prices
for American scalps, but generally none for prisoners, thus inducing the
savages to at once kill all weak or resisting prisoners reserving such as
could carry the plunder for them to Detroit where it would be deter-
mined what disposition could best be made of them. These war parties
went out, and returned, through this Basin : and many of them were
recruited from this region.

It was at these trying times that Captain Alexander M'Kee, a
native of Pennsylvania, his two negro servants, with Matthew Elliott,
Simon Girty and a few others, deserted Pittsburg 2ftth March, 177H,

'^See The Winning of the West, by Theodore Roosevelt, volume ii, paue 30 et seq.

tThe late Samuel Prescott Hildreth, M. D., communicated to The American Pioneer of July. 1H43,
volume i, pages 291, 292, the confession in the year 179H of the noted savaye ' Silver Heels ' that he had
taken the scalps of sixteen white people, among the number beiny Abel Sherman who resided near where
he boasted of taking the scalp in large size, of dividing it carefully, and selling the parts as two scalps in
Detroit for fifty dollars each.

Possibly many of the scalps and prisoners referred to above by Hamilton, were taken at the Mas-
sacre of Wyoming, Pennsylvania, as many of the savages who participated in that crime went from this
western region, led by Captain Henry Bird of the 8th British Regiment.

t The enquiring reader can learn more of this horrible story by referring to General Lewis Cass'
communication to the North American Review, and to Rev. David Zeisberger's Diary, volume i, page 37.
Also to the Haldimand Papers, passim, and Farmer's History of Detroit.

154

THE MAUMEE RIVER BASIN.

and the Americans who had trusted them, and made their way to Detroit
where they joined the British. Soon thereafter throutfh their influence
over twenty other persons deserted for Detroit. In Pittsburt;, where the
efficient number of patriots was small and the dangers great, these de-
sertions caused alarm and anxiety. These traitors stopped with the Dela-
ware Aborigines ' Moravians ) by the Tuscarawas River, a tributary of the
Muskingum, and influenced them against the Americans. The reports
carried to Detroit led to communications with these Aborigines by the

THE SCALP UANCE OF THE SA\'AGES
[ From Catlin )

British, which in turn led the Americans to the belief that they were in
accord with the British. This belief, with the large number of Delawares
known to be with the war parties, caused the sad massacre of a part of
the Moravian band by Pennsylvanians, reference to which will be again
made.

M'Kee, Elliott and Girty were received at Detroit with great joy
bv Governor Hamilton''' a man of their own type. M'Kee was com-
missioned Captain and interpreter in the British Aborigine Department
and, later, was advanced to Colonel and to Commissary and Department
Aborigine Agent. Simon Girty was retained as interpreter and sent to
the Senecas CMingoes) with whom he was to live, keep them friendly
to the British, and to accompany them on their raids against the Ameri-
cans. James and George Girty also deserted to Detroit, the former
arriving there 15th August, 177H, and the latter Hth August, 1779.t

* Hamilton's letter of April 25. 1778, with Haldiniand Papers.

tTherp were four brothers in this Girly, or Gerty, family. The father, Simon, was killed in 17.t1
vhile in a drunken bout with the .^borinines. He was Irish, and his wife was EmiUsh. The names of

THE GIRTYS. RXPEDITION OF GEORGE ROGERS CLARK. 155

The resources of the Americans were fully employed for their pro-
tection against the British and their AhoriKine allies in the East ; but it
was apparent that somethini^" more should be done to prevent or
counteract the activities of these enemies from the West. Early in the
sprini;' of 1778 Virginia, or rather Governor Patrick Henry, for the
purpose of drawing the enemy away from her borders and from Ken-
tucky, gave the energetic Major George Rogers Clark ( who had been
aiding in the protection of Kentucky) authority to gather four com-
panies of soldiers to make his bravely planned expedition for the cap-
ture of the British forts in the Illinois country. With great difficulty
about one hundred and fifty men were gathered. They boated down
the Ohio River to the Falls, and thence to Fort Massac whence they
went overland. In the evening of July Fourth thev surprised and
captured without bloodshed the British post at Kaskaskia, and on the
Hth the post and depository at Cahokia about sixty miles up the
Mississippi River were captured in like manner : and the French
soldiers and settlers of these places took the oath of allegiance to
the United States with joy upon being informed by Major Clark
of the recent a-lliance of France with the United States. Information
of this alliance and of these surrenders was communicated to the
French at Vincennes and they, being desirous of an opportunity to
antagonize the British, conspired against them, and one night in
August they expelled the British sentiment from the garrison and
hoisted the American flag over the fort. Colonel Clark, Colonel by

their children were: 1. Thomas, born in 1739 by the SuS')uehanna River, Pennsylvania. He resided at
Pitt?;bure loyal to the United States. 2, Simon, born in 1741 just above Harrisburg. He was appointed
as interpreter for the Six Nations at Pittsburi; 1st May, 1776. but was discharged 1st August "for ill be-
havior.' The Patriots appointed him 2nd Lieutenant in 1777. There will be occasional reference on the
following pages to his evil conduct while with the Hritisli. He died near Aniherstburg, Canada, 18th
February, 1818. after a savage course toward his countrymen, and several years blindness. 3. James,
born in 1743. was of good stature, and not so much addicted to intoxication as Simon and George. He
married a Shawnee and became a trader with the Aborigines in after years with posts at different times
at St. Marys, Ohio: near the head of the Maumee, at Detiance; and on the left bank of the Maumee op-
posite Girty Island which took its name from him. He died l.^th April, 1817. in Canada. 4. George Girty,
born in 1745. He married a Delaware woman who bore him several children. He died while intoxicated
at the trading post of liis brother James at the Shawnee village by the Maumee two or three miles below
Fort Wayne just before the War of 1H13. His family remained with the Delawares. — Buttertield.

These three notorious brothers were captured by the Aborigines in August, 1756. Simon was taken
by the Senecas, James by the Shawnees, and George by the Delawares. In 1759 they were all returned
to their friends at Pittsburg. After their desertion to the British in 1778-79 they, with M'Kee, Elliott,
and other deserters, were attainted of high treason by the Supreme Court of Pennsylvania. The Girtys
and Elliott went into the employ of the British on pay of two dollars a day, with one and a half rations,
and were given one gun each, and three horses for riding and packing. The savage deeds of the Girtys,
even tliose of Simon which were the worst, have been excused on account of their three years captivity
with the savages in early life. Such excuse is not just to civilization. It is true, also, thai all their early
life was passed in the midst of alarms and bloodshed ; but so was that of all the frontier children, some of
whom suffered longer captivity, and nearly all of whom became patriots and conformed to the rules of
legal warfare and were, later, exemplary citizens. The Girty brothers were incited to, and given op-
portunity for their horrible work by Governor Henry Hamilton's precepts, examples, and employment
of them for such work. Such men were sought by the officers and agents of the British government to
lead the savages, and the British thus became a party to and responsible for their acts.

136 THE MAUMEE RIVER BASIN.

recent promotion, having thus gained control of all of the British
posts in the southwest, gave his attention to allaying the savagery of
the Aborigines toward the Americans, and with good success in the
Illinois country.

In October, 1778, the Legislature of Virginia, acting under the
Colonial Charters of King James I, April 10, 1606, May 23, 1609, and
March 12, 1611, organized the Northwestern Territory, or as much of
it as could be controlled by Colonel Clark, into the County of Illinois*
and appointed Colonel John Todd, junior. County Lieutenant or
Military Commandant. The 15th June, 1779, this officer issued a
proclamation from Kaskaskia regarding lands, those occupied by the
French and others, and this same month a court of civil and criminal
jurisdiction was instituted at Vincennes with Colonel J. M. Legras
president. t

Colonel Clark's successes gave great joy in Virginia and through-
out the East, and naturally the account of them was received at De-
troit with alarm ; thev even frustrated Hamilton's projected attack on
Fort Pitt early in 1778. The building by the Americans this year of Fort
Mcintosh by the upper Ohio, and Fort Laurens by the upper Tuscarawas,
caused yet further apprehension among the British. They strengthened
Fort Detroit •. and Governor General Frederick Haldimand listened with
more attention to the complaints of residents of Detroit against Lieu-
tenant Governor Hamilton and his appointe Justice of the Peace, Philip
Dejean, and they were indicted at Montreal 7th September, 1778, for
"divers unjust and illegal, Terranical and felonious acts and things con-
trary to good Government and the safety of His Majesty's Liege sub-
jects." These presentments were sent to Secretary Germain at London
endorsed with the excuse that the condition of affairs justified stringent
measures on the part of Hamilton.]!

Governor Hamilton's continuance in office showed entire confi-
dence and sympathy of the British Government in and with the savage
work he was doing. To recover lost ground, and to continue in the
favor of his Government, Hamilton renewed his efforts with the sav-
ages bv messengers to the tribes, and to the commandants of the
remaining British posts, along the western lakes, requesting them to

'■' Tliis Territory was before nominally included in the County of Botetourt. Virginia, established
by the House of Burgesses in 1769. Like the average early county, Botetourt has been divided to
form new counties from time to time until the remaining part in Virginia is now only of ordinary size.

t See Virginia Statutes at Large, volume ix, page 557. Theodore Roosevelt writes, in his Winning
of (/le West, that Colonel Todd's MS. ' Record Book ' in the Library of Colonel Durrett of Louisville
is the best authority for these years in the new County of Illinois. The material part of this record is
embraced in Edward G. Mason's Illinois in the 18th Century. This also gives account of the tinancial
troubles after the departure of General Clark's troops.

+ Haldimand Papers. Also Michigan Pioneer and Historical Collections.

BRITISH EFFORTS TO RECAPTURE THE SOUTHWEST. 157

incite the Lake Aborigines against Colonel
Clark and the American settlements in the
southwest. Hamilton wrote to Governor
Haldimand the 17th September that ' next
year there will be the greatest number of
savages on the frontier that has ever been
known, as the Six Nations [Iroquois of New
York] have sent belts around to encourage
those allies who have made a general alli-
ance."

The turn in affairs was becoming so evi-
dent against the British that Colonel Hamil-
ton decided to proceed to Vincennes against
Colonel Clark, in person. The thought of
getting away from Detroit for a time must
have lieen a relief to him — and he was sure
of success, for he wrote to Governor Haldi-
mand "that the British were sure to succeed
if they acted prom]itly, for the Aborigines
were favorable to them, knowing they alone
could give them supplies. . . The Sjjan-
iards [along the Mississippi River] are
feeble and hated by the French ; the French
are fickle and have no man of capacity to
advise or lead them ; and the Rebels [.\meri-
icans] are enterprising and brave, but want
resources" — a just estimate.

.After great preparations Hamilton's com-
mand left Detroit the 7th October, 177b,
with fifteen large bateaux and numerous
pirogues, each with carrying capacity of from
1800 to 3000 pounds: the largest ones being
laden with food, clothing, tents, ammunition,
and the inevitable rum and other presents
for the savages. His force at the outset of
his expedition consisted of one hundred and
seventv-seven white soldiers as follows :
Thirtv-six British regulars with two lieuten-
ants ; seventy-nine Detroit militia under a
major and two captains; forty-five volunteers,
mostlv Frenchmen, under Captain Lamothe ;
and seventeen members of the Aliorigine
Department including three captains and

158 THE MAUMEE RIVER BASIN.

four lieutenants who led the sixty Aborigines that started with
them from Detroit as well as the Miamis and others gathered to them
along the Maumee and Wabash — the whole number accreting to
about five hundred upon arrival at Vincennes. Oxen, carts and a six-
pounder cannon were sent along on shore with the beef cattle, all to
stop at the portages to aid in carrying the supplies and l)oats to the
next river. Those in the boats had snow, a high wind and rough
water to deal with across Lake Erie, and were nearly upset by the
waves before they could be landed ' on an oozy flat close to the mouth
of the Maumee.' The Maumee was at a low stage of water, and about
sixteen days were required to take the boats from its mouth to its head
( see chapter on the Maumee River ). Most of the supplies were left
under guard at the head of the Maumee during the winter. Here the
savages, the Miamis principally, had remained friendly to the British,
as had the Eel River and Wea bands of this trifle, and the warriors
that were assembled readily fell in line for the march after the regular
council, feasting and present giving were completed. The 16th De-
cember the advance of Hamilton's army appeared before the fort at
Vincennes, and demanded its surrender. Captain Leonard Helm was
in command and, notwithstanding the fact that his French militia gar-
rison had deserted him to run to the British on their approach* leav-
ing him with only one American, Moses Henry, the Captain refused
to surrender the fort, and did not until the next day when Governor
Hamilton, who had learned by the deserting French of his loneliness,
came up with the army and promised him that he would be well treated.
The 7th February, 1779, Colonel Clark started from Kaskaskia
through the floods for Vincennes and, after great hardships from the
cold, from hunger, and the overflowed country, his command of one
hundred and seventy men arrived at Vincennes the evening of the '23rd
and invested Fort Sackville.t This strong fort, armed with cannon
and swivels, was so thoroughly besieged by Clark's men who were
armed only with rifles, that Hamilton surrendered it and its garrison
the next afternoon, and the American flag was again, and ])ermanentl\:,
hoisted. t Two days later twenty-seven of the prisoners of war, includ-
ing Colonel Hamilton the other officers and regulars, were started

* An oflicer of the French militia who had been contntissioned by the British, and later by Colonel
Clark (who carried blank commissions from Patrick Henry. Governor of Virpinia) was examined by
Colonel Hamilton and both commissions were found in his pocket. Apparently it was of little import-
ance to the French which of the contending parties came alonn — they could declare allegiance to either
in a moment.

t Named in honor of the cruel British Colonial Secretary Lord George Germain. Viscount Sack-
ville, a friend of Lieutenant Governor Hamilton whom Colonel Clark designated the Hair Buyer from
his purchase of American scalps from his savage war-parties at Detroit.

t For description of Colonel George Rogers Clark's troops and their patriotic, energetic and suc-
cessful work in the southwest, see The Winning of the West, by Theodore Roosevelt.

CAPTURE OF THE BRITISH EXPEDITION FROM DETROIT. 139

undL-r guard for Virginia where the officers were, after due trial, con-
victed of gross and most cruel atrocities enacted principally b}- their
agents from Detroit under their incitements. These acts were so far
outside the rules of warfare that in punishment . . ' this Board
has resolved that the Governor, the said Henry Hamilton, Philip
Dejean, and William La Mothe [his officers and partners in savagery]
prisoners of war, be put into irons, confined in the dungeon of the
public jail, debarred the use of pen, ink and paper, and excluded all
converse except with their keeper. And the Governor [Patrick Henry]
orders accordingly." — Virginia State Papers.

Hamilton was released on parole 10th October, 17^0, and went to
New York whence he sailed for England in March, 1781. The militia ,
surrendered with Hamilton were paroled by Colonel Clark and the}- re-
turned to Detroit, it being impracticable to maintain them at \'incennes,
so far from the base of supplies.

A few davs after the capture of Vincennes a detachment of fift\-
soldiers in boats with swivels, sent by Colonel Clark for this purpose,
captured Colonel Hamilton's boats laden with S50,000 worth of supplies,
and their British con\'oy, while on their way from winter quarters at the
head of the Maumee, to and down the Wabash River for Hamilton's
army.

Some savages, principall\' Shawnees, with headquarters at old
Chillicothe on the east tributary of the Little Miami River, becoming
particularly annoying to the frontier settlers. Colonel John Bowman
County Lieutenant, with one hundred and sixty Kentuckians, co-
operating with nearly as many others under Colonel Benjamin Logan,
marched against them in May, 1779, destroyed their huts, caiitured
about one hundred and sixtv horses and other property, but were ob-
liged to retire with a loss of eight or nine of their troops killed, with-
out inflicting much other loss on the enemy. This expedition had a
wholesome effect, however, for Captain Henry Bird had at this time
marshalled a war party of two hundred savages who immediately de-
serted him upon learning of the Kentucky expedition.''

Al)out this time Colonel Rogers and Cajitain Benliam with a small
command of Americans suffered defeat near the mouth of the Licking
River, with a loss of forty-five or more of their men.T

The active series of murderous maraudings, instigated by Lieu-
tenant Governor Hamilton at Detroit, lessened for a time after his de-
parture for Vincennes ; but after his capture by the Americans the

* Captain Bird's letter from ' Upper St. Duski' ( Sandusky ) June 9, 1779, to Captain Lernoult com-
mandant of Kort Lernoult, Detroit — Canadian Archives.

tFor account of this disaster, and a pathetic account of the resources of wounded woodsmen, see
Marshall's and Butler's History of Kentucky, the Annals of the West. etc.

140 THE MAUMEE RIVER BASIN.

British redoubled their efforts in the West. Regular troops and militia
were sent from Niagara to Detroit to strengthen Fort Lernoult, the new
tort huilt there late in 1778 and early the following year, and named in
honor of Captain Richard Beringer Lernoult the officer who drafted its
plan and who succeeded to the command after the departure of Colonel
Hamilton. The work of the savages in the spring of 1779 not proving
satisfactory to the British, inquiries as to the cause were instituted.
Governor Haldimand wrote to Captain Lernoult July 23rd, that " I ob-
serve with great concern the astonishing consumption of Rum at
Detroit, amounting to 17,520 gallons per year." Such profuse flow of
this intoxicant impaired the ability of the savages for constant activity.
Only active persons were wanted ; and the British organization and dis-
cipline pervaded every quarter. Governor William Tryon of New York
wrote to Lord George Germain Secretary of State, London, under date
of July 2lS, 1779, that . . . " My opinions remain unchangeable re-
specting the utility of depradatory excursions. I think Rebellion must
soon totter if those exertions are reiterated and made to ex-
tremity." '

Captain Lernoult at Detroit did not prove himself equal to the
demands of his more cruel superiors, and he was superseded in October
by Major Arent Schuyler DePeyster, a New York tory of pronounced
character. Efforts were renewed to establish war parties of savages.
Some scalps were brought in, but the letters of the new commandant to
Governor Haldimand under date of October 20, and November 20, show
disgust at the great quantities of rum drank by the savages, and their
inefficiency — they refusing to make further effective raids from fear of
American retaliation.

The successes of the American troops in the West under Colonel
Clark, and the placing of lands on the market, induced many families
to remove west of the Allegheny Mountains in 1779. The winter began
early and was of unusual severity from cold and depth of snow. Hunt-
ing was attended with great difficulties, and game, when found, was in
poor condition. Many wild animals, as well as the domesticated ones,
died from insufficient food and water, and from the cold. The bears,
hibernating in hollow trees, were in the best condition and they were
much sought. The wild turkeys and grouse were the next best game
for food. The supply of corn iZea Mays) which was the only bread-
stuff for most of the people, was early exhausted in many settlements,
and great suffering was experienced particularly by those who came too
late to raise a crop. With the ojiening of spring new settlers came in
increased numbers. Three hundred large family boats arrived at the

♦London Document XLVII. Wew York Colonial Documents volume viii, paee "

fNCREASE OF AMERICANS. AND OF SAVAGE RAIDS. Ml

Falls of the Ohio, near the present Louisville, with immigrants from
the East during the spring of 1780.* It is but fair to ascribe their re-
moval largely to the lauded fertility of the soil and the mild climate,
while admitting that the desire to avoid conscription for the Revolu-
tionary army was an additional incentive.

The citizens and garrison of Detroit had also suffered from the se-
verity of the winter and the scarcity of food supplies. The savages
relied almost wholly on that post for their supplies, and they were
generally inactive during the cold weather. They were started out
early in the spring, however, and Colonel DePeyster reported May 16,
1780, that . " . "The prisoners daily brought in here are part of the
thousand families who are flying from the oppression of Congress in
order to add to the number already settled at Kentuck, the finest coun-
try for new settlers in America : but it happens, unfortunately for them,
to be the best hunting ground of the Aborigines which they will never
give up and, in fact, it is our interest not to let the Virginians, Mary-
landers, and Pennsylvanians get possession there, lest, in a short time,
they become formidable to this post." . . Ma>' "itith he wrote to
Captain Patt. Sinclair, who succeeded him at Michillimackinac as nom-
inal Lieutenant Governor and Superintendent of Aborigine Affairs, that
"everything is quiet here [Detroit] except the constant noise of
the war-drum. All the Seiginies [Saginaws?] are arrived at the in-
stance of the Shawnees and Delawares. More Aborigines from all quar-
ters than ever known before, and not a drop of rum !" . . He wrote
to Governor Haldimand June 1st that he had already fitted out two
thousand warriors and sent them along the Ohio and Wabash Rivers.

Great efforts, including an expenditure of near S300,000 had been
made in the fitting out of a larger war-party than usual to wholly subdue
the fast increasing numbers of Americans in southern Ohio and Ken-
tucky. The first of June this party, composed of about six hundred
savages and a number of Canadians led by Captain Henry Bird, started
from Detroit. They were well equipped, including two (one writer says
six) pieces of artillery, this being the first of such parties to take the
heavier guns. They passed up the Maumee and Auglaize Rivers, theii;
number being augmented by the savages along their route until, with a
force of nearly one thousand men, they appeared June 2'2nd before
Ruddell's Station on the south tributary of the Licking River in Ken-
tucky. Captain Ruddell, having no heavy guns, decided to surrender
on promise that the people gathered within the stockade should be
prisoners of the Canadians alone ; but the Aborigines made haste and at
the first opportunity seized the men, women and children, many of

*Mann Butler's History of Kentucky, pace S

142 THE MAUMEE RIVER BASIN.

whom they massacred and the others they carried into captivity. The
Station was completely destro^-ed. Martin's Station was taken in the
same way and its occupants suffered the same fate. Bryan's (or Bry-
ant's ) and Le.xington Stations were assailed on this expedition onlv
by savages without artillery, who were repulsed; but they took away
some live-stock that was grazing without \.hv stockades.

Possibly Captain Bird, and some other British companions of the
Aborginies, endeavored to exercise some control over the Aborigines to
prevent gross and indiscriminati.' butchery of captives. They well knew,
however, before starting out with these 'war-parties' that the savages
would have their way; that the savages permitted their company only
for the help derived from them to further their savage desires : and,
furthermore, that it was from their savage selfishness alone that they
spared the life of any captive, hoping thereby to find a desirable help-
mate, to have a keener enjoyment of savagery in the future torture, or
more sensuous enjoyment from the rum to bo purchased with the price
of the ransom.

Colonel De Peyster wrote further, 6th July, 1780, that . . .

I am so hurried with warparties coming in from all quarters that I
do not know which way to turn myself" . . . The 4th August he
reported to Colonel Bolton, his superior officer on the lakes that

I have the pleasure to acquaint you that Captain Bird arrived here
this morning with about 150 prisoners, mostlv Germans who speak
Englisii, the remainder coming in, for in sjiite of all his endeavors to
prevent it the Aborigines broke into the forts and seized many. The
whole will amount to about 3.')0. . . Thirteen have entered into the
Rangers,* and many more will enter, as the prisoners are greatly
fatigued with traveling so far [from carrying the plunder, and from the
scourgings imposed upon them] some sick and some wounded.
P. S. Please excuse the hurry of this letter — the Aborigines engross
my time. We have more here than enough. Were it not absolutely
necessary to keep in with them, they would tire my patience." t

^Proclamations weie issued from Detroit and elsewhere durinp the Revolutionary War in which
qreat inducements were ottered to the Americans to join the British army. These inducements to join,
coupled with threats to all who refused, were scattered broadcast throuch every pioneer settlement, and
many of the less patriotic, of the adventurous and bloodthirsty characters, were thereby led into the
British ranks.

tThe late General Lewis Cass, in a communication to the North American Review, thus quotes an
eyewitness to the return of Captain Bird's Savages : . . " Hearing the usual signals of success [sounds
indicating the number of scalps and prisoners given on the approach of a war-party to Detroit] I walked
out of town and soon met the party. The squaws and young .Aborigines had ranged themselves on the
side of the road with sticks and clubs, and were whipping the prisoners with great severity. Among these
were two yoiulg girls, thirteen or fourteen years old, who escaped from the party and ran for protection
to me and a naval officer who was with me. With much trouble and some danger, and after knocking
down two of the Aborigines, we succeeded in rescuing the girls, and fled with them to the Council House.
Here they were safe, because this was the goal where the right of the .Aborigines to beat them ceased.
Ne\t morning I received a message by an orderly-sergeant to wait upon Colonel De Peyster the com-

KENTUCKIANS PURSUE SAVAGES IN OHIO. DETROIT. MS

Colonel Clark had in mind an expedition against the savages in
Ohio before Captain Bird's invasion of Kentucky ; and now making
haste to Kentuckv with two companions, he so aroused the riflemen
that nine hundred and seventy were on the march the 2nd of August,
carrying a three-pounder cannon on a pack-horse. Their first objective
point was Old Chillicothe, which they found deserted, and the huts of
which they burned. They arrived before Old Piqua by the Miami River
in the morning of 8th August. This town is described as laid out in the
manner of the French villages, and substantially built. The strong log-
houses stood far apart, fronting the stream and were surrounded by
growing corn. A strong blockhouse with loopholed walls stood in
the middle. Thick woods, broken by small prairies, covered the roll-
ing country about the town. Colonel Benjamin Logan, second in com-
mand, became separated with a part of the Kentuckians from those
with Colonel Clark who led his men across the river and finally routed
the enemy before Logan came up. The Americans lost seventeen killed
and a large number wounded. The enemy's loss was less. Colonel
Clark burned the houses and destroyed the corn, at Piqua and at an-
other village with storehouses of British and French traders." He did
not find Captain Bird's cannon which was left at one of the upper
Miami towns on his return from Kentucky, and which his bombadier
in charge buried on the approach of the Americans.

Detroit was developed by the British as their headquarters in the
West from the time of their succeeding the French in ITtiO ; and so it
remained until the year 1796. It was the great rallying center of all the
western tribes of savages during this time : and the Americans had,
during the Revolutionary War, many projects for its ca])ture on this
account. General Lachlin M'Intosh, Colonel Daniel Brodhead, Gen-
eral George Rogers Clark, Colonel Le Balme, General William Irvine,
and others proposed plans for this purpose.

The march of M'Intosh into Ohio with one thousand soldiers, and
their building Fort Laurens on the west bank of the Tuscarawas
River in the fall of 1778, was a good step toward Detroit and it had a
repressing effect upon the savages for a time; but this fort soon ex-

mandine officer. I found the naval officer, who was witli nie the precedint: day, already there. The
Colonel stated that a serious complaint had been preferred against us by M'Kee the airent for the Abo-
rigines, for interfering with the .aborigines, and rescuing two of their prisoners. He said the Aborigines
had a right to their mode of warfare, and that no one should interrupt them ; and after continuing this
reproof for some time he told me if I ever took such liberty again, he would send me to Montreal oi'tjue-
bec. The naval officer was still more severely reprimanded, and threatened to have his uniform stripped
from his bacli and to be dismissed from his Majesty's service if such an incident again occurred. And
although I stated to the Colonel that we saved the lives of the girls at the peril of onr own, he abated
nothing of his threats or harshness." . .

*See Roosevelt's Winning of the West vol. ii, paces 104 to 111, for full description of this foray,
based on the Durrett. Bradford, M'Afee and Haldimand MSS.

144 THE MAUMEE RIVER BASIN.

perienced so many losses of men and horses from the rallyin^r foe that
it was abandoned in August, 1779.

Colonel DePeyster commandant of Detroit reported to General
Frederick Haldimand Governor of Canada on November 13, 1780, as
follows :

, A body of Canadians, as the French are called, commanded by Colonel La Balm*
were defeated on the 5th instant by the Miami Aborigines near that village [at the head
of the Maumee River]. The Colonel and between thirty and forty of his men were killed,
and Mens. Rhy, who styles himself aid-de-camp, taken prisoner. They relate that they
left the Cahokias on the iird of October with 41 men; that a large body were to follow
them to the Ouia [Ouiotenon] from whence Colonel La Balm proceeded to the Miamis
[now Fort Wayne, Indiana,] with one hundred and three men and some Aborigines,
without waiting for the junction of the troops expected, leaving orders for them to follow,
as well as those he expected from Post Vincent. His design was to attempt a coup-de-
main upon Detroit, but finding his troops, which were to consist of 400 Canadians
[Frenchmen] and some Aborigines, did not arrive, after waiting twelve days they plun-
dered the place [the Miami \'illages at the head of the Maumee] and were on their way
back when the Aborigines assembled and attacked them.

Three days later, 16th November, Colonel De Peyster again re-
ported that La Balme's command entered the Miami village, took the
horses, destroyed the horned cattle, and plundered a store he ( DePeyster)
allowed to be kept there for the convenience of the Aborigines. This
information was carried to Detroit by Miamis who, also, delivered to
De Peyster Colonel La Balme's personal effects, including a watch set
with diamonds, his double-barrel gun, regimentals, spurs and papers.
Governor Haldimand acknowledged the receipt of the Colonel's ' Com-
mission, etc.'t

General George Rogers Clark, recently promoted to Brigadier Gen-
eral, again revived his plan to capture Detroit. He wrote to President
Washington who knew the full imiiortance of such an expedition, but
he replied that . . " It is out of my power to send any reinforce-
ments to the westward. If the States would fill their Continental bat-

* Augustin Molton de la Balme reported that he came from France with General La Fayette; that
he had served as a lieutenant-colonel of cavalry in France, and as colonel in the .American army.
Richard Winston, Deputy, wrote to Colonel Jolin Todd Lieutenant of Illinois County, 31 October, 17W,
that . . There passed this way a Frenchman callinc himself Colonel la Balme in the American service.
I look upon him as a nralcontenl, much disgusted at the Virginians. Yet I must say he did some good —
he pacified the Aborigines. He was received by the inhabitants 1 French 1 just as the Hebrews would re-
ceive the Messiah. He was conducted from the Post here [Kaskaskial by a large detachment of the
inhabitants, as well as different tribes of Aborigines. He went from here against Detroit, being well
assured tliat the Aborigines were on his side. He got at this place and the Kahos ICahokial about fifty
volunteers who are to rendezvous at Oliia tOuiotenonl. Captain Duplaise from here went along with
him on his way to Philadelphia, there to lay before the French ambassador all the grievances this country
labors under by the Virginians, which is to be strongly backed by Monsieur de la Balme. 'Tis the gen-
eral opinion that he will take Baubin, the general partisan at Miamis Ihead of the Maumee Riverl and
from thence to Fort Pitt. . . He passed about one month here without seeing Colonel Montgomery,
nor did Colonel Montgomery see him.— Virginia State Papers, vol. i, page 380.

ISee Haldimand Papers; Michigan Pioneer and Historial Coliections, and Farmer's History of De-
troit and Michigan, volume i.

PLANS AGAINST DETROIT. CESSION BY NEW YORK. 145

talions we would be able to oppose a regular and permanent force to
the enemy in every quarter. If thev will not, thev must certainly take
measures to defend themselves by their militia, however expensive and
ruinous the system." . . Clark went to Virginia and laid his plans
before Governor Thomas Jefferson who favored them and, in 17^0-81,
about £500,000 depreciated currency was expended for this purjiose.
There was wanted, however, £300,000 more to complete contracts. This
sum could not well be raised ; nor were the troops forthcoming, for
various questions arose to deter volunteers from enlisting in this expe-
dition— objections to going so far from home : disputes regarding boun-
dary lines ; and the jealousies between Colonial and local officers, being
those most prominent.

The various claims of the eastern States to the territor}' west of
Pennsylvania and Virginia had been the cause of friction between these
States for years. These claims were based on the Colonial Charters and
treaties with the Aborigines, which were indefinite regarding boundar\-
on account of the great extent of the unsurve\ed regions. It was finally
advocated that each State cede her claim to the Union. In October,
1780, Congress passed an Act providing that territory so ceded should
be disposed of for the benefit of the United States in general : and that
the States organized therein should be of good extent — not less than
one hundred nor more than one hundred and fifty miles square. This
Act had a good effect and accordingly, 1st March, 17^1, New York as-
signed her claims ; but the other States did not act for three, four and
five years.

The savages renewed their depredations during the spring of 17*^1,
and raided far into Kentucky, and to the eastward. Colonel Archibald
Lochrey Cor Loughry ) Lieutenant of Westmoreland County, Penn-
sylvania, with about one hundred men who went west two years before
with Colonel Clark, started to rejoin him by the Ohio below the mouth of
the Miami River for the projected expedition against Detroit. They were
assailed by savages 24th August, 1781, about forty were killed and the
others taken prisoners to Detroit, including the Colonel. The savages
were soon thereafter reinforced by one hundred white men, and they
then raided south of the Ohio River.

These and other serious disasters caused fresh and increased terror
among all the frontier settlements. Governor Jefferson appealed to
President Washington for aid and received reply, written from New
Windsor "28th December, 1781, that . . " I have ever been of the
opinion that the reduction of the post of Detroit would be the only cer-
tain means of giving peace and securitv to the whole western frontier,
and I have constantly kept my eyes upon that object ; but such has been
the reduced state of our Continental force, and such the low ebb of our

146 THE MAUMEE RIVER BASIN.

funds, fspt-cially of late, that I fiavu never had it in my power to make
the attempt." . . General Clark was meantime kejU busy on the de-
fensive against the savages.

General William Irvine of Fort Pitt also investigated the condition
of affairs at Detroit with regard to an attack on that fort. He reported
to President Washington that . . " the British there had made treaties
in November, 1781, with thirteen nations [tribes] of Aborigines; and
at the conclusion they were directed to keep themselves compact and
ready to assemble on short notice. Secondly, the Moravians [Delaware
Aborigines who were instructed to neutrality by the missionaries] are
carried into captivity [to or near Detroit] and strictly watched and
threatened with severe punishment if they should attempt to give us
[Americans] information of their movements. Thirdlv, part of the
Five [Six] Nations [the Senecas] are assembled at Sandusky."

At this time, 7th February, 1782, the information was gathered
that the forces at Detroit were composed of three hundred regular
troops, from seven hundred to one thousand Canada militia, and about
one thousand Aborigine warriors who could be assembled within a few
days time.'^ It was also estimated at this time that an American army
to successfully attempt an expedition against Detroit should consist of
at least one thousand regular soldiers and one thousand militia, with
cannon, and supplies for at least three months. But it was impossible
for the Americans to gather such an army for this purpose and, conse-
(|uently, the well-prepared savage allies of the British continued to
inflict great havoc along the extensive frontier.

The savages becoming more aggressive, the Americans determined
on more positive defensive and offensive measures. A marauding party
of savages murdered a woman and child near the Ohio River and muti-
lated their liodies. These savages were pursued by about one hundred
and sixty militia from Washington County, Pennsylvania, under Colonel
David Williamson, to Gnadenhuetten a settlement of Moravian (United
Brethren ) missionaries by the Tuscarawas River a tributary of the
Muskingum. These missionaries and their Delaware Aborigine fol-
lowers had been taken to Detroit by forces under British command to
answer to Commandant DePeyster regarding charges of being friendly
to Americans. They were there exonerated of the charge and taken to
Sandusky. Being here short of provisions, a number returned to
Gnadenhuetten for supplies ; and these Christian Aborigines Colonel
Williamson's command assailed the 8th March, 1782, killed and
scalped sixty-two adults and thirty-four children. It appears that the
savages who committed the recent murders made good their escape

^ A review, or rough census of all the tribes of Aborigines tributary to Detroit in 1782. gave the
total number as 11.402 — Haldiniand Papers,

MASSACRE OF AND BY DELAWARE ABORIGINES. 147

after warning the mission Delawares to do likewise or they would
surely all be killed. Onh- two, youths, of the mission Delawares at
Gnadenhuetten and Salem escaped to find their way to Sandusky and
tell the fate of the others.* These Delawares were suspected of aiding,
if not participating in, the marauding incursions with the warriors of
their tribe and others — see ante page 134. They had been several times
warned of the danger of their position, aud even invited by Colonel
Brodhead in 1781 to remove to Fort Pitt, without effect. The mission
Delawares at Schoenbrunn, a few miles distant, escaped Colonel Wil-
liamson's soldiers and went to Sandusky, to the Maumee, and later
suffered several other removals. Their huts, with the others, were
destroyed.

This slaughter has an ugly look on the page of histor\\ It has
been a favorite subject of comment adverse to the Americans by many
persons, particularlv those who seek every opportunity to condemn all
disciplinary dealings with the savages ; and of those who overlook the
desperation to which the Americans were driven by them. It was the
action of men, or at that time was looked upon with favor by men who
saw at that moment no other course to pursue for the protection of
their own lives and the lives of their families. The Delawares had for
many years the reputation, even among their fellow Aborigines of
other tribes, of being particularly deceitful, treacherous and blood-
thirsty, and this onslaught was the reaping of but a jiart of the whirl-
wind which many of the tribe had sown in past years.

An unfortunate American expedition against Sandusky occurred
early in June, 17h2, with defeat and great loss of life, including that of
its commander. Colonel William Crawford, who was taken prisoner
and tortured to death with fire and woundings by the Delawares in the
most horrilile manner. t Emboldened by this success against Ameri-
cans, savage war-parties again increased in number and daring.
Captains M'Kee and Caldwell reported to the commandant at Detroit
the latter part of August, that they had ... " the greatest body of
Aborigines collected on an advantageous piece of ground near the
Picawee village that has been assembled in this quarter since the com-
mencement of the war . . . eleven hundred on the ground and
three hundred more within a days march. " . . This great gathering
was to oppose the (reported) coming of General Clark. Scouts soon

-'- Histon/ of the Mission of the United Brethren Among the Aborigines in North America, by
Henry Loskiel, London, 1794. Part iii, pages 180, 181. For many details of this massacre see, also.
Roosevelt's The Winning of the West: Heckewelder's Narrative of the Mission of the United Brethren ,
Zeisber«er's Diary: The Pennsylvania Packet: U. S. Department MSS. No. 41, volume iii; Hale's
Trans-Allegheny Pioneers, and the Haldimand Papers.

t For a full account of Crawford's unfortunate campaign see Expedition Against Sandusky, by
Consul W. Butterfield, Cincinnati, 1873.

148 THE MAUMEE RIVER BASIN.

reported that Clark was y;ivin^- attention in another direction and the
savages divided, mostly into small bands.

Somewhat over three hundred of these savages led by Captains
William Caldwell, M'Kee and perhaps Elliott, and one or more of the
Girtys and other renegades, passed southward across the Ohio River,
avoiding the gunboat and riflemen patrols that had been guarding the
border, and attacked Bryan's Station in Kentucky the 16th August.
They were repulsed with a loss of five killed and several wounded, while
the loss by the garrison was four killed and three wounded. They
retreated, and were followed by the rallying Kentuckians who were un-
wiseh' led against their superior number the 19th at the Blue -Licks,
and defeated with a loss of seventy killed, twelve wounded, and seven
captured. As was often the case, the enemy suffered loss of a much
less number — only one Frenchman and six Aborigines being here killed
and ten Aborigines wounded.* The loss of Americans amounted to
nearly one-half the number present, and nearly one-tenth of the avail-
able force in central Kentucky. It was the last severe raid, however,
suffered by this region, for General George Rogers Clark was soon afield
again, from his station at the Falls of the Ohio, and led the hastily
gathered one thousand and fifty mounted riflemen into Ohio. They
passed rapidly to the headquarters of the savages, principally Shawnees,
by the headwaters of the Miami Rivers where, the 10th November,
they overtook and killed ten of the fleeing enemy, took seven prisoners,
and released two Americans. All the cabins and huts were burned,
also a great quantity of corn and provisions which destruction reacted
directly against the British inasmuch as they, from motives of economy
to themselves, encouraged the planting of corn by Aborigine women,
and every bushel destroyed meant so much the more to be supplied by
them for the feeding of their savage allies. The dislodged savages
found refuge by the Auglaise and Maumee Rivers. They were followed
as far as the British trading post at the beginning of the portage to the
Auglaise River bv Colonel Benjamin Logan of Clark's command with
one hundred and fiftv men who destroyed the trading post there.

May 23, 17H2, the British Cabinet agreed to pro]iose independence
to the United States. Armistice was declared to the armies as soon as
practicable thereafter, but months were necessary to control the savage
allies of Great Britain to acquiescence in the terms of peace. A pro-
jected expedition into northwestern Ohio by Colonel Williamson from
Fort M'Intosh was stopped by this armistice. November 30th the
preliminary treaty was signed at Paris, closing the Revolutionary War.

"^ For details of this severe battle, see account in Roosevelt's Winning of the West, here based on
Levi Todd's (Colonel John Todd was anionc the killed) Boon's and Locan's letters given in the Virginia
State Papers vol. iii, paces 376, 2y0, 3ilO and 333, which show some other writers inaccurate.

TREATY BOUNDARY. LULL IN SAVAGERY. 149

Continued British Aggressions. The Aborigines.

The Treaty of Paris was concluded at Versailles 3rd September,
1783, about ten months after the preliminary agreement closing the
Revolutionary War. This Treaty distinctly set forth that the territory
southward of the middle of the Great Lakes and their connecting waters,
and eastward of the middle of the upper Mississippi River, should be-
long to the United States, and that Great Britain should withdraw her
troops from Detroit and other parts of this territory.

As with the British on their succeeding the French in 17B0, the
Aborigines were willing to go with the nation which extended to them
the most presents, and which most freely indulged their sensualities.
In May, 17H3, Benjamin Lincoln the American Secretary of War sent
Ephraim Douglas to the Aborigines of Ohio, and the west, to win and
encourage their friendliness to the United States. He arrived at San-
duskv the 7th June and passed some days with the Deiawares there, and
the Wvandots, Ottawas and Miamis along the lower Maumee. The
4th July he arrived at Detroit and Colonel De Peyster there called a
council at which the following named tribes were represented, viz;
Chippewa, Delaware, Kickapoo, Miami, Ottawa, ' Oweochtanos' Pianke-
shaw, Pottawotami, Seneca, Shawnee, and Wyandot: and, reported Mr.
Douglas, . . ' Most of them gave evident marks of their satisfac-
tion at seeing a subject of the United States in the country. They car-
ried their civilities so far that my lodging was all day surrounded with
crowds of them when at home, and the streets lined with them to attend
my going abroad, that they might have an opportunity of seeing and
saluting me, which they did not fail to do in their best manner with
every demonstration of joy." . . Mr. Douglas returned to Niagara
the 11th July, and his further reports lead to the inference that he did
not comprehend the full cause of the adherence of the savages to the
British during the war, nor the mercenary cause of their dogging his
steps during his visit : and that he had no foreboding of the manv
bloody years that were to follow. The British allowances had largely
ceased at the close of the war. The savages were therefrom now short
of rum and provisions: and they hoped to find in the new regime fresh
and more liberal supplies.*

*The cause of the popularity and continued successes of the British with the savages durint; the
Revolutionary War is plain. They outbid the Americans in their lavish giviny of intoxicants and articles
that delit^hted the savage palates and eyes, and in the general aid extended them for the free indulgence
of their bloodthirsty natures. The British expenditures for this purpose during the Revolutionary War
grew apace, and in the view of the central office the amounts became 'enormous' and 'amazing,' aggre-
gating millions of dollars. From 35th December, 1777, to 31 st August, 1778, there were received at De-
troit 371, 4«1 barrels flour ; 42,176 lbs. fresh beef; 16,473 lbs. salt beef; 203.932 lbs. salt pork; ig.T.W lbs.
butter ; and great quantities of mutton, corn, peas, oatmeal, rice, and rum. In the summer of 177H fifty-
eight-and-a-half tons of gunpowder was sent to Detroit from Niagara of which the savages received the
largest share, as there were in Detroit 30th August, 1778, but four hundred and eighty-two militia with

150 THE MAUMEE RIVER BASIN.

The British Government was fully apprised of the difficulties and
the improper aggressiveness of their conduct toward the American Abori-
gines before and after the close of the war. Colonel DePeyster early
saw the danger of the course prescribed for him and wrote to Governor
Haldimand that

I have a very difficult card to play at this post [Detroit] which differs widely from
the situation of affairs at Michilimackinac. Niagara, and others in the upper district of
Canada. It is evident that the back settlers [southward from Detroit] will continue to
make war upon the Shawanese. Delawares and Wyandots, even after a truce shall be
agreed to betwixt Great Britain and her revolted Colonies. In which case, while we con-
tinue to support the Aborigines with troops (which they are calling aloud for) or only
with arms, ammunition, and necessaries we shall incur the odium of encouraging incur-
sions into the back settlements — for it is evident that when the Aborigines are on foot,
occasioned by the constant alarms they receive (rem the enemies entering their country,
they will occasionally enter the settlements and bring off prisoners and scalps — so that
while in alliance with a people we are bound to support, a defensive war will, in spite of
human prudence, almost always terminate in an offensive one.

Immediately after the Treaty of Paris the British began to ex-
perience the embarrassment of their desired relation to the Aborigines —

little use for ammunition in and near the fort. David Zeisberger, the Moravian Missionary, compelled
by the British to remove to Detroit, wrote in his Diary, volume i, pate 32, under date 31st October, 1781,
that ..." We met to day Ljust east of the mouth of the Maumee River] as indeed every day as far
as Detroit, a multitude of Aborigines of various Nations, who were all bringing from Detroit horse-loads
of wares and k'ifts, and in such number that one would think they must have emptied all Detroit." .

The following list shows the character and ijuanlity of some of the articles estimated by the British
as wanting for the Aborigines at Detroit for the year ending 30th August, 17H3, before the treaty of peace,
viz : 330 pieces Blue strouds ; 20 pieces Red strouds ; 10 pieces Crimson slrouds ; 10 pieces Scarlet strouds ;
. 20 pieces Scarlet cloth 8s, 6d Sterling: 4,000 Pr. 2^ Pt. Blankets; 300 3 Pt. Blankets ; 500 Pr. 2 Ft. Blankets;
500 Pr. 1^2 Pt. Blankets; 1000 fine 2}2 Pt. Blankets; 1000 pieces 4^ linen, sorted; ia> pieces striped cali-
niancs; 100 pieces striped cotton; 2,000 lbs. Vermillion in 1 lb. bags; .50 pieces coarse nmslin; 20 pieces
Russia Sheeting; 100 Doz. Blk silk handkerchiefs; 20 Doz. Colored silk handkerchiefs; 30 Doz. Cotton
handkerchiefs; 250 pieces ribbon assorted ; 200 Gross Bed lace; 200 Gross gartering ; 30 pieces embossed
serge; 500 felt Hats ^2 laced; KXt Castor Hats '2 laced; 50 Beaver Hats ^2 laced; 500 Pieces White Melton;
20 Pieces Coating, blue and brown; 20 Pieces Brown Melton; 30 Pieces Ratteen, Blue and Brown; 1(X)
Common Saddles; 4a) Bridles; .500 Powder Horns; 20 Doz. Tobacco Boxes; 30 Doz. Snuff Boxes; .SO
Gross Pipes; 300 large feathers, red, blue, green; 300 Black ostrich feathers; 200 Pairs shoes; 251-t Pairs
Buckles; 100 Pieces Hambro lines; 10 Doz. Mackerel lines ; '0 Doz. Spurs; ,50 Gro. Morris BeJls; .50 Gro.
Brass Thimbles ; 6 Pieces Red serge ; 10 Pieces White serge ; 6 Pieces Blue serge ; 10 Gross Jews harps ;
500 Fusils [Flintlock Muskets]; 2tX) Rifled Guns small bore; 50 Pair Pistols; 5 Doz. Couteaux de Chasse
I hunting knives]; .50.000 Gun Flints; 60 Gro Scalping Knives; [The books of one jobber in Detroit also
show ' sixteen gross red handled scalping knives at ltX)s per gross,' and, again, 'twenty four dozen red
handled scalping knives,' sold to one retailer within a period of seven weeks in the summer of I7S;i]; 10
Gross Clasp Knives; 20 Gross Scissors; 20 Gross Looking Glasses; 10 Doz. Razors; 300 lbs. Thread as-
sorted ; 20 pieces spotted swan skin ; 13. IKK) lbs. Gunpowder; 36,000 lbs Ball and shot; 1 Gro Gun locks;
500 Tomahawks; .500 Half axes; 300 Hoes; 30 Gross tire steel; 10,000 Needles ; 400 Pieces calico; SO pounds
Rose Pink; 1.500 lbs Tobacco; 600 lbs. Beads assorted; 40 Gross Awl Blades; 40 Gross Gun Worms; 30
Gross Box combs; 6 Gross Ivory combs; 20 Nests Brass Kettles; 20 Nests Copper Kettles; 20 Nests Tin
Kettles; CO Nests Hair Trunks; 3(X) lbs. Pewter Basins; 100 Beaver Traps; 20 Gross Brass finger rings;
5,000 lbs. iron; I0(X) lbs steel; WO lbs Soap; 6 barrels White Wine; 5 Barrels Shrub; 400,000 Black Wam-
pum; lOO.OtK) White Wampum.

Silver Works :

la.tKX) large Brooches; 7000 Small Brooches; 300 Large Gorgets; 300 Large Moons; 550 Ear Wheels; 550
Arm Bands; 1.500 Prs. large Ear bobs; 1500 Prs. Small Ear bobs; Some medals chietly large; A large as-
sortment Smith and Armorers hies. — i Signed J A. S. DePeyster, Major King's Regt, Detroit and its De-
pendencies.

RENEWED BRITISH AGGRESSION. MILITARY POSTS. 151

of the difficulties in retaining their influence with them while lessening
expenditures on their behalf. Colonel DePeyster reported from Detroit
to Governor Haldimand's secretary ll^th June, 1783, before the arrival
of Ambassador Douglas, that . . . "We are all in expectation of
news. Everything- that is bad is spread through the Aborigines' coun-
try but, as I have nothing more than the King's proclamation from
authority, I evade answering impertinent questions. Heavens! if goods
do not arrive soon, what will become of me? I have lost several stone
weight* of flesh within these twent\- days. I hope Sir John [Sir John
Johnson British Superintendent of Aborigine Affairs] is to make us a
visit."

To prevent comjilications and consequent quarrels, Congress in
1783 forbade the purchase of land from the Aborigines by individuals
or companies. Agent Ephraim Douglas reported February 2, 1784,
that early in the fall of 1783 Sir John Johnson assembled the different
western tribes of Aborigines at Sandusky (American territory) and,
having prepared them with lavish distribution of presents, addressed
them in a speech to this purport, Simon Girty being the interjireter,
viz: . . . "That the King his and their common father had made
peace with the Americans, and had given them the land possessed by
the British on this continent ; but that the report of his having given
them any part of the Aborigines' lands was false, and fabricated by the
Americans for the purpose of provoking the Aborigines against their
father ; that they should, therefore, shut their ears against it. So far
the contrary was proved that the great river Ohio was to be the line
between the Aborigines in this quarter and the Americans, over which
the latter ought not to pass and return in safety. "

The impartial and unreserved historian must attribute a large pro-
portion of the trouble the United States has had with the savages, inclu-
ding their many savage butcheries, to the perfid>- and arrogant meddle-
someness of the British from the first. They were repeatedly im-
portuned to withdraw from this territory according to the terms of the
Treatv at Paris, and to let the savages in American territory alone.
President Washington sent Baron de Steuben of the United States Army
to Governor Haldimand l'2th Jul\', 1783, to ask that orders be issued
for the withdrawal of British troops from Detroit and other posts in
American territory whence they persisted in dominating the savages
throughout Ohio and the southwest. t The recjuest was refused, and
statements made that the treaty was provisional, and that no orders had
been received to surrender the posts. Governor George Clinton of New

*An English stone weiirht in the sense here used is fourteen pounds avoirdupois.

t See letter on the the subject of an Established Militia and Military Arrangements, addressed to
the Inhabitants of the United States by Baron de Steuben New York. 1784, in which is a suggested
treatment of the British at this time.

152 THE MAUMEE RIVER BASIN.

York was refused the surrender of Fort Niagara May 10, 1784. Another
unsuccessful demand for their surrender was made July 12, 1784, through
(the then) Lieutenant Colonel William Hull.* The British continued
to hold the posts of Detroit, Michillimackinac, Niagara and Oswego
until the year 1796; and in 1794 they built Fort Miami by the lower
Maumee ; whence they were a menace to the peace, and lives, of Ameri-
can settlers in this Northwest Territory, as shown on subsequent pages.

CHAPTER VI.

The Aborigines — Organizations — Hostilities — Defeats.
1784 TO 1791.

The Aborigines continued unsettled and threatening, and the
United States Government continued a pacific policy. The Legislature
of New York for some time after the close of the Revolutionary War
favored the expulsion from American territory of the Six Nations
(Iroquois of New York) on account of their instability and treachery;
but it was finally decided by Congress to bear with them, to keep them
as fully as possible from British influence and try to civilize them
through treaty and confining them to narrower limits, by gradually and
nominally purchasing their claims to territory unnecessary to them.
Accordingly the 2"2nd October, 1784, a treaty was effected at Fort
Stanwix, on the site of the present Rome, New York, when the Six
Nations relinquished all claim to the western country. These claims
were based on their, and the British, idea of right of conquest from the
western tribes, but they did not want to accord the Americans any such
right.

Virginia ceded to the United States all her right, title and claim to
the country northwest of the Ohio River March 1, 1784. t Congress
was prepared for this act and the committee, of which Thomas Jeffer-
son was Chairman, reported the same day a plan for its teniporar\-
government. The names proposed for the divisions of this Territory
(see engraving) not meeting with approval, they were erased from the
plan tlie 23rd April ; and later this suggested plan for division was
rejected.

'■'•'■ American State Papers, Foreign Relations volume i, page 181 e( sequentia.

t For account of the claims of the States to the Northwest Territory, see Hinsdale's The Old
Northwest: Donaldson's Pu6//c Doma/n .- Hildreth's H/s(ory 0/ Washington County: Smith's The St.
Clair Papers: Cutler's Life, Journal and Correspondence of Manasseh Cutler, etc. These claims
were not altogether valid. The Territory belonged to the United States from conquest.

EFFORTS FOR TREATY WITH ABORIGINES. LANDS. 155

PtAN roR
DIVISION orncWEST

BEFORE CONORCSS
MARCH lH/754

Continuing its humane policy towards the Aborigines, the United
States, bv commissioners George Rogers Clark, Richard Butler and
Arthur Lee, met the chiefs of the Chippewa, Delaware, Ottawa and
Wyandot tribes at Fort M'Intosh on the right bank of the Ohio River
at the mouth of Beaver Creek about twenty-nine miles below Pitts-
burg and 'ilst January, 1785, effected a treaty in which the limits of
their territory were agreed upon as the Mauniee and Cuyahoga Rivers,
and from Lake Erie to a line running westward from Fort Laurens bv
the Tuscarawas to the portage on the headwaters of the Miami River.
Reservations were made by the United States of tracts six miles square
at this portage, at the mouth of the Maumee, and two miles square at

Lower Sandusky. Three chiefs
were to remain hostages until all
American prisoners were surren-
dered b\- them.

Overtures for treaty and peace
were also made to the Miami, Pot-
tawotami, Piankeshaw, and other
western tribes but, through the
influence of the British and French
with whom they associated and who
were in opposition to the American
system of government, land surveys,
and definite land titles, the desired
treat\- could not be effected. But a
large council of these tribes was
held at Ouiotenon the next August
where savage raids on American
frontier settlements were incited.

The 19th April, 1785, the Legis-
lature of Massachusetts released to
the General Government her claims
in the Northwestern Territory, ex-
cei)ting Detroit and vicinit\- which
were released 30th May, IHOO.

The desire for western lands for settlement by immigrants from
the East being so great following the Treaty at Fort M'Intosh, with
the desire for action to adjust titles, that Congress, 20th May, 17''^5,
passed An Ordinance for Ascertaining the Mode of Disposing of
Lands in the Western Territory ' which provided for the survey and
marking of lines, townships, water power sites, etc. On account of
several disorderly persons having crossed the River Ohio and settled
upon unappropriated lands' Congress passed an Act June 15th pro-

^ ''»i-i'P5»«U5'^''^'-'5'^**Si\yin

1S4 THE MAUMEE RIVER BASIN.

hibiting such intrusions, and commanding the intruders to depart with
their families and effects without loss of time, as they shall answer the
same at their peril.' This action was taken to protect the lives of the
would-be settlers as two members of the four families who settled near
the mouth of the Scioto River were killed b}' savages in April: also
to allay the antipathy of the savages while preparing the country for
formal settlement. It was during this summer that the extensive pur-
chases of land by the Ohio Company of Associates, and by John Cleves
Symmes, were negotiated.

Great Britain, with her usual selfish arrogance, continued to hold
all the Great Lake forts. John Adams, United States Minister to
Great Britain, reported to Congress 30th November, 1785, that he had
demanded that the British withdraw their forts and posts from Ameri-
can territory, and that they objected with the statement that some of
the States had violated the Treaty of Paris in regard to the payment of
their debts to Great Britain.*

A few regular troops occasionally passed along the Ohio River
from Fort Pitt to and from Vincennes and Kaskaskia, escorting officers,
carrving dispatches and convoying supplies. The 22nd October, 1785,
Fort Finney was built by Major Finney's command on the bank of the
big Miami River about one mile above its mouth ; and here the 31st
January, 1786, commissioners effected a treaty with the Shawnees,
with Wyandots and Delawares as witnesses, wherein land was allotted
to them southwest of that allotted at the Treaty of Fort M'lntosh, and
extending to the Wabash River, with like conditions. Hostages were
retained for the return of American captives, as at the other treaties ;
but thev escaped, and very few captives were returned. The Miami
and western Aborigines were urged to participate in these treaties, but
thev again declined, being yet under British influence. t There con-
tinued a great removal of settlers from the East to the Ohio Valley; and
depredations on them by these savages became so frequent and
exasperating that a thousand Kentuckians under General Clark marched
to Vincennes against the Wabash tribes in the fall of 1786 ; but poor
supplies and disaffection among the volunteers caused a return of the
army without punishing the enemy. An expedition of nearly eight
hundred mounted riflemen under Colonel Benjamin Logan was also
fitted out against the hostile Shawnees. This expedition detourred the

"^The British armies impressed into their service and took away some of the negro slaves of
Americans; and these States desired to offset the value of these slaves against the levies of the British.
See Benjamin Franklin's articles on ' Sending Felons to America.' and his ' Retort Courteous ' for some
just sarcasm regarding the urgent haste of the British to be paid by the people whose property they
had destroyed. Compare The Laws of Virginia regarding these claims. Also the several Letters of
Henry Knox Secretary of War, No. 1.50, volume i.

t See the United States State Department MSS. No, .%. pages 345, 395; and No. 150.
Also the Haldimand Papers during 1784 to 1786.

LAND CESSION. DISAFFECTION IN OHIO BASIN. 155

headwaters of Mad River, in the present Clark and Champaign coun-
ties, Ohio, burned eight large towns, destroyed many fields of corn,
killed about ten warriors including the head chief, and captured thirty-
two prisoners.*^

The 14th September, 17^6, Connecticut released her claims to lands
in the Northwestern Territory in favor of the United States excepting
her ' Western Reserve ' from the forty-first degree of latitude to that of
forty-two degrees and two minutes, and from the western line of Penn-
sylvania to a north and south line one hundred and twenty miles to the
west ; and that State opened an office for the disposal of that part of the
Reserve east of the Cuyahoga River, the eastern boundary of the ter-
ritory allotted the Aborigines. This cession cleared this Basin of claims
bv individual States.

With the increasing po])ulation west of the Allegheny Mountains
the free navigation of the Mississippi became a paramount question,
and some misconceptions regarding Secretary John Jay's efforts toward
a treaty with Spain caused some commotion in the Ohio Valley to the
increase there of even the spirit of independence from the East.t Gen-
eral George Rogers Clark, whose commission had been withdrawn '2nd
July, 1783, on account of his services not being necessary and to
curtail expenses, acting with others at Vincennes decided to garrison the
abandoned Post Vincennes. A compan\' of men was enlisted early in
October, 1786, and the goods of Spanish merchants at Vincennes and
along the Ohio were seized with a 'determination that they should not
trade up the river if they would not let the Americans trade down the
Mississippi.' The Council of Virginia decided positively against these
measures 28th February, 1787, and, by resolution of Congress 24th Ajiril,
the United States troops on the Ohio were directed to take immediate
and efficient measures 'for dispossessing a body of men who had, in a
lawless and unauthorized manner, taken possession of Post Vincennes
in defiance of the proclamation and authority of the United States'; and
the recently brevetted Brigadier General Josiah Harmar with a small
force of United States soldiers took possession of the post, allowing
Clark and his followers to return to their homes. Thus was narrowly
averted a war between the United States and Spain and France combined.
The Americans engaged in these overt acts wrote to their friends that
Great Britain stands ready with open arms to receive and sup])ort us.
They have already offered to open their resources for our sup]5lies.' +

* M'Donald's Western Sketches: Dillon's History of Indiana. For full description of the temper
of the savaaes and of the settlers, and of ettorts of the treneral Koverninent for peace, see U. S. State
Department MSS. Nos. 30. .56, 60 and l.iO. Also Draper MSS. Wisconsin Historical Society Library.

t See Reports of Se'cretary John Jay ; State Department MSS. No. .HI, volume ii; Thomas M. Green's
The Spanish Conspiracy, page .'^1. etc.

+ See Draper MSS. Wisconsin State Historical Society Library ; and State Dept. MSS. Washintton.

156

THE MAUMEE RIVER BASIN.

The animus of Great Britain at this time is further shown by a let-
ter of 22nd March, 1787, from Sir John Johnson to Joseph Brant, the
most prominent Aborigine Chief in the Six Nations, regarding the miH-
tary posts still held by the British in American territory as follows : ' It
is for your sake, chiefly, that we hold them. If you become indifferent
about them they may, perhaps, be given up . . whereas, by sup-
porting them you encourage us to hold them, and encourage the new
settlements . . every day increased by numbers coming in who find
they cannot live in the States." . . Arthur St. Clair, Representative
from Pennsylvania, also reported 13th April, 1787, to Congress the con-
tinued infraction of the Treaty regarding these posts by Great Britain. *
The manv different schemes calculated to embarrass the struggling
young Republic, to deprive it of its rights, and even to disrupt it alto-
gether, were apparently aided if not initiated by the British. The noted
Virginia loyalist Doctor John Connolly, before mentioned, a full British
subject and resident in Canada, again became active, traversing the
Maumee in his journeyings in 1787-88-89 between Detroit and Kentucky
with efforts to alienate the Kentuckians from the East and to ally them
with the British for the purpose of capturing the Spanish territory on
the Mississippi and controlling the Mississippi Basin. General James
Wilkinson charged that Connolly was an emissary direct from Lord
Dorchester then Governor of Canada — and Wilkinson himself was not

free from suspicion of being en-
gaged in similar schemes, even
for the secession of Kentucky'
from the United States. The
probability of the correctness of
Wilkinson's charge, however,
was strengthened by the fact
that in June of this year the
British garrison at Detroit was
largelv reinforced by soldiers
from lower Canada, and the
next year the fortifications were
rebuilt and strengthened by
order of Lord Dorchester who
was then there. These warlike
preparations continued for some length of time, and similar prepara-
tions were occasionally made for several years. t Benedict Arnold

* Journals of Congres s. volume iv, payes 73.5, 739.

t See James Wilkinson's Memo/rs vol. ii; Charles E. A. Gayarri5's History of Louisiana, vol. Hi;
State Dept. MSS.; Virginia State Papers, vol. iv. Draper MSS.; Gardoqui MSS., etc. For accounts of
the treachery and savagery of the Aborikiines of these years see U. S. State Department MSS. vol. iii.
No. 1511; and Draper MSS.

CIVIL AND MILITARY ACTIVITIES. THE SAVAGES. 157

was reported as being in Detroit about the 1st June, 1790, inspecting
the troops; and the 25th August President Washington took official
notice of these British preparations which were evidently- for a Miss-
issippi campaign.

The Congressional Committee on the Territory Northwest of the
Ohio River reported, 7th July, 17H6, a plan for its division on the
lines existing to day, exce]iting that a line running due east and west
from the southernmost shore of Lake Michigan was drawn as the north
line of Ohio, Indiana, and Illinois, and the Straits of Mackinaw were
the northern line of Michigan. The map then used showed the south
end of Lake Michigan too far north, as will be described on later page.

The full Ordinance for the government of this Territory was made
a law the 13th July, 17H7. This 'Ordinance of 1787' marks an era in
legislative history, and it has received large attention by many writers.
The principal officers of the Northwestern Territory under this Ordin-
ance were appointed on the 5th October, 1787, to enter u]ion their
duties 1st February, 1788, as follows : Governor, Major General
Arthur St. Clair; Judges, Samuel H. Parsons, James M. Varnum, and
John Armstrong; Secretary, Winthrop Sargent. John Cleves Symmes
was subsequently appointed to the place declined by John Armstrong.
It has been estimated that within a year after the organization of this
Territory twenty thousand men, women and children from the eastern
States passed down the Ohio River to settle in this Territory or in
Kentucky.

The renewal of military prejiarations by the British had an exciting
effect upon the Aborigines who had long been impatient of their en-
forced quiet. The increasing settlements in southern Ohio, and south
of that river, on lands relinquished by the Aborigines in treaty, and the
completion of the organization of the Territory Northwest of the Ohio
River, were eagerly accepted as incentives for repeating their murderous
raids upon the settlements.

To allay the restlessness known to exist among the Aborigines
Congress, the 21st July, 1787, directed the Superintendent of Aborigine
Affairs for the Northern Department, or if he was unable to attend to
it then General Josiah Harmar, to proceed to the most convenient
place and make treat}' with the Aborigines of the Wabash River
country and the Shawnees of the Southern part of this Basin and of
the Scioto, and to grant them all assurances consistent with the honor
and dignity of the United States. These and repeated like efforts for
peace were unavailing. Thereupon the first instructions bv Congress
to Gove-nor St. Clair in 1788 were ; 1. Examine carefully into the
real temper of the Aborigines. 2. Remove if possible all causes of
controversy, so that peace and harmony may be established between

158 THE MAUMEE RIVER BASIN.

the United States and the Aborigine tribes. 3. Regulate trade among
the Aborigines. 4. Neglect no opportunity that otters for extinguish-
ing the Aborigine claims to lands westward as far as the Mississippi
River, and northward as far as the completion of the forty-first degree
of north latitude. 5. Use every possible endeavor to ascertain the
names of the real head men and warriors of the several tribes, and to
attach these men to the United States by every possible means. 6.
Make every exertion to defeat all confederations and combinations
among the tribes ; and conciliate the white people inhabiting the
frontiers, toward the Aborigines.

The County of Washington in the Northwest Territory was organ-
ized in 17HH within the present limits of Ohio: and Governor St. Clair
and the J.udges adopted and published laws, both civil and criminal,
for the government and protection of the Territory. These laws, how-
ever, were not operative in the Maumee River Basin for many years on
account of the Aborigine and British dominance.

» Governor St. Clair succeeded in effecting another treaty 9th Jan-
uary, 17h9, this time at Fort Harmar at the mouth of the Muskingum
River, with the Six Nations, also with the Chippewas, Delawares,
Ottawas, Pottawotamis, Sacs, and Wyandots ; all confirming the
boundary of the Aborigine claims to be limited between the Cuyahoga
and Maumee Rivers, and Lake Erie and a line extending from Fort
Laurens to Loramie, with the reservations to the United States and
other agreements embraced in the treaties of Forts M'Intosh and
Finney. These Aborigines at this treaty received from the United
States an additional sum of six thousand dollars. But a few weeks,
however, sufficed to again demonstrate their insincerity, and treachery
— their maraudings being resumed with the opening o£ spring.*

General Henrv Knox Secretary of War reported to President
Washington 13th June, 1789, that murders by savages were still being
committed on both sides of the Ohio River and that the inhabitants
were exceedingly alarmed through the extent of six or seven hundred
miles, that the settlers had been in constant warfare with the savages
for many years ; that

The injuries and murders have been so reciprocal that it would be a point of
critical investigation to know on which side they have been the greatest. Some of the
inhabitants of Kentucky during the past year, roused by recent injuries, made an
incursion into the Wabash country and, possessing an equal aversion to all bearing the
name Aborigines, they destroyed a number of peaceable Piankeshaws who prided them-
selves in their attachment to the United States. . . By the best and latest informa-
tion it appears that on the Wabash and its communications there are from fifteen hun-
dred to two thousand warriors. An expedition with a view of extirpating them, or

' See state- DepaitinenI MSS. Nos, 56. 71, 151; Draper MSS.: and Virginia State Papers, vol. iv,
page 149.

AMERICAN EFFORTS TO AVERT WAR WITH SAVAGES. 159

destroying their towns, could not be undertaken with a probability of success with less
than an army of two thousand five hundred men. The regular troops of the United
States on the frontiers are less than six hundred, of which number not more than four
hundred could be collected from the posts.

The posts referred to were Forts Pitt, Harmar, Steulx-n at the
Falls of the Ohio, and Vincennes. The Kentuckians again decided to
avenge some wrongs they had recently suffered and, 26th August, 1789,
Colonel John Hardin led two hundred volunteer cavalrymen across
the Ohio River at the Falls to the Wabash. They killed six Aborigi-
nes, burned one deserted town, and destroyed the corn found, return-
ing the 28th September without the loss of a man.

President Washington addressed Governor St. Clair the 6th
October desiring full information regarding the Wabash and Illinois
Aborigines and requesting that war with them be averted if possible ;
but authorizing him to call not to exceed one thousand militiamen
from Virginia and five hundred from Pennsylvania, if necessary, to
cooperate with the Federal troops. The Governor was also directed
to proceed to execute the orders of the late Congress regarding French
and other land titles at Vincennes and the Illinois country and other
matters of organization. A little later in the autumn of 1789 Major
Doughty's troops built Fort Washington, within the site of the present
City of Cincinnati, which fort served a useful purpose for several
years. Governor St. Clair and the judges started from Marietta about
the 1st Januarv, 1790, by boat and stopped at Fort Washington where
they organized the county of Hamilton, and changed the name of the
settlement about Fort Washington from that of Losantiville to Cin-
cinnati. Proceeding down the river, they arrived at Clarksville Hth
January, and thence to the Illinois country where they organized St.
Clair County to embrace all the Territory west of Hamilton County.

In consonance with President Washington's instructions, a promi-
nent French merchant of Vincennes, .Vntoine Gamelin, who well under-
stood the temper of the savages and by whom he was favorably known,
was commissioned by Major John F. Hamtramck to visit and conciliate
those Aborigines along the Wabash and Maumee Rivers. He started
on the 5th April, 1790, and his report evidenced a desire of the older
men of the weaker tribes for peace ; but the}' could not stop their young
men who 'were being constantly encouraged and invited to war by the
British' and they were dominated by the stronger tribes who, in turn
were dominated by the British from whom they received their sujiplies.
All reproached him for coming to thetn without presents of intoxicants
and other supplies. The 23rd April Mr. Gamelin arrived at the Miami
town, at the head of the Maumee River, where the Miamis, Delawares,
Pottawotamis and Shawnees united in telling him they could not give
reply until they consulted the British commandant of the fort at

160 THE MAUMEE RIVER BASIN.

Detroit ; and they desired, and obtained, a copv of the message of the
United States to them for the purpose of showing it to him. The British
traders at this village were ]iresent at the meetings. The Aborigines
promised to send to Major Hamtramck at Vincennes, in writing, their
answer within thirty days, which was their way of getting rid of him.

Commissioner Gamelin, being unable to accomplish more with the
savages, started from the Miami village on his return the :2nd May ;
and on the 11th reports were received at Vincennes that three days
after his departure an American captive was roasted and eaten by the
cannibals at the head of the Maumee River : and that all the tribes had
sent out war-parties, in addition to those already operating along the
Ohio River, who ambuscaded many new immigrants.

With hope to check the more active savages, the latter half of
April Brigadier General Josiah Harmar, United States Agent to the
Aborigines, with one hundred regular troops, seconded by General
Charles Scott with two hundred and thirty Kentucky volunteers, made
a detour of the Scioto River. They destroyed the food supplies and
huts of the hostile savages but shot only four of them — reporting that
'wolves might as well have been pursued.'

Early in July, 1790, Judge Henry Inness of Danville, Kentucky,
wrote to the Secretary of War that

1 have been intimately acquainted with this district from 178.'i, and I can with truth
say that in this period the Aborigines have always been the aggressors — that any incur-
sions made into their country have been produced by reiterated injuries committed by
them — that the predatory mode of warfare they have carried on renders it difficult, and
indeed impossible, to discriminate, or to ascertain to what tribe the offenders belong.
Since my first visit to the district in November, 1783. I can venture to say that more
than fifteen hundred persons have been killed and taken prisoners by the Aborigines ;
and upwards of twenty thousand horses have been taken away, with other property con-
sisting of money, merchandise, household goods, wearing apparel, etc., of great value.
The government has been repeatedly informed of those injuries, and that they continued
to be perpetrated daily, notwithstanding which the people have received no satisfactory
information whether the government intended to afford them relief or not. . . I will,
sir, be candid on this subject, not only as an inhabitant of Kentucky but as a friend to
society who wishes to see order and regularity preserved in the Government under which
he lives. The people say they have groaned under their misfortunes — they see no pros-
pect of relief — they constitute the strength and the wealth of the western country, and
yet all measures heretofore attempted have been committed for execution to the hands of
strangers who have no interest in common with the West. They are the great sufferers
and yet have no voice in the matters which so vitally affect them. They are even accused
of being the aggressors, and have no representative to state or to justify their conduct.
These are the general sentiments of the western people who are beginning to want faith
in the Government, and appear determined to avenge themselves. For this purpose a
meeting was lately held in this place by a number of respectable characters, to determine
on the propriety of carrying on their expeditions this fall.

Earlv in June, 1790, when yet at Kaskaskia, Governor St. Clair re-
ceived from Major Hamtramck report of the failure of his and Game-

GATHERING OF ARMY FOR HARMAR'S CAMPAIGN. 161

lin's mission to the hostile savages, and of the hopelessness of being
able to make a treaty for peace. Committing the Resolutions of Con-
gress relative to lands and settlers along the Wabash River to Win-
throp Sargeant Secretary, who then proceeded to organize the County
of Knox, Governor St. Clair returned by way of the rivers to Fort
Washington where he arrived the 11th julv. Here General Harmar
reported to him many raids and murders by the savages, and "it was
agreed and determined that General Harmar should conduct an ex-
pedition against the Maumee towns, the residence of all the renegade
Aborigines, from whence issued all the parties who infest our frontiers.
The Governor remained with us but three days. One thousand militia
were ordered from Kentucky, and the Governor on his wa}' to New
York the seat of the general government, was to order five hundred
from the back counties of Pennsylvania. The liSth September was the
time appointed for the militia to assemble at Fort Washington." * . .
Active preparations were instituted by General Harmar for this
campaign the object of which was not alone the present chastisement
of the savages, but also for the building of one or more forts by the
Maumee, and the establishing of a connecting line of refuge posts for
supplies and from which sorties could be made to intercept the savages. t

fn a spirit of deference that appears not only undesirable but ser-
vile at this distance. Governor St. Clair sent on the 19th September
from Marietta 'by a private gentleman' a letter to Major Patrick Mur-
ray-, Commandant at Detroit, reading that "this is to give you the full-
est assurance of the pacific disposition entertained towards Great Britain
and all her possessions; and to inform you explicitly that the expedition
about to be undertaken, is not intended against the post \'0u have the
honor to command." . . The only redeeming feature of this letter
is this sentence: "After this candid explanation, sir, there is every
reason to expect, both from your own personal character, and from the
regard j'ou have for that of your nation, that those tribes will meet with
neither countenance nor assistance from any under your command, and
that you will do what in your power lies to restrain the trading people
from whose instigations, there is too good reasons to believe, much of
the injuries committed b}' the savages has proceeded."

The command under General Josiah Harmar Commander-in-Chief
of the Army of the United States marched northward from near Fort
Washington, 4th October, 1790. It was composed of fourteen hundred
and fifty-three soldiers, viz : three hundred and twenty regulars ( in-
cluding one artillery company with three light brass cannon, the largest

■' Ebenezer Denny's Military Journal page 343. Published by the Pennsylvania Historical Society.

t InterestinE details reearding this proposed forward movement may be found in the American
State Papers. Aborigine Affairs volume i, page 100 et sequentia.

!62 THE MAUMEE RIVER BASIN.

a six pounder) in two battalions ; eleven hundred and thirty-three mili-
tia from Kentucky in four battalions, three of infantry and one of moun-
ted riflemen ; and one battalion of infantry from Pennsylvania. Some
of the Iventuckv militia were 'raw and unused to the L;un or the woods;
indeed many were without guns [when they reported at Fort Washing-
ton] and many of those they have want repairing. Our artificers were
employed in putting to right the militia arms. General Harmar was
much disheartened at the kind of people from Kentucky. One-half cer-
tainly serve no other purpose than to swell the number. . . The
colonels disputed about the command. . . There was much trouble
in keeping the officers, with their commands in their proper order, and
the pack horses, etc., compact.' . . — Denny's Military Journal.

The following account of the experiences of General Harmar's
army on the march to and within the Maumee River Basin is taken
from the diary of Captain John Armstrong of the United States troops,
when not otherwise noted, viz: *

October!], 17!)0. The Army moved at half past nine o'clock ; marched a north-
west course seven miles to a branch where French traders formerly had a number of
trading houses — thence a north course four miles to a small branch and encamped at
five o'clock. The country we passed over is very rich and level. Eleven miles.

October 12th. The Army moved at half past nine o'clock ; our course a little west
of northwest — crossed a stream at seven miles and a half running to the northeast on
which there are several old camps, much deadened timber which continues to the River
Auglaize [River St. Mary] about a mile. Here has been a considerable village — some
houses still standing. This stream is a branch [tributary] of the Omi [Maumee] River,
and is about twenty yards wide. From this village to our encampment our course was
a little to the north of west. Rich level land. Fourteen miles. t

October IHth. The Army moved at ten o'clock ; just before they marched, a pris-
oner [a Shawnee] was brought in, and Mr. Morgan from Fort Washington joined us.
We marched to the W. of N. W. four miles to a small stream through low swampy land
— then a course a little to the N. of W. passing through several small prairies and open
woods to an Aborigine village on a pretty stream. Here we were joined by a detach-
ment from Fort Washington, with ammunition. Ten miles. J

October 14th. At half past ten in the morning Colonel Hardin was detached for
the Miami village [at head of Maumee River] || with one company of Regulars and
six hundred militia — and the Army took up its line of march at eleven o'clock: a N. W.
course; four miles a small branch — the country level — many places drowned lands in
the winter season. Ten miles.

* See Dillon's History of Indiana paije 267, and Draper MSS. in Wisconsin Historical Society's
Librar.v.

t . . Half pound powder and one pound lead served out to each rifleman, and twenty-four rounds
cartridges to the musketry. Commandinc officers of battalions to see that their men's arms are in fiood
order and loaded. . . Denny's Military Journal pace .147.

^ Marched through a thick brushy country. Encamped on great branch [tributary] of the Miami
or Omee [Maumee! River [the River St. Maryl near the ruins of La Source's old house, about one
hundred and tnirty-five miles from Fort Washington — Denny, page 347.

II In consequence of intelligence gained of the prisoner that the Aborigines were clearing out as
fast as possible, and that the towns would be evacuated before our arrival ... it was impossible
for the army to hastep much, . . Marched over beech and white oak land generally, and no running

APPROACH OF HARMAR'S ARMY TO THE MAUMEE. 163

October l."">th. The army moved at eight o'clock, N. W. course, two miles, a small
branch; then north a little west, crossing a stream, three miles, N. W. course —
the Army halted at half past one o'clock on a branch running west. Eight miles.*

October Kith. The .^rmy moved at forty-five minutes after eight o'clock ; marched
nine miles and halted fifteen minutes after one o'clock. Passed over a level country,
not very rich. Colonel Hardin with his command took possession of the Miami town
[head of Maumee River] yesterday at four o'clock — the Aborigines having left just
before. Nine miles (over beech and swamp oak land — Denny). Colonel Hardin found
that the Aborigines had left behind them some cows, and large quantities of corn and
vegetables ; and the militia, in parties of thirty or forty regardless of discipline, strolled
about in search of plunder.

October 17th. The Army moved at fifteen minutes after eight o'clock ; and at one
o'clock crossed the Maumee River to the village (.several tolerably good log houses, said
to have been occupied by British traders; a few pretty good gardens with some fruit
trees, and vast fields of corn in almost every direction — Denny ).t The river is about
seventy yards wide — a fine, transparent stream. The River St. Joseph, which forms
the point on which the [main] village stood, is about twenty yards wide [low stage of
water] and, when the waters are high, navigable a great way up it. Major M'MuUen
and others reported that the tracks of women and children had been discovered on an
Aborigine path leading from the village, a northwest course, towards the Kickapoo
towns [on Eel River]. General Harmar, supposing that the Aborigines, with their
families and baggage, had encamped at some point not far from the Miami village,
determined to make an effort to discover the place of their encampment, and to bring
them to battle. Accordingly on the morning of the 18th, he detached Colonel Trotter,
Major Hall, Major Ray, and Major M'Mullen, with a force amounting to three hundred
men, and composed of thirty regular troops [under command of Captain John Armstrong
the writer of this record] forty of Major Fontaine's light horse, and two hundred and
thirty active riflemen. The detachment was furnished with three days' provision, and
ordered to examine the country around the Miami village. After these troops under the
command of (?olonel Trotter had moved about one mile from the encampment, the light

water. Country very flat and appears as if at particular seasons it was altoyether under water. . ,
This ni^ht the horses were ordered to be tied up, that the army might start by daylieht. with a view of
keeping as near to Colonel Hardin as possible. The distance to the Aborigine towns [head of Maumee
River] this morning [14th October! when the detachment went ahead, supposed to be about thirty-tive
miles — Denny, 347.

''' Every exertion made to get forward the main body. Difficult march this day [October l.^thl over
beech roots and brush. Encamped on the [tributary] waters of the Omee [Maumeel about one hundred
and lift.v-three miles from Fort Washington. Horses were again tied, grass cut and brought to them that
the army might not be detained next morning, as had frequently been the case : for although repeated
orders were given to the horse-masters to hopple well their horses, and directions to ttie officers and
men not to suffer them to pass through the lines, many of them, owing to the scarcity of food, broke loose
and passed the chain of sentries and were lost. Patrols of horsemen are ordered out every morning at
daylight to scour the neighboring woods and bring in any horses that might have passed the lines:
and the pickets turned out small parties for the same purpose. The cattle, also, every pains taken to
secure them. At evening when the army halts the cattle guard, which is composed of an officer and
thirty men, build a yard always within the chain of sentries, sometimes in the square of the encamp-
ment and place themselves round the inclosure, which secures them.— t)enny, page ,348.

t There were seven or more Aborigine villages near .ih^, three rivers within a few miles, at the time
of General Harmar's visit, or later, approximaSp/>,. as. fo^ljyws : Two of the Miamis, the principal one
situate on the east bank of the St. Joseph Rivei,-a|.its mouth, and, the other of thirty cabins was on the
west bank a little above. The Delaw^afiCS h^di two towns of forty cabins about three miles above the
mouth of the River St. Mary. Th^-Pottai-votamis had, one town of thirty cabins on the east bank of the
St. Joseph about three miles above ifs mputh ; and the Shawnees had two towns three miles below the
head of the Maumee. one on the north bank called Chillicothe having fifty-eight cabins, and one on
the south bank with. sixteen cabins. See Map anfe page 9*/.

164 THE MAUMEE RIVER BASIN.

horsemen discovered, pursued, and killed an Aborigine on horseback. Before this party
returned to the columns, a second Aborigine was discovered, when the four field officers
left their commands and pursued the Aborigine — leaving the troops for the space of
about half an hour without any directions whatever. The flight of the second Aborigine
was intercepted by the light horsemen, who despatched him after he had wounded one
of their party. Colonel Trotter then changed the route of his detachment and marched
in various directions until night, when he returned to the camp at the Miami village.*
The return of Colonel Trotter to camp, on the evening of the 18th, was unexpected
by General Harmar, and did not receive his approbation. Colonel Hardin asked for the
command of the same detachment for the remaining two days [first allotted Trotter]
and his request was granted. On the morning of the liHh the detachment under com-
mand of Colonel Hardin marched a northwest course on the Aborigine patht which led
towards the Kickapoo towns ; and after passing a morass about five miles distant from the
Miami village, the troops came to a place where, on the preceding day, a party of Abo-
rigines had encamped. At this spot the detachment made a short halt, and the com-
manding officer stationed the companies at points several rods apart. After the lapse of
about half an hour the companies in front were ordered to move on ; and Captain Faulk-
ner's company was left on the ground, the Colonel having neglected to give him orders to
march. The troops moved forward about three miles, when they discoverd two Aborigi-
nes on foot, who threw off their packs and, the brush being thick, made their escape.
About this time Colonel Hardin despatched Major Fontaine with part of the cavalry in
search of Captain Faulkner, supposing him to be lost ; and soon afterwards Captain
Armstrong, who commanded the regulars, informed Colonel Hardin that a gun had been
fired in front which might be considered as an alarm gun, and that he had seen the
tracks of a horse that had come down the road and returned. The Colonel, however,
moved on without giving any orders or making any arrangements for an attack ; and
when Captain Armstrong discovered the fires of the Aborigines at a distance, and
informed Colonel Hardin of the circumstance that officer, saying that the Aborigines
would not fight, rode in front of the advanced columns until the detachment was fired on
from behind the fires. The militia, with the exception of nine who remained with the
regulars and were killed, immediately gave way and commenced an irregular retreat,
which they continued until they reached the main army.+ Hardin, who retreated with
them, made several ineffectual attempts to rally them. The small band of regulars,
obstinately brave, maintained their ground until twenty-two [of the thirty] were killed,
when Captain Armstrong, Ensign Hartshorne, and fi\-e or six privates, escaped from the
carnage, eluded the pursuit of the Aborigines, and arrived at the camp of General
Harmar. The number of Aborigines who were engaged on this occasion cannot be
ascertained.il They were led by a distinguished" Miami chief whose name was Mish-e-

* The 18th October General Harmar issued a general order prohibiting the straggling of soldiers
from the camp which had been extreme: also for an equal distribution of the ' plunder.'

t I saw that the men moved off with great reluctance, and am satisfied that when three miles from
camp he had not more than two-thirds of liis command: they dropped out of the ranks and returned to
camp. . . —Denny's Military Journal, paiie^iQ.

t Of the militia forty are missing, but it is well known that very few of these were forward in the
tight. The conjecture is that most of them ran back from the rear and have pushed for the Ohio River.

Last night Captains M'CInre and M'fjuircy of the militia took a notion to trap some of the Abori-
gines who were suspected of lurking about after night to carry off straggling horses. A short distance
outside the sentries they close hoppled a horse with a bell on, and took their station in a hazel thicket but
a few yards off. It was not long until an Aborigine stalked up and seized the horse. The captains rushed
upon him. cut oft his head and brought it into camp, and claimed at least the price of a wolf's scalp. . .
— Denny's Militiary Journal, page 3.50.

II Captain .Armstrong, under oath at the court of investigation, estimated the number at one hundred
warriors. Colonel Hardin in a deposition which he made in I79I estimated the number at about one

SUCCESSES AND DEFEATS OF HARMAR'S ARMY. 165

ken-o-quoh, which signifies the Little Turtle. The ground on which the action took
place, lies about eleven miles from Fort Wayne, and near the point at which the Goshen
State road crosses Eel River.

On the morning of the I'.tth the main body of the army under Harmar, having
destroyed the Miami village, moved about two miles [down the north side of the
Maumee] to a Shawnee village which was called Chillicothe, where was published the
following orders:

Camp at Chillicothe, one of the Shawnee towns, on the Omee 1 Maumee] River, October 20th, 1790.
The party under command of Captain Strong is ordered to burn and destroy every house and wig-
wam in this villau'e, together with all the corn, Ac. which he can collect. A party ot one hundred men
[militia) properly officered, under the comniand of Colonel Hardin is to burn and destroy eftectually, this
afternoon, the Pickaway town [of the Delawares by the River St. Mary] with all the corn, cVc. which
he can find in it and its vicinity.

The cause of the detachment being worsted yesterday was entirely owing to the shameful cowardly
conduct of the militia who ran away and threw down their arms, without tiring scarcely a gun. In return-
ing to Fort Washington if any officer or man shall presume to Quit the ranks, or not to march in the form
that they are ordered, the General will most assuredly order the artillery to fire on them. He hopes the
check they received yesterday will make them in future obedient to orders.

iosiAH Harmar, Brig. General.

At ten o'clock, A. M., on the 21st the army moved from the ruins of the Chilli-
cothe village, marched about seven miles on the route to Fort Washington, and en-
camped.* The night being very clear. Colonel Hardin informed General Harmar that
he thought it would be a good opportunity to steal a march on the Aborigines, as he had
reason to believe that they had returned to the towns as soon as the army left them.
Harmar did not seem willing to send a party back ; but Hardin urged the matter, inform-
ing the General that, as he had been unfortunate the other day, he wished to have it in
his power to pick the militia and try it again ; and at the same time endeavored to
account for the men's not fighting ; and desired an opportunity to retrieve the credit of
the militia [deposition of Colonel John Hardin 14th September, 1791]. In order to
satisfy the request of Hardin, and to give the Aborigines a check and thus prevent their
harassing the army on its return to Fort Washington, General Harmar determined to
send back a detachment of four hundred men. Accordingly, late in the night of the 31st
a corps of three hundred and forty militia, and sixty regular troops under the command
of IVIajor Wyllys, were detached, that they might gain the vicinity of the IVfiami village
before day-break and surprise any Aborigines who might be found there. The detach-
ment marched in three columns. The regular troops were in the center, at the head of
which Captain Joseph ,\shtont was posted, with Major Wyllys and Colonel Hardin in
his front. The militia formed the columns to the right and left [see map ante page '.17].
Owing to some delay occasioned by the halting of the militia, the detachment did not
reach the bank of the Maumee till some time after sunrise. The spies then discovered
some Aborigines and reported to Major Wyllys who halted the regular troops, and moved
the militia on some distance in front where he gave his orders and plan of attack to the
several commanding officers of corps. Major Wyllys reserved to himself the command
of the regular troops. Major Hall with his battalion was directed to take a circuitous
route around the bend of the Omee [Maumee] River, cross the Pickaway fork [the
River St. Mary] and there, in the rear of the Aborigines, wait until the attack should be

hundred and fifty men. Some writers, on questionable authority, have given the number at seven hun-
dred. Captain Armstrong wrote that 'many of the Aborigines must have been killed, as I saw my men
bayonet many of them. They fought and died hard.'

* The army having burned five villages, besides the capitol town, and consumed and destroyed
twenty thousand bushels of corn in ears, took up their line of march back to Fort Washington and en-
camped eight miles from the ruins — Denny.

t Captain Asheton's testimony before the Court of Imtuiry. See Am. State Papers vol xii, page 28.

766 THE MAUMEE RIVER BASIN.

brought on by Major M'Mullen's battalion. Major Fontaine's cavalry, and the regular
troops under Major Wyllys, who were all ordered to cross the Omee [Maumee] at and
near the common fording place. After the attack commenced the troops were by no
means to separate, but were to embody, or the battalions to support each other as
circumstances required. From this disposition it appeared evident that it was the inten-
tion of Hardin and Wyllys to surround the Aborigine encampment ; but Major Hall, who
had gained his position undiscovered, disobeyed his orders by firing at a single Aborigine
before the commencement of the action. Several small parties of Aborigines were soon
seen running in different directions, and the militia under M'MuUen and the cavalry
under Fontaine pursued them in disobedience to orders, and left Major Wyllys unsup-
ported. The consequence was that the regulars, after crossing the Maumee. were
attacked by a superior force of .Aborigines and compelled to retreat with the loss of
Major Wyllys and the greater part of their corps. Major Fontaine, at the head of the
mounted militia, fell, with a number of his followers, in making a charge against a small
party of Aborigines ; and on his fall the remainder of his troops dispersed, leaving the
federal troops unsupported to become an easy sacrifice to much the largest party of
savages that had been seen that day. While the main body of the Aborigines, led by
the Little Turtle, were engaged with the regulars near the banks of the Maumee, some
skirmishing took place near the confluence of the rivers St. Mary and St. Joseph between
detached parties of Aborigines and the militia under Hall and M'Mullen. .^fter the
defeat of the regulars, however, the militia retreated on the route to the main army ; and
the Aborigines having suffered a severe loss, did not pursue them.*

About eleven o'clock A. M. a single horseman reached the camp of Harmar with
[very imperfect] news of the defeat ol the detachment. The General immediately
ordered Major Ray to march with his battalion to the assistance of the retreating
parties; but so great was the panic which prevailed among the militia that only thirty
men could be induced to leave the main army. With this small number Major Ray
proceeded a short distance towards the scene of action, when he met Colonel Hardin on
his retreat. On reaching the encampment of Harmar, Colonel Hardin requested the
General to march back to the Miami village with the whole army ; but Harmar said to
him, 'you see the situation of the army; we are now scarcely able to move our baggage;
it would take up three days to go, and return to this place ; we have no more forage for
our horses; the Aborigines have got a very good scourging; and I will keep the army in
perfect readiness to receive them if they think proper to follow.' t The General at this
time had lost all confidence in the militia. The bounds of the camp were made less and.

* It was my opinion that the misfortunes of that day were owintr to the separation of the troops, and
disobeyance of orders. After the federal troops were defeated, and the tiring in all ^juarters nearly
ceased. Majors Hall and M'Mnllen with their battalions met in the [site of the I town and, after dis-
charging, cleaning and fresh loading their arms, which took up about half an hour, proceeded to join the
army unmolested. I am convinced that the detachment, if it had been embodied, was sufficient to have
answered the fullest expectations of the General. . . — Testimony of Captain Joseph Ashton, Am.
State Papers vol. xii. page 2H.

The wings commanded by Majors Hall and M'Millen came upon a few Aborigines immediately
after crossing the Omee I Maumee] put them to flight and, contrary to orders, pursued up the St. Joseph
for several miles. The center division, composed chiefly of the regular troops, were left unsupported.
It would seem as if the enemy designed to draw the principal part of the force after a few of their people,
while their main body attacked Major Wyllys. The center division sustained a very unequal ftght for
some time. They were obliged at length to give way. The few that escaped fled in the direction that
the militia had gone, and met them returning from the pursuit of the scattering Aborigines. The enemy
followed and were met by the militia several miles up the St. Joseph; this narrow river was between the
parties; a smart tire commenced and was kept up. The Aborigines attempted to force their way across
but were repulsed, and at length withdrew. Our parties collected their wounded, and returned slowly
to camp— I^enny's Military Journal pages 3.'jl, H52.

t Deposition of Colonel John Hardin September 14, 1791 American State Papers.

CAUSES OF HARMAR'S DEFEATS. THE SAVAGES. 167

at eight o'clock on the morning of the 23rd October, the army took up the Hne of march
for Fort Washington and reached that place on the 4th of November, having lost in the
expedition one hundred and eighty-three killed, and thirty-one wounded.* Among the
killed were Major Wyllys and Lieutenant Ebenezer Frothinghara of the regular troops;
and Major Fontaine, Captains Thorp, M'Murtrey and Scott, Lieutenants Clark and
Rogers, and Ensigns Bridges, Sweet, Higgins and Thielkeld, of the militia. The Abo-
rigines, whose loss was about equal to that of ours, did not annoy the army after the
action of the 22nd of October.

The causes of the serious disasters attending General Harmar' ex-
pedition to the head of the Maumee, in addition to those stated above
were the alleged incompetency of some officers, insufficient discipline of
the militia, and the bickerings among some of their officers, causing
distrust, disorder and panic at the first attack of the enemy. General
Harmar, annoyed by adverse criticism of his conduct of this expedition,
asked President Washington "28th March, 1791, for a board of officers
to act as a Court of Inquiry. This request was granted and, after con-
sidering the evidence, he was acquitted. Nothing was said about his
failure to build the forts that had been thought desirable at first. Some
of the officials, however, had objections to the suggested forts in the
wilderness, such as the cost of their maintenance from garrisons and
supplies snd their narrow influence. But General Harmar's command
was prepared for such work, and not prepared for aggressive war as
the sequel proved. Had he built a strong fort at the head of the Mau-
mee immediately upon his arrival there, and garnered, instead of burn-
ing, the extensive products of the fields and, on his return, left a chain
of such forts, they would have been rallying points for soldiers to keep
the savages in check : for the commissioners of peace to these savages,
and for those of the savages who would gradually, one by one and tribe
bv tribe, have been won to peace. The moral as well as physical
effects of such forts were demonstrated by General Wayne, as is shown
in a later chapter. General Harmer resigned his commission the follow-
ing January, was made Adjutant General of Pennsylvania in 179^, and
rendered good service in furnishing troops for General Wayne's cam-
paign along the Maumee in 1794. t

The savages reported their loss as only fifteen to twenty. + They were
greath' elated at their success in defeating General Harmar's arm\'.
Like the Ancient Romans who returned home to celebrate their great
victories in triumphal processions, these savages went to Detroit the

* The whole number of the killed and missine of the army amounts to one hundred and eiyhty-
three, but it is verily believed that a number of the militia who are missing have deserted, and are on
their way to Kentucky — Denny's Military' Journal page 3.>1.

t General Harmar was addicted to the use of intoxicating beverages like many others of liis
time. See letter of General Knox of September 3, 1790, to him remonstrating against this practice in
Knox Papers in Library of the New England Historic and Genealogical Society, Boston, vol, xxiii,
page 169.

+ This report was probably of only one tribe or squad. Savages did not aggregate their losses.

168 THE MAUMEE RIVER BASIM.

headquarters of their masters and allies the British, where they daily
paraded the streets uttering their demoniac scalp-yells while bearing
long poles strung with the scalps of the many American soldiers they
had killed.* Additional savage war-parties were started for the frontier
settlements. The British, also, were elated at the success of the savages,
exhibiting their pleasure by words condemnatory of the American polic}-,
and by their continued acts in supplying the savages for further atrocities.

It must be admitted that the conduct of the Americans coming in
contact with the savages from the beginning in governmental, soldiery,
and pioneer settler relations, had not always exhibited that thought-
fulness, dignity and unity of action that commands the full respect,
particularly of those at a distance ; and much of their later conduct, for
two years at least, was open to severe criticism. But the extenuating
circumstances, individual and general, were many and great, and such
as not to be fully appreciated by persons foreign to them.t

The anxiety, always present with the frontier settlers, now increas-
ed to a panic. The officers, local and general, whose duty it was to
guard and protect the legitimate settlers, had often been remiss in their
duties. While their physical resources were narrow, they had been
wanting in that broad comprehension of requirements that would have
begotten from the first more of a union of effort and strength of re-
sistance to the treacherous savages while accumulating means for that
complete subjection of them that was necessar\-. Now they became
even more disconcerted than before and their spasmodic efforts to pro-
tect the settlements with soldiers — to send embassies to placate the
savages at this inopportune time, while gathering an arm\-, meantime,
sufficient to overcome them and build forts throughout the forests,
which forests the savages had been taught by the French and British
never to give up, and in which determination they were yet being sus-
tained bv the British — all were again pointed to by the British and
savages as evidences of American insincerity and duplicity. Such was
the fruit of the long-continued pacific policy of the American officials,
if anv policy could be said to have existed. Their efforts had only
occasionally been awakened, with mere temporizing effect on the
enemies, to react unfavorably upon the settlements.

The Legislature of Virginia 20th December, 1790, authorized
Governor Beverly Randolph to provide for the enlistment of several
companies of rangers before the first of March for the protection of the
frontier; and Charles Scott was appointed Brigadier General of Ken-

* Compare Michigan Pioneer and Historical Collections, and Farmer's His. of Detroit.

t For many details regarding the ditierent questions and annoyances of these troublous times, the
inquirer is referred to the American State Papers, volumes relating to .aborigine, and Military Affairs:
also to the many MSS. that have already been referred to.

AMERICANS RALLY AGAINST THE SAVAGES. 169

tuckv militia. Early in January, 1791, Congress named General Scott,
Henrv Inness, John Brown, Benjamin Logan, and Isaac Shelby a local
Board of War for the District of Kentucky, with discretionary powers.
The third of March Congress also provided another regiment of
Federal Troops, and for raising two thousand militia for six months,
for the further protection of the frontiers; and President Washington
immediatelv appointed Governor Arthur St. Clair Commander in Chief
of this Army of the Northwest. Colonel Thomas Proctor was sent
12th March, 1791, to the Senecas in New York to gather an embassy
from them to the western tribes, but the British at Niagara would not
permit a boat to take them across Lake Erie in the American interest;
and through the British and Colonel Brant false reports were circulated
— that the United States were endeavoring to involve the Six Nations
in war with the western savages. Further illustration of the continued
British policy to dominate all the savages is given in the communica-
tions of their officers to the savages, and the savages deferring to their
request that all questions of moment should be referred to the British.
Radical operations against the savage retreats appearing necessarx',
and the result of Colonel Proctor's mission for intercession of the Six
Nations for peace having been awaited as long as practicable. General
Scott crossed the Ohio River 23rd May, 1791, at the mouth of the Ken-
tucky with eight hundred cavalry, and started for the historic Ouiotenon
on the Wabash River near the present City of Lafayette. Rain fell in
torrents with much high wind, but he arrived at Ouiotenon the first of
June after an estimated march of one hundred and sixtv miles across
the forested country with only trails for road. The last of the savages
were just leaving the proximal town when General, now acting as Lieu-
tenant Colonel-Commander, James Wilkinson pressed forward with the
First Battalion and destroyed all the savages with which five canoes
were crowded.' There was a Kickapoo town on the north l)ank of the
river from which a brisk firing was directed at the troops. The river
was high and soldiers were sent above and below to effect a crossing,
which was done by some swimming, and the savages were dislodged.
Meantime Colonel Hardin's command had discovered a stronger village
to the left which was surprised and six savages were killed and fifty-two
taken prisoners. The next evening General Wilkinson started with three
hundred and sixty men on foot, and early the next morning assailed and
destroyed the important town of Kethtipecanunk at the mouth of Eel
River eighteen miles above Ouiotenon, returning from this thirty-six
miles walk and work in twelve hours. All the villages and supplies
were destroyed. General Scott reported that " Many of the inhabitants
of this village [Ouiotenon] were French and lived in a state of civiliza-
tion. B}' the books, letters, and other documents found here it is evi-

170 THE MAUMEE RIVER BASIN.

dent that the place was in close connection with and dependent on
Detroit. A large quantity of corn, a variety of household goods, peltry,
and other articles were burned with this village which consisted of about
sevent\- houses, many of them well finished."* The 4th June General
Scott discharged sixteen of his prisoners who were less able to with-
stand the march, giving to their care a well-worded letter, addressed
to all the tribes of savages along the Wabash, requesting peace and in-
forming where his retained prisoners could be found. The severe rains
and the swollen condition of the streams, with his forced marches through
the trackless forest had disabled his horses and, his supplies being de-
pleted, he reluctantl\- directed the march southward instead of to the
Maumee, and arrived at the Rapids of the Ohio River 14th June. He
reported no death in his command and only five wounded, while of the
savages thirty-two were killed and fifty-eight taken prisoners, of which
the fortv-one not liberated were given to the care of Captain Asheton
of the First United States Regiment at Fort Steuben, on the site of the
present Jeffersonville, Indiana. His troops did not take any scalps.

General St. Clair recommended another expedition to the Eel River
to weaken those tribes which would join the Miamis against his army then
forming for the purpose of laying waste the strongholds, and establish-
ing a series of forts in the Maumee country. Acordingly Colonel Wil-
kinson with five hundred and twenty-five cavalry started from the vi-
cinity of Fort Washington (site of the present Cincinnati) northward
'feinting boldly at the Miami villages' and then turning northwestward
to the Wabash near the mouth of Eel River. The evening of the
sixth da\- out he cai)tured the savages' most important town known by
the French name L'Anguille — the Eel. This expedition then ranged
near the Wabash, passed through Ouiotenon, thence along General
Scott's route, and arrived at the Rapids of the Ohio 21st August, having
traveled four hundred and fifty miles, destroyed several villages and
over four hundred acres of corn 'chiefly in the milk' stage of growth;
captured thirty-four or more savage prisoners and killed ten or more
others. One American prisoner was released. Two soldiers were killed
and one wounded. Colonel Wilkinson also left behind some infirm
Aborigines unharmed, to whom he gave a letter addressed to the dif-
ferent tribes urging them to accept the favorable terms of peace that
were offered them. These letters were taken to the British who gave
their own desired renderings of them to the Aborigines.

General Harmar predicted defeat for General St. Clair's army
which was being gathered with great difficulties to operate along the
Maumee River. t This armv was not ready to advance until 17th Sep-

''■' American State Papers. Aborigine Affairs volume i, page 129.

1 Denny's Military Journal page 357, American State Papers. Aborigine Affairs volume i. page 118.

SAVAGES ATTACK GENERAL ST. CLAIR'S ARMY. 171

tember, 1791, when about twenty-three hundred soldiers, mostl\' regu-
lars, moved from the vicinity of Fort Washington and built Fort Hamilton
on the west bank of the Miami River at the site of the present Citv of
Hamilton, Ohio. Again advancing under command of General St. Clair,
they began to build Fort Jefferson, six miles south of the present-Green-
'ville, the l"2th of October. Twelve da>s later themarch again began, but
the progress was very slow. The evening of the 3rd of November the
army encamped by the Wabash River about one mile and a half east of
the present Ohio-Indiana State line. During the night there were man\'
savages near the pickets, and much firing of guns by the pickets, .\bout
ten o'clock at night General Butler, who commanded the right wing,
was desired to send out an intelligent officer with detachment of soldiers
to make discoveries. He chose Captain Slough, two subalterns and
thirty men for this purpose, but nothing alarming was discovered.

Early the next morning the army, then numbering about fourteen
hundred regular and militia soldiers, and eighty-six officers, was furi-
ously assailed by about the same number of savages, and it went dcjwn
to the most disastrous defeat ever suffered by such large numbers from
such foe. General St. Clair's Adjutant Ebenezer Denny thus de-
scribes the scene :'^

The troops paraded this morning [4th November, 171)1] at the usual time, and had
been dismissed from the lines but a few minutes, the sun not yet up. when the woods in
front rung with the yells and fire of the savages. The poor militia, who were but three
hundred yards in front, had scarcely time to return a shot — they fled into our camp.
The troops were under arms in an instant, and a smart fire from the front line met the
enemy. It was but a few minutes, however, until the men were engaged in every
quarter. The enemy from the front filed oft to the right and left, and completely sur-
rodnded the camp, killed and cut off nearly all the guards, and approached close to the
lines. They advanced from one tree, log, or stump to another, under cover of the smoke
of our fire. The [our] artillery and musketry made a tremendous noise [huddled
together as they were] but did little execution. The Aborigines seemed to brave every-
thing, and when fairly fixed around us they made no noise other than their fire [guns]
which they kept up very constant and which seldom failed to tell, although scarcely
heard.

Our left flank, probably from the nature of the ground, gave way first ; the enemy
got possession of that part of the encampment but, it being pretty clear ground, they
were too much exposed and were soon repulsed. I was at this time with the General
[St. Clair] engaged toward the right ; he was on foot [he had been sick some days] and
led the party himself that drove the enemy and regained our ground on the left. The
battalions in the rear charged several times and forced the savages from their shelter,
but they always turned with the battalions and fired upon their back; indeed they .seemed
not to fear anything we could do. They could skip out of reach of the bayonet and
return, as they pleased. They were visible only when raised by a charge.

The ground was literally covered with the dead. The wounded were taken to the
center, where it was thought most safe, and where a great many who had quit their

■ Denny's Military Journal, paee 369, et seq. See, also, American Pioneer, volume ii. pane l.'jO.

172 THE MAUMEE RIVER BASIN.

posts unhurt had crowded together. The General, with other officers, endeavored to
rally these men, and twice they were taken out to the lines. It appeared as if the officers
had been singled out ; a very great proportion fell, or were wounded and obliged to
retire from the lines early in the action. [Major] General [Richard] Butler was among
the latter, as well as several other of the most experienced officers. The men, being
thus left with few officers, became fearful, despaired of success, gave up the fight, and
to save themselves for the moment, abandoned entirely their duty and ground, and
crowded in toward the center of the field, and no exertions could put them in any order
even for defense; [they became] perfectly ungovernable. The enemy at length got
possession of the artillery, though not until the officers were all killed but one and he
badly wounded, and the men [gunners] almost all cut off, and not until the pieces were
spiked.

As our lines were deserted the Aborigines contracted theirs until their shot centered
from all points, and now meeting with little opposition, took more deliberate aim and did
great execution. Exposed to a cross fire, men and officers were seen falling in every
direction ; the distress, too, of the wounded made the scene such as can scarcely be con-
ceived— a few minutes longer, and a retreat would have been impossible — the only hope
left was, that perhaps the savages would be so taken up with the camp as not to follow.
Delay was death ; no preparation could be made ; numbers of brave men must be left a
sacrifice, there was no alternative. It was past nine o'clock when repeated orders were
given to charge toward the road. The action had continued between two and three
hours. Both officers and men seemed confounded, incapable of doing anything ; they
could not move until it was told that a retreat was intended. A few officers put them-
selves in front, the men followed, the enemy gave way, and perhaps not being aware of
the design, we were for a few minutes left undisturbed. The stoutest and most active
now took the lead, and those who were foremost in breaking the enemy's line were soon
left behind.

At the moment of the retreat one of the few horses saved had been procured for the
General ; he was on foot until then ; I kept by him, and he delayed to see the rear. The
enemy soon discovered the movement and pursued, though not more than four or five
miles, and but few so far ; they turned to share the spoil. Soon after the firing ceased I
was directed to endeavor to gain the front and, if possible, to cause a short halt that the
rear might get up. I had been on horseback from the first alarm, and well mounted ;
[and now] pushed forward, but met with so many difficulties and interruptions from the
people that I was two hours at least laboring to reach the front. 'With the assistance of
two or three officers I caused a short halt ; but the men grew impatient and would move
on. I got Lieutenants Sedam and Morgan, with half a dozen stout men, to fill up the
road and to move slowly ; I halted myself until the General came up. By this time the
remains of the army had got somewhat compact, but in the most miserable and defense-
less state. The wounded who came off left their arms in the field, and one half of the
others threw theirs away on the retreat. The road for miles was covered with firelocks
[flintlock guns] cartridge boxes and regimentals. How fortunate that the pursuit was
discontinued ; a single Aborigine might have followed with safety upon either flank.
Such a panic had seized the men that I believe it would not have been possible to have
brought any of them to engage again.

In the afternoon Lieutenant Kersey with a detachment of the first regiment met us.
This regiment, the only complete and best disciplined portion of the army, had been
ordered back upon the road on the 'Msl October. They were thirty miles from the battle
ground when they heard distinctly the firing of the cannon, were hastening forward and
had marched about nine miles when met by some of the militia who informed Major
Hamtramck, the commanding officer, that the army was totally destroyed. The Major

CRUSHING DEFEAT OF GENERAL ST. CLAIR'S ARMY. 173

judged it best to send on a subaltern to obtain some knowledge of things, and to return
himself with the regiment to Fort Jefferson eight miles back, and to secure at all events
that post. He had made some arrangements, and as we arrived in the evening, found
him preparing again to meet us. Stragglers continued to come in for hours after we
reached the fort.

The remnant of the army, with the first regiment, were now at Fort Jefferson,
twenty-nine miles from the field of action, without provisions, and the former without
having eaten anything for twenty-four hours. A convoy was known to be upon the road,
and within a day's march. The General determined to move with the First Regiment
and all the levies [militia] able to march. Those of the wounded and others unable to
go on were lodged as comfortably as possible within the fort. Accordingly we set out a
little after ten and continued our route until within an hour of daylight, then halted and
waited for day and until the rear came up. Moved on again about nine o'clock ; the
morning of the Sth we met the convoy ; stopped a sufficiency to subsist us to Fort Hamil-
ton; sent the remainder on to Jefferson under an additional escort of a captain and sixty
men; proceeded, and at the first water halted, partly cooked and eat for the first time
since the night preceding the action. At one o'clock moved on, and continued our route
until nine at night when we halted and made fires within fifteen miles of Fort Hamil-
ton. Marched again just before day. the General soon after rode on to the fort.
Troops reached [there] in the afternoon.

November 7, 1701. Fort Hamilton command was ordered off with a small supply
for the wounded. &c. About twelve same day continued our march, and halted before
night within fifteen miles of Fort 'Washington, which place we reached the afternoon of
the 8th.

The prediction of [defeat by] General Harmar before the army set out on the
campaign was founded upon his experience and particular knowledge of things. He
saw with what material the bulk of the army was composed ; men collected from the
streets and prisons of the cities, hurried out into the enemy's country, and with the
officers commanding them totally unacquainted with the business in which they were
engaged, it was utterly impossible they could be otherwise [than defeated] . Besides,
not any one department was sufficiently prepared ; both quarter-master and the con-
tractors extremely deficient. It was a matter of astonishment to him [General Harmar]
that the commanding general [St. Clair] who was acknowledged to be perfectly compe-
tent, should think of hazarding with such people and under such circumstances, his
reputation and life, and the lives of .so many others, knowing too, as both did, the
enemy with whom he was going to contend ; an enemy brought up from infancy to war,
and perhaps superior to an equal number of the best men that could be taken against
them. It is a truth, I had hopes that the noise and show which the army made on their
march might possibly deter the enemy from attempting a serious and general attack.
It was unfortunate that both the general officers were, and had been, disabled by sick-
ness; in such situation it is possible that some essential matters might be overlooked.
The Adjutant-General Colonel 'Winthrop Sargent, an old Revolutionary officer, was,
however, constantly on the alert ; he took upon himself the burden of everything, and a
very serious and troublesome task he had. But one most important object was wanting,
can't say neglected, but more might have been done toward obtaining it : this was a
knowledge of the collected force and situation of the enemy: of this we were perfectly
ignorant. Some few scouts out but to no great distance.*

* See also. Lieutenant Colonel William Darke's letter to President "Washington describing this
defeat; in the Henry Knox ( Secretary of War) Papers vol.'xxx. page 13, Library of the New England
Historic Genealogical Society, Boston. And Benjamin Van Cleve's Memoranda in The American
Pioneer volume ii. 1843. page 150 et seq.

174 THE MAUMEE RIVER BASIN.

In this overwhelming,' defeat General St. Clair's army lost five hun-
dred and ninety-three privates killed and missiny;. Thirtv-nine officers
Were killed, including Major General Richard Butler, one Lieutenant
Colonel, three Majors, twelve Captains, ten Lieutenants, eight Ensigns,
two Quartermasters, one Adjutant, and Surgeon Grasson. Thirty-one
officers and two hundred and fifty-two privates were wounded. The
artillery and all supplies including clothing, two hundred tents, three
hundred horses, one hundred and thirty beef cattle and food in the
wagons, with muskets and other equipment thrown nwny by many
stricken soldiers, all valued at S32,810.75, were left to lie gathered by
the highly elated savages who took to their lodges by the Maumce and
Auglaise Rivers all that could be readily transported.*

On account of necessary delavs, the cold weather and bad roads,
it required six weeks for St. Clair's Aide, Lieutenant Denny, to con-
vey on horseback the news of this crushing defeat to the office of Sec-
retary Knox in Philadeli)hia.t General St. Clair requested the ap-
pointment of a Court of Inquiry. This was done by the War Depart-
ment, and the Court exonerated him. He resigned his commission
March 5, 179"2. The jirinciiial causes of the failure of the campaign
were, 1st. The deficient number of good troops, according to the ex-
pectation in the early part of the year. 2nd. Their want of sufficient
discipline, according to the nature of the service. 3rd. The lateness
of the season. + The wet and cold condition of the weather which
covered the country with thin ice and snow, certainly added much to
the inefficiency of the volunteers who were unused to such campaign-
ing, and added greatly to their sufferings in defeat. But such con-
dition cannot be urged to account for the incompetency of the com-
manders. Nor should the illness of General St. Clair be an excuse for
the laxity in the fortifying and reconnoitering by his subordinates.
There were other unwise features of this campaign beside undiscijilined
men and incom|ietent officers. The wives and women of many soldiers
were with the army. They were favored as much as practicable,
but man}' of them were killed by the savages. ||

* A Delaware Aborigine named Whincwy Pooshies, of prominence in his tribe, took from this
battlefield to his cabin by the Aui:laise River near its mouth, two cood horses, four tents — one a good
markee (manjuee) in which his family lived for several years— a great ijuantity of ctothine from the
dead soldiers and their wives; also axes, guns, and everything necessary to make an Aborigine rich.
' There was much joy among them ' — From the Narrative of John Brickell who was then a captive living
with this family, in The American Pioneer volume i, page 50.

t For accounts of the reception by the President of the account of St. Clair's Defeat, see George
W. P. Custis' Personal Recollections of Washington ; Henry C. Lodge's Life of Washington, etc.

+ Statement of Henry Knox Secretary of War, Am. State Papers Aborigine Affairs vol. i, page 98.

II Caleb Atwater writes in his History of the State of Ohio, 1838. page 142, that there were in this
army at the commencement of the ac^tion about two hundred and fifty women of whom fifty-six were
killed in the battle. But few escaped death and captivity.

REMAINS OF THE VICTIMS OF ST. CLAIR'S DEFEAT. 175

General Wilkinson visited this battle-field about the last of Janu-
ary, 179'2, with one hundred and fi{t\' volunteer cavalrymen some of
whom were frost bitten on the way from Fort Jefferson. When within
four miles of the battle field they found scattered aloni;- the wa\- tlie
remains of Americans who had been pursued and killed or wlio had
died of their wounds while endeavoring to escape. The field was
thickly strewn with remnants showing horrible mutilations b\- the
savages. Sand and claj' were found packed into the eyes and throats,
done probably while the wounded were yet alive; limbs were separated
from bodies; and stakes the size of arms were found driven through
the bodies of women. The flesh had been stripped from many bones,
but the relative part done bv the savage cannibals and the wolves
could not be determined. The latter were yet at work. As many of
these remains as practicable on account of the cold and snow, were
gathered and buried in a shallow trench* dug into the frozen ground
with difficulty by the benumbed soldiers. Three whole cannon car-
riages were found and removed to Fort Jefferson; the other five were
in damaged condition. All the cannon were missing.

* General Wayne's army gathered and buried all bones that could be found at this battle held
Christmas week, 1793, previous to the buildiuR of Fort Recovery. Six hundred skulls were counted.
American Pioneer, 1842. volume i, page 294.

Pistol found in the Maumee River, at the mouth of the .^uglaise off Fort Dehance Park, in low
water of the summer of 189.5. Without mark to indicate date or place of its manufacture. Length nine
inches. Rifled bore. Cocked and ready for tirinc. In the Author's collection.

176 THE MAUMEE RIVER BASIN.

CHAPTER VII.

Continued Efforts to Placate the Aborigines Prove Futile —

General Wayne's Successful Campaign Against Them.

1792 TO 1794.

The savagt'S did not want peace with the Americans previous to
their defeat of General Harmar's army; much less would they complv
with the proclamation of Governor St. Clair or respond to various
other overtures made to them for peace after that disaster. They rallied
all the available warriors of the different tribes nearby — the Miamis
under Chief Little Turtle, the Delawares under Buckongehelas, the
Shawnees under Blue Jacket, the Ottawas, Wyandots, Pottawotamis,
Kickapoos, and bands of lesser significance against the on-coming of
General St. Clair, and their easy overwhelming of this the second large
armv, commanded by the Governor — the, to them, great American
chieftain — was to them the cause of excessive joy. This, with the
largely increased number of scalps and other rich spoils gathered from
their victims were looked upon as license for a continuance of their
raids on the settlements, and as omens of their ultimate success in
driving the Americans from the country on the plan of Pontiac in 1763.

The American frontier settlements, with increased apprehension,
sent more urgent petitions to the authorities for protection. Some of
these petitions represented that not less than fifteen hundred Kentuck-
ians — men, women and children — had been slain or carried into cap-
tivity by the savages within seven years, and that the frontier settle-
ments of Pennsylvania and Virginia had suffered nearly as much; and
that the prospect was now more gloomy than ever as the enemy was
more aggressive and savage.

On the other hand, the British were becoming more ajiprehensive
regarding their fur trade and the loss of their allies from the organiza-
tion of American armies. The defeat of two armies was sure to be
followed bv another army, stronger and more destructive. The Montreal
merchants whose lucrative traffic with these savages had lessened dur-
ing the more active hostilities, petitioned 9th December, 1791, Colonel
John Graves Simcoe Lieutenant Governor of Upper Canada for protec-
tion; and suggested closer union with the savages and a continued
holding of the forts yet occupied by the British in American territory.

Secretary Knox 'in obedience to the command 'of President Wash-
ington, made the 26tli December an interesting statement relative to
the frontiers northwest of the Ohio River, which included this para-
graph, viz: Hence it would appear that the principles of justice as
well as policy and, it may be added, the principles of economy, all

CIVIL DIVISIONS. CHOICE OF GENERAL WAYNE. 177

combine to dictate that an adequate military force should be raised as
soon as possible, placed upon the frontiers, and disciplined according
to the nature of the service, in order to meet with the prospect of suc-
cess against the greatest probable combination of the Aborigine enemy.*
Messages and overtures for peace were again sent to the various tribes,
including the Iroquois Six Nations; and preparations for the proposed
armv were also entered upon.

To advance the civil jurisdiction as much as possible, Hamilton
County was extended 11th February," 1792, by Governor St. Clair

eastward to the Scioto River and
northward to the territorial limits,
thus including the eastern part
of this Basin although it was vet
held by the savages.

President Washington, having
been greatly disappointed in the
risult of . the expedition of Gen-
eral St. Clair who was a former
memfier of his staff, made choice
of the commander for the pro-
posed campaign with great cir-
cumspection. Generals Anthony
Wayne, Henry Lee, Daniel Mor-
gan, .Andrew Pickens, Rufus Put-
nam, Charles Scott, James Wil-
kmson and Alexander M'Gilli-
vray, were those of most prom-
inence from whom to choose ;

Civil Divisions existing in Ihe eastern part of the and AuthoUy WaVUe WaS Selected
Territory Northwest of the Ohio River in the year ^^j^lv in 1792. The result showed
1792.

the wisdom of the choice not-
withstanding the statement of General Lee that this appointment
caused extreme disgust among all orders in the Old Dominion.

Soon after this ajipointment General Wayne issued a proclamation
to acquaint the anxious frontiersmen with the efforts in progress to
secure peace by treaty, and to request all persons to avoid all action
that would further anger the Aborigines. The governors of Virginia
and Pennsylvania issued similar proclamations.

Major John F. Hamtramck effected treaties at Vincennes in March,
1792, with small bands of the Wabash and Eel River tribes, and he
also sent peace messages to those of the Maumee. About fifty chiefs

* American State Papers. Aborigine Affairs, volume i, page 198.

778 THE MAUMEE RIVER BASIN.

of the Six Nations also visited Philadelphia by invitation and accepted
the overtures for peace.

The 7th April General Wilkinson sent two messengers, Freeman
and Girard, with peace message to the Miamis of the Maumee ; and the
20th May Colonel John Hardin and Major Alexander Truman started
northward on a like mission — but not one of the four returned to tell
of the savage treatment, and death, they suffered.

General Putnam succeeded the 27th September in closing terms of
peace with thirty-one Aborigines of the Wabash and Illinois tribes at
Vincennes. Each of the parties to these peace negotiations carried
copies of the Treaties of 1784-85-i^fi-H9, and many expressions and
assurances by the Americans to turn the savages from their work of
carnage ; but all availed nothing with those more directly under the
influence of the British. The raidings by the savages continued
unabated.

Of the secret efforts to learn more regarding the relations between
the British and the savages, to be the better able therefrom to appease
the latter, but one succeeded on account of the vigilance of both the
British and savages. William May was started from Fort Hamilton
the 13th May, 1792, to follow on the trail of Major Truman. He was
captured by the savages, as expected, and after escaping many dangers
was taken along the Maumee, and sold to Matthew Elliott then British
Assistant Agent to the Aborigines from whose service he finally escaped
and gave sworn testimony before General Wayne at Pittsburg 11th
October, 1792.°^ This evidence detailed some items of interest, among
which are the following: There were gathered in the summer of 1792
by the Maumee River at the mouth of the Auglaise then the headquar-
ters of nearby tribes, three thousand and six hundred warriors of many
tribes, and more were often arriving at the time of William May's
sojourn there, all of whom received daily rations from the British at
Detroit.

This was the largest council of Aborigines held in America, and it
appeared to the British as the culmination of their hopes and efforts
for their confederation. The Seneca Chief Cornplanter and forty-eight
other chiefs of the Six Nations of New York were there for the Ameri-
cans in the interest of peace; and Chief Cornplanter reported to
General Waynet that . . . 'we cannot tell the names of the
nations present. There were present three men from the Goral nations;

■■' American State Papers. Aboricine Affairs, volume i. page 343.

t Idem pace 337.

+ Gora, or Gorah, was one of the names formerly given by the Six Nations (Iroquois) of New
York to Sir William Johnson and to Colonel Guy Johnson; and these Gora Aborigines were probably of
the Iroquois of Canada who were at this time under the control of Sir John Johnson British Super-
intendent of Aborigines.

GRAND COUNCIL. HOSTILITIES. PEACE EFFORTS. 179

it took them a whole season to come ; and twenty-seven nations [tribes]
from beyond Canada. The whole of them know that we, the Six
Nations, have General Washington by the hand.' . . This reference
was to their recent visit to Philadelphia by invitation, and the peace
treaty there effected. Other tribes were expected at this Grand Council
at the mouth of the Auglaise River, and they came later. A like
council was called for the next year, 1793, and runners were sent with
invitations to the most distant tribes in all directions, including the
Creeks and Cherokees of the south, urging their attendance.

William May, having been a sailor, was kept by his purchaser
three months in the transjjortation service on board a schooner that
carried about one hundred and sixty barrels as a load between Detroit
and the foot of the lowest Maumee Rapids, where was situated the
great supph^ house of the British Aborigine agent Alexander M'Kee,
from whom the savages received their supplies of firearms and ammu-
nition with which to raid and murder Americans wherever possible.

A number of small forts were built along the frontier as bases of
supplies and protection and places of refuge for the remaining Ameri-
can settlers. In addition to the attacks on individuals and families
along the borders, a company of mounted Kentucky riflemen under
Major John Adair was suddenly attacked November 6, 1792, near Post
St. Clair about twenty-five miles north of Fort Hamilton, by a party of
savages who exhibited 'a degree of courage that bespoke them warriors
indeed' reads the report of the Major: and six . Americans were killed,
five wounded, and four were missing. The savages also killed a num-
ber of packhorses and captured others. Their loss of men was thought
to be about the same as that of the Kentuckians. At this time the
army being formed by General Wayne was rendezvoused twentv-two
miles below Pittsburg for discipline, and to protect the Virginia
frontier.

For the purpose of continuing the efforts to secure peace with the
savages by further treaty. President Washington the 2nd March, 1793,
appointed General Benjamin Lincoln of Massachusetts, Beverlv Ran-
dolph of Virginia and Timothy Pickering of Pennsylvania, Commis-
sioners to attend the great council to be held at the foot of the lowest
Rapids of the Maumee, or at Sandusky the 1st of June. The 17th
May Messrs. Randolph and Pickering arrived at Fort Niagara and
there received a note from Lieutenant Governor and Colonel John
Graves Simcoe to be guests at his home. Navy Hall nearly a mile from
the fort; and there being no other suitable place for them to stop the
invitation was accepted. General Lincoln arrived 25th May. Mean-
time a letter was received from Colonel M'Kee, British Aborigine
Agent, stating that the tribal councils would probably not end bv the

180 THE MAUMEE RIVER BASIN. -

Maumee before the latter part of June, and the Commissioners would
best remain at Niagara until he notified them that the Aborigines were
ready to receive them.

Colonel John Butler, a leader in the Wyoming Massacre in July,
1778, now British Superintendent of Aborigine Affairs, and Captain
Joseph Brant of like notoriety, with a picked comjiany of fifty savages,
arrived at Niagara July 5th from the large collection of Aborigines then
at the British distributing house at the foot of the Maumee Rapids
(now the Village of Maumee) and requested explanation of the 'unfair
and unwarrantable' warlike preparations of General Wayne; and they
desired to know the authority for the trespassing of the Americans
north of the Ohio River, all of which thev claimed as territory belong-
ing to the Aborigines. The Commissioners in reply cited the several
treaties of previous years and the subsequent maraudings of the
savages in explanation, and exjiressed desire for peace: and agreement
was made to meet in full council at Sanduskv.

The Commissioners left Niagara the Ulth July and, awaiting a fav-
orable wind, the British sloop sailed from Fort Erie opposite the present
City of Buffalo the 14th, and arrived at the mouth of the Detroit River
the 21st where they were received, and entertained during their enforced
stay there of nearly four weeks, by Captain Matthew Elliott British
Assistant Agent to the Aborigines. They frequently urged an early
meeting of the Council at Sandusky, the place named bv the British.

The 29th Julv, a deputation of over twentx' Aborigines arrived at
Captain Elliott's from the grand council that had for weeks been in
progress at the foot of the Maumee Rapids, with the notorious Simon
Girty as interpreter. After a brief preliminary thev presented to the
Commissioners a short written communication from the council, the
principal sentence being that If you seriously design to make a firm
and lasting peace you will immediately remove all \ our jieople from
our side of that river' [the Ohio]. The Commissioners delivered to
them in writing a long and carefully prepared reply in which the
treaties of 1768, 1784-85-86 and 1789 were referred to in justification of
the advance of American immigrants into the territory north of the
Ohio, and with reasons why it was impossible at this late date to make
this river the boundary: that the United States Government was will-
ing to make liberal concessions to the Aborigines, as the treaty with
Great Britain declared the middle of the Great Lakes and the waters
which unite them to be the boundary of the United States; and they
closed with the desire to soon meet the general council in treaty.

The 8th and yth of August the Commissioners received reports
that all the tribes represented at the Maumee Council were for peace
excepting the Shawnees, Wyandots, Miamis and Delawares, and that

SAVAGES AND BRITISH REJECT OFFERED PEACE. 181

they were yielding': that manv Aborigines were tired of the long' delavs
and were departing for their respective villages. The Commissioners
desired to go directly to the Maumee Council, but this action the
British would not permit.

The 14th they wrote to the chiefs of the council again urging a
meeting for a treaty: also to Colonel M'Kee that his aid to this result
would be gratefully acknowledged. The 16th August a long and care-
fully written reply was received at Captain Elliott's by the Commis-
sioners closing with the assertion that if the Commissioners would not
agree to the Ohio River being the boundary 'a meeting would be alto-
gether unnecessary.' Appended to this paper was written the follow-
ing names of 'Nations' represented, viz: Wyandots, Seven Nations
of Canada, Delawares, Shawnees, Miamis, Ottawas, Chippewas,
Senecas of the Glaise [Auglaise River], Pottawotamis, Connovs,
Munsees, Nantakokias, Mohicans, Messasagoes, Creeks, Cherokees.

This communication was, undoubtedly, fully conceived and written
liy the British authorities : it was certainly approved by their censors.
This general council, as well as the one the year before by the Maumee
at the mouth of the Auglaise, was the result of British efforts for manv
years to federate all the savages that their dictated decision in council,
and united action in war, might become irresistable to the Americans.
Joseph Brant, leader in the Six Nations and generally a stanch friend
of the British, declared that such united action 'caused the defeat of
two American armies [Harmar's and St. Clair's] . . . But to our
surprise, when upon the point of entering upon a treatv with the
[American] Commissioners, we found that it was opposed by those
acting under the British government."' . . In replv the American
Commissioners sent to the chiefs and to the British Colonel M'Kee,
regretfull\', the statement that their efforts for negotiations were at an
end; including with the letters copies of the former treaties. + The
23rd August the Commissioners on their return arrived opposite Fort
Erie where they dispatched, by different runners, letters to General
Wayne and to General Knox Secretary of War announcing their failure
to secure terms for peace.

General Wayne believed further delay would be an undue expos-
ure of the frontier to the savage incursions and, 5th October, 1793, he
reported to the Secretary of War from near Fort Washington that his
available army remained small from Kentucky disappointments, from
fevers among his enlisted men, and from "the influenza [later called in
America by the French name La Grippe] which has pervaded the whole

* William L. Stone's Life of Brant, volume ii. page 358.

t American State Papers. Aborigine Affairs volume i. pages 340. 360.

182 THE MAUMEE RIVER BASIN.

line in a most alarming and rapid decree. . . This is not a pleasant
picture, but something must be done immediately to save the frontiers
from impending savage fury. I will therefore advance to-morrow with
the force I have in order to gain a strong position about six miles in
front [north] of Fort Jefferson, so as to keep the enemy in check.".
The 23rd October he reported, from this 'strong position' which he
named Fort Greenville in honor of his friend of the Revolutionar\' War,
General Nathaniel Greene, that

We have recently experienced a little check to one of our convoys which may prob-
ably be exaggerated into something serious by the tongue of fame before this reaches
you; the following is, however, the fact, viz: Lieutenant Lowry. of the 2nd sub-
legion and Ensign Boyd of the 1st with a command consisting of ninety non-commis-
sioned officers and privates, having in charge twenty wagons belonging to the quarter-
master general's department loaded with grain and one of the contractor's loaded with
stores, were attacked early in the morning of the 17th instant about seven miles advanced
of Fort St. Clair [twenty-nine miles above Fort Hamilton] by a party of Aborigines;
those two gallant young gentlemen (who promised at a future day to be ornaments to
their profession) together with thirteen non-commissioned officers and privates, bravely
fell after an obstinate resistance against superior numbers, being abandoned by the
greater part of the escort upon the first discharge. The savages killed or carried off
about seventy horses, leaving the wagons and stores standing in the road which have
been all brought to this camp without any other loss or damage except some trifling
articles. . . It is reported that the Aborigines at Au Glaize [present Defiance] have
sent their women and children into some secret recess or recesses from their towns ; and
that the whole of the warriors are collected or collecting in force. . . A great number
of men as well as officers have been left sick and debilitated at the respective garrisons,
from a malady called the influenza ; among others General Wilkinson has been danger-
ously ill ; he is now at Fort Jefferson and on the recovery.

The character of General Wayne, including his determination is
further illustrated in the following sentence, excerpted from the same
letter, viz: "The safety of the Western frontiers, the reputation of the
legion, the dignity and interest of the nation, all forbid a retrograde
manceuvre, or giving up one inch of ground we now possess, until the
enemy are compelled to sue for peace."'' His encampment at Green-
ville was fortified and part of the army passed the winter there.

Major Henry Burbeck was ordered 23rd December, with eight
companies of infantry and artillery, to proceed to the battle-field of
General St. Clair's defeat and there erect a fortification. This stockade
enclosure with blockhouses was given the name Fort Recovery.

The Aborigines, observing this steady advance toward their princi-
pal retreats, with fortifications, made a movement for peace; and
probably a treaty of peace could, also, at this time have been effected
but for the continued adverse influence of the British. Their desires
and continued efforts to 'unite the American Aborigines' which Gov-

* American State Papers, Aborigine Atiairs vohiiiie i, paye 1161,

MACHINATIONS OF BRITISH. FRENCH AND SPANISH. 18S

ernor Simcoe expressed at Niagara to the American Peace Commis-
sioners as 'the principle of the British government' was tor their own
Better control of them; and these efforts were continued also with the
Creeks, Cherokees, and other tribes along the American frontiers south
of the Ohio River, thus costing the United States many lives and much
expense there, also. In fact much of the open as well as of the secret
conduct of the British was not only reprehensible, but criminal. It
was they who kept alive the boundary question in its virulence, seeking
to extend their own boundary thereby while professing to favor the
Aborigines. The British desire for the traffic of the Aborigines had
something to do with this conduct: but they could not have been
actuated to their course by any complicity of the American authorities
in any other act inimical to their interest.*

These were troublous years to the Americans generally, they being
beset on all sides, by the British and Aborigines, and by the machina-
tions of the French and Spanish to involve them in complications with
Great Britain and, further, to again incite the inhabitants west of the
Allegheny Mountains to a separation from the East. The natural
outlet for the products of the Ohio Basin down the Mississippi River
had much to do with the continuation of the disaffection of the settlers
with the East; but the statesmen of the East were largely responsible
for its beginning, by their arguments against the extension of the
United States domain which they thought already too large to be
governed from one center. The Spanish and French emissaries took
advantage of these complicities at different times, and circulated their
schemes among the settlers of the West from Detroit to Kentucky and
the Illinois country. General Wayne well styled this complicity of
enemies to the United States an hydra. t

The Aborigine chiefs kept in close communication with the British
officials — not only with Elliott and M'Kee, but with Detroit, Lieu-
tenant Governor Simcoe of Niagara and with the Governor General
Lord Dorchester. In an address of welcome to the chiefs 10th Febru-
ar\-, 1794, Lord Dorchester spoke in part as follows: . . ' Chil-
dren, since my return I find no appearance of a [boundary] line re-
mains; and from the manner in which the people of the United States
push on and act [evidently referring to the advance of General Wayne]

■■ See President Washington's proclamation of neutrality, and Secretary Jefferson's remonstrance
reearding the overtures of the Spanish of the Mississippi to the Kentuckians. and also against the
incitings of the French Minister Edmund Charles Genest ( often written Genet ) to beget sympathy for
the French revolutionists against the British and Spanish. Also the American order to occupy Fort
Massac, situate on the north bank of the Ohio River eight miles below the mouth of the Tennessee, to
intercept all illegal transit — American State Papers. Foreign Relations vol. i, page 173 et seq.

tCompare American State Papers, .Aborigine Affairs and Foreign Relations. Also for a brief
connected account of these complicities, see The Winning of the West by Theodore Roosevelt.

184 THE MAUMEE RIVER BASIN.

and talk ... I shall not be surprised if we are at war with them
in the course of the present year; and if so a line must then be drawn
bv the warriors. . . . We have acted in the most peaceable manner
and borne the language and conduct of the people of the United States
with patience: but I believe our patience is almost exhausted."* . . .

This address was characteristic of the unlimited selfishness and
arrogance of the British: and the assertion of impending war — in
which thev were again to actively champion the savages in their most
horrid work — was not idle words. Lieutenant Governor Simcoe was
immediately sent to Detroit, he being there the iMth February: and the
17th April a letter from Detroit reads that "we have lately had a visit
from Governor Simcoe: he came from Niagara through the woods
he has gone to the foot of the [Maumee] Rapids, and three
companies of Colonel [Richard] England's regiment have followed
him to assist in building a fort there. "T

This fort was a veritable stronghold. It was named Fort Miami,
and situated on the left bank of the Maumee River near the lower limits
of the present Village of Maumee, which was then as now, a great
advance into United States territory. M'Kee's Agency house was one
mile and a half above this fort and near the foot of the lowest rapids. +
The reinforcement of General Waxne's command by Kentucky troops
and all their movements were regularly rejjorted at Forts Miami and
Lernoult at Detroit: and at the advance of his army Fort Miami was
strengthened and further garrisoned, and Major William Campbell
succeeded Captain Caldwell its first commandant. President Washing-
ton, through Edmund Randoliih Secretary of State, complained to the
British Government regarding Lord Dorchester's address to the
savages, which had been widely circulated among them and the Ameri-
cans: and he also protested against Fort Miami. The reply showed
that the London Government instigated the aggressions, and it offered
no relief. II

General Wayne reported 7th |ul\-, 1794, from his headquarters at
Greenville that

At seven o'clock in the morning of the UOth ultimo one of our escorts consisting of
ninety riflemen and fifty dragoons commanded by Major McMahon, was attacked by a
numerous body of Aborigines under the walls of Fort Recovery, followed by a general
assault upon that post and garrison [of about two hundred men] in every direction. The
enemy were soon repulsed with great slaughter, but immediately rallied and reiterated
the attack keeping up a very heavy and constant fire at a more respectable distance for

* A verified copy from the Archives of the London Foreign Office. See Rives' Life and Times OJ
James Madison volume iii, page 418. Also Roosevelt's The Winning of ttie West, volume iv. page 57.

t American State Papers. Aborigine Affairs volume i, page 480,

+ See M'Kee's letter to Chew of 8th May. 17&4. In Canadian Archives at Ottawa.

II American State Papers. Foreign Relations volume i.

SAVAGES ATTACK FORT RECOVERY. 185

the remainder of the day, which was answered with spirit and effect by the garrison and
a part of Major McMahon's command that had regained the post. The savages were
employed during the night (which was dark and foggy) in carrying off their dead bv
torch light, which occasionally drew a fire from the garrison. They, nevertheless, suc-
ceeded so well that there were but eight or ten bodies left upon the field, and those close
under the range of the guns of the fort.

The enemy again renewed the attack on the morning of the ist instant, but were
ultimately compelled to retreat with loss and disgrace from that verv field where thev
had upon a former occasion been proudly victorious.

It was apparent that 'there were a considerable number ot the
British and the militia of Detroit"^ mixed with the savages in the
assault' and they expected to find the cannon lost bv General St.
Clair: but these had been found by the /Vmericanst who used them
against the assailants. The American loss by the assault on Fort
Recovery was twenty-two killed, thirty wounded and three missing.
Of the horses fifty-nine were killed, twenty-two wounded, and two
hundred and twenty-one were missing: but the General reported that
their loss would not in the least retard the advance of the legion after
the arrival of the expected mounted volunteers from Kentuck\-.

The British had, also, been again holding communication with the
Spanish of the Mississippi who promised to help them against the
Americans: and MTvee was supplying the savages with the best of
firearms (rifles) and other articles of war. These were used in the
attack at Fort Recovery: and a party of Delawares and Shawnees
afterward presented six American scalps before M'Kee and addressed
him as follows: 'We had two actions with Wayne's troops in which a
great many of our enemies were killed. Part of their flesh we have
brought here with us to convince our friend of the truth of their being
now in great force on their march against us: therefore. Father, we
desire you to be strong and bid your children make haste to our assist-
ance as was promised by them." +

In further confirmation of the reprehensible action of the British,
and their fears that the Americans would retaliate, the following letters
from Colonel Alexander M'Kee British .\gent to these Aborigines,
written to Colonel Richard England Commandant at Detroit, are
given, they being endorsed 'On His Majesty's Service' viz:||

* American Stale Papers, .^borinine Affairs volume i, pates 4HH-K9.

t All of these cannon, but one, were early found hidden under old trees and debris. Tlie
missing one was reported by a Shawnee, by way of Little Turtle, to Colonel Hamtranick 9th December.
1795. as buried at the confluence of the water courses near St. Clair's Battle Field.

i M'Kee's letters 7th. 8th, 25th and 30th. May. 1794. in Canadian Archives. See. also, letter of
Carondelet 9th July, 1794, in the Draper Spanish Documents Madison, Wisconsin. Quoted in Roose-
velt's The Winning of the West. G. P. Putnam's Sons, 1899, volume iv.

II National Intelligencer, Washington. District of Columbia, a6th July, 1814.

786 THE MAUMEE RIVER BASIN.

[Maumee] Rapids. July 5, 1794.

Sir : I send this by a party of Saganas [Saginaw Aborigines] who returned yes-
terday from Fort Recovery where the whole body of Aborigines, except the Delawares
who had gone another route, imprudently attacked the fort on Monday the 30th of last
month, and lost Ki or 17 men besides a good many wounded.

Everything had been settled prior to their leaving the fallen timber, and it had
been agreed upon to confine themselves to taking convoys and attacking at a distance
from the forts, if they should have the address to entice the enemy [Americans] out ;
but the impetuosity of the Mackinac Aborigines and their eagerness to begin with the
nearest, prevailed with the others to alter their system, the consequences of which from
the present appearance of things may most materially injure the interests of these people.
Both the Mackina and Lake Aborigines seemed resolved on going home again, having
completed the belts they carried with scalps and prisoners, and having no provisions
there at the Glaize [the present Defiance] to subsist upon, so that His Majesty's posts
will derive no security from the late great influx of Aborigines into this part of the
country, should they persist in their resolution of returning so soon.

The immediate object of the attack was three hundred pack horses going from this
fort [Recovery] to Fort Greenville, in which the Aborigines completely succeeded, taking
and killing all of them. But the commanding officer. Captain Gibson, sending out a
troop of cavalry, and bringing his infantry out in the front of his post, the Aborigines
attacked him and killed about fifty, among whom is Captain Gibson and two other
officers. On the near approach of the Aborigines to the fort, the remains of his gar-
rison retired into it, and from their loopholes killed and wounded as already men-
tioned. Captain Elliott writes that they are immediately to hold a council at the Glaize
[Auglaise or Grand Glaise, site of the present Defiance, Ohio] in order to try if they can
prevail upon the Lake Aborigines to remain ; but without provisions, ammunition, &c.,
being sent to that place, I conceive it will be extremely difficult to keep them together.

With great respect, I have the honor to be

Your obedient and humble servant,

A. McKee.

Another letter from the same to the same one week before the
Battle of Fallen Timber, reads as follows:

[Maumee] Rapids, August 13. 1794.

Sir : I was honored last night with your letter of the 11th. and was extremely glad
to find you are making such exertions to supply the Aborigines with provisions.

Captain Elliott arrived yesterday ; what he has brought will greatly relieve us, hav-
ing been obliged yesterday to take all the corn and flour which the traders had here.

A scouting party from the Americans carried oft a man and a woman yesterday
morning between this place and Roche de Bout, and afterwards attacked a small party
of Delawares in their camp: but they were repulsed with the loss of a man, whom they
either hid or threw into the river. They killed a Delaware woman.* Scouts are sent

*Captain John McDonald, in a small book of Biographical Slietches published in Cincinnati in 1838,
+:ives the following account of the doings of some of the most daring men of those savage times in itiis
Maumee Basin where savagery had then focused. Captain McDonald was a member of Captain
Ephraim Kibby's Company of Rangers with General Wayne's army and was well informed regarding
what he wiote. Some of these daring acts are recounted here in as near his own words as
space will admit, as the best possible glimpses of Americans who met savagery in its lair and contributed
largely to the success of a most important and daring military campaign:

Captain William Wells commanded an effective division of spies with General Wayne's army.
Wells was captured by the Miamis when about twelve years of age and grew to manhood with them and
could speak the language of several tribes. He left <he Aborigines [ particulars not known } in spring of

DARING DEEDS OF AMERICAN SCOUTS. 187

up to view the situation of the army; and we now muster 1000 Aborigines. All the
Lake Aborigines from Sagina downwards should not lose one moment in joininti their
brethren, as every accession of strength is an addition to their spirits.
I have the honor to be, with very great respect sir.

Your most obedient and very humble servant.

A. McKhe.

1792, or about eighteen months before the coming of General Wayne, and returned to his relatives ( place
not given). Attached to Wells's command in General Wayne's army were Robert M' Lei Ian [see Irving "s
Astoria) a most athletic man; Henry Miller who had also been a captive with the savages, older brother

of Christopher Miller who vs-ill be mentioned later; also Hickman and Thorp, all of tried

worth in warfare again:^t the savages. Wells and his four spies soon became confidential and privileged
gentlemen in camp, who were only called upon to do duty on very particular and interesting occasions.
They were permitted a carte blanche among the horses of the dragoons and when on duty went well
mounted, whilst the spies commanded by Captain Kibby went on foot and were kept constantly on tlie
alert, scouring the country in every direction.

At Greenville General Wayne sent out Wells and his spies to bring in a prisoner. They proceeded
to the Auglaise River where they soon discovered a smoke. They dismounted, tied their horses, and
proceeded cautiously to reconnoiter. They found three Aborigines camped on a high, open space of
ground, clear of brush and underwood except a fallen tree extending to within eighty yards of the fire
where the Aborigines were cooking their meal. It was decided that they go around to and along the
tree the branches of which, covered with leaves, were nearest the enemy. Wells and Miller were to
shoot each the man in front of him, leaving the central one to be caught alive by M'Clellan. Inmiedi-
ately after the discharge of tlie guns M'Clellan sprang after his man who, as quickly, started to run.
Observing that his pursuer was gaining on him in the course he had taken, he turned to the bank of the
Auglaise. here about twenty feet high, and jumped over miring in the soft mud at the bottom. Without
hesitation M'Clellan jumped after, also miring. Here the ready knife of the pursued was opposed by
the uplifted tomahawk of the athletic pursuer at whose command the knife was surrendered. Soon
Captain Wells and Miller came to the edge of the bank and. seeing their friend and enemy safe, took
time to descend the bank at a less precipitous place. They dragged the captive out of the mud and tied
him. He was very sulky, refusing to speak either language. One went for the horses while others
washed the mud and paint from the prisoner, who was a white man. Still he refused to give any
account of himself. The two dead Aborigines were scalped, and the scouts started for headquarters
with their prisoner. On tlie way Henry Miller began to gather the idea that the prisoner was his
brother Christopher whom he was obliged to leave captive with the Aborigines several years before.
With this impression he rode alongside him and called him by the name given by his Aborigine captors.
He startled, stared around, and eagerly inquired how he came to know his name. The mysteries were
soon explained — their prisoner was indeed Christopher Miller. He was at first very reticent when
questioned by General Wayne. After being confined for some time as a prisoner, with the army, he
gave all the information he could regarding the Aborigines, agreed to forsake his savage habits, joined
Captain Wells' scouts and, in company with his brother, remained faithful to the Americans. Early in
July he accompanied the scouts to the Auglaise River where they captured a Pottawotami chief after
he had discharged his gun at them and started to escape by running.

On another adventure, they captured a canoe load of Aborigines on the River St. Mary, who were
recognized by Wells as the family with whom he had lived during his captivity. They were kindly
treated, and were liberated with the injunction to keep away from the route of the army.

After General Wayne's arrival at the point where he built Fort Defiance, he started Wells and
his spies down the Maumee River to ascertain the position and condition of the enemy. They started
in the dress and paint of the Aborigines and, when near the British Fort Miami, entered an .■\borieine
village and talked with its people without being suspicioned. Beyond this village they captured a man
and woman (mentioned above in one of M'Kee's letters) without their resisting, and started on their
return to the army. A little after dark they came near a large encampment of Aborigines who were
merrily passing the evening. They detoured this camp and. about half a mile above it along the river
they halted, tied and gagged their captives, and riding boldly among the savages plied tliem with
questions regarding General Wayne's army and where they were to gather to resist its advance. The
savages gathered around them and were very communicative until one, somewhat removed, expressed
the belief that the strangers were not their friends. Wells understood the remark and, giving the
signal, each rifle in his company was fired at short range, each killing a savage. They turned, put spurs
to their horses on which they had remained seated, picked up their prisoners, and hoped to escape
injury by lying close to their horses. They were pursued, fired upon, and two were wounded — Wells
through the bone of the arm carrying his rifle which dropped to the ground, and a bullet passed under
M'Clellan's shoulder blade, coming out at the top of the shoulder. They were about thirty miles from
the mouth of the Auglaise where the army was building Fort Defiance, and one of the parly rode for-

188

THE MAUMEE RIVER BASIN.

The testimony of savages of different trilies \'ct lurttier confirm ttie
influence of ttie Britisfi in promoting tfie war, even after most of tfie
tribes desired peace witli tlie Americans. '

Major Generaf Cfiarfes Scott witli aliout sixteen fiundred volunteer

cavalymen from Ken-
tucky wlio liad tieen
sent tiome for ttie
winter, rejoined the
armv, then number-
ing possibly two
thousand soldiers, at
Greenville, Ohio,
llfith July, 1794: and
the next da\' General
Wayne ordered the
general a d va n c e
movement for the
•iSth.

This was to be a
most momentous
campaign. If this,
the third army be
defeated, the country
west and southwest
of the Allegheny
Mountains would,
evidently, thence-
forth be completely
dominated by the
British, and completely lost to the Americans. On account of its
supreme importance, the ability and signal success with which it was
conducted by General Wayne, and the original records being the only

MAJOR GENERAL ANTHONY WAYNE.

Born in Easttown, Chester County, Pennsylvania, Isl Jaiuiary, 1745,
Died at Erie, Pa., l.'ith December, 17%.

ward at full speed for help. Upon his arrival at camp 'General Wayne at once dispatched a surgeon
and a company of his swiftest dragoons, who brought the wounded, and the prisoners safely to camp.'

In regard to plainling, bravery, and daring, American scouts far excelled the savages. William
Wells remained a valuable scout and interpreter. He married a sister of the noted Miami chief Little
Turtle, and exerted a great influence over that chief and his tribe favorable to the Americans. A large
tract of land at Fort Wayne was given to him (see Map, page 97) and there he afterward lived, and there
Little Turtle died 14 July, 1812. Spy Run in this reservation was named from Wells. He was killed by
western savages at the evacuation of Fort Dearborn, Chicago, 15th August, 1812.

* At this time every exertion was being made Iby the British] to aid the Aborigines: and on August
18, 17&4, Governor Simcoe wrote to Lord Dorchester that he would ' go to Detroit with all the force he
could muster.' He was too late, however, for on August 20th General Wayne defeated the combined
forces near their own fort — History of Detroit, by Silas Farmer, volume i. See also testimony of Pot-
tawotamis, Shawnees and others before General Wayne in June, 1794. American State Papers, Aborigine
Aifairs volume i, pages 489, 490.

MARCH OF WAYNE'S ARMY TO ST. MARY RIVER. 189

authentic account of it and they being long out of print, the writer
decides to reproduce them in full, beginning with the

Diary of General Wayne's Campaign, by Lieutenant Boyer*

Fort Greenville, where we were employed in erecting huts, and remained until the
28th July, 1794.

Camp at Stillwater. t 28th July. 171)4. Agreeable to the general order of yesterday,
the legion took up their line of march at eight o'clock, and encamped at half past three
on the bank of Stillwater, twelve miles from Greenville. The w'eather extremely warm
— water very bad. Nothing occurred worth noticing.

Camp one mile in advance of Fort Recovery 'iilth July, 17'.)4. At five o'clock left
the camp — arrived on this ground at one o'clock, being fifteen miles. Nothing took
place worth reciting. '

I am now informed that tracks were percei\'ed on our right flank, supposed to be
runners from the Oglaize.J

Camp Bea\er Swamp, eleven miles in advance of Fort Recovery, IHHh July, 1794.
This morning the legion took up the line of march, and arrived here at three o'clock.
The road was to cut, as will be the case on every new route we take in this country.

The weather still warm no water except in ponds, which nothing but excessi\-e
thirst would induce us to drink. The mosfpiitoes are verv troublesome, and larger than

Site of the Fort Adams bviilt b.v General Wayne. In the N, E. '•* of Section 24. Dublin Township.
Mercer County. Ohio. Lookint: northward across the River St. Mary, m the rain 29lh .\pril. iyti:i.

* The American Pioneer volume i, pages 315, 35! et sequentia.

I Stillwater Creek, a tributary of the Miami River.

4 Spies from the Auglaise River down which the army was to pass.

]90

THE MAUMEE RIVER BASIN.

I ever saw. The most of this country is covered with beech, the land of a wet soil inter-
mixed with rich tracts, but no running water to be found. A bridge to be built over this
swamp to morrow, which prevents the march of the legion till the day after. We are
informed there is no water for twelve miles.

July 'list, 1(!U. Commenced building the bridge, being seventy yards in length,
which will require infinite labor ; it will be five feet deep, with loose mud and water.

One hundred pioneers set out this morning, strongly escorted, to cut a road to the
St, Mary River, twelve miles. I expect the bridge will be completed so as to march
early in the morning.

Camp St. Mary River, 1st August, 17iJ4. Proceeded on our way before sunrise,
and arrived at this jjlace at three o'clock, being twelve miles as aforesaid. Our encamp-
ment is on the largest and most beautiful prairie I ever beheld, the land rich and well
timliered ; the water plenty but very bad — the river is from forty-five to fifty yards
wide, in which I bathed. I am told there is plenty of fish in it.

.August "ind, 1794. The legion detained here for the purpose of erecting a garrison
[fort]* which will take up three days. This day one of the deputy quartermasters was
taken up by the Aborigines, t Our spies discovered where four of the enemy had re-
treated precipitately with a horse, and supposed to be the party the above person had
been taken by. ft is hoped he will not give accurate information of our strength.

August .'ird, r7i)4. An accident took place this day by a tree falling on the Com-
mander-in-Chief [General Wayne] and nearly putting an end to his existence ; we
expected to be detained here some time in consequence of it, but fortunately he is not
so much hurt as to prevent him from riding at a slow pace. No appearance of the
enemy to-day, and think they are preparing for a warm attack. The weather very hot
and dry, without any appearance of rain.

Camp Thirty-one miles in advance
of Fort Recovery, 4th August, 1794.
The aforesaid garrison [fort] being com-
pleted, Lieutenant Underbill with one
hundred men left to protect it ; depart-
ed at six o'clock and arrived here at
three o'clock, being ten miles. The
land we marched through is rich and
well timbered, but the water scarce and
bad ; obliged to dig holes in boggy pla-
ces and let it .settle.

Camp Forty-four miles in advance
of Fort Recovery, 0th August, 1794. J
We arrived at this place at four o'clock,
nothing particular occurring. The land
and water as above described — had
some rain to-day.
Camp Fifty-six miles from Fort Recovery, Hth August, 1794. Encamped on this
ground at two o'clock. In the course of our march perceived the track of twenty Abori-
gines. I am informed we are within six miles of one of their towns on the Oglaize river

Ground plan of Fort Adams established by General
Wa.vne 3rd AuRust, 1794. Abandoned by its carrison
of .^ United States Troops in the early summer of
1796- From the American Pioneer.

' Fort Adams, located on the south (left) bank of the St. Mary River, three and three-fourths miles
np stream (eastward! from the present Rockford, Mercer County, Ohio, formerly known as Shane's
Crossinc for many years,

I This man deserted. See General Wayne's letter on subsequent pace

Z Near the present villafie of Fort Jennincs, Putnam County, Ohio.

«r

ARRIVAL OF WAYNE'S ARMY AT THE MAUMEE. 191

supposed to be the upper Delaware town.* If so. I expect to eat green .corn to-morrow.
Our march this day has been through an e.\ceeding fine country, but the water still bad ;
the day cooler than heretofore.

Camp sixty-eight miles from Fort Recovery,! 7th .-August, 1704. This day passed
the upper town on the Oglaize [Auglaise River] which the Aborigines evacuated
some time ago. I expect to see one of their new towns, where I am told there are all
sorts of vegetables, which will be very acceptable to the troops. We have had no
appearance of Aborigines today.

LONinTVDt \^ FROM WASHINGTON
lA'

l"^/^

wnU^>

Muh

^^*'1^'^;;^""i

Defiance iCovyNTr

Noble Tow\N5hipi

^.e!

HLAfND

^^^i

5cjo

1 ftOiflp ^J

How

■'??<

^^/

erir

N5HIP

CamK
D-.-Vg is t —

0*0 w

^^f^.^'

>:v

WDfflANCL

SREENVILUf '

-J_

Township

TREATY

_c.

iUNE

Township L
'Itefidnce City Limits

z A Five prehistoric Bvial Mounds

5 B Thrci Later Aboriqimdl Burial Places

S cTTviz Aboriijinal Com yields

5 D Five Appk Orchards pidt?ted bu The Early French

\ ETwo 5V7dwr7ee VilldOes in ]79Z

u) F Nirje Earlier and Later flboriijmalVilldOeOTJGirtjpinij Sif^s

a OAborirtmdl Council Oak ,CvT Pown About I8fe5

GGeneral Wdyr7e'5f6r"t Befidrpce I79A Au^ustSth
Nol NoZ.NoJ, H J Gen WincWesterstive Cdmpmij) 5ite5 18IZ

K General Winchesters Abdtis 181 Z

L fort WinchesTir. leiZ

Ga-Enca'r)pinenT&ei7WaYr7e'5 Arwy Aucj 2? te5eptl3. 1754

M "Buridl Ground of Soldiers

N frcstorz Islarjd

P Bloddett Island [blown down in 1887

^ Hie Larjcsf and most T^inous Appl« Tree onT^ecorJ Was

LONGITUDE W FROM GREEN\A/iCH

84* 24'

MAP SHOWING THE SITES OF THE PREHISTORIC AND EARLY HISTORIC PLACES
of most interest at Defiance, Ohio. A Field Assistant in the I'nited States Coast and Geodetic
Survey contirmed the Author's computation of Latitude and Longitude as here recorded. He also set
a stone about forty rods northeast of the main building of Dehance College near the north limit of the
City, and there computed the earth's magnetism July 21. 1903. as follows: Intensity. .1869 dynes;
Dip. 72° 3'='; Declination. 20' west.

Camp Grand Oglaize, + 8th August, Kill. Proceeded on our march to this place at
five o'clock this morning, and arrived here at the confluence of the Miami [Maumee]
and Oglaize [Auglaise] rivers at half past ten, being seventy-seven miles from Fort

* Site of the present village of Charloe, Paulding County, Ohio.

t Near mouth of Crooked (Flat Rock) Creek. Paulding County. Ohio.

t Junction of the Auglaise River with the Maumee. site of the present City of Defiance. Ohit

192 THE MAUMEE RIVER BASIN.

Recovery. This place far excels in beauty any in the western country, and believed
equalled by none in the Atlantic States. Here are vegetables of every kind in abun-
dance, and we have marched four or five miles in corn fields down the Oglaize
[Auglaise] and there are not less than one thousand acres of corn [Zea. mays] round
the town.* The land in general of the fir nature.!

This country appears well adapted for the enjoyment of industrious people, who
cannot avoid living in as great luxury as in any other place throughout the states. Nature
having lent a most bountiful hand in the arrangement of the position, that a man can
send the produce to market in his own boat. The land level and river navigable, not
more than sixty miles from the lake [Erie].

The British have built a large garrison [fort] about fifty miles from this place, and
our spies inform us that the enemy are encamped about two miles above it by the river.

Grand Oglaize. !)th August, 1794. We remain here. The Commander-in-Chief
has ordered a garrison [Fort Defiance] to be erected at the confluence of the Miami
[Maumee] and Oglaize [Auglaise] rivers, which was begun this morning, and will take
up some time; by this means the troops will be much refreshed, as well as the horses
and cattle, the latter being much wearied and in need of a recess of labor. No appear-
ance of an enemy.

Grand Oglaize [Defiance] 10th August, 171(4. The troops in good spirits. No
interruption from, or account of, the enemy. We have plenty of vegetables. One of
our militia officers was wounded by his own sentinel by mistake.

Grand Oglaize, 11th August, 1794. Nothing occurs to prevent the completion of our
work. J

Whatever diary was written by Lieutenant Boyer for the dates of
l'2th to 15th August inclusive, styled 'a few leaves' by John S. Wil-
liams editor of The American Pioneer, was lost previous to September,
1^42. The preserved dates continue as follows:

[August 1.1, 1794.] Took up the line of march [from Fort Defiance] and

* The British should be largely credited for tliis agricultural thrift on account of their encourape-
nient of it; but the Aborigine women did the work of planting and cultivating.

t This expression was due to the Red Cedar trees [Junlperous Virginiana. L.) seen along the
rivers. Fir trees proper have not been found indigenous alone the Maumee and Auglaise Rivers.

?The 11th August, 1794, William Wells, one of General Wayne's scouts, took a Shawnee prisoner
near the foot of the lowest Maumee Rapids and, upon examination by General Wayne at the mouth of
the Auglaise River he testified as follows :

(Juestion— When did the Aborigines receive information of the advance of the army ? Answer —
The first information was from a white man who came in of his own accord about ten days since.
Q. — Where are the Aborigines at this time ? A.^At Colonel McKee's. Q.— Where are the British and
what are their numbers ? A — In a fort about one mile below Colonel McKee's, on the north side of the
river, situate on a hill or bank close by the margin where are about 300 men. They are now at work at
the fort. Q. — What number of guns have they in the fort ? A. — Four or five. C'-~^What number of
warriors are at McKee's and what nations do they belong to ? A.^-There are six hundred, who aban-
doned this place lat the niouth of the Auglaise Riverl on the approach of the army ; Shawnese about 200.
but no more; Delawares, about 300; Miamis. about 100; and warriors of other tribes, about 100. Q. —
What number are expected to assemble, in addition to those now at the foot of the Rapids ? A.— In all
about 400 men; Wyandots. 300, and Tawas [Ottawas] about 240. A. — What number of white men are to
join, and when ? A. — Mr. or Captain Elliott set out for Detroit six days since and was to be back yester-
day with all the militia, and an additional number of regular troops, which with those already there
would amount to 1000 men. This is the general conversation among the Aborigines, and Captain Elliott
promised to bring that number. Colonel McKee's son went with Elliott, as also the man who deserted
from this army on its march. <J. — When and where do the Aborigines mean to fight this army ? A.^At
tlie foot of the rapids. The white man who came in. told the Aborigines and Colonel McKee that the
-army was destined for that place.

MARCH OF WAYNES ARMY DOWN THE MAUMEE. 195

at one arrived on this ground without any occurrence. Our camp is situated in sight of
Snaketown* by the Miami of the Lake [Maumee River]. Vegetables in abundance.

Camp Nineteen miles from Oglaize, Kith August, li!U.i' Our march this day was
through a bushy ground, and the road generally bad. Miller (the flag)t returned
this day from the enemy with information from the tribes, that if the Commander-in-
chief would remain at Grand Oglaize ten days they would let him know whether they
would be for peace or war.

Camp Thirty-one miles from Camp Oglaize|| 17th August. 1794. This day a small
party of the enemy s spies fell in with ours ; both parties being for discoveries, they
retreated, at which time the enemy fired and wounded one of our horses. Our
camp, head of the Rapids.

Camp Forty-one miles from Grand Ogteize [at Roche de Bout] 18th August, 1794.
The legion arrived on this ground, nothing particular taking place. Five of our
spies were sent out at three o'clock — they fell in with an advanced body of the enemy,
and obliged to retreat ; but May, one of our spies, fell under the enemy's hold. What
his fate may be must be left to future success.^

Camp Deposit^ 19th August, 1794. The legion still continued in encampment, and
are throwing up works to secure and deposit the heavy baggage of the troops, so that
the men may be light for action, provided the enemy have presumption to favor us
with an interview, which if they should think proper to do, the troops are in such high
spirits that we will make an easy victory of them.

By this morning's order, the legion is to march at five o'clock.

Camp in sight of a British garrison on the Miamis of the Lake,** August 20, 1794.
One hundred and fifty miles from Greenville. This day the legion, after depositing
every kind of baggage, took up the line of march at 7 o'clock and continued their route
down the margin of the river without making any discovery until eleven o'clock,
when the front guard, which was composed of mounted volunteers, were fired on by
the enemy. The guard retreated in the utmost confusion through the front guard of
the regulars, commanded by Captain Cook and Lieutenant Steele, who, in spite of
their utmost exertion, made a retreat. These fell in with the left of Captain Howell
Lewis' company of light infantry and threw that part of the men into confusion,
which Captain Lewis observing, he ordered the left of his company to retreat about

* On the site of the present Florida, Henry County, Ohio.

t About the site of the present Napoleon, Henry County, Ohio.

t Christopher Miller, see ante page 187, sent with a (white) flag of truce to offer peace to the
Aborigines. Compare General Wayne's report on subsequent pace.

11 At the head of the Grand Rapids of the Maumee River.

^ The story of William May's capture and of his fate, is thus told by John Brickell who saw May at
the time when he (BrickelU was then a young captive, viz : Two or three days after we arrived at the
[lower Maumee! Rapids, Wayne's spies canie right into camp among us. I afterwards saw the survivors.
Their names were Wells. Miller, McClelland, May, Mahatty. and one other whose name I forgot. They
came into camp boldly and fired on the Aborigines. Miller was wounded in the shoulder. May was
chased by the Aborigines to the smooth rock in the bed of the river, where his horse fell, and he was
taken prisoner. The others escaped. They took May to camp where they recognized him as having
been a captive among them, and having escaped [see ante page 1781. They said: We know you; you
speak Aborigine language; you not content to live with us; to-morrow we take you to that tree [pointing
to a very large oak at the edge of the clearing which was near the British fortl we will tie you fast, and
make a mark on your breast, and we will see which one of us can shoot nearest it. It so turned out.
The next day. the day before the battle [of Fallen Timber! they riddled his body with bullets, shooting
at least hfty into him— The American Pioneer vol. i, page ,r2.

^ At Roche de Bout. See engraving, and Chapter on the Maumee River.

* ' Fort Miami on the left ( north ) bank of the Maumee River near the lower side of the corporate
limits of the present Village of Maumee, Lucas County, Ohio, See Map of lower Maumee River,

194

THE MAUMEE RIVER BASIN.

forty yards, where he formed them and joined the right which had stood their
ground. They continued in this position until they were joined by part of Captain
Springer's battalion of riflemen, which was nearly fifteen minutes after the firing
commenced, who drove the enemy that had attempted to flank us on the right
[probably at the site of Turkeyfoot Rock]. Nearly at the same time, the right
column came up, and the charge was sounded -the enemy gave way and fired scattering
shots as they run ofl.

About the time the right column came up, a heavy firing took place on the
left, which lasted but a short time, the enemy giving way in all quarters, which left us
in possession of their dead to the number of forty. Our loss was thirty killed and one
hundred wounded. .\mong the former we have to lament the loss of Captain Miss
Campbell of the dragoons, and Lieutenant Henry B. Fowles of the 4th sub-legion;
and of the latter. Captains Prior of the first, Slough of the fourth, and Van
Rensselaer of the dragoons, also Lieutenant Campbell Smith of the fourth sub-
legion. The whole lo.ss of the enemy cannot at present be ascertained, but it is more
than probable it must have been considerable, for we pursued them with rapidity
for nearly two miles.

:\i.\imi;k kivkk .\.\ij mi.\.mi a'sd krie c.an.al.

Lookiiii^ iiuitlieast down the livei" .April i."i, I'.hM. Roche de Bout (point of ronk) is seen in the livef
one-half mile distant. Above the ledjie of rock on the left shore General Wa.vne bnilt his Fort Deposit
within his encampment, before the Battle of Fallen Timber, the place of whicli is about three miles
down llie river. In the left distance is a larye crusher of stone for road macadamizing: and to the
right of it are several derricks of a newly developed petroleum field in the ancient deserted channel of
the Maumee, In Lucas County, Ohio.

As to the number of the enemy engaged in this action, opinions are so various
that 1 am at a loss to know what to say ; the most general opinion is one thousand
fi\'e hundred, one-third of which are supposed to be Canadif.ng;-i I am led to believe
this number is not over the mark. .\fter the troops had taken some refreshment,
the legion continued their route down the river, and encamped in sight of the British
garrison. One Canadian [Antoine Lasselle] fell into our hands, whom we loaded
with irons.

Camp Foot of the Rapids 21st August, \T.H. We are now lying within half a
mile of a British garrison [Fort Miami]. A flag came to the Commander-in-chief,
the purport of which was that he, the commanding officer of the British fort, was
surprised to see an American army so far advanced in this country ; and why they
had the assurance to encamp under the mouths of his Majesty's cannons! The
Commander-in-chief answered, that the aflair of yesterday might well inform him

RETURN OF ARMY FROM BATTLE OF FALLEN TIMBER. 195

why this army was encamped in its present position, and had the fleeing savages
taken shelter under the walls of the fort, his Majesty's cannons should not have pro-
tected them.

Camp Foot of the Rapids 22d August, 1794. We have destroyed all the
property within one hundred yards of the British garrison. The volunteers were
sent down eight miles below the fort, and have destroyed and burnt all the pos-
sessions belonging to the Canadians and savages. The Commander-in-chief led
his light infantry within pistol shot of the garrison to find out the strength
and situation of the place, and in hopes of bringing a shot from our inveterate but silent
enemies. They were too cowardly to come up to our expectations, and all we got by in-
sulting the colors of Britain was a flag, the amount of which was, that the commanding
officer of the fort felt himself as a soldier much injured by seeing His Majesty's colors
insulted, and if such conduct was continued he would be under the necessity of making a
proper resentment ; upon which the Commander-in-chief demanded the post, it being the
right of the United States, which was refused. A small party of dragoons were sent over
the ri\'er to burn and destrov all the houses, corn t*cc.. that were under cover of the fort,
which was effected.

BATTLE FIELD Ol- F.^LLEN TLMBEU.
Ancient River Channel in lore and middle ijround Presrjue Isle, where the battle began,
obscures the Mauniee River on the Riyht. Lookini; Eastward April 1.5, 19(12.

Camp Deposit 2;!d August, K'.U. Having burned and destroyed everything con-
tiguous to the fort [British Fort Miami] without any opposition, the legion took up
the line of march, and in the evening encamped on this ground, being the same they
marched from the 20th. It may be proper to remark that we have heard nothing from
the savages, or their allies the Canadians, since the action. The honors of war have been
paid to the remains of those brave fellows who fell on the 20th, by a discharge of three
rounds from sixteen pieces of ordnance, charged with shells. The ceremony was per-
formed with the greatest solemnity.

Camp Ihirty-two Mile Tree" 24th August, 17!t4. The wounded being well pro-
vided for with carriages, &c.. the legion took up the line of march, and halted in their
old camp about two o'clock in the evening without any accident. In this day's march we
destroyed all the corn and burnt all the houses we met with, which were very considerable.

Camp Fifteen Mile Treef 2.")th August, 1794. The legion continued their march,
and encamped on this ground at three o'clock P. M. This morning a few of the volun-

* Council Ehn at the Grand Rapids of the Mamnee. about thirty-two miles below Defiance. Ohio.
1 At or a little above the present Village of Napoleon. Henry County. Ohio.

196

THE MAUMEE RIVER BASIN.

teers remained in the rear of the army, and soon after the legion took up their line of
march they saw eight Aborigines coming into our camp; they fell in with them, killed
one and wounded two.

BATTLE FIELD OF FALLEN TIMBER.

Looking! south November 13, 1903. up the Mauinee River seen on the left. Presque Isle in cen-
tral distance. Ancient deserted Channel of the Mauniee on the ri^rht. Maumee Valley Electric Railway,
built in 1901, on the left.

General Wayne beean the Battle on Presiju' ile, and the Aborigines were rapidly driven to the
lower lands, and down the river. On the right side of the public road at the foot of Presqu' ile is situated
Turkeyfoot Rock, a fair size Corniferous Limestone boulder, by which, tradition says. Chief Turkey-
foot was killed while trying to rally the retreating Aborigines, see ante page 194.

This place was surveyed, in common with the other historic places along the Mauniee River, in
188S by O. M. Poe, Colonel of Engineers and Brevet Brigadier General United States Army, who reported
favorably to the purchase hereof twelve and one-third acres of land, mostly on Presqu" ile and west of it,
and the erection of a monument, all at a cost of about $17,000. But Congress has not made any appropri-
ation for this purpose.

The surveys of these historic places were the result of the work of The Maumee Valley Monument
Association, which was incorporated 28 July. 1885 ; and which was succeeded in 1899 by the Maumee
Valley Pioneer and Historical Association. In the summer of 1903 this Association acquired title to a
small portion of land around Turkeyfoot Rock which is now established on a permanent foundation. It
is the desire of this Association to acquire title to this Battle Field, and to care for it.

Camp Nine Mile Tree* 2(>th August. 171)4. The legion continued their march, and
after burning and destroying all the houses and corn on their route, arrived on this
ground at two o'clock, being one of our encamping places when on our advance.

*.lust above the present Florida. Henry County. Ohio, nine miles below Detiance.

GENERAL WAYNES ARMY AGAIN AT FORT DEFIANCE. 197

CENKR.U, WiY.NE'S I-IAII.V ENCAMI'MENT,

22^

5
_,t^/P\ /try

IS ;

ttttt

All the wounded that were carried on litters and horseback were sent forward to

Fort Defiance. Doctor Carmichael
through neglect had the wounded men
of the artillery and cavalry thrown into
wagons, among spades, axes, picks, dfec,
in consequence of which the wounded
are now lying in extreme pain, besides
the frequent shocks of a wagon on the
worst of roads. The wounded of the
third sub-legion are under obligations
to Doctor Haywood for his attention
and humanity to them in their distress.

Camp Fort Defiance 2~th August,
ITIM. The legion continued their route,
and at three o'clock were encamped on
the Miami [Maumee River, right bank,
a little below the mouth of the Tiffin]
one mile above the garrison [Fort De-
fiance], On this day's march we de-
stroyed all the corn and burnt all the
houses on our route. The wounded
are happily fixed in the garrison, and
the doctors say there is no great danger
of any of them dying.

Fort Defiance 2Sth August, 17S(4.
The Commander - in - Chief thinks pro-
per to continue on this ground for
some time, to refresh the troops and
send for supplies. There is corn,
beans, pumpkins, &c., within four
miles of this place to furnish the troops
three weeks.

r.EFEBENCE.

1, LioOfattiU MmioV ba«inn,

H, Hi'arc3'i^'''y>

2. LicUtcoiuii Fopri" biurtion

12. Kfoi,-. CiK-vai-.

3. 1'lpiain PorUT* ba.umi.

13,ii;-l H. Thinl fliilhl^^o!

4. Comiin Fcnl'i baiuon.

l.". ...,.( 11.. flM'. *ul-l.:hloH

6. H^»a-qiurt«^
e. I'.rti of drmirry.

17»,„1 l« S.-,-„r,J lut^kCi

10 iu.\-JK K..1K1I. bul-lffpo

7. Srcuixl ir<>op ol JnuooEU.

'^1, ■.:-, i3, i:j, :5, ■iH. ::

9. FiM L'jop of Jr*?i>oii*.

ID. iWl Uoop of dniipon*.

30. Rcar^njri

Geneiai Wayne kept his army secure from be-
ing surprised by the stealthy enemy. This ^ave
rise to the statement by the savages that he never
slept. The rapidity and security of his army's
movement through the enemy's wilderness strong-
hold, caused the savages to call him the wind ; and
after his impetuous, and to them disastrous, charge
at the Battle of Fallen Timber, the survivors called
him The 'Whirlwind' probably in comparison
to the wind that had prostrated the forest at the
Battle Field. The engraving is taken from The
American Pioneer, ii. 39("i.

General Orders.
The Quartermaster General will issue one
gill of whisky to every man belonging to the
Federal army (this morning) as a small com-
pensation for the fatigues they have under-
gone for several days past. Major General
Scott will direct his quartermasters to attend
accordingly with their respective returns.
The Commander-in-Chief wishes it to be fairly
understood that when he mentioned or may
mention the Federal army in General Orders,
that term comprehends and includes the legion

and mounted volunteers as one compound
army, and that the term legion comprehends the regular troops, agreeable to the organization by the
President of the United States, and by which appellation they are known and recognized on all occasions
when acting by themselves, and separate from the mounted volunteers. As the army will probably
remain on this ground for some time, vaults must be dug, and every precaution taken to keep the
encampment clean and healthy.

The legion will be reviewed the day after to-morrow at ten o'clock. In the interim the arms must
be clean and varnished, and the clothing of the soldiers repaired and washed, to appear in the most
military condition possible ; but in these necessary preparations for a review great caution must be used
by the commanding officers of wings, not to permit too many men at one time to take their locks off. or
to be engaged in washing.

All the horses belonging to the quarter master and contractors' department, in possession of the
legion, must be returned this afternoon.

798

THE MAUMEE RIVER BASIN.

This is the first fair day we have had since we began to return to this place, it
having rained nearly constant for five days, which was the occasion of fatiguing the
troops very much.

Fort Defiance 39th August, 1704, We are as yet encamped on this ground; all
the pack-horses belonging to the quarter-master and contractors' department moved
this morning for Fort Recovery, escorted by Bigadier General Todd's brigade of

Looking northwest November 18, I90:i, across Maumee River to site of the tiritish Fort Miami,
built in ,-\pril, 1794, and surrendered to American troops July II, 1796. The road up the distant river bank
passes throuyli the yet existing earthworks.

The United States surveyor of the historic places along the Maumee River in I88JS, recommended
to Congress that 5 6H-100 acres of land including the site of this Fort be purchased and a monument erect-
ed, all at a probable cost of $7,.VHi. Congress has not made any appropriation foi tliis purpose.

mounted volunteers, for the purpose of bringing supplies to this place. It is said the
legion will continue in their present camp until the return of this escort. Our spies
were yesterday twelve miles up this river [the Maumee] and they bring information
that the cornfields continue as far as they were up the river.

Fort Defiance TtOth August. r7!)4. This day at ten o'clock, the Commander-in-
Chief began to review the troops at the posts occupied by the different corps, and I am
led to believe that he was well pleased at their appearance. Major Hughes, Captain
Slough. Captain Van Rensselaer and Lieutenant Younghusband obtained a furlough
to go home to repair their healths, being, as they pretended, very much injured by the
service. I believe the two first and the last mentioned, if they never return will not
be lamented by the majoritv of the army.

The out-guards were much alarmed this morning at the mounted volunteers firing
oft all their arms without our having any notice.

General Oroers. Headuvarters 31st August. 1794.

A general court-martial to consist of live members, will sit to-morrow morning at ten o'clock, for
the trial of such pi isoners as may be brought before them. Major Shaylor. President, Lieutenant Wade,
Judge .advocate.

The disorderly and dangerous practice of permitting the soldiery to pass the chain of sentinels, on
pretext of going after vegetables, can no longer be suffered. In future, on issuing day. only one man

DISCIPLINE. STRENGTHENING OF FORT DEFIANCE. 199

from each mess, properly armed, and commanded by the respective sub-legionary 'Quarter masters, will
be sent as a detachment for vegetables, to march at 7 o'clock in the morning.

The pack-horses shall forage daily under protection of a squadron of dragoons; every precaution
must be taken to guard against surprise. Any non-commissioned officer or soldier found half a mile
without the chain of sentinels, without a pass signed by the commanding officer of wings or sub-legion,
or from Headquarters, shall be deemed a deserter, and punished accordingly. Every sentinel suttering
a non-commissioned officer or private to pass without such written permit, except a party on command,
shall receive fifty lashes for each and every violation of this order.

A fatigue party of three hundred non-commissioned officers and privates, with a proportion of
commissioned officers, will parade at 7 o'clock to-morrow morning, furnished with one hundred axes, one
hundred picks, and one hundred spades and shovels, with arms, commanded by Major Burbeck.

A part of this order was in consequence of three men of the first sub-legion being
either killed or taken bv the enemy when out a foraging, which was done some time
since in a very disorderly manner, at the same time liable to the attacks of the enemy
without having it in their power to make the smallest resistance.

Fort Defiance 1st September. 1 7!U. This morning the fatigue party ordered yes-
terday began to fortify and strengthen the fort and make it of sufficient strength to
be proof against heavy metal. The work now on hand is a glacis with fascines, and a

ditch twelve feet wide and eight feet

deep. The blockhouses are to be
made bomb-proof.

Fort Defiance, 2nd September,
17i)4. Every effective man of the
light troops in the redoubts round
the camp was ordered this morning
to make three fascines.

The foraging party that went out
this day brought in as much corn,
dry enough to grate, as will suffice
the troops three days. The soldiery
get sick very fast with the fever and
ague, and have it severely.

Fort Defiance ord September,
1794. Nothing but hard fatigues
going forward in all quarters. The
garrison [the Fort] begins to put on
the appearance of strength, and will
in a few days be able to stand the
shock of heavy cannon. The troops
are very sickly, and I believe the
longer we continue in this place the
worse it will be.

Fort Defiance 4th September, 17114.
The number of our sick increases
daily ; provision is nearly exhausted ;
the whisky has been out for some

GROUND PLAN OF FORT DEFIANCE.
Distance between opposite Palisades. ItXf feet ;
length of Palisades between Blockhouses, seventy-five
feet. The entrance was on the southwest side by means of
a Drawbridge that was raised and lowered over the Ditch
by chains working over the top of the Palisade timbers, be-
tween which there was a Gate. The Rivers were approached
for water at their junction under protection of triangular
Palisade and l^nderground way. The Ditches, sites of

Blockhouses and Palisades, yet remain (19t>4) in fair out

line. From Researches and Surveys by Charles E. Slo- time, which makes the hours pass

cum. Compare American Pioneer, volume ii, pages 3K6- heavily to the tune of Roslin Castle.

87, and copies therefrom. , . ^ -^ .■ ^u

' when in our present situation they

ought to go to the quick step of the merry man down to his grave. Hard duty and scant

allowance will cause an army to be low spirited, particularly the want of a little of the wet.

If it was not for the forage we get from the enemy's fields, the rations would not

be sufficient to keep soul and body together.

200

THE MAUMEE RIVER BASIN.

* Fort Dehance was the sironyest fortitication built by General Wayne— where he could defy the
hostile Aborigines and the British — and he styled it 'an Important and Formidable Fort.' His careful
study of the strong British Fort Miami induced the strenetheninK of Fort Defiance after the return of
the army from the Battle of Fallen Timber, it beiny thought possible, if not probable, that the Aborigines

LIEUTENANT BOYER'S DIARY CONTINUED. 20]

Fort Defiance .'nh September, 17i*4. No news of the escort ; this day the troops
drew no flour, and I fear we will shortly draw no beef; however, as long as the issuing of
beef continues the troops will not suffer, as there is still corn in abundance along the
river.

Fort Defiance fUh September. 1704. The work on the [Fort] garrison, goes on with
life and will be completed in a few days. The weather very wet and cold ; this morning
there is a small frost.

Fort Defiance 7th September, r7!*4. Nothing of consequence took place this day.
Our sick are getting better.

Fort Defiance 8th September, 17i(4. This day brings us information of the escort ;
by express we learn it will be with us to-morrow. It will be fortunate for us should
provisions arrive, as we have not drawn any flour since the 7th instant ; nevertheless
we have the greatest abundance of vegetables.

Fort Defiance 9th September, 1704. The escort has not yet arrived, but will be
in to-morrow. General Scott with the residue is ordered to march to-morrow morning
at reveille. The Commander-in-Chief engaged with the volunteers [General Scott's com-
mand] to bring on the flour from Greenville on their own horses, for which they are to
receive three dollars per hundred, delivered at the Miami villages, [the present Fort
Wayne. Indiana].

Fort Defiance 10th September. 171)4. The escort arrived this day about ^^ o'clock,
and brought with them two hundred kegs of flour and nearly two hundred head of
cattle. Captain Preston and Ensigns Strother, Bowyer and Lewis, joined us this
day with the escort. We received no liquor by this command, and I fancy we shall
not receive any until we get into winter quarters, which will make the fatigues of the
campaign appear double, as I am persuaded the troops would much rather live on
half rations of beef and bread, provided they could obtain their full rations of whiskey.
The vegetables are as yet in the greatest abundance. The soldiers of Captain William
Lewis' company are in perfect health, the wounded excepted.

Fort Defiance 11th September, 171*4. This day General Barber's brigade of
mounted volunteers marched for Fort Keco\ery for provisions, to meet us at the Miami
villages [the present Fort Wayne] by the '*Oth.

might raHy and. aided a^ain by the British, endeavor to destroy ii. It was principally built between
the 8th AuEUst and the Nth September. 1794.

Outside the Palisades and Blockhouses there was a glacis or wall of earth eii;ht feet thick, whicli
sloped outwards and upwards, and was supported on its outer side by a log wall and fascines. A ditch
encircled the entire works excepting the east side of the east Blockhouse which was near the precipi-
tous bank of the Auglaise River along which was a line of fagots. The Ditch was fifteen feet wide and
eight feet deep. It was protected by pickets eleven feet long and nearly a foot apart, secured to the
log walls, and projecting over the Ditch at an angle of forty-five degrees. The outlines of these earth-
works are yet well maintained.

Generally this Fort was garrisoned by about one hundred men, with an armament of several
small field cannon which had been dismounted and brought through the forest on the backs of horses.
Captain William March Snook commanded it for three or four months, and Major (afterwards Colonel)
Thomas Hunt about eighteen months. It was probably dismantled and abandoned by I'nited States
soldiers about the 1st June, 1796.

The site has continued the property of the (\'iltage and the) City of Defiance, and it is freely open
as a Public Park. This Fort Defiance Park was surveyed, in common with the other historic places
along the Maumee River, in August, 1K8M, under the supervision of Colonel O. M. Poe, of the Corps of
Engineers of the United States Army, and in obedience to Act of Congress approved 24th May, 188H. A
monument was recommended for this place to cost five thousand dollars; but the bill was not passed.
John S. Snook, M. C. introduced a bill to the Linited States House of Representatives February 10.
1904, for the appropriation of $"3.'),(XK) for the erection of a monument in this Park to the honor of General
Anthony Wayne. The Trustees of The Defiance Public Library, by permission of the City Council,
located the Carnegie Library building in this Park west of the Earthworks in 1904. See Chapter on
Libraries.

202 THE MAUMEE RIVER BASIN.

Fort Defiance 12th September, 1794. This day the pioneers were ordered to cut
the road up the [north side of the] Miami [Maumee] under the direction of the sub-
legionary quartermaster ; they are to commence at seven o'clock to-morrow morning.

Fort Defiance fifth September. 1794. This day a general order was issued, setting
forth that the legion would march to-morrow morning precisely at seven o'clock, every
department to prepare themselves accordingly. The squaw that Wells captured on the
11th August, was this day liberated and sent home. Three soldiers of the 1st and three
of the 3rd sub-legions deserted last night : sixteen volunteers pursued them ; they are to
receive twenty dollars if they bring them in dead or alive.

Camp Hi Mile Tree* 14th September. 17!M. The legion began their march for
the Miami villages at 7 o'clock this morning and encamped on this ground at ii o'clock,
after marching in the rain eight hours.

Camp 2.'!rd Mile Treet l-)th September, 1794. The legion marched at 0 and en-
camped at 4 o'clock. Captain Preston, who commanded the light troops in the rear,
got lost and lay out from the army all night with a large part of the baggage.

Camp 33rd Mile TreeJ Kith September, 1794. We encamped on this ground at 4
o'clock, after passing over very rough roads, and woods thick with brush, the timber very
lofty and the land generally rich and well watered.

Camp Miami 'Villagesll 17th September. 1794. The army halted on this ground at 5
o'clock P. M., being 47 miles from Fort Defiance and 14 from our last encampment;
there are nearly five hundred acres of cleared land lying in one body on the rivers St.
Joseph, St. Mary and the Miami [Maumee] ; there are fine points of land contiguous to
these rivers adjoining the cleared land. The rivers are navigable for small craft in the
summer, and in the winter there is water sufficient for large boats, the land adjacent
fertile and well timbered, and from every appearance it has been one of the largest
settlements made by the Aborigines in this country.

Camp Miami 'Villages l.Sth September, 1794. This day the Commander-in-Chief
reconnoitered the ground and determined on the spot to build a fort. The troops
fortified their camps, as they halted too late yesterday to cover themselves. Four de-
serters from the British came to us this day ; they bring information that the Aborigines
are encamped eight miles below the British fort [Miami] to the number of 1(300.

Camp Miami 'Villages 19th September, 1794. This day we hear that General Bar-
ber's brigade of mounted volunteers are within twelve miles of this place, and will be in
early to-morrow with large supplies of flour ; we have had heavy rains, the wind north-
west, and the clouds have the appearance of emptying large quantities on this western
world.

Camp Miami 'Villages 20th September, 1794. Last night it rained violently, and
the wind blew from the northwest harder than I knew heretofore. General Barber with
his command arrived in camp about 9 o'clock this morning with ."i."i3 kegs of flour, each
containing 100 pounds.

Camp Miami Villages 21st September, 1794. The Commander-in-Chief reviewed
the legion this day at 1 o'clock. All the quartermaster's horses set off this morning,
escorted by the mounted volunteers, for Greenville and are to return the soonest
possible. We have not one quart of salt on this ground, which occasions bad and dis-
agreeable living until the arrival of the next escort.

Camp Miami 'Villages 22nd September, 1794. Nothing of consequence took place
to-day except that the troops drew no salt with their fresh provisions.

'Near the mouth of Platter Creek, westward from Defiance eleven and a half miles.
1 Nearly opposite the present Village of Antwerp, Paulding County, Ohio,
t Near the east line of Milan Township, Allen County, Indiana.
IIAt the head of the Maumee River. See map ante pa^e 97.

BEGINNING CONSTRUCTION OF FORT WAYNE. 203

Camp Miami Villages 2lird September, ITW. Four deserters from the British
garrison arrived at our camp; they mention that the Aborigines are still em'bodied on the
Miami [Maumee] nine miles below the British fort [at the mouth of Swan Creek] ; that
they are somewhat divided in opinion, some are for peace and others for war.

Camp Miami Villages 24th September, 17il4. This day the work commenced on
the Fort, which I am apprehensive will take some time to complete. A keg of whiskey
containing ten gallons was purchased this day for eighty dollars, a sheep for ten dollars :
three dollars was offered for one pint of salt, but it could not be obtained for less
than six.

Camp Miami Villages 2.1th September, 1794. Lieutenant Blue of the dragoons was
this day arrested by [on complaint of] Ensign Johnson of the 4th sub-legion, but a
number of their friends interfering the dispute was settled upon Lieutenant Blue asking
Ensign Johnson's pardon.

Camp Miami Villages 2()th September. 17114. M'Clelland. one of our spies, with
a small party came in this evening from Fort Defiance, and brings information that the
enemy are troublesome about the Fort, and that they have killed some of our men under
its walls. Sixteen Aborigines were seen to day near this place ; a small party went in
pursuit of them. I have not heard what discoveries they have made.

Camp Miami Villages 27th September, 17'.M. No intelligence of the enemy. The
rain fell considerably last night ; this morning the wind is southwest.

Camp Miami Villages 2iSth September. 17i(4. The weather proves colder.

Camp Miami Villages .'iOth September. 17i)4. Salt and whisky were drawn by the
troops this day, and a number of the soldiers became much intoxicated, they having stolen
a quantity of liquor from the quartermaster.

Camp Miami Villages 1st October, 1794. The volunteers appear to be uneasy, and
have refused to do duty. They are ordered by the Commander-in-Chief to march to-
morrow for Greenville to assist the pack-horses, which I am told they are determined not
to do.

Camp Miami Villages 2d October, 1794. This morning the volunteers refused to go
on command, and demanded of General Scott to conduct them home ; he ordered them
to start with General Barber, and if they made the smallest delay they should lose all
their pay and be reported to the war office as revolters. This had the desired effect and
they went off, not in good humor.

Camp Miami Villages lid October. 1794. Every officer, non-commissioned officer
and soldier belonging to the square are on fatigue this day, hauling trees on the hind
wheels of wagons ; the first day we got an extra gill [of whiskey] per man, which appears
to be all the compensation at this time in the power of the Commander-in-Chief to make
the troops.

Camp Miami Villages 4th October, 1794. This morning we had the hardest frost I
ever saw in the middle of December; it was like a small snow ; there was ice in our
camp-kettles three-fourths of an inch thick. The fatigues go on with velocity, considering
the rations the troops are obliged to live on.

Camp Miami Villages .5th October. 1794. The weather extremely cold, and hard
frosts; the wind northwest. Everything quiet, and nothing but harmony and peace
throughout the camp, which is something uncommon.

Camp Miami Villages lith October, 1794. Plenty and quietness the same as yester-
day. The volunteers engaged to work on the Fort, for which they are to receive three
gills of whisky per man per day ; their employment is digging the ditch and filling up the
parapet.

Camp Miami Villages 7th October, 1794. The volunteers are soon tired of work and
have refused to labor any longer ; they have stolen and killed seventeen beeves in the
course of these two days past.

204

THE MAUMEE RIVER BASIN.

P E

*Fort Wayne was principally built under direct supervision ot ( .tMiei al Anthony Wayne between the
18th September and 22nd October. 1794. There were but two blockhouses. The palisaded enclosure
was about 150 feet square. The Officers' quarters were at the north ; the Quartermaster's quarters, with
subordinates, at the west, or front ; the Cooks' .quarters at the east ; and the Stores at the south.

GENERAL WAYNE AND ARMY AT HEAD OF MAUMEE. 205

Camp Miami Villages Sth October. 1704. The troops drew but half rations of flour
this day. The cavalry and other horses die very fast, not less than four or five per day.

Camp Miami Villages itth October. 1701. The volunteers have agreed to build a
blockhouse in front of the Fort.

Camp Miami Villages llth October, 1704. A Canadian (Rozelle) [Antoine Lasalle]
with a flag [of truce] arrived this evening; his business was to deliver up three prisoners
in exchange for his brother, who was taken on the 20th August. He brings information
that the Aborigines are in council with Girty and M'Kee near the fort of Detroit ; that all
the tribes are for peace except the Shawneese who are determined to prosecute the war.

Camp Miami Villages 12th October, 1704. The mounted volunteers of Kentucky
marched for Greenville, to be mustered and dismissed the service of the United States
army, they being of no further service therein.

Camp Miami Villages 13th October. 1704. Captain Gibson marched this day, and
took with him a number of horses for Fort Recovery to receive supplies of provisions.

Camp Miami Villages 14th October, 1704. Nothing particular this day.

Camp Miami Villages 15th October. 1704. The Canadian that came in on the llth.
left us this day accompanied by his brother; they have promised to furnish the garrison
at Defiance with stores at a moderate price, which, if performed, will be a great advan-
tage to the officers and soldiers of that post.

Camp Miami Villages KHh October. 1704. Nothing new; weather wet and cold,
wind from the northwest. The troops healthy in general.

Camp Miami Villages 17th October, 1704. This day Captain Gibson arrived with a
large quantity of flour, beef and sheep.

Camp Miami Villages, 18th October, 1704. Captain Springer and Brock, with all
the pack-horses, marched with the cavalry this morning for Greenville, and the foot
[infantry] for [Fort] Recovery, the latter to return with the smallest delay with a supply
of provisions for this post and Defiance.

The Commandants were : Colonel John Francis Haintiainck. 22nd Ociobei. 1794. to 17th May. 1796;
he died at Detroit, llth .-Vpril. 18(>3. Major [afterwards Colonel} Thomas Hunt. 25th May. 1796, to 1799?
He brought his family from Massachusetts to the Fort in 1797, His son General John E. Hunt, was born

here 1st .\pril, 179H. Major Whipple? Major Thomas Fasteuer' Major Zebulon M. Pike. Captain

Nathan Heald. Captain James Rhea, to 13th September. 1812. Captain Hugh Moore, 1812. Captain Joseph
Jenkinson. 1813. The Maumee reeion was at this date in Military District No. 8. Captain [brevet Major)
John Whistler conunanded from 1814 to 1817. He was probably there in the early summer of 1812. The
Fort was generally rebuilt by him in 1814-15. and materially changed. He infused new life in the carrison.
and into the town as well. Major Whistler came to America in Bureoyne's army and was taken prisoner at
Saratoga. He was in St. Clair's army at its defeat in 1791. Was aspiring and won his commissions from
merit. He was the last commander of Fort St. Marys in 1814. He died at St. Louis about 1826. Captain
(afterwards Major and Colonel by brevet) Josiah H. Vose commanded Fort Wayne from 1817 until its
abandonment 19th April. 1819. when it was in Department No. 5, yet subordinate to Detroit. Colonel
John Johnston wrote in 1859 that Major Vose was the only army officer known to him in 1812 who
publicly professed Christianity. He was constant in assembling his men on Sunday, reading the Scriptures
to them and discoursing thereon. He died at New Orleans iDth July, 1845. — Lossings War of 1812,
page 316.

The later garrisons of Fort Wayne numbered as follows: 1st January, 1803, 64 soldiers: Early in
1812. 85 according to the Peace Establishment; 1815, 60; 31st December. 1817, 56; October. 1818. 91 ; 19th
April. 1819, 91 men, viz: Major Vose; 1 Post Surgeon; 2 Captains; 1 1st Lieutenant; 5 Sergeants; 4
Corporals; 4 Musicians (2 fifers. 1 snare drummer and 1 bass drummer) ; and 74 Matrosses (artillerymen)
and Privates. The artillery then consisted of one six and one twelve pounder.

All that is now left to the public of the site of Fort Wayne beside streets, is a small triangular piece
of ground at the northeast corner of Main and Clay Streets, narrowed on the north by the New York,
Chicago and St. Louis Railway along the line of the former Wabash and Erie Canal.

In an appendix of the Annual Report of ithe Chief of United States Engineers for 1889. it is re-
commended that a monument to cost $5,000 be erected here ; but Congress has not made up to this time
(1904) any appropriation for this p-urpose- Grand Army Posts have since mounted a more modern cannon
on a high pedestal which is inscribed in memory of General Wayne, and of later wars.

206 THE MAUMEE RIVER BASIN.

Camp Miami Villages Utth October, 1794. This day the troops were not ordered
for labor, being the first day for four weeks, and accordingly attended divine service.

Camp Miami Villages 20th October, 1794. An express arrived this day with dis-
patches to the Commander-in-Chief; the contents are kept secret.

A court-martial to sit this day for the trial of Lieutenant Charles Hyde.

Camp Miami Villages 21st October, 1794. This day were read the proceedings of a
general court-martial held on Lieutenant Charles Hyde (yesterday) ; was found not
guilty of the charges exhibited against him, and was therefore acquitted.

Camp Miami Villages 22d October, 1794. This morning at 7 o'clock the following
companies, under the command of Lieutenant-Colonel-Commandant Hamtramck of the
1st sub-legion, took possession of this place, viz; Captain Kingsbury's 1st; Captain
Greaton's 2d; Captain Spark's and Captain Reed's Hd ; Captain Preston's 4th; and
Captain Porter's, of artillery ; and after firing fifteen rounds of cannon [one for each of
the States then in the Union] Colonel Hamtramck gave it the name of Fort Wayne.

Camp Miami Villages 2)M October, 1794. The general fatigue of the garrison
ended this day and Colonel Hamtramck, with the troops under his command to furnish
[finish] it as he may think fit. All the soldiers' huts are completed except covering, and
the weather is favorable for that work.

Camp Miami Villages 24th October, 1794. This day the troops drew but half
rations of beef and flour, the beef very bad.

Camp Miami \'illages 2.")th October, 1794. Nothing extraordinary the same as
yesterday.

This evening Captain Springer with the escort arrived with a supply of flour and
salt. .\ Frenchman and a half Aborigine came to headquarters, but where they are
from or their business we cannot learn but that it is of a secret nature.

Camp Miami Villages 26th October, 1794. Nothing occurring today except an
expectation to march the day after to-morrow.

Camp Miami Villages 27th October, 1794. Agreeable to general orders of this day,
we will march for Greenville to-morrow morning at 8 o'clock.

Camp Nine miles [southeast] from Fort Wayne 2Sth October, 1794. The legion
took up the line of march at 9 o'clock and arrived here without anything particular
occurring.

Camp Twenty-one miles [southeast] from Fort Wayne 29th October, 1794. The
troops proceeded on their march at sunrise, and arrived on this ground at half past
ff o'clock, our way was through rich and well timbered land, the weather cold and much
like for rain.

Camp Southwest side of St. Mary River 80th October, 1794. The legion proceeded
on their march at 7 o'clock, and arrived here at sunset ; continual heavy rain all day.

Camp Girty Town* 81st October, 1794. The troops took up their line of march at
sunrise, and arrived here three hours after night, through heavy rain.

Greenville 2nd November 1794. This evening the legion arrived here, where they
marched from 28th July, 1794.

We were saluted with twenty-four rounds from a six-pounder. Our absence from
this ground amounted to three months and six days. And so ends the expedition of Gen-
eral Wayne's campaign.

*From James Girty the trader. Site of the present City of St, Marys, Auglaise County, Ohio.

FORT DEFIANCE. BEGINNING AND SURROUNDINGS. 207

CHAPTER VIII.

General Wayne's Reports — Treaty at Greenyille. 1794, 1795.

General Wayne reported to the Secretary of War from time to time,
and such reports as are of interest to this rej^ion are here given:

Head Quarters. Grand Glai.se [Fort Defiance] 14th August, 1794.

Sir ; I have the honor to inform you, that the army under my command took posses-
sion of this very important post on the morning of the .Sth instant — the enemy, on the pre-
ceding evening, having abandoned all their settlements, towns, and villages, with such
apparent marks of surprise and precipitation, as to amount to a positive proof that our
approach was not discovered by them until the arrival of a Mr. Newman, of the Quarter-
master General's department, who deserted from the army near the St. Mary [River]
and gave them every information in his power as to our force, the object of our destina-
tion, state of provision, number and size of the artillery, &c.. &c., circumstances and
facts that he had but too good an opportunity of knowing, from acting as a field quarter-
master on the march, and at the moment of his desertion. Hence. I have good grounds
to conclude that the defection of this villain prevented the enemy from receiving a fatal
blow at this place, when least expected."""

I had made such demonstrations, for a length of time previously to taking up our line
of march, as to induce the savages to expect our advance by the route of the Miami vill-
ages to the left, or towards Roche de Bout by the right ; which feints appear to have pro-
duced the desired effect by drawing the attention of the enemy to those points, and gave
an opening for the arm\' -to approach undiscovered by a devious route, i. e. in a central
direction, and which would be impracticable for an army, except in a dry season such as
then presented.

Thus sir. we ha\'e gained possession of the grand emporium of the hostile ,\liorigines
of the West, without loss of blood. The very extensive and highly cultivated fields and
gardens show the work of many hands. The margin? of these beautiful rivers, the Mia-
mies of the lake [Maumee] and An Glaize, appear like one continued village for a number
of miles both above and below this place [chief Blue Jacket's towns on right bank of
Auglaise River one mile above its mouth, and on left bank of Maumee one and a half
miles below mouth of .Auglaise] nor have I ever before beheld such immense fields of corn
in any part of .America, from Canada to Florida.

We are now employed in completing a strong stockade fort, with four good block
houses by way of bastions, at the confluence of Au Glaize and the Miamies [Maumee]
which I have called Defiance.^ Another fort was also erected on the bank of the [River]
St. Mary twenty-four miles advanced of Recovery, which was named .Adams and endowed
with provision and a proper garrison.

Everything is now prepared for a forward move to-morrow morning towards Roche
de Bout, or foot of the Rapids, where the British have a regular fortification well supplied
with artillery and strongly garrisoned, in the vicinity of which the fate of the campaign
will probably be decided ; as, from the best and most recent intelligence the enemy are
there collected in force, and joined by the militia of Detroit, (Src. &c., possessed of ground
very unfavorable for cavalry to act in. Yet. notwithstanding this unfavorable intelligence.

*This deserter. Newman, was finally arrested at Pittsburn and sent down the Ohio to Headquarters.

+ Regarding the naming of this Fort, tradition says that General Wayne, as the walls assumed the
desired form, remarked that he could here safely defy the savages, the British, and all the devils. Then .
said General Charles Scott who was present, call it Fort Deiiance. ^

208 THE MAUMEE RIVER BASIN.

and unpleasant circumstances of ground, I do not despair of success from the spirit and
ardor of the troops, from the generals down to the privates, both of the legion and
mounted volunteers.

Yet I have thought proper to offer the enemy a last overture of peace; and as they
have everything that is dear and interesting now at stake, I have reason to expect that
they will listen to the proposition mentioned in the enclosed copy of an address*
despatched yesterday by a special flag, who I sent under circumstances that will ensure
his safe return, and which may eventually spare the effusion of much human blood.

But, should war be their choice, that blood be upon their own heads. America
shall no longer be insulted with impunity. To an all-powerful and just God I therefore
commit myself and gallant army, and have the honor to be, with every consideration of
respect and esteem, Your most obedient and very humble servant.

Anthony Wavne.
The Hon. Major General Knox, Secretary of War.

The Report of General Wayne after the Battle of Fallen Timber is
as follows :

Head Quarters, Grand Glaise [Fort Defiance] 2Hth August, 1794.
Sir : It is with infinite pleasure that I now announce to you the brilliant success of
the Federal army under my command, in a general action with the combined force of the
hostile Aborigines, and a considerable number of the volunteers and militia of Detroit, on
the 20th instant, on the banks of the Miami [Maumee] in the vicinity of the British post
and garrison, at the foot of the Rapids.

* To the Delawares. Shawanese, Miamis. and Wyandots. and to each and every one of them, and
to all other nations of Aborigines northwest of the Ohio, whom it may concern :

I. Anthony Wayne, Major General and Commander-in-Chief of the Federal army now at Grand
Glaise [ Fori Defiance 1 and Commissioner Plenipotentiary of the United States of America, for settlinR
the terms upon which a permanent and lasting peace shall be made with each and every of the
hostile tribes, or nations of Aboriirines northwest of the Ohio, and of the said United States, actuated by
the purest principles of humanity, and urtjed by pity for the errors into which bad and desipninc men
have_led you; from the head of my army, now in possession of your abandoned villages and settlements,
do hereby once more extend the friendly hand of peace towards you, and invite each and every of the
hostile tribes of Aborigines to appoint deputies to meet me and my army, without delay, between this
place and Roche de Bout, in order to settle the preliminaries of a lastinp peace which may eventually,
and soon, restore to you the Delawares, Miamis. Shawanese, and all other tiibes and nations lately
settled at this place and on the margins of the Miami I Maumee 1 and au Glaise rivers, your late grounds
and possessions, and to preserve you and your distressed and hapless women and children from danger
and famine during tlie present fall and ensuing winter.

The arm of the I'nited States is strong and powerful, but they love mercy and kindness more than
war and desolation.

And. to remove any doubts or apprehensions of danger to the persons of the deputies whom you
may appoint to meet this army, I hereby pledge my sacred honor for their safety and return, and send
Christopher Miller [see an(e page 1871 an adopted Shawanee, and a Shawanee warrior whom I took
prisoner two days ago, as a flag, who will advance in their front to meet me.

Mr. Miller was taken prisoner by a party of my warriors six moons since, and can testify to you
the kindness which I have shown to your people my prisoners, that is five warriors and two women, who
are now all safe and well at Greenville.

But. should this invitation be disregarded and my flag, Mr. Miller, be detained or injured, I will
immediately order all those prisoners to be put to death, without distinction, and some of them are
known to belong to the first families of your nations.

Brothers: Be no longer deceived or led astray by the false promises and language of the bad
white men at the foot of the Rapids; they have neither the power nor the inclination to protect you. No
longer shut your eyes to your true interest and happiness, nor your ears to this last overture of peace.
But, in pity to your innocent women and children, come and prevent the further effusion of your blood;
let them experience the kindness and friendship of the United States of America, and the invaluable
blessings of peace and tranquility. Anthony Wayne.

Grand Glaise [Fort Defiance] I3th August, 1794, ■ ,

WAYNE'S REPORT OF BATTLE AT FALLEN TIMBER. 209

The army advanced from this place on the 1.5th, and arrived at Roche de Bout on the
18th; the lOth we were employed in making a temporary post for the reception of the stores
and baggage [Fort Deposit] and in reconnoitering the position of the enemy, who were en-
camped behind a thick brushy wood and the British fort.

At S o'clock on the morning of the 20th the army again advanced in columns,
agreeably to the Standing Order of March, the legion on the right, its right flank covered
by the Miamis [Maumee River] one brigade of mounted volunteers on the left under
Brigadier General Todd, and the other in the rear under Brigadier General Barbie. A
select battalion of mounted volunteers moved in front of the legion, commanded by Major
Price who was directed to keep sufficiently advanced so as to give timely notice for the
troops to form in case of action, it being yet undetermined whether the Aborigines would
decide for peace or war. After advancing about five miles Major Price's corps received
so severe a fire from the enemy, who were secreted in the woods and high grass, as to
compel them to retreat. The legion was immediately formed in two lines, principally in
a close thick wood which e.xtended for miles on our left and for a considerable distance
in front, the ground being covered with old fallen timber probably occasioned by a tornado
which rendered it impracticable for the cavalry to act with effect, and afforded the enemy
the most favorable covert for their mode of warfare. The savages were formed in three
lines, within supporting distance of each other and extending for near two miles, at right
angles with the river. I soon discovered from the weight of the fire and extent of their
lines, that the enemy were in full force in front in possession of their favorite ground, and
endeavoring to turn our left flank. I therefore gave orders for the second line to advance
and support the first, and directed Major General Scott to gain and turn the right flank of
the savages with the whole of the mounted volunteers by a circuitous route ; at the same
time I ordered the front line to advance and charge with trailed arms and rouse the
Abori.gines from their coverts at the point of the bayonet and, when up, to deliver a close
and well direct fire on their backs followed by a brisk charge so as not to give them time
to load again.

I also ordered Captain Mis Campbell, who commanded the legionary cavalry, to
turn the left flank of the enemy next to the river, and which afforded a favorable field
for that corps to act in. All these orders were obeyed with spirit and promptitude ; but
such was the impetuosity of the charge by the first line of infantry, that the Aborigines,
and Canadian militia, and volunteers, were driven from all their coverts in so short a
time that, although every possible exertion was used by the officers of the second line of
the legion and by Generals Scott, Todd and Barbie, of the mounted volunteers to gain
their proper positions, but part of each could get up in season to participate in the action,
the enemy being driven in the course of one hour more than two miles through the thick
woods already mentioned, by less than half their numbers.

From every account, the enemy amounte(J to two thousand combatants. The troops
actually engaged against them were short of nine hundred. This horde of savages, with
their allies, abandoned themselves to flight, and dispersed with terror and dismay,
leaving our victorious armv in full and quiet possession of the field of battle which termi-
nated under the influence [range] of the guns of the British garrison, as you will observe
by the enclosed correspondence between Major Campbell, the commandant, and myself,
upon the occasion. [This correspondence is given after this report].

The bravery and conduct of every officer belonging to the army, from the Generals
down to the Ensigns, merit my highest approbation. There were, however, some whose
rank and situation placed their conduct in a very conspicuous point of view, and which I
observed with pleasure and the most lively gratitude ; among whom I must beg leave to
mention Brigadier General Wilkinson and Colonel Hamtramck the commandants of the
right and left wings of the legion, whose brave example inspired the troops. To those I
must add the names of my faithful and gallant Aids-de-camp Captains DeButt and

210 THE MAUMEE RIVER BASIN.

T. Lewis, and Lieutenant Harrison, who, with the Adjutant General. Major Mills,
rendered the most essential service by communicating my orders in every direction, and
by their conduct and bravery exciting the troops to press for victory.

Lieutenant Covington, upon whom the command of the cavalry now devolved, cut
down two savages witli his own hand, and Lieutenant Webb one, in turning the enemy's
left flank.

The wounds received by Captains Slough and Prior, and Lieutenant Campbell
Smith an extra aid-de-camp to General Wilkinson of the legionary infantry, and Captain
Van Rensselaer of the dragoons. Captain Rawlins. Lieutenant McKenny, and Ensign
Duncan of the mounted volunteers, bear honorable testimony of their bravery and
conduct.

Captains H. Lewis and Brock with their companies of light infantry, had to sustain
an unequal fire for some time, which they supported with fortitude. In fact, every
officer and soldier, who had an opportunity to come into action, displayed that true
bravery which will always ensure success. And here permit me to declare that I never
discovered more true spirit and anxiety for action than appeared to pervade the whole
of the mounted volunteers, and I am well persuaded that, had the enemy maintained
their favorite ground for one half hour longer, they would have most severely felt the
prowess of that corps.

But, whilst I pay this just tribute to the living, I must not neglect the .gallant dead,
among whom we have to lament the early death ot those worthy and brave officers
Captain Mis Campbell of the dragoons, and Lieutenant Towles of the light infantry, of
the legion, who fell in the first charge.

Enclosed is a particular return of the [thirty-three] killed and [one hundred]
wounded [eleven of whom died previous to the sending of this report]. The loss of the
enemy was more than double to that of the Federal army. The woods were strewed for
a considerable distance with the dead bodies of the Aborigines and their white auxil-
iaries, the latter armed with British muskets and bayonets.

We remained three days and nights on the banks of the Miami [Maumee] in front
of the field of battle, during which time all the houses and cornfields were consumed
and destroyed for a considerable distance, both above and below Fort Miami, as well as
within pistol shot of that garrison who were compelled to remain tacit spectators to this
general devastation and conflagration, among which were the houses, stores, and prop-
erty of Colonel McKee the British Aborigine agent and principal stimulator of the war
now existing between the United States and the savages.

The army returned to this place [Fort Defiance] on the 27th by easy marches, laying
waste the villages and cornfields for about fifty miles on [along] each side of the Miami
[Maumee]. There remain yet a great number of villages, and a great quantity of corn,
to be consumed or destroyed, upon An Glaise and the Miami [Maumee] above this place,
which will be effected in the course of a few days.

In the interim we shall improve Fort Defiance and, as soon as the escort returns with
the necessary supplies from Greenville and Fort Recovery, the army will proceed to the
Miami Villages [at the head of the Maumee River] in order to accomplish the [final]
object of the campaign.

It is, however, not improbable that the enemy may make one desperate effort against
this army, as it is said that a reinforcement was hourly expected at Fort Miami from Nia-
gara as well as numerous tribes of Aborigines living on the margin and islands of the
lakes. This is a business rather to be wished for than dreaded whilst the army remains
in force. Their numbers will only tend to confuse the savages and the victory will be the
more complete and decisive, and which may eventually ensure a permanent and happy
peace.

CORRESPONDENCE REGARDING EORT MIAMI. 211

Under these impressions, I have the honor to be your most obedient and very hum-
ble servant. Anthony Wayne.

The honorable Major General H. Knox, Secretary of War.

N. B. I forgot to mention that I met my flag [Christopher Miller] on the Kith, who
was returning with an evasive answer in order to gain time for the arrival of the rein-
forcement mentioned by the Shawanee Aborigine, and which actually did arrive two days
before the action.

The correspondence that passed between the British and American
commanders, mentioned on page 209, is as follows:

Miami [MaumeeI River August 21. 1794.
Sir : An army of the United States of America, said to be under your command, having taken post
on the banks of the Miami [Maumee] for upwards of the last twenty-four hours, almost within the reach
of the cuns of this fort [Miamil. beinc a post belonpinK to his Majesty the King of Great Britain, occupied
by his Majesty's troops, and which I have the honor to command, it becomes my duty to inform myself as
speedily as possible, in what light I am to view your making such near approaches to this garrison.

I have no hesitation on my part to say that I know of no war existing between Great Britain and
America.

! have the honor to be. sir, with great respect, your most obedient and very humble servant.

William Campbell,
Major 24th regiment, commanding a British post on the banks of the Miami [MaumeeI. To Major
General Wayne, &c.

Camp on the Bank of the Miami [Maumee] August 31, 1794.

Sir: I have received your letter of this date, requiring from me the motives which have moved
the army under my command to the position they at present occupy, far within the acknowledged juris-
diction of the United States of America. Without questioning the authority or the propriety, sir, of
your interrogatory. I think I may without breach of decorum observe to you that, were you entitled to an
answer, the most full and satisfactory one was announced to you from the muzzles of ray small arms yes-
terday morning in the action against the horde of savages in the vicinity of your post, which terminated
gloriously to the American arms ; but, had it continued until the Aborigines. &c.. were driven under the
influence of the post and guns you mention, they would not have much impeded the progress of the vic-
torious army under my command, as no such post was established at the commencement of the present
war between the Aborigines and the United States.

I have the honor to be, sir, with great respect, your most obedient, and very humble servant.

Anthony Wayne.
Major General, and Commander-in-Chief of the Federal Army.

To Major William Campbell. &c.

Fort Miami August 22d, 1794.

Sir : Although your letter of yesterday's date fully authorizes me to any act of hostility against the
army of the United States of America in this neighborhood under your command, yet, still anxious to
prevent that dreadful decision which, perhaps, is not intended to be appealed to by either of our coun-
tries. I have forborne, for those two days past, to resent those insults you have offered to the British flag
flying at this fort, by approaching it within pistol shot of my works, not only singly, but in numbers, with
arms in their hands.

Neither is it my wish to wage war with individuals ; hut, should you after this continue to approach
my pobt in the threatening manner you are at this moment doing, my indispensable duty to my King and
country, and the honor of my profession, will oblige me to have recourse to those measures which thou-
sands of either nation may hereafter have cause to regret, and which, 1 solemnly appeal to God, I have
used my utmost endeavors to arrest.

I have the honor to be, sir, with much respect, your most obedient and very humble servant.

William Campbell.
Major 24th regiment, commanding at Fort Miami.

Major General Wayne, i^c, &c..

General Wayne adds in his report that

No other notice was taken of this letter than what is expressed in the following
letter. The fort and works were, however, reconnoitered in every direction, at some
points possibly within pistol shot. It was found to be a regular strong work, the front
covered by a wide river, with four guns mounted in that face. The rear, which was
most susceptible of approach, had two regular bastions furnished with eight pieces of

212 THE MAUMEE RIVER BASIN.

artillery, the whole surrounded by a wide deep ditch with horizontal pickets projecting
from the burn of the parapet over the ditch. From the bottom of the ditch to the top of
the parapet was about twenty feet perpendicular. The works were also surrounded by
an abbatis, and furnished with a strong garrison. [The correspondence concluded as
follows] :

Camp, Banks of Miami [Maumee] 23d August, 1794.

Sir : In your letter of the 21st instant you declare ' I have no hesitation, on my part, to say that I
know of no war existint: between Great Britain and America."

I, on my part, declare the same, and that the only cause I have to entertain a contrary idea at
present, is the hostile act you are now in commission of. i. e. by recently taking post far within the well
known and acknowledeed limits of the United States, and erecting a fortification in the heart of the
settlements of the Aboriyine tribes now at war with the United States. This, sir, appears to be an act
of the hi^rhest aggression, and destructive to the peace and interest of the Union. Hence, it becomes my
duty to desire, and 1 do hereby desire and demand, in the name of the President of the United States,
that you immediately desist from anv further act of hostility or aggression, by forbearing to fortify, and
by withdrawing the troops, artillery, and stores, under your orders and direction, forthwith, and remov-
ing to the nearest post occupied by his Britannic Majesty's troops at the peace of 1783. and which you
will be permitted to do unmolested by the troops under my command.

I am. with very great respect, sir, your most obedient and very humble servant,

Anthony Wayne,

Major William Campbell, &c.

Fort Miami 23d August, 17fH,

Sir: I have this moment to acknowledge the receipt of your letter of this date; in answer to
which I have only to say, that, being placed here in the command of a British post, and acting in a
military capacity only, I cannot enter into any discussion, either on the right or impropriety of my occu-
pying my present position. Those are matters that I conceive will be best left to the embassadors of our
different nations.

Having said this much, permit me to inform you that I certainly will not abandon this post at the
summons of any power whatever, until I receive orders to that purpose from those I have the honor to
serve under, or the fortune of war should oblige me.

I must still adhere, sir, to the purport of my letter this morning, to desire that your army, or
individuals belonging to it, will not approach within reach of my cannon, without expecting the conse-
quences attending it.

Although 1 have said, in the former part of m\' letter, that my situation here is totally military, yet,
let me add. sir, that I am much deceived if his Majesty, the King of Great Britain, had not a post on this
river at and prior to the period you mention. (Fort Miami at the head of the Maumee River, captured
by Chief Nicholas in 1763].

I have the lienor to be, sir. with the greatest respect, your most obedient and very humble servant.

William Campbell,
Major 24th regiment, commanding at Fort Miami.

To Major General Wayne, &c.

In his report to the Secretary of War General Wayne writes that
The only notice taken of this letter, was by immediately setting fire
to, and destroying, everything within view of the fort, and even under
the muzzles of his guns. Had Mr. Campbell carried his threats into
execution, it is more than i>rol)able that he would have experienced a
storm.'

Antoine Lassell, a native of Canada and a volunteer in the British
Captain Caldwell's company of refugees, friends and allies of the
hostile Aborigines, was captured by the Americans the 20th August,
the day of the Battle of Fallen Timber, and he testified before General
Wayne at Fort Defiance as follows :

He says that he has resided for twenty-nine years in Upper Canada, twenty-one of
which he has passed at Detroit and on this [Maumee] river, and that he has constantly
traded with the Aborigines all that time ; that he resided at the Miami villages for nine-
teen years before Harmar's expedition, when he kept a store at that place, and used to

SAVAGE TRIBES AND BRITISH INFLUENCES. 215

supply other traders with goods ; that he has since lived chiefly at Bean Creek or Little
Glaise [on left bank of Tiffin River, one rffile below Brunersburg and one mile-and-a-half
from Fort Defiance] at the Little Turtle's town.

That, having lived so long among the hostile Aborigines, he is perfectly acquainted
with the tribes and numbers.

That the Delawares have about MK) men including those who live on both rivers —
the White River and Bean Creek. That the Miamis are about 200 warriors ; part of
them live on the [River] St. Joseph, eight leagues from this place [Fort Defiance] ; that
the men were all in the action [at Fallen Timber] but the women are yet at that place,
or Piquet's village [not far from the present St. Joseph. Indiana] ; that a road leads
from that place directly to it ; [This trail is yet remembered in Defiance County. It
remained until obliterated by the development of farms, in places being noticeable as
late as the year 18(i0] ; that the number of warriors belonging to that place, when all
together, amounts to about 40.

That the Shawanese have about :{00 warriors ; that the Tawas [Ottawas] on this
river are 2.50 ; that the Wyandots are about :i00.

That those Aborigines were generally in the action of the 20th instant, except some
hunting parties. That a reinforcement of regular troops and 200 militia arrived at Fort
Miami a few days before the army appeared ; that the regular troops in the fort
amounted to 2.i0, exclusive of militia.

That about seventy of the militia, including Captain Caldwell's corps, were in the
action. That Colonel McKee, Captain Elliott, and Simon Girty, were in the field, but
at a respectful distance and near the river.

That Colonel M'Kee's existence now depends upon the exertions he can make to
retrieve the loss and disgrace of the Aborigines ; that he will use every influence and
means in his power to raise the distant nations to come forward immediately and assist
in the war.

That, should they not be able to collect in force sufiicient to fight this army, their
intention is to move on the Spanish side of the Mississippi where part of their nations
now live ; that Blue Jacket told him (Lassell) that he intended to move immediately to
Chicago, on the Illinois.

That the Aborigines have wished for peace for some time, but that Colonel M'Kee
always dissuaded them from it. and stimulated them to continue the war.

Colonel John Johnson, while American Agent to the Aborigines
at Fort Wayne knew this Antoine Lasselle, or LaSalle. He was
informed that Lasselle was captured at the Battle of Fallen Timber
while dressed and painted as a savage, and that upon examination at
Fort Deposit he was sentenced to be hung. A temporary gallows was
erected, and the execution was ordered, when Colonel John F. Ham-
tramck of the 1st Regiment Infantry, who was also a Frenchman,
interceded and saved his life. His brother ransomed him at Fort
Wayne the 13th October, 1794 (see ante, page '205) by three American
prisoners. General Wayne and Colonel Hamtramck were quick to see
the worth of these brothers Lasselle to the American cause, and culti-
vated their interest which, from their wit and gratitude, amounted to a
great force in turning the Aborigines from the British. The blanks in
General Wayne's reports on another page may be filled with the name
Antoine Lasselle. Colonel Hamtramck refers to his favorable work in

214 ■ THE MAUMEE RIVER BASIN.

letters given on subsequent pages. In after years Antoine was licensed
to trade with the Aborigines at Fort Wayne. Occasionally, in his rem-
iniscent moods, he would clasp his neck with both hands in reference to
' Mad Anthony's ' (General Wayne's) desire to hang him. Another

prisoner, John Bevin, a drummer in the 24th British regiment, testified
after the battle as follows:

There are now four companies of the 24th at Fort Miami, averaging about .'iO men,
non-commissioned officers and privates included ; that there was part of Governor
Simcoe's corps in the garrison, together with about sixty Canadians ; that the whole
number of men actually in the garrison, including officers, &c., exceeded 400; that the
number of Aborigines, Canadians, &c. in the action [Battle of Fallen Timber] were at
least 2000, according to the report made by Colonel M'Keeand Captain Elliott to Major
Campbell after the action, who declared in his presence that there was actually that
number engaged.

That there were four nine-pounders, two large howitzers, and six six-pounders,
mounted in the fort, and two swivels, and well supplied with ammunition.

That the Aborigines were regularly supplied with provision drawn from the British
magazine in the garrison by Colonel M'Kee.

That a certain Mr. Newman, a deserter from the American army, arrived at the
fort about eight days before the army made its appearance, who gave information to
Major Campbell that the object of the Americans was to take that post and garrison;
that General Wayne told the troops not to be uneasy about provisions, that there was
plenty in the British garrison.

That Governor Simcoe was expected at that place every hour in consequence of an
express sent to Niagara after the arrival of Newman the deserter, but had not arrived
when he came away ; that the distance from Fort Miami to Detroit is sixty miles, which
is generally performed in two days.

The militia of Detroit and its vicinity amounts to near two thousand ; that a
Colonel Baubee commands them; that M'Kee is also a Colonel of militia; that a
Lieutenant Silve of the British regiment is in the Aborigine department and acts as
secretary to Colonel M'Kee; that a Captain Bunbury of the same regiment is also in
the .Aborigine department.

That he has seen a great number of wounded Aborigines pass the fort, but did not
learn what number were killed ; that the retiring Aborigines appeared much dejected
and much altered to what they were in the morning before the action ; that he knew of
one company of volunteers, commanded by Captain Caldwell, all white men and armed
with British muskets and bayonets, who were in the action.

A returned prisoner gave information 21st October, 1794, as
follows :

James Neill, a packhorse-man in the service of Elliott and 'Williams, aged Vi years,
and belonging to Beardstown, in Kentucky, was in the action of the .Wth June at Fort
Recovery, and was taken prisoner by the Aborigines, together with Peter Keil and
another by the name of Cherry, and three pack horse-men.

After he was taken prisoner he was carried to the British fort at the Miami
[Maumee] where, however, he was not permitted to be seen by the British as the Abo-
rigines wanted to carry him to their own town; thence he was taken to Detroit, and
thence to Michilimackinac, where a British officer bought him, who sent him to Detroit
to Colonel England who treated them well, and sent them to Niagara, at which place
Peter Keil, being an Irishman, enlisted in the Queen's rangers.

EVIDENCE AGAINST THE SAVAGES AND BRITISH. 215

Neill understood that there were of Aborigines and white men, 1500 in the attack of
Fort Recovery ; he himself did not see the whole, but he saw upwards of seven hundred.

He understood they lost a great many in killed and wounded ; he himself saw about
twenty dead carried off, and many wounded, while he was tied to the stump of a tree
about half a mile distant from the firing.

The Aborigines, on their return to the Miami fort, asserted that no enemy ever
fought better than the people at Fort Recovery ; and Neill was told by Captain Doyle at
Michilimackinac, that the Aborigines lost two to one that they did at St. Clair's defeat.

Neill was taken by the Shawane.se. and made a present to the Ottawas who live near
the fort at Michilimackinac.

Neill was at Detroit when the news arrived of General Wayne's action with the
Aborigines, the 20th August. He received the information from one John Johnson who
was a deserter from General Wayne's army, and then was a militia man of Detroit, and
in the action against General Wayne. He spoke of the affair as a complete defeat ;
that the Aborigines lost a great many but he could not tell how many. He says the
Aborigines, upon being defeated, wanted to take refuge in the British fort ; that they
were denied, which greatly exasperated them.

The militia of Detroit were again ordered out, and several Captains put in the
guard-house for refusing. He understood the militia men were forced on board vessels
and sent to Roche de Bout.

Upon his arrival at Niagara he understood that most of the troops were ordered to
reinforce the garrison at the Miami [Maumee] River, but Governor Simcoe did not go.

Neill says that it was generally said there were only seven hundred Aborigines at
General St. Clair's defeat.

Immediately following the Battle of Fallen Timber many ot the
savages, not finding the expected support and protection from the
British at Fort Miami, fled to Detroit the British headquarters, where
an estimate placed their number, within a few days, at thirteen hun-
dred. Another evidence of the severe effect of the battle on them and
the British militia with them, was the equipment of another hospital
with an additional surgeon at Detroit, the expense of which was
approved by Lieutenant Governor Simcoe the 31st October. The
British also proceeded at once to strengthen Fort Lernoult at Detroit;
and a blockhouse was built on the opposite side of the river, also six
gunboats for patrolling the river. '

Ten days after the Battle of Fallen Timber, 30th August, 1794,

Colonel M'Kee wrote to Colonel England, commandant at Detroit, as

follows :

Camp near Fort Miami August 30, ITOl.

Sir ; I have been employed several days in endeavoring to fix the Aborigines (who
have been driven from their villages and cornfields) between the fort and the Bay. Swan
Creek is generally agreed upon, and will be a very convenient place for the delivery of
provisions, &c.

The last accounts from General Wayne's army were brought me last night by an
Aborigine who says the army would not be able to reach the Glaise [at Fort Defiance]
before yesterday evening, it is supposed on account of the sick and wounded, many of

"^Michigan Pioneer and Historical Collections. Farmer's History of Detroit and Michigan.

216 THE MAUMEE RIVER BASIN.

whom they bury every day. I propose being in town in a day or two when I hope for the
pleasure of paying you my respects.

The military interests of this reg^ion in the latter part of 1794 are
set forth in the followinjj^ report of General Wayne to the Secretary of
War, viz :

Head Quarters, Miami Villages [Fort Wayne] 17th October, 1794.

Sir; I have the honor to enclose a duplicate of my letter of the 20th ultimo,
together with the general return of the legion, and an invoice of stores and medicine
wanted in the hospital department.

The great number of sick belonging to the mounted volunteers, added to the sick
and wounded of the legion, has exhausted all the stores forwarded for the year 1794, so
that 1 shall be under the necessity of ordering the Surgeon General to purchase a tem-
porary supply at Fort Washington at an advanced but current price, at that place.

The Quartermaster General is directed to make out a return of the stores issued, on
hand, and wanting, in his department. Major Burbeck has similar orders for the
Ordnance Department, which will be transmitted by the first opportunity. The unfor-
tunate death of Mr. Robert Elliot, the acting contractor, who was killed by the
Aborigines on the (ith instant near Fort Hamilton, added to the deranged state of
that department, has made it my duty to order the Quartermaster General to supply
every defect on the part of the contractors, and at their expense, in behalf of the United
States, to be settled at the treasury at a future day. The posts in contemplation at
Chillicothe or Picquetown on the Miami of the Ohio, at Loramie's store on the north
branch, and at the old Tawa town on the AuGlaise [River] are with a view to facilitate
the transportation of supplies by water and which, to a certainty, will reduce the land
carriage of dead or heavy articles, at proper seasons, viz : late in the fall and early in
the spring, to thirty-five miles, and in times of freshets to twenty in place of 17.") by the
most direct road to Grand Glaise [Fort Defiance] and 150 to the Miami Villages from
Fort Washington on the present route of transport in time of war, and decidedly so in
time of peace.

The mounted volunteers of Kentucky marched from this place on the morning of
the 14th instant for Fort Washington, where they are to be mustered and discharged
agreeably to instructions mentioned in the enclosed duplicates of letters to Major
General Scott and Captain Edward Butler, upon the occasion.

The conduct of both officers and men of this corps, in general, has been better than
any militia I have heretofore seen in the field for so great a length of time. But it would
not do to retain them any longer, although our present situation, as well as the term for
which they were enrolled, would have justified their being continued in service until the
14th November, in order to escort the supplies from Fort Washington to the head of the
line, whilst the regular troops were employed in the completion of the fortifications, and
keeping the enemy in check so as to prevent them from insulting the convoys; but they
were homesick. All this I am now obliged to perform with the skeleton of the legion, as
the body is daily wasting away from the expiration of the enlistments of the soldiery.
Nor is it improbable that we shall yet have to fight for the protection of our convoys and
posts. It is therefore to be regretted that the bill in contemplation for the completion of
the legion, as reported by the committee of the House of Representatives, was not passed
into a law in the early part of last session of Congress.

The enclosed estimate will demonstrate the mistaken policy and bad economy of
substituting mounted volunteers in place of regular troops ; and unless effectual measures
are immediately adopted by both Houses for raising troops to garrison the Western
posts, we have fought, bled, and conquered, in vain; the fertile country we are now in

REPORT AND RECOMMENDATION OF GENERAL WAYNE. 211

possession of will again become a range to the hostile Aborigines of the West. who.
meeting with no barrier, the frontier inhabitants will fall an easy prey to a fierce and
savage enemy whose tender mercies are cruelty : and who will improve the opportunity
to desolate and lay waste all the settlements on the margin of the Ohio, and which they
will be able to effect with impunity, unless some speedy and proper measures are
adopted to re-engage the remnant of the legion. The present pay and scanty ration will
not induce the soldiery to continue in service after the period for which they are now
enlisted, and which will expire, almost in toto. between this and the beginning of May.

I had the honor to transmit you a copy of the deposition of a certain

[.A.ntoine Laselle] a Canadian prisoner, taken in the action of the 20th August [the
Battle of Fallen Timber]; his brother arrived at this place on the i::!th instant with a
flag [of truce] and three American prisoners which he redeemed from the Aborigines
with a view of liberating. Enclosed is his narrative given upon oath, by which you will
see that Governor Simcoe. Colonel M'Kee, and the famous Captain Brandt, are at this
moment tampering with the hostile chiefs, and will undoubtedly prevent them from
concluding a treaty of peace with the United States, if possible. I shall, however.

endeavor to counteract them through the means of [Antoine Lasalle]

who has a considerable influence with the principal hostile chiefs, and whose interests it
will eventually be to promote a permanent peace. But. in order to facilitate and effect
this desirable object, we ought to produce a conviction to them, as well as to the British
agents, that we are well prepared for war ; hence I have been induced to bestow much
labor upon two forts [Fort Defiance and Fort Wayne] of which the enclosed are
draughts* and I am free to pronounce them the most respectable now in the occupancy
of the United States, even in their present situation [condition] which is not quite
perfect as yet. The British, however, are not to learn that they may possibly be left
without garrisons ; they well know the term for which the veterans of the legion are
engaged, as well from our laws and proceedings of Congress as from our deserters, and
that no provision is yet made to supplv their places; circumstances that Mr. Simcoe
will not fail to impress most forcibly upon the minds of the .\borigines with whom he is
now in treaty ; and to hold up to them a flattering prospect of soon possessing those
posts, and their lost country, with ease and certainty.

I have thought it ray duty to mention those facts to you at this crisis, to the end that
Congress may be early and properly impressed with the critical situation of the Western
country-, so as to adopt measures for retaining the posts, and for the protection of the
frontier inhabitants, previouslv to the expiration of the term of service for which the
troops have been enlisted. I have the honor to be. Sec.

Anthony W.avne.
Major General Knox. Secretan.- of War.

An army of two thousand non-commissioned officers and privates
was recommended to be enlisted for three years. The general expense
of such army was estimated as follows, viz: Bounty to each soldier
ten dollars: each 'stand of arms' ten dollars: one suit clothing per
year thirty dollars: subsistence per man four dollars per month. Pav
per month : twelve sergeant-majors and quartermaster sergeants seven
dollars each: Eighty-four sergeants six dollars each; ninety-six cor-
porals live dollars each: and one thousand eight hundred and eight
privates each at three dollars per month.

'-■' The writer has been unable lo 6nd ihe plans of the Forts here mentioned, by his several inquiries
at the State and War Departments, and United States Library, at Washington.

218 THE MAUMEE RIVER BASIN.

The return of the army, opinions regarding questions in general,
and the opening of friendly negotiations with the Aborigines, are
announced in the following letter from General Wayne to the Secre-
tary, viz :

Head Quarters, Greenville 12 November, 1794.

Sir ; I have the honor to transmit you a duplicate of my letter of the ITth ultimo
from the Miami villages, and to acknowledge the receipt of a letter from Colonel Alex-
ander Hamilton of the 2.")th September, enclosing an extract of a letter from Mr. Jay
Minister Plenipotentiary from the United States at the court of London, dated the 12th
July, r7!)4 ; also a letter from Major Stagg of the 4th ultimo.

The enclosed copy of a correspondence between the contractor's agents, the
Quartermaster General and myself, will inform you of additional measures taken to
obtain supplies for the support of the respective posts, and the skeleton of the legion.
I have the honor to enclose copies of certain overtures and speeches from the Wyandots
settled at, and in the vicinity of, Sandusky, together with my answer ; what the result
may be is yet very problematical ; they have, however, left two hostages with me (one of
them a young chief) until the return of the flag that went from this place on the .^th
instant, and promised to be here again in the course of twenty days with an answer to
my propositions.

From the enclosed narrative of a half breed, and a brother to (whose

interest I have made it to be true and faithful to the United States) it would appear that
the savages are playing an artful game ; they have most certainly met Governor Simcoe,
Colonel M'Kee, and Captain Brandt, at the mouth of Detroit River, at the proposed
treaty of hostile Aborigines ; and, at the same time, sent a deputation to me with the
overtures already mentioned as coming from only part of one nation ; it is, however,
understood by all, that there shall be a temporary suspension of hostilities for one moon
say until the 22nd instant ; in fact it has been a continued suspension upon their own
part ever since the action of the 20th August, except a few light trifling predatory
parties ; it's true, we always moved superior to insult, which may account for this
apparent inactivity.

Permit me now to inform you that the skeleton of the legion arrived at this place on
the 2nd instant, in high health and spirits after an arduous and very fatiguing, but a
glorious, tour of ninety-seven days ; during which period we marched and countermarched
upwards of three hundred miles through the heart of an enemy's country, cutting a
wagon road the whole way, besides making and establishing those two very respectable
fortifications [Forts Defiance and Wayne] the draughts of which were enclosed in my
letter of the 17th ultimo. [The plans of the Forts, here referred to, cannot be found
in the War Department. They may have been in the British fire of 1814.]

,\s soon as circumstances will admit, the posts contemplated at Picquetown,
Loramie's stores, and at the old Tawa [Ottawa] towns at the head of navigation on
Au Glaise River* will be established for the reception, and as the depositories, for stores
and supplies by water carriage, which is now determined to be perfectly practicable in
proper seasons ; I am, therefore, decidedly of opinion that this route ought to be totally
abandoned and that adopted as the most economical, sure, and certain mode of supply-
ing those important posts, at Grand Glaise [Fort Defiance] and the Miami Villages '
[Fort Wayne] and to facilitate an effective operation towards the Detroit and Sandusky,
should that measure eventually be found necessary ; add to this that it would afford a
much better chain for the general protection of the frontiers, which, with a block house

* Probably al the site of Fort Amanda built in 1H12 at the north line of the present Auplaise
County. Ohio,

SAVAGES SUFFER AFTER BATTLE OF FALLEN TIMBER. 219

at the landing place on the Wabash [Little River] eight miles southwest of the post* at
the Miami Villages [Fort Wayne] would give us possession of all portages between the
heads of the navigable waters of the Gulfs of Mexico and St. Lawrence, and serve as a
barrier between the different tribes of Aborigines settled along the margins of the
rivers. [Here some words, or sentences, are lost] emptying into the creek, as mentioned
in the enclosed copy of instructions of the 22nd ultimo to Colonel Hamtramck.

But, sir, all this labor, and expense of blood and treasure, will be rendered abortive,
and of none effect, unless speedy and efficient measures are adopted by the National
Legislature to raise troops to garri-son those posts.

As I have already been full and explicit upon this subject, in my letter of the l/th
ultimo, I shall not intrude further upon your time and patience than to assure you of the

high esteem and regard with which I have the honor to be, &c.,

Anthony Wayne.
Major General Henry Knox, Secretary of War.

The autumn of 179-t, and the following winter, were times of great
suffering among the Aborigines of the Maumee River Basin. Their
crops being destro\ed by General Wayne's army, rendered them more
than ever dependent on the British who, not being prepared for so
great a task and, withal, quite fatigued already with their exactions
'did not half supply them'.t They were huddled along the Maumee
River at the mouth of Swan Creek where much sickness prevailed on
account of exposures, scant supplies, and want of sanitary regulations.
What few domestic animals they possessed also died or languished on
account of improper food and care and were eaten, even the dogs.
They became impatient, murmured at the failure of the British to pro-
tect and supply them according to promise, and lamented that they
did not make peace with the Americans in oyiposition to the British
influence.]!

They turned to the Americans who were more able and willing to
protect and to supply.il Communications from them were encouraged
by General Wayne and his officers: and they were received at first by
way of iiersons whose interests were enlisted by the General (the
brothers Antoine and Jacques Lasselle particularh') and whose names
were for a time suppressed. Later, some chiefs personally visited
Forts Defiance and Wayne, and General Wayne at Greenville on invi-
tation. Evidence now accumulated that some of the former appeals

* This blockhouse was probably not built, as no further mention of it is found.

t Narrative of John Brickell who was durinc this time with these Aborigines along the Maumee as
a captive of the Delawares— T/ie American Pioneer volume i, page 53.

f Canadian Archives, Letters of Oct. 22. 24, Nov. 2S, and Dec. 7, 1794; Feb. 24 and March 17, 27,
1795.

II See Canadian .Archives, Letter of George Ironside to Alexander M'Kee December 13, 1794, in
which is stated that the Aborigines as yet had felt only the weight of General Wayne's little linger, and
that he would surely destroy all the tribes if they did not turn to peace. M'Kee. in a letter of March
27. 1795, to Joseph Chew Secretary of the British Aborigine Office, chided the government for leaving to
shift for themselves " the poor Aborigines who have long fought for us and bled freely for us, which is no
bar to a peaceable accommodation with .\merica'.

220 THE MAUMEE RIVER BASIN.

to the Aborigines had been intercepted and wholly suppressed by white
people in employ of the British, or by them changed in interpretation
to suit British desires.

Meantime, the settlers at the frontiers of the southern States, in
conjunction with United States troops, were having much trouble in
allaying the hostility of the Cherokees, Creeks, and other southern
Aborigines who had been incited by their attendance at the general
councils held in 179"2-93 at the mouth of the Auglaise River and at the
foot of the lowest rapids of the Maumee, in accordance with the British
efforts 'to unite the American tribes' in their interest.

General Wayne's next report to the Secretary of War, then Tim-
othv Pickering, is as follows:

Head Quarters. Greenville 23rd December, 1794.

Sir '. I have the honor to inform you that the flag from the Wyandots of Sandusky,
after an absence of forty-two days, returned to this place on the evening of the 14th
instant.

The enclosed copies of letters and speeches* will best demonstrate the insidious part
recently taken by the British agents, Messrs. Simcoe, M'Kee, and Brandt, to stimulate
the savages to continue the war, who, being but too well acquainted with the near
approach of that period in which the legion will be dissolved, have artfully suggested a
suspension of hostilities until spring, in order to lull us into a state of security to prevent
the raising of troops, and to afford the .\borigines an opportunity to make their fall and
winter hunt unmolested.

In the interim, the British are vigilantly employed in strengthening and making
additions to their fortification at the foot of the rapids of the Miamies of the lake [Mau-
mee River] evidently with a view of convincing the Aborigines of their determination to
assist and protect them ; hence there is strong ground to conclude that Governor Simcoe
has not received any orders to the contrary, otherwise he would not presume to persevere
in those nefarious acts of hostility.

The Wyandots and other .\borigines, at and in the vicinity of the rapids of San-
dusky [River] are completely within our power, and their hunting grounds all within
striking distance ; hence their present solicitude for a suspension of hostilities.

It is, however, probable that ^ may now be seriously inclined for peace,

being the only surviving principal chief out of four belonging to the Wyandots of
Sandusky ; the three were killed in the action of the 20th August [Battle of Fallen
Timber] and he himself shot through the right elbow which has deprived him of the use
of that arm ; add to this his present candid information of opinion, which is corroborated

by , now with me, who has a little village of his own consisting of a few

Aborigine families settled at and well known to be friendly to the United States.

All those people are, or affect to be, in dread of the hostile Aborigines in the vicinity
of Detroit (who are under the immediate influence of the British agents) on account of

the part they have recently taken. says, that the present flag is sent

without the privity or consent of those tribes, and expresses some doubts of its safe
return should any of the hostile Aborigines meet it on its way home and discover the
object of its mission.

I shall endeavor to benefit by this real, or affected dread, and propose to take them
under the immediate protection of the United States, and build a fortification at the foot

* See American Stale Papers. Aborigine Atlairs volume i, page 54H et sequentia.

TRADING HOUSES AMONG ABORIGINES SUGGESTED. 227

of the rapids of Sandusky [River] as soon as the season and circumstances will permit;
this will serve as a criterion by which their sincerity may be tried, and [is] perfectly
consistent with the treaty of the !lth January, 1780.

But unless Congress has already, or will immediately adopt effectual measures to
raise troops to garrison this as well as the other posts already established, it would only
be a work of supererogation, as the whole must [otherwise] be abandoned by the middle
of May. I have, however, succeeded in dividing and distracting the counsels of the
hostile Aborigines, and hope through that means eventually to bring about a general
peace, or to compel the refractory to pass the Mississippi and to the northwest side of
the lakes.

The British agents have greatly the advantage in this business at present by having
it in their power to furnish the Aborigines with every necessary supply of arms, ammu-
nition, and clothing, in exchange for their skins and furs, which will always make the
savages dependent upon them until the United States establish trading houses in their
country, from which they can be supplied with equal facility, and at reasonable rates.

The country we acquired in the course of the late campaign, and the posts we now
occupy, are happily situate for this purpose and which, with the addition of a post at
Sandusky and one at the mouth of the Miamies of the lake [Maumee River] would
render the .Aborigines as dependent upon the ITnited States then, as they are now upon
the British.* If my recollection serves me, the President has more than once recom-
ended this measure to the serious attention of Congress ; and without its being adopted
we can never expect a permanent peace with, or fidelity from, the Aborigines.

Could I. with truth and propriety, pledge myself to the hostile tribes that this
measure would be adopted, and that they would with certainty be supplied in this way
in the course of the ensuing spring, as well as in the future, I am confident we should
draw them over to our interest, notwithstanding every effort of the British to prevent it :
because the inclemency of the winter season, the sterility of soil, and the scarcity of
game within the British territory, are all opposed to their removing to the north side of
the lakes; and certain I am that, had not Governor Simcoe held up to the Aborigines at
the late council the fond, but I trust idle, hope of compelling the Americans to aban-
don and relinquish to them all the posts and lands on the west side of the Ohio [River]
the principal part of the hostile tribes would either have accepted of the invitation to
treat, or have passed to the Spanish [west] side of the Mississippi in the course of the
fall and winter. Possibly they may yet do the one or the other, as I am informed that
their present dependent situation is far from pleasant ; nor have we much cause to en\'y
the British the pleasure and expense of supporting and clothing this numerous horde of
savages, thrown upon them by their own insidious conduct, and the fortuitous events
of war.

The following' e.xcerpts of letters, communicated by John W. Van
Cleve of Dayton, Ohio, to The American Pioneer 24th June, 1843, were
taken from Colonel John Francis Hamtramck's letter-book which re-
mained, after his death 11th .\pril, 1H03, among the papers of the
Detroit garrison until the surrender of Detroit by General William Hull
in 1812, when an officer of Ohio militia was permitted by the British to
take possession of it. Colonel Hamtramck is described as a small
Canadian Frenchman, but he had proved himself an intelligent, capable
and meritorious officer. His letters throw some interesting side-lights

'■" The surrender of the British Fort Miami to United States troops 11th July. 1796. under the Jay
Treaty, obviated the necessity for building a fort by the lower Maumee.

222 THE MAUMEE RIVER BASIN.

on the events of the times. The first were written from Fort Wayne to

General Wayne at Greenville, viz :

Fort Wayne December ."ith. 1704.

Sir: . It is with a great degree of mortification that I am obliged to inform your

excellency of the great propensity many of the soldiers have for larceny. I have flogged
them until I am tired. The economic allowance of one hundred lashes, allowed by
government, does not appear a sufficient inducement for a rascal to act the part of an
honest man. I have now a number in confinement and in irons for having stolen four
quarters of beef on the night of the 3rd instant. I could wish them to be tried by a
general court martial, in order to make an example of some of them. I shall keep them
confined until the pleasure of your excellency is known.

Fort Wayne December 20, 1704.
Sir; Yesterday a number of chiefs of the Chippeways, Ottawas, Socks [Sacs] and
Potawotamies arrived here with the two Lassells. It appears that the Shawanese, Del-
awares, and Miamies remain still under the influence of M'Kee ; but Lassell thinks that
they will be compelled to come into the measures of the other Aborigines. After the
chiefs have rested a day or two, I will send them to headquarters.

December 20, 1704.
Sir ; Since my letter to your excellency of the present date, two war-chiefs have
arrived from the Miami nation, and inform me that their nation will be here in a few
days, from whence they will proceed to Greenville. They also bring intelligence of the
remaining tribes of savages acceding to the prevalent wish for peace, and collecting for
the purpose the chiefs of their nations, who, it is expected, will make their appearance
at this post about the same time the Miamies may come forward.

Fort Wayne January 1."), 170.5.

Sir ; . . .^ number of chiefs and warriors of the Miamis arri\'ed at the garrison
on the I'ith instant. Having informed them that I could do nothing with them, and that
it was necessary for them to proceed to headquarters, finding it inconvenient for so
many to go, they selected five, who are going under charge of Lieutenant Massie, and
perhaps will be accompanied by some warriors. The one whose name is Jean Baptiste
Richardville, is half white and a village chief of the nation.

As you are well acquainted with the original cause of the war with the .\borigines,
I shall not say much upon it, except to observe that all the French traders, who were so
many machines to the British agents, can be bought, and M'Kee, being then destitute of
his satellites, will remain solus, with perhaps his few Shawanese, to make penance for
his past iniquities.

Since writing the foregoing, I have had a talk with the chiefs. I have shown them
the necessity of withdrawing themselves from the headquarters of corruption, and in-
vited them to come and take possession of their former habitations [across the Maumee
and St. Mary from Fort Wayne] which they have promised me to do. Richardville tells
me, that as soon as he returns he will go on the Salamonie [River] on [near] the head of
the Wabash, and there make a village. He has also promi.sed me to open the naviga-
tion of the Wabash to the flag of the United States. . .

February :ird, 170.").

Sir : Lieutenant Massey arrived on the .'ilst. The Aborigines also returned on

the 20th in high spirits and very much pleased with their reception [by you. General

Wayne] at head-quarters. They assure me that they will absolutely make a lasting

peace with the United States. . .

March 1, 170.i.

Sir: . . 1 have now with me about forty Aborigines on a visit. They are Pota-

THE WINNING OF THE SAVAGES TO PEACE. 22c5

wotamies, who live on Bear Creek [in the present Lenawee County, Michigan]. They
say that as they are making peace with us, they will expect us to give them some corn to
plant next spring. Indeed all the Aborigines who have been here have requested that
I would inform your excellency of their miserable situation, and that they expect every-
thing from you.

March ."), 179.").

Sir; . . A number of I'otawotamie .Aborigines arrived here yesterday from
Huron River. They informed me that they were sent by their nation at that place, and
by the Ottawas and Chippeways living on the same river, as also in the name of the
Chippeways living on the Saginaw River which empties into Lake Huron, in order to
join in the good intention of the other Aborigines, by estalilishing a permanent peace
with the United States. I informed them that I was not the first chief, and invited them
to go to Greenville ; to which they replied that it was rather a long journey, but from
the great desire they had to see The Wind (for they called you so) they would go. I
asked them for an explication of your name. They told me that on the 20th August
last, you were exactly like a hurricane, which drives and tears everything before it.
Mr. LeChauvre, a Frenchman, is a trader with them and has come as their interpreter.
Father Burke continues his exhortations. He assures the inhabitants that if any of
them should be .so destitute of every principle of honor and religion as to aid or advise
the .Aborigines to come to the Americans, they shall be anathematized. He is now a
commissary and issues corn to the Aborigines. Mr. LeChauvre informs me that Burke
is going, in the spring, to Michilimackinac. Of consequence we may easily judge of his
mission. He will, no doubt, try to stop the nations from coming in to the treaty. How-
would it do to take him prisoner? I think that it could be done very easily.

March 17, 17!»,i.
Sir : . . I had very great hopes that the man who deserted when on his post
would have been made an example of ; but weakness too often appears in the shape of
lenity, for he was only sentenced to receive one hundred lashes, to be branded, and
drummed out. This man, from his past conduct, was perfectly entitled to the
gallows. . .

March 27, 17'.r).

Sir ; . . Le Gris [Nag-oh-quang-ogh] the village chief of the Miami nation, and
one of the commanding trumps in M'Kee's game, has at last come in. He stood out for
a long time, but from a number of circumstances, too tedious to mention, that passed
between him and me by messengers, and with Lassell, he has surrendered and, I be-
lieve [him] fully converted. I have promised him a great deal of butter with his bread,
but your excellency very well knows that flies are not caught with gall or bitter, particu-
larly after having experienced for sixteen years the dulcet deceptions of the British.
He was four days with me, during which time I had an opportunity of examining him
with great attention. He is a sensible old fellow, and no ways ignorant of the cause of
the war, for which he blames the Americans, saying that they were too extra\'agant in
their demands in their first treaties; that the country they claimed by virtue of the
definitive treaty of 178:i was preposterous: that the king of Great Britain never had
claimed their land after the conquest of Canada, and far less ever attempted to take any
part of it without the consent of the Aborigines, and of consequence had no authority to
cede their country to the United States. I have spoken with him respecting the medi-
tated treaty of M'Kee in May next, and he very honestly told me that he had received
wampum and tobacco on that head, but that he would, on his return, send it back and
also send speeches to the different nations requesting them to adhere strongly to the
preliminaries between you and them, saying that they must be sensible how they had
been deluded by M'Kee, and entreating them at least to hear you first before they should

224 THE MAUMEE RIVER BASIN.

come to any other determination. He is also to keep a couple of men at the rapids [at
M'Kee's station near Fort Miami] in order to ascertain what is going on, and has prom-
ised me that as soon as his messengers return he will come himself and give me all the .
information.

April U), 17'.lo.

Sir : . . Le Gris is again with me. and tells me that the two first chiefs of the
Potawotamies of the St. Joseph [River] passed his camp the other day. from Detroit,
with four horses loaded with presents. These chiefs informed him that a speech from
lord Dorchester [Governor of Canada] had arrived at Detroit directed to all nations,
wherein he assures them of his friendship and of his readiness to support them in all
their distresses. He invites them to make peace with the United States, if they can do
it on honorable terms, and tells them that they will see him before the time of our
treaty. One would suppose that his lordship is coming up to Detroit to feel, himself,
the pulse of the Aborigines.

April 25, 1795.

Sir The Aborigines are truly starving, and say that we must support them, at
least until they have made corn, as it will not do for them to ask provision of the British
without remaining with them.

Fort Wayne June 17. 1795.

Sir : . . The Miamies go to Greenville tomorrow. I believe they are the last
that will pass this way. Enclosed is a letter from Major Hunt. I believe that M'Kee
is using every strategem to prevent the treaty, but the bayonet of the 20th of August last
[the Battle of Fallen Timber] embarrasses him. . . J- F. Hamtr.4Mck.

The diplomacy of General Wayne and his agents was successful
and, 1st January, 1795, he sent a message to the petitioning Wyandots
at Sandusky that the chiefs of the Chippewas, Ottawas, Sacs, Potta-
wotamis, and Miamis had arrived at Fort Wayne and would soon visit
him at Greenville in the interest of jjeace. The '1-^ih January he re-
ported to the Secretary of War that two preliminary articles of peace
had been signed by him and the sachems and war chiefs of the Chip-
pewas, Pottawotamis, Sacs, and Miamis. These preliminary articles
provided that hostilities should cease: that there should be a meeting
for council and treaty at Greenville, Ohio, on or about the 15th June,
1795; and that immediate information should be given to General
Wayne of all hostile movements that came to the knowledge of any of
the Aborigines; and the General was to reciprocate.

The Delawares soon visited Fort Defiance and exchanged prison-
ers to the number of nine, this being all of the Aborigines then held at
that place. John Brickell, from whom this information is obtained*
then fourteen years of age, had been a captive with the Delawares four
years and on this occasion keenly felt the want of another Aborigine
prisoner of war that he also, might be exchanged. In May, however,
the Delawares appeared across the Maumee from Fort Defiance and
discharged their guns in salute. The garrison of the Fort returned

* The American Pioneer 1842 volume i. page .M.

PRELIMINARIES TO THE GREAT TREATY. 225

the salute with a cannon shot for each State in the Union, then num-
bering fifteen. At this visit Brickell was surrendered to the garrison
with some sentiment on the part of the Atiorigines, and good fellow-
ship prevailed.*

The Treaty at Greenville.

Meantime ground was cleared at Greenville, an ample Council
House was built, a large quantity of clothing and other useful articles
were obtained for presents, and liountiful supplies received for the
feeding and entertainment of large numbers of iVborigines during the
summer.

About the 1st June a considerable number of Delaware, Ottawa,
Pottawotami and Eel River Aborigines began to arrive, and they were
well received. t Others arrived each day, and the general council was
opened June 16th with a goodly attendance. i\.fter smoking the
Calumet of Peace, an oath of accuracy and fidelity was subscribed to
by eight interpreters, and by Henry DeButts as Secretary. General
Waj'ne as presiding officer, stated the object of the council, exhibited
his commission received from President Washington, and put all
present in good humor liy his happy remarks, saying in closmg:
"The heavens are bright, the roads open; we will rest in peace and
love, and wait the arrival of our brothers [the tardy Aborigines who,
at similar times like sulking children, desired to be sent for with
special overtures]. In the interim we will have a little drink to wash
the dust from our throats. We will on this happy occasion be merry
without, however, passing the bounds of temperance and sobriety."
The council was then adjourned until the arrival of the other chiefs.

Forty Pottawotamis arrived June 17th and were received by the
General. Chief Buck-on-ge-he-las with a party of Delawares, and Asi-
me-the with Pottawotamis arrived June 21st and were received at the
Council House, and June 2;-Jrd Le Gris, Little Turtle and seventeen
other Miamis arrived. The 2r)th some Chijijiewas arrived : and other
Chippewas with Pottawotamis caine the next day.

The third day of July General Wayne called all the Aborigines to-
gether and explained to them why Americans celebrated the Fourth of
July, adding :

To morrow we shall for the twentieth time salute the annual return of this happy
anniversary, rendered still more dear by the brotherly union of the American and red
people ; tomorrow all the people within these lines will rejoice ; you, my brothers, shall
also rejoice in your respective encampments. I called you together to explain these
matters to you : do not, therefore, be alarmed at the report of our big guns ; they will do

* See American Captives among the Ohio Aborigines, by Charles E. Slocum.
I American State Papers. Aborii;ine Attairs volume i, paae ,*J64.

226 THE MAUMEE RIVER BASIN.

no harm ; they will be the harbingers of peace and gladness, and their roar will ascend into
the heavens. The flag of the United States, and the colors of this legion, shall be given
to the wind to be fanned by its gentlest breeze in honor of the birth-day of American
freedom. I will now shew you our colors that you may know them to-morrow. Formerly
they were displayed as ensigns of war and battle ; now they will be exhibited as emblems
of peace and happiness. This eagle which you now see, holds close his bunch of arrows
whilst he seems to stretch forth, as a more valuable ofiering, the inestimable branch of
peace. The Great Spirit seems disposed to incline us all to repose for the future under
its grateful shade and wisely enjoy the blessings which attend it.

The 4th July twenty-four additional Ottawas came to swell the
numbers of other tribes that had been arriving almost daily. Others
continued to come, and all were received with expressions of pleasure.
A sachem arriving with a hand of Chippewas July 18th, said to General
Wayne ' We would have come in greater numbers but for Brant's en-
deavors to prevent us' in interest of the British.

- With great thoughtfulness and circumspection General Wayne drew
up the treaty, and he impressed all present with his cheerful yet serious
and dignified demeanor to a careful consideration and assent to each of
its provisions, separately.

Little Turtle was slow in becoming possessed with the spirit of the
meeting, but gradually became one of the principal participators,
making ten addresses in representing the Miamis and allied tribes of
Weas, Piankeshaws, Kaskaskias and Kickapoos. He had not been in
favor of the former treaties, knew nothing about them because he was
not present at their ratification by his young men who were seduced to
this action by the other tribes. Little Turtle did not want to wholly
surrender the portage between the head of the Maumee and Little River
on account of the revenue derived therefrom, sa\ing . . That
place has brought to us in the course of one day the amount of one
hundred dollars. Let us both own this place and enjoy in common the
advantages it affords.' . . But this could not be granted to him on
accountof the Ordinances of 1786-87 which declared portages free public
ways. The chiefs generally and fully expressed their views as favorable
to the former treaties, and to this one yet more liberal to the Americans,
attributing their hostile acts, and their delays in answering the appeals
for peace, to British influences.

The 9th August, 1795, General Wayne wrote to the Secretary of
War that . . "it is with infinite pleasure I now inform you that a
treaty of peace between the United States of America and all the late
hostile tribes of Aborigines Northwest of the Ohio, was unamimously
and volimtarily agreed to, and cheerfully signed, by all the sachems and
war chiefs of the respective nations on the .Srd, and exchanged on the 7th,
instant." . . The full text of this most important Treaty is here
reproduced, viz:

THE MOST IMPORTANT TREATY AT GREENVILLE. 227

A Treaty of Peace between the United States of America and the Tribes of
Aborigines called the Wyandots. Delawares. Shawnees. Ottawas. Ghippewas. Potta-
wotamies. Miamis. Eel Rivers. Weas [Ouis or Ouiotenons]. Kicl<apoos. Pianl<eshaws
and Kasltaskias :

To put an end to a destructive war, to settle all controversies, and to restore har-
mony and friendly intercourse between the said United States and Aborigine tribes,
Anthony Wayne. Major-General. commanding the Army of the United States, and sole
Commissioner for the purposes above mentioned ; and the said tribes of Aborigines, by
their sachems, chiefs, and warriors, met together at Greenville, the Head Quarters of
said Army, have agreed on the following articles, which, when ratified by the President,
with the advice and consent of the Senate of the United States, shall be binding on them
and the said Aborigine tribes:

Article I. Henceforth all hostilities shall cease: peace is hereby established, and
shall be perpetual : and friendly intercourse shall take place between the said United
States and Aborigine tribes.

Art. 2. All prisoners shall, on both sides, be restored. The Aborigines, prisoners
to the United States, shall be immediately set at liberty. The people of the United
States still remaining prisoners among the Aborigines, shall be delivered up within
ninety days from the date hereof, to the General or Commanding Officer at Greenville.
Fort Wayne, or Fort Defiance: and ten chiefs of the said tribes shall remain at Green-
ville as hostages until the delivery of the prisoners shall be effected.

Art. 3. The General Boundary Line between the lands of the United States and
the lands of the said Aborigine tribes, shall begin at the mouth of Cuyahoga River and
run thence up the same to the portage between that and the Tuscarawas branch of the
Muskingum: thence, down that branch to the crossing place above Fort Lawrence
[Laurens] ; thence, westerly to a fork of that branch of the great Miami River, running
into the Ohio, at or near which fork stood Loramie's store, and where commences the
portage between the Miami of the Ohio and the St. Mary River which is a branch of
the Miami [the Maumee River] which runs into Lake Erie : thence, a westerly course to
Fort Recovery which stands on a branch of the Wabash ; thence, southwesterly in a
direct line to the Ohio, so as to intersect that river opposite the mouth of Kentucky or
Cuttawa River. .And, in consideration of the peace now established, of the goods
formerly received from the United States, of those now to be delivered, and of the yearly
delivery of goods now stipulated to be made hereafter, and to indemnify the United
States for the injuries and expenses thev have sustained during the war. the said Abo-
rigine tribes do hereby cede and relinquish, forever, all their claims to the lands lying
eastwardly and southwardly of the General Boundary Line now described, and these
lands, or any part of them, shall never hereafter be made a cause or pretense, on the
part of said tribes, or any of them, of war or injury to the United States, or any of the
people thereof.

And for the same considerations, and as an evidence of the returning friendship of
the said Aborigine tribes, of their confidence in the United States, and desire to provide
for their accommodation, and for that convenient intercourse which will be beneficial to
both parties, the said Aborigine tribes do also cede to the United States the following
pieces of land, to wit; 1. One piece of land six miles square at or near Loramie's .
store, above mentioned. 2. One piece two miles square at the head of the navigable
water or landing on the St. Mary River near Girty town [site of the present City of St.
Marys]. '.'•. One piece six miles square at the head of the navigable water of the Auglaise
River [probably near the present north line of .Auglaise County]. 4. One piece
six miles square at the confluence of the Auglaise and Miami [Maumee] Rivers where
Fort Defiance now stands. .">. One piece six miles square at or riear the confluence of

228 THE MAUMEE RIVER BASIN.

the Rivers St. Mary and St. Joseph where Fort Wayne now stands, or near it. 6. One
piece two miles square on the Wabash [Little] River at the end of the portage from the
Miami of the Lake [Maumee], and about eight miles westward from Fort Wayne.
7. One piece six miles square at the Ouiotanon or old Wea [Ouia] towns on the
Wabash River. 8. One piece twelve miles square at the British fort, on the Miami of
the lake [Maumee] at the foot of the Rapids. !•. One piece six miles square at the
mouth of the said river, where it empties into the lake. 10. One piece six miles square
upon Sandusky Lake [Bay] where a fort formerly stood. 11. One piece two miles
square at the lower rapids of Sandusky River. 12. The post of Detroit and all the
lands to the north, the west, and the south of it, of which the Aborigine title has been
extinguished by gifts or grants to the French or English governments ; and so much
more land, to be annexed to the district of Detroit as shall be comprehended between the
River Rosine [Raisin] on the south. Lake St. Clair on the north, and a line the general
course whereof shall be six miles distant from the west end of Lake Erie and Detroit
River. Ki. The post of Michilimackinac and all the land on the island on which that
post stands, and the main land adjacent of which the Aborigine title has been extin-
guished by gifts or grants to the French or English governments; and a piece on the main
to the north of the island to measure six miles on Lake Huron, or the strait between
Lakes Huron and Michigan and to extend three miles back from the water of the lake or
strait ; and, also, the Island De Bois Blanc, being an extra and voluntary gift of the
Chippewa nation. 14. One piece of land six miles square at the mouth of Chicago
River emptying into the southwest end of Lake Michigan where a fort formerly stood.
15. One piece twelve miles square at or near the mouth of the Illinois River emptying
into the Mississippi. 10. One piece six miles square at the old Peorias fort and village
near the south end of the Illinois Lake, on said Illinois River. And whenever the
United States shall think proper to survey and mark the boundaries of the lands hereby
ceded to them, they shall give timely notice thereof to the said tribes of Aborigines that
they may appoint some of their wise chiefs to attend and see that the lines are run
according to the terms of this Treaty. And the said Aborigine tribes will allow to the
people of the United States a free passage by land and by water, as one and the other
shall be found convenient, through their country, along the chain of posts hereinbefore
mentioned , that is to say, from the commencement of the portage aforesaid, at or near
Loramie's store, thence along said portage to the St. Mary and down the same to Fort
Wayne, and then down the Miami [Maumee] to Lake Erie; again, from the commence-
ment of the portage at or near Loramie's store along the portage ; from thence to the
River Auglaise, and down the same to its junction with the Miami [Maumee] at Fort
Defiance ; again, from the commencement of the portage aforesaid to Sandusky River,
and down the same to Sandusky Bay and Lake Erie ; and from Sandusky to the post
which shall be taken at or near the Foot of the Rapids of the Miami of the Lake
[Maumee] ; and from thence to Detroit. Again, from the mouth of the Chicago to the
commencement of the portage between that river and the Illinois, and down the Illinois
River to the Mississippi ; also, from Fort Wayne along the portage aforesaid, which
leads to the Wabash, and then down the Wabash to the Ohio. .And the said Aborigine
tribes will, also, allow to the people of the United States the free use of the harbors and
mouths of rivers along the lakes adjoining the Aborigine lands, for sheltering vessels and
boats, and liberty to land their cargoes where necessary for their safety.

Art. 4. In consideration of the peace now established, and of the cessions and
relinquishments of lands made in the preceding Article by the said tribes of Aborigines,
and to manifest the liberality of the United States, as the great means of rendering this
peace strong and perpetual, the United States relinquish their claims to all other Abo-
rigine lands northward of the River Ohio, eastward of the Mississippi, and westward and
southward of the Great Lakes, and the waters uniting them, according to the boundary

TEXT OF TREATY AT GREENVILLE IN 1795. 229

line agreed on by the United States and the King of Great Britain, in the treaty of
peace made between them in the year 178.'!. But. from this relinquishment by the
United States, the following tracts of land are explicitly excepted. 1st. The tract of
one hundred and fifty thousand acres near the rapids of the River Ohio, which has been
assigned to General [George Rogers] Clark for the use of himself and his warriors.
2d. The post of St. Vincennes on the River Wabash, and the lands adjacent of which
the Aborigine title has been extinguished, iid. The lands at all other places in poss-
ession of the French people and other white settlers among them of which the Aborigine
title has been extinguished, as mentioned in the .'id Article ; and 4th, The post of Fort
Massac towards the mouth of the Ohio. To which several parcels of land, so excepted,
the said tribes relinquish all the title and claim which they or any of them may have.

And for the same considerations, and with the same views as above mentioned, the
United States now deliver to the said Aborigine tribes a quantity of goods to the value of
twenty thousand dollars, the receipt whereof they do hereby acknowledge ; and hence-
forward, every year forever, the United States will deliver at some convenient place
northward of the River Ohio, like useful goods, suited to the circumstances of the
Aborigines, of the value of nine thousand five hundred dollars ; reckoning that value at
the first cost of the goods in the city or place in the United States where they shall be
procured. The tribes to which those goods are to be annually delivered, and the pro-
portions in which they are to be delivered, are the following ;

1st. To the Wyandots. the amount of one thousand dollars. '2nd. To the Dela-
awares. the amount of one thousand dollars. :.ird. To the Shawanese. the amount of
one thousand dollars. 4th. To the Miamies. the amount of one thousand dollars.
•5th. To the Ottawas, the amount of one thousand dollars, (ith. To the Chippewas,
the amount of one thousand dollars. 7th. To the Pottawatamies. the amount of one
thousand dollars. 8th. And to the Kickapoo, Wea. Eel River, Piankeshaw, and
Kaskaskia, tribes, the amount of five hundred dollars each.

Provided, that if either of the said tribes shall, hereafter, at an annual delivery of
their share of the goods aforesaid, desire that a part of their annuity should be furnished
in domestic animals, implements of husbandry, and other utensils convenient for them,
and in compensation to useful artificers who may reside with or near them, and be
employed for their benefit, the same shall, at the subsequent annual deliveries be
furnished accordingly.

Art. .5. To prevent any misunderstanding about the Aborigine lands relinquished
by the United States in the Fourth Article, it is now explicitly declared that the mean-
ing of that relinquishment is this : The Aborigine tribes who have a right to those
lands are quietly to enjoy them, hunting, planting, and dwelling thereon, so long as they
please, without any molestation from the United States; but when those tribes, or any
of them, shall be disposed to sell their lands, or any part of them, they are to be sold
only to the United States; and until such sale the United States will protect all the said
Aborigine tribes in the quiet enjovment of their lands against all citizens of the United
States, and against all other white persons who intrude upon the same. And the said
Aborigine tribes again acknowledge themselves to be under the protection of the United
States, and no other Power whatever.

Art. (i. If any citizen of the United States, or any other white person or persons,
shall presume to settle upon the lands now relinquished by the United States, such
citizen or other person shall be out of the protection of the United States ; and the
Aborigine tribe on whose land the settlement shall be made may drive off the settler, or
punish him in such manner as they shall think fit ; and because such settlements made
without the consent of the United States will be injurious to them, as well as to the
Aborigines, the United States shall be at liberty to break them up, and remove and

230 THE MAUMEE RIVER BASIN.

punish the settlers as they shall think proper, and so effect that protection of the Abo-
rigine lands herein before stipulated.

Art. 7. The said tribes of Aborigines, parties to this treaty, shall be at liberty to
hunt within the territory and lands which they have now ceded to the United States,
without hindrance or molestation, so long as they demean themselves peaceably, and
offer no injury to the people of the United States.

Art. 8. Trade shall be opened with the said Aborigine tribes ; and they do hereby
respectively engage to afford protection to such persons, with their property, as shall
be duly licensed to reside among them for the purpose of trade, and to their agents and
servants ; but no person shall be permitted to reside at any of their towns or hunting
camps as a trader, who is not furnished with a license for that purpose, under the hand
and seal of the Superintendent of the Department Northwest of the Ohio, or such other
person as the President of the United States shall authorize to grant such licenses, to the
end that the said Aborigines may not be imposed on in their trade. And if any licensed
trader shall abuse his privilege by unfair dealing, upon complaint and proof thereof, his
license shall be taken from him, and he shall be further punished according to the laws
of the United States. And if any person shall intrude himself as a trader without such
licence, the said Aborigines shall take and bring him before the Superintendent or his
Deputy, to be dealt with according to law. And, to prevent impositions by forged licences,
the said ,\borigines shall, at least once a year, give information to the Superintendent, or
his Deputies, of the names of the traders residing among them.

Art. 9. Lest the firm peace and friendship now established should be interrupted
by the misconduct of individuals, the United States and the said .aborigine tribes agree
that, for injuries done by individuals on either side, no private revenge or retaliation
shall take place; but, instead thereof, complaint shall be made by the party injured to
the other; by the said Aborigine tribes, or any of them, to the President of the
United States, or the Superintendent by him appointed ; and by the Superintendent, or
other person appointed by the President, to the principal Chiefs of the said .\borigine
tribes, or of the tribe to which the offender belongs ; and such prudent measures shall
then be pursued as shall be necessary to preserve the said peace and friendship
unbroken, until the Legislature (or great council) of the United States shall make other
equitable provision in the case to the .satisfaction of both parties. Should any Aborigine
tribes meditate a war against the United States or either of them, and the same shall
come to the knowledge of the before mentioned tribes, or either of them, they do hereby
engage to give immediate notice thereof to the General, or officer commanding the
troops of the United States at the nearest post. And should any tribe with hostile
intentions against the United States, or either of them, attempt to pass through their
country, they will endeavor to prevent the same, and in like manner give information of
such attempt to the General, or officer commanding, as soon as possible, that all causes
of mistrust and suspicion may be avoided between them and the United States. In like
manner the United States shall give notice to the said .Aborigine tribes of any harm that
may be meditated against them, or either of them, that shall come to their knowledge,
and do all in their power to hinder and prevent the same, that the friendship between
them may be uninterrupted.

Art. 10. All other treaties heretofore made between the United States and the
said Aborigine tribes, or any of them, since the treaty of 1783 between the United States
and Great Britain, that come within the purview of this treaty, shall henceforth cease,
and become void.

In testimony whereof, the said Anthony Wayne, and the Sachems and War Chiefs
of the before mentioned nations and tribes of Aborigines, have hereunto set their hands
and affixed their seals.

SIGNATURES TO THE TREATY AT GREENVILLE. 251

Done at Greenville, in the Territory of the United States Northwest of the River
Ohio, on the third day of August, One thousand seven hundred and ninety-five.

[Signed] Antv Wayne [L. S.]

-tem^

JiLety ^ y

)> V

^y * 1

signatures to the Treaty at Greenville, Ohio. 1795. The
names were written by the Secretary and each Aborigine
chief made a mark or imitation of an animal opposite a
seal. This and the two following plates are copied from
the Ohio Archaeological and Historical Quarterly, vol-
ume xii, for which publication they were taken from the
original document at Washington.

WVANDOTS.

Tarhe. or Crane.

J. Williams, Jun.

Teyyaghtaw.

Haroenyon or Half King's Son.

Tehaavvtorens.

Awmeyeeray.

Stayetah.

Shateyyaronyah or Leather Lips.

Daughshuttayah.

Shaawrunthe.

Delawares.
Tetabokshke or Grand Glaise King.
Lemantanquis or Black King.
Wabatthoe.

Maghpiway or Red Feather.

Kikthawenund or Anderson.

Bukongehelas.

Peekeelund.

Wellebawkeelund.

Peekeetelemund or Thomas Adams.

Kishkopekund or Capt. Buffalo.

Amenahehan or Capt. Crow.

Queshawksey or George Washington.

Weywinquis or Billy Siscomb.

Moses.

Shawnees.

Misquacoonacaw or Red Pole.

Cutthewekasaw or Black Hoof.

Kaysewaesekah.

Weythapamattha.

Nianymseka.

Waytheah or Long Shanks.

Weyapiersenwaw or Blue Jacket.

Nequetaughaw.

Hahgooseecaw or Capt. Reed.

232

THE MAUMEE RIVER BASIN.

•/Yol. rvoMj-rmJ /fn__\ I \

( Jttawa.

Chegonickska, an Ottawa from Sandusky

Pattauatimas of the River
St. Joseph.

Thupenebu.

Nawac, tor himself and brother Etsi-
methe.

Nenanseka.

Keesass or Sun.

Kabamasaw, for himself and brother
Chisaugan.

Sugganunk.

Wapmeme or White Pigeon.

Wacheness. for himself and brother
Pedagoshok.

Wabshicawnaw.

LaChasse.

Meshegethenogh. for himself and broth-
er Wawasek.

Hingoswash.

Anewasaw.

Nawbudgh.

Missenogomaw.
Waweegshe.
Thawme or Le Blanc.
Geeque, for himself and brother She-
winse.

Pattawatimes of Huron.
Okia.
Chamung.
Segagewan.
Nanawme, for himself and brother

A. Gin.
Marchand.
Wenameac.

MlAMIS.

Nagohquangogh or Le Gris.
Meshekunnoghquoh or Little Turtle.

Ottawas.
Augooshaway.
Keenoshameek.
La Malice.
Machiwetah.
Thowonavva.
Secaw.

Chippewas.

Mashipinashiwish or Bad Bird.

Nahshogashe from Lake Superior.

Kathawasung.

Masass.

Nemekass or Little Thunder.

Peshawkay or Young Ox.

Nanguey.

Meenedohgeesogh.

Peewanshemenogh.

Weymegwas.

Peewanshemenogh.

Weymegwas.

Gobmatick.

MiAMis AND Eel Rivers.
Peejeewa or Richard Villa.
Cochkepoghtogh.

Eel River Tribe.
Shamekunnesa or Soldier.

MlAMIS.

Wapamangwa or White Loon.
Weas for Themselves and Pianke-

SHAWS.

Amacunsa or Little Bea\'er.
Acoolatha or Little Fox.
Francis.

WITNESSES AND INTERPRETERS AT GREENVILLE. 253

KiCKAPOOS AND KaSKASKIAS. DeLAWARES OF SaNDUSKY.

Keeawhah. Hawkinpumisha.

Nemighka or Josey Renard. Peyamawksey.

Paikeekanogh. Reyntueco of the Six Nations living at Sandusky.

In presence of (the word 'goods' in the l!th Hne of the lird article; the word 'before'
in the 20th line of the :ird article ; the words ' five hundred ' in the 10th line of the 4th
article, and the word ' Piankeshaw ' in the 1 4th line of the 4th article, being first interlined) :

H. DeButts first A. D. C. and Sec'y to Major General Wayne. Wm. H. Harrison
Aide-de-camp to Major General Wayne. T. Lewis Aide-de-camp to Major General Wayne.
James O'Hara Quarter Master General. John Mills Major of Infantry and Adjutant
General. Caleb Swan L. M. T. U. S. Geo. Cemter Lieut. Artillery U. S. A. N. Sr.
LaFontaine. Grant Lasselle. H. Lasselle. Wm. Geo. Pean. Jun. David Jones Chap-
lain U. S. L[egion]. Louis Beaufait. R. Echambre. L. Copen U. S. L[egion]. Baties
Coutien. S. Navarre — [Signed as witnesses; also the sworn interpreters named below].

The number of Aborifj'iiies, and of tribes and l)ands, credited as at
the Treaty of Greenville are as follows, viz:

Tribes. Number. Sworn Interpreters.

Wyandots, 180 Isaac Zane and Abraham Williams.

Delawares, ^Wl Cabot Wilson.

Shawnees, 14M Jacques Lasselle and Christopher Miller.
Ottawas, 4') i

Chippewas, 4(i ■ M. Morans and Bt. Sans Crainte.

Pottawotamis, 240 1
Miamis and Eel Rivers, 7.i j

Weas and Piankeshaws, 12 - William Wells.

Kickapoos and Kaskaskias, 10 )

Total, 12, li:!0

A number of hostile Cherokees who were lingering' around the
head waters of the Scioto River did not accept the invitations to the
council at Greenville and, 3rd August, 1795, General Wayne notified
them of the Treaty with all the other tribes and, also, of the treat\' re-
cently effected with their brethren of the South. He also notified them to
immediately accept his last invitation to corne to Greenville and enter
into articles of peace or they would stand alone and unprotected. Some
of them accompained Captain Longhair, a principal Cherokee chief and
General Wayne's messenger, to Greenville and soon thereafter
accomjiained the chief to the South. The others promised to hunt
quietly along the Scioto until their crops ripened when they would re-
turn to their brethren in the South to remain permanently with them.

The Aborigines lingered at Greenville about one week after the
completion of the Treaty, explaining some of the late thieving raids of
their young men which they promised to correct ; in exchanging congrat-
ulations -. and in receiving the medals, and the twenty thousand dollars
worth of goods mentioned in the Treaty. In Council the 10th August,
General Wayne, thinking it time to draw the meetings to a close, gave
his admirable farewell address, viz :

234 THE MAUMEE RIVER BASIN.

Children ; All you nations listen. By the seventh article of this treaty all the
lands now ceded to the United States are free for all the tribes now present to hunt
upon, so long as they continue to be peaceable, and do no injury to the people
thereof. It is, therefore, the common interest of you all to prevent any mischief being
done upon those hunting grounds. Those people who have committed the late outrage on
our peaceable inhabitants, had been hunting on those grounds and, after finishing their
hunt, proceeded to the commission of the bad actions of which I have complained.
These practices, for the reasons I have already given you, must have an immediate end.

The Red Pole, [a Shawnee Chief] has behaved like a candid, honest man, in
acknowledging the errors of his people, and in promising to restrain them immediately.
He has done more ; he has offered to leave his own father as a hostage until he can
inform me of his having called them home ; but I will not separate him from his old
father; I will depend upon his honor for the performance of his promise. (Here he
gave a string of white wampum to Red Pole. )

All you, my children, listen to me. The great business of peace, so long and
ardently wished for by your great and good father. General Washington and the Fifteen
Fires [the number of States then in the Union] and, I am sure, by every good man
among you, being now accomplished, nothing remains but to give you a few words of
advice from a father anxious for the peace and happiness of his children. I^et me
earnestly exhort you to restrain your young people from injuring, in any degree, the
people of the United States. Impress upon their minds the spirit and meaning of the
treaty now before us. Convince them how much their future welfare will depend upon
their faithful and strict observance of it. Restore to me as soon as possible all my flesh
and blood which may be among you, without distinction or exception, and receive now
from my hands the ten hostages stipulated by the second article to be left with me as a
security for their delivery. This unequivocal proof of the confidence that I place in
your honor, and in the solemn promises you have made me, must satisfy you of my full
persuasion of your sincerity. Send those ten young men to collect your prisoners ; let
them bring them to me, and they shall be well rewarded for their trouble. I have here
a particular account of the number remaining among you. and shall know them when
they are all restored.

I now fervently pray to the Great Spirit that the peace now established may be
permanent, and that it may hold us together, in the bonds of friendship until time shall
be no more. 1 also pray that the Great Spirit above may enlighten your minds, and
open your eyes to your true happiness ; that your children may learn to cultivate the
earth, and enjoy the fruits of peace and industry. (Here he gave a string of white
wampum. )

As it is probable, my children, that we shall not soon meet again in public council, I
take this opportunity of bidding you all an aftectionate farewell, and of wishing ^-ou a
safe and happy return to your respective homes and families. (Gave white string wampum.)

Each of the more prominent chiefs desired to have the last word
with General Wayne who had pleased them exceedingly in his words,
in his conduct of the business in hand, and in his entertainment of them.
Buck-on-ge-he-las, the great war chief of the Delawares, seemed to voice
the sentiments of all when he said :

Your children all well understand the sense of the Treaty which is now concluded.
We experience daily proofs of your increasing kindness. I hope we may all have sense
enough to enjoy our dawning happiness. Many of your people are yet among us. I
trust they will be immediately restored. Last winter our King [Te-ta-boksh-ke] came
forward to you with two [captives] and when he returned with your speech to us, we

FAVORABLE CLOSING OF TREATY AT GREENVILLE. 255

immediately prepared to come forward with the remainder, which we delivered at Fort
Defiance.* All who know me. know me to be a man and a warrior, and I now declare
that I will for the future be as true and steady a friend to the United States as I have
heretofore been an active enemv. We have one bad man among us who. a few days
ago. stole three of your horses; two of them shall this day be returned to you. and 1
hope I shall be able to prevent that youns man from doing any more mischief to our
Father the Fifteen Fires [States].

The 9th Septemlit-r between sixty and seventy refractory and hostile
Shawnee warriors, led by Chief Puck-se-kaw or Jumper, arrived at
Greenville and wished to be counted in the Treaty. From the efforts
of Chief Blue Jacket they brought and surrendered four American
captives three of whom were taken in Randolph County, Virginia, the
13th July. These being the last of the malcontents, General Wayne
turned his attention to matters best calculated to make the Treaty, and
peace, permament.

*It was the Delawares. or Lenni Lenapes, who took captive the child Frances Slocum 2nd
November. 1778. followinj; the horrible Wyomine Massacre. She was not restored : nor was she dis-
covered to her surviving relatives until after a residence with the Delawares and Miamis for about tifty-
nine years. This was in many particulars the most remarkable captivity on record, and the one best
illustrating the influence of heredity over environment. See Miner's. Stone's. Chapman's, and Peck's
History of Wyoming : The Pennsylvania Archives : Lossing's Pictorial Field-Book of the Revolution :
The Story of the Lost Sister hy Rev. John Todd ; The History oj the Slocums in America volumes i and
ii. by Dr. Charles E. Slocum ; and The Biography of Frances Slocum by Johu F. Meginness.

SECTION OF BELT OF WAMPUM

236 THE MAUMEE RIVER BASIN.

CHAPTER IX.

Treaties — The Aborigines — Organizations for Civil Govern-
ment— Renewal of Hostilites.
1795 TO 1812.

The United States concluded a treaty of friendship, of limits, and
of navigation with Spain October 27, 1795. This treaty further allayed
for a time the feelin^i of anxiety and unrest with some and of ambition
with others, and contributed to the strengthening of the liond of union
between the West and the East. This was also a year of much migra-
tion from the East, with increase of settlements along the rivers of
southern Ohio, other southern parts of the Northwest Territory, and
south of the Ohio River.

Colonel Hamtramck's letters to General Wayne during the winter of
1795-96 describe the temper of the Aborigines, and their disinclination
to supply the wants of the younger and older members of the tribe, viz:

Fort Waynk December l.'i, IT!*.").
Sir : . . The issues to the Aborigines would be very inconsiderable this winter if
it was not for about ninety old women and children with some very old men, who live
near us and have no other mode of subsisting but by the garrison. I have repeatedly
tried to get clear of them, but without success.

January l.'i, 1790.

Sir. . . About ninety old women and children have been victualled by the
garrison. I have, yesterday, given them five days' provisions and told them it was the
last they should have until spring. I was obliged to do so because, from calculation, I
have no more flour than will last me until spring. But, sir, if other supplies could be
got by land, I consider it politic to teed these poor creatures, who will suffer very much
for want of subsistence.

The military stations in and near this Basin 3rd February, 1796,
were: Forts Defiance, Wayne, Miami (the British fort by the lower
Maumee, which the Americans expected would soon be surrendered )
and Sanduskv, all of which, excepting Miami, aggregated a force of one
battalion of infantry, one company of riflemen, and one company of
artillery at Fort Wayne which fort was the headquarters for these
posts; also Forts Adams, Recovery, Jefferson, Loramie, Head of
the Auglaise, and Greenville the headquarters of this group, with an
aggregate of one battalion of infantry and one company of riflemen
divided among them. The forts recommended March 29, 1796, to be
maintained were: Defiance, Wayne, Adams, Recovery, Head of
Auglaise, Miami and Michilimackinac, each by a garrison of fiftv-six
men; and Detroit with one hundred and twelve men — Detroit and
Miami being yet in possession of the British.*

*See American State Papers. Military Atlairs volume ii, pages 113. 115.

BRITISH AGAIN COUNCILLING WITH THE SAVAGES. 257

In January, 1796, General Wayne visited the seat of the general

Government, probably to give opinion regarding the British forts in

American territory. Great courtesy and deference were given him in

Philadelphia and his native County of Chester near-by. He placed

General James Wilkinson in charge of the Northwestern Army during

his absence with headquarters at Greenville, and it was to him that the

following letters of the series of Colonel Hamtramck were addressed,

viz :

Fort Wayne February 10, 179(1.

Sir : . . Sometime ago I wrote you that I had refused provisions to a number of
old men, women, and children of the Delaware nation. But I have since been compelled
to give to them or see them die. It was impossible to refuse,

March 28, 1 TOfi.

Sir : , . I am out of wampum. I will be much obliged to you to send me some,
for speaking to an Aborigine without it is like consulting a lawyer without a fee.*

The British agents again succeeded in arousing dissatisfaction
among some of the Aborigines, and a council was called in the interest
of the British for June, 1796, near their Fort Miami. To counteract
these influences General Wilkinson invited some of the chiefs to visit
him and, later. Colonel Hamtramck passed down the Maumee River
with a detachment of troops for the purpose of being near those Abo-
rigines attending the council. The parts of his letters to General
Wilkinson regarding these movements, are here excerpted:

.\prii ,1, nnc.

Sir : . . Little Turtle [war-chief of the Miamis] arrived yesterday, to whom I
delivered your message. His answer was, to present his compliments to you, that he
was very glad of the invitation, as he wished very much to see General Wilkinson, but it
is impossible for him to go to Green\'ille at present, as he had ordered all his voung men
to repair to a rendezvous in order, when assembled, to choose a place for their perma-

* Wampum to the Aborigines served the purpose of money, and far more than money. It was not
only a standard of value and a medium of exchange, but it was worn as an ornament and a badge of
wealth, and of position. It was also employed as symbols of various sentiments — as an invitation to join
in war, and as emblems of various sentiments of peace and good will in councils. Originally it was of
any bright, hard and smooth object that could be fastened to the ears, nose, neck, waist, arms or lower
limbs. It was also formed from Mollusk shells — from the larger clam shells of the rivers, and from shells
thrown upon the shore by the waves of tlie lakes, and the salt sea. The shells were broken into small
pieces which were drilled by pieces of flint, wood and sand, and shaped and smoothed usually into
cylinders one-eighth inch or more in diameter, and one-fourth to a half inch or more in length, by rubbing
them on stones of varying roughness. Considerable time, patience and skill were necessary to make
pieces somewhat uniform in size for placing on strings of hemp or bark liber or from sl<ins of animals.
These strings were often fastened side by side to form belts, usually of few strings width, but sometimes
of eight, ten, twelve or more wide. Dark beads came from the ' eye ' of the shell. In some tribes they
were known as socki and were of twice the value of the ordinary while beads called Wompi. Sections of
bones were used as wampum, also the claws and beaks of birds and the teeth of animals; but the latter
could not be so readily drilled or fastened together and to the person as substances of less hardness.

Wampum was also a medium of payment and exchange among the Europeans in America as well as
between them and the .\borigines. See engravings of wampum on page 23.^ and later.

The Hollanders for some years, in the early part of the seventeenth century, were the principal
manufacturers and wholesale dealers in wampum of various colored glass and porcelain, in various forms
and sizes. This wampum was a great attraction to the .-Vborigines who eagerly exchanged the skins of

238 THE MAUMEE RIVER BASIN.

nent residence ; that, as soon as that object shall be accomplished he would go to see
you. which, he said, would be by the time he hears from you again.

April IS. 1796.
Sir ; . . The bearer is Captain Blue Jacket [a war-chief of the Shawnees] who,
at your request, is now going to Greenville. Blue Jacket is used to good company and is
always treated with more attention than other Aborigines. He appears to be very well
disposed, and I believe him sincere.* .

C.'kMP Deposit [Roche de Bout] June S. 179(>.
Sir : I arrived at this place the day before yesterday and have been waiting the
result of the Aborigine council at the [British] Miamis fort. It would appear that they
are divided in their opinions. White Cap, the principal Shawanese chief, wants to
alarm the Aborigines, but I am in hopes he will not succeed. Blue Jacket is with me,
and says that he will remain until your arrival. Yesterday some of 'their chiefs and
young men were with me, and assured me of their good intentions towards us. How far
this can be depended upon time will determine.

Camp Deposit June Hi, 179(5.
Sir: . . Two of my men deserted on the 14th inst. I sent my interpreter and
an Aborigine after them. They brought them back last night. I wish they had brought
their scalps for I know not what to do with them. Could I have power, at times, to call
a general court martial for the trial of deserters, it would save a great deal of time.

J. F. Hamtramck.

The British Surrenher the Fiirts.

John Jay Special Minister to Great Britain concluded a treaty 19th
November, 17'J4, known as the Jay Treaty, which was favorable to the
Northwest Territory inasmuch as one of its provisions was for the
British abandonment of their military posts on American soil on or
before the 1st June, 179H. This treat\' was proclaimed as a law by
the President 1st March, 1796. The 27th May General Wilkinson
sent Captain Schaumberg his aide-de-camp to Detroit to demand of
Colonel England the evacuation of the forts subject to his orders —

tlie best fur-bearine animals for it. In the year 1627 De Rasiers with a Holland trading vessel from New
Amsterdam (now New York) entered Plymouth Harbor and traded this wampum to the Puritans to the
value of ^,50. By the year 1640 it was quite generally used as money, on account of the scarcity of silver
and gold, throughout the northern Colonies, exclusively in some places, as the most convenient article
for exchange of values although it was considered in places "but a commodity, and it is unreasonable
that it should be forced upon any man.' — Rhode Island Colonial Records. 1662. Waiupum was current
in New York and throughout the East for fare in public conveyances, also in many places for taxes and
for goods until near the close of the eighteenth century, and yet later in this Basin. Strings of wampum
were of definite length and were used as measurers as well as for exchange. In the year 1666 the Con-
necticut Assembly made a land grant of ' Fifty fathoms of Wompom ' size.

* After chief Blue Jacket joined the .Americans Colonel M'Kee British Agent said to him; The
commission [see Index reference to Blue Jacket] you received from Sir John Johnson was not given you
to carry to the Americans. I am grieved to find that you have taken it to them (at the preliminary
treaty in January, 17951. It was with much regret I learned that you had deserted your friends [the
British! who always caressed you and treated you as a great man. You have deranged, by your im-
prudent conduct, all our plans for protecting the Aborigines and keeping them with us. They have
always looked up to you for advice and direction in war, and you have now broken the strong ties which
held them all together under your and our direction. You must now be viewed as the enemy of your
people and the other Aborigines whom you are seducing into the snares the Americans have formed for
their ruin; and the massacre and destruction of these people by the Americans must be laid to your
charge— Buttertields History o/ the Girtys page 396.

AMERICANS TAKE POSSESSION OF BRITISH FORTS. 239

Fort Lernoult at Detroit, Fort Miami near the foot of the Maumee
Rapids, and Fort Michilimackinac ; but Colonel England had received
no orders so to do from his superior officer and could not comply with
the demand. The British, however, had been buildin^i a fort at
Maiden, near Captain Matthew Elliott's estate, at the present Amherst-
burg on the left liank and near the mouth of Detroit River.

The first of June having passed without a movement of the British
to vacate the forts, the War Department decided with General Wavne
to make one more formal demand. Accordingly Captain Lewis was
sent from Philadelphia direct to Lord Dorchester who received him,
and the demand from headquarters, with great civility, and caused
orders to be drawn and given to him commanding the officers in charge
of the Forts — Oswego, Niagara, Miami, Lernoult, and Michilimackinac
— to vacate them to " such officer belonging to the forces of the United
States as shall jiroduce this authority to you for that jiurpose, who
shall precede the troops destined to garrison it by one day, in order
that he may have time to view the nature and condition of the works
and buildings." The orders for the surrender of Forts Oswego and
Niagara were handed by Captain Lewis on his return to Captain Bruff
at Albany, and those for the other forts were given to General Wayne
at Philadelphia who immediately dispatched them to General Wilkin-
son at Greenville and he sent them to Colonel Hamtramck who also
acted with proinptness as shown by his report to General Wilkinson,

viz :

Fort Miami |uly 11, ITitd.

Sir ; On the '7th instant two small vessels arrived from Detroit in which I sent a
detachment of artillery and infantry consisting of sixty-five men, together with a number
of cannon with ammunition, &c., Ac, the whole under the command of Captain [Moses]
Porter. On the !)th a sloop arrived from Detroit at Swan Creek, purchased by Captain
Henry DeButts, which carries fifty tons, and which is now loaded with flour, quarter-
master's stores and troops. That, together with eleven batteaux which I have, will be
sufficient to take all the troops I have with me. leaving the remainder of our stores
deposited at this place, which was evacuated [by the British] on this day, and where I
have left Captain Marschalk and Lieutenant Shauklin with fifty-two men, infantry, and
a corporal and six of artillery, that is, including the garrison at the head of the Rapids
[Roche de Bout ?]. I have endowed Fort Miami with one month's provision for both the
troops and the Shawanese. The latter, you recollect, you promised subsistence until
the crops were ripe. The number of the Shawane,se is about one hundred and eighty,
besides twenty-six or thirty Ottawas. I shall embark in two hours, with all the troops,
for Detroit.

Detroit, July 17, 1'7!)().

Sir ; I have the pleasure to inform you of the arrival of the troops under my com-
mand at this place [Fort Lernoult] which was evacuated [by the British] on the 11th
instant and [was] taken possession of by a detachment of sixty-five men commanded by
Captain Moses Porter, whom I had detached from the foot of the [Maumee] Rapids for
that purpose. Myself and the troops arrived on the IHth instant. . .

To Major General Wilkinson. J- ^- Hamtramck.

240 THE MAUMEE RIVER BASIN.

Thus was accomplished, after a further struggle of thirteen years
by the young Republic with the loss of much blood, what Great Brit-
ain should have at once surrendered at the close of the Revolutionary
War in 17h3 according to the Treaty of Paris. Instead of her arrogant
and continued aggressions and her incitements of the savages, had she
by proper conduct toward these savages given moral support to the
L'nited States in their efforts to cultivate and maintain among them a
desire for peace and progress toward civilization, their condition would
have greatly improved and the United States would have been saved
many lives and much expense. But the end was not vet come.
Eighteen more years the British persisted in their infamous conduct
toward the United States and with the savages for mastery over this
Basin. The policy of the British was then, as ever, to acquire territory
and never to relinquish any that was possible to hold. The treaty
necessary to close the Revolutionary War did not extinguish their
desire and expectation of re-possessing the American Colonies, or the
territory west of the Allegheny Mountains at least. This is shown by
their continual refusal to surrender their fortifications on the American
border; by their building the strong Fort Miami by thi' Maumee River,
a great advance into United States territory; and by their continued
efforts to federate and control all the Aborigine tribes in this Basin,
also those to the westward and southward of it. Some of Great Brit-
ain's apologists have attempted to attach the blame for these undue
and persistent aggressions and misdemeanors on the British subordi-
nate officials. This would imply a laxity of supervision on the part of
their superiors that no well-informed person will admit. The British
Home Office in London, England, kept well informed regarding the
methods and details of their subordinates as well as of the results of
them: in fact the Home Office dictated all. Many occurrences in the
conduct of affairs here that were reported were not kept of record; but
enough was entered upon record to convict all parties, as shown on
previous and succeeding pages hereto. Communications with London
bv trained messengers were also frequent. The most alert and aggres-
sive subordinates were sought for the frontiers ; and if the voice of one
was raised for a less aggressive or less cruel policy it was soon hushed,
generally b\- his removal.

During the summer of 1796 there was great scarcity' of provisions
at Detroit for the three hundred American soldiers as well as for the
large number of Aborigines who continued to gather there. Samuel
Henley Acting (Quartermaster went to Greenville to hasten forward
supplies bv way of the Ohio River. He wrote l^'th August to General
Williams Ouartermaster General at Detroit that . . 'the Commis-
sary General gave thirty dollars for the transjiortation of one barrel of

CHARACTER OF GENERAL ANTHONY WAYNE. 241

flour from Fort Washington to Fort Wayne.'' . . I am well con-
vinced that our public wagonmasters are a poor set of drunken
men.' .

Death ok General Wayne — W\\yne County — Intrigues.

General Wayne, on his return from Philadelphia, arrived at
Detroit 13th August, 1796, probably by the sloop Detroit from Fresque
Isle the present Erie, Pennsylvania. He was received by demonstra-
tions of great joy by all persons, including the twelve hundred Abo-
rigines there assembled. He remained at Detroit until the 17th No-
vember, when he again started for Philadelphia on a small sloop.
On this voyage over Lake Erie his system was much irritated and
fatigued by the tossings of the storms, and the disease from which he
had for some time suffered ( recorded as the gout ) made great progress.
It could not be allayed after his arrival at Fort Presque Isle, and he
there died l.Tth December, 179fi, aged fift\-one vears, eleven months
and fourteen days.T

General Wayne served his country well, and with much (jatriotic
fervor. He was a typical American commander. He was a thorough
disciplinarian, brave, impetuous and irresistilile in battle, and success-
ful in inspiring his soldiers with these requisites. He was also
thoughtful and conservative in planning and equally successful in
strategy and assault, as shown on different fields. North and South,
during the Revolutionary War. These characteristics were very pro-
nounced during his campaign through the Maumee River Basin : and
the success and value of this campaign were equalled only by the suc-
cess and value of his dij^lomacy in drawing the savages to Greenville
the next year, away from their British keepers and to the most import-
ant of treaties. These last, and greatest, acts of his life should ever
be respected as invaluable to our countr\', as thev settled favorably for
the Union its first great crisis.

General James Wilkinson continued to act as General-m-chiel of
the United States Army after the death of General Wayne.

The 15th August W^inthrop Sargent, Secretary of the Northwestern
Territory, proclaimed at Detroit the organization of Wayne County
which included nearly all of the Maumee River Basin and eastward to
the Cuyahoga River, and all of the Territory north of a line extending
from Fort Wayne to the south part of Lake Michigan. Thus this

'^The form of money most in use at this time was ' York Currency ' issued by the Provincial Con-
Eress of New Yorli. A few Spanish silver dollars were in circulation. They were then the most valuable
of all money seen and were rated at ten shillings each.

+ In 1809 his son Colonel Isaac Wayne, removed his remains from Presque Isle (Erie. Pennsyl-
vania) to his early home at Radnor, where the Society of the Cincinnati of Pennsylvania erected a
moderate marble monument to inatk his grave.

242

THE MAUMEE RIVER BASIN.

WAYNE COUNTY

BY PROCLAMATION

Basin was brought under the jurisdiction of the United States for the
first time, it having before l)een, excepting the sites of the American
Forts, under the nominal jurisdiction of County Kent organized in Can-
ada in 1792; but during this time, as previously, it was practically
subject to the Commandant of the garrison at Detroit.

With the occupation of Detroit by the Americans, there
followed the necessity for regular and prompt communication with

Fort Washington at Cincinnati.
Horses were kept at the sev-
eral stations of Greenville, St.
Marys, Defiance, and Miami at
the foot of the lowest Maumee
Rapids, for this purpose. J.
Wilkins, Junior, Quartermaster
General at Detroit, wrote to
Major John Wilson, Assistant
Quartermaster at Fort Miami,
under date of 16th Sejitember,
1796, that "I send' over by
Ogden two horses which are to
remain at Fort Miami to serve
as a relief for expresses; when
expresses are coming to this
place [Detroit] they are to leave
the horses they bring with you
and come on with fresh horses. You will take the greatest care of the
horses and have them well fed and attended to."

Near the close of the year 1796 the number of white people within
the present limits of Ohio was recorded as about five thousand, mostly
located along the Ohio River and along its tributaries within fifty miles
of the Ohio. With the prospects of peace and of the land being sur-
veyed and opened to settlers, the population increased rapidly.

After the organization of Wayne County, and until the formation
of the Ohio State Government in 1803, lawyers of Cincinnati attended
the General Court at Detroit. Five or six of them usually traveled in
company on horseback and took along a packhorse to carry supplies
additional to the personal effects in the saddle-bags of each individual.
Aborigine camps were passed through but it was not safe to rely on
them for assistance, and supplies along the route through the forest
were uncertain, even of corn to feed their horses. There were no
bridges, and each horse was a tried swimmer for crossing the deepest
of streams. They were generally from six to eight days in the wilder-
ness, and sometimes ten days. On one of these journeys the party

CINCINNATI LAWYERS SEE SHAWNEE BALL GAME. 245

arrived at the Ottawa town on the Autjlaise River about the middle of the
day, and accepted an invitation to remain there until the next morning.
Jacob Burnet, afterwards judge, was often a member of the party and
he wrote the following description of one of their entertainments/"

Blue Jacket the Shawnee chief who commanded in the battle of the 20th August,
]7!)4 [Battle of Fallen Timber] resided at that village, but was then absent. The party,
however, were received very kindly by the venerable Delaware chief Bu-kon-ge-he-las.
whose name has been given to a fine mill-stream in Logan County. He was one of the
chiefs who negotiated the treaty at the mouth of the Big Miami [Fort Finney] with Gen-
eral George R. Clark in 17S(i, in which his name is written Bo-hon-ghe-lass.

In the course of the afternoon he got up a game of foot-ball, for the amusement of
his guests, in the true aborigine style. He selected two young men to get a purse of
trinkets made up, to be the reward of the successful party. That matter was soon ac-
complished and the whole village, male and female in their best attire, were on the lawn
which was a beautiful plain of four or five acres, in the center of the village, thickly set
in blue grass. At each of the opposite extremes of this lawn two stakes were set up about
six feet apart. The men played against the women, and to countervail the superiority of
their strength it was a rule of the game that they were not to touch the ball with their
hands on the penalty of forfeiting the purse ; while the females had the privilege of using
their hands as well as their feet, being allowed to pick up the ball and run and throw it
as far as their strength and activity would permit. When a squaw succeeded in getting
the ball the men were allowed to seize, whirl her around and. if necessary, throw her on
the grass for the purpose of disengaging the ball, taking care not to touch it except with
the feet. The contending parties arranged themselves in the center of the lawn, the men
on one side and the women on the other, each party facing the goal of their opponents.
The side which succeeded in driving the ball through the stakes at the goal of their ad-
versaries, was proclaimed victors and received the purse to be divided among them. All
things being ready, the old chief came on the lawn and, saying something in the Abori-
gine language not understood by his guests, threw up the ball between the lines of the
combatants and retired. The contest began. The parties were pretty fairly matched as
to numbers, having about a hundred on a side, and for a long time the game appeared
to be doubtful. The young .squaws were the most active of the party and most frequently
caught the ball, at which time it was amusing to see the struggle between them and the
young men which generally terminated in the prostration of the squaw upon the grass be-
fore the ball could be forced from her hands. The contest continued about an hour with
great animation and varying prospects of success. It was finally decided in fa\'or of the
fair sex by the herculean strength of a mammoth squaw who got the ball and held it, in
spite of the efforts of the men to shake it from the grasp of her uplifted hand, till she ap-
proached the goal near enough to throw it through the stakes. When the contending par-
ties had retired from the strife it was pleasant to .see the exultation expressed in the faces
of the victors whose joy was manifestly increased by the circumstance that victory was
won in the presence of white men whom they supposed to be highly distinguished and
honored in their nation, a conclusion very natural for them to draw as they knew the
business on which their guests were journeying to Detroit. The party spent the night
very pleasantly in the village, and in the morning resumed their journey.

* Burnet's Notes pages 6H tu 7r Henry Howe in his Historical Collections of Ohio places this
' Ottawa town ' at the present Wapakoneta. There were many 'Ottawa' towns alony these rivers and
this particular one on the .\uglaise River in the opinion of the writer was about the central part of the
present Allen County, Ohio, or about the site where Fort Amanda was built in 1813 in AuElaise County
near the line of Allen, and site of General Wayne's fort at the ' Head of the Anglaise,'

244 THE MAUMEE RIVER BASIN.

On the outward journey they [the lawyers] took the route by Dayton, Piqua, Loramie,
St. Marys, and the Ottawa town on the Auglaise, and thence down this river to Defiance;
thence down the Maumee to the foot of the rapids, and thence to and across the River
Raisin to Detroit. On their return they crossed the Maumee at Roche de Boeuf [properly
Roche de Bout] by the advice of Black Beard, a personal friend of Judge Symmes, who
lived in that neighborhood and with whom the party breakfasted. As a matter of pre-
caution they hired his son to accompany them in the capacity of guide. He led them
through a succession of wet prairies over some of which it was impossible to ride,
and it was with great difficulty they were able to lead or drive their horses through the
deep mud which surrounded them on all sides. After two days and a half of incessant
toil and difficulty they arrived at the same village in which they had been so kindly treat-
ed, and so much amused, on their outward journey. To their great mortification and
disappointment they were informed that Blue Jacket had returned from Cincinnati a day
or two before with a large quantity of whiskey, and that his people were in a high frolic. This
information was soon confirmed by the discovery that the people of the whole village,
male and female were drunk. The party, however, were received with great kindness,
but it was in a style they were not disposed to permit. An old withered looking squaw,
very drunk, was extremely officious. Knowing that Mr. St. Clair, one of the party, was
the Attorney General of the Territory and son of the Governor, her attentions were prin-
cipally conferred upon him. She kissed him and exclaimed 'you big man — Governor's
son'. Then turning to the rest of the party, said with marked contempt ' you be milish'*
and then kissed Mr. St. Clair again. It was certainly one of those rare occasions on
which men of sensibility and delicacy feel the advantage of being placed at a low grade
on the scale of dignity. It was manifestly impossible to remain in the village, and the
only alternative was to proceed on their journey. It was then late in the afternoon.
They were much fatigued, and had a wet swampy path of twelve miles to pass over to
the River St. Mary, through a valley swarming with gnats and mosquitoes. It was a
choice of evils ; but, as there was no time to hesitate, they saddled their horses and
started. Night overtook them in the middle of the swamp. There being no moon, and
the forest being very dense, it was found impossible to keep the path, much less to see
and avoid the quagmires on every side. They had no alternative, and halted till morning.
To lie down was impossible from the nature of the ground; and to sleep was still more
difficult as they were surrounded with gnats and mosquitoes. After remaining in that
uncomfortable condition five or six hours, expecting every moment their horses to break
away, daylight made its appearance for their relief. About sunrise they arrived at the .
old Fort ■'Vdams on the St. Mary. This fort was then occupied by Charles Murray and
his squaw who got them a breakfast, after which they proceeded to Cincinnati. Jour-
neys of a similar character were of frequent occurrence during the continuance of the
Territorial government, and for some years after.

The Jay Treaty with Great Britain was considered by France as an
alteration and suspension of her treaty of 177H with the United States;
and on the 19th August, 1796, a treaty of alliance, offensive and defen-
sive, was concluded between France and Spain, and this at once led to
some overt acts bv France against the United States on the high seas,
and to agents of Spain and France again becoming active to alienate
this Northwestern Territory from the East. The idea of a Western
Confederac}' was again advocated b}' a few persons in Kentucky. A

'■"This expression nrobabb' voiced the opinion of the Aborigines at this time of the inilitiatnen, in
contradistinction to soldiers of the regular army.

INTRIGUES OF FRANCE AND SPAIN. 245

special emissar\' from Baron de Carondelet the Spanish Governor
General of Louisiana was again sent in the person of Thomas Power,
a versatile Irishman possessing a practical knowledge of the English,
French and Spanish^ languages who had previously been in Kentucky
and in the Ohio settlements to advance the interests of Spain in the
Mississippi Basin. In June, 1797, he again proceeded to Kentucky and
addressed influential personages on subjects that were in the present
uncertain and critical attitude of politics, highly imprudent and danger-
ous to lay before them on paper' but which were, in effect, that if they
would 'immediately exert all their influence in impressing on the minds
of the inhabitants of the western country a conviction of the necessity
of their withdrawing and separating themselves from the Federal
Union, and forming an independent government wholly unconnected
with that of the Atlantic States' they would be well rewarded.

If a hundred thousand dollars distributed in Kentucky would cause it
to rise in insurrection, I am verv certain that the minister, in the pres-
ent circumstances, would sacrifice them with ])leasure: and you may,
without exposing yourself too much, promise them to those who enjoy
the confidence of the people, with another equal sum, in case of
necessity: and twenty pieces of field artillery.'*.

Meantime the Spanish forts along the Mississippi River were not
surrendered to the United States according to the Treaty of 1795, and
it was reported to the Secretary of State by Winthrop Sargent Secre-
tary of the Northwest Territory, 3rd June, 1797, that General Howard
an Irishman commissioned f\v Spain as Commander-in-chief had
arrived at St. Louis with upwards of three hundred men and had begun
the erection of a formidable fort; that a large party of Aborigines
(Delawares) passed down the White River, a tributary of the Wabash,
the first week in May bearing a Spanish flag on their way to reinforce
the Spaniards. Further, that the Spaniards had on the Mississippi
above the mouth of the Ohio several galley row boats with cannon.

Thomas Power also traversed the Maumee Valley in August on
his way to Detroit to meet General Wilkinson and other influential
men. He was accompanied, or soon followed, by the Agents of
France, Victor de Collot and M. Warin, who sketched maps of the
rivers and country. In a letter from Detroit to Captain Robert Buntin
at Vincennes under date 4th September, 1797, General Wilkinson
mentions receiving a letter from Carondelet stating "a variety of frivo-
lous reasons for not delivering the posts, and begs that no more [Amer-
ican] troops be sent down the Mississippi. I have put aside all his
exceptions, and have called on him in the most solemn manner to fulfill

* American State Papers, Miscellaneous volume ii. page 1

246 THE MAUMEE RIVER BASIN.

the treaty. . . Although Mr. Power has brought me this letter it is
possible it might be a mask to other purposes; I have therefore, for
his accommodation and safety, put him in care of Captain Shaumburgh
who will see him safe to New Madrid by the most direct route. I pray
you to continue your vigilance, and give me all the information in your
power." .

France refused to receive the American Minister and permitted
man}' unwise acts of her citizens while instigating others. Congress,
also, adopted measures of defense and retaliation, authorizing the form-
ation of a provisional army, about twelve regiments of which were to
gather at Fort Washington where boats were to be built to transport
them down the Mississippi; commercial intercourse with France was
suspended ; an act was passed for the punishment of alien and secret
enemies of the United States; and for the punishment of treason and
sedition.

The Spaniards of the Mississippi fearing an invasion by the
British, President John Adams ordered General Wilkinson 4th Febru-
ary, 1798, to oppose all who should presume to attempt a violation of
the laws of the territory of the United States by an expedition through
it against their enemies. This implies that the British had designs on
the Spanish Colony by way of the Maumee or Illinois. The Territory
of Mississippi was formed by Congress 7th April, 1798, and Winthrop
Sargent was nominated and approved as its Governor. The vacancy
thus made of Secretary of the Northwestern Territory, was filled ■26th
June by the appointment of William H. Harrison.

Ex-President George Washington was chosen 2nd July, 1798,
Lieutenant General and Commander-in-Chief of the armies raised or to
be raised for the service of the United States. There was little to be
done, however, that he could not readily delegate to his subordinates.
During the summer of 1798 the Spanish vacated their forts in American
territor}', and the 5th October General Wilkinson took up headquarters
at Loftus Heights, where Fort Adams was soon built, on the eastern
bank of the Mississippi about six miles north of the 31st degree of
north latitude the then dividing line between the United States and
Spanish territory.

The first Wayne County was divided into four townships according
to the law of 6th November, 1790. The 1st November, 1798, these
townships bore the names Detroit, Mackinaw, Sargent and Hamtramck,
the last named including, probably, nearly all of this Basin. The first
election in which Wayne County participated was held at Detroit, and
one or two other places, the third Monday of December, 1798, accord-
ing to proclamation of Governor St. Clair the 29th October; but owing
to some irregularity another election was held the 14th January, 1799,

FIRST NEWSPAPERS. LEGISLATURE. CONGRESSMAN. 247

which resulted in the election of Solomon Sibley, Charles F. Chobert
de Joncaire (jonquiere?) and Jacob Visger, all of Detroit and its
vicinity, as Representatives to the Legislature.

Territorial Legislature — Indiana Territory — Other
Organizations.

The Legislature convened at Cincinnati the 22nd January, 1799,
and later selected ten citizens whose names were sent to the President
of the United States according to the Ordinance of 1787, from whom
he was to nominate a Legislative Council or Senate for the Territory.
The meeting was then prorogued by Governor St. Clair to meet the
16th September.

The first newspaper in this Northwestern Territory was started 9th
November, 1793, by William Maxwell later postmaster at Cincinnati.
It was a half sheet, size 10 x 13 inches and headed Centinel of the
Northwestern Territory. The second newspaper was the Western Spy
started at Cincinnati 2Mth May, 1799.

A quorum of the General Assembly was not present at the
adjourned meeting until 24th Sejjtember when the nineteen Represen-
tatives reported as follows: two from Adams County, seven from
Hamilton, one from Jefferson, one from Knox, four from Ross, one
from Washington, and three from this Wayne County. These, with
the five persons selected by President Adams from the names that had
been sent to him (Jacob Burnet, James Findlay, Henry Vanderburg,
Robert Oliver, and David Vance) as Legislative Council or Senate,
completed the first Territorial Legislature.

William H. Harrison was chosen, the 3rd October, 1799, by this
Legislature as the first Delegate or Representative to Congress from
the Territory Northwest of the Ohio River. He at once resigned his
office as Secretary of the Territory, proceeded to Philadelphia and took
his seat in Congress which was there in session. Here, as elsewhere
he did good work for his constituents. The office of Secretary' of the
Territory becoming thus vacant. President Adams nominated Charles
Willing Byrd for the place 30th December, and the United States
Senate confirmed the choice the next day.

The difliculties attending the organization and maintenance of
government for a vast extent of country remote from officers and the
seat of government, had long been felt, and at length became the sub-
ject of Congressional inquiry. A committee of Congress reported the
3rd March, 1800, that 'in the three western counties of the Northwest
Territorv there had been but one court having cognizance of crimes
in five years; and the immunity which offenders experience, attracts as
to an asvlum the most vile and abandoned criminals, and at the same

248

THE MAUMEE RIVER BASIN.

WAYISEl, COUMTY

Aftcf for»T7a^on o^
InoiarM T(irr\Tori\
Law of Maij 7.I800

lAURENS
9-

time deters useful and virtuous persons from making settlements in
such society.'

In consonance with the recommendations of this committee, Con-
gress provided, the 7th May, that from and after the 4th of July, 1800,

all that part of the Territory of
the United States Northwest of
the Ohio River which lies to the
Westward of a line beginning at
the Ohio opposite to the mouth
of Kentucky River, and running
thence to Fort Recovery, and
thence north until it shall inter-
sect the Territorial line between
the United States and Canada,
shall, for the purpose of tem-
porary government, constitute
a separate territorv, and be
called the Indiana Territory.
All east of this line was called
Ohio Territory; and thus Wayne
County was reduced about one-
half in size. The Ordinance of
1787 was to apply for the government of Ohio and Indiana Territories
as heretofore, and William H. Harrison was appointed Governor of
Indiana Territory. Arthur St. Clair was reappointed Governor with
jurisdiction over Ohio Territory, notwithstanding his increasing dis-
favor with the people. Chillicothe was occupied as the capitol of Ohio
Territory in the year 1800.

Four land offices were established in Ohio Territory the 10th May,
1800; at Chillicothe, Cincinnati, Marietta and Steubenville. The
desirability of the United States Patent for settlers' lands, and more
compactness of jurisdiction, became more apparent to settlers in Con-
necticut's Western Reserve. Early in the year 1800 the seekers of
homes therein numbered about one thousand, mostly located near Lake
Erie. The 30th May the Connecticut Assembly transferred all her
rights of jurisdiction to the United States, which action placed all of
Ohio Territory upon a uniform land basis. This further conduced to
the increase in this Reserve of settlements, which extended westward
and occupied the eastern jiart of the lands of the Aborigines, they
receiving pay therefor from the Connecticut Land Company. Later in
this year, 1800, Trumbull County was organized, its limits extending
westward to the middle of Sandusky Bay or about five miles west of
the pi;esent City of Sandusky, and including all of the Western Reserve,

ADDED BRITISH INSULT. THE LOUISIANA PURCHASE. 249

X.AKC
SUPERIOR

WAYNE COUNTY

Ajfcr procUrodiloN oj
Ju)-^ I0-)9oo

which further curtailed Wayne County east from this line to the Cuya-
hoga River. The second protestant missionary in northern Ohio was sent
to this Reserve the latter part of IHOO liy the Connecticut Missionary
Societv. He found no township containing more than eleven families.

The Second ITnited States Cen-
sus, for the year IHOO, showed
the population of Ohio Territorj'
to be 45,365, including, as it
did, what is now eastern Michi-
gan.

The British, after their re-
moval to the Canadian bank of
Detroit River in 179fi, continu-
ed to ignore the line of United
States Territory, officially cross-
ing it at their pleasure. As late
as the -iOth October, IKOO, one
of their officers went to Detroit,
broke into a private house and
arrested Francis Poquette, using
such violence that the victim
soon died of the injuries he re-
ceived. They also endeavored to retain their former influence over
the Aborigines. The rising power of the United States, was apparent,
however, in the development of the West. The courage and prompt-
ness of the Government in meeting the many intrigues and aggressions
of the Aborigines, the French, Spanish, and of the unduly ambitious
Americans, had allayed visionary and chimerical schemes, and given
impetus and more stability to the Western settlements. The threat-
ened war with France was happily allayed and, the 30th September, a
treaty with that power was consummated. The ambitions of Spain,
through a number of years to possess this region, were also defeated,
and the 1st October she secretly ceded Louisiana back to France after
an ownership of thirty-eight years.

Nor did Napoleon's first idea of a new France prevail, but rather
that wise decision of President Jefferson and Congress for the purchase
by the United States 30th April, 1803, of that vast domain, styled the
Louisiana Purchase. Thus was removed by one master act all object-
ions to Americans navigating the Mississippi and trading throughout
its course. This purchase also quieted the agitations, both foreign and
domestic, for a Western Republic.

The first post road between Cincinnati and Detroit was established
3rd March, 1801. There bemg no postoffices, however, on the northern

250

THE MAUMEE RIVER BASIN.

end of the route for about two years after thiis date, tlie mail was carried
as a military or semi-military express as formerly. There was this
year also an increase of carrying facilities on Lake Erie, and on the
Ohio River. The first ship to pass down the rivers, across the Gulf to
Havana, and up the Atlantic coast to Philadelphia, was launched this
)'ear at Marietta. In 1801 the first capitol building for Ohio was built
at Chillicothe w^here Congress had designated the seat of government,
and in November the first session of the Second General Assembly met
there. Wayne County was represented by persons from Detroit as

follows: Solomon Sibley, as member of the Council or Senate in
place of Judge Vanderburg who resided in the new Territory of Indiana;
George M'Dougall, Charles F. Chobert Joncaire, and Jonathan Schief-
flin. The two last named aided the notorious Governor Hamilton in
his cruel warfare against Americans during the Revolutionary War,
and after the surrender of Detroit to the Americans in 1796 the last
named yet declared himself a British subject with determination to
remain such. The United States has had many similar examples, in
which the ignoring by the public of a forceful man's ill-advised state-

MILITARY POSTS. OHIO STATE ORGANIZED. 251

ments and actions has ^iven him opportunity in which he has refornit-d
his opinion and tempered his after life to lieneficent service. Tliis
Legislature continued in se'ssion until iord January, iHOl', wlun Gov-
ernor St. Clair, who as a Federalist had become very officious and e.xact-
ing against the organization of Ohio to the displeasure of the i>eo])le
generally, adjourned the session to meet in Cincinnati the following-
November. This act greatly offended many people of Chillicothe,
some of whom started to mob the Governor. Fortunately Jonathan
Schiefilin of Detroit was present with a pair of pistols whicli, being
exhibited in a firm manner, caused the mob to disperse without the
necessity for their further use.

In the 'Estimate of all Posts and Stations where [military] Garri-
sons will be expedient, and of the Number of Men requisite' made
December 3, 1801, but three Posts were mentioned for the Territory
Northwest of the Ohio River, viz: Michilimackinac one compan\- of
artillery and one of infantry: Detroit one company of artillery and four
of infantry: Fort Wayne one company of infantry. In Act of Congress
March, 1802, for Reduction of the Army, Fort Wayne was styled a
'frontier post with garrison of sixty-four men.' In the year 1803 Fort
Wayne had garrison of fifty-one men, viz: one Captain, one Surgeon's
Mate, one first and one second Lieutenant, one Ensign, four Sergeants,
four Corporals, three Musicians, and thirty-five Privates. '

State of Ohio — Treaties — Michigan and Illinois Territories.

The 4th March, 1802, with the presumption that Ohio Territory
contained a population of at least sixt\' thousand people, and a Con-
gressional Committee on this Territory reporting favorably. Congress
voted the 30th April to call a Convention of representatives of the Ter-
ritory to meet the 1st November, 1802, to frame a Constitution for the
proposed State of Ohio. This Convention, by a majority of five, per-
mitted the request of Governor St. Clair to deliver an address 'on
those points which he deems of importance.' In his speech the
Governor advised the postponement of a State organization until the
people of the original (eastern) division were plainly entitled to
demand it, and were not subject to be bound by conditions. Unwise
criticism, made at this time in addition to previous unwise acts, caused
President Thomas Jefferson to at once remove St. Clair from the
governorship. When the vote was taken upon the question of doing
that which St. Clair advised them not to do, but one of the thirtv-three
members of the Convention, Ephraini Cutler of Washington County,
voted with the Governor. t

' American State Papers, Military Affairs volume i, pages 156. 175. 786.
t See Jacob Burnet's Letters, patres lOH, llu and 111,

Z&Z THE MAUMEE RIVER BASIN.

The Constitution was agreed upon and signed with commendable
promptness, being completed the 29th November, 1802 ; and the 19th
February, 1803, Ohio was admitted to the Union as a State, the fourth
under the general Constitution and the seventeenth in general number.
The first Legislature met at Chillicothe the first Tuesday of March,
lb03, thus completing the State organization. The white residents of
Wayne County were mostly settled at Detroit : but some were settled
by the water courses to, and including, the Maumee. They were
counted to make the requisite number for the Statehood of Ohio: but
this Wayne County was given neither representation in the Convention
nor vote on the Constitution. In fact northwestern Ohio over the
whole extent of this Basin had no representation in the government
until after the organization of counties in April, 1820. Naturall\' the
Ohio part of this Basin reverted to Hamilton Countv for its civil gov-
ernment after the organization of Ohio as a State; and at the organi-
zation 1st May, 1h03, of Montgomery and Greene Counties they could
be supposed to extend north to the State line. Thev exercised but
little if any jurisdiction, however, in this region which, with other parts
of the Basin, remained the territory of the Aborigines until the treaties
of 1817, and were directly subject to the United States authorities at
Fort Wayne and Detroit. Wavne Countv in Ohio was not again
mentioned until 13th February, 1808, when by Legislative Act the
present County was organized with boundaries somewhat as now
existing, widely separated from the original Wa\'ne County which has
been taken from until it is of ordinary county size, with Detroit yet its
seat of government.

After the Treaty at Greenville in 1795, the Aborigines remained for
a short time reasonably contented with the United States Annuity, and
with what they received for the peltries obtained by hunting and trap-
ping. They also received many gratuities from the white settlers
among whom they wandered and entered dwellings at will, and by
whom thev were generally treated with kindly consideration notwith-
standing their want of regard for individual rights in property desired
bv them. It became more and more apparent, however, that British
influence was yet being exerted among them and causing discontent to
be fostered among the several tribes.

Governor Harrison, who was also Superintendent of the Affairs of
the Aborigines for Indiana Territory, completed at Fort Wayne 7th
June, 1803, the treaty that was begun 17th September, 1802, at Vin-
cennes, in which the Eel River, Kaskaskia, Kickajjoo, Miami, Pianke-
shaw, Pottawotami and Wea tribes formally deeded to the United
States the lands about Vincennes which had previously been bought of
the other Aborigme tribes: and this act was further confirmed at

PURCHASES FROM ABORIGINES. MICHIGAN ORGANIZED. 255

Vincennes the 7th August by yet other Aborigine chiefs. The 13th
August the Illinois tribes deeded to the United States a large portion
of the countr\' south and east of the Illinois River. The 13th August,

1804, Governor Harrison jiurchased for the United States the claims of
the Delawares to the land between the Wabash and Ohio Rivers. He
also purchased of the Piankeshaws their claims to lands deeded to the
United States by the Kaskaskias in 1803; also by treaty and purchase,
the claims of the several tribes were extinguished to large areas of
lands further west.

A treaty was also held at Fort Industry on the 4th July, 1805.*
At this time and place the chiefs and warriors of the Wyandot,
Ottawa, Chippewa, Munsee, Delaware, Shawnee, and Pottawotami
tribes, and those of the Shawnees and Senecas who lived with the
Wyandots, ceded to the United States all of their claims to the West-
ern Reserve of Connecticut, for and in consideration of an annuity of
one thousand dollars in addition to sixteen thousand dollars paid to
them by the Connecticut Land Company and the Proprietors of the
one half million acres of Sufferers' Lands ( Firelands, lands granted to
those persons who suffered by fire in Connecticut by acts of the British
during the Revolutionary War). Further, a treaty with and an
annuity to the dissatisfied Pottawotami, Miami, Eel River and Wea
Aborigines near Vincennes, the 21st August, 1805, induced them to
relinquish their claims to the southeastern part of Indiana which was
also bought of the Delawares by the United States on the iWth of
August, 1804. These several treaties and purchases, of 1H03-04-05,
including yet another with the Piankeshaws on the 30th December,

1805, extinguished several times over all alleged right of claim to these
lands by the Aborigines.

Michigan was organized into a separate Territory by Congress the
11th January, 1S05. The southern limit was to be a line running due
east from the most southern shore of Lake Michigan, as it was then
understood ; and the new government was to go into effect the 30th
June. General William Hull was appointed Governor.

'^American State Papers. Aborigine Aftairs volume i, pa^ie 696. The writer has been unable to
find any further authentic mention of Fort Industry by several applications by letters and in person to
the Secretaries of State and War at WashiuKton. and by personal search there and in the United Slates
Library. A writer some years ago ascribed its building to General Wayne immediately after the Battle
of Fallen Timber (Knapp's History of the Maumee Valley] and others have copied his assertion.
Henry Howe wrote in his Historical Collections of Ohio that the time of its building was about the year
1800. The writer has shown by official reports, of all existing forts on previous pages of this bool< that
Fort Industry was not built before the winter or spring of IHO.t; that it was probably but a stockade
(probably an old one repaired) for the accommodation of the troops present at the treaty and called a
fort for the effect of the name on the Aborigines; and that it was abandoned soon after the treaty.
Tradition alone gives its situation on the left (north) bank of Swan Creek at its entrance into the
Maumee River, about the crossing of Summit and Monroe Streets in the present City of Toledo, Ohio.
See the writer's article in the Ohio Archaeologicai and Hisiorical Ouarterly. vol. sii p, 123,

254 THE MAUMEE RIVER BASIN.

Aaron Burr journeyed, and re journeyed, through the west and
southwest during- the vears IHOo and 1H06, and rumors became rife of
his pre]iarations to invade and conquer Mexico, and to create a West-
ern Republic of which the country west of the Allegheny Mountains
was to form a part. The Legislature of Ohio ordered, the first part of
December, 1806, the seizure of fourteen boats and supplies at Marietta,
which were about read}- to start down the rivers in aid of Burr's
scheme. Burr was arrested 17th January, 1807, and was released on
bail, which he forfeited. He was again arrested while endeavoring to
escape, was subjected to trial at Richmond, and accjuitted. Thus
failed, however, the fourth and weakest effort to wrest this western
region from the United States. During these years of scheming by
restless, designing persons, and of apprehension by the Government,
there was considerable strengthening of United States troops at Forts
Washington, Wavne, and Detroit; and preparations were made for their
active service. The conduct of Aaron Burr was a cause for this : and
the increasing aggressions of the British were also an explanation.

The ■27th January, 1H07, Henry Dearborn Secretary of War, sent a
commission to William Hull Governor of Michigan Territorv and Suii-
erintendent thereof Aborigine Affairs, with instructions to hold a treaty
council with the Aborigines. Governor Hull issued a call to the differ-
ent tribes for a council at Detroit; but they did not attend. Two other
calls were sent, and President Jefferson directed him to communicate
to them the continued friendl\- intentions and offices of the United
States. The setjuel proved that their desires to respond to the invita-
tions to council had been thwarted by Captain Alexander M'Kee
British agent. Finally, they evaded M'Kee and his aids and went to
Detroit for council, in which they proclaimed the intrigue of the British
to again more closelv alh' them to their aid for the war likelv to ensue
with the United States. '■' Between seven and eight hundred Aborigines
had been invited to Maiden, now Amherstburg, where intoxicating bev-
erages and promises prevailed. During October and November many
hundreds of these Aborigines were unavoidably fed at Detroit by Gov-
ernor Hull while on their way to and from Maiden, and also during
the council, notwithstanding the direction of the Secretary of War that
from fifty to one hundred was as great a number as ought to be allowed
to attend. A iirominent feature of this council, and one that was
remembered and repeated by the Aborigines, was the expression of
President Jefferson that they should remain quiet spectators, and not
participate in any (piarrels of others, particularly of the white people;
that tht' ['uited States were strong enough to fight their own battles ;

■'' Compare American State Papers, Ab.'iiwiiie Allairs Nuhune i. pat;c

GRANTS TO ABORIGINES. RESERVATIONS. ROADS. 255 ^

and that it was evidence of weakness on the part of any people to
want the aid of the Aborigines.

Finally a treaty was effected at Detroit 17th November, 1S()7, with
the Chippewa, Ottawa, Pottawotami and Wyandot tribes in which
they deeded to the United States all their claims to the country north
of the middle of the Maumee River from its mouth to the mouth of the
Auglaise, thence extending north to the latitude of the south part of
Lake Huron, thence east to and southward along the Canadian boun-
dary. For this territory- they received ten thousand dollars in 'money
and goods' as first payment and an annuity of two thousand and four
hundred dollars. They were given, however, the option of monev,
goods, implements of husbandry, and domestic animals, from which to
choose. Of these sums, the Chijipewas received one-third, the Ottawas
one-third, and the Pottawotamis and Wyandots each one-sixth. This
treaty further reads that "the llnited States, to manifest their liberalitv,
and disposition to encourage the said Aborigines in agriculture, further
stipulate to furnish the said Aborigines with two blacksmiths during
the term of ten years — one to reside with the Chippewas at Saginaw,
and the other to reside with the Ottawas at the Maumee. Said black-
smiths are to do such work for the said nations as shall be most useful
to them." As in former treaties, the Aborigines were to have the
privilege of hunting on the ceded lands as long as they remained the
distinctive property of the United States.

Certain tracts of this land were also reserved for the exclusive use
of the Aborigines. These reservations within this Basin were as
follows : Six miles square on the north bank of the Maumee above
Roche de Bout 'to include the village where Tondagame [Tontogany]
or the dog, now lives ' probably at the Grand Rapids. Another reser-
vation three miles square on the Maumee "above the twelve miles
square ceded to the United States by the Treaty at Greenville, includ-
ing what is called Presque Isle: also, four miles square on the Miami
[Maumee] Bay, including the villages where Meshkemau and Waugau
now live. . . It is further understood and agreed, that whenever
the reservations cannot convenientl>- be laid out in squares, they shall
be laid out in parallelograms or other figures as found most practicable
and convenient, so as to obtain the area specified in miles : and in all
cases they are to be located in such manner and in such situations as
not to interfere with any improvements of the French or other white
people, or any former cession."

American settlers continued to gather in Ohio, and some took resi-
dence on the United States Reservations at the Foot of the Rapids of
the Maumee. The necessity for roads to connect the settlements in
Ohio with those in Michigan, becoming more ap]iarent, Governor Hull

256 THE MAUMEE RIVER BASIN.

was directed to secure cession of lands for such roads from the Aborigi-
nes. Accordingly a treaty was held at Brownstown, Michigan, 25th
November, IKOH, with the sachems, chiefs and warriors of the Chip-
pewa, Ottawa, Pottawotami, Shawnee, and Wa\'ndot tribes in which
they quitclaimed a tract of land one hundred and twenty feet in width
for a road from the foot of the lowest rapids in the Maumee River to
the western line of the Connecticut Reserve; also all the land within
one mile of each side of this roadway for the settlement of white
people: "also a tract of land, for a road only, of one hundred and
twenty feet in width to run southwardly from what is called Lower
Sandusky [now Fremont] to the boundary line established by the
Treatv of Greenville, with the privilege of taking, at all times, such
timber and other materials from the adjacent lands as may be necessary
for making and keeping in repair the said road, with the bridges that
mav be required along the same." . . No compensation was given
the Aborigines in money or merchandise for these roadways, as they
were desirable and beneficial to the Aborigine nations as well as to the
United States, reads a clause in the cession.

Indiana Territory from its organization in 1M02 had extended to
the Mississippi River. The settlements had increased so much, how-
ever, that the Illinois country was organized into a separate Territory
the 3rd Februarv, IHO'J.

Tecumseh's Conspiracy with British Against Americans.

For several years the Aborigines had manifested an increasing
restlessness, which was attributed by Captain Dunham and other Amer-
ican officers principally to the influence of foreigners who were trading
among them.''' The idea first taught to the savages by the early
French in opposition to the British, then exploited by Pontiac in 1763,
and then amplified with greater force by the British against the Amer-
icans from the beginning of the Revolutionary War — of a confedera-
tion of all the tribes, and that all lands should be claimed by them col-
lectively, and that no claim should be disposed of, nor any advance of
the Americans upon the lands be permitted — was being revived and
again urged before the Aborigines by the British and a few French.

Tecumseh, an energetic Shawnee brave, began in 1805 therefrom
to repeat the history of Pontiac, the Americans being the people con-
spired against. The increasing purchases of claims b\' the United
States, and the rapid increase of American settlers thereon who at
once began to clear away the forest; the organization of Territories,
State and Counties, with their courts and closer government, all had

* COTII

ipaie American State Papers. Aborigine Atfairs volume i. page T9y.

CONSPIRACY OF TECUMSEH AND ELSKWATAWA. 257

excited apprehension among lawless traders and loungers in the camps
of the Aborigines, and had also excited afresh the chronically meddle-
some British officers and agents, inciting them to renewed intrigues.

Tecumseh's reputed brother,
lilskwatawa, had recently remov-
ed with other Shawnees from the
Scioto River, Ohio, to the Tippe-
canoe, Indiana, where he soon
gained something of a notoriety
as a sorcerer. He began to tell
of his dreams and visions, and to
claim the knowledge and power of
a prophet inspired and commis-
sioned by the Great Spirit to lead
the Aborigines l>ack to the con-
dition of their ancestors before
the coming of the Americans. His
remarkable pretensions s [ire ad
Irom the Shawnee town by the
Tipjiecanoe River to other and
distant tribes, being carried by
runners including Tecumseh who
traveled rapidly from tribe to tribe
between Lake Erie and the Mis-
sissippi, and from the u|i]ier lakes
to the Gulf of Mexico.
These actions of Tecumseh and the 'Prophet' were understood by
Governor Harrison as a concerted effort to marshal the Aborigines in
the interest of their British allies again against the United States.
Since the campaign of General Wavne a new generation of young men,
fed from the rations supplied their jiarents by the United States, had
developed into warriors anxious for excitement and ready at short
notice to follow an\' leader whose project appeared probable to gratify
their savage impulses. Letters were soon received by the Secretary of
War from the several military jaosts throughout the western country
regarding the increasing hostility of the Aborigines and their threaten-
ings to exterminate Americans, also of their being aided by the British;
but, notwithstanding accumulating proof of their designs both parties,
Tecumseh and the 'Prophet' and the British, denied any hostile inten-
tion against the United States. Excerjits from some of the letters to the
Secretary of War in proof of the contrarv are here presented, viz:''

ELSKWATAWA

The Shawnee Sorcerer and Prophet. Born
probably about 1770. 'A cunning, unprincipled
man. in earl.v life remarkable for nothim,' but
stupidity and intoxication.' The last years of his
life were obscured.

''^' For much other proof, see American Stale Papers volume iv. paye 798 et sequentia.

258 THE MAUMEE RIVER BASIN.

General William Clark wrote from St. Louis April 5, 1809, that
the Aborigine prophet's emissaries have been industriously employed
the latter part of winter and spring privately councillinsi with, and
attempting to seduce the Kickapoos, Saukeys, and other bands of
Aborigines by the Mississippi and Illinois Rivers, to war against the
frontiers of this country. William Wells wrote from Fort Wayne Hth
April that the Aborigines appear to be agitated respecting the conduct and
as they say the intentions of the Shawnee Prophet. The Chippewas,
Ottawas, and Pottawotamis are hurrying away from him and say that
their reason for doing so is because he has told them to receive the
tomahawk from him and destroy all the white people at Vincennes and
Ohio, as low down as the mouth of the Ohio and as high up as Cincin-
nati : that the Great Spirit had directed that they should do so, at the
same time threatening them with destruction if they refused to comply
with what he proposed. General Clark wrote from St. Louis April
30th: I have the honor to enclose you a cop\' of a letter which con-
firms my suspicions of the British interference with our Aborigine
affairs in this country. The following is an extract from the enclosed
letter from Boilvin: 'l am at present in the fire receiving Aborigine
news every da}'. A chief of the Puant nation appears to be employed
b}' the British to get all the nations of Aborigines to Detroit to see
their fathers the British, who tell them that they pity them in their
situation with the Americans, because the Americans had taken their
lands and their game; that they must join and send them off from their
lands. They said they had but one father that had helped them in
their misfortunes, and that they would assemble, defend their father,
and keep their lands.' It appears that four English subjects have been
at Riviere a la Roche this winter in disguise : they have been there to
get the nations together and send them on the American front-
iers. Governor Harrison wrote from Vincennes 3rd May, 1809,
of his decided opinion that the Prophet will attack our settlements.
About eight days ago he had with him three hundred and fifty warriors
well armed with rifles; they have also bows and arrows, war clubs, and
a kind of spear. The Factor (Agent) of the Trading Post at San-
dusky, S. Tupper, wrote 7th June that the conduct of the British
traders in introducing spirituous liquors among the Aborigines in this
part of the country, and their determined hostility to the measures of
our Government, have long been subjects of complaint; and their
infamous stories have embarrassed our operations. Governor William
Hull wrote from Detroit June 16th that the influence of the Prophet
has been great, and his advice to the Aborigines injurious to them and
to the United States. We have the fullest evidence that his object has
been to form a combination of them in hostility to the United States,

SEDITIOUS ACTS. TREATY AT FORT WAYNE. 259

The powerful influence of the British has been exerted in a wav alluring
to the savage character. Complaints also came to the Secretary of
War that British agents were inciting the Aborigines along the western
shore of Lake Michigan and supplying them with guns and ammuni-
tion. General Harrison wrote from Vincennes 5th July that the
Shawanese Prophet and about forty followers arrived here about a week
ago. He denies most strenuously any participation in the late combi-
nation to attack our settlements. . . I must confess that my sus-
picions of his guilt have been rather strengthened than diminished at
every interview I have had with him since his arrival. He acknowl-
edged that he received an invitation to war against us from the British
last fall, and that he was apprised of the intention of the Sacs, Foxes,
etc., early in the spring, and was warmlv solicited to join in their
league. . . The result of all my enquiries on the subject is, that the
late combination was produced bv British intrigue and influence in
anticipation of war between them and the United States. It was, how-
ever, premature and ill-judged.

Governor Harrison, in council with Aborigines at Fort Wayne
30th September, 1809, succeeded, however, in further purchasing their
claims to two tracts of land in Indiana Territory west of the Greenville
Treaty Line and adjoining former purchases, the stipulated price being
permanent annuities of five hundred dollars to the Delawares, five
hundred dollars to the Miamis, two hundred and fiftv dollars to the
Eel River Miamis, and five hundred dollars to the Pottawotamis. The
Miamis, by separate article of same date, as additional compensation
were promised to receive at Fort Wayne the next spring domestic
animals to the amount of five hundred dollars, and the like number for
the two following years; and that an armorer should be also main-
tained at Fort Wayne for the use of the Aborigines as heretofore. In
treaty with the Kickapoos at Vincennes 9th December, 1H09, Governor
Harrison purchased claims to land northwest of the Wabash River
adjoining the Vincennes tract, the consideration being a permanent
annuity of four hundred dollars, and goods to the amount of eight
hundred dollars. By this last treatv the Miamis were to receive a
further annuity of two hundred dollars, and the Eel River tribes one
hundred dollars each.

Trading Agencies — Continued Conspiracy of Tecumseh.

The report to the Secretary of War 31st December, 1809, of
J. Mason Superintendent of the Trading House Establishments or
agencies styled Factories among the Aborigines, possesses features of
interest in this connection. There were at this date twelve establish-
ments of this character, eight of which were in the South and South-
west; and the net assets involved in them amounted to ?235,461.64.

260 THE MAUMEE RIVER BASIN.

The Trading House in this Basin was established at Fort Wayne in
the year 1802. Colonel John Johnston was the Factor (yVgent) in 1809
with salars' of $1000 per year and a subsistence allowance of $365.
William Oliver his clerk received a salary of $250 a year and $150 for
subsistence. Inventory of the assets of this Fort Wayne Trading
House October 5th showed: Merchandise, Peltries, etc., on hand
$5,020.75; Accounts Receivable per return of March $2,112.72; Build-
ings estimated at about one half of cost $500. Merchandise forwarded
by the Government to Fort Wayne 9th June and 2Hth July not included
in the above amounted to $4,686.87. A Trading Agency was also
established in Detroit in 1802, but it was discontinued in 1805. Those
in operation nearest this Basin in 1809, were: Sandusky established in
1806; Chicago 1805; and Michilimackinac 1808. The peltries taken in
exchange for merchandise at these Trading Houses were; Beaver,
first quality valued at two dollars each, and second tjuality one dollar
Dressed Deer Skins one dollar and fifty cents; Wolf Skins one dollar
Muskrat, Raccoon, Wildcat, and Fox Skins, twenty-five cents each
Otter two dollars and fifty cents; Bear first quality one dollar and fifty
cents, second quality one dollar. Tallow at twelve and a half cents a
pound, and Beeswax at twenty cents, also entered into the accounts.

Tecumseh and the Prophet continued active. The additional
councils and purchases of land at F"ort Wayne and Vincennes were
alleged as new incentives. General Harrison wrote to the Secretary
of War 14th June, 1810, that I have received information from various
sources which has produced entire conviction on my mind, that the
Prophet is organizing a most extensive combination against the United
States. Another letter dated the 26th June informs that Winemac
[a friendly Aborigine] assured me that the Prophet not long since pro-
posed to the young men to murder the principal chiefs of all the tribes ;
observing that their hands would never be untied until this was
effected ; that these were the men who had sold their lands, and who
would prevent them from opposing the encroachments of the white
people. An Iowa Aborigine informs me that two years ago this
summer an agent from the British arrived at the Prophet's town and,
in his presence delivered the message with which he was charged, the
substance of which was to urge the Prophet to unite as many tribes as
he could against the United States, but not to commence hostilities
until they gave the signal.'''

The 11th Juh' General Harrison again wrote that I have received

* The reader will bear in mind the strained relations between the L'nited States and Great Hrit-
ain whicli had existed for several years, and which fre'inently received fresh incentives from the im-
pressment of American seaman, the search of American ships, and unjust discriminations in trade. The
continued arrocance of the British in Canada, and their conduct toward the Aborigines on American
soil, show that their former ulterior desiKns on this western country were unabated.

CONTINUED PLOTTING OF BRITISH WITH SAVAGES. 261

a letter from Fort Wayne which confirms the information of the hostile
designs and combination of the Aborigines. The people in the neigh-
borhood where the horses were stolen are so much alarmed that thev
are collecting together for their defense. Again, July iHth: From the
lowas I learn that the Sacs and Foxes have actually received the
tomahawk [declared for war] and are ready to strike whenever the
Prophet gives the signal. A considerable number of Sacs went some
time since to see the British superintendent and, on the first instant,
fifty more passed Chicago for the same destination. A Miami chief
who has just returned from his annual visit to Maiden, after having
received the accustomed donation of goods was thus addressed by the
British agent: ' My son keep your eyes fixed on me; my tomahawk is
now up: be you ready, but do not strike until I give the signal.'
General Clark wrote from St. Louis July 20th that a few weeks ago the
post-rider on his way from Vincennes to this place was killed, and the
mail lost; since that time we have had no communication with
Vincennes. A part of the Sacs and the greatest part of the Kickapoos
who reside east of the Mississippi have been absent some time on a
visit to the Aborigine Prophet. One hundred and fifty Sacs are on a
visit to the British agent by invitation, and a smaller party on a visit
to the island of St. Joseph in Lake Huron. On July "ioth General
Harrison again wrote that there can be no doubt of the designs of the
Prophet and the British agent of Aborigine affairs [Alexander M'Kee?]
to do us injury. This agent is a refugee from the neighborhood of

[Pittsburg] and his implacable hatred of his native country

prompted him to take part with the Aborigines in the battle between
them and General Wayne's army. He has, ever since his appointment
to the principal agency used his utmost endeavors to excite hostilities,
and the lavish manner in which he is allowed to scatter presents
amongst them, shews that his government participates in his enmity
and authorizes his measures. Governor Hull wrote from Detroit Juh'
■27th that large bodies of Aborigines from the westward and southward
continue to visit the British post at Amherstburg [Maiden] and are
supplied with provisions, arms, ammunition, etc. Much more atten-
tion is paid to them than usual. On August 7th Captain John Johns-
ton, agent of the Fort Wayne Trading Post, wrote that since writing
\-ou on the 25th ultimo, about one hundred Sawkevs [Sacs] have re-
turned from the British agent who supplied them liberally with every-
thing they stood in want of. The party received forty-seven rifles and
a number of fusils [flintlock muskets] with plenty of powder and lead.
This is sending firebrands into the Mississijipi country inasmuch as it
will draw numbers of our Aborigines to the British side in the hope of
being treated with the same liberality. On the 1st August General

262 THE MAUMEE RIVER BASIN.

Harrison reported that a number of the inhabitants of the northern
frontier of the Je'ffersonville district had been driven away by the Abo-
rigines and much of their property destroyed. Many other letters were
written to the Secretary of War from the widely separated posts evi-
dencing the continued preparations of the Aborigines for war under
the incitements of the British. But few other extracts will be here
given: February 6, 1811, Captain John Johnston again wrote from
Fort Wavne that has been at this place. The information de-
rived from him is the same I have been in possession of for several
years, to wit: the intrigues of the British agents and partisans in
creating an influence hostile to our people and Government, within our
territory. I do not know whether a garrison [fort] is to be erected on
the Wabash or not; but every consideration of sound policy urges the
earlv establishment of a post somewhere contiguous to the Prophet's
residence. Hostilities were continued to the westward, some murders
and captivities being reported; and some blockhouses were built along
the frontier for the refuge and defense of the settlers.

Governor Harrison had not remained idle. He had instituted
preparations for defense and, also, for advance. By appointment he
was visited by the chief leader of the hostile Aborigines, his written
report of the same on 6th August, 1811, being in part as follows: The
Shawanee Chief Tecumseh has made a visit to this place with about
three hundred Aborigines, though he promised to bring but a few
attendants; his intentions hostile, though he found us prepared for him.
Tecumseh did not set out till yesterday ; he then descended the Wabash
attended by twenty men on his way to the southward. After having
visited the Creeks and Choctaws he is to visit the Osages, and return
by the Missouri. The spies say his object in coming with so many
was to demand a retrocession of the late purchase [of Aborigine claims
to land]. At the moment he was promising to bring but a few men
with him he was sending in every direction to collect his people. That
he meditated a blow at this time was believed by almost all the neutral
Aborigines.*

It appears, wrote J. Shaw Agent at Fort Wayne the 18th August,
that the fruit of the Shawanee Prophet and his band, is making its
appearance i-n more genuine colors than heretofore. I have lately had
opportunities of seeing" many of the Aborigines of this Agencv from
different quarters, and by what I have been able to learn from them,
particularly the Pottawotamis, I am induced to believe the news circu-
lating in the papers respecting the depredations committed in the

* In Drake's Life of Tecumseh there is description of a dramatic scene at this council, in which
Teciunseh's men at a given sit;na) sprang to arms and were instantly faced by a strong guard of Ameri-
can troops who had been held in the background for any emergency.

FURTHER COLLUSION OF BRITISH WITH SAVAGES. 263

Illinois Territory by the Aborigines, is mostly correct, and is thought
by them to have proceeded from Mar Poe [or Marpack a Pottawotami
chief] and the influence of the Shawanee Prophet. Several of the
tribes have sent to me for advice. Governor Harrison wrote Septem-
ber 17, 1811, from Vincennes to the Secretary of War as follows:

states that almost every Aborigine from the countrv

above this had been or was then gone to Maiden on a visit to the
British agent. We shall probably gain our destined point at the
moment of their return. If then the British agents are reall\' endeav-
oring to instigate the Aborigines to make war upon us, we shall be in
their neighborhood at the very moment when the impressions which
have been made against us are most active in the minds of the savages.

succeeded in getting the chiefs together at Fort Wayne,

though he found them all preparing to go to Maiden. The result of
the council discovered that the whole tribes ( including the Weas and
Eel Rivers, for they are all Miamis ) were about equally divided in

favor of the Prophet and the United States. reports

that all the Aborigines of the Wabash have been or now are on a visit
to the British agent at Maiden ; he has never known more than one-
fourth as many goods given to the Aborigines as they are now distrib-
uting. He examined the share of one (not a chief) and found that he
had received an elegant rifle, twenty-five pounds of powder, fiftv
pounds of lead, three blankets, three strouds of cloth, ten shirts, and
several other articles. He says every Aborigine is furnished with a
gun (either rifle or fusil) and an abundance of ammunition. A trader
of this country was lately in the King's store at Maiden, and was told
that the quantity of goods for the .\borigine department which had been
sent out this year, exceeded that of common years by i:/20,000 sterling.
It is impossible to ascribe this profusion to any other motive than that
of instigating the Aborigines to take up the tomahawk; it cannot be to
secure their trade for all the peltries collected on the waters of the
Wabash in one year if sold on the London market would not pay the
freight of the goods which have been given to the Aborigines.' .
Tecumseh and the Prophet advocated discontinuance of trade with
Americans. Action on this advice led to clandestine trading, to more
fraudulent practices, and to some violence. But the principal result
was observed as an additional incentive to turn the savages to the
British whose lavish gifts had already operated to draw the most of
them to Maiden.

The report of Captain John Johnston Factor [Agent] of the United
States Aborigine Factory [trading agency] at Fort Wayne the 30th
September, 1811, to J. Mason Superintendent of Trade with the Abo-
rigines, shows the Inventory of Merchandise on hand 30th December,

264 THE MAUMEE RIVER BASIN.

1807, as $13,046.84; Accounts of Aborigines $-2,459.29; Amount of
Merchandise received from 1st January, 1808, $15,226.91; Expenses
since 1st January, 1808, $6,048.62. To tlie credit side of the report
there is the Inventory of Merchandise on hand 30th September, 1811,
$10,281.66; Furs, Peltries, etc., principally hatters' furs of good sale
[beaver skins] $689.62; Cash in hand $76.37/1': Accounts against
Aborigines $2,747.56 and Buildings $400. The two last items were
included as loss. There had been received during these years for Furs
and Peltries sold $27,547.07; the value of Furs and Peltries on the way
to market $3,053.12: Goods returned to the Government $1,752.34;
New York Auctioneer paid State Duty which was refunded $195.42;
Salary transferred $572.30 all of which shows a profit of $10,502.77 for
the three years and ten months.

There were at this time ten Trading Agencies in operation with
a total capital of $290,000. They were situate as follows: Fort
Hawkins, Georgia; Chickasaw Bluffs, Mississippi Territory: Fort
Stephenson, Mobile River Mississippi Territory; Fort Osage, by
Missouri River: Fort Madison, bv upper Mississippi River Louisiana
Territory : Natchitoches, by Red River Orleans Territory : Fort
Waj'ne by the Miami of the Lakes [Maumee River] ; Chicago, San-
dusky, and Michilimackinac. Several of these agencies were conducted
at a loss to the Government, viz: Sandusky $3,366.50; Fort Stephen-
son $10,352.54; Natchitoches $11,718.73 and Fort Hawkins $1,023.
The nominal profit at the others was: Chicago $3,454.24; Michili-
mackinac $1,945.71 ; Fort Wayne $10,502.77 ; Fort Osage over two
hundred dollars less than Fort Wayne, and Fort Madison $10,026.39.
The Agencies showing gain received more of hatters' furs, the greatlv
coveted beaver, which were constant!)' in greater demand than the sup-
ply. The Agencies showing loss were at a disadvantage from carriage
■charges and the -barter, which was mostly for deer skins formerly
marketed in Europe, and latterly much injured by vermin from the
delay in sale on account of the British obstruction.

Meetings of citizens along the frontier were held during the sum-
mer of 1811 and memorials stating the depredations and murders b\-
the Aborigines, accompanied by petitions for protection, were sent to
President James Madison. Governor Harrison was given additional
regular troops and militia and, the second week in October, iHll, they
advanced up the Wabash towards the Prophet's town on the Tippe-
canoe to stop his influence for further murderous raids. Peace mes-
sengers were sent forward, but they were violently treated and the
night of the 10th a sentinel of the American army was severely- wounded
by the Prophet's warriors. Governor Harrison commanded in person. •
The army advanced cautiously and, the 6th November, meeting some

BATTLE OF TIPPEGA-NOE. THE DOUBLE FRONTIER. 265

of the Prophet's messengers near his town an aj^'reement was made for
a council the next morniny;. But, true to the treacherous nature of the
savages, they made a stealthy attack in the dark about a quarter past
four o'clock in the morninjj when, in the words of Governor Harrison's
report, they manifested a ferocity uncommon to them. To their
savage fury our troops, nineteen-twentieths of whom had not before
been in battle, opposed that cool and deliberate valor which is charac-
teristic of the Christian soldier.' The savages retreated. The Ameri-
cans in this Battle of Tippecanoe numbered a few over seven hundred ;
and the number of savages was estimated as nearly the same. The
American loss was sixty-two killed and one hundred and twentv-six
wounded. The loss of the savages was estimated at a greater number.

The condition of the frontier settlements was not much improved
by this defeat of the Shawnee Prophet's army. Depredations and
murders continued in the west, and grave apprehensions pervaded the
whole country. Among the i)etitioners to the President and Congress
for protection were some of the prominent citizens of the Territorv of
Michigan living at Detroit, who gave statistics from which the follow-
ing are extracted, viz: The population of the Territory on the lUth
December, IHll, was given as four thousand seven hundred and sixty-
two, about four-fifths of whom were French, the remainder being
largely Americans, with a few British and some servants of African
blood. "^ They were distributed in nine principal settlements each
having a double frontier ' — the British on one side, the savages on
the other. The first three of these settlements were named as 1, the
mouth of the Maumee River; "2, the River Raisin; 3, the River Huron.
The population of these three settlements was given as one thousand
three hundred and forty (not including the savages) the males over
sixteen years of age being three hundred and ninety-one. There were
two forts, one at Detroit with a garrison of ninet\'-four soldiers, and
the other at Michilimackinac with seventy-nine soldiers. Additional
forts were pt-titioned for, with stronger garrisons, and cavalrv.

The following extracts of letters show the continued hostilitv of
the savages and the influence of the British against the Americans :
William Wells wrote from Fort Wayne 10th February, 1812, that at
the request of Little Turtle I enclose you his speech to Governor
Harrison of the 25th ultimo. On the 12th ult. two British emissaries
passed through this neighborhood on their way to see the Prophet.
On the 21st ultimo they called at my house on their return to Maiden;
they were two Munsey Aborigines. It appears that their business was
to invite all the Aborigines to meet at Maiden very early in the spring.

" African slaves were brought info this Basin by the Aborigines, and taken to Detroit from early
date. They were bought by the army ofiicers and merchants and retained as servants for many years.

266 THE MAUMEE RIVER BASIN.

What took place between them and the Prophet, I have not yet learnt.
The Pottawotamy chief Marpack has been in the neighborhood of
Maiden since August last; he now is near the white settlement on the
River Raisin in Michigan Territory and visits Maiden every eight or
ten days. He has about one hundred and twenty of the best warriors
in this country with him, stationed in such a manner as to be unob-
served by the white settlers; that is to say, eight or ten in one place,
fifteen or twenty in another, and so on; but within such distance of
each other as to enable him to collect them all in twenty-four hours.
I know this chief is hostile-inclined towards the United States, and
have no hesitation in saying that he is kept at that place by the British
agents at Maiden ; and in case the United States have war with that
Power, this chief will attack our settlements immediately. I believe
many of the warriors that fought Governor Harrison have, and are now
about to join him.' The speech of Little Turtle referred to above
acknowledges receipt of the letters of Governor Harrison, and states
that their contents had been communicated to the Miami tribes, includ-
ing those of Eel River. He stated that none of these tribes was in the
Battle of Tippecanoe. He expressed regret that the Aborigines had
become hostile, and promised his influence to prevent further like
action. William Wells wrote again 1st March, from Fort Wayne as
follows : In my letter of the lOth ultimo I informed you that the
Aborigine chief Tecumseh had arrived on the Wabash. I have now to
state to you that it appears he has determined to raise all the Al^origi-
nes he can, immediately, with intention no doubt to attack our front-
iers. He has sent runners to raise the Aliorigines on the Illinois and
the upper Mississippi; and I am told has gone himself to hurry on the
aid he was promised by the Cherokees and Creeks. The Prophet's
orator, who is considered the third man in this hostile band, passed
within twelve miles of this place on the 23rd ultimo with eight Shawa-
nese, eight Winnebagoes and seven Kickapoos, in all twenty-four, on
their way as they say to Sandusky, where the\- expected to receive a
quantit\- of powder and lead from their father the British.

Had the petitions of the settlers for more forts and stronger garri-
sons been granted, and such bands as above mentioned been arrested and
imprisoned, the influence of the British could have been greatly
reduced and many American lives saved that were lost in later conflicts
when the British and their savage allies were again fully organized.
Governor Howard of Missouri Territory wrote from St. Louis March
19, 1812, detailing depredations and ' most barbarous murders ' by
savages ; and the letters of like import from Captam Nathan Heald
were frequent from Chicago, including the killing and eating of two
Americans by Winnebagoes at the lead mines near the Mississippi.

MURDEROUS RAIDINGS AND CANNIBALISM. 267

Captain J. Rhea of the 13th Regiment of Infantry, stationed at Fort
Wavne, wrote March 14th, you say if we have a British war we shall
have an Aborigine war. From the best information I can get, I have
everv reason to believe we shall have an Aborigine war this spring
whether we have a British war or not. I am told the Aborigines are
making every preparation. There is certainly a very deep plan going
on among the Aborigines. Captain John Whistler, in 'command of
Fort Lernoult at Detroit, wrote 2nd April, that Lieutenant Eastman
arrived here on the evening of the ■29th ultimo from Cincinnati. About
six miles on this side of the foot of the Miami [Maumee] rapids he met
twenty-four Aborigines who were in the action against Governor Har-
rison [Battle of Tippecanoe]. They were on their return from Maiden,
and had been there for a length of time this winter and had, when Mr.
Eastman met them, each a new stand of arms, some of them were
rifles others smooth bore; also a quantit\- of ammunitiijn. One of
these Aborigines has shown in this town several wounds he had received
in the action. The 15th .\pril Captain Nathan Heald, in command of
Fort Dearborn at Chicago, wrote that the Aborigines had commenced
hostilities in that vicinity by murdering two men about three miles
from the fort. Other murders were reported from different parts of
the west. The first of May Captain John Johnston reported from
Piqua, Ohio, that three Americans had been killed at Defiance and two
at Sandusky by the savages. A general uprising of the savages was
now apparent to the westward, and the frontier settlers there were
generally gathered in hastily constructed and uncomfortable block-
houses.

Benjamin F. Stickney, who had recently succeeded John Johnston
as Aborigine agent at Fort Wayne, wrote on May 25th that My last was
on the 15th instant. I told you then of the measures I had taken to
make peace with the relatives of the two Aborigines who were killed at
Greenville. Before receiving this you will undoubtedly have received
more correct information of the circumstances than I could give \'ou.
The women and child who were taken prisoners were sent to me by
Mr. Johnson with three or four horses and as much of the other
property that was taken as he could obtain, under the care and pro-
tection of two Shawanee chiefs and ten warriors. The\- arrived four
days ago when there was a general collection of Aborigines forming to
inform me what had been doing at a grand council they had been hold-
ing on the Wabash where twelve tribes were represented, consisting of
the Wyandots, Chippewas, Ottawas, Pottawotamies, Delawares,
Miamis, Eel River Miamis, Weas, Piankeshaws, Shawanese, Kicka-
poos, and Winnebagoes. The council here continued two days and
amounted to but verv little more than that they had united to secure

268 THE MAUMEE RIVER BASIN.

and maintain peace. I cannot explain the whole better than by enclos-
ing you a copy of my letter to Governor Hull [at Detroit] viz : . . .
' The time appears to have arrived when it is necessary, if possible, to
cut off all communication between the Aborigines within the territory
of the United States and Canada.' .

This was a very tardy suggestion of a policy the wisdom of the
enforcement of which should have seemed a necessity years before.
Many Aborigines in this Basin, recipients of United States annuities
and favors and more immediately under control of United States agents,
had been loath to join Tecumseh and the Prophet; but band after
band, including several hundred Ottawas of the lower Maumee, with
the other tribes before named, had been enticed to remove to Tippe-
canoe, or to near Maiden, and to ally themselves with the hostiles.

CHAPTER X.

First Year of the War of 1812.

Notwithstanding the many reports to the Secretary of War through
several years of depredations and murders bv the Aborigines, and the
accumulated evidence of the incitements by British traders, agents and
officers, it was not until the 13th June, 181"2, that a committee of
Congress reported it proved that the British had been working among
these Aborigines with the intention of securing them as allies against
the United States; that the British had incited them to hostilities and
presented them with weapons of warfare which had already been used
against the Americans ; and that it was the duty of the President of the
United States to use the necessary means to protect the frontiers from
the attacks with which they were yet threatened.

Tecumseh visited the Aborigine Agent at Fort Wayne in June,
ostensibly in friendship, but his real object was not apjiarent at that
time. He had been giving attention to Little Turtle and the Miamis ;
but the former would have nothing to do with him. Soon after this
visit he, and his followers, removed their headquarters to Maiden, to
be in closer communication with the ISritish.

The war-cloud that had been lowering for several years settled
into a formal declaration of war against Great Britain the IHth June,
1H12, on account of the eneitiy's interference with American trade,
enforced bv a blockade: the impressment of American seamen, and
the encouragement of the Aborigines in their savagery, the last charge
being Vet far more apparent in the West than in the East.

OHIO ARMY FOR DETROIT. BUILDS TWO FORTS. 269

Governor William Hull of Michigan Territory was in Washington
during a part of the winter and spring of 1H12, and he urged the Presi-
dent to increase the military force in the Northwest: and for the third
time he called attention to the positive necessity of an American fleet
on Lake Erie. The President made requisition early in April u]>on
Governor Return J. Meigs of Ohio for twelve hundred militia to lie
ready for immediate march to Detroit. He also appointed Commander
Stewart agent on Lake Erie, and ordered the building of vessels for
defense. April 8th Governor Hull was commissioned Brigadier
General in the United States Army and was ordered to take charge of
the Ohio troops. This was against his desire; but he arrived at Day-
ton the place of rendezvous the SSth May and the volunteer army was
given to his command at once by Governor Meigs.

The army moved northward June 1st to Urbana where the Fourth
Regiment of United States troops, which the President had ordered
forward from Vincennes, joined it. This regiment was in the
Battle of Tippecanoe, and to show the great respect felt it was re-
ceived bv the Ohio troops with joyful demonstrations including an arch
inscribed in its honor. It was the desire of General Hull to go as
direct to Detroit as practicable, and this course led through a trackless
forest until arrival at the Maumee River. Colonel Duncan M'.Vrthur's
First Regiment was detached to cut a road from Urbana, which was
done to the Scioto River near the present Kenton, and there were built
two blockhouses connected by palisades, which later received the name
Fort M'Arthur. The army arrived at this post June 19th. Colonel
James Findlay's Second Regiment was here detached to cut and bridge
a road onward. June '2'2nd Fort MWrthur was garrisoned by Captain
Dill's companv and, leaving the sick in his care, the army moved forward.

Heavy rains made the way across the morasses at the headwaters
of the Blanchard River well nigh impassable and, after laborious
struggle and with great annoyance by small black flies and mosquitoes,
they were obliged to halt sixteen miles from Fort M'Arthur. Here
were built another stockade and houses which were named Fort Neces-
sity. It was situated near the south line of the present Hancock
County east of the center. At Fort Necessity, with lessening food
supplies, the horses and oxen were put on short allowance and re-ar-
rangements were made whereby the wagons were to be relieved of
more of their burden by packs on the horses 'and ever\- man who
could make a packsaddle was detailed on that business, but as soon as
a sufficient number of saddles were made the order was rescinded and
the saddles were deposited in the blockhouse.'' As the arm\- was

* Captain Robert M'Afee's History o/t/ie War 0/ 1812. paye oi.

270

THE MAUMEE RIVER BASIN.

about to march from Fort Necessity General Robert Lucas and Wil-
liam Denny, who had been sent by General Hull from Davton with
dispatches to acting Governor Atwater at Detroit, returned to General
Hull with reports of British and Aborigine activity and alliance with
threatening attitude. Also that the fort in Detroit was in bad condi-
tion, and that the citizens generally were much pleased with the
approach of the American army. The weather improving the armv
advanced and, after three days marching, arrived at the Blanchard
River, on the left bank of which Colonel Findlav's detachment which

FORT FINDLAY

Built the latter part of June, iyi2. Abandoned by the United States late in 1SI4. Area
about l.'iO feet square. Captain Arthur Thomas was Commandant with a carrison of about
one company of soldiers. Its service was that of a resting place, and temporary storage for
supplies. The pickets next to the Blanchard River were in good condition as late as the
year 1826. A blockhouse was also then standing, and two small houses where travelers
stopped for the night. Other pickets and timber had been or were being used as firewood.
— From Researches and Surveys bv Charles E. Slocum.

had been sent forward had nearly completed a palisade enclosure about
one liundred and fifty feet square with a blockhouse at each corner,
and a ditch in front. General Hull gave this place of refuge in the
forest the name Fort Findlay. It was situated but a few squares north
of the present Court House in the City of ' Findlay. A messenger.
Colonel Dunlap, here delivered to General Hull June 24th an order
from the Secretary of War for the army to proceed at once to Detroit

MARCH OF OHIO TROOPS. HULL'S THOUGHTLESSNESS. 27/

and there expect further orders. This order was dated the morning of
June LSth the dav that war was declared, but no mention was made in
the order of this declaration. Colonel M'Arthur, however, received
communication the same day from Chillicothe, stating on the authority
of Thomas Worthington then United States Senator, that war would
be proclaimed before this writing could be delivered to him. This
letter was shown to General Hull who, from his previous information,
knew that war was imminent.

President Madison and William Eustis Secretary of War early
provided for three armies for the prosecution of the War of ISl:^, viz :
the Armv of the Northwest under General Hull, which was the first in
the field : the Army of the Center under General Solomon Van Rens-
selaer whose headquarters were at Niagara; and the Armv of the North
under General Joseph Bloomfield whose headquarters were at Platts-
burg, New York. The limits of this book will admit of following only
the movements, failures, and successes of the Armv of the Northwest
in, and relating to this Basin.

General Hull directed Colonel Lewis Cass with the Third Regi-
ment to cut and prepare the road northward from Fort Findlay. Much
of the heavy luggage was stored at Fort Findlay to be forwarded as de-
sired, and the army proceeded northward as soon as practicable. After
a few davs march they arrived at the Maumee River opposite General
Wayne's Battle Field of Fallen Timber where they encamped for the
night. Fording the river at the Rapids here, the next encampment was
made in view of a small village of American settlers at the foot of the
lowest rapids near the site of the former Fort Miami. Here the schooner
Cuyahoga under Captain Chapin was chartered for Detroit and loaded
with much of the heavier luggage, including entrenching tools, hospital
stores, the heaviest part of the officers' personal effects and even thought-
lessly including General Hull's commission, the instructions from the
Secretary of War, and the complete muster rolls of the army. Thirtv
soldiers were detailed as a guard for the schooner, which carried as pas-
sengers the wives of three of the minor officers. The sequel proved that
it would have been far better for the American cause had General Hull
also gone with his private papers, directly to the British. Captain
M'Pherson of Cincinnati here suggested to General Hull that war must
have been declared and that the schooner would be captured — M'Afee,
page 56. The Cuyahoga, accompanied by a sloop carrying the sick
under care of Surgeon's Mate James Reynolds, sailed however from the
Maumee River July 1st, 1H12, to be captured by the British next day
when passing Maiden. The sloop bearing the sick was belated and,
going up the shallower channel w'est of Bois Blanc Island, evaded the
enemy and arrived at Detroit July 3rd,

272 THE MAUMEE RIVER BASIN.

Lieutenant Davidson and twenty-five men were detached to build
and occupy a blockhouse at the ruins of Fort Miami * and, the 1st July,
the army continued the march northward 'through an open country in-
terspersed with thin f:;roves of oak trees and scattering settlements of
French' the one at the River Raisin being styled liy Captain M'Afee
'a handsome village.'

General Hull did not formally learn of the declaration of war until
the afternoon of Julv 2nd when he was overtaken near Frenchtown (the
present Monroe, Michigan) by a messenger with such information from
the Secretary of War: and he here also learned of the capture of his
schooner. The British garrison at Maiden had previousl\- received no-
tification of the war, and was alert for action. Fort Michilimackinac
( the name now often contracted to Mackinaw ) with a garrison of fiftv-
seven soldiers was surrendered to a far superior force of British and
savages the 17th July the commandant Lieutenant Porter Hicks first
learning at their demand for surrender that war was declared. Late in
Julv General Hull ordered the abandonment of Fort Dearborn, Chicago,
Captain William Wells bearing the order from Fort Wayne.

Governor Return J. Meigs, Thomas Worthington, and Jeremiah
Morrow, as United States Commissioners, held a council at Piqua, Ohio,
August 15th with such representatives of the Aborigines as could be
gathered, for the purpose of retaining their neutrality with the British.
A number of the Ohio tribes were represented, but little could be done
with them, they having heard the reports from Detroit and Chicago.

It is not within the scope of this writing to detail the waverings
and cowardice of General Hull which have been so fully written about,
and which culminated August 16th in the surrender of Detroit to the
British with toward two thousand .American soldiers without any effort
to sustain their soldierly function. This surrender was an irreparable
loss to the Northwestern region, and of corresponding value to the
British, on the account of the loss to the Americans of two thousand
and four hundred stand of arms besides those in the arsenal: also of
cannon as follows: of iron, nine ■24-pounders : five 9, three 6, four 2,
and two l-])0unders: and of howitzers, one H inch and one 5/'3 inch,
according to the British official returns.

*Tlus small fortiticalioii will here be styled Fori Miami No. 6. On account of the confusions that
have arisen in the past, the other forts of tliis name will be here mentioned, viz : 1, Fort des Miamis built
in November, 1679, by Sieiir de la Salle near the mouth of the Kiver St. Joseph of Lake Michigan; 2,
Fort Miami, built by the French about lt'>S(t-H6 by the River St. Mary near the head of the Maumee; .S,
Fort Miami, built by Commandant Raimond in 1749-.50 by the River St. Joseph near the head of the Mau-
mee to succeed number two, see map ante page 97; 4, Fort Miami temporarily built by United States
troops about 179(1 by the Ohio at the mouth of the Little Miami River; ."i. Fort Miami, built by the British
in the spring and summer of 1794 on the left bank of the Maumee River at the lower part of the present
plat of the Villaie of Maumee. Ohio. See the article on the Forts Miami in the Ohio Arcbaelogical and
Historical QuartarJy April, 1903, volume sii paye 120 e( saq. by Charles E. Slo2um.

OHIO TROOPS -RETURN. NEW CALL FOR DEFENSE. 273

The Ohio volunteers in this unfortunate army were paroled and
sent across Lake Erie to Cleveland whence they walked to their several
homes. They were exchanged in March or early April, 1813. General
Hull and the United States troops were retained as prisoners of war,
and were sent to Montreal.

An additional two hundred and thirtv volunteers under Captain
Henry Brush, with one hundred beef cattle and other food supjilies
sent by Governor Meiy;s to reinforce the army at Detroit, were held by
the British from advancing beyond the River Raisin from the first days
of August without relief from Detroit. General Hull included this
force in his surrender; but when Captain Elliott, son of the notorious
Captain Matthew Elliott, and attendants came to claim this prize Cap-
tain Brush placed them under arrest and immediately started his com-
mand and supplies southward, and conducted them back to Governor
Meigs.

When the critical state of affairs at Detroit was made known to
Governor Meigs he immediately ordered the remaining part of Ohio's
quota of the one hundred thousand detached militia, which the Pres-
ident was authorized to lew among the States, twelve hundred in
number, to rendezvous under Brigadier General Tupper at Urbana
which was then well in the edge of the wilderness. When the Gover-
nor learned of the loss of Detroit he was active in placing every effect-
ive force and point in good condition for successful defense against
the savages; also in advising the frontiersmen to gather and build
blockhouses for the protection of their families.

Kentucky, under the Governorshii) of the veteran General Charles
Scott, was prompt in gathering her ([uota of ten regiments of about
five hundred and fifty men each. Governor Harrison who. the pre-
ceding year, had been commissioned to command the troops in Indi-
ana and Illinois Territories had, with his characteristic thoughtfulness
and good judgment, secured places of refuge for the settlers in his
domain. He was also authorized to call on the Governor of Kentucky
for any soldiers needed from that State, who were not in service. By
invitation of Governor Scott, his comrade in General Wayne's cam-
paign through Ohio, he visited Frankfort, inspected the militia, and
was given a public reception, the principal citizens including H(-nr\-
Clay uniting to do him honor; and in order that he might be chief in
command of the Kentucky forces. Governor Scott commissioned him
25th August, 1812, Major General of the Militia of Kentucky by brevet.
It was not known b}- either party that President Madison had commis-
sioned him 22nd August Brigadier General in the Army of the I'nited
States. Writing to Governor Meigs on the 27th from Cincinnati,
General Harrison stated that the Kentucky troops then with him were

274 THE MAUMEE RIVER BASIN.

two regiments of infantry and one of mounted riflemen, whicfi were
ordered at once to Urbana; and tliat tfiree regiments of infantry, one
of dragoons, and one of mounted riflemen, were in full marcfi to join
fiim — tlie whole numlier lieing over four thousand men. He further
stated that 'should the report of the capture of General Hull's army
prove untrue, I shall join them either at that place [Urbana] or before
they reach it, and proceed to Detroit without waiting for the regiments
in my rear.' He also enquired what assistance could be given him
from Ohio.

The Kentucky troops marched up the Miami Vallev and were
overtaken by General Harrison the third day. September 2nd, when
above Dayton, they were overtaken bv an express bearing the United
States commission for General Harrison, and instructions for him to
take command of the Indiana and Illinois troops and cooperate with
General Hull and Governor Howard of Missouri Territory, as General
James Winchester had been assigned ti5 the command of the North-
western Army. The march was continued to Piqua where they arrived
September 3rd to learn that Fort Wayne, which had been rebuilt by-
Colonel Thomas Hunt in 1H04, was strongly besieged by savages and
that a strong command of British and savages had been sent from
Maiden for the conquest of the Maumee and Wabash vallevs. The
Aborigine Agent at Piqua, John Johnston, at the request of General
Harrison sent some Shawnee scouts to the site of Fort Defiance to
ascertain if any British force had passed up the Maumee to the siege
of Fort Wayne. Captain John Logan a Shawnee half-breed was also
sent to Fort Wavne to learn and to report its condition as soon as
possible.'''

Immediate action seemed imperative and, without awaiting Gen-
eral Winchester's arrival or his orders. General Harrison ordered
Lieutenant Colonel John Allen's regiment of United States troops,
with two companies from Colonel Lewis' regiment and one company
from Colonel Scott's regiment to prepare for a forced march to the
relief of Fort Wayne. t A delay of two days of the cavalry was neces-
sary to receive flints for their guns and a few other supplies that were

* This half-breed Shawnee was captured when a boy by the Kentiickians, and he lived some years
in the family of General Logan, hence his name. He grew to noble stature, and with manly qualities.
Upon return to his people in Ohio, he became a chief and governed the sentiments of many of his
tribe favorably to the Americans. He will be referred to again.

t Early the next day, the .5th September, General Harrison paraded the remainder of the troops
and delivered to them a speech, detailing the duties of soldiers, and staling if there was any person
who would not submit to such regulations, or who was afraid to risk his life in defense of his country,
he might return home. Only one man desired to return; and his friends having obtained leave, as
usual, to escort him on his way, he was hoisted on a rail and carried to the Big Miami, in the waters of
which they absolved him from the obligations of courage and patriotism, and then gave him leave of
absence— Captain Robert M'Afee's His. of the Lats War 118121 page 121,

HARRISON'S MARCH TO RELIEF OF FORT WAYNE. 275

daily expected: and at dawn of the 6th September they moved briskly
forward in light marching equipment, and came up to Colonel Allen's
command early on the 8th at St. Marys fGirty Town, so named from
James — not Simon — Girty's trading house) where an express from
General Harrison had overtaken Colonel Allen with orders to halt and
build a palisaded fort for protection of the sick and security of provis-
ions. Here they were joined by Major Richard M. Johnson with a
corps of Kentucky' mounted volunteers. That night Aborigines were
seen spying the encampment but they did not molest. They returned
to the besiegers of Fort Wayne with the re])ort that Kentuck was
coming as numerous as the trees.' Here the spy Captain Logan re-
ported the distressed condition of Fort Wayne, he having evaded the
besiegers and returned in safety. The afternoon of the 9th September
the army encamped at Shane's (Chesne's) Crossing of the River St.
Mary, at the present Rockford, where they met Colonel Adams with a
good force of Ohio Volunteer Cavalry. From this place the combined
torces moved cautiously and in as near battle order as practicable.
General Harrison had been an apt student of General Wayne's suc-
cess. He fortified the camp each night, and marched through the
forest in such order by day as to prevent being ambuscaded or attacked
unawares; and he kept well-informed regarding the temper and con-
dition of each corps. Captain Logan and another Shawnee acted as
guides, while scouts and an advance guard were maintained. These
discovered an ambush of savages at the narrow crossing of the marshy
ancient channel of the River St. Mary, about five miles southeast of
Fort Wayne. As the army approached this place the cavalry under
Majors Johnson and Adams were sent around to the right and left.
The length of the swampy portion was about one mile and its width
about nine hundred feet excepting the part most feared which was
about three hundred feet across. But one savage was seen by this
force and he a mile distant. They forsook their hiding places on
approach of the cavalry.

The scouts soon reconnoitered the country around Fort Wayne to
find that the savages had made good their escape. That afternoon
most of the army encamped near the Fort where a short time before
had been a comfortable village. It was now in ruins, having been
burned by the savages together with the United States Factory (Trad-
ing Agency Building) which had been erected to supply the ungrateful
wretches with farming utensils and the comforts of civilized life. The
following letter written by Lieutenant Daniel Curtis is here given as a
description of the Siege of Fort Wayne by an officer who experienced it :

Fort Wayne October 4, 1812.

Friend Cullen ; As our difficulties for the moment have in some manner subsided

276 THE MAUMEE RIVER BASIN.

and as I have been so fortunate as to survive the seige. it affords me the highest satisfac-
tion to have it in my power to communicate to you some among many of the most im-
portant occurrences since my arrival at this place. I arrived here on the 5th of June after
a successful passage, and killed two deer on the way. 1 was on my arrival and still con-
tinue to be highly delighted with the place and my situation, except perhaps I might be
better suited with a more active employment than 1 have had till about the fourth of last
month.

Shortly after my arrival Lieut. Whistler left this place for Detroit (which perhaps
you are acquainted with) and has not yet returned ; we presume he has gone to take a peep
at Montreal with the other unfortunate beings included in the capitulation of Gen. Hull
to the British. Nothing of an important nature transpired till about the 7th of August,
when our captain received a note from General Hull stating that Fort Dearborn was to
be evacuated and requesting the Captain to communicate the same to Capt. Wells and
Mr. Stickney, and ask them to point out the most safe and expeditious route for Capt.
Heald to take from Chicago to Detroit. The gentlemen were consulted on the subject,
and concluded that by way of this place would be the best route : and in order to secure
as much of the public property at that place as possible, Capt. Wells thought proper to
use his endeavors to that eftect.

Accordingly on the 8th [August, liS12] Capt. [William] Wells, with a party of thirty-
five Miami Aborigines with their pack horses, and one of our soldiers with five of our pub-
lic horses, started to assist Capt. Heald in the evacuation of Chicago. On the morning of
the 19th one of the Aborigines that accompanied Capt. Wells returned bringing the intel-
ligence that on the morning of the l.">th Capt. Heald and his company with Capt. Wells
were all cut off, the particulars of which he then related. They arrived at Chicago on the
Kith where were encamped then about .'iOO Aborigines of different tribes, some of whom
were known to be at enmity with our government. Capt. Wells being well acquainted with
Aborigine customs and seeing the difficulties likely to attend Capt. Heald in getting away
from his post, used every exertion in his power to effect an evacuation without the loss of
men. He even gave up the arsenal and magazine stores to satisfy their savage ferocity,
[but he poured the large stock of alcoholic liquor into the river and the powder into the
water-well. These were the articles most desired by the savages] but to no effect, and
then agreed to deliver up all the cattle (about 100 head) and made them several valuable
presents, in hope of being permitted to depart in peace.

The fatal morning arrived, and while the blood-thirsty savages were killing and dress-
ing their beeves, the garrison [fort] was evacuated, Capt. Heald and Wells marching in
front, the baggage wagons next, the women and children next to them, followed by the
soldiers and the thirty-five Miamis with their pack-horses bringing up the rear. They had
not passed one mile from their little asylum when the alarm was given that the enemy,
about 400 in number, were close upon them. A kind of hollow square was immediately
formed encompassing the women and children, and two rounds fired ; but being over-
powered by numbers, the brave, the innocent, the fair and the helpless fell a prey to the
savage cruelty of the tomahawk and scalping knife. We have since been told by another
Aborigine that Capt. Heald and wife (both wounded) Mr. Kinzy and wife, Lieut.
Helms and wife, and nineteen soldiers were made prisoners and are to be transported to
Montreal or Quebec, with other prisoners taken at the capitulation, which perhaps you
know better than I do. Thus ends the fate of Chicago and its worthy commander.*

Thesuccessof thispost [Fort Wayne] and the fate of its great, worthy and intrepid [?]
commander t now proceed to relate, and in some instances to particularize. The
Aborigines, since the news of Chicago, except some of the Miamis, have expressed and

'■'See Captain Nathan Heald's Report of the evacuation of Fort Dearborn and tlie subsequent
massacre, M'Afee, in his History o/ the Late War (War of 1813) states that Captain Wells started from

BEGINNING OF THE SIEGE OF FORT WAYNE. 277

manifest a very different disposition from anything discovered in them previous to that
event. Many attempts have been made to send expresses through to Detroit and many
failed, either by being killed or driven back by the Aborigines. A Mr. Johnson an
express to Piqua, Ohio, was killed on the evening of the 28th [August] before he had
gone half a mile from the post. He was shot through the body, tomahawked,
scalped, stabbed in twenty-three places, and beaten and bruised in the most
cruel and barbarous manner. The next day an Aborigine came within hearing of our
sentinels and hailed, requesting admittance into the garrison. This was the first instance
since my acquaintance at this place of an Aborigine hesitating or expressing any fear in
approaching the garrison. His business was to request of our captain a white flag that
some of the chiefs might come and speak with him and the Aborigine agent, a Mr.
Stickney. The flag was granted under a promise of its being returned that day ; but
the rascals kept it several days, during which time they were constantly plundering our
gardens and cornfields, and were killing and carrying away our cattle and hogs immedi-
ately under our guns and we poor soldiers, either from cowardice or some other agency
in our captain, were not suffered to fire a gun but obliged to suffer their repeated insults
to pass with impunity.

On the evening of the ith of September the Hag returned accompanied by several
chiefs, and after being asked whether they wished to remain at peace with us or be con-
sidered in an open state of warfare, the head chief among them observed; 'You know
that Mackinaw is taken, Detroit is in the hands of the British, and Chicago has fallen ;
and you must expect to fall next, and that in a short time ! ' Immediately our great
captain invited the savage rascal over to his quarters and after drinking three glasses of
wine with him rose from his seat and observed ; ' My good friend, I love you ; I will fight
for you; I will die by your side. You must save me! ' and then gave him a half dollar
as a token of friendship, inviting him at the same time to come and breakfast with him
the next morning. The chief and his party retired to their camps, but instead of accept-
ing his invitation to breakfast sent five of their young warriors, who secreted themselves
behind a roothouse [house for vegetables] near the garrison, from which they shot two
of our men about sunrise as they were passing from a small hotel near that place.

The night of the ."ith arrived and our captain had not drawn a sober breath since the
chiefs left the garrison the night before. From the movement of the Aborigines in the
course of the day, Lieut. Ostrander and myself expected to have some sport before the
next morning and were not disappointed in our conjectures, for at about 8 p. m. a gen-
eral shout from the enemy was heard, succeeded by a firing of small arms on every side
of us. The alarm post of every man, as well as the respective duties of Mr. Ostrander
and myself having been regulated during the day, the enemy had not time to fire a
second round before we were ready and opened three broadsides upon them, and sent
them a few shells from our howitzer which we presume must have raked the skins of
many. We exchanged three general shots when I discovered from the flash of their
guns that they were secreted behind the building, fences and shrubbery near the gar-
rison, and ordered the men to cea,se firing till further orders, thinking the enemy would
conclude that we were either frightened or scarce of ammunition, and perhaps would
venture a little nearer. Although our ceasing to fire did not appear to bring them
nearer, yet it tended to concentrate them more in a body though they continued an
irregular fire about half an hour, without our returning a shot. As soon as a large body

Fort Wayne about the 3rd .■\ufe'U5t, 1813. witli about fifty Miamis, and arrived at Chicaj^o on the l:ith, . .
that the garrison of Fort Dearborn numbered seventy soldiers. . . That at the massacre of the gar-
rison the head of Captain Wells was cut oft. and his heart cut out and eaten by the savages who were of
the Winnebago. Pottawotami. and Ottawa tribes — principally of the two last named. They were
directly incited to this massacre by Tecumseh.

278 THE MAUMEE RIVER BASIN.

had collected at one point we threw a couple of shells from our howitzers which soon
made them disperse, and but few shots were received from them the remainder of the
night. The next day they kept up a firing from behind fences, buildings and shrubbery
near the garrison, till about ii p. m. in order, we presume, to disturb our rest, knowing
that we had been all night on the alert. Our captain still continued drunk as a fool,
and perfectly incapable of exercising rationality on any subject whatever, but was con-
stantly abusing and illtreating everyone that came in his presence. The night of the
6th [September] approached; and as we' are told that caution is the mother of safety,
we had the roofs of our houses all watered, as well as the pickets on the inside, our
water casks all filled, and buckets all ready in case of the enemy's attempting to throw
fire, which they had endeavored several times to do without success. This was all done
and every man at his post before dark. Between 8 and 9 p. m. we heard a most tremen-
dous noise, singing, dancing and whooping, and when they arrived within a proper dis-
tance they hailed and asked us in plain English what we intended to do, whether sur-
render or to fight ? They said they had .'iOO men with them and that they expected 700
more the next day, and that in three days' time they would show us what they could do.
We answered them that we were ready, and bade them to come on ; that we were
determined to a man to tight till we should lose our lives before we would yield an inch
to them, and then we gave a general shout round the works in true Aborigine style,
which they instantly returned, commencing at the same time a general fire which was
kept up on both sides with much warmth till about 11 o'clock, without the loss or injury
of a man on our side : but, from appearance, they must have lost many as they were
very quiet till towards night.

The siege continued from the morning of the 5th till the morning of the 10th, both
day and night, much in the manner abo\'e described, and the fears and troubles of our
great and intrepid commander were continually drowned in the excessive use of the
ardents. Our fears and apprehensions from the disorder and confusion he created
among the men, were one of our greatest troubles, and we had everything prepared at
one time to silence his noise and clamor by coercive measures. He would frequently
talk of surrendering if the Aborigines were likely to be too much for us, and particularly
if they or the British were to bring one or more pieces of cannon* which they took at
Chicago and place them near the garrison, when he knew that the largest piece at
Chicago was only a three-pounder ; and when told by one of his subalterns, that the first
person in the garrison who should offer to surrender to the Aborigines or British at the
approach of no heavier piece than a three-pounder should instantly be shot, he offered
no resistance, but remained silent on the subject.

After the 10th we rested in tranquility, but could see large bodies of Aborigines
between that time and the 12th running in great haste across the prairies, and many
without arms. We were at a loss to determine the cause of this movement, but con-
cluded that they must have met with some opposition or discovered the approach of an
army between this place and Piqua, as they were running from that quarter. About

* Tlie armament of Fort Wayne at this time consisted of four small cannon — M'Afee's History of
the War, page 137. On tiie night of the 6th September the whole body of Aborigines, supposed to have
been six hundred strong, attacked the Fort. Tliey attempted to scale the palisades, but so vigilant and
skillful were the garrison that the savages were not permitted to do any damage. Perceiving such
assaults to be useless, they resolved to employ strategy in the morning. Two logs were formed into the
shape of cannon and placed in battery before the Fort. A half-breed with a flag approached and in-
formed the comnrandaiu that the British, then on the march, had sent them two battery cannon, and if
surrender was not immediately made the Fort would be battered down. He also threatened a general
massacre of the garrison within three days as a reinforcement of seven hundred Aborigine warriors
were expected the next day. The troops were not frightened by the ' Quaker guns' — M'Afee, page 126.
Lossing's Pictorial Field-Book of the War of 1812, page 314. Different later writers have amplified
their supposition:, regarding phases of this siege for local newspapers, and for local addresses.

ANOTHER ACCOUNT OF THE SIEGE OF FORT WAYNE. 279

3 o'clock p. m. of the 12th [September] to our great joy we discovered the approach of a
small troop of horses, and on their coming up to the garrison, we learned it was the ad-
vance guard of an army of about oOOO men [the number here given is about twice too large]
under the command of Brigadier General Harrison. You may rest assured friend C. that
we lost no time after the general had pitched upon and regulated his encampment, in
making known to him the late conduct of our great, worthy, and mortal Captain James

A sword twenty-one inches lone tliat was plowed up a few years aiiO while ^iradini^ the Lakeside
Addition to Fort Wayne on the site of the ancient Miami Village at the head of the Mauinee River. See
No. 2 A on Map page 97. Probably this weapon was made by a French Armorer (who accompanied
some of the early French troops) for a savage warrior who presented a bone from one of his human
victims for the handle. Possibly it was made somewhat in imitation of and to cope with the 'long
knives ' of tlie Kentuckians which the savages dreaded. In the Author's Collection.

Rhea. The General, after hearing with great attention what we had to relate, expressed his
great astonishment at the breach of confidence in the captain, and desired to have
everything reduced to writing and the charges produced in regular form, which was done
that evening and the next morning handed in. About 10 o'clock the captain was hon-
ored with a note from the General, requesting him to deliver the bearer his long knife
and consider himself under arrest till his late conduct should be brought to a public
investigation. Shortly afterwards the General sent one of his aids to us, requesting to
know whether we would withdraw the arrest in case the captain would resign. We at
first declined, but on further request of the General, we consented, on the consideration
of his having been a long time in the service, but more particularly on account of his
having a young family. His resignation was sent in and accepted, to take effect on the
31st of December next, and in two days he left this place for the state of Ohio. Thus
ends the success of this place so far, and thus you see the evils, the disappointments and
mortifications, attendant upon cowardice and intoxication in mortal men.

Yours, Daniel Curtis.

Major Benjamin Franklin Stickne}' United States Agent to the
Aborigines ■was stationed at Fort Waj'ne in 1H12 and, in later years,
wrote something of a description of the Siege. His manuscript reads,
in part, that after the massacre at Chicago, those Pottawotamis en-
gaged in it, and who promised safe escort of the garrison to Fort
Wayne, spent some time about Fort Dearborn dividing and enjoying
the spoils which had been given to them by Captains Heald and Wells
just before the massacre. They then went to the St. Joseph River of
Lake Michigan where the}' were assembled in council by British

280 THE MAUMEE RIVER BASIN.

emissaries who instigated the sieges of F"ort Wayne and Fort Harrison
on the Wabash. The British agents promised that in case the Aborigi-
nes would besiege these forts, and prevent their evacuation by the
garrisons, they should be joined in one moon by a large British force
from Maiden and Detroit with artillery which would be able to
demolish the stockades and give up the garrisons to massacre and spoil

— and their success in this would eX]iose the whole frontier to their
devastation. The siege was to be commenced in twent\' davs after
the council adjourned.

yVntoine Bondie, who had lived with the Aborigines from his
twelfth year, was at this time about fifty years of age; had married a
Miami and been a member of the tribe many years, conforming to their
habits and mode of life. He had also been a trader among them in
their village near Fort Wayne. He was notified by Me-te-a, Potta-
wotami chief, of the proposed siege for the purpose of saving him from
the destruction they planned for the garrison. Bondie told Mr. Stick-
nev of the designed siege and he informed Captain Rhea, commandant
of Fort Wayne, and Captain Zacharv Tavlor of Fort Harrison, also
General Harrison. Captain Rhea discredited the report, but Agent
Stickney sent the women and children at Fort Wayne to Piqua; and
within a few hours after these several expresses were sent the Aborigi-
nes drew their lines of guard around Fort Wayne. On the 5th August
Agent Stickney was prostrated by a severe illness from which he be-
came convalescent only after twelve davs. He was then conveyed
from the Agency' House to the Fort for safety. Bondie and his family
also moved into the Fort.

The number of the Aborigine warriors around was estimated at five
hundred. They were secreted around, hoping to catch the sentries care-
less or off guard. They essayed strategy. They killed Stephen Johnson
clerk in the Agency Store who started for Piqua to visit his wife. They
killed the garrison's cattle and hogs, stole the horses, and committed all
depredations possible. Both parties wished to delay tlu' final conflict

— the Americans for General Harrison's arrival, the Aborigines for the
arrival of the British — but they kept up their efforts at strategy.

One day the Aborigines expressed a desire to be admitted to the
Fort to see the Agent, to agree upon some terms for 'burying the toma-
hawk' and asked for a signal by which they might approach the Fort
and be permitted to talk with their 'white father.' A white cloth was
sent to them to be used as a flag of truce. For several days they de-
layed making use of the flag, and continued their depredations. Agent
Stickney sent a message to them by an Aborigine, that they had
soiled his flag and he could not suffer them to retain it any longer; they
must return it imniediateh'. The next dav the whole bod\- moved up

SCHEMES OF SAVAGES AT SIEGE OF FORT WAYNE. 281

to the Fort bearing the white flag in front. The gates of the Fort had
been kept closed but the savages were in hopes by this scheme to
obtain the admission of a large number. The Agent, still ver\- weak
from his sickness, with difficult\- walkid to the gate and designated by
name the chiefs to be admitted, who upon their entrance within the
stockade, one by one, were examined closely and disarmed li\' the
guard. Thirteen were admitted, and they followed the Agent to his
sleeping apartment. The officers of the garrison remained in their
quarters. The Agent addressed a note to Captain Rhea requesting
that the guard be paraded and kept under arms during thi' continuance
of the council. As usual tobacco was given to the chiefs. When their
pipes were smoked out, Winnemac arose and, addressing the Agent,
said the Pottawotamis did not kill his clerk Johnson: but the young
men could not be controlled. The soldiers had been killed, and the
horses taken without the knowledge or consent of the chiefs. 'Hut,'
he continued, 'if my Father wishes war, I am a man.' With this ex-
pression he struck his hand upon a knife that was concealed under his
blanket. The Agent at this time did not understand the language, but
saw there was something sitIous impending. Antoine Bondie, who
was present and understood the whole force of what was said, sprang
to his feet and, striking his own knife, shouted in Pottawotami I am a
man also.' This excited the interpreter, but the savages, contrary to
Winnemac's expectations, remained quiet. Winnemac, turning to the
principal chief, An-ouk-sa, who had been watching the soldiers through
the window, received from him signs intimating that their intended
strategy was at an end. Their plans as later divulged were for Winne-
mac to assassinate Agent Stickney, and others to kill the militarv
officers, while the others opened the gates for the outer savages to
enter for a general massacre.

About the 1st of September William Oliver, Captain John Logan
and thirty other Shawnees, arrived at the Fort on hoiseback at full
speed and in full yell' of triumiih. Oliver was then about t\vent\-
three years old. He had been a sutler at the Fort, and went to Cincin
nati on business before there was a suspicion of siege. After a short
rest his escort started southward to hasten forward the relieving arm\-.
The garrison was doomed to a longer state of suspense. The anxietv
became intense I and it was through extreme good fortune, perhaiis
mere accident, that the garrison did hold out with so little good
management. The commanding officer was drunk nearly all the time,
and the two lieutenants were inefficient men, entirely unfit to hold
commissions of anv grade. ' The non-commissioned officers and

'■' Probably these extreme statements of Acent Stickney should be received with some allowance.
it is signiticant that neither the letter of Lieutenant Curtis, yiven in full on preceding pages, nor Captain

282 THE MAUMEE RIVER BASIN.

privates, eighty in number, behaved very welL The Aborigine Agent
was feeble. and incapable of much exertion. William Oliver, though a
private citizen, was the most efficient man in the Fort after his return."

During the siege the garrison lost but three men killed. From
subse(4uent information it was believed that the savages lost about
twentv-five.

The savages, before retrt-ating from the Siege of Fort Wayne,
destroyed all the food they could not take away, cattle and crojis.
The)' also burned all the buildings outside the stockade, includ-
ing those of thL' United States Trading Agency a little southwest of the
Fort, and those belonging to the family of William Wells who met
death in the massacre at Chicago.

The next day after his arrival at Fort Wayne General Harrison sent
Colonel Payne with troops down Little River to the Wabash. The}-
destroyed several Miami villages and corn, Init did not find any Abo-
rigines.'^ The command of Colonel Samuel Wells was also sent the
13th on like mission to the Elk Heart River, about sixty miles distant,
where they destroyed the town and supplies of the Pottawotamis under
chief Onoxse or Five Medals. t This was a forced and very exhausting
march. Many of the infantry sickened on the return and came strag-
gling in, helped along by the cavalry, after the arrival of the main body
on the 18th September. Another detachment under Colonel Simrall,
who followed the army to Fort Wayne with three hundred and twenty
dragoons with muskets and a company of mounted riflemen arriving
on the 17th September, was sent on the evening of the IMth to Eel
River about twenty miles to the northwest, where the}' destroyed Little
Turtle's townj leaving onl}' the house built for him by the United
States in recognition of his adherence to tht- Treaty of Greenville.

General Winchester arrived at Fort Wayne September 19th to
take command of the entire army. James Winchester was born at

Robert B. M'Afee who was with the relieving army, do not mention tlie arrival of William Oliver in
company with Captain Logan.

•' In one of these villages an unusual mode of burial was recognized in a tomb built of logs with
the interstices filled with wet clay. The body was that of a chief and the articles noticed as having
been deposited with the body, were a blanket underneath, his gun and pipe by his side, a small tin pan
containing a wood spoon on his breast, and a number of ear rings and brooches.

t A pole before the cabin of chief O-nox-se supported a red flag with a broom above. A white flag
was waving at the tomb of an old woman. This tomb was not desecrated by the soldiers ; but they saw
the body in a sitting posture with face toward the east; with a basket at her side containing the bills
and claws of owls and hawks, a variety of bones, and bunches of roots tied together, from which it was
inferred that she was respected as a sorceress. In one of the huts was found a morning report of one of
General Hull's captains at Detroit; a copy of the Liberty Hall newspaper printed in Cincinnati which
contained an account of General Harrison's army: several coarse bags which appeared to have con-
tained shot; and pieces of boxes with the name London and Maiden painted on them— M'Afee, page 130.

+ Early in the year the Miamis, excepting those associated with Little Turtle, joined Tecumseh
and the Prophet and. after the death of Little Turtle Uth July, 1H13, and of Captain Wells at Chicago,
the others went to the British,

GENERAL WINCHESTER TAKES COMMAND. 283

White Level (now Westminster) Maryland, 6th February, 1752. He
was appointed a Lieutenant in the Third Rey.iment Marylajrd Infantry
■27th Mav, 1778, and served in the Continental Army until captured by
the British a few months later. He was exchang^ed 22nd December,
17^0, and soon thereafter he removed to Sumner County, Tennessee,
where he married. He there attained a good property and maintained
a liberal establishment on a large estate. He wascommissioned Briga-
dier General in the United States Army 27th March, 1812, and after
the surrender of General Hull he was directed by the Secretary of War
to take command of the Army of the Northwest. With commendable
promptitude he started northward, stopping in Kentucky to learn of
the preparations there. Upon his arrival at Cincinnati 9th September
he wrote to Governor Meigs announcing his mission, asking for rein-
forcements of Ohio militia, and for a meeting at Piqua. With a small
detachment of troops he moved northward along the wav of the jire-
ceding army to Fort Wayne. General Harrison received him with due
deference, and the command of the armv was at once given over to him
in complete exhibition of the ready obedience of the true soldier to his
ranking officer under ver\' trying conditions. General Harrison had
been an efficient aide-de-camp to General Wayne in his successful
campaign against the Aborigines in this Basin in 1794: later, he served
as Secretarv of the Territory Northwest of the Ohio River; and he had
been an efficient first Governor of Indiana Territory, and Superin-
tendent of the Affairs of the Aborigines during the last eleven years.
No man knew this frontier and wilderness region, and the /Aborigines,
better than he from long personal experience. He had met the differ-
ent tribes of Aborigines in thirteen imjiortant treaties and they, to the
utmost of their ability and in their calmer moments, had acknowledged
his superiority and his fairness. He had later experience in the com-
mand of an army against treacherous and impetuous night assault in
the Battle of Tippecanoe. The soldiers of Ohio and Kentucky, as well
as of Indiana, knew his wisdom and his bravery which inspired confi-
dence, and they wanted him as their commander. The Governors of
Ohio and Kentucky were of like mind, and they had commissioned him
accordingly. Notwithstanding all this, General Harrison in obedience
to the command of the Secretary of War at once accepted as his rank-
ing officer a stranger to himself, to the soldiers, to this wilderness
country, to the ways of the Aborigines and to the condition of affairs.
He did this September 19th and immediately, after issuing orders to
the army introducing General Winchester and urging strict obedience
to his commands, started on his return.

At St. Marys General Harrison wrote to Governor Meigs under
date of the 20th, and to Governor Shelb\- the 22nd September, that

284

THE MAUMEE RIVER BASIN.

from Fort Wavne there is a path, which has been sometimes used bv
the Aborigines, leading up to St. Joseph, and from thence by the head-
waters of the River Raisin to Detroit. By this route it appears to me
very practicable to effect a coup-de-main upon that place, and if I can

A GLIMPSE OF THE VILLAGE OF FORT JENNINGS

Putnam County, Ohio, May 28, 19()2. Looking westward up the AuEiaise River at low stage of
water. The first small building on the right inarks the site of the Fort Jennings built in October, 1812,
and abandoned late in the year 181-1.

collect a few hundred more mounted men I shall attempt it.'* This
route, however, was not entered upon. There had arrived at St.
Marvs up to this time, of Kentucky troops. Colonel Joshua Barbee's
regiment which was ordered to build there a fortification and stockade
as a storehouse and protection for supplies, which was named Fort
Barbee ; Colonel Robert Rogers' regiment, and Colonel William Jen-
nings' regiment of riflemen; also, of Ohio men, a corps of cavalry
commanded by Colonel Findlay. The cavalry was ordered to burn the
Ottawa towns by the Blanchard Rivert while Colonel Jennin,gs was
ordered to open a direct road toward Defiance, and to build a post by
the Auglaise River for the protection of supplies. This post was

. * Lossing's Pictorial Field-Boolt of the War of 1812 page 326.

t There were two Ottawa (often called Tawa) towns by the Blanchard River at this time, the
Upper and the Lower, about two miles apart, the lower being at the site of the present Village of
Ottawa, seat of government of Putnam County, Ohio.

HARRISON GIVEN COMMAND NORTHWESTERN ARMY. 285

named Fort Jennings in his honor, which name the pleasant village at
its site yet retains.

Governor Isaac Shelby of Kentucky on the 5th September, ISl'J,
addressed a letter to William Eustis, Secretary of War, suggesting a
Board of War for this western country : also recommending General
Harrison as commander-in-chief, and mentioned evils that would result
from continuing General Winchester as chief in command. Mr. Eustis
replied under date of the 17th that General Harrison would at once be
given chief command: and at Piqua on the 24th September, General
Harrison received a letter from the Secretary of War stating that ' the
President is pleased to assign to you the command of the Northwestern
Army which, in addition to the regular troops and rangers in that
quarter, will consist of the volunteers and militia of Kentucky, Ohio,
and three thousand from Virginia and Pennsylvania, making \our
whole force ten thousand men. . . Colonel Buford, deputy com-
missioner at LexingtoUj^ is furnished with funds, and is subject to your
orders. . . You will command such means as may be practicable.
Exercise your own discretion, and act in all cases according to your
own judgment." . . Thus General Harrison was invested with all the
powers necessary or desired for the proposed Board of War, while
immediately subject to the President.

General Winchester wrote from Fort Wayne 2:2nd Se]5tember to
Governor Meigs that I rejoice at the i)rospect of regaining lost terri-
tory . . and with hope to winter in Detroit or its vicinity.
You will please furnish two regiments of soldiers to join me at the toot
of the lowest Maumee Rapids about the 10th or loth of October, well
clothed for a fall campaign. Arms and ammunition can be drawn
from Newport, Kentucky. It is extremely desirous to me that no time
be lost in supplying this requisition. The cold season is fast ap-
proaching, and the stain on the American character by the surrender of
Detroit not vet wiped away. If \'0U can furnish one regiment to rendez-
vous at Piqua, and proceed to open and improve the road, by cause-
ways, etc., to Defiance, it would greatly facilitate the transportation of
supplies to this army, which is im]5eratively requisite to its welfare.
This latter regiment might then return or proceed on after the army as
circumstances should dictate." . . The soldiers forming his advance
army, about two thousand in number each carrying six days' provisions,
were started down the north bank of the Maumee River, retracing the
route of General Anthony Wayne eighteen years before, after issuing
the following carefully prepared Order of March:

Camp Head of the Maumee, ■22nd September. 1S12.

The front guard in three lines, two deep in the road, and in Aborigine files on the
flanks at distances of fifty and one hundred yards, as the ground will admit. .\ fatigue

286 THE MAUMEE RIVER BASIN.

party to consist of one captain, one ensign, two sergeants, and two corporals, with fifty
men. will follow the front guard for the purpose of opening the road. The remainder of
the infantry to march on the flanks in the following order ; Colonels Wells and Allen's
regiments on the right, and Lewis and Scott's on the left. The general and brigade
baggage, commissaries' and quartermasters' stores, immediately in the rear of the fatigne
party. The cavalry in the following order : Captain Garrard and twenty of his men
to precede the guard in front, and equally divided at the head of each line ; a lieutenant
and eighteen men in the rear of the whole army and baggage ; the remainder of the
cavalry equally divided on the flanks or the flank lines. The regimental baggage
wagons will fall according to the respective ranks of their commanding officers.

The officers commanding corps previous to their marching will examine carefully
the arms and ammunition of their respective corps, and see that they are in good order.
They will also be particularly careful that the men do not waste their cartridges. No
loaded muskets are to be put in the wagons. One half of the fatigue party is to work at
one time, and the others will carry their arms.

The wagon master will attend to loading the wagons, and see that the various
articles are put in in good order, and that each wagon and team carry a reasonable load.
The hour of march will be !• o'clock this morning. The officer of the day is charged
with this order.

The line of battle will be the same as that of General Harrison in his last march to
Fort Wayne. J. Winchester, Brig. Gen. Commanding.

These precautions were well taken as companies of Aborigines
were several times seen. A volunteer company of spies organized
under Captain Ballard and Lieutenant Harrison Munday of the rifle
regiment and Ensign Leggett of the 17th U. S. Infantry, marched in
advance to reconnoiter the country. Ensign Leggett obtained permis-
sion the 25th SeiJtember to go forward with four men of the Woodford,
Kentucky company, as far as the ruins of Fort Defiance. While pre-
paring their evening meal by the way, a Frenchman and eight savages
surprised, assailed, and put them to death. The next day Captain
Ballard's company discovered their bodies, and savages near who en-
deavored to draw the Americans into ambush, but they returned safely
to the army. Lieutenant Munday with other spies soon discovered the
same enemv and charged against them; but discovering their superior
number while they were running to ambush, he hastily turned and re-
treated. Scouts Hickman and Riddle on the 26th crossed to the south
side of the Maumee River and passed to the Auglaise which they also
crossed and went thence to the Maumee about two miles below De-
fiance, thence, crossing to the north outer bank, they returned to the
army having encircled an invading army without discovering any of its
parts. Captain Ballard with his scouts, and forty of Captain Garrard's
dragoons, were ordered to bury their dead comrades and, when nearing
the Tiffin River on the 27th September, they discovered and charged
an ambuscade of the same savages lingering near the bodies the day
before, who now fled beyond pursuit. They were the advance line of
the armv marching against Fort Wayne, composed of two hundred

AN INVADING ARMY OF BRITISH AND SAVAGES. 287

British Rf^ular troops under Major Muir, and one thousand or more
Aborigines under the notorious Colonel Matthew Elliott. A report
received at Piqua that this army was about to start from Maiden, de-
cided General Harrison to hasten to the protection of Fort Wayne.

WINCHESTER FORU OI- THE MAU.MEE

At the low place just beyond the Fishinc Lodye on the Left. Lookin^i west up the river, in
the north central part of Section 30. Defiance Township. Ohio, 31st October. 1902.

They brought four cannon and other heavy equipment by boats as far
as the ruins of Fort Defiance, and thence they continued up the south
bank of the Maumee on foot. They had advanced about twelve miles
above Defiance when their spies captured, and took before Major
Muir, Sergeant M'Coy one of General Winchester's scouts who exager-
ated the strength of the American Army, and reported that it was soon
to be reinforced by like numbers comin.g down the Auglaise River
which would cut off the chance of the British retreat. This report
agreeing quite well with that of his own spies alarmed Major Muir who
ordered a retreat to Defiance where his boats were prepared for hasty
return down the Maumee. Desiring to form an ambuscade for General
Winchester's army at the ford across the Tiffin, he attempted to gather
his forces for that purpose on the 2Mth but found that his Aborigine
allies had largely deserted. The report of Sergeant M'Coy, the retreat
to Defiance, the preparation of the boats, and the successful charge of
Captain Ballard the 27th, were enough for them. Fresh reports of the

288 THE MAUMEE RIVER BASfN.

advance of the American Army decided Muir and Elliott to hastily
retreat; and to facilitate the speed of their boats they threw into the
river one cannon, at least, with part of their heavy ammunition. These
were thrown into deep water toward the north shore about one-half
mile below Fort Defiance point, nearly opposite the mouth of Shawnee
Glen : and they were removed from the water and used by the advanc-
ing Americans.

General Winchester advanced cautiously and, fearing that the
enemy would oppose his crossing Tiffin River, he crossed to the south
side of the Maumee four and a half miles above the Tiffin and about
six miles bv river above Defiance. Here he found the trail of the re-
treating army, showing signs of artillery. Four mounted squads of
soldiers were dispatched, one to notify General Harrison of the enemy
and that the army was short of food, and the others to determine the
whereabouts of the enemy. These squads soon reported that the Brit-
ish had retreated many miles down the Maumee, leaving some Abo-
rigines on horses to watch the movements of the Americans. General
Winchester advanced and September 30th fortified an encam^iment
(Number 1 see map ante page 191) on the high south bank of the
Maumee opposite the mouth of the Tiffin River. The bushes had grown
so thick and high since General Wayne's clearing here in 1794 that it
recjuired much labor to clear the desired ground across to the Auglaise
River and to Fort Defiance point. The soldiers had been on short
rations and, as the work of clearing began, they joyfully hailed the
return of Captain Garrard's dragoons which had been sent a day or two
before to hasten supplies from Colonel Jennings.

General Harrison received his commission of ajipointment to suc-
ceed General Winchester September 24th while at Piqua, whereupon
he renewed his efforts to hasten forward troops and supplies. On the
30th General Winchester's dispatch regarding the enemy was received ;
and a few minutes afterward a letter was received from Governor Meigs
also informing him of the strong British forces opposing General Win-
chester. There were at this time about three thousand troops at Fort
Barbee embracing the cavalry comjianies of Captains Bacon, Clark and
Roper, and the volunteers gathered by Major Richard M. Johnson who
had been chosen Colonel of these combined forces; also the Ohio
cavalry under Colonel James Findlay. These cavalry commands had
been organized into a brigade under the general command of Brig-
adier General Edward W. Tupper 'a gentleman about fifty years of age
of a respectable soldierly appearance ' who had gathered a thousand
men for the war. General Harrison at once set this army in motion
for Defiance with three days rations. Notwithstanding a severe rain
they arrived at Fort Jennings the first night and there laid in the cold

HARRISON RESTORES ORDER AT DEFIANCE. 289

without tents till early morning on hastily arranged brush from the
beech trees used in building the fort. Intelligence was here received
that the enemy had retreated without attack.

Colonel Barbee's regiment was ordered back to Fort Barbee, and
Colonel Poague was ordered to clear a road to Defiance. After opening
this road he was ordered to build a fort at the Ottawa town by the
Auglaise River about twelve miles northward from Fort Barbee. This
fortification Colonel Poague named Fort Amanda in honor of his wife.*

General Harrison with the cavalry continued down the Auglaise,
the latter encamping for the night at Three Mile Creek (see map ante
page 191 ) while the General with his guard rode into Winchester's en-
campment by the Maumee early in the evening of October 2nd. Here
he found a sad state of affairs. The food supplies had become very
short, and the men were suffering from insufficient clothing and sick-
ness. They had not been favorably impressed by their General ; one
regiment in particular had become fully discouraged : had murmured,
and the men were talking about returning to their homes which thev
would probably have done but for the efforts of Major Hardin and
Colonel Allen. The ne.xt morning the cavalry marched by the camp
and came to a parade dress. A special call to Winchester's troops
promptly brought into ranks every man who was able for duty. They
were paraded to the best advantage, and there was read to them the

following General Order:

Camp at Defiance, October 3. 1812.

I have the honor of announcing to this army the arrival of General Harrison who is
duly authorized by the executive of the Federal Government to take command of the
Northwestern Army. This officer is enjoying the implicit confidence of the States from
whose citizens this army is and will be collected and, possessing himself great military
skill and reputation, the General is confident in the belief that his presence in the army,
in the character of its chief, will be hailed with unusual approbation.

J. WiNCHE.sTER, Brig. Gen. U. S. Army.

The soldiers greeted General Harrison with great warmth ; and he
addressed them as a kind father would talk to his children (Atherton).
He told them of expected bountiful supplies. He gave those who

■•' The site of Fort Amanda is on the left bank of the Anelaise River in the present Auclaise County,
Ohio, near its north line. Before the organization of Auclaise it was in Allen County, This was also
the site, or near the site, of General Wayne's Fort at the Head of the Auglaise — See ante paces 218, 227.
There is now nothint; to mark the place but remains of the water well, luxuriant vegetation, and grave
stones recently erected by the United States Government in the garrison cemetery where seventy-live
soldiers were buried. The fort enclosure was quadrangular in form with the usual blockliouse at each
corner, the one at the southeast being the largest and used as otficers' quarters. There was a well and
a large storehouse in the center of the enclosure. This fort was an important station for rest and for
the storing of supplies to be boated down the Auglaise River at proper stages of water. The boats for
this purpose were built here, and this work, and the transportation of the supplies from Fort Loramie,
required a good force of men. The la>t half of March, 1813, Colonel Miller arrived here from Chilli-
cothe with one hundred and fifty men to build boats. The storehouse and blockhouses were used in
after years by families, for religious and other meetings, and as the first postoiSce. See J. D. Simkins"
Early History of Auglaise County.

290 THE MAUMEE RIVER BASIN.

desired it liberty to return home; but he could not refrain from allud-
ing to the mortification which he anticipated they would experience
from the reception they would meet from the old and the young,
who had applauded them on their march for the scene of war, as
their gallant neighbors (M'Afee). The food brought with the visitors
gave the hungry soldiers a better breakfast than they were accus-
tomed to, which, with the parading and fraternizing of the cavalry,
renewed the soldierly spirit; and the fact that General Harrison
had been appointed chief in command went yet further to change
the resolves of the disaffected ones and to bring about a settled state
of feeling among all the men to remain and to endure all hardships.

New plans were entered upon. They found General Wayne's
Fort Defiance in ruins; and had it remained in good condition its size
would have been inadequate for the demands at this time. The area
embraced within the palisades of Fort Defiance was about ten thous-
and square feet, or about one quarter acre. General Harrison selected
the site and drew the plan for a new fort to embrace over twelve times
the ground space of Fort Defiance. A fatigue force of two hundred
and fifty men was detailed under Major Joseph Robb with axes to cut
timber for the buildings and palisades, and the work progressed as fast
as the weakened condition of the men and the weather admitted.

A new encampment, Number Two, was established one mile south-
east of Number One. It was located on the high left bank of the
Auglaise River about one mile and a half above its mouth, by river,
and occupied the ground north of Coe Run that is now the north part
of Riverside Cemetery of the City of Defiance. A line of trees was
felled across the neck of land between Encampments Numbers One
and Two, to serve as an abatis and breastworks for the army's outpost
guarding the entire peninsula between the Maumee and Auglaise
Rivers — see map page 191. General Harrison, accompanied by Col-
onel Richard M. Johnson and his original battalion including Ward's
and Ellison's companies, returned to Fort Barbee where these troops
were honorably discharged October 7th, their term of enlistment hav-
ing expired.

The feelings of General Winchester upon being superseded in
command, have not been recorded. General Harrison treated him
with great consideration and assigned him to the command of the Left
Wing of the Northwestern Army, to include the United States troops
and six regiments of Ohio and Keptucky militia. These troops were
to superintend the transportation of supplies to the new fort in readi-
ness for the advance movement; and they were instructed to possess
the corn and other crops as soon as possible that had been abandoned
by settlers along the lower Maumee.

FORT WINCHESTER NAMED. OTHER FORTS.

291

The Riyht Winn of the Northwestern Arm\- was to be composed
of the brigades from VirKinia and Pennsylvania, and one briijade from
southeastern Ohio. This Winfj was to proceed down the Sandusky
River. Durinsj the latter part of the year 1^12 the soldiers of the

^^H^Bht,

H^|^^^^^flH^^HpS^^pr^^^?^^HHH

gjipll

^- 'f . ^!1

^^^H^9^^^

V,^

\ '

V v\ i i^PiSH

HS^BHHbImI

lllfl

v'jcttH^^^^^^^^^BB

■

HL,J^h

:^hI

Lookini.' north of we^t up tht Au^lai^e River lo Apiil, !9nl. fiom the foot of Wayne Stieet. De-
fiance, Ohio. The distant hii^li bank sliows the site of General Winchester's Encampment Number
Two. and the Standpipe of the City Water Works toward tlie riyht marks the site of his Encampment
Number One on bank of the Maumee River. See Map ante pajje 191.

Right Wing built Fort Feree at Upper Sandusky: Fort Ball at the
present Tiffin: and Fort Stephenson at Lower Sandusky, now Fremont,
Ohio. General Tupper's command was stvled the Center of the
Northwestern Army, and was to move alon.g Hull's Road by Forts
M'.\rthur, Necessity, and Findlay.

As further evidence of the desire to respect and honor the com-
mander of the Left Wing, the new fort at Defiance was duly christened
Fort Winchester. This Fort was completed by the soldiers working
with short and often unwholesome rations, thinly clad, and with much
suffering from inclement weather: but it was happily completed and
fulfilled its mission during the war as an important stronghold for the
defense of the territory of the upper rivers, as a rendezvous for troops
and, later, for the storing of supplies to be boated down the Maumee
River as wanted by the advancing troops. For some length of time it
was the only obstruction against the incursions of the British and Abo-
rigines into Northwestern Ohio,

292 THE MAUMEE RIVER BASIN.

Fort Winchester was styled a beautiful fort by William Atherton
who was present during its construction.* It was built along the high
and precipitous west bank of the Auglaise Rivir, a line of apple trees
planted bv the earlv French alone intervening. Beginning about
eighty yards south of the ruins of Fort Defiance, near the present First
Street of the City of Defiance, Ohio, Fort Winchester extended south-
ward to, or south of, Third Street a distance of over six hundred feet,
and including the highest part of the natural terrace thereabout. Its
east line was in or near Washington Street. It was in the form of a
parallelogram, and extended in width to about Jefferson Street, its
palisades including three acres or more of land. There was a strong
two-story blockhouse at each of its four corners, a large gate midway
of each side and end with a sentinel house, above each one, and all
were connected bv a strong palisade of logs set on end deep into the
ground snuglv matched together and extending twelve to fifteen feet
above ground, all pointed at the upper ends. A cellar was excavated
under the blockhouse at the northeast corner, and from it a passage
way under ground was made to the rock-bed of the Auglaise River
and was there jirotected by logs so that abundance of water could
be obtained from the rjver under protection from the enemy. The
onlv ditches made were for drainage.

While at Defiance General Harrison suggested to General Win-
chester that two regiments of infantry be sent southward to be near the
base of food and clothing su])plies; and that General Tupper with all
the cavalry, nine hundred and sixty in number, be sent down the Mau-
mee beyond the lowest rapids to disperse any of the enemy who could
be found, thus saving the crojis there abandoned bv the American set-
tlers, and to return to Fort Barbee by way of the Ottawa ( Tawa ) towns
by the Blanchard River. These suggested orders were not executed,
the last one for several reasons principal among which were, damaged
powder and scarcity of food which made it impossible to take adequate
supplies for an expedition that might last a week or ten days; also lurk-
ing savages who were a constant and harassing menace at Fort Win-
chester; the dissatisfaction of some of the Kentucky troops with the
command of General Tupper of the Ohio Militia; a misunderstanding
between Generals Winchester and Tupper and the unfriendly treatment
of the latter by the former; the weakening of Tupper's force by the
withdrawal of Kentucky troops and Simrall's dragoons; and the dis-
missal of Tupper from the command of the expedition by Winchester
who gave it to Colonel Allen of the regulars, which caused the Ohio
troops to recross the Auglaise and positively refuse to march under an}'

* Narrative of the Sufferings and Defeat of the North- Western Army by William Atherton,
Franl<fort, Kentucky. 1842.

QUARREL AMONG OFFICERS AND TROOPS.

295

other than their own chosen leader. * The quarrel was between the reg-
ular and volunteer soldiers as well as their officers: and it defeated the
proposed expedition of the Left Winjj; of the Army, which, Tupper

FORT WINCHESTER

With Ruins of Fort Defiance at the junction of the Auylaise River on the right with the Mauniee
beyond. From personal interviews with persons who saw it, from researches, and from surveys, by
Charles E. Slocum. Fort Winchester was cnniplf ted \rtih October. 1H12, and was abandoned by United
States troops in the spring of 1815.

* See General Tupper's report to General Harrison under date of Urbana October 12, 1H12, yiven in
full in Official Letters of the Military and Naval Officers of the United States During the War with Great
Britain in the years 18J2-15-14 and 1815, etc., collected and arranged by John Brannan, Wasliinaton. 1H23.
Also History of the late War in the Western Country by Robert H. M'Afee. pages 148,149; Brackenridge,
page 59; Perkins, page 97; Lossing. page 331.

294 THE MAUMEE RIVER BASIN.

wrote, was at one time capable of tearing the British flag from the walls
of Detroit. The time of enlistment of about three hundred mounted
riflemen having expired, they were discharged, and they returned to
their homes. Instead of leading his command down the Maumee River
and then to St. Marys, as he was ordered to do, General Tupper went
direct to Fort M'Arthur by way of the Ottawa towns. General Win-
chester preferred charges of insubordination against him, and General
Harrison ordered his arrest: but at this time he was on an expedition
to the lower Maumee and his trial did not occur until the next year after
the defeat of Winchester's army at the River Raisin when the witnesses
were captives with the British; and he was acquitted.

Ambuscades by the savages continued about Fort Winchester. Five
soldiers who had strayed somewhat from their duty to gather wild plums
were killed and scalped. Soldiers in Encampment Number Two were
also fired upon from across the river, and one was killed. This caused
an alarm call to arms, but the enemy escaped punishment. Scouting
parties met the savages and suffered wounds from them, resulting in
an occasional death. Comparative quiet, however, gradually pervaded
the encampment.

Some breaches of discijiline were noted, and their jmnishment re-
lieved the monotony of camp life. On the 8th October Frederick Jacoby,
a young man, was found asleep while posted as guard. He was sen-
tenced bv court martial to be shot. A platoon was ordered to take pla-
ces before the paraded army and twenty paces from the prisoner who,
blindfolded, was on his knees preparing for the order to the soldiers to
fire. A great stillness pervaded the army, just as the suspense was at
its height a courier arrived with an order from General Winchester
saving his life by changing the sentence ( Atherton ). This sentence and
scene produced a profound effect upon the soldiers. It was their first real
view of the sternness of military discipline : and they recognized its neces-
sity and justness while in the country of the stealthy and savage enemy.
Later, as the savages became less numerous, hunting for wild game was
permitted, and soon all game was killed, not even a squirrel could be
found within reasonable distance of the encampment for the soldiers to
hunt.

While on his way from Defiance, General Harrison was informed
by express from Fort Wayne that the savages were again besieging that
fort. He proceeded to Fort Barbee where he found Colonel Allen Trim-
ble with five hundred Ohio cavalry. This force he immediately ordered
to the relief of Fort Wayne, with orders to proceed thence against the
town of the Pottawotomi chief White Pigeon by the River St. Joseph
of Lake Michigan. These troops expected to join General Tu])per's
command and proceed against Ditroit. IIo\ve\er, they obeyed orders

FORT WINCHESTER COMPLETED. CHANGE OF GAMP. 295

to march to Fort Wa\-ne, whence the savages fled as they ap-
proached. Here about half of the soldiers refused to go further north-
west. Colonel Trimble, however, obeyed the orders of his superior
officer with those who would accompanx' him. They destroyed two vil-
lages of the savages, but on their approach a treacherous guide gave
alarm to the denizens in time for them to escape punishnrent.

Some sachems of the Miamis, whose warriors had gone to the British,
were brought before General Harrison by messengers, for them to show
their willingness to live peaceably on the benefactions of the United
States. Five of their number were to be sent to Piqua as hostages for
the good behavior of the others — but they did not come according to
promise.

Fort Winchester was completed the loth October, 1812. The con-
dition of affairs with General Winchester at this date is set forth in his
letter to Governor Meigs, viz:

Captain Wood, commanding a small party of spies, came into camp yester-
day and reports that he was detached from Urbana to visit the [foot of the Maiimee]
Rapids, etc. ; that he fell in with other spies who had just returned from that place, and
had obtained all the information that he possibly could. I therefore have directed him
to return and report, deeming it unnecessary that he should proceed, as the information
required had been obtained, and being desirous too, to communicate to your excellency
that this army could immediately march and take possession of the Rapids if supplies of
provisions, etc., could certainly reach us in a few days after our arrival. Many days
provisions could not be carried with us, because they are not here. Neither have we
the means of transportation ; but it is important that the corn at that place should be
saved if it could be done.

At this place [Defiance] a picketed post with four block houses, two storehouses and
a house for the sick, will be finished this day. Then I shall turn my attention to build-
ing pirogues for the purpose of transporting heavy baggage and provisions down the
river, and anxiously wait your answer with relation to supplies. I shall remain in
readiness to march as soon as it is received. If General Harrison is at Urbana, you will
communicate the contents of this letter to him. If I knew where he could be found. I
would address a letter to him on the subject. .

Soon after the completion of Fort Winchester, and the detachment
of a garrison for its defense, the army moved to the present central
part of Land Section Nineteen in Richland Township on the north
side of the Maumee River one mile and a half below the mouth of the
Auglaise. This site is on the lower land, and protected from the north
and west winds, and it is designated by the letter H on the map ante
page 191. With continued short rations, delay in the receipt of winter
clothing and the increasing severity of the weather, the sufferings and
sickness of the soldiers were increasing, and this change of encamp-
ment was made for sanitary reasons and that the men might be nearer
timber for fuel. The ground of this Camp H proving too wet, the
armv soon occupied a dryer place two miles further down the Maumee,

296

THE MAUMEE RIVER BASIN.

in the north part of Section Twenty-one. This Camp J soon showing
great exposure to the wind yet another site, the historic Camp Number
Three, was chosen. Its site is nearly two miles below Camp J, in the
present Land Sections Twenty-two and Twenty-three, Richland Town-

SITE OF ENCAMPMENT NUMBER THREE

of General Winchester's Army from last of October until :^Oth December, 1SI9. Looking south-
west 27 November. 1903. from the N. W, corner of Land Section 2M, Richland Township, Defiance County,
Ohio. Graves of Pioneer settlers from 1822 in foreground. The Maumee River in distance, flowin^; from
rii:ht to left. The Cemetery of the Encampment is supposed to be near the river, on the left.

ship, Di'fiance County, Ohio. This site proved favorable, with al)und-
ance of good firewood, and here the army remained aliout eight weeks.
At these several encampments of General Winchester's army there
was as much suffering as an army could endure, it culminating at
Camp Number Three. Hunger impelled many lireaches of discipline.
Soldiers wandered from camp, against orders, in search of game and
fruit. One man started to desert. He was caught and sentenced 'to
ride the wooden horse before the whole army.' This penalty consisted
in his being placed astride a bent sapling and being there subjected to
a series of tossings and joltings to the great amusement of the soldiers
who entered with zest into everything affording diversion from their
sufferings. We get other gliinpses of the life and experiences of Fort
Winchester and its neighboring Encampment Number Three. Special
orders signed J. Winchester, Brig. Gen'l, and dated Camp Winchester
read that "James Givins, private in Captain Croghan's Company,
charged with sitting down near his post, apparently asleep with his
gun out of his hands, last night, October 25th, 1812, found guilty and
sentenced to receive ten cobs on his bare posterior, well laid on with a

SUFFERINGS AT ENCAMPMENT NUMBER THREE. 297

paddle four inches wide and one-half an inch thick bored full of holes.
Thomas Clark, charged with altering; his uniform without leave, sen-
tenced to a reprimand on parade."

Sickness increased. The rations were constantlv short, beinsi re-

SITE OF ENCAMPMENT NUMBER THREE

Of General Winchester's Army. Looking northeast 15 May, 19(11. from riftht bank of Maumee River,
middle of Section 22. Richland Township, Defiance County, Ohio. The graves of the soldiers buried
here are supposed to be near the distant bank of the river.

ceived in small fjuantities and consisting some days only of beef, and
again only of flour, and of some hickory nuts gathered near the camp.
The beef was of poor quality, the cattle being greatly reduced from
want of food and the cold like the soldiers.* Complaints were also
made of the want of salt, to the liberal use of which the Kentuckians
had been habituated at their homes. To cheer the discouraged and
languishing army by renewing hope there were issued November 1st,
1812, from Fort Winchester the following General Orders:

With great pleasure the General announces to the army the prospect of an early
supply of winter clothing, amongst which are the following articles shipped from Phila-
delphia on the !)th September last ; 10,000 pairs of shoes, ,">000 blankets, .lOOO round

* When reduced to necessity, the skins of animals were eaten even after being dried. They were
cut into pieces, boiled and the soup eaten: and then the pieces were roasted so fully that they could be
eaten.

298 THE MAUMEE RIVER BASIN.

jackets. ."^OOO pairs pantaloons, woolen cloth to be made up, besides the underclothing for
Colonel Well's regiment, 100 watch coats, .")000 blankets and 10000 yards of flannel,
10000 pairs wool socks, 10000 wool hose.

This bountiful supply evinces the constant attention of the government to the com-
forts of its armies although the immense distance this wing hath been detached into the
wilderness has prevented its receiving those comforts in due season, owing to causes not
within the control of human foresight, yet a few days and the General consoles himself
with the idea of seeing those whom he has the honor to command clad in warm woolen
capable of resisting the northern blasts of Canada, either from the bellows of Boreas or
the muzzles of British cannon.

These promised supplies of clothing came not to Fort Winchester
nor to its neighboring Encampment Number Three. Sickness found
the weakened and shivering soldiers an easy prey. Typhoid fever pre-
vailed. The list of those sick increased to over three hundred, with
often three or four deaths a day. So many funereal rites had very de-
pressing effects. Everything militated against proper camp sanitation;
and probably the efforts to maintain a good sanitary regimen were not
so thorough as those in later times; certainly the ways and means were
not so ample as now. On account of their hurried march to the relief
of Fort Wayne much of the soldiers' clothing was left at Piqua, and
many of the men were yet wearing the linen hunting coats in which thej-
started from their homes in Kentucky the 12th August; and these were
in rags from natural wear and from the brush and timber with which
thev had been obliged to contend. Man}' were so entireh' destitute of
shoes and other clothing that thev must have frozen had they been
obliged to go much distance from their campfires.''' In fact the sufferings
of the soldiers in the fall and winter of 1812 at Fort Winchester and its
Encampments, are altogether the saddest that have been experienced
in the Maumee River Basin ; and these sufferings were probably the
greatest of their kind that .\merican soldiers have endured.

General Harrison, at his headquarters in Franklinton now Colum-
bus, kept informed regarding the condition of affairs and put forth great
efforts to gather supplies and men and to advance them toward Detroit.
The 13th October he wrote to the Secretary of War that 'I am fully
sensible of the responsibility invested in me. I accepted it with full
confidence of being able to effect the wishes of the President, or to show
unequivocally their impracticability. If the fall should be very dry, I
will take Detroit before the winter sets in; but if we have much rain, it
will be necessary to wait at the Rapids until the Miami of the Lake
[Maumee] is sufficiently frozen over to bear the army and its baggage.'
The 22nd October he again wrote, 'I am not able to fix any period for
the advance of the troops to Detroit. It is pretty evident that it cannot

* Captain Robert B. M'Afee and William Atlierlon, wlio were witli General Winchester's army,
recount in their books many otlier details of the sufterings here of tliis unfortunate army.

NEW ROADS AND EFFORTS FOR ADVANCE OF ARMY. 299

be done upon proper principles until the frost shall become so severe
as to enable us to use the rivers and the mars<in of the lake for trans-
portation of the baggage and artillery upon the ice. To get them for-
ward through a swampy wilderness of near two hundred miles, in wag-
ons or on packhorses which are to carry their own provisions, is
absolutely impossible. . . My present plan is to occupy Upper San-
dusky, and accumulate at that place as much provision and forage as
possible, to be taken from thence upon sleds to the River Raisin. At
Defiance, Fort Jennings, and St. Mary, boats and sleds are preparing
to take advantage of a rise of water or a fall of snow.

After personal examination of diverse reports General Harrison
ordered, the latter part of October, General Reazin Beall's command of
five hundred men at Mansfield to join General Elijah Wadsworth's com-
mand of eight hundred which was near the mouth of the Huron River,
Ohio, and General Simon Perkins was given chief command of these
and other soldiers composing the Right Wing of the Northwestern
Army. This Wing was directed to clear and make a road from P'ort
Stephenson to the foot of the lowest Maumee Rapids.

Captain Hinkston with a small detachment was sent by General
Tupper from Fort M'Arthur, to reconnoiter at these Rapids. He soon
returned with a prisoner, one Captain Clarke, who was captured a short
distance from his command of about seventy-five British regulars
at the foot of the Rapids where they had come in boats for corn there
planted by Americans. They also reported a force of three to four
hundred Aborigines at the Rapids. General Tupper reported to Gov-
ernor Meigs November 9th that he had decided to capture these British
or drive them from the Rajiids and save the corn. He wrote . . 'A
moment is not to be lost. We shall be at the Rapids in three days. I
have also sent an express to General Winchester, advising him of the
situation of the enemy, and of our march ; but as we can reach the
Rapids one dav sooner than General Winchester waiting for my express,
I could not think of losing one day, and thereby suffer the enemy to
escape with the forage.' He detailed the condition of the forces and
the operations at Maiden the British headquarters, now Amherstburg,
Canada, and to some extent the condition at Detroit, as obtained from
Captain Clarke adding 'they [the British at Maiden] are apprised of
General Winchester's force, but understand he is building a fort at
Defiance and is to remain there during the winter. They have no
knowledge of any other preparations making in the State of Ohio.' .

General Tupper proceeded on his march November 10th, along
the roadway cut by General Hull's army, with six hundred and fifty
men, and a light six-pounder cannon which they were obliged to leave
at one of the forts along the wav on account of the mud. When with-

300 THE MAUMEE RIVER BASIN.

in a few miles of tfie foot of tlie Rapids fiis scouts informed him tfiat the
enemv was still there. He halted his soldiers until evening and then
passed down the Maumee to a ford about two miles above the enemy's
camp. Here scouts again reported that the enemy was closely en-
camped and was singing and dancing. General Tupper decided to
cross the river and make ready to attack at daybreak. Leading the
van of the first section through the cold, swift current which was waist
deep to his men in places, they crossed in safety; but the second sec-
tion was not so fortunate, some men being carried down by the cur-
rent, losing their guns, and being themselves rescued by horses with
difficulty. The night was passing, the soldiers were fatigued and
cold, and those who had crossed were ordered back to the main force
on the south bank where all hastily sought a camp in the woods near-b\-.
Earlv the next morning messengers were dispatched to General Win-
chester for food and reinforcements. A few scouts were sent down
till' river opposite the enemv's encampment desiring them to be
pursued, biit the enemy could not be decoyed.' General Tupper then
moved his entire fcyce and displayed it to the enemy, whereupon the
squaws ran to the woods, the British ran to their boats and escaped,
and the Aborigines, more brave than their allies, paraded and fired
across the river at the troops with muskets and a four-pounder cannon,
but without doing any damage. The Americans feinted a retreat to
draw the savages across the river, but only a few mounted on horses
were seen to pass up the river, the main body remaining near their
camp. Thinking themselves secure from attack many of the soldiers,
contrary to orders, began to gather corn in a near-by field. Others,
while endeavoring to catch some hogs that had come in sight, were
impetuously attacked by the Aborigine horsemen, and four of their
number were killed. The soldiers rallied and repulsed the horse-
men, when they were met bj- the main body of Aborigines led by
the noted Chief Split-Log, who had crossed the river above. A
sharp engagement ensued with Bentley's battalion and the enemy was
soon driven away, but not without some loss to the Americans. The
food brought with them was nearly gone. They could have subsisted
on the corn and other food growing thereabouts that had been planted
and early cared for by the American settlers who had been driven away
by the savages; but they decided to return to Fort M'Arthur, and the
march was begun that evening 'leaving accidentally in the camp a sick
soldier who was unable to march and who fell a prey to the tomahawk
and scalping knife' — M'Afee page 17L

When General Tupper's express arrived at Fort Winchester, a

It is probable that the eneitiys encampment was in tlie vicinity of the former Britisli Fort Miami.

UNNECESSARY AND SEVERE MARCH. SCOUTS. 301

detachment of three hundred and eighty of the most alile men* was at
once equipped at Encampment Number Three to aid Tujiper's com-
mand at the foot of the Rapids as desired, notwithstanding the great
amount of sickness prevailing, and the want of food and clothing.
This detachment started down the north bank of the Maumee in the
morning of November 15th ; and later in the day General Tupper's
second dispatch from the Rapids urging re-inforcement and food,
arrived at Fort Winchester from along the south side of the river.
The information in this dispatch was at once hastened to the marching
column, which laboriously forced its way forward until nine o'clock the
night of the second day when fatigue necessitated a halt.

Colonel William Lewis, who was in command, sent Ensign ( after-
wards Colonel ) Charles S. Todd with a few of the hardier soldiers, pre-
ceded by five guides, forward to reconnoiter. They crossed the Maumee,
entered the deserted camp of General Tupper's command about mid-
night, found the deserted American dead and scalped, fiut found no
word of explanation— the road only showing evidence of the hastv re-
treat. These scouts returned to Colonel Lewis who decided to return
to Encampment Number Three. They had not struck fire from fear
of discovering the detachment to the enemy's scouts, and they were
obliged to keep huddled and stirring to keep from freezing. Their
weakened condition before starting on this forced march, the fatigue
consequent upon it, the keenness of the cold in their thinly clad condi-
tion, their loss of sleep and continued vigils, being prepared every
moment for an attack of the savages, all caused acute and intense
physical suffering which was not at all alleviated by thoughts of the
unnecessary march and of General Tupper's thoughtlessness in not
sending them notice of his retreat. Two da\s were required for many
to get back to camp, and the second night was nearly as bad as the first
on account of indications continuing of nearness of savages.

There were employed and fed by the armies several scouts. Aborig-
ine as well as American. Captain ( John ) Logan with a small ]-)arty of
his tribe of Shawnees, including 'Captain John' and 'Bright Horn'
were sent by General Harrison to reconnoiter down the Maumee. They
soon came to Winchester's Camp Number Three and reported that
they had been pursued so closely by overpowering numbers of the
enemy that they escaped with difficulty. Their sincerity being
questioned Captain Logan, being one of the most sensitive and trust-
worthy of the Aborigines, felt aggrieved that he was suspected either of
cowardice or treachery, and he determined on another scouting expedi-
tion to the Rapids, declaring at the time that something should be done

* See the Narrative of the Sufferings and Defeat of the Northwestern Army page 30, by William
Atherton who was a member of this detachment.

302 THE MAUMEE RIVER BASIN.

before his return that would convince all concerned of his bravery and
friendship to the Government of the United States. 'Old Captain John
and Lightfoot [or Bright Horn] if I mistake not, accompanied him'
— Atherton. They started down the river November 22nd, were soon
captured by a British officer, the eldest son of Colonel Elliott, and his
escort of five savages including Win-e-mac who recognized Logan
and gloried in his capture. The prisoners in due time, when about
twenty miles below Camp Number Three, found opportunity to use
their code of signs and attack their captors. Logan killed Win-e-mac,
or Winnemeg a noted Pottawotami chief and enemy before mentioned,
and the others killed Elliott and a young Ottawa chief. Logan was
shot through the body and Bright Horn through a thigh ; but they were
able to mount the empty saddles of the slain and escape to Camp Num-
lier Three, where Logan died two days later from his wound notwith-
standing careful attention of the surgeon and the soldiers as nurses.
His loss was lamented by the whole army. A detachment of troops
under Major Hardin bore his body to Wapakoneta the county seat of
the present Auglaise County, where his family lived and where he was
buried with mixed military honors and savage rites. Captain John
carrying at the end of a long limb of a tree the scalp of the young
Ottawa that he had slain at the time of their escape. Most of the im-
portant information regarding the enemy, however, was obtained by an

American 'Old Man Riddle' (Ruddle?) who would advance into

the region of the enemy and there linger until he learned quite fully
the particulars desired.

The 15th November General Harrison wrote to the Secretary of
War that he thought it unwise to attempt moving beyond the Maumee
Rapids before spring on account of the insurmountable difficulties
attending the trans])ortation of supplies. And about the same time in
a letter to Governor Shelby he wrote . . ' 1 know it will be mortifying
to Kentucky for this armv to return without doing anything; but it is
better to do that than to attempt impossibilities. I wish to God the
public mind were informed of our difficulties, and gradually prepared
for this course. In my opinion, we should in this quarter disband all
but those suffiicient for a strong frontier guard, convoys, etc., and pre-
pare for the next season.' .

The latter part of November heavy rains were experienced at Fort
Winchester and Encampment Number Three and, the prospects of the
army's advancing not being improved in any way, the soldiers were
ordered about the first of December to build huts from saplings and
bark for their better protection from the wet and cold, their frail tents
being now of little worth. The supplies that were received continued
inadequate, and were seldom varied. Often the army was wholly with-

GREAT DIFFICULTIES IN TRANSPORTATION. 503

out food. A^ain, for eleven days they had nothing but pork, just killed,
without salt. Reconnoitering parties kept the vicinity of the camp free
from savages, and gathered in everj'thing vegetable and animal that
could be eaten.

The difficulties attending transportation of supplies through these
'Black Swamp' regions accounted in most part for these privations and
sufferings. The roads were bad beyond description. From Fort Lor-
amie on the south to the River St. Mary, and thence to Defiance at the
north, was ipne continuous swamp knee deep to the packhorses and up
to the hubs of the wagons — M'Afee. Most of the time it was impos-
sible to move a wagon through the mud, even without a load; it would
mire and become completely blocked. Packhorses were brought into
use, but many horses, and their packs, were lost by the thoughtless,
careless, and sometimes dishonest, drivers; the depth and consistency
of the mud ; the want of food for the horses ; and the wet, cold weather.*
The food supplies that were brought to the army were often in spoiled
condition. Nor were the difficulties of transportation by river less, as
described by Captain Robert B. M'Afee, viz:

About the first of December Major Bodley. an enterprising officer who was quarter-
master of the Kentucky troops, made an attempt to send near two hundred barrels of
flour down the Kiver St. Mary in pirogues to the Left Wing of the army below Defiance,
Previous to this time the water had rarely been high enough to venture in a voyage on
these small streams. The flour was now shipped in fifteen or twenty pirogues and ca-
noes, and placed under the command of Captain Jordan and Lieutenant Cardwell, with
upwards of twenty men. They descended the river and arrived about a week afterward
at Shane's Crossing [the present Rockford] upwards of one hundred miles by water [?] but
only twenty by land from the place where they started. The river was so narrow, crook-
ed, full of logs, and trees overhanging the banks, that it was with great difficulty they
could make any progress. And now in one freezing night they were completely ice-
bound. Lieutenant Cardwell waded back through the ice and swamps to Fort Barbee
with intelligence of their situation. Major Bodley returned with him to the flour, and
offered the men extra wages to cut through the ice and push forwards ; but having gained
only one mile by two day's labor, the project was abandoned, and a guard left with the
flour, A few days before Christmas a temporary thaw took place which enabled them
with much difficulty and suffering to reach within a few miles of Fort Wayne, where they
were again frozen up. They now abandoned the voyage and made sleds on which the
men hauled the flour to the Fort [Wayne] and left it there.

In a letter to the Secretary of War December 12th, 1812, General
Harrison used the following emphatic lau,guage :

Obstacles are almost insuperable ; but they are opposed with unabated firm-
ness and zeal. . . I fear that the expenses of this army will greatly exceed the calcu-
lations of the government. The prodigious destruction of horses can only be conceived

* The only persons who could be procured to act as packhorse drivers were generally the most
worthless creatures in the community, who took care neither of the horses nor the t:oods with which they
were entrusted. The horses of course were soon broken down, and many of the packs lost. The teams
hired to haul were also commonly valued so high on couiinp into service that the owners were willing to

504 THE MAUMEE RIVER BASIN.

by those who have been accustomed to military operations in the wilderness during the
winter season. . . I did not make sufficient allowance for the imbecility and inexperi-
ence of the public agents, and the villainy of the contractors. . . If the plan of ac-
quiring the naval superiority upon the lakes, before the attempt is made on Maiden or
Detroit, should be adopted, I would place fifteen hundred men in cantonment at the Miami
[Maumee] Rapids — Defiance would be better if the troops had not advanced from there —
retain about one thousand more to be distributed in different garrisons, accumulate pro-
visions at St. Marys, 'Tawa Town [Fort Jennings] Upper Sandusky, Cleveland, and
Presque Isle, and employ the dragoons and mounted infantry in desultory expeditions
against the Aborigines. The villages south of Lake Michigan might be struck with effect,
by making a deposit of corn and provisions at Fort Wayne. I am dissappointed in the ar-
tillery which has been sent me. There are in all twenty-eight pieces of which ten are
sixes, and ten twelve-pounders. The former are nearly useless. I had five before, and
if I had a hundred I should only take three or four with me. You will perceive by the
return of Captain Gratiot, which is enclosed, that all the carriages for the howitzers, and
eight out of the ten for the twelve-pounders, are unfit for use.

A large number of hostile Miamis, who had lived at the head of
the Maumee, at Eel River, and along the Wabash, had been gathering
by the Mississinewa River fifteen to twenty miles from its mouth, and
had attracted thither the Delawares from the White River in Indiana.
In November General Harrison ordered Lieutenant Colonel Campbell
of the 19th Regiment U. S. Infantry, with a detachment of Kentucky
and Pennsylvania cavalry and infantry, to dislodge those savages if they
would not consent to remain peaceful. This command moved from
central Ohio rapidly to and down the Mississinewa about the middle of
December, each man carrying ten daj's rations, and as much food for
his horse as practicable. They destroyed four villages of the savages,
killed eight warriors and took eight more, with thirty-two women and
children, prisoners. Early in the morning of December 18th the main
body of savages rallied, stealthily approached and impetuously
attacked the .\mericans. The savages fought desperately but were
obli.ged to retreat, leaving fifteen of their killed on the field. The
American loss was eight men killed and forty-two wounded; and one
hundred and seven horses killed. Lieutenant Colonel Campbell being
informed at this time that Tecumseh had been only eighteen miles
lielow him on the river, thought it prudent to return as fast as pract-
icable, and to communicate the presence of Tecumseh's force to
General Harrison. The return march to Ohio was very slow and
laborious, seventeen of the wounded being carried on litters. The
entire command suffered greatly from the cold: and three hundred
soldiers were so frozen as to be for some time unfit for duty. This
expedition had a wholesome effect on the savages. The Delawares had

drive them to debility and death with the view of getting the price Lfrom the Governtnentl. In addition
to this no bills of lading were used, nor accounts kept with the wagoners, and of course each one had an
opportunity to plunder the public without risk of detection— M'Afee.

ADVANCE OF WINCHESTER'S ARMY DOWN MAUMEE. 305

before been requested to return to Ohio; and after this chastisement
they did return, and settled alon^^ the upper Au^laise River.

General Harrison dispatched Ensig'n Charles S. Todd, with an
escort of two soldiers and three Wyandots, from Fort Stephenson to
General Winchester, instructing him to advance to the lower Maumee
Rapids as soon as he could accumulate twenty days' food supplies, and
there to build huts thus to lead the watchful scouts of the enemy to infer
that he intended to pass the winter there; then to build sleds to be
ready to advance to Maiden when ice formed sufficiently to hold. The
messengers were instructed to further inform him that the three lines
of the Northwestern Army would be concentrated at the Rapids for the
advance, and that secrecy regarding these orders and preparations
should be maintained.

The '2'2nd December flour and some other supplies, including a
partial supjily of clothing from the ladies of Kentucky''' were received
at Fort Winchester and Encampment Number Three, with the most
welcome intelligence that a constant supply would follow. Prepara-
tions were at once made for the armv's advance. The sick were
removed to Fort Winchester, and a sufficient garrison left for their care
and protection. The soldiers were greatly inspirited by the order to
prepare for the march, and . . . 'On the 25th December, 1812.
[M'Afee recorded this march as beginning 30th December] at sunrise
we bade adieu to this memorable place. Camp Number Three, where
lie [yet undesignated] the bones of manv a brave man. This
place will live in the recollection of all who suffered there, and
for more reasons than one. There comes up before the mind the
many times the dead march was heard in the Camp, and the solemn
procession that carried our fellow sufferers to the grave; the many times
we were almost on the point of starvation; and the many sickening
disappointments which were experienced by the army from day to day,
and from week to week, bv the failure of promised supplies' — Ather-
ton page 26.

Leslie Combs and the noted guide and scout A. Ruddle (Riddle?)
were sent to inform General Harrison of the advance; and he, having
just received the express from Lieutenant Colonel Campbell that Te-
cumseh and his large body of savages might invade Ohio along the
Mississinewa, sent orders to General Winchester to turn his army south-
ward to Fort Jennings to protect the supplies being gathered along that
military' road ; but General Winchester persisted in his march down the
Maumee. Had he followed the orders of his ranking officer the signal

* Much of the clothint; sent from Kentucky was lost on the way, like the food, owiny to the mis-
conduct of the wagoners and wacon-inasters, and the insuperable difficulties of transportation — M'Afee
pace 183.

306 THE MAUMEE RIVER BASIN.

defeat and massacre to which he led his army would have been pre-
vented. His soldiers proceeded under great difficulties, and slowly.
In addition to the great weakness and insufficient clothing of his men
they were obliged to haul much of their provisions and equipment on
sleds through a deep snow that had fallen on the wet ground made soft
by a general thaw. The gullies and other depressions contained much
water which, with the snow, wet the provisions and the men's clothing.
The weather soon became colder and there was intense suffering. The
clearing of ground for the night encampments, and the making of fires
by the uncertain process of sparks from striking flints with steel, and
kindling with wet wood, were slow, cold and fatiguing processes. The
greatest suffering, however, was at night when thev laid down and at-
tempted to sleep.

Some complaints being made agamst Doctor William Eustis Secre-
tary' of War, he resigned that office, and James Monroe was appointed
his successor by President Madison. Secretary Monroe was a practical
soldier: was quick to recognize General Harrison's worth and wrote to
him to prosecute the campaign in pursuance of his own views. General
Harrison replied from Franklinton under date of January 8, 1813, as
follows :

When I was directed to take command in the latter part of September, I thought
it possible by great exertions toeUect the objects of the campaign before the setting in of
winter. I distinctly stated, however, to the Secretary of War that there was always a
period of rainy weather in this country in the months of November and December in
which the roads within the settlements were alinost impassable ; and the swamps which
extend northwardly from about the 40th degree of north latitude, entirely so ; and that
this circumstance would render it impossible to advance with the army before that period
without exposing it to inevitable destruction, unless a sufficiency of provisions could be
taken on to subsist it until the severe frosts should remove the impediments to trans-
portation.

The experience of a few days was sufficient to convince me that the supplies of pro-
visions could not be procured for our autumnal advance ; and even if this difficulty was
removed, another of equal magnitude existed in the want of artillery. There remained
then no alternative but to prepare for a winter campaign. But in order to take advantage
of every circumstance in our favor, boats and pirogues were prepared in considerable
numbers on the Auglaise [at Forts Amanda and Winchester] and St. Marys, in the hope
that when the land transportation could not be used, we might by means of these rivers
take on large supplies to the Rapids of the Miami [Maumee], An effort was made also
to procure flour from Presque Isle [the present Erie, Pa.] by coasting the lake with small
boats. These measures were calculated on as collateral aids only. The more sure
one of providing a large number of packhorses and ox teams was resorted to, and the
Deputy Quartermaster General, Colonel Morrison, was instructed accordingly.

Considering the Miami [Maumee] Rapids as the first point of destination, pro-
visions were ordered to be accumulated along a concave base, extending from St. Marys
on the left to the mouth of Huron River and afterwards Lower Sandusky, on the right.
From this base the [foot of the Maumee] Rapids could be approached by three routes, or
lines of operation, two of which were pretty effectually secured by the posts which were

HARRISON'S REVIEW. MISTAKE AT DEFIANCE. 307

established and the positions taken on the third [by way of the Sandusky River]. St.
Marys, M'Arthur's Blockhouse, and Upper Sandusky were selected as principal deposits.
The troops, excepting those with General Winchester, were kept within the bounds
of the local contractors, that they might not consume the provisions procured by the
United States' Commissaries, and which were intended to form the grand deposit at the
Miami [Maumee] Rapids, It was not until late in October that much effect could be
given to these arrangements; and for the six following weeks little or nothing could be
done from the uncommonly unfavorable state of the weather which afforded just rain
enough to render the roads impassable for wagons, and not a sufficiency to raise the
waters to a navigable state. Great exertions however were made to prepare for the change
which might reasonably be expected.

The last twenty days of December were entirely fa\'orable to our views, and were so
well employed by Colonel Morrison as to afford the most flattering prospect of being
able to take on to the Rapids early in this month [January] a sufficiency of provisions
and stores to authorize an advance upon Maiden from the 2.5th instant to the 10th of
February. Our hopes were again a little checked by a general thaw, succeeded by a
very deep snow whilst the ground was in that soft state. It is however cold again, and
we calculate on being able to use with effect the sleds, a considerable number of which
I had caused to be prepared.

My plan of operation has been, and now is, to occupy the [foot of the] Miami
[Maumee] Rapids, and to deposit there as much provisions as possible, to move from
thence with choice detachment of the army, and with as much provision, artillery and
ammunition as the means of transportation will allow, make a demonstration towards
Detroit and, by a sudden passage of the strait upon the ice, an actual investiture of
Maiden ... It was my intention to have assembled at [the foot of] the Rapids from
4500 to .5000 men, and to be governed by circumstances in forming the detachment with
which I should advance. This is still my plan, and it was always my intention to dis-
miss at that period all that I deemed superfluous. The nominal amount of the army
was ten thousand, but the effective force was much less . . You will read with as
much pain as I write it, that a fine body of regular troops belonging to the 17th and l!Hh
Regiments under Colonel Wells, has been nearly destroyed by the want of clothing.
The whole of the effective men upon this frontier does not exceed six thousand three
hundred infantry.

Upon the whole sir, my reaching Maiden this winter depends upon circumstances
which I cannot control — the freezing of the strait in such a manner as to enable me to
pass over the troops and artillery. General Winchester is I hope now, or will be in a
day or two, at the Rapids. Provisions in large quantities are progressing thither. I
calculate onbeing there myself by the 20th [January 1 SI 3] instant with the troops which are
intended for the march upon Maiden. . Should our offensive operations be sus-

pended until spring, it is my decided opinion that the most effectual and cheapest plan
will be to obtain the command of the Lake. This being once effected, every difficulty
will be removed.

You do me justice in believing that my exertions have been unremitted, and I am
sensible of the commission of one error only that has injuriously affected our interests ;
and that is in retaining too large force at Defiance. The disadvantages attending it
were, however, seen at the period of my committing the management of that wing to
General Winchester. Possessing a superior rank in the line of the army to that which
was tendered to me, I considered him rather in the light of an associate in command
than an inferior. I therefore recommended to him, instead of ordering it, to send back
two regiments within the bounds of White's contract. Had this measure been pursued,
there would have been at Fort Winchester 100,000 rations more than there is at present.

508 THE MAUMEE RIVER BASIN.

The General, who possesses the most estimable qualities of the head and heart, was
deceived as I was with regard to the period when the army could advance, and he did
not think that the reduction of issues would be so important as it is now ascertained it
would have been.

General Winchester's army of about thirteen hundred men, arrived
at Presqu'ile on the south-west side of General Wayne's Battle Field
of Fallen Timber January 10th. Here an encampment was fortified to
some extent and a larg^e storehouse for provisions and heavy baggage
was built within the enclosure. This has been termed by the writer
Fort Deposit — see accompanying map. It was situated' about three
miles down the Maumee from Roche de Bout the site of General
Wayne's Fort Deposit. Corn (maize) was gathered from a near-by
field, hastily boiled whole and greatlv relished bv the soldiers whose
supplies had continued limited in quantify and variety. Devices were
soon made for pounding the corn, and from thi' meal thus obtained
bread was made. Additional supplies were here received, including
some clothing from their homes and the soldierlyspirit was soon revived.

General Payne with six hundred and seventy soldiers had early been
sent forward by General Winchester to rout a gathering of Aborigines
which had been reported to General Harrison as gathered 'in an old
fortification at Swan Creek.' Possibly the old fortification here men-
tioned was the remains of Fort Industry of 1^05. No Aborigines could
be found by General Payne's scouts. Captain Williams with twenty-
five men discovered another deserted camp and, following the fresh
trail, overtook the Aborigines and hastened their retreat by an exchange
of shots from which a few persons were wounded on both sides. The
11th |anuar\- General Winchester sent notification of his arrival at the
Rapids to General Harrison by the persons who were taking in the
starved and worn out packhorses to General Tapper's camp at Fort
M'Arthur, a place as distant from the Rapids as the headquarters of
Harrison, and from which the messenger must then pass through a
swampy and pathless wilderness of forty miles to Upper Sanduskv,
where he did not arrive until General Harrison had left that place; and
the notification was ultimately received by him at the Rapids, where it
started — M'Afee page 202.

The advance and occupation of the lower Maumee Rajiids by Gen-
eral Winchester without opposition by the enemy was reassuring to
the officers and to the ranks, and this had much influence in inducing
the unwise advance to the River Raisin. In compliance with several
requests for protection received from Frenchtown (now Monroe, Mich-
igan, then a settlement of thirty-three families) Colonel William Lewis
was dispatched liy General Winchester with five hundred and fifty
soldiers January 17th for that jmrpose. A few hours later Colonel

WINCHESTER'S FATAL MOVE TO THE RIVER RAISIN. 509

John Allen followed with a force of
one hundred and ten, which over-
took the former opposite Presqu'-
e of Maumee Bay, where they
were informed that there were four
hundred Aborigines then at
Frenchtown, and that Colonel
P211iott was detaching a force at
Maiden to proceed against the
Americans on the Maumee. These
rumors were dispatched to General
Winchester', and he sent them to
General Harrison with a statement
of the movement of his main force
against the enemy. The sending
of this small force with only small
arms near Maiden the headquart-
ers of the British and their Abori-
gine allies, without the order of
General Harrison and a near re-
serve force, was the third in the
series of grave errors on the part
of General Winchester which was
soon to cause the complete de-
struction of his army and to ob-
scure, at least, what little honor
was attached to him. Colonels
Lewis and Allen rapidly advanced
over the ice along the shore of the
Lake, engaged the enemy, about
one hundred British troops and
four hundred Aborigines, near
Frenchtown and drove them
across the River Raisin notwith-
standing their opposing howitzer.
They then dispatched for re-
enforcements and began prejsara-
tions for defense against oncoming
superior numbers.

General Winchester, on learning
of the success of his Colonels, left
a guard at Fort Deposit, and start-
ed January 19th with all the force

310 THE MAUMEE RIVER BASIN.

that could be spared from this Fort, two hundred and fifty in number,
for Frenchtown where he arrived in the night of the 20th. There his
former thoughttulness and care for the safety of his command were
relaxed. He established headquarters in the comfortable residence of
Colonel Francis Navarre on the south side of the river about nine hun-
dred feet from the camp of his soldiers. The next day he was informed
bv Peter Navarre and his four brothers whom he sent out to recon-
noiter, that a large force of British and Aborigines would attack him
that night. A Frenchman, Jacques La Salle commonly termed locko,
who was in SA-mpathy with the British, persuaded the General into a
disbelief of the report. His vigilant and successful Colonels also
received and communicated to him evidences of the oncoming of large
forces of savages and British with artillery. But the General was
under an evil spell. The reports were discredited; no other scouts
were sent out by him: no definite precautions against a night attack
were ordered : nor special preparations for the comfort and safety of
his small armv. To what subtle and soothingly disastrous influences
had the General been subjected by association with his liberal host, and
the voluble and genial Jocko! Habituated to an easy, luxurious life,
the General had been for many weeks in the midst of forest wilds, pri-
vations and sufferings, and now had headquarters in a comfortable
house as the guest of a man with similar tastes in a social way, and
with well stocked cellar. The successes of his Colonels and his re-
liance on their vigilance brought relaxation on the part of the General,
on whom they relied, and he settled down to some enjoyment, soothed
by the kind and ample hospitality of his host and the false assurances
of the enemy's friend ! He was under the magic spell of security and
peace which, like the brief calm preceding a disastrous burst of the
tempest, lulled to inactivity ! Very early in the morning of January
2"2nd the brave American troops, yet weak from their former sufferings,
were surprised by the stealthy foe and quite overwhelmed by superior
numbers with six cannon. About three hundred were killed in the
fierce onslaught and later messacred direct and by the burning of build-
ings in which the wounded were placed ; five hundred and forty-seven
were taken prisoners by the British and forty-five by the Aborigines;
only thirty-three escaped ! General Winchester, aroused by the guns,
strove in the biting cold to join his army. Mounting his host's horse
he rode in what he supposed to be the proper part of the camp of his
soldiers — Hosmer. He was soon captured by Jack Brandy, an Abo-
rigine of Round Head's band, who divested him of his outer clothing
and led him half frozen to Colonel Proctor the British comriiander who
persuaded him to order his troops to surrender. The white flag was
started with this order towards the garden pickets behind which the

WINCHESTER'S SURRENDER. MASSACRE. 511

Americans were well holding their position. They refused to surrender.
Thrice did the flag pass from the British headquarters to the American
line' once accompanied by Major Walter H. Overton of General Win-
chester's staff and by Colonel Proctor, before the courageous Major
George Madison would surrender, and he then consented onlv after
promises by Proctor of protection from the Aborigines. How these
promises were ignored by the British regarding the wounded and manv
of those captured by the savages, and how fully the intoxicated savages
reveled in the butchery of their helpless victims and left the remains to
be eaten by dogs and hogs, has been described bv manv persons whose
writings are readily accessible.

Most of the American prisoners who could march with the British
were led to Amherstburg (formerly Maiden ) the morning of januar\'
23rd. The 26th they were marched toSandwich, whence some were
sent across the river to the I:5ritish garrison at Detroit, and the others
to Fort George at Niagara where nearly all of them were released
on parole not to bear arms against his Majesty or his allies [the
savages] during the war or until exchanged.' General Winchester,
Colonel Lewis and Major Madison, were sent to Quebec and, some
time later, to Beauport near (Juebec, where they were confined
until the spring of 1814 when they were exchanged with manv
others. t Colonel Proctor reported the British loss in this battle at
twenty-four killed and one hundred and fiftv-eight wounded. No
accurate estimate of the loss of their savage allies could be made.
The enemy numbered about two thousand, one half being British
regulars and Canada milita. Round Head and Walk-in-the-Water
were the principal chiefs of the savages. Tecumsch was then in
Indiana. Proctor's report, and commendation of his savage 'allies'
led the Assembly of Lower Canada to extend to him 'and his men'
a vote of thanks: and the part he acted also led to his promotion to
the rank of brigadier general.

This great disaster at the River Raisin, though most deeplv la-
mented, was not without good results in its lessons. 'Remember the
Raisin' became the slogan that spurred many other Kentuckians to
enlist in the army and to do valiant service for their country, and it al-

••■ American State Papers, Military Aifairs, volume i pa^te 367. See, also. General Winchester's
report to the Secretary of War written at Maiden January 33. 1^13, while a prisoner — Brannan's Official
Letters pajje 132.

tGeneral Winchester was transferred toconttnand at Mobile ; and the last report from him seen by the
writer was to the Secretary of War announcing, under date of February 17, 1815, ' his duty to communi-
cate the very unpleasant news of the loss of Fort Bowyer 'situated by Mobile Bay, which was captured
by the British the 13th February with its garrison of three hundred and sixty men — Brannan's Official
Letters. He resigned his commission in March, 1H1.5, and returned to his home in Tennessee, where he
died 27th July 1836. He is described as a ' fussy man. guite heavy in person, and illy fitted for the
peculiar service in which he was eneayed.' — Lossiny's Pictorial Field-Booli of the War of 1812 page 361 ,

572 THE MAUMEE RIVER BASIN.

so incited the officers to greater thout;"htfulnfss, and to a greater sense of
responsibility.*

General Harrison, upon receipt at ITpper Sandusky of General
Winchester's express that he was advancing to the Raisin, urged for-
ward troops and artillery from his headquarters, and from Lower San-
dusky. He preceded the troops and, upon his arrival at Fort Deposit,
ordered General Payne with the garrison there, forward to the support
of his General. The cold was severe, the snow-covered road was
rough, and mirey in places, and the troops were slow in arriving at the
lower rapids. As they arrived in small bodies they were hastened
onward toward the Raisin, led b}- General Harrison. They had not
proceeded far, however, before some fugitives were met and, as they
advanced, others confirmed the total defeat of General Winchester's
command. A council of officers in the saddle decided to return the
main body to Fort Deposit, while scouts were sent forward to aid those
escaping. t Upon arrival at Fort Deposit a council of the general and
field officers was called. This council decided that

The position of General Winchester's Camp [Deposit] was injudicious and un-
tenable against any formidable force. The position was on the wrong side of the river ;
for it frequently happens in the winter that heavy rains suddenly swell the current and
break the ice so as to render the stream wholly impassable for many days together.
This would prevent the convoys from reaching the camp, whilst the enemy might cross
on the ice at the mouth of the Bay and destroy them without opposition. The attempt
to fortify the position had also destroyed all its natural advantages. The camp was a
parallelogram with its longest side on the river, corresponding to the form of the rise
of the ground [Presqu'ile] on which it was placed, the abrupt declivity of which afforded
the enemy a better fortification, at point blank shot in the rear, than the breastwork of
logs by which the lines were protected. The flanks were also at a convenient distance
from the ends of the rise of ground to be annoyed from them by the enemj'. By revers-
ing the order and making the flank lines the longest so as to extend quite across the
prominence the rear would have been rendered secure, and the flanks would have
been at too great a distance to be annoyed from the extremes of the eminence. On the
next morning therefore the army abandoned the Rapids, having first set fire to the
blockhouse in which there was a quantity of provisions that would be useful to the
enemy if they advanced to that place.

The few troops there assembled retired to the Portage River, about
eighteen miles on the road to Lower Sandusky, where they strongly
fortified a camp to there await the oncoming regiments, including the
artillery, when they would return to the Maumee with all the supplies.
Copious rains, however, delayed all the forward movements. Fort

*The Legislature of Michigan, session of 1903-04, appropriated five tliousand dollars for the erection
of a monument at Monroe commemorative of the .Americans who were there killed in this battle. The
commission awarded tlie contract to a Toledo firm in February, 1904. and the monument was unveiled
the 1st September, 1904, in presence of several thousand people, including prominent Kentuckians.

t See General Harrison's report to the Secretary of War, Brannan's Official Letters paye 135.

ACTIVITY OF AMERICAN TROOPS.

313

Winchester again became the frontier position of defense in the Maumee
Valley, and a shield to the forts and settlers to the south and southwest
who were again experiencing great alarm.

Poniard, found without scabbard many \ears ayo soutlieast of Defiance. Tlie reverse side of
blade is hollowed. Lentjth over all eleven inches. In the Autlior's Collection.

CHAPTER XI.

The Second .\nd Third (Final) Years of the War of 1812.

The scouts of the army by the Portage River kept the movements
of the savages under observation. The 9th of February they reported
about six hundred gathered on the north shore of Maumee Bay. Gen-
eral Harrison detached six hundred soldiers with one cannon, and led
them in person to the savage encampment which was abandoned on
his approach. The troops were ordered to march in pursuit on the ice
near the shore. Near the lowest part of the Bay the horses with the
cannon liroke through the ice. The cannon was not recovered until
the next day and after great exertion and much suffering from the
severe cold. Meantime the main body, which had again pressed for-
ward, was met by the scouts with the information that the savages had
escaped to Maiden, and the detachment returned to camp. General
Harrison wrote to the Secretary of War from 'Headquarters, Foot of
the Miami [Maumee] Rapids, February 11, 1S13,' that

Having been joined by General Leftwich with his brigade, and a regiment of the
Pennsylvania quota at the Portage River on the i'Oth ultimo, I marched thence on
the 1st instant and reached this place on the morning of the 2d with an effective force of
sixteen hundred men. I have since been joined by a Kentucky regiment and part of
General Tapper's Ohio brigade, which has increased our numbers to two thousand non-
commissioned officers and privates. . . I have ordered the whole of the troops of
the Left Wing (excepting one company for each of the six forts in that quarter) the
balance of the Pennsylvania brigade, and the Ohio brigade under General Tupper,
and a detachment of regular troops of twelve-months volunteers under command of
Colonel Campbell, to march to this place as soon as possible. . . The disposition
of the troops for the remainder of the winter will be as follows ; A battalion of
militia lately called out from this State, with a company of regular troops now at Fort

314

THE MAUMEE RIVER BASIN.

Winchester [Defiance] will garrison the posts upon the waters of the Auglaise and
St. Marv. The small block-houses upon Hull's trace [M'Arthur, Necessity, and
Findlav] will have a subaltern's command in each. A company will be placed at Upper
Sandusky, and another at Lower Sandusky. All the rest of the troops will be brought
to this place, amounting to from fifteen to eighteen hundred men.

I am erecting here a pretty
strong fort [Meigs] capable
of resisting field artillery at
least. The troops will be
placed in a fortified camp,
covered on one flank by the
fort. This is the best position
that can be taken to cover the
frontier, and the small posts in
the rear of it, and those above
it on the Miami [Maumee]
and its tributaries. The force
placed here ought, however,
to be strong enough to en-
counter any that the enemy
may detach against the forts
above. Twenty-five hundred
would not be too many. But,
anxious to reduce the expenses
during the winter within as
narrow bounds as possible,
I have desired the Governor
of Kentucky not to call out
(but to hold in readiness to
march) the fifteen hundred
men lately required of him.
All the teams which have been
hired for the public service
will be discharged, and those
belonging to the public, which
are principally oxen, disposed of in the settlements where forage is cheaper, and every
other arrangement made which will lessen the expenses during the winter. Attention
will still, however, be paid to the deposit of supplies for the ensuing campaign. Im-
mense supplies of provisions have been accumulating along the Auglaise River, and
boats and pirogues prepared to bring them down as soon as the river opens.

The building- of the strong- fort (Meigs) mentioned in the preced-
ing letter was under the immediate supervision of Captain, afterward
Colonel, Eleazer D. Wood chief engineer of the army. General Har-
rison's experience with General Wayne along the lower Maumee, and
his later observations, led him to choose as the site of this fort the
high right bank of the river, a short distance below the lowest fording
place and near the foot of the lowest rapids. The first plan of this fort
and encampment embraced soi-nething over eight acres of ground. In
the words of Captain Wood

WILLI.4M HENRY H.\RRISON
Major General, and Fourteenth President of the United
States. Born at Berkeley, Virginia, 9th February, 1773. Died
4th April, 1841, at Washington, D. C, when one month President.

FORT AND CAMP MEIGS. UNSUCCESSFUL VENTURE. 315

The camp was twenty-five hundred yards [over one mile and one-third] in irregular
circumference. With the exception of short intervals for blockhouses and batteries,
this extent was picketed with timber fifteen feet long, from ten to twelve inches in diam-
eter, set three feet into the ground. The army at this camp then numbered about
eighteen hundred, and as soon as the lines of the fort were designated, large portions of
the labor were assigned to each corps in the army, by which means^a very laudable
emulation was easily excited. To complete the picketing, to put up eight blockhouses
of double timbers, to elevate four large batteries, to build all the storehouses and maga-
zines required to contain the supplies of the army, together with the ordinary fatigues
of the camp, was an undertaking of no small magnitude. Besides, an immense deal of
labor was likewise required in excavating ditches, making abatis and clearing away the
wood about the camp ; and all this was done, too, at a time when the weather was
inclement, and the ground so hard that it could scarcely be opened with the mattock and
pickaxe. But in the use of the axe, mattock, and spade consisted the chief military
knowledge of our army ; and even that knowledge, however trifling it may be supposed
by some, is of the utmost importance in many situations, and in ours was the salvation
of the army. So we fell to work, heard nothing of the enemy, and endeavored to busy
ourselves as soon as possible.

The scouts kept the General informed resjarding the enem\' ; and
when they reported the armed vessels of the British frozen in the ice
near iVIalden he conceived a plan for their destruction. A detachment
for this purpose was made the 26th Februar\' of sixty-eight regulars,
one hundred and twenty Pennsylvania and Virginia militiamen, a
special company of thirty-two soldiers, twenty-four sled drivers, with
guides and twenty-two friendlv Aborigines. All were placed under
command of Captain Augustus L. Langham of Ohio and M. Madis
from France then serving as conductor of artillery. They started
March "2nd with sleighs containing provisions for six days and combust-
ibles with which to set fire to the vessels and whatever storehouses
they could approach. Their route was eastward and, at the Portage
River, the destination and object of the expedition was more fully ex-
plained to the soldiers, and permission to return was given to all who
desired so to do. Aborigine and French spies abounded, and the ]iro-
ject appeared so hazardous that twenty of the militia and six Aborigi-
nes returned to the Maumee. The others continued through Lower
Sandusky and out on the ice covering Lake Erie. They were to leave
the sleighs at Middle Bass Island and proceed noiselessly with moc-
casins. The next day General Harrison started with a protecting
detachment, and at Maumee Bav met Captain Langham's command
returning, they being turned back without fulfilling their mission,
partly on account of desertions, forerunning spies from the enemy and,
principally, by the weakness of the ice from the moderated weather.

Soon after the favorable beginning of the important fortification
by the lower Maumee General Harrison started southward to urge for-
ward additional troops in person, and to visit his sick family at Cincin-
nati. Cajitain Wood had been sent by him to Sandusky to plan a

316

THE MAUMEE RIVER BASIN.

fortification for that place. General Leftwich of the Virginia militia,
whom Captain Wood afterwards called 'an old phlegmatic Dutchman
who was not even fit for a packhorse master much less to be entrusted
with such an important command' as this, was left in charge of the

W^ - - - * -iCs ' \9°^ '-■ \ / Ix- — ■ t >(P«'Pw**"i

B.MoBTAXBArrroi -^^^/'-'~-*-=~-~-^ M owvis wornctm ' iijig

C. BLocKHouicS N/ .__._*_____ N OrfCEBSOUAHTERS '' '^'^1

D.LooKtiuTi /•D/ii/«in Pi;/i/i; nc "--:--S> P stokhousu sf

COL„MA»«« GROUm PLm OF ^ R™g«*R.,A.„5H0M '^l

r. f^fWMAGAKME Cy^DT "^ JlAj^iCQ S. BUH(AcGflOUNO.-ATT«vKcBlUO

H.CATEWAYSwTMGMNBTWrtWE g \J I\ I f /tLfvX^ T CflWlSON BuRlAL 6RoUNO

The siipyestion of the United States Kiiyineers wlio made survey of this place in 1888, was
tlie purchase of fifty-five acres of land, the erection of a principal nionuinent \vithin the site of
the Fort to cost $10,000 and three minor monuments in the burial places to cost with fences
$1.5, (XX); but Congress has not made any appropriation for this purpose. The Maumee Valley
Pioneer and Historical Association, however, has undertaken to commemorate the history here
enacted. In October, 1903, eight and a half acres of the eastern part of Camp Meigs including
the burial ground of Kentuckians was purchased, and a United States flag has been raised over
it. An Act of the Ohio Legislature of March, 1904, gives historical and like organizations the
right of eminent domain: also mention was made of a monutnent. but without appropriation of
money.

camp and the building of the fort. He permitted the work to cease
and, further, permitted the soldiers to use the gathered timber for fuel
while there was much material better adapted to their use, and neces-
sary to be cleared away, within easy distance. Captain Wood re-
turned the 20th February to find, also, that there had been considerable
destruction of the work that was done before his departure.

The time of enlistment of the Virginians, and some Pennsyl-
vanians, soon expired and they started for home, leaving only about
five hundred soldiers at this important camp. Cajitain Wood, how-
ever, recommenced work on the fortifications and pressed it forward
as fast as possible. In honor of the Governor of Ohio at this time
this, the largest and most important defensive work of the Army of the
Northwest, was named Fort Meigs. It was both a fort and a fortified

BRITISH DESIGNS. PREPARATIONS FOR DEFENSE. 317

camp. Its limits were extended to embrace fourteen acres or more of
land for the purpose of encompassing and protecting the entire army,
with the horses, cattle, and all trains and supplies, in case it be
besieged. The batteries of cannon and howitzers were distributed
around its entire oblong and irregular limits, the largest and strongest
being toward the river. The palisades on the north or river side and
those on the east end were set in ground declining from the enclosure
and nearly perpendicular to the slopes thus being more of a i:>rotection
against an assailing force than against shot and shell from the oppo-
site bank.

About the first of March a small party of citizens of Detroit
arrived at Fort Meigs and reported that General Proctor had ordered
the assembling of Canada militia on the 7th April at Sandwich pre-
paratory to an attack on Fort Meigs : and the mode of attack, as dis-
cussed b^- the British officers, would be by constructing strong bat-
teries of cannon on the opposite side of the river to be manned l)y
British artillerists while the savages would invest the fort on the
other sides. In the opinion of Major Muir 'a few hours action of the
cannon would smoke the Americans out of the fort into the hands of
the savages.' Many other boastings of the British were reported.

British scouts, both Canadian and Aborigine, continued active.
The yth of March a small conijiany of soldiers were permitted to shoot
some game while reconnoitering. When near the ruins of Fort Miami
they were shot at by savages and Lieutenant Walker was killed.
Another bulb-t lodged in a bible or h\-mn-book carried by a soldier in
his breast pocket and he was thus saved from being wounded if not
killed. The body of Lieutenant Walker was recovered the next day
and buried at Fort Meigs.

Under date of 'Headquarters, Chillicothe March 17th' General
Harrison wrote to the Secretary of War opposing Cleveland as a point
of embarkation of troops, or dejiository for provisions, as . . .
'There are already accumulated at the Rapids of the Miami [Maumee]
or in situation to be easily sent thither, to an amount equal to the con-
sumption of a protracted campaign. . . I am well aware of the
intolerable expense . . . Upon the whole it is m_v decided opinion
that the [foot of the] Rapids of the Miami [Maumee] should be the
point of rendezvous for the troops, as well as the principal depot.
The artillery and a considerable supply of ammunition are already
there. Boats and pirogues have been built in considerable numbers
on the Auglaise and St. Mar>- Rivers and every exertion is now making
for the double purpose of taking down the provisions to the Rapids,
and for coasting the Lake with the baggage of the army in its advance.
I had calculated on being able partially to use this mode of transport-

318 THE MAUMEE RIVER BASIN.

ation, even if the enemy should continue his naval superioritv on the
lake . . . Amongst the reasons which make it necessary to employ
a large force, I am sorry to mention the dismay and disinclination to
the service, which appears to prevail in the western country.'

Chief among the continued difficulties attending' General Harrison's
work was the keeping of enough soldiers, and supplies, for an advance
movement. The terms of enlistment were short, and often more were
departing than arriving. He had early in the winter called on Gover-
nor Shelby of Kentucky for fifteen hundred men to report at head-
ipiarters immediately. Governor Shelby's special message to the
Legislature then in session was well received and promptly favored by
an offer of seven dollars a month additional pay to any fifteen hundred
Kentuckians alreadv in the service, who would remain until others were
sent to relieve them. This information was brought to the troops
February Sth by Colonel Anthony Crockett. The Ohio and Pennsyl-
vania troo]:)s were similarly ajipealed to, and fair success resulted.
Governor Meigs ordered the organization of two additional regiments,
and Kentucky ordered by draft an additional fifteen hundred militia
forward to reinforce General Harrison's army.

At this time, when an army of four thousand men was almost
assured for an early advance on Maiden, a letter was received by
General Harrison from General John Armstrong then Secretary of
War, requesting him to dispense with militia as much as possible, to
fill up the 17th, 19th and 24th Regiments of United States troops, to
garrison the forts built, and to make feints toward the enemy, but no
actual attack, until the contemplated vessels were ready to advance by
the lake. General Harrison replied to this letter with sufficient argu-
ments to iirove to the Secretary that he should not urge his plans
regarding militia as these plans were inadequate — and the Secretary
wiselv refrained from further meddling with the conduct of the Army
of the Northwest. With date of 21st March, 1813, General Harrison
wrote to Governor Shelby that

Last night's mail brought me a letter from the Secretary of War in which I am
restricted to the employment of the regular troops raised in this State to re-inforce the
post at the Rapids. There are scattered through this State about one hundred and forty
recruits of the l'.)th Regiment, and with these I am to supply the place of the brigades
from Pennsylvania and Virginia whose time of service will now be daily expiring. By a
letter from Governor Meigs I am informed that the Secretary of War disapproved the
call for militia which I had made on this State and Kentucky, and was on the point of
countermanding the orders. I will just mention one fact which will show the conse-
quences of such a countermand. There are upon the [banks of the] AuGlaise and St.
Mary Rivers eight forts [Forts Winchester, Brown, Jennings, .\manda, Barbee, Adams,
Decatur near the present Decatur, Indiana, and Wayne] which contain within their
walls property to the amount of half a million of dollars from actual cost, and worth now
to the United States four times that sum. The whole force which would have had

SAVAGE ENCOUNTER. SUPPLIES AND TROOPS ARRIVE. 519

charge of all these forts and property would have amounted to less than twenty invalid
soldiers.

The garrison of Fort Meigs had enjoyed comparative quiet for two
or three weeks when, about tht_' first of April, the soldiers liecame
excited over a desperate encounter of aliout a dozen French volunteer
comrades who, while reconnoitering by boat the channels around the
large Ewing Island below the Fort, were surprised and violently
assailed at close quarters by two boat loads of savages who were
watching for them. In the encounter that ensued but one savage
escaped death ; several of the Frenchmen were killed and of the others
but three escaped wounds.'^'

Following the moving of the ice from the rivers, advantage was
taken of the high stage of water to boat supplies to Fort Winchester
and to Fort Meigs from the u])-river forts named above. The Ken-
tuckv troops were sent northward as fast as possible by way of Hull's
road, passing Forts Necessity and Findlay. General Harrison also
took up his return march as soon as possible by way of Forts Barbee,
Amanda, Jennings, and Winchester and, learning on the way that the
enemy was becoming active about Fort Meigs, he dispatched a mes-
senger to Governor Shelby to send him the entire force of three thous-
and men drafted by Kentucky. lie also gathered from the forts last
named all the troops that could be spared, about three hundred in
number, to accompany him down the Maumee against any of the
enemv gathered at Fort Meigs. I'pon their arrival April Il'th they
were pleased to find peace prevailing, and that upwards of two hun-
dred Pennsylvania militia had been infiuenced to remain past their
enlistment time by Doctor Hersey their chayilain. Upon the arrival of
three of the advance Kentucky companies, these Pennsylvanians were
permitted to return home.

General Proctor had been informed at Maiden of the building of
Fort Meigs, of the great amount of supplies being there collected, and
of the departure of troops. He had been gathering a force sufficient
in his opinion for the capture of all; and he boasted to the savages of
their easv work to secure the prize. Had the orders of the Secretary
of War prevailed, his desire would have been accomplished, not only
regarding Fort Meigs but with Fort Winchester and all the other forts
throughout this western country.

It was gathered from Maiden by scouts that about the first of
April Tecumseh was there with about fifteen hundred savages, fully
six hundred of whom were from the region between Lake Michigan and
the Wabash River, and with many others who formerly ranged along

' Journal of Lieutenant Larwill copied into Howes Historical Collections of Ohio.

520

THE MAUMEE RIVER BASIN.

tht' Maumef and its tributaries. The fact of their lieing collected at
Maiden, so as not to molest the lijfhtly garrisoned forts and his rear,
pleased the General and he notified Governor Shelby that he would not
need all the drafted Kentuckians, some of whom hv had designed to
place at Fort Wayne to keep in check these savages.

The Canada militia assembled at Sandwich the 7th April and on
the 23rd General Proctor's army, consisting of five hundred and
twenty-two regulars and four hundred and sixty-one militia, embarked
at Maiden on a brig and several smaller vessels for Fort Meigs, con-
voyed by two gunboats with artillery. Nearly all their savage allies,
or about fifteen hundred of them"^ crossed the Detroit River and made
their way on foot: others accompanied the British in small boats. The
vessels arrived at the mouth of the Maumee River on the 26th, and
the army landed the 28th April near the ruins of Fort Miami about two
miles below and on the opposite ( left ) bank of the Maumee from Fort
Meigs, where they made and continued their principal encampment on
the high ground. General Harrison was kept informed of their ap-
proach by Cai-itain Hamilton's small detachment of troops who were
reconnoitering along Maumee Bay, accompanied by the serviceable

Peter Navarre as runner. The
General dispatched Navarre with
letters to inform the garrisons at
Lower and Upper Sandusky, and
Governor Meigs at Urbana, of the
formidable force api^roaching him.
The effective force at Fort
Meigs numbered about eleven
hundred soldiers which was inade-
quate to cope with the well-trained
and far better equipped enemy,
about twenty-five hundred in
number. Most of the savages
were taken across to the right
(Fort Meigs) bank of the Mau-
mee to invest and harass the Fort
at every possible point and noth-
ing but tlieir hideous yells and
firing of musketry were now to be
heard - Lorraine. The ground had been cleared for a distance of six
to nine hundred feet of the heavy oak and beech trees excepting stumps

- ---^

• vW^

W-i^'^Wi

■ ''"jSk

^^M

iSS^^^^^^^'i^^^^M

^^^^^^^^Hi

-^^^^^

PETER NAVARRE

urn at Detroit about 1785; Died at East Toledo
20th March. 1874.

* In this, as in most other events, there are various statements. M'Afee records the British army
as composed of six hundred reeulars, eight hundred militia of Canada, and eighteen hundred savapes;
and the Amerinan force at about one thousand eftectives.

KENTUCKY TROOPS APPROACH. BRITISH BATTERIES. 521

and an occasional log. Behind these the savages would advance in
the night and occasionally wound a picket-guard ; but generally the
savages suffered most during the day. They also climbed the trees
back of the Fort, and an occasional one on the other side of the river*
from which vantage points they were finally routed.

Knowing that General Green Clay's Kentucky troops were well on
their way to Fort Meigs, General Harrison dispatched Captain William
Oliver Commissary of the Fort with an oral message to hasten their
coming. Oliver and his one soldier and one Aborigine attendants
were escorted some distance on their way by a company of Captain
Garrard's dragoons, and they hastened without opposition to Fort
Winchester where General Clay's command of twelve hundred men
had just arrived — a part under Colonel William Dudley by way of the
Auglaise and the others under General Clay by way of the River St.
Mary, Fort Wayne and the Maumee. They had already heard of Gen-
eral Harrison's danger and, two days before, had sent Leslie Combs
then a Captain of riflemen scouts, with soldiers Johnson, Paxton, and
two brothers Walker and Black Fish Junior a Shawnee warrior guide,
to inform General Harrison of their approach. These messengers
were attacked by a superior number of Pottawotamis just as they had
sighted the flag of Fort Meigs. Johnson and Paxton , were wounded
and taken prisoners. The former soon died from his wounds, and the
latter was finally restored to his friends. Combs and Black Fish
escaped and returned to Fort Winchester about the time of the
arrivals there of General Clay and Captain Oliver.

There had been continuous rain, and the efforts of the British to
move their heavy cannon (with two hundred men and several oxen to
each twenty-four-pounder ) and construct batteries, were very laborious
and attended with delays. The work was carried forward first only at
night and later uninterruptedly* day and night with strong relays, not-
withstanding the rain and shots from Fort Meigs which killed some of
their men and wounded others.

By the early morning of the 30th April they had completed two
batteries nearly opposite Fort Meigs, on the sites of the present Meth-
odist and Presbyterian Churches in Maumee Village, the first mounting
two twenty-four-pounder cannon ( the heaviest at Fort Meigs being
two eighteen-pounders ) and the other mounting three howitzers, one
eight inches and the other two five and a half inches caliber. During
the mounting of these cannon several more were killed by the good

* Residents of the ViUai^e of Maumee yet point to ' the old elm' tree on the hik;h bank opposite
the site of Fort Meius, and task the credulity of visitors re^iardiny the shooting qualities of the muskets
and rifles of 1K13, by repeating to them the tradition of the soldiers at Fort Mei^'S killinc savages who
were perched in this tree, and who had from it wounded and killed some of the garrison. It is an aged,
larce. tall, and fair tree to look at, nevertheless.

322 THE MAUMEE RIVER BASIN.

aim of the American artillerymen at the Fort. At the coming of the
British, General Harrison issued an address to his soldiers appealing
to their patriotism as follows:

Can you. the citizens of a free country who have taken arms to defend its rights,
think of submitting to an army composed of mercenary soldiers, reluctant Canadians
goaded to the field by the bayonet, and of wretched naked savages ? Can the breast of
an American soldier, when he casts his eyes to the opposite shore the scene of his coun-
try's triumphs over the same foe [the site of the flight of the enemy from the Battle
Field of Fallen Timber] be influenced by any other feelings than the hope of glory? Is
not this army composed of the same materials as that which fought and conquered
under the immortal Wayne ^ Yes, fellow soldiers, your General sees your countenances
beam with the same fire that he witnessed on that glorious occasion ; and, although it
would be the height of presumption to compare himself with that hero, he boasts of
being that hero's pupil. To your posts, then, fellow citizens, and remember that the
eyes of your country are upon you !

Stakes had been placed behind the tents to outline the traverses
shown on the accompanying ground plan of Fort Meigs, and the throw-
ing uyj of earth had progressed rapidly, so that when the first British
battery was complete many of its shot were opposed by solid walls of
earth twelve feet high and twenty feet thick at the base, behind which
the soldiers and the tents were hastil\' removed, and the main body of
the army was thus protected from the heavy guns across the river.
Another well for water was also dug behind the Grand Traverse. The
British observing these heretofore hidden means of protection sent a
detachment of soldiers under Major Muir and of Aborigines under
Tecumseh across the Maumee below Fort Meigs, under protection of
their gunboats (the shots from which did no damage to the Fort) to
build batteries there. General Harrison, understanding this movement,
directed the throwing up of other traverses, and the strengthening of
the encampment defenses as much as possible. William Christy of
Kentucky acting C|uartermaster was directed by the General to nail an
American flag on each of the batteries ; and there they remained during
the siege.

The rain continued, but it did not stop the cannonading. But little
damage was done to the Fort. Two Americans were killed the first of
May and Major Amos Stoddard was wounded by a fragment of shell so
that he died of tetanus ten days later. It was estimated that the large
guns of the British threw not less than five hundred balls and shells at
Fort Meigs during the most active day of the siege. The Americans
dug holes in the ground and covered them with timber and earth, and
some were floored with timber: but when not covered with tents these
bomb-proof cellars would leak from the drenching rains, and ditching
became necessary.

The American supply of balls and shells for their twelve-pounders
was limited to about three hundred and sixtv : with about the same

SIEGE OF FORT AND CAMP MEIGS.

323

number for their eighteen-pouiidurs. These Runs, therefore, answered
those of the i3ritish only occasional!}-, and then to the best advantage.
To increase the supply, a gill of whiskey was offered for every British
ball of these sizes delivered to Thomas L. Hawkins the keeper of the

THE VILLAGE OF MAUMEE, LL'CAS COUNTY. OHIO.

Lookinti north from the Grand Traverse of Fort Meiiis 1st December. 19t.)2. The Presbyterian
Church, beyond the end of the bridce on the ri^'ht, marks the site of the first British battery in the Siege
of Fort Meigs; the Methodist Churcll. the belfried bnildinij to the left of the middle distance, is on the
site of their second battery, of howitzers; the Roman Catholic Church, with spire, is about the site of
their third battery, of cannon; and on the lower land between the end of the bridce and the Public
School Building, was placed their fourth battery, of mortars. Something of the earthworks of the
batteries of Fort Meigs yet exist, as shown on the proximal river-bluff line.

magazine. It was estimated that over one thousand balls from the
British guns were thrown during the five days' siege. The balls ac-
cepted for the reward were from tlu' twelve-pounders and less — the
British having no eighteen-pounder cannon, and the Americans having
no use for their twenty-four-])ounder balls.

The British completed a third battery of three twelve-pounder
cannon the night of May 1st between the other two. A battery of
several mortars was also put in ojieration nearer the river the 3rd of
May: and that night smaller cannon and mortars were taken across
the river below the Fort and were mounted on mounds prepared by the
soldiers who had crossed earlier — some of which mounds were within two
hundred and fifty yards of the rear angles of Camp Meigs. Additional
traverses of earth were made so that the shots from these batteries had
little effect; and a few well-directed shots from the American guns

324 THE MAUMEE RIVER BASIN.

caused hasty removal of the nearer cannon to the ravine on the east at
greater distance.

Reverend A. M. Lorraine, who was at Fort Meigs at the time,
published in March, 1845, his recollections of the siege, viz:'^

One of our militia-men took bis station on the embankment, and gratuitously fore-
warned us of every shot. In this he became so skillful that he could in almost every
case predict the destination of -the ball. As soon as the smoke issued from the muzzle of
the gun he would cry out 'shot' or 'bomb' as the case might be. Sometimes he would
exclaim 'block-house No. 1' or 'look out. main battery'; 'now for the meat-house;'
'good-by, if you will pass.' In spite of all the expostulations of his friends, he main-
tained his post. One day there came a shot that seemed to defy all his calculations.
He stood silent, motionless, perplexed. In the same instant he was swept into
eternity. Poor man ! he should have considered that when there was no obliquity in the
issue of the smoke, either to the right or left, above or below, the fatal messenger
would travel in the direct line of his vision.

The Aborigines, climbing up into the trees, fired incessantly upon us. Such was
their distance that many of their balls barely reached us but fell harmless to the ground.
Occasionally they inflicted dangerous and even fatal wounds.

The number killed in the fort was small considering the profusion of powder and
ball expended on us. About eighty were slain, many wounded, and several had to suffer
amputation of limbs. The most dangerous duty which we performed within the pre-
cincts of the fort was in covering the magazine. Previous to this the powder had been
deposited in wagons and these stationed in the traverse. Here there was no security
against bombs ; it was therefore thought to be prudent to remove the powder into a
small block-house and cover it with earth. The enemy, judging our designs from our
movements, now directed all their shot to this point [particularly from their twenty-four-
pounder battery]. Many of their balls were red-hot. Wherever they struck they
raised a cloud of smoke and made a frightful hissing. .An officer passing our quarters
said, 'bovs, who will volunteer to cover the magazine ? ' Fool-like away several of us
went. .As soon as we reached the spot there came a ball and took off one man's head.
The spades and dirt flew faster than any of us had before witnessed. In the midst of
our job a bomb-shell fell on the roof and, lodging on one of the braces, it spun round for
a moment. Every soldier fell prostrate on his face and with breathless horror awaited
the vast explosion which we expected would crown all our earthly sufferings. Only one
of all the gang presumed to reason on the case. He silently argued that, as the shell
had not bursted as quick as usual, there might be something wrong in its arrangement.
If it bursted where it was, and the magazine exploded, there could be no escape ; it was
death anyway ; so he sprung to his feet, seized a boat-hook and, pulling the hissing
missile to the ground and jerking the smoking match from its socket, discovered that the
shell was filled with inflammable substance which, if once ignited, would have wrapped
the whole building in a sheet of flame. This circumstance added wings to our shovels;
and we were right glad when the officer said 'that will do; go to your lines.'

General Proctor sent his Major Chambers with a white flag' May
4th, to demand surrender of the Fort. General Harrison promptly re-
plied: 'Tell General Proctor that if he shall take the Fort it will be
under circumstances that will do him more honor than a thousand sur-
renders.' That night about eleven o'clock General Harrison's anxiety

^ Ladies Repository, 1^4,1. Copied into Howe's His. Collections of Ohio. vol. ii, paries H68-69,

DEFEAT AND MASSACRE OF DUDLEY'S MEN. 325

regarding reinforcements was largely relieved by the return of Captain
Oliver accompanied bv Major David Trimble and fifteen soldiers who
had evaded the savages, to report that General Green Clay's command,
eleven hundred in number in eighteen large flatboats with high sides to
protect the soldiers from the bullets of the savages they might meet,
were tied on the left bank of the Maumee at the head of the Grand
Rapids, the river being so high that the pilot declined to run the rapids
in such a dark night unless commanded so to do. Captain Hamilton
with a subaltern and canoe was dispatched to meet General Clay and
say to him as the command of General Harrison: 'You must detach
about eight hundred men from your brigade, who will land at a point I
[Hamilton] will show, about one or one and a half miles above Fort
Meigs and I will conduct them to the British batteries on the left bank
of the river. They must take possession of the enemy's cannon, spike
them, cut down the carriages, then return to their boats '' and cross over
to the Fort. The balance of your men must land on the Fort side of
the river, opposite the first landing, and fight their wav to the Fort
through the savages. The route they must take will be pointed out by
.a subaltern officer now with me, who will land the canoe on the right
bank of the river to point out the landing for the boats."

It was some time after daylight before the oncoming boats arrived
at Hamilton's station about five miles above the Fort. Colonel William
Dudley was in the first boat and General Clay in the thirteenth from the
front. When the orders were delivered to him General Clay ordered
Colonel Dudley as the senior Colonel to assail the batteries as directed
by General Harrison, with the men in the first twelve boats ; while he,
with the others, would go forward to the Fort.

Colonel Dudley executed his prescribed task most gallantly and
successfully' up to the capture of the batteries. His command arrived
near the batteries (which were in full action) unobserved, the right led
by Dudley the left by Major Shelby and the center as a reserve by Act-
ing Major Morrison. Captain Combs with thirty riflemen, including
seven friendly Aborigines, were in front and on the left flank a hundred
yards distant. The columns marched so as to present a semicircular
front to the enemy. Major Shelby's command passing around between
the batteries and the British camp. The orders were to move quietly,
but savages fired on Dudley's troops when near the batteries and, with
a shout, they charged. The gunners fled, the Americans rushed for-
ward to the guns, spiked eleven of the largest^ and hauled down the

* Writing of General Green Clay May 13, 1H13. Brannan's Official Letters, DSLge 158.

■^ Unfortunately, thespikeing of the cannon could then be done only with ramrods (instead of with the
usual files or other short, hard pieces of metal that could be broken at level with guns) which were readily
removed by the British after their recapture, and the Kuns were ayain used against the ,\mericans.

526 THE MAUMEE RIVER BASIN.

enemy's flag, which action caused loud applause at the Fort. Not one
American had been killed in this successful charge — but dire results
awaited the exulting soldiers from their non-compliance with the orders
of General Harrison to start for the Fort as soon as the batteries were
disabled. Some savages fired at Captain Combs' riflemen, the fire was
returned, and others on both sides rushed to the support of their friends.
The Americans were anxious for a combat and, notwithstanding their
short thirty days presence in the army and want of discipline, they im-
petuously drove their opposers back into the woods, pursuing them
promiscuouslj' until the pursuers were confused, and surrounded by
superior numbers of Aborigines and British who rallied, particular!}-
between them and the river, preventing their escape. Major Shelby
remained at the captured batteries until a rallying force of British drove
his soldiers toward their boats, regaining their batteries ; he rallied a
few of his men and endeavored to follow after Colonel Dudley, but
they, like the main force, were soon involved in disorder and captured.

Colonel Dudley landed with eight hundred and sixty-six men — his
regiment numbering seven hundred and sixty-one and, in addition there
were sixty of Colonel William E. Boswell's regiment and forty-five
United States troops. Only one hundred and seventy escaped to Fort
Meigs. Many were killed, including Colonel Dudley, in thefierce contest
that continued about three hours. Many others were wounded, scalped
and stripped of clothing by the savages. Those who could walk were
taken prisoners b}- the British and were started for the ruins of Fort
Miami near their encampment. Some were slain by the savages while
on this march; and the stripping of Americans dead and alive of their
clothing and possessions was freely indulged in. At Fort Miami the
prisoners were compelled to run the gauntlet where many more were
killed by the savages with war clubs, scalping knives, tomahawks and
pistols.

Descriptions of this great tragedy were afterward given by three
participants in the battle, and extracts will follow from the writings of
each one, to elucidate the foregoing outline, viz: From Joseph R.
Underwood First Lieutenant in Cajatain John C. Morrison's company;*
Captain Leslie Combs of the Riflemen Scouts;! and Major Richardson
of the British 41st Regiment J as follows:

In effectuating the plan of attack, Captain Morrison's Company was thrown by the
river above the battery. While passing through a thicket of hazel, toward the river in
forming the line of battle, I saw Colonel Dudley for the last time. He was greatly ex-

* Copied from an old public print into Howe's Historical Collections of Ohio volume ii, page 869.

t Official Report to General Oreen Clay 6th May. 1815, Print of Spiller and Gates, Cincinnati, 1869.

t Copied into Howe's Historical Collections of Ohio, volume ii, page 87:^, et seq., from the London New
Monthly Magaz ne for December, 1836.

DESCRIPTION OF DUDLEY'S DEFEAT AND MASSACRE. 327

cited; he railed at me for not keeping my men better dressed [in better line]. I replied
that he must perceive from the situation of the ground, and the obstacles that we had
to encounter, that it was impossible. When we came within a small distance of the
river we halted. The enemy at this place had gotten in the rear of our line, formed
parallel with the river, and were firing upon our troops. Captain Morrison's Company
did not long remain in this situation. Having nothing to do, and being without orders,
we determined to march our company out and join the combatants. We did so accord-
ingly. In passing out we fell on the left of the whole regiment and were soon engaged
in a severe conflict. The Aborigines endeavored to flank and surround us. We drove
them between one and two miles, directly back from the river. They hid behind trees
and logs, and poured upon us as we advanced a most destructive fire. We were from
time to time ordered to charge. The orders were passed along the lines, our field officers
being on foot. . . Captain Morrison was shot through the temples, the ball passing
behind the eyes cutting the optic nerve and depriving him of sight. . . Having made
the best arrangement for the safety of my much esteemed Captain that circumstances
allowed, I took charge of the company and continued the battle. We made several
charges afterwards and drove the enemy a considerable distance. . . At length
orders were passed along the lines directing us to fall back and keep up a retreating
fire. As soon as this movement was made the Aborigines were greatly encouraged, and
advanced upon us with the most horrid yells. Once or twice the officers succeeded in
producing a temporary halt and a fire on the Aborigines, but the soldiers of the
different companies soon became mixed, confusion ensued, and a general rout took
place. The retreating army made its way towards the batteries, where I supposed
we should be able to form and repel the pursuing Aborigines. They were now
so close in the rear as to frequently shoot down those who were before me.
About this time I received a ball in my back which yet remains in my body.
It struck me with a stunning, deadening force, and I fell on my hands and knees. I rose
and threw my waistcoat open to see whether it had passed through me. Finding it had
not, I ran on and had not proceeded more than a hundred or two yards before I was
made prisoner. In emerging from the woods into an open piece of ground near the
battery we had taken, and before I knew u'hat had happened, a soldier seized my sword
and said to me, 'Sir, you are my prisoner! ' I looked before me and saw, with astonish-
ment, the ground covered with muskets. The soldier observing my astonishment, said
'your army has surrendered' and received my sword. He ordered me to go forward and
join the prisoners. I did so. The first man I met whom I recognized was Daniel Smith
of our company. With eyes full of tears he exclaimed 'good Lord, Lieutenant, what
does all this mean?' I told him we were prisoners of war. . . — Underwood.

In small parties, by tens and twenties, they arrived at the batteries, thereby falling
an easy prey to the regular force of the enemy who, early in the action, had retaken the
batteries from our right columns — Combs.

On our march to the garrison [ruins of Fort Miami] the Aborigines began to strip
us of our valuable clothing and other articles. One took my hat, another my hunting
shirt, and a third my waistcoat, so that I was soon left with nothing but my shirt and
pantaloons — Underwood. Some lost their pantaloons. He who did not instantly give
up his clothes frequently paid his life for it. This was done before the British guard,
also before General Proctor, Colonel Elliott, and other officers who were riding up the
lines. No difference was made between well and wounded in this as well as what fol-
lowed. It would be almost impossible to relate all the acts of individual outrage that
took place. I shall never forget the demoniac look of the villain who stripped me.
I showed him my wound. 'Twas vain ; before I could unfasten the bandage, regardless
of my pain, he tore my coat off from my shoulders. I had gone but little further before
I saw ten or twelve men lying dead, stripped naked, and scalped — Combs, page '.).

328 THE MAUMEE RIVER BASIN.

I saved my watch by concealing the chain, and it proved of great service to me
afterwards. Having read when a boy Smith's narrative of his residence among the
Aborigines, my idea of their character was that they treated those best who appeared
the most fearless. Under this impression, as we marched down to the old garrison
[ruins of Fort Miami] I looked at those whom we met with all the sternness of counte-
nance I could command. I soon caught the eye of a stout warrior painted red. He
gazed at me with as much sternness as I did at him until I came within striking distance,
when he gave me a severe blow over the nose and cheek-bone with his [gun] wiping
stick, I abandoned the notion acquired from Smith, and went on afterwards with as
little display of hauteur and defiance as possible. On our approach to the old garrison
[fort] the Aborigines formed a line to the left of the road, there being a perpendicular
bank to the right on the margin of which the road passed. I perceived that the prisoners
were running the gauntlet and that the Aborigines were whipping, shooting and toma-
hawking the men as they ran by their line. When I reached the starting place I dashed
off as fast as I was able, and ran near the muzzles of their guns, knowing that they
would have to shoot me while I was immediately in front or let me pass, for to have
turned their guns up or down the lines to shoot me would have endangered themselves
as there was a curve in their line. In this way I passed without injury except some
strokes over the shoulders with their gun-sticks. As I entered the ditch around the gar-
rison the man before me was shot and fell, and I fell over him. The passage for a while
was stopped by those who fell over the dead man and me. How many lives were lost at
this place I cannot tell, probably between twenty and forty. The brave Captain Lewis
was among the number. . . — Underwood. We heard frequent guns at the place
during the whole time the remaining prisoners were coming in. Some were wounded
severely with war clubs, tomahawks, etc. The number who fell after the surrender was
supposed by all to be nearly equal to the killed in the battle. As soon as all the surviv-
ing prisoners got within the stockade the whole body of Aborigines, regardless of the
opposition of our little guard, rushed in. There seemed to be almost twice our number
of them. Their blood-thirsty souls were not yet satiated with carnage. One Aborigine
shot three of our men, tomahawked a fourth, and stripped and scalped them in our
presence. . Then all raised the war-hoop and commenced loading their guns.

Tecumseh. more humane than his ally and employer [Proctor] generously interfered and
prevented further massacre. Colonel Elliot then rode slowly in, spoke to the Aborigi-
nes, waved his sword, and all but a few retired immediately. . . — Combs.

When we got within the walls we were ordered to sit down. I lay in the lap of Mr.
Gilpin a soldier of Captain Henry's Company from Woodford. A new scene com-
menced. An Aborigine painted black mounted the delapidated wall and shot one of
the prisoners next to him. He reloaded and shot a second, the ball passing through him
and into the hip of another who afterwards died of the wound at Cleveland. I was
informed. The savage then laid down his gun and drew his tomahawk with which he
killed two others. When he drew his tomahawk and jumped down among the men they
endeavored to escape from him by leaping over the heads of each other, thereby to place
others between themselves and danger. Thus they were heaped upon one another and,
as I did not rise, they trampled upon me so that I could see nothing that was going on.
The confusion and uproar of this moment cannot be adequately described. There was
an excitement among the .aborigines, and a fierceness in their conversation, which
betokened on the part of some a strong disposition to massacre all of us. The British
officers and soldiers seemed to interpose to prevent the further effusion of blood. Their
expression was Oh nichee wah! meaning. Oh, brother quit. After the one who had
occasioned this horrible scene had scalped and stripped his victims he left us, and a
comparative calm ensued. The prisoners resumed their seats on the ground. While
thus situated a tall stout Aborigine walked into the midst of us, drew a long butcher

TECUM SEH INTERFERES TO STOP MASSACRE. 529

knife from his belt and commenced whetting it. As he did so he looked around among
the prisoners, apparently selecting one for the gratification of his vengeance.
After exciting our fears sufficiently for his satisfaction, he gave a contemptuous grunt and
went out. About this time, but whether before or after I do not distinctly recollect.
Colonel Elliott and Tecumseh rode into the garrison [Fort Miami earthworks enclosure].
When Elliott came to where Thomas Moore of Clarke County stood, the latter enquired
if it was compatible with the honor of a civilized nation, such as the British claimed to
be. to suffer defenceless prisoners to be murdered by savages ? Elliott desired to know
who he was. Moore replied that he was nothing but a private in Captain Morrison's
company ; and the conversation ended. . . Elliott was an old man. His hair was
more white than gray, and to my view he had more of the savage in his countenance
than had Tecumseh. This celebrated chief was a noble, dignified personage. He wore
an elegant broadsword, and was dressed in Aborigine costume. His face was finely
proportioned, his nose inclined to be aquiline, and his eyes displayed none of that savage
and ferocious triumph common to the other Aborigines on that occasion. . . I saw
him only on horseback. . . Upon the arrival of Elliott and Tecumseh we were

directed to stand up and form in lines, I think
four deep, in order to be counted. After we were
thus arranged a scene transpired scarcely less
affecting than that which I have before attempted
faintly to describe. The Aborigines began to
select the young men whom they intended to take
with them to their towns. Numbers were taken.
I saw Corporal Smith of our company bidding
farewell to his friends, and pointing to the Abc-
rigine with whom he was to go. I never heard
of his return. The young men, learning their
danger, endeavored to avoid it by crowding into
the center where they could not be so readily
reached. Owing to my wound I could not scuffle,
and was thrust to the outside. An Aborigine
came up to me and gave me a piece of meat. I
took this for proof that he intended to take me
with him. Thinking it the best policy to act with
confidence. I made a sign to him to give me his
butcher knife, which he did. I divided the meat
with those who stood near me, reserving a small
piece for myself, more as a show of politeness to
the savage than to gratify any appetite I had for
it. After I had eaten it and returned the knife, he
turned and left me. When it was near night we
were taken in open boats about nine miles down the river to the British shipping. On the
day after, we were visited by the savages in their bark canoes in order to make a display
of their scalps. These they strung on poles perhaps two inches in diameter and about
eight feet high. The poles were set up perpendicularly in the bows of their canoes, and
near the top the scalps were fastened. On some poles I saw four or five. Each scalp
was drawn closely over a hoop about four inches in diameter, and the flesh side was
painted red. . . We remained six days on board the vessel — those of us who were
sick, or wounded. All were discharged on parole. . . The wounded and sick were
taken in a vessel to the mouth of Vermillion River and there put on shore — Underwood.
[Another report set them ashore at the mouth of Huron River, where General Harrison
had them cared for and protected on their way home].

^1^^

Hp^^^b

J^^

'^f^^SBt

■H^rv^^^vl^^l^lt-^

TECUMSEH

In his dress as a British officer. Born near
Chillicothe, Ohio (?) about 1770; was killed
in ihe Battle of the Thames October f>. 1H13.

330 THE MAUMEE RIVER BASIN.

The victory obtained at the Miami [Maumee] was such as to reflect credit [sic] on
every branch of the [British] service ; but the satisfaction arising from the conviction
was deeply embittered by an act of cruelty, which, as the writer of an impartial memoir,
it becomes my painful duty to record. In the heat of the action a strong corps of the
enemy, which had thrown down their arms and surrendered prisoners of war, were
immediately dispatched under an escort of fifty men for the purpose of being embarked
in the ,gun-boats, where it was presumed they would be safe from the attacks of the
Aborigines. This measure, although dictated by the purest humanity, and apparently
offering the most probable means of security, proved of fatal import to several of the
prisoners. On reaching our encampment, then entirely deserted by the troops, they
were met by a band of cowardly and treacherous Aborigines who had borne no share in
the action, yet who now, guided by the savage instinct of their nature, approached the
column and, selecting their victims, commenced the work of blood. In vain did the
harassed and indignant escort endeavor to save them from the fury of their destroyers.
The frenzy of these wretches knew no bounds, and an old and excellent soldier named
Russell, of the 41st, was shot through the heart while endeavoring to wrest a victim from
the grasp of his murderer.

Forty of the.se unhappy men had already fallen beneath the steel of the infuriated
party when Tecumseh, apprised of what was doing, rode up at full speed and, raising his
tomahawk, threatened to destroy the first man who refused to desist. Even on those
lawless people, to whom the language of coercion had hitherto been unknown, the threats
and tone of the exasperated chieftian produced an instantaneous effect, and they retired
at once humiliated and confounded.*

The survivors of this melancholy catastrophe were immediately conveyed on board
the gunboats, moored in the river, and every precaution having been taken to prevent a
renewal of the scene, the escorting party proceeded to the interment of the victims, to
whom the rites of sepulture were afforded, even before those of our own men who had
fallen in the action. Colonel Dudley, second in command of General Clay's division,
was among the number of the slain.

On the evening of the second day after this event I accompanied Major Muir, of
the 41st [British Regiment] in a ramble throughout the encampment of the Aborigines,
distant some few hundred yards from our own. The spectacle there offered to our view
was at once of the most ludicrous and revolting nature. In various directions were lying
the trunks and boxes taken from the boats of the American division, and the plunderers
were busily occupied in displaying their riches, carefully examining each article, and
attempting to define its use. Several were decked out in the uniforms of officers; and
although embarrassed to the last degree in their movements, and dragging with difficulty
the heavy military boots with which their legs were for the first time covered, strutted
forth much to the admiration of their less fortunate comrades. Some were habited in
plain clothes ; others had their bodies clad with clean white shirts, contrasting in no
ordinary manner with the swarthiness of their skins; all wore some articles of decoration,
and their tents were ornamented with saddles, bridles, rifles, daggers, swords and pistols,

*A letter from William G. Ewint; to John H. James, Esq., of Urbana, Ohio, as quoted in Drake's Life
of Tecumseh. reads that Tecumseh . . . sprans from his horse, caught one savage by the throat and
another by the breast, and threw them to the ground. Drawing his tomahawk and scalping knife he ran
in between the Americans and savages, brandishing them with the fury of a madman, and daring anyone
of the hundreds that surrounded him to attempt to murder another American. They all appeared con-
founded, and immediately desisted. His mind appeared rent with passion, and lie exclaimed almost
with tears in his eyes, ' Oh ! what will become of my Aborigines ?' He then demanded in an authoritative
lone where Proctor was; but casting his eyes upon him at a short distance, sternly inquired why he liad
not put a stop to the inhuman massacre? Sir, said Proctor, your Aborigines cannot be commanded.
Begone ! retorted Tecumseh witli the greatest disdain, you are unfit to command : go and put on petticoats !

BRITISH ACCOUNT OF SAVAGES EATING AMERICANS. 351

many of which were handsomely mounted and of curious workmanship. Such was the
ridiculous part of the picture.

But. mingled with these, and in various directions, were to be seen the scalps of the
slain drying in the sun. stained on the flesh side with vermilion dyes, and dangling in air
as they hung suspended from poles to which they were attached, together with hoops of
various sizes on which were stretched portions of human skin taken from various parts of
the human body, principally the hand and foot and yet covered with the nails of those
parts ; while scattered along the ground were visible the members from which they had
been separated, and which were serving as nutriment to the wolf-dogs by which the sav-
ages were accompanied.

As we continued to advance into the heart of the encampment a scene of a more
disgusting nature arrested our attention. Stopping at the entrance of a tent occupied by
the Minoumini [Menomeni] tribe we observed them seated around a large fire over which
was suspended a kettle containing their meal. Each warrior had a piece of string hanging
over the edge of the vessel, and to this was suspended a food which, it will be presumed
we heard not without loathing, consisted of a part of an American. Any expression of
our feelings, as we declined the invitation they gave us to join in their repast, would have
been resented by the savages without ceremony ; we had, therefore, the prudence to
excuse ourseh'es under the plea that we had already taken our food, and we hastened to
remove from a sight so revolting to humanity. . . — Major I^ichardson, of the list
British Regiment.

This description does not accord with the previous statement that
the British buried the American dead before their own dead. D(mbt-
less the savages took all the bodies of the Americans they desired as
food for themselves and their dotfs before the bur\'ing began. Another
report reads that parts of the large, muscular Colonel Dudley was one
of those eaten bv the cannibals. (See report on a later page of the
number of fragmentary bodies afterwards found and buried by the
Americans). The foregoing statements by Major Richardson, Captain
Combs, and Lieutenant Underwood, corroborate the testimony of manv
witnesses heretofore mentioned, and of many yet to be mentioned, that
the British authorities did not discourage the inhumanities of their
savage allies; but that many encouraged their savagery — were even
tutors of the Aborigines to make their acts more poignant to the
Americans !

The 4th of Ma\' was a sad day at Fort Meigs on account of this,
the third great loss suffered by the Army of the Northwest in less than
one year after the beginning of the War of 181:2. General Harrison,
from his outlook, saw the beginning of the fatal error of Colonel Dud-
ley's doomed troops. He signaled, repeating his former command to
come at once to the Fort, but his signals were lost to the enthusiastic
men 'whose excessive ardor . . always the case when Kentucky
militia were engaged . . was the source of all their misfortunes"''
A volunteer was called for to convey to Colonel Dudley the

* From General Harrison's General Orders, May 9. 1813.

552 THE MAUMEE RIVER BASIN.

imperative command of the General to retreat to the Fort. Lieutenant
Campbell responded: but he arrived near the farther shore too late.

The soldiers in the other six boats of the reinforcing Kentuckians
met with better success. General Clay's boat, containing beside him-
self Captain Peter Dudle\- and fifty men, was separated by the swollen
rapid current from the other five after the detachment of Colonel Wil-
liam Dudley's command, and was carried further down the stream than
the others before a landing could be effected; and landing on the right
shore opposite Hollister Island, notwithstanding opposition of savages
who policed the shores and roads leading to the Fort, General Clay
led the soldiers to the Fort without loss of life: but their boat contain-
ing four sick soldiers and their baggage became separated from them
and was secured by the savages. Colonel William E. Boswell com-
manding the other five boats landed at Turkey Point above, formed
his men in open order, rapidly crossed the flood-plain intervening,
charged the savages who were firing on them from among the trees of
the slopes and, being reinforced by Majors Alexander and Johnson's
commands, and the companies of Captains Nearing and Dudley sent
out of the Fort b>' General Harrison, they drove the savages, though
superior to them in numbers, half a mile into the woods. General
Harrison seeing from his high point of observation that they were going
too far and that the British and their main body of savage allies nearest
the Fort desired to involve them in a dangerous ambuscade, at once
sent a volunteer, John T. Johnson, to recall them with imperative
orders. Johnson started on this perilous mission on horseback and
succeeded, notwithstanding the killing of his horse by the enemy.
General Harrison also ordered John Miller, a native of Ohio and Col-
onel of United States troops, to sallv from the Fort and do what he
could, safely, to attract the enemy's attention. Three hundred and
fifty soldiers, regulars and Captain Uriel Sebree's company of Ken-
tucky militia, were hastily chosen, and they were soon impetuoush'
charging the battery nearest the Fort. The enemy at that point, esti-
mated at eight hundred and fifty British and savages, were driven back
into the ravine, their cannon were spiked and, before the enemy could
rally in force, the victorious Americans returned to the Fort with forty-
three prisoners. This brilliant sortie resulted, however, in the loss of
twenty-eight Americans killed and twenty-five wounded. Captain
Sebree's company would have been entirely cut off but for the timelv
charge against four times their number of investing enem\- bv Lieu-
tenant Gwinn's squad from the 19th Ignited States regiment.*

'■ At this moment a white fiag was observed waving on the ramparts of the Fort, and the courage and
perserverance of the [British! troops appeared about to be crowned with the surrender of the fortress,
the siege of which had cost tliem so much toil and privation. Such, however, was far from being the

THE RAISING OF THE SIEGE OF FORT MEIGS. 555

Following these engagements General Proctor again sent Major
Chambers with a white flag to demand that General Harrison sur-
render. The reply was such as to indicate that the demand was
considered as an insult. When this reply was received by the
British commander he began preparations to raise the siege. His
efforts to remove his siege guns, however, were dela>'ed by the
American cannon, although his gunboats were taken as near Fort
Meigs as practicable to divert their attention. The last shot from the
boats killed several Americans, including Lieutenant Robert Walker of
the Pittsburg Blues. In his report to Governor Sir George Prevost,
General Proctor wrote regarding his raising the siege as follows :
" I had not the option of retaining my position on the Miami [Maumee].
Half of the militia had left us. . . Before the ordinance could be
withdrawn from the batteries I was left with Tecumseh and less than
twenty chiefs and warriors — a circumstance which strongly proves that,
under present circumstances at least, our Aborigine force is not a dis-
posable one, or permanent, though occasionally a most powerful
aid." . . Notwithstanding this, Governor Prevost was led by a
later report, and perhaps by his own want of accuracy of statement, to
proclaim that the battles on the Maumee 'terminated in the complete
defeat of the enemy, and cajiture, dispersion, or distruction of thirteen
hundred men.' The British loss was reported as fifteen killed, forty-
seven wounded, and forty-four taken prisoners. The Americans ac-
knowledged a loss of eight\-one killed and one hundred and eighty-
nine wounded, of which number seventeen were killed and sixty-five
wounded within the enclosure.

Proctor made a proposition to exchange the American prisoners
for the Aborigines of the frontiers who were not prisoners of the United
States but nominally friends. Whether he made this proposal for an
insult, or for the purpose of recruiting his allies, is known only to him-
self. General Harrison, through courtesy, told him he would refer the
subject to the President — M'Afee, page 27"2.

The savages kept between thirty and forty American prisoners.

intentions of General Harrison. Availini; himself of the cessation of hostilities which necessarily en-
sued, he caused Lieutenants M'Intyre and Hailes and tlie privates he liad just captured to be sent
across the river for the purpose of beinc exchanired ; but this was only a feint for the accomplislinient of
a more important object, Drawinc up his whole force, cavalry and infantry, on the plain beneath the
fortress, he caused such of the boats of General Clay's division as were laden with ammunition, in which
the garrison stood in much need, to be dropped under the works, and the stores immediately disembarked.
All this took place in the period occupied for the exchance of prisoners. The remaining boats [probably
those lost of Colonel Dudley's command and one of General Clay's, are here referred to] containing
the private bacyavie and stores of the division, fell into the hands of the Aborigines still enyaged in the
pursuit of the fugitives, and the plunder they acijuired was immense. General Harrison having secured
his stores, and received the officers and men exchanged for his captives, withdrew into the garrison,
and the bombardment was recommenced — From the British Major Richanison's account, published in
fhe London New Monthly Magazine for December, 1836,

334

THE MAUMEE RIVER BASIN.

concealing' them after the battle, and hurrying them away the next day.
Tin- main body of savages now retired, temporarilx', from the British
command on account of their being tired of the continued siege, and
sated with their butchery and booty from strijiping the captured Ken-

view Northeast from the Giaiid Tiavcr^e of Fort Meigs 1st December, ]9t)2. Perrysbury at ex-
treme riuht, Ewine Island in middle distance, and site of Fort Miami beyond and left of the center.

tuckians. An ignoble part of the character of Tecumseh is demon-
strated by his continued adherence to Proctor, probably not from any
valid respect for the man but for the emolument he might receive.
General Proctor, on giving up the siege, returned with his remaining
force to Amherstburg ( Maiden) where he disbanded the militia. The
savages remained near enough to receive regular rations : and some of
them were constantly employed as spies.

General Harrison on May 9th, immediately after the departure of
the enem\-, sent out a detachment to gather all the bodies of the killed
that could be found — and the search was successful; but general muti-
lations marked the work of the savages. The indifference or oversight
of the British in their nominal burying of the dead of Colonel Dudley's
command, in contradiction to Major Richardson's statement, was shown
by finding fragments of forty-five Kentuckians, which the Americans
conveved across the river and buried with the honors of war like the
others near Fort Meigs. '"

■' These different burial places are indicated on the ground plan of Fort and Camp Meigs ante page
;ilH. These graves remain without monument up to the time of this writing [summer of 1904) but the
Manmee Valley Pioneer and Histori':al Society (organized May", 1S64; reorganized and incorporated in
1S03) has taken up the work of the extinct Maumee Valley Monument Association (incorporated July 28,

3S4

THE MAUMEE RIVER BASIN.

concealint;- them after the battle, and hurryins,^ them away the next dav.
The main l)od\- of savaijes now retired, temporarily, from the British
command on account of their beint;" tired of the continued siege, and
sated with their butchery and booty from strijiping the captured Ken-

\'iew Northeast from the Grand Traverse of Fort Meigs 1st December. 1902. Perrysbury at ex-
treme rit-'ht. Ewinir Island in middle distance, and site of Fort Miami beyond and left of the center.

tuckians. An ignoble part of the character of Tecumseh is demon-
strated b\' his continued adherence to Proctor, probably not from any
valid respect for the man but for the emolument he might receive.
General Proctor, on giving up the siege, returned with his remaining
force to Amherstburg ( Maiden ) where he disbanded the militia. The
savages remained near enough to receive regular rations: and some of
them were constantly employed as spies.

General Harrison on May 9th, immediately after the departure of
the enemv, sent out a detachment to gather all the bodies of the killed
that could be found — and the search was successful; but general muti-
lations marked the work of the savages. The indifference or oversight
of the British in their nominal burying of the dead of Colonel Dudley's
command, in contradiction to Major Richardson's statement, was shown
l)v finding fragments of forty-five Kentuckians, which the Americans
conveyed across the river and buried with the honors of war like the
others near Fort Meigs. '^

^' These different burial places are indicated on the cround plan of Fort and Camp Meics ante page
:^lfi. These graves remain without monument up to the time of this writing (summer of 1904) but the
Maumee A'alley Pioneer ::nd Historical Society (organized May 7, 1SG4; reorganized and incorporated in
lSt)3) has taken up the work of the extinct Maumee Valley Monument Association (incorporated July 38,

■"j-Jk^c;r--Crt:.i;'v'N"^F--A3Sl^^ township map of

^^^^^^S!3^"Ti:|^ y^DJACENT Watersheds

SS-vB^J^-ft^^^l-Ti-^P^^B^i^ ENORAVED FOR THE HISTORY

85' LONQIT-

fe-.;5fJ^gt,T^Ii^ 1^^^^^^^^ ENORAVED FOR THE HISTORY

5?^'.£lfes45iSCT"K^"H-£S?ls»g^^^^ ;rr^^^S?V"K ofthemaumee river basin.

""'""' CHARLES E.SLOCUM.

fork 4

J HMsorj I.E.'' fV V/HMeotP-A"' V'*

■?f-"-jSE^F7T^K3i:jVS;,^Trr&UVt;^^ township map of

^m!;^m^S^tm:riSSk .uf maumee river Ba....

40'l5
SHEDS

" ;vs Scale ok Milks

.MoNftil ',

84' GREENWICH 83"30„ucM»ii« raoRAviNtl c . 83°

40"

NAMES OF SOLDIERS PROTECTING FORT MEIGS. 335

In his reports of the siege to the Secretarj' of War, General Har-
rison described the enemy and mentioned the savages as the most
efficient force. He commended the efficiency of his entire besieged
force, and made special mention of Colonel John Miller and Major Todd
of the 19th Regiment United States Infantry: Major Ball of the dra-
goons and Major Sodwick, Colonel Mills and Major Ritzer of the Ohio
Militia, and Major Johnson of the Kentucky Militia, and Adjutant
Brown; Captains Eleazer D. Wood, Engineer, Gratiot and Gushing
of the Artillery; Mr. Timberlee and sergeants Henderson, Tommes
and Meldrum, each in charge of Battery or Blockhouse; Captain

Sebree's company of Kentucky Mili-
tia; the Pittsburg Blues under Lieu-
tenant M'Gee ; the Pittsburg Volun-
teers and Lieutenant Drum's detach-
ment; Cai)tains Croghan, Bradford,
Langham, Elliott, Nering, and their
detachments of the 17th and lOth
Regiments; Lieutenants Cam]i|i(ll,
Gwinn, Lee, Kercheval and Rees ;
Ensigns She]), Hawkins, Harrison,
Mitchell and Stockton; To General
Clay, Colonel Boswell, Major
Fletcher, Captains Dudley, Simons
and Medcalf, Kentuckians. Also to
members of his Staff, Major Hukill
Aide-de-cam]), Acting Insjiector Gen-
eral, Major Graham Aide-de-camp,
J. Johnson, Esq., volunteer Aide-de-
camp, Lieutenant John O'Fallon
Acting Assistant Adjutant General,
and Deputy Quartermaster Euliank.
The injuries received by the Fort during the siege were carefully
examined by the Generals and Engineers, and methods of repairs and
strengthening devices were discussed and the work at once entered upon.
Leaving General Clay in command of Fort Meigs, General Har-
rison started eastward with an escort of cavalry ( mounted riflemen )
under Captain Robert M'Afee. He arrived at Lower Sandusky (now
Fremont, Ohio) May Pith and there met Governor Meigs with a strong

J^^^k,

^7 ■'=rr?^^P^^

GENERAL GREEN CLAY

Born 14 August, 1757, in Powhatan County
Virginia. Died 31 October, 1826, In Kentucky/

1885) and in October. 1903, purcliased eiglil and tifty-five one-luindredtlis acres of land embracing ilie
burial ground of the Kentuckians. Communications have been had with the Governors and Legislatures
of Kentucky and Ohio and, notwithstanding present disappointments, strong hopes are entertained that
not only a monument will eventually be built on this ground, but that all the historic places along the
Maumee River will be purchased and appropriately marked.

* From Harper's Encyclopedia of United States History. Copyright. 1901. by Harper & Brothers.

556 THE MAUMEE RIVER BASIN.

force of Ohio volunteers who were hastening to reinforce Fort Meigs
in answer to the message carried by Peter Navarre. The army not
being prepared for an advance against the enemy, these troops were
returned southward to conserve food supplies. After providing for a
continued careful watch of the south shore of Lake Erie, General Har-
rison went southward to further provide for the defenses, and for the
advance.

We catch glimpses of the soldiers' later experiences within the for-
tified encampment at Fort Meigs from the manuscript 'Book of Gener-
al Orders' kept bv Adjutant Samuel Bayless, who also served as Judge
Advocate in court martials, viz:* On May 15th a Regimental Court
Martial composed of Captains Patrick Shaw, Nathan Hatfield and
Theophilus Simonton, sat in trial of Samuel Stewart, charged by
Major Anthony Pitzer with exploding a bombshell in camp on the 11th.
This was probably one of the British shells that lodged in the camp
during the siege. Alexander Tucker, J. Boggs, and E. Sprig, were
sworn but their evidence not being explicit against the defendant, he
was declared not guilty; and James Mills, Colonel 1st Regiment, 3rd
Department Ohio Militia, approved the finding. Maj' 24th James Kelley
Corporal in Captain Simonton's company was charged before a court
composed of Major J. Lodwick and Captains P. Shane and N. Hatfield
'with having suffered public whiskey to be used from the barrel under
his charge on the night of the "iSnd inst.' The testimony of J. Davis,
the onlv witness, was not strong enough to convict, and the accused
was declared not guilty. A garrison order with date May 24, 1813,
reads that ' The commandants of the different corps at this place will
make out and didiver to Major Pondell, Acting Adjutant General,
complete returns of their respective commands on the 'ith day of ^une
ensuing, for the month of May, instant. Fighting is especially forbid-
den after this date unless authorized. Every soldier shall be entitled
to one gill of whiskev for every cannon ball or bomb [British] he mav
find and deliver to Captain Gushing or Lieutenant Hawkins. [Signed]
John Miller, Colonel Nineteenth Regiment Infantry, Commandant."
June 4th first Sergeant John Haines complained to a court martial of
abusive language used to him by private Galloway. The accused plead
guilty and was sentenced to 'parade with the general fatigue on the
r^th and (ith inst. and do that duty faithfully these two days.' Sergeant
Haines also complained, June 26th, of Thomas Gregory for using to-
ward him abusive and threatening language. The accused plead not
guilt\ but, on testimony of Adam Stonebraker and Robert Jordan he
was declared guiltv and sentenced to acknowledge his fault to and

* See Knapp's History of The Maumee Valley, page 179 et sequentia.

BRITISH GATHER MORE SAVAGES. SUPPLIES.

557

ask forgiveness of liis Orderly Sergeant in presence of tile battalion, or
be compelled to go on fatigue for three days and be put in the guard
house each night, at his option : and that this sentence shall be read on
battalion parade by the Adjutant this evening.'

Proctor's and Tecumseh's emissaries to the distant tribes of
Aborigines had gathered large numliers of them, and in June, 1813,
over one thousand of the most savage and depraved were marched from
their rendezvous at Chicago to Amherstburg by their chiefs and a
Scotch trader, Dickson. Colonel Richard M. Johnson, who had left
Congress and organized a regiment of seven hundred mounted Ken-
tuckians, was directed to move around the headwaters of the Auglaise
and Maumee. About the time of the jiassing of these savages through
southern Michigan Colonel Johnson was circulating through northern
Indiana, meeting and dispersing savages near Fort Wavne and to the
noithwest with the noted French-Shawnee Anthony Shane as one of
his scouts; but he did not learn of his nearness to the route of the
western savages until later and far distant.

Meantime supplies were being hastened forward with good success*
and everything seemed favorable to an early advance of the army, when
General Harrison received at Franklington an express from General

* Report of Provisions Remaining at Different Posts on the Center and Left Wings of the

Northwestern Army (the Purchases of John H. Piatt Deputy Purchasing

Commissary) on the 24th Day of June, 1813.

Names of Posts.

3 °

3m
aw

3 o

Ha,

T3 c
C O
3 O

o rt

0.3

1 „
a, d

0 o
37)

—

X c
O nl

Fort Winchester.

1.2(19

247

119

20,000

Jennines,

2(i

3' =

1.1

600

1 Gooc

Order

Amanda.

UK)

110,0(X1

" Barbee,

1(16

'.2

8,000

Loramie.

l..59(1

153

1.5

Greenville,

18.360

" Pi<iua,

.%S3

l,2tX)

Dayton,

l(i:l

4,000

" Findlay,

.50

500

" M'Arthur,

.536

4.122

19;^

air';

2.53-,

163.660

9.5

t Part of tlie flour damaged, being sunk in the river after leaving Amanda and St. Marys, and for
the want of proper care after it arrived at Fort Winchester. At all of the above mentioned Posts I have
appointed Issuinc Commissaries, agreeably to your Excellency's [Governor Meigs] order, at thirty
dollars per month, who will take every necessary care until your excellency may think proper to give
the Provisions into the hands of the contractors. [Signed! John H. Piatt — American State Papers.
Military Affairs, volume i. page 653.

General Clay, writing at Fort Meigs to General Harrison under date 20th June. 4 days before the
above inventory, states that . . " By different detachments sent from tliis place, we have received
from Fort Winchester abc.it one tlio-.r^and and two hundred barrels gf flour, including that escorted
from IFort] Amanda by Ensign Gray."

338

THE MAUMEE RIVER BASIN.

Clay informing him that a Frenchman whom the British captured at
Dudley's defeat had escaped from Amhersthuri< and informed him that
Proctor was preparing for a second attack on Fort Meigs with an
increased force: and that he, Clav, had ordered to Fort Meigs Colonel

FUKT MEIGS AND FORTIFIED ENCAMPMENT

Photoyrapli of the lartje wall paintint: in the upper liall of Wood County's new Court House, Bowlini,'
Green, Ohio, Thispaintiny is evidently not a fair portrayal of this important fortress. The blockhouses
are not of sufficient height, nor is the contour cf the river-bluft satisfactory. Other criticisms can
readily be named from descriptions on other panes. The logs at the base of the palisade were lioUow
and tilled with stone and gravel ; and were held in place by ropes which were to be cut to let the logs roil
upon and overwhelm the army attempting to capture the Fort by assault. Built from February to May.
1813. Besieged by British and Aborigines 1st to 8th May. inclusive, and by feint 25th to 27th July, 1813.
Abandoned by L'nited States soldiers l.^th May, IKl,i.

R. M. Johnson's regiment, then at Fort Winchester after guarding
boatloads of supplies from Forts Barbee, Wayne and Amanda.

Colonel Johnson, upon receiving General Clay's dispatch in the
afternoon, although his horses were all much worn and some disabled
by their continuous marchings, gave orders for the march down the
Maumee, and within half an hour most of the force began to ford the
river just above Fort Defiance point, leaving those unable to march,
with the garrison of Fort Winchester. The provisions and baggage in
the boats soon followed the cavalcade and all stopped for the night at
General Winchester Camp Number Three. Early next morning the
forward movement was resumed, and they arrived at Grand Rapids at
five o'clock that evening. Here another dispatch was received from.

GOOD CONDITION OF FORT MEIGS.

539

General Clay, cautioning against ambuscades by savages who were
lying in wait by their course. This information was communicated to
the soldiers, who seconded the desire to proceed notwithstanding the
savages. A guard was left at Grand Rapids with the boats which were

SITE OF FORT MEIGS FROM OPPOSITE SIDE OF RIVER.

Looking east across the Maumee River \'alley I.Sth November, 19H2, from above the sites of the
British Batteries. The Fort and Encampment extended alone the hiyh bank from near the riirht side of
view to the blutt of the broad erosion of the creek in the central distance. Note the flood plain ' bottom
land' under the blufl:. Bridge and Perrysburg in the left distance. The upright poles on the
proximal side of the river mark the course of the Maumee \'allev Electric Railway built in 1901.

to continue the journey at daylight the next morning, and the main
body resumed the march, arriving ojiposite Fort Meigs at ten o'clock
and there encamped for the night on the lower land. The Fort's day-
light ,gun so frightened the horses that they ran through the camp, and
over several of the soldiers hurting them severely, and continued to run
down the river for a half mile or more, being caught after much trouble
and risk. About ten o'clock the order of march was given and, passing
above the foot of the rapids, the Maumee was forded, and the regiment
encamped just above Fort Meigs 'in a handsome plain clothed with
blue grass' — M'Afee.

Fort Meigs was now in better condition for defense than before
its siege. The damages done by the British guns had been repaired,
the trees, logs, and stumjis, had been cleared awav for a .greater distance,
and the British battery mounds leveled. Better drainage and sanitary
conveniences had also been established. The garrison had suffered much
sickness, and during June and |ul\' intermittent and virulent remittent

340 THE MAUMEE RIVER BASIN.

fevers prevailed which, with dysentery and other complications, proved
very fatal. Several soldiers died each day and night for some length of
time ; and the aggregate number increased to over one hundred deaths
in a period of six weeks.

The 24th Regiment United States Infantry under Colonel Ander-
son was hurried forward from Upper Sandusky, also Major George
Croghan with part of the 17th Regiment, and Colonel Ball with his squad
of cavalry. General Harrison also started northward and, overtaking
Colonel Anderson the evening of June 26th, detached three hundred
soldiers to make a forced march to Fort Meigs on account of being
informed that savages were gathering below the fort. Finding quiet
prevailing along the Lake to the eastward. General Harrison proceeded
to Fort Meigs where he arrived the 28th to find that Colonel Johnson
had recently arrived. A detachment pi one hundred and fifty from this
regiment under Colonel Johnson in person was ordered to reconnoiter
the country to the River Raisin, which they did without discovering
any of the enemy ; but their march temporarily thwarted the designs of
a partv of savages who had started from Amherstburg to harass the
Americans wherever possible.

The extent of frontier under the surveillance of General Harrison
was great; and it required constant watchfulness and great executive
ability to guard against invasion and to gather, and keep, the means
for the desired advance against the enemy. The 1st July the General
again went eastward to arrange the defenses and garrisons along the
Lake to the Cuyahoga River. He directed Colonel Johnson to take
post at the Huron River. On the Colonel's way thither he arrived at
Fort Stephenson the 4th of July where the soldiers of that garrison
were celebrating this National Holiday and, upon urgent request, he
delivered a stirring address. At Fort Meigs, also, there was a grateful
celebration of this day as expressed in the following General Order, viz:

Camp Meigs, July 4, 181.'!.

The General commanding announces to the troops under his command the return
of this day, which gave liberty and independence to the United States of America; and
orders that a national salute be fired under the superintendence of Captains Gratiot and
Gushing. All the troops reported fit for duty shall receive an extra gill of whisky. And
those in confinement and those under sentence attached to the corps, be forthwith released
and ordered to join their respective corps.

The General is induced to use this lenience alone from consideration of the ever
memorable day, and flatters himself that in future the soldiers under his command will
better appreciate their liberty by a steady adherence to duty and prompt compliance with
the orders of their officers by which alone they are worthy to enjoy the blessings of that
liberty and independence, the only real legacy left us by our fathers. All courts martial
now constituted in this camp are hereby dissolved. There will be no fatigue this day.

[Signed] Robert Butlek, A. .Adjt. Gen,

FOURTH OF JULY CELEBRATIONS. FORT SENECA. 341

And so at the different militan- posts in this Basin the hearts of
the soldiers were cheered, and thev were made more contented with
their condition, by these simple yet effective celebrations in the forest
that gave a renewed and a broader significance to their servici-.

The term of enlistment of some of the soldiers at Cami) Mei^s
having^ expired, a little diversion was planned to start them homeward
with good cheer. General Clay, therefore, issued the following Gen-
eral Order, with date July Hth, viz: 'The commanding General
directs that the Old Guard, on being released, will march out of camji
and discharge their guns at a target placed in some secure position :
and as a reward for those who may excel in shooting, eight gills of
whiskey will be given to the nearest shot, and four gills to the second.
The officer of the guard will cause a return, signed for that purpose,
signifying the names of the men entitled to the reward.'

The savages were becoming more numerous and troublesome along
the Maumee River. Fourteen soldiers whose term of enlistment had
expired at Fort Meigs, desired to return home on foot by way of Fort
Winchester. They were attacked by savages a few miles above Fort
Meigs and but two escaped. Eighteen cavalrymen under Lieutenant
Craig while passing up the river to guard some flour at the Grand Rajjids,
were attacked by these savages. A retreat was ordered, and obeyed
by all but three men who pursued the enemy. One of these three,

Wyant by name, wounded a savage who seemed likely to escape

until he dismounted, followed him through the close brush where he
was conquered and his weapons were taken as trophies. For this
courageous act Wyant was promoted to the rank of Ensign : while
Lieutenant Craig was cashiered liy a court martial.

Colonel Johnson continued his march to the Huron River; but, not-
withstanding the mischief liable to be done by the War Department giving
orders for the field, he was ordered by this Department to proceed at once
to the protection of the Illinois and Missouri Territories against the
same savages that Trader Dickson had brought to Detroit. This fact
being presented to the Department at Washington by General Harrison,
Colonel Johnson was recalled after he had well advanced southwestward.

The General had, before leaving Franklinton now Columbus,
Ohio, again held a council with the Delaware, Seneca, Shawnee, and
Wyandot Aborigines remaining accessible to him, some of them being
reported as desirous of going to the British. In order to more carefully
stimulate and guard their constancy to the United States he established
headquarters at the Seneca town on the Sandusky River, nine miles
above Lower Sandusky and nine miles below Fort Ball on the site of
the present Tiffin, Ohio, and there he built Fort Seneca during the
middle and latter part of Julv.

342 THE MAUMEE RIVER BASIN.

About this time General Proctor started from Amherstburg, and
the 20th July he arrived at the mouth of the Maumee River with an
army estimated to number at least five thousand ; and the next morning
a picket guard of a corporal and ten soldiers about three hundred yards
from Fort Meigs were surprised by savages and all but three were
killed or captured. The number of savages now with the British was
evidently greater than they had ever before gathered ; and it was prob-
ablv one of the greatest collections of such warriors ever assemliled in
America — the number being variously estimated at from two to four
thousand. M'Afee records the number of warriors as about two thous-
and and five hundred, and the number of Aborigines fed each da\' by
the British from Amherstburg as seven thousand including the women
and children. It was also reported that there were with the regulars
and militia from Amherstburg, one thousand British regulars from
Niagara. The savage allies of the British succeeded in capturing some
horses and oxen belonging to Fort Meigs, but their shots were not
effective on the garrison.

After midnight Lieutenant Montjoy with twenty United States
troops arrived at the Fort from the Portage River blockhouse, having
escaped the savages with the loss of one man. General Clay at once
sent Captain M'Cune of the Ohio militia to inform General Harrison of
the approach of the enemy. This messenger was returned to Fort
Meigs to report that reinforcements would soon be forthcoming, and
with repeated caution to guard against surprise. Lieutenant Colonel
George Paul with his United States Infantry and Colonel Ball with his
dragoons, together numbering four hundred and fift}', were ordered
forward; also Brigadier Generals M' Arthur and Cass (who had recently
been promoted ) with their Ohio troops. Five hundred additional
United States troops were approaching from Fort Massac under
Colonel Theodore Deye Owings (Owens?). These, with the one hun-
dred and forty regulars who were building Fort Seneca and those at
Forts Stephenson and Meigs, would have been a sufficient number for
the defense of these posts and lines had they arrived in time.

On July '2;!rd General Clay again sent Captain M'Cune with report
that a collection of about eight hundred savages "were passing up the
opposite (left) bank of the Maumee, possibly to attack Fort Winchester.
General Harrison believed, correctly, that this movement was only a
feint l)ut, after a council with his staff, scouts were sent out, and
M'Cune was again sent back to Fort Meigs with this information and
with further precautionary suggestions regarding the wily enemv. The
sequel proved the wisdom of the Commander-in-Chief. Accompanied
by James Doolan a French-Irish Canadian, M'Cune arrived near the
Fort about davbreak, they having lost their wav in the night. At the

SECOND INVESTMENT OF FORT MEIGS BY BRITISH. 545

edge of the Fort's clearing they were beset by savages, who were also
on horseback, and were pursued several miles up the river. Coming to
a deep ravine they entered it and passed out its mouth and along the
narrow lowland until their course was impeded by the river. They
retraced their course and found that the savages had turned up the
ravine. This enabled them to gain upon their i)ursuers who, however,
with their unwearied horses regained upon them the distance lost in the
ravine. When again closely pressed they turned to the right into a
thicket. The savages thinking to gain by turning among the bushes at
once, the pursued turned at once to the clearing and were thus enabled
to arrive under the protection of the guns of the Fort. The pursuers,
evidently desiring to capture them alive to be questioned by the British,
had not before this time discharged their guns at them, and now their
bullets were non-effective. The report to the garrison was that
General Harrison had as yet no troops to spare, but upon the arrival of
the expected forces he would move to the support of the Fort il
necessary.

The evening of july 24th Colonel Gaines with two hundred soldiers
made a detour of the edge of the woods from Fort Meigs to reconnnoiter
the enemy and any batteries they might be constructing. A stronger
detachment was started from the British encampment to Intercept his
return, liut it did not arrive in time for an engagement. The British
moved their main force to the right bank of the river on the 25th, but
did not approach within good range of the Fort's cannon.

Proctor and Tecumseh formulated an ingenious strategic plan for
the capture of Fort Meigs at night with little fighting. The British
secreted themselves in the deep ravme near the Fort to the eastward.
Tecumseh, with a large number of savages opened a brisk sham battle
along the road to Lower Sandusky as near the Fort as practicable, to
make it appear to the garrison that they were attacking an American
force coming to reinforce the Fort. This ruse was for the purpose of
drawing the garrison from the Fort when the British, as with Colonel
Dudley's command, would cut off their return and leave them to be
surrounded and massacred by the horde of savages while they would
enter the gates under cover of the darkness take the garrison by surjirise
and thus capture the Fort. Many of the garrison desired to sally forth
and succor their supposed hard-pressed comrades, but the firmness of
General Clay, supported by the memorv of repeated cautionings of his
Commander-in-chief, prevailed. Rain, and several discharges of
cannon from the Fort, soon put a stop to the sham battle.* The enemy
departed from Fort Meigs July 27th without further effort to mislead or

* See account of the British Major Richardson in the London New Monthly Magazine for Decem-
ber. IH2G. Also Howe's Historical Collections of Ohio.

544 THE MAUMEE RIVER BASIN.

capture the garrison, having been in its vicinity about thirty hours.'
After leaving Fort Meigs for the second time, part of the British
force sailed around through Lake Erie, through Sandusky Bay and up
the Sandusky River to Fort Stephenson, expecting to find it an easy
prey. Upon their arrival they found it already invested by their allies,
the savages who had marched across from Fort Meigs. Here was
another illustration of the good grasp of the general situation and the
excellent judgment displayed by General Harrison. He did not expect,
nor fear, that the enemy would expend much more effort for the capture
of Fort Meigs, but he did expect them to direct their energies to the
Right Wing of his defenses which possessed large stores and were not
so strongly fortified. Their investment of Fort Stephenson the first
and second days of August, and their repulse by that garrison of but
one hundred and sixty men with but one small cannon under the
brilliant, young ( about twenty-one years of age) courageous and most
patriotic Captain ( afterwards Major) George Croghan, nephew of Gen-
eral William Clark, is one of the most remarkable events in the War of
1812. It was preposterous to presume that such small garrison in such
weak fortification could withstand such a large, well-equipped, and
experienced investing force ; hence General Harrison had ordered young
Croghan to burn the small amount of stores with the Fort, and take
the garrison to Fort Seneca if the enemy approached : but Captain
Croghan was surrounded by savages before the British advanced up the
Sandusky River, and he with his garrison preferred to die, if die they
must, at their post rather than be massacred by the savages in an effort
to escape. This determination, and their alertness and good judgment
to take advantage of every opportunity, led to one of the most brilliant
victories of American arms, with the loss of but one man killed and
seven slightly wounded while inflicting a loss on the enemy of one
hundred and twenty. Late in the afternoon of August 1st the British
troops and gunboats came within sight of Fort Stephenson. They had
made sure against retreat of the garrison, and to intercept reinforce-
ments. Captain Croghan was summoned to surrender, but replied that
he and the garrison were determined to defend the Fort. After some
parleying by the British with efforts to intimidate, their cannon and
howitzers for twentv-four hours threw balls and shells with little effect

* The report to the Department of War for July, 1818, which is the only one showing stations of
troops in the Eighth Military District now on file there for that year, shows the following named troops
at Camp Meigs, viz: Captain Cushing's Artillery: Colonel Miller's 17th and 19th Regiments Infantry;
Colonel Anderson's 24th Regiment Infantry; Captain Butler's Volunteers; and Lieutenant Mills' Ohio
Militia. The book entitled Official Letters of the Military and Naval Officers of the United States
During the War with Great Britain in the years 1812 to 1815. collected and arranged by John Brannan.
contains all that is found of record in the War Dpiitirtment regarding the losses in the Siege of Fort Meigs,
as given on preceding pages. See also the American State Papers. Military .affairs; Niles's Register:
and Lossing's Field Boo/f of the War of 1812.

BRILLIANT BRITISH REPULSE AT FORT STEPHENSON. 545

until thev concentrated on the northwest angle of the Fort, evidently to
form a breach for assault. The effect of their shot was here guarded
against to some extent by bags of sand and sacks of flour being piled
against the palisade. The single six-pounder cannon in the Fort was
fired only at long intervals from scanty ammunition. Toward evening
of August 2nd an assailing party of the enemy advanced in the direction
expected, and to command which the only cannon had been placed,
masked, and doubly charged with slugs and grapeshot. At an opportune
moment, when the first column of the enemy had advanced into the
ditch within ten to fifteen paces of the six-pounder, the masked port was
opened and the cannon discharged with dire effect. The second column
that advanced to take the place of their fallen comrades, soon met great
loss and confusion from the small arms of the garrison which completed
the disastrous work of the defense. The remnant of the assailing columns
retreated precipitately and in confusion. Two hundred grenadiers who
were to assail the south side of the Fort, did not attain their position
until later. They were so warmly opposed by the small arms of the
garrison that thev soon withdrt'w.

During the night, which was now come. General Proctor sent
savages to gather the wounded and dead, which the\- did without the
range of the garrison's muskets in the darkness. About daylight the
British and their savage allies departed, leaving a small vessel contain-
ing clothing and military stores, their retreat being hastened by reports
of rallying Americans from Fort Seneca. The garrison supplied the
wounded enemy with water, at first in pails let down outside the stock-
ade and, later through an opening made under the stockade, through
which they were later taken within the enclosure and well cared for.
The British left behind of their killed three officers and twenty-five
privates; and of their wounded twenty-six who were taken prisoners.

Scouts were sent in the morning down the river to the ba\' : but
no enemy was discovered other than a few straggling British soldiers
who were surprised and captured by the Wyandot Aborigine scouts,
recently admitted to the American Army, who quickly surrendered
them at headquarters. These prisoners evidently expected to be
massacred like the American prisoners captured by the British allies:
and their trepidation and anxiety produced much merriment among
their captors who enjoyed the recollection for a long time.

General Proctor sent Doctor Banner to the Fort to enquire after
his wounded soldiers. He was treated courteously and given every
opportunity for personal examination, which was in great contrast to
the treatment by the British of Doctor M'Keehan of the Ohio Militia
who was sent by General Harrison to Amherstburg 31st January to
enquire after the wounded of General Winchester's army after the

546 THE MAUMEE RIVER BASIN.

defeat and massacre at the River Raisin. Surgeon M'Keehan after
receiving much discourteous treatment, was arrested by order of
Proctor and sent to a dungeon in Montreal.

General Harrison was informed that many of the savages with the
British were discouraged-and dissatisfied with the war since the repulse
at Lower Sandusky. He therefore sent to them at Brownstown, below
Detroit, some of his most confidential Wyandot chiefs, to confer with
Chief Walk-in-the-Water and the Wyandot warriors under him for the
purpose of spreading the disaffection toward the British, and of securing
their neutrality. Such was the alertness and discipline of the British,
however, that Colonel M'lvee and Captain Elliott were at once notified
of the visit and were present to prevent or neutralize the proposition.
The British thereupon renewed their work among the Aborigines,
extending it to the neutrals by the headwaters of the Auglaise River,
the St. Mary, and the Miami to the southward.

The signal success of Captain Croghan at Fort Stephenson ended
the invasion of Ohio by the British; and. it was soon succeeded by
other triumphs of American prowess that even drove the British from
Upper Canada. The former suggestions of General Hull of a United
States fleet or squadron of armed vessels on Lake Erie, were reported
upon favorably and, in the spring of 1812, Commodore Stewart took
action for this purpose. There was, however, liut little result from
this effort. In September Lieutenant Jesse D. Elliott was sent to
Black Rock, now part of the City of Buffalo, for the purpose of build-
ing such vessels. The 8th October two armed vessels, the Detroit and
Caledonia, arrived from Detroit and anchored under the guns of the
British Fort Erie across the Niagara River and a little above Black
Rock. Lieutenant Elliott x^lanned their capture at night and, by the
aid of Lieutenant Colonel (afterward General) Winfield Scott, he
succeeded after a series of remarkable experiences and escapes. The
Deiro/f was partly built by General Hull and went to the British with
his surrender, and her first name, Adams, was changed by her captors.
The British rallied in such force and so persistently from Fort Erie to
her relief that the Americans burned her on the Niagara River to
prevent her recapture. They were more successful in getting the
Caledonia away from the British. Little was accomplished on new
vessels, however.

General Harrison had urged the building of vessels sufficient to
cope with the increasing British squadron. This work was seriously
undertaken in the spring of 1813 under the direction of Commodore
Isaac Chauncey. This officer settled upon Master-Commander Oliver
Hazard Perry of Newport, Rhode Island, to produce the desired squad-
ron. Erie, Pennsylvania, the historic Presque Isle, had been selected

AMERICAN SQUADRON FORMING FOR LAKE ERIE. 347

as the place of rendezvous, and Commander Perry arrived there the
27th March, lyl3. The work, already well begun, now progressed
rapidly. The British Fort George on the Niagara River was captured
the "27th May, Perry there acting an important part. The Niagara
frontier now being free from the enemy, five small vessels ( the
Caledonia the small brig captured at Fort Erie, three schooners named
the Somers, Tigress and Ohio, that had been purchased, and a sloop,
the Trippe) were thus liberated from service on the Upper Niagara
River, and were taken by Perry to his rendezvous at Erie, barely evading
on the way the British squadron that was on the lookout for them.

Many obstacles and delays attended Commander Perrv's efforts;
and when his boats were ready (the}- being, in addition to those named
above, the Lawrence, flagship, and Niagara, both twenty-gun brigs, and
the schooners Scorpion, Porcupine, and Ariel which was clipper-mod-
elled) there were only men enough at hand to officer and man one of
the brigs despite his importunities to tin- contrary. While in this
predicament Perrv was annoyed — almost taunted — by letters from the
Navv Department and from General Harrison, urging him to yirocerd
against the enemy; also by the British squadron remaining in siglit of
his Erie Harbor, threatening to attack him. A few men came straggling
in 'a motley set, blacks, soldiers, and boys' and there was much
sickness. The second movement of the British against Fort Meigs,
described on preceding pages, occurred at this time, and the British ves-
sels moved from the offing to the west end of the Lake in support of it.

Master Commander Perrx's force increased, by frontiersmen and
soldiers volunteering, until at the close of July it numbered about three
hundred. On August 1st it was decided to get his ten vessels from the
Erie harbor into the Lake but, owing to the shallow water on the bar,
five days elapsed before his largest vessels when empty were gotten
across by great efforts of buoying with 'camels' or large deep scows
on each side filled with water to the brim and uprights connecting them
with horizontal timber through the forward and after ports, and then
pumping the water from the scows. Just as the vessels were in deep
water, with their armament and stores placed, some of the British
vessels appeared to the westward on their return. The Ariel and
Scorpion were sent forward and, ujjon their exchanging a few shots,
the British Captain, Robert Heriot Barclay, turned his vessels around
and retreated to Amherstburg. The sailing and maneuvering qualities
of Perry's squadron were then tried, and the mixed crews were given
some much-needed practice and discipline. The 9th August Captain
Jesse D. Elliott joined Commander Perry at Erie with about one
hundred officers and men of some experience, and he was given com-
mand of the Niagara.

348 THE MAUMEE RIVER BASIN.

The squadron left Erie on the 12th August, 1813, and sailed to the
western part of Lake Erie, casting" anchors on the 15th in a pleasant
harh()r that was soon to hv christened hv this naval force as Put-in Bav.
Communications with General Harrison had been continued, and the
16th Commander Perry sailed toward the south shore and, when off the
mouth of Portage River the 17th, he fired the signal guns agreed u]3on
as notice to the General of his approach. Direct communications were
established: and the 19th Generals Harrison, Cass, and M'Arthur,
escorted by a company from the 2Sth Regiment United States Infantry
undt'r Colonel Owings (Owens?) of Kentucky together with all the
seamen that could readily be found among the troops and twenty
volunteers under Lieutenant Coburn of Payne's company and Johnson's
regiment of cavalry, started for a visit with Perry on board the flagship
Lawrence. These mixed troops were the best that could be secured to
bring tlu' number near to that necessary for the different vessels. They
sailed the 20th to Put-in Bay to consider Put-in Bay Island as a station
for the army in its advance on Amherstburg. Commander Perry kept the
British vessels in the Detroit River under observation, but unfavorable
winds and much disabilit\' among his men, many of whom were pros-
trated with remittent fever which serious disease he was also experi-
encing, prevented his attacking them. The 31st General Harrison
reinforced the naval squadron with thirty-six more men. September
1st Perry again moved to within sight of the enemy's vessels, but they
were arranged under cover of the strong shore batteries and would not
answer his challenge.

The British had been building at Amherstburg a vessel, the Detroit,
largej than either of those under Perry's command. At the time of her
completion provisions had become scarce at Amherstburg and, on
Friday the 10th September, the British squadron was obliged to move
eastward for supplies. The vessels were early sighted by the Ameri-
cans who decided to give battle, and prepared accordingly. Perry
hoisted on his flagship, the Lawrence, his battle-flag bearing the dying
command of Captain James Lawrence in the contest of the Chesapeake
with the Shannon 'Don't Give Up the Ship.'

The battle was begun by a long range gun of the Detroit, the missile
from which fell short of its mark. Master Commander Perry reserved
his fire for short range. His flagship, the Lawrence, was the target for
most of the British shot and the results to the brig and crew were wide-
spread and direful. All of her guns became dismounted or useless and
only fourteen unhurt men remained on her deck, and only nine of these
were seamen. The room below, to which the wounded had been taken,
was above the water line and the enemy's shot frequently passed
through it continuing the work of destruction to life and vessel. Being

COMPLETE SUCCESS OF AMERICANS ON LAKE ERIE. 549

unable to do mort- in the Lawrence. Perry ordered a boat lowered while
putting on his full uniform and, giving the brig in charge of Lieutenant
Yarnell with discretionary jiowers, he with his small brother and four
oarsmen entered the boat and passed to the Niagara. He persisted in
standing most of the fifteen minutes required to make the transit, being
the target of many British guns, large and small. Taking command

of the Niagara he sent Lieutenant
Elliott in small boat to bring into
close action the more distant vessels
and, raising the Commodore pennant,
changed the course of the lirig and
broke through the British line pour-
ing at short range the full force of the
guns right and left into the discon-
certed enem\' with great effect. The
other American vessels followed the
leader and, in eight minutes after the
Niagara passed through the line the
tour principal British vessels surren-
dered. The other two, the Chippewa
and Little Belt, attempted to c-scape,
liut the Scorpion and Trippe, giving
chase, soon brought them back to
American possession. Lieutenant
Yarnell lowered the colors of the
Lawrence soon after the departure of
Commander Perry, and the enemy's
fire was thereafter directed elsewhere, they being kept too busy to take
possession of the wreck. Immediately after the surrender of the British,
was written with a firm hand those model dispatches which have been
familiar to all, the first to General William H. Harrison, viz:

Sir: We have met the enemy and they are ours: Two Ships, two Brigs, one
Schooner and one Sloop. Yours with great respect and esteem,

O. H. Perrv.

U. S. Brig Niagara, off the Western Sister [Isi.anh]

Head of Lake Erie, September 10, ISl.'i, 4 P. M.

Sir : It has pleased the Almighty to give to the arms of the United States a signal

victory over their enemies on this lake. The British squadron, consisting of two ships,

two brigs, one schooner, and one sloop, have this moment surrendered to the force

under my command after a sharp conflict.

I have the honor to be, sir, very respectfully, your obedient servant,
Honorable William Jones, Secretary of the Navy. O. H. Perry.

Commander Perr^' decided to formally receive the surrender of the
British officers on board the disabled Lawrence which he did, they

OLIVER H.\Z.\RD PERRV

Master-Conimaiider and, later. Captain in the
United States Navy. Born South KinESton,
Rhode Island, 2;Jrd August, ITKi. Died 23rd
Aucust, 1H19, in Port Spain. Trinidad Island.

350

THE MAUMEE RIVER BASIN.

winding their way between the dead Americans whose bodies yet
remained on the deck. The British commander Captain Barclay was
wounded and unable to appear. At twilight the non-commissioned
dead of friend and foe, enveloped in shrouds with cannon balls at the
feet, were dropped one by one into the Lake after the reading of the
burial service of the Episcopal Church. This sad service being
completed the vessels slowly made their way to that beautiful near-by
ba}' which has since been known as Put-in Bay ; and the dead officers
were buried on the land which received the name Put-in Bay Island.
The losses were: American, twenty-seven killed and ninety-six
wounded of whom twent3'-two killed and sixty-one wounded were
aboard the Lawrence: British, forty-one killed and ninety-four wounded.

There are various reports regarding the relative strength of the
contending squadrons. The British had six vessels carrying sixty-three
carriage guns, one on pivot, two swivels, and four howitzers. The
Americans had nine vessels with fifty-four carriage guns and two
swivels. The British squadron had thirty-five long guns and the
American fifteen, which explains the advantage of the former in the
early part of the action. In close action the weight of metal was favor-
able to the Americans. The British crews possessed , far more naval
experience than the American."^

This capture of the entire squadron, the first instance in the historj-
of America's brilliant successes on the water, had a very depressing
effect on the British and, per contra, a very enthusing effect upon the
three American Armies (the Northwestern, the Central, and the East-
ern) and upon the entire populace as well. This was the continued
work of voung officers — Perry being but twenty-seven years of age, and
his subordinates yet younger. Perry was immediately promoted to
Captain, and Congress gave him a vote of thanks and a medal. Captain
(acting Commodore) Barclay, in his report to the British Government,

* AMERICAN SQUADRON. MASTER-COMMANDER OLIVER HAZARD PERRY,

'S3 3

Name of Vessel.

RiegiriK.

o a)

O t-

O 3

Armament.

/ Lawrence.

Brie

480

1.%

105

300

2 Lonp 13's,

18 Short 32's.

2. Niagara.

Hrie.

480

155

127

300

2 Lone 12's,

18 Short 32's.

S. Caledonia.

Brie.

180

53 1

2 Lone 24's,

1 Short 3S.

4. A riel.

Schooner.

112

36 1

4 Long 12's,

( 1 burst early).

Schooner.

35 1

1 Long .32,

I Short 32.

6. Somers.

Schooner.

30 >

184

.56

1 Long 24,

1 Short 32, 2

Swivels.

7. Porcupine.

Schooner.

•&\

1 Long 32.

8. Tigress.

Schooner.

27 1

1 Long 32,

9. Trippe.

Sloop.

3.=)'

1 Long 34.

1671

.5.32

416

936

54 G

uns, 2 Swivels.

The schooner Ohio was yone to Erie for supplies.

A DAY OF THANKSGIVING IN THE FOREST.

551

■expressed high praise of Commander Perr}- for his thoughtful and kind
attention to the wounded and the prisoners, and for his magnanimity.
He not only declined to take the swords of the British officers, hut he
loaned to them one thousand dollars to be expended for their comfort.
The prisoners who were able to travel were taken to Pittsburg by wav
of Lower and Upper Sandusky, and Franklinton. The wounded and
sick were taken to Erie in the hospital vessc'ls, the Detroit. Queen
Charlotte, and Niagara. It not being practicable to repair the two first
named vessels they were left in Little Bay, Erie Harbor, where they
finally went to the bottom, followed a few years later b_v the Niagara
which had in the interim been doing good service as a receiving ship.
Colonel Richard M. Johnson's regiment of mounted infantrj- being
recalled from the southwest, was ordered to escort the army supplies
down the St. Mary, Auglaise and Maumee from Forts Barbee, Amanda
and Winchester. During its sojourn in Kentucky this regiment had
been recruited to over full numbers and, by their Lieutenant Colonel
James Johnson, brother of the Colonel, their discipline was brought to
a high state. About the 1st of September they, with the train of thirtv
wagons and a brigade of packhorses, started northward arriving at
Fort Winchester the 9th, the day appointed by President Madison
according to the Act of Congress for fasting, humiliation and prayer.
Those who chose to observe the day in that manner were encour-
aged to do so: and although there is in general but little religion to be
found in the army, yet in the evening of this day a number of little
parties were seen in different parts of the lines paving their devotions
to the God of armies, and chanting his praises with plainness, sinceritv
and zeal ; whilst their less pious but moral and orderh- compatriots

BRITISH SQUADRON. CAPTAIN-COMMANDER ROBERT HERIOT BARCLAY.

Name of Vessel.

Riseing.

O V

ho:

.'3

0 3

Armament.

I 1 Long 18, 2 Lone 24's, 6 LOnc

12s, 1

1. Detroit.

Ship.

49(1

1.50

138

■ Short 18, I Short 24, 8 Long 9's,
f on Pivot, and 2 Howitzers.

1 Gun

2. Queen Charlotte.

Ship.

4(X1

126

189

.1 1 Long 12, 2 Long 9's, 14 Short 24
1 1 Howitzer.

s, and

3. Hunter.

Brie

180

\ 4 Long 6's, 2 Long 4's, 2 Long
1 Short 12s.

2's. 2

4. Lady Prevost.

Schooner.

230

.1 1 Long 9, 2 Long Bs, 10 Short
t Howitzer.

12s. 1

5. Chippewa.

Schooner.

1 Long 9. and 2 Swivels.

6. Little Belt.

Sloop.

1 Long 12, 2 Long 6's.

1460

440

4.59

63 Guns, 4 Howitzers, 2 Swivels,

Compare Official Letters of the Military and Naval Officers of the United States During the
War with Great Britain in the Years 1812-13-14 and IBIS, by John Brannan. Washington, 1823. page
207; Lossing's War of 1812 page 520; and The Naval War of 1812 b.v Theodore Roosevelt, volume i
pages 311, 312,

552 THE MAUMEE RIVER BASIN.

preserved around them the strictest order and decorum. A pleasing
tranquility pervaded the ranks, and the patriot soldier seemed to feel a
cheerini;' confidence that the God of battles would shield him in the
hour of danger — Captain Robert B. M'Afee who was present. The
loth of September, the day of the complete victory on Lake Erie, a
spirited and valuable disciplinary sham battle was fought in the vicinity
of Fort Winchester between the infantry and cavalry, in which the
horses participated with but little less zest than their riders, being thus
taught not to fear the noise and smoke of the guns of the infantry as
their riders directed the rapid charge between their ranks.

General Harrison had invited the venerable Governor Isaac Shelby
the hero of King Mountain, South Carolina in 17H1, to accompany his
Kentucky troops to the invasion of Canada, and this invitation was
accepted. Announcement that the Governor would be present on the
march and in the field, caused great enthusiasm in Kentucky, and
nearly double the number of volunteers called for, responded giving
General Shelby the proud command of about three thousand mount-
ed men, exclusive of Colonel Johnson's Regiment. The United
States Arsenal at Newport was emptied of arms and many of the
Kentucky troops were supplied at Upper and Lower Sandusky, these
troops coming through Ohio along the course of the Right Wing of
the Northwestern Army. Upon the arrival of General Shelby and staff
at Fort Ball,, the present Tiffin, they learned of Perry's victory. A
dispatch was at once sent to Major General Henry in command of the
advancing army at Upper Sandusky to hasten forward the troops.
General Shelby met General Harrison at Fort Seneca and, passing on,
arrived September 14th at the present Port Clinton, and during the next
two days the troops arrived.

General M'Arthur was ordered to take command of Fort Meigs and
to send General Clay and his troops with those of the United States to
the rendezvous at the mouth of the Portage River where the fresh
Kentucky men were gathering; also to embark artillery and provisions
from Fort Meigs ( which was then reduced to the principal blockhouses
in the southwest corner of the enclosure ) to join the consolidated army
on the Lake, having Colonel Johnson with his mounted Regiment go
along the left bank of the Maumee River, Bay and Lake, keeping
abreast of the boats. Thus all of the Northwestern Army that could be
spared from garrison and guard duty was mobilized and concentrated.

The army also now embraced two hundred and sixty Aborigine
warriors of the Wyandot, Shawnee and Seneca tribes which General
Harrison had been placating. As a result of the desire of the British
to o'et these tribes as allies and of their desire to be engaged in the
strife, the United States Government decided to enlist them into its

THE SAVAGES COULD BE RESTRAINED. THE ADVANCE. 355

service, but with the injunction, and full undcTstandin!,^ on their part,
that thev must conform to the modes of civilized warfare. General
Harrison positively pointed out to them that they must not kill nor
injure defenseless prisoners, old men, women or children. And, if
those fr^-htins: with him would forbear such conduct it would prove that

the- ISritish could also restrain the Abo-
riii'ines with them if they desired so to do.
lie t;reatl\- pleased them by humorously
tellint; them that, inasmuch as he had
been informed that General Proctor had
promised to deliver him (General Harri-
son ) into the hands of Tecumseh if he
succeeded in capturing Fort Meigs, to be
treated as that warrior might desire, he
would promise to let them have General
Proctor as their prisoner, if they could
take him, provided they would only put
petticoats on him and treat him as a squaw.
These Aborigines accompanied the Ameri-
can army into Canada and, impliedly, were
jireseiit at the Battle of the Thames, but
no savage act has been imputed to them,
nor to those that were subsequently sub-
ject to American command. This has
been taken as additional evidence that if
the British officers did not directly instigate, they at least very willingly
permitted the savages to massacre the prisoners who had surrendered,
not to the savages but to themselves after a solemn promise of pro-
tection. Compare M'Afee's History of the War of 1812 page 303.

General Harrison was much in the saddle, personally attending to
all delinquents, and business. September 2'2nd he addressed the fol-
lowing note from Franklinton to Governor Meigs, viz; . . Be pleased
to send a company of one hundred men to Fort Meigs. Thirty or forty
will do for Lower Sandusky. I am informed that the term of the gar-
rison at Fort Findlay will expire on the :^2nd instant. Will you be
pleased to order there twenty or thirty men ?

The army commenced to embark at the mouth of the Portage River,
the present Port Clinton, on the 20th Seyjtember. The vessels under
command of Captain Perry were used as transports, excepting the wrecks
Lawrence. Detroit, and Queen Charlotte, which contained the wounded and
sick, they lieing now very airy and good hospitals. All these vessels

RICHARD MENTOR JOHNSON
Member of Congress and Colonel of
Kentucky Cavalry. Born near Louis-
ville 17th October, 1780. Died 19th No-
vember. 18.50, at Frankfort. Kentucky.*

* From Harper's Encyclopaedia of United States History.
lirothers.

■ol. ■

354 THE MAUMEE RIVER BASIN.

were viewed with great interest by the soldiers, many of whom had
never before seen such liroad water and such large boats; and the many
marks they bore of the fierce battle were associated with thoughts of
the complete victory they represented of American arms, to the enthus-
ing of the soldiers who grew impatient for an opportunity to show their
prowess in battle for their country's honor. All the horses, even those
of the officers, were left on the mainland. It required four days to
transport the army of nearly five thousand men with armament and
supjilies to Put-in Bay Island by the slow moving sail vessels. The
2.Tth the army encamped on Middle Sister Island which, being but six
or eight acres in size, afforded only close cjuarters.

General Harrison in comjiany with Cai)tain Perry on the Ariel
reconnoitered the enemy at Amherstburg and returned in time to issue
a general order to embark against them the next morning. He also
prepared for issue the next day the following General Order: The
General entreats his brave troo]is to remember that they are the sons
of sires whose fame is immortal [soldiers of the Revolutionary War]
that they are to fight for the rights of their insulted country, whilst
their opponents combat for the unjust pretensions of a master. Ken-
tuckians, remember the River Raisin, but remember it only whilst the
victory is suspended. The revenge of a soldier cannot be gratified
upon a fallen eneni}' — By command, Robert Butler ;\.cting Adjutant
General. "^

The weather continued favorable and, after seven hours sail Sep-
tember 27, 1813, in sixteen armed vessels and near one hundred
smaller boats, the army landed about four o'clock in the afternoon on
the sandy shore of Canada about three miles below Amherstburg, form-
erly the ill-famed Maiden. There was no enemy found to dispute the
landing nor the entrance into the town. The British troops and their

*The sad massacre of Kentuckians at the River Kaisiii nine months previous to this date by the
savage allies of the British had. like most stirring events in war, been commemorated in song. X stanza
of one of the songs often heard around the campfires of the Northwestern army of these times runs as .
follows :

Freemen! no longer bear such slaughters;

Avenge your country's cruel woe ;
Arouse, and save your wives and daughters!
Arouse and smite the faithless foe !

Chorl's — Scalps are bought at stated prices.
Maiden pays the price in gold.

The British policy toward the Colonies, and also toward the United States had been, as expressed
in the New Quarterly Review and British Colonial Register No. 4. London, following Perry's victory,
as follows: . We dare assert, and recent events have gone far in establishing the truth of the prop-

osition, that the Canadas cannot be effectually and durably defended without the friendship of the Abori-
gines and command of the lakes and the River St. Lawrence. , We must consider the interest of the
Aborigines as our own; for men whose very name is so formidable to an American, and whose friendship
has recently been shown (in the savage massacres of Winchester's and Dudley's troops! to be of such
great importance to us. we cannot do too much, , , — Compare Lossine's Pictorial Field-Book of th§
War of 1812, page .536, .

ESCAPE OF BRITISH FROM AMHERSTBURG. PURSUIT. 355

savage allies had hastily departed after setting fire to the army and
navy buildings, and to all the public stores they could not carry away.
A few troops were hurried forward and they prevented the British from
destroying the bridges. U]ion intiuiring among the few people remain-
ing in the town for horses on which to mount the general officers, it
was ascertained that Proctor had taken them all, more than one thous-
and, and only one small pony could be found by the Americans and
this was taken for General Shelby's use.

Leaving Colonel Smith's regiment of riflemen at Amherstburg to
guard the smaller boats and the town against prowling savages, the
Americans pressed forward the next morning, and soon after midday of
the 29th September they arrived at Sandwich, Captain Perry's vessels
arriving about the same time.

General M'Arthur with seven hundred men was sent across the
river to Detroit to guard against the large number of savages reported
in the woods near-by. and they drove away a band of savages in the
town and found that Fort Lernoult had been abandoned by the British
and partly burned, the fire having been e.xtinguished by the citizens
who now generally welcomed the Americans. A few days later the
Aborigines who had become discouraged with the British on account of
their disaster at Lower Sandusky, on Lake Erie, and at Amherstburg,
and who did not follow Proctor's retreating columns — the Ottawas,
Chippewas, Pottawotamis, Miamis and Kickapoos — came to General
M'Arthur for peace, and he reported to the Secretary of War October
6th that he had agreed with them that hostilities should cease for the
present on their agreeing 'to take hold of the same tomahawk with us,
and to strike all who are or may be enemies of the United States,
whether British or Aborigines. They are to bring in a number of their
women and children and leave them as hostages whilst they accompany
us to war. Some of them have already brought in their women, and
are drawing rations.' . . The W'yandots were soon added to the
above mentioned tribes sueing for peace; but no effort was made to
marshal any of them against the British.

The martial law that had lieen enforced by the British at Detroit
was now declared ended by proclamation of General Harrison who also
reproclaimed the civil government of the Territory of Michigan which
ended with the surrender of Hull in June, iHli. Colonel Johnson's
regiment arrived at Detroit the SOth, having brought along four pieces
of light field artillery from Fort Meigs, and they were ordered across
the river the 1st October. A council of officers decided to continue
the pursuit of the enemy by land rather than by water. General
M'Arthur and his brigade remained at Detroit: a brigade and one
regiment were left at Sanduich, and the main body of the army,

S56 THE MAUMEE RIVER BASIN.

numbering about three thousand and five hundred, started the 2nd of
October as'ain on the track of the British, having obtained some horses
in addition to those ridden to Detroit by Colonel Johnson's regiment.
Captain Perry took the heavy baggage and much of the supplies on
some of his vessels to the mouth of the Thames River in Lake St.
Clair; and he there learned that some small vessels bearing the British
cannon and heavy baggage had just escaped him and passed up the
river beyond where his vessels could go. Evidentlv the British did
not expect to be pursued bevond Sandwich as they did not destroy the
bridges. The road being good, the army was enabled to progress
rapidly without the artillery and baggage carried by Perry's vessels.
Seven deserters from the enemy were met, and the situation of the
enemy was learned from them. The next day a small detachment of
the eneni}' which had been sent to destroy some bridges, was captured.
Captain Perr\' received permission to accompany the army, leaving
his boats well guarded. The Americans passed up the River Thames,
their cannon driving Aborigines and others awav from partially
destroyed bridges which were speedily repaired for the army's use.
The Wyandot Chief Walk-in-the-Water with sixty of his warriors
reported as deserters from the British to the General who, being intent
after the main foe, told the Aborigines to keep out of the way of the
American Army : and they returned to Detroit. The British attempted
to destroy their stores and whatever was burdensome to them. They
set fire to a house near Chatham which contained near a thousand
muskets. These were saved by the Americans. They burned other
buildings and three of their small vessels, which contained artillery
and heavy munitions — from which our army saved two twent\-four-
pounder cannon and considerable ammunition ; and early in the morning
of the 5th two of the enemy's gunboats and several bateaux laden with
supplies were captured, with more prisoners. The Thames was crossed
at Arno.ld's Mill, partly by each cavalryman taking an infantryman
behind him on his horse, and partly by means of the bateaux. Early
in the afternoon scouts reported the position of the British and savages
as near and well chosen for defense. The Americans at once advanced
to the battle which was sharp and decisive. The mounted regiment of
Colonel R. M. Johnson broke the British lines liy its impetuous charge
and in less than five minutes after the first shot near the entire British
force threw down their arms and surrendered. The savages started
their part well but were after a few minutes unable to withstand the
rifles of the Kentuckians. Tecumseh was killed, whether by Colonel
R. M. Johnson or other is not known; and no one could for long rally
the savages against the victorious Americans. General Proctor with a
few followers attempted to escape in his carriage, but he was so closely

DEFEAT OF BRITISH AT THE THAMES. FORT SHELBY. 357

pressed that he rushed into the forest on foot and, later finding a horse,
was sixty-five miles from the battle-field within twenty-four hours.
.His carriage and private papers, and much valualile militarv material,
were captured including six brass cannon, three of which were captured
from the British in the Revolutionary War and were surrendered to
them by Hull at Detroit.

The American loss in the liattle of the Thames was about fifteen
killed and thirty wounded including the brave Colonel R. M. Johnson.
The British loss was about eighteen killed, twentv-six wounded, and
six hundred prisoners including twenty-five officers. The savages left
thirty-three of their dead on the field. Further is not definitely known,
but their loss must have been large from wounds and want of proper
care. Some of the severely wounded and dead were doubtless carried
away, including Tecumseh.

The American army started on its return to Detroit the 7th of
October. General Harrison went before at a more rajiid pace, leaving
General Shelby in command. They arrived at Sandwich on the 10th
in a cold, driving snow storm. This storm injured some of the vessels
on their return from the Thames and caused the loss of much of the
military property captured from the British. It also put a stop to the
contemplated movement against Mackinaw; but report was soon received
that the small British garrison had abandoned that post, which was
probably not correct, as this point was the kej' to the northern and
northwestern fur trade. The reports of the signal victory at the Thames
were received throughout the United States with illuminations, bonfires,
and patriotic addresses in which General Harrison was much lauded.
Congress afterwards gave him a vote of thanks, and a gold medal.

General Harrison appointed General Lewis Cass civil and militarv
Governor of Michigan, and directed him to retain his brigade of
soldiers, numbering about one thousand men, to guard against the
savages and to hold the Territory against invasion by the British.
This appointment was confirmed by the United States Senate, and
General Cass continued in this office several years. The fort at Detroit
was repaired and the name Fort Lernoult, which it had borne since
1778, was changed to Fort Shelby in honor of Kentucky's distinguished
Governor. The Kentucky volunteers were permitted to return home.
They stopped at the River Raisin on their way and there buried such
remains as could be found (sixty-five skeletons) of the massacred
soldiers of General Winchester's army of the jirevious Januarv — See
ante page 311. They also stopped at the mouth of the Portage River
to get their horses.

The garrisoning of the several forts in this Basin being provided
for. General Harrison sailed with about thirteen hundred soldiers in

558 THE MAUMEE RIVER BASIN.

Captain Perry's squadron for Buffalo* whert they arrived tlie 24tli
Octolier to co-operate with the Army of the Center; liut he did not
there remain as a party to the resulting defeats. On account of antag-
onisms in the War Department his able and successful work in the War
of 1812 had been nearly completed. He returned to his family in
Cincinnati where he retained headquarters until he resigned his
commission 11th May, 1814, to take effect on the 31st of that month.

The North-west experienced comparative quiet after the imrsuit and
defeat of the British by the Thames, but not for long. Food and money
became scarce and some successes of the British over the Army of the
Center, again brought anxiety to this region. The following extracts
from a letter to Governor Meigs written by General John S. Gano under
date of Headquarters Ohio Militia, Lower Sandusky January 16th, 1814,
show something of the condition of affairs at that date, viz:

I have the pleasure to inform you that after repeated solicitations, and much delay,
the paymaster has succeeded in obtaining two month's pay for the troops under my com-
mand. I have sent him on to Detroit, as the men there are in great want of money to
purchase necessaries, etc.t Yesterday the Lieutenant and Surgeon of the Navy, Cham-
plain and Eastman, left this post for Put-in Bay. They arrived the evening before, and
report they have everything arranged to give the enemy a warm reception should they
visit them. About forty pieces of cannon can be brought to play upon them at any point.
I find, however, they want men. I shall send in the regulars from Seneca as soon as
possible, to reinforce them which is absolutely necessary from the Lieutenants represen-
tations to me. We have not had the detailed account from Buffalo, etc. Majors Vance
and Meek have just arrived from Detroit, and give me a favorable account from that
quarter as to the exertions of Colonel Butler, to whom I sent Major Vance as an express.
There is a detachment under Major Smiley up the River Thames who will, I hope, fare
better than Larwell. The militia are very tired of the service there, and all are begin-
ning to count days. They have had an immense deal of fatigue and severe duty to

* General Harrison received, by messeniier Lieutenant Le Breton, a letter from Major General
Proctor dated October 18th (place of writing not siven) addressed to fiim at the Moravian towns by
the Thames, but delivered at Detroit before his departure from that place. This letter requested the
return of private papers and property captured by the Americans at the Battle of the Thames; also a
request for mild treatment of the British prisoners and subjects. This writing of General Proctor was
considered by General Harrison unnecessary as such requests had been already provided for; and, fur-
ther, it was asking from him what General Proctor had not been known to accord to Americans. Lieu-
tenant Le Breton was given good opportunity to see that the proprieties of civilization had been complied
with in regard to the British. He was not permitted to return by land, however, but was taken across Lake
Erie in boat with General Harrison. He was given in reply a letter dated Headquarters, Fort George,
November 3, 1813, addressed, not to Proctor but to Major General \^incent the ranking officer. This
letter cited three instances, of the many in addition to Winchester's and Dudley's troops, of atrocious
savage murders and mutilations committed on inoffensive American men, women and children by savage
members of the British army wliose officers were at least privy to the deeds and did not subject their
perpetrators to discipline. Eloquent protest was again made against such atrocious warfare, and
demand for its cessation, truthfully adding that 'the effect of these barbarities will not be confined to
the present generation. Ages to come will feel the deep rooted hatred and enmity which they must
produce between the two nations.' He also declared that, if the British persisted in such inhumanities,
retaliation would be the result — Official Letters, etc.. by John Brannan, 1833.

t The procuring of the necessaries of life was difficult during all these early years; but the years
1814-15 were classed as years of unusual scarcity. Ohio money had been at twenty-five per cent or more
discount for several years, and now it was very difficult to get. Individual due-bills had also been in
extensive circulation, and attended with much loss.

DIFFICULTIES IN OBTAINING SOLDIERS AND FOOD. 359

perform. The fort at Portage is progressing and is the best piece of work in the Western
country as to strength. The men draw the timber to admiration — eighty or ninety logs
a day without a murmur. The teams have been, and are, useless for want of forage.
The greatest part have actually died. I wrote in November to Quartermaster Gardiner
for funds to be sent to the Quartermaster's assistant here to purchase forage, which
could have been obtained two or three hundred miles from here. If three hundred
dollars could have been sent on, I think it would have saved the United States three
thousand ; and I assure you I have used every exertion to preserve and protect the public
property. As I before observed, nothing will induce the militia to remain after their term
of service expires, which will be the last of next month. Is there any information from
General Harrison or the Secretary of War on this subject ? I am only anxious on account
of the public property that may be left exposed. I have this post in a tolerable state of
defense, as well as all the posts I command, which, you know, are scattered from Dan
to Beersheba ; and each must rely on its own strength for its defense. I have had an
immense detail business in communication, etc.

Flour is very scarce at all the frontier posts. I have been between ' hawk and
buzzard' — the commissary and contractor; and between the two, as is usual, must fail.
What a wretched system of Warfare.

P. S. An express by a naval officer has just arrived from Erie. Lieutenant
Packet has given me a full account of the loss of the posts below, at Niagara. The
enemy possessed themselves of the artillery, military stores, etc., etc.. to a large amount ;
and there is no doubt but an attempt to take or destroy the vessels at Put-in Bay will be
attempted, and Captain Elliott has requested a reinforcement of two hundred men to
send to the Island, which I have not the power to furnish. I have ordered a few regulars
from Seneca, and will send a few militia. My troops are so scattered, I have no dispos-
able force without evacuating some of the posts that contain considerable military stores.
I wrote some time since to General Harrison, recommending him to send on the recruits.
They certainly will be wanted as soon as the British can move on the ice or by water to
Detroit or the Islands. I fear we shall lose all that has been gained, unless great exer-
tions are used to reinforce ; and supply of provisions is much wanted.

Fort Meigs had suffered much from short rations and, al)out the
middle of January, some of the soldiers of the garrison were sent up
the river to Fort Winchester where they obtained as much as they could
carry, and transported it to Fort Meigs as best they could. The quan-
tity of flour at Fort Winchester the latter part of January was mentioned
by General Gano as 'two or three hundred barrels' while Fort Meigs
continued very short. General Gano wrote to General Harrison the
27th that . . 'I think I would hang half of the ciuartermasters and
all the contractors If I was to remain in service much longer: and I
am astonished how you have managed with them to effect the objects
you have, for there appears no system or regularity with any of them.'
Eighty soldiers were reported sick at Fort Meigs the 27th
January, 1H14. ' March and May, 1814,' there were reported at Fort
Meigs 9461 rations of meat ; 29,.S90 of flour: 25,6HH of whiskey; 1271
quarts salt: 1018-/'4 pounds soap; 94H lbs. candles; and 1584 lbs.
tallow and grease.*

* American State Papers, Militai y .\ttairs volume ii paue 661.

360 THE MAUMEE RIVER BASIN.

The fears of attack by the enemy expressed by General Gano were
not realized ; but fears were often again excited during' the summer and
fall. Lieutenant Colonel Butler, in temporary command at Detroit,
being informed the last of January or early in February that a body of
British and Canadian soldiers, and savages, were by the River Thames
near Chatham, sent Captain Lee with a squad of cavalry to investigate.
The Americans went around the enemy, attacked them fiercely, scattered
them, and took several prisoners, including Colonel Babie (Bahbie)
who led a band of western savages to the New York frontier the
summer or fall of 1813. A little later in February Lieutenant Colonel
Butler Sent one hundred and sixty soldiers, with two six-pounder
cannon, under Captain Jeremiah Holmes, against the British Fort
Talbot one hundred miles or more from Detroit on the north shore of
Lake Erie. Deeming it unwise to attack that Fort, Captain Holmes
passed across country to Delaware on the Thames when the enemy,
superior in numbers, led him on to the Longwoods where they gave
battle for an hour about dark on March 3rd. Both parties withdrew
during the night. The Americans lost seven in killed and wounded.

Early in July, 1814, a small sijuadron of vessels left Detroit for the
capture of Fort Mackinaw and other posts in that region important to
the British fur trade. Some time had been given to preparation for
this expedition. Arthur St. Clair was in command of the vessels
Niagara. Caledonia. Scorpion, St. Lawrence and Tigress, and George
Croghan, now a Lieutenant Colonel, in command of the five hundred
United States troops and two hundred and fifty militia which had quar-
ters on the vessels. When the squadron arrived at Fort Gratiot,
recently built by order of General M'Arthur at the head of St. Clair
Strait or River, Croghan's force was augmented by Colonel William
Colgreave's regiment of Ohio volunteers and Captain Gratiot. A
desired attack on a new British post on Matchadach Bay was abandoned
after several davs' trial to get through the narrow channels between the
islands in the fogs, and without a familiar pilot. Sailing to Fort St.
Joseph, toward Lake Superior, they found it abandoned. The buildings
here were destroyed by part of the expedition while others pressed for-
ward to the Saut Ste. Marie where they arrived July 21st to find that
John Johnson 'a renegade magistrate from Michigan' agent of the
fjritish Northwest Company, had just departed with his assistants,
carrying away all the property possible, but setting fire to the com-
pany's sloop. This fire was extinguished by the Americans but the
vessel proving unseaworthy she was again fired. After destroying the
buildings, the Americans returned to St. Joseph, and the squadron
arrived at Mackinaw Jul\- 26th, where they were to suffer repulse.
Deciding it unwise for the vessels to attack the fort in front, Croghan's

LOSS OF TWO BOATS. SUCCESSFUL DETOUR. 561

men were landed and proceeded to a rear attack. They were met,
however, by such severe fire by the British and concealed savages, that
they retreated to the boats with a loss of thirteen killed, including
Major Holmes, and fifty-five wounded, including Captains Van Horn
and Desha, and Lieutenant Jackson. Two were missing. Passing to
the Nautawassaga River, they captured the blockhouse three miles from
its mouth, but the valuable furs of the Northwest Company had been
removed, and their vessel burned. The vessels now sailed for Detroit
excepting the Tigress with Captain Champlin, and the Scorpion with
Captain Turner, with crews of near thirty men each, which were left as
a blockade to cut off supplies from the garrison at Mackinaw. This
they did effectually until the night of the 3rd September when the
Tigress, being alone, was captured by a stealthy and overwhelming
force; which force, in turn, deceived the Scorpion's officers and crew to
a close contact when she was also boarded and overwhelmed. These
disasters, with tht' loss of the post at Prairie du Chien on the 17th Juh',
again increased the ajiprehensions of the Americans throughout the
Northwest.

The savages becoming more aggressive around Lake Michigan,
General M'Arthur was directed to gather mounted men to proceed
against them. He arrived at Detroit through Ohio the 9th October,
with about seven hundred men gathered from Ohio and Kentucky. The
American army under General Jacob Brown being sorely pressed on
the Niagara frontier, General M'Arthur, deciding to divert some of the
British forces from that point, executed the most daring raid of the war
through Canada. Starting northward from Detroit after the middle of
October with seven hundred and fifty men and five field cannon, he
circled around Lake St. Clair, crossed the River St. Clair on the 2(ith,
moved rajtidly through the Scotch settlement of Baldoon, the Moravian
Towns on the Thames, and London, arriving at Oxford the 4th Novem-
ber. Here he found a considerable force of militia which he disarmed
and paroled; and he punished those who viciously opposed him bv
burning their houses. He moved eastward and passed through Bur-
ford to Brantford on the Grand River. Here, being o]ii)osed bv the
Iroquois Aborigines resident there, the militia and British, he turned
southward, attacked the militia at Malcolm Hill by the Grand River,
killing and wounding seven and taking one hundred and thirtv-one
prisoners. The only American loss on this raid was one killed and si.x
wounded at this point. The flouring mill and its belongings were here
destroyed: also several mills on his way to Dover on Lake Erie.
These mills had been the chief source of supply to the British in their
operations against the Central Army. At Dover General M'Arthur
turned westward passing through Simcoe, St. Thomas, and near the

362 THE MAUMEE RIVER BASIN.

Thames, being pursued some distance by eleven hundred British regu-
lar troops. The 17th November this successful American raid ended
at Sandwich, where all the volunteers so desiring were discharged.

Returning to Ohio, from this most daring of marches through the
enemy's country, Brigadier General Duncan M'Arthur, then command-
ing the 8th Military District, wrote a confidential letter to Thomas
Worthington, then Governor of Ohio, under date Chillicothe, Decem-
ber 13, 1814, as follows:

With serious concern for the safety of the Northwestern frontier. I have the honor
to submit to your consideration, and that of the Legislature of Ohio, a statement in rela-
tion to the situation of affairs in this district. The contractor failed in November to sup-
ply the troops at Detroit with the flour part of the ration, and they are now subsisting
upon the immediate resources of the adjacent country. The advanced state of the season
precludes the hope that any flour can be forwarded by lake transportation, should it have
been collected at Krie, of which there is no authentic account. A considerable supply is
reported by the contractor to be in readiness to be taken down the St. Mary and Miami
of the Lake [Maumee] as soon as practicable, of which there can be no certainty until
April. Three or four thousand hogs are reported by the contractor to be in readiness to
proceed to Detroit by the route of the Auglaise, or Hull's Road. Subsequent information
as to the number collected, and the price allowed to sub-contractors, induces a belief that
not more than one thousand will reach that place. These facts have been communicated
to the Government, with a request that funds might be transmitted to this place to enable
a special commissary to endeavor to supply the troops of the frontier. There is reason
to presume that a delay for an arrangement of this kind would be fatal ; more especially
as it is the intention of the Government to increase the military force of the North-
western frontier.

I have, therefore, to request of your Excellency to solicit the Legislature of Ohio to
aid the United States in effecting this important object in such a manner as they, in their
wisdom, may deem most expedient. The loan of thirty thousand dollars would probably
enable a person duly authorized to forward to Detroit, by way of Sandusky, five hundred
barrels of flour, and fifteen hundred hogs.

Overtures for peace having been made, however, and peace com-
missioners appointed by the United States and Great Britain, a treaty
closing the war was signed at Ghent, Belgium, December 24, 1814.
And now came the time when the United States first entered into the
full, peaceable, continued possession and jurisdiction of the territorj^
of the Maumee River Basin and to the northward and westward — rights
that should have been fully accorded this Government by Great Britain
over thirty years before according to the Treaty of Paris. The infamy
of the British Government during these thirty-eight years — from 1776
to 1815 — is but sketched in minor part on the preceding pages. The
strongest of language is necessary for its proper characterization.
The later offenses were all the more reprehensible from the British being
obliged November 30, 1782, to recognize in treaty the rights of the
struggling patriots whom they had impoverished by many years of
continued violation of civilized warfare ! .And then, after becoming

CLOSE OF THE WAR OF 1812.

563

somewhat recuperated, they acted the part of a conscienceless bully
.yet thirty years, harassing personally and with the savages whom they
continued to encourage to the commitment of the most inhuman
butcheries and atrocities!*

The discharge of volunteers and drafted militiamen followed the
receipt of the news of peace as soon as practicable for the preservation
of the jiublic property: and all classes of people united in the general
rejoicings. The forts were rapidly dismantled and abandoned, only the
principal ones being continued during the winter. Fort Winchester
was abandoned in the sjiring of IHl.o, the equipment being taken down
the Maumee to Fort Meigs, and thence to Detroit. The garrison of
Fort Meigs had been reduced to forty men under command of Lieuten-
ant Almon Gibbs, and the ordnance to four cannon. These, with the
militarv stores, were loaded on the schooner Blacksnake under Cajitain
Jacob Wilkinson, in May, 1H15, and taken to Detroit, thus leaving but
one military post. Fort Wayne, in this Basin.

''^ Thomas Jeftersoii fully understood the British Goveninient. In Autjust, IHI-3. he wrote that . .
the regeneration of the British government will take a longer time than I have to live. ... I shall
make my exit with a bow to it as the most flagitious of BOvernnients I leave among men. . . . Also
after the Treaty of Ghent, in lyi.'i. he wrote : . . We know that the government of England, maintaining
itself by corruption at home, uses the same means in other countries of which she has any jealousy, by
subsidizing agitators and traitors among themselves to distract and paralyze them. She sufficiently
manifests that she has no disposition to spare ours. . . . Also in 1S16, . . . Great Britain in her
pride and ascendency, has certainly hated and despised us beyond every earthly object. Her hatred
may remain, but the hour of her contempt is passed and is succeeded by dread: not a present, but a
distant and deep one. It is the greater as she feels herself plunged into an abyss of ruin from which no
human means point out an issue. We also have more reason to hate her than any nation on earth. .
— The Je/fersom'an Cyclopedia, Funk and Wagnalls Company, 19<.K), pages 29^. 399.

.*\ Cavalryman's Spur, found many years ago near the Maumee River below Defiance. Uiaineter
of wheel about three inches. In the .Author's Collection.

564 THE MAUMEE RIVER BASIN.

CHAPTER XII.

Later Descendants of the Aborigines — Final Treaties —
Their Removal Westward.

The savages, the much valued allies of the British, were left with-
out means of obtaining food for the winter after the Battle of the
Thames. As at the close of the Revolutionary War they turned at
once, and with as little apparent regret for their past hostilities, to the
Americans for their support — anxious to be fed, even if their savage
propensities could not be gratified as they had been bN- the British.
As formerly they gathered at Detroit in such great numliers that they
could not be fully fed, and they went about the streets gathering and
devouring so far as they could the rinds of pork, crumbs, bones, and
everything thrown out by the citizens and soldiers.''' The decrepit, the
women, and the children began to gather around General M'Arthur
soon after the American army started from Sandwich for the Thames;
and representatives of the Miamis, Ottawas, Pottawotamis, Chippewas
and Kickapoos, all soon desired to be recognized in treaty council —
and to be fed.

Upon their delivering hostages for their good behavior, and agree-
ing to deliver all their prisoners at Fort Wa\ne, General Harrison
arranged for a treaty council to be held at Greenville, Ohio, the follow-
ing summer; and his pacific as well as discii>linary work among these
Aborigines was attended with such success that he and General Cass
met the representatives of several tribes and their families, numbering
about four thousand (?) at Greenville, Ohio, July 22, 1814, according
to agreement, and there effected a treaty as follows:

Article 1. The United States and the Wyandots, Delawares, Shawanese, and
Senecas, give peace to the Miami nation of Aborigines, formerly designated as the Miami,
Eel River, and Wea tribes ; they extend this indulgence, also, to the bands of the
Pottawatamies which adhere to the grand sachem Tobinipee, and to the chief Onoxa ; to
the Ottawas of Blanchard River who have attached themselves to the Shawanese tribe,
and to such of the said tribe as adhere to the chief called the Wing in the neighborhood
of Detroit, and to the Kickapoos under the direction of the chiefs who sign this Treaty.

Article 3. The tribes and bands abovementioned, engage to give their aid to the
United States in prosecuting the war against Great Britain and such of the Aborigine
tribes as stil! continue hostile, and to make no peace with either without the consent of
the United States. The assistance herein stipulated for, is to consist of such number of
their warriors from each tribe as the President of the United States, or any officer
having his authority therefor, may require.

Article F>. The Wyandot tribe, and the Senecas of Sandusky and Stony Creek
[Michigan] the Delaware and Shawanese tribes who have preserved their fidelity to the
United States throughout the war, again acknowledge themselves under the protection

'■ Compare Samuel R. Brown's. Views on Lake Erie. pai;e 95.

EXPENDITURES FOR ABORIGINES IN WAR OF 1812. 565

of the said States, and of no other Power whatever, and agree to aid the United States
in the manner stipulated for in the former article, and to make no peace but with the
consent of the said States.

Article 4. In the event of a faithful performance of the conditions of this treaty,
the United States will confirm and establish all the boundaries between their lands and
. those of the Wyandots, Delawares, Shawanese, and Miamis, as they existed previously
to the commencement of the war.

A large number of Pottawotamis, Winnebagoes and Chippewas,
yet adhered to the British. The Agency for the payment of annuities
to these people had been kept open during the war, first at Fort Wayne
and later at Piqua, Ohio. The following list of payments by John
Johnston Agent, show which tribes remained more generally within the
American lines, the vacant spaces indicating which tribes followed the
fortunes of the British, viz:

ANNUITIES DUE, P.\ID AND DELIVERED TO THE DIFFERENT ABORIGINE TRIBES
FROM .Srd march, 1811. TO 3rd .MARCH, 181,5.

Tribe

Annual Amount

Appropriations

by Ditterent

A£ts of

Congress

Amount Paid
1811

Amount Paid
IHl:;

.Amount Paid
1813

Amount Paid
1814

s 2,:i00.oo

1.100.00
1.000.00
2.400.00

L.SOO.OO
1.1.")0.00
1.000.00
1,000.00
1,000.00
1,400.00
1,800.00
1,800.00
4,.-)00.00

$ 2,!)48.,Sit
1.100.10
1.000.7.'i
1.000..")4
l,7il!).2t

;.")0.oo

."lOO.dO
1,000.00

',100. 00
1,400.00
1,800.00
1,800.00
4,.-)00,00

28, 2:!!). 2.')

Eel River

S 1,.")00.00

fOO.OO

L.SOO.OO

$ l,.i00.82

S 1 . .")00 00

l:!!):^.04

i.:ioo,oo .

Wea

Kickapoo

1,000.00
1,010.28
L.SOO.OO
L.S00.00
4,410.00

2i,o:i:!.8:!

400.00

I 000 00

4,.-)00.00
lit,fi31.,S8

2,:ioo.oo

To more distant /

20 4,")i 00

Tribes \

Total payments......

5 48,788.77

s:u,7.->4.ii

S27,42.>.74

S2(i,,"),")1.00

The Presents, Provisions and other supplies furnished Aborigines
from 4th March, 1811, to 4th March, 1815, in addition to the foregoing
amounted as follows: For Tribes on North and Northwestern Fron-
tiers §225,788,02; Western Frontier $32,116.53: Southern Frontier
$150,523.87; Those Visiting Seat of Government $30,350.94; At Detroit
Agency $11,233.55; At Fort Wayne $32,175.14 ; At Kaskaskia $10,410. 30 :
At Vincennes $1,671.18; and at Chicago $2,377.55. Property within
the Fort Wayne Agency taken and destroyed by the Aborigines, Listed
31st March, 1814, $5,500.00: Chicago $13,074.47: Michilimackinac
$12,961.31: Sandusky $6,333.83.* After the driving of the British

* American State Papers, Aborigine Affairs volume ii paces 29. 30,

566 THE MAUMEE RIVER BASIN.

from Amherstburs and Detroit, and particularly after the Treaty of
Greenville in 1H14, the amount expended for the Aborigines by the
Ihiited States increased materially.

During' the summer and fall of 1815 nearJy all the Mississippi tribes
were gathered into councils and treaties and, in these as in all other
similar acts of the United States, great magnanimity was manifested —
no penalty was exacted but, in the language of each treaty 'every injury
or act of hostility was forgiven and forgotten.' These tribes were the
lowas, Ixickayjoos, Sioux of the Lakes, Sioux of St. Peters, Pianke-
shaw's, Great and Little Osage tribes, Yanctons, Mahas, Foxes, Tee-
tons, Sacs, and Kansas. A treaty was also held 8th September, 1815,
at Spring Wells, Michigan, at which 'the United States gave peace to
the Chippewa, Ottawa, and Pottawotami tribes' and restored to them
tliL'ir former possessions 'they agreeing again to place themselves
under the protection of the United States, and of no other Power what-
soever.' And 'in consideration of the fidelity to the United States
which has been manifested by the Wyandot, Delaware, Seneca, and
Shawnee tribes throughout thi_' late war, and of the repentance of the
Miami tribe, as manifested b\' placing themselves under the protection
of the United States by the Treaty of Greenville in 1814, the said
States agree to pardon such of the chiefs and warriors of said tribes as
may have continued hostilities against them until the close of the war
with Great Britain, and to permit the chiefs of their respective tribes
to restore them to the stations and property which they held previous
to the war' they renewing and confirming the Treaty of Greenville in
1795, and all subsequent ones. A treaty with the Weas and Kickapoos,
like those here mentioned was entered into at Fort Harrison by the
middle Wabash 4th June, 1H1(3. And a renewing of treaties was in-
dustriously sought and entered into with all the other tribes, east and
west, north and south.

The Aborigines generally, sated with war, had been comporting
themselves in comparative quiet under the paternal ministrations of the
United States since the close of the War of \H\2.* The principal

'•"The niimher of Aborigines 'of all atjes and sexes within the Stale of Ohio in 1816' was reported
to be, with their locations, as follows:

Wyandots, by Sandusky River and its tributaries 695

Shawnees, by the upper Auglaise River, and by the upper Miami, principal village

Wapakoneta, 840

Delawares, by the head waters of the Sandusky and Muskingum Rivers 161

Senecas, and others of the Six Nations, between Upper and Lower Sandusky at and

near Seneca Town 450

Senecas. Munseys. and Delawares, by the headwaters of the Miami at and near Lew-

iston. .SO miles northeast of Pi'jua 434

Ottawas, about Maumee Bay and Lake Erie, near Fort Meigs, and by the Auglaise

River — numbers not stationary — about 450

[Completed on opposite page) . Total 3036

DIFFICULTIES IN CIVILIZING THE ABORIGINES. 367

difficulties in civilizinj^^ thum at this time as heretofore, are portrayed in
a letter addressed 27th August, 1817, to Thomas L. M'Kinney Super-
intendent of Aborigine Affairs, Washington, by Benjamin F. Stickney
then Agent to the Miamis and Pottawotamis at Fort Wayne. These
difficulties were the same among all the tribes, and were in addition to
their native savage instincts, viz:

I shall pay every attention to the subject of your letter, developing the exalted
views of philanthropy of the Kentucky Baptist Society for Propagating the Gospel
among the Heathen. The civilization of the Aborigines is not a new subject to me. I
have been, between five and six years, in the habit of daily and hourly intercourse with
the Aborigines northwest of the Ohio, and the great question of the practicability of
civilizing them ever before me. That I might have an opportunity of casting in my mite
to the bettering of the condition of these uncultivated human beings, and the pleasure of
observing the change that might be produced on them, were the principal inducements
to my surrendering the comforts of civilized society.

Upon my entering on my duties. I soon found that my speculative opinions were
not reducible to practice. What I had viewed at a distance as flying clouds, proved upon
my nearer approach to be impassible mountains. Notwithstanding these discouraging
circumstances, I am ready to aid your views by all proper means within my power ; and
in so doing believe I embrace the views of the United States Government of which I am
Agent. . . It will be proper for me to be more particular, and give you something of
my ideas of the nature and extent of the obstacles to be met.

Firstly. The great, and I fear insurmountable, obstacle is the insatiable thirst
FOR intoxicating LiyuoRS that appears to be born with all the yellow-skin inhabitants of
America ; and the thirst for gain of some of the citizens of the United States appears to
be capable of eluding all the vigilance of the Government to stop the distribution of
liquor among them. When the Aborigines cannot obtain the means of intoxication within
their own limits, they will travel any distance to obtain it. There is no fatigue,
risk, or expense, that is too great to obtain it. In some cases it appears to be
valued higher than Hfe itself. If a change in habit in this can be effected, all other
obstacles may yield. But if the white people can not be restrained from furnishing them
spirituous liquors, nor they from the use of them. I fear all efforts to extend to them the
benefits of civilization will prove fruitless. The knowledge of letters serves as the
medium of entering into secret arrangements with white people to supply the means of
their own destruction and, within the limits of my intercourse, the principal use of the
knowledge of letters or civilized language has been for them to obtain liquor for them-
selves and others.

Secondly. The general aversion to the habits, manners, customs, and dress of
civilized people ; and, in many cases, an Aborigine is an object of jealousy for being
acquainted with a civilized language, and it is made use of as a subject of reproach
against him.

Thirdly. General indolence, connected with a firm conviction that the life of a
civilized man is that of slavery, and that savage life is manhood, ease and independence.

Fourthly. The unfavorable light in which they view the character of the citizens
of the United States — believing that their minds are so occupied in trade and specula-
tion, that they never act from any other motive. . . Their opinion of the Government

Total white population of Ofiio believed to amount to about 450,00(1 souls — Statement of John
Johnson. Aboriirine Aeent ai Pinua. Ohio, in The Western Gazeteer, or Emigrants' Directory, etc..
Aubuin. N. Y.. iyi7. See Index references to other enumerations of .Aboriyines of^difierent dates.

368 THE MAUMEE RIVER BASIN.

of the United States is, in some degree, more favorable; but secretly they view all white
peo]ile as their enemies, and are extremely suspicious of everything coming from them.

All the Miamis, and Eel River Miamis, are under my charge, about one thousand
four hundred in number; and there are something more than two thousand Pottawotamis
who come within my agency. The proportion of children can not be ascertained, but it
must be less than among the white inhabitants of the United States. They have had no
schools or missionaries among them since the time of the French Jesuits. [Major
Stickney overlooked the efforts of the Society of Friends by Little I^iver in 1,804 and
afterward. See Index.]

They have places that are commonly called villages, but perhaps not correctly, as
they have no uniform place of residence. During the fall, winter, and part of the spring,
they are scattered in the woods, hunting. The respective bands assemble in the spring
at their several ordinary places of resort, where some have rude cabins made of small
logs covered with bark ; but more commonly some poles stuck in the ground and tied
together with pliant slips of bark, and covered with large sheets of bark, or a kind of
mat made of flags. [See ante page (i7 where this style of hut is described as being in
use two hundred years before the date of this letter.] Near these places of resort they
plant some corn [zea ways}. There are eleven of these places of resort within my
agency. The Miamis and Eel River Miamis reside principally by the Wabash, Missis-
sinewa, and Eel River, and at the head of White River. The Pottawotamis reside on
the Tippecanoe, Kankakee, Iroquois, Yellow River, St. Joseph of Lake Michigan, the
Elkhart, Miami of the Lake [the Maumee] and by the St. Joseph and the St. Mary
emptying into it.

They all believe in a God as creator and governor, but have no idea of His will
being" communicated to a man, except as it appears in the creation, or as it appears
occasionally from his providential government. Some of them had been told of other
communications having been made to the white people a long time since, and that it was
written and printed ; but they neither have conception nor belief in relation to it. [This
was probably the faint remembrance of the teachings of the Society of Friends twenty
to twenty-two years before by Little River.] Their belief in a future existence is a kind
of transubstantiation — a removal from this existence to one more happy, with similar
appetites and enjoyments. They talk of a bad spirit, but never express any apprehen-
sions of his troubling them in their future existence. *

*It is obvious that the mind of the Aborigines lias never seriously occupied itself with any of the
hisher themes of ttroujrht. The beings of its belief are not impersonations of the forces of Nature, the
courses of human destiny, or the movements of human intellect, will and passion. In the midst of
nature, the Aborigine knew nothing of her laws. His perpetual reference of her phenomena to occult
agencies forestalled in^iuiry and precluded inductive reasoning. If the wind blew with violence, it was
because the' water-lizard, which makes the wind, had crawled out of his pool ; if the lightning was sharp
and fre<iuent, it was because the young of the thunder-bird were restless in their nest ; if a blight fell
upon the corn, it was because the Corn Spirit was angry; and if the beavers were shy and difficult to
catch it was because they had taken offense at seeing the bones of one of their race thrown to a dog.
Well and even highly developed in a few instances — I allude especially to the Iroquois — with respect
to certain points of material concernment, the mind of the Aborigine in other respects was and is almost
hopelessly stagnant. The very traits that raise him above [against] the servile races are hostile to the
kind and degree of civilization which those races have attained. His intractable spirit of independence,
and the pride 1?1 which forbids him to be an imitator, reinforce but too strongly that savage lethargy
of mind from which it is so hard to rouse him. No race [peoplel perhaps, ever presented greater
difticulties to those laboring for its [their] improvement.

To sum up the results of this examination, this primitive man was as savage in his religion as in his
life He was divided between fetich-worship and that next degree of religious development which con-
sists in the worship of deities embodied in the human form. His conception of their attributes was such
as might have been expected. His gods were no whit better than himself. Even when he borrows from
Christianity the idea of a Supreme and Universal Spirit, his tendency is to reduce Him to a local
habitation and a bodily shape; and this tendency disappears only in tribes that have been long in contact

TREATY OF 1817 SECOND ONLY TO THAT OF 1795. 569

It had constantly been the policy of the United States to keep
spirituous liquors from the Aborigines: to discourage their wandering
habits by narrowing their range, and to incline them more and more to
agricultural pursuits. This would admit of parcelling the adjoining
lands to citizen settlers who, by their industry, would be exemplars for
the self-support and civilizing of the Aborigines. Naturally the greater
the number of such settlers the more secure should peace and prosperity
become. With these results yet in view, a treaty and purchase council
was called to meet at the 'Foot of the Rav>ids of the Miami [Maumee]
of Lake Erie' ]irobabl\- on the left bank of the river at the site of the
present Village of Maumee, the '29th September, 1^17. Here Generals
Lewis Cass and Duncan M'Arthur met the sachems and other chiefs,
with the warriors of the Wyandot, Seneca, Delaware, Shawnee, Potta-
wotami, Ottawa and Chippewa tribes and completed a treaty ranking
in importance, particularly to Ohio, only second to the great Treaty at
Greenville in 1795. The provisions of this treatx' are as follows;

Article 1. The Wyandot tribe of Aborigines, in consideration of the stipulations
herein made on the part of the United States, do hereby forever cede to the United
States the lands comprehended within the following lines and boundaries ; Beginning at
a point on the southern shore of Lake Erie where the present Aborigine boundary line
intersects the same, between the mouth of Sandusky Bay and the mouth of Portage
River: thence, running south with said line to the line established in the year 1 Til.) by
the Treaty of Greenville which runs from the crossing place above Fort Laurens to
Loramie's Store ; thence westerly with the last mentioned line to the eastern line of the
Reserve at Loramie's Store : thence, with the lines of said Reserve, north and west to
the northwestern corner thereof ; thence to the northwestern corner of the Reserve on
the River St. Mary, at the head of the navigable waters thereof [site of the present City
of St. Marys] thence, east to the western bank of the St. Mary River aforesaid ; thence.
down on the western bank of the said river to the Reserve at Fort Wayne ; thence, with
the lines of the last mentioned Reserve, easterly and northerly, to the north bank of the
River Miami of Lake Erie [Maumee] ; thence down on the north bank of the said
river to the western line of the land ceded to the United States by the Treaty of Detroit
in the year 1807: thence, with the said line south to the middle of said Miami [MaumeeJ
River, opposite the mouth of the Great Au Glaise River; thence down the middle of
said Miami [Maumee] River and easterly with the hues of the tract ceded to the.
United States by the Treaty of Detroit aforesaid, so far that a south line will strike the
place of beginning.

Art. 2. The Pottawatomie. Ottawa and Chippewa tribes of Aborigines, in
consideration of the stipulations herein made on the part of the United States, do hereby

with civilized white men. The Aborigine, yielding his untutored hotnaue to One .All-pervadintr and
Omnipotent Spirit, is a dream of poets, rhetoricians, and sentimentaiists -- The Jesuits in North Amer-
ica in the Seventeenth Century by Francis Parkman. Little. Brown and Company. 1H9H.

The lives of the .\merican .Aborigines fully illustrate the irreat power of heredity and early
environment in the formation of habit xharacterl that longest endures-- and the lower in the scale of
barbarism and savaeery was the tribe, the more difficult it was to effect improvement toward civilization.
These characteristics yet exist, markedly among the more secluded tribes: and the missionary school
teacher is not yet receiving the ready and full seconding of his efforts that he is entitled to from the
various kinds of white men found around their camptires, some bent on personal adventures and others
under pay of museums and societies for gathering relics, myths and what not from these poor people.

370 THE MAUMEE RIVER BASIN.

cede to the United States the land comprehended within the following lines and bound-
aries : Beginning where the western line of the State of Ohio crosses the River Miami
of Lake Erie [Maumee] which is about twenty-one miles above the mouth of the Great
Au Glaise River : thence down the middle of the said Miami [Maumee] River to a point
north of the mouth of the Great Au Glaise River ; thence with the western line of the
land ceded to the United States by the Treaty of Detroit in ISOT, north forty-five miles;
thence west so far that a line south will strike the place of beginning , thence south to
the place of beginning.

Art. '■'>. The Wyandot, Seneca, Delaware, Shawnee, Pottawatomie, Ottawa,
and Chippewa tribes of Aborigines accede to the cessions mentioned in the two pre-
ceding articles.

Art. 4. In consideration of the cessions and recognitions stipulated in the
three preceding articles, the United States agree to pay to the Wyandot tribe, annually
forever, the sum of $4000 in specie at Upper Sandusky ; to the Seneca tribe, annually
forever, the sum of S.iOO in specie at Lower Sandusky [now Fremont] ; to the Shawnee
tribe, annually forever, the sum of $2000 in specie at Wapakoneta : to the Pottawatomie
tribe, annually for the term of fifteen years, the sum of $i:!(Hl in specie at Detroit; to
the Ottawa tribe, annually for the term of fifteen years, the sum of SlOOO in specie at
Detroit ; to the Chippewa tribe, annually for the term of fifteen years, the sum of SlOOO
in specie at Detroit; to the Delaware tribe, in the course of the 3'ear ISIS, the sum of
S.">00 in specie at Wapakoneta, but no annuity ; and the United States also agree that all
annuities due by any former treaty to the Wyandot, Shawnee, and Delaware tribes, and
the annuity'due by the Treaty of Greenville to the Ottawa and Chippewa tribes, shall
be paid to the said tribes, respectively, in specie.

.\rt. .">. The schedule hereunto annexed is to be taken and considered as part
of this treaty ; and the tracts herein stipulated to be granted to the Wyandot, Seneca,
and Shawnee tribes of Aborigines are to be granted for the use of persons mentioned in
the said schedule agreeably to the descriptions, provisions, and limitations therein
contained.

Art. (i. The United States agree to grant by patent in fee simple to
Do-an-quod, How-o-ner, Ron-ton-dee, Tau-yau, Rod-ta-yau, Daw-a-tont, Ma-no-cue,
Tau-yau-dau-tau-son, and Hau-dau-u-waugh, chiefs of the Wyandot tribe, and their
successors in office chiefs of the said tribe for the use of the persons and for the purposes
mentioned in the annexed schedule, a tract of land twelve miles square at Upper San-
dusky the center of which shall be the place where Fort Ferree stands; and also a tract
of one mile square to be located where the chiefs direct on a cranberry swamp on Broken
Sword Creek and to be held for the use of the tribe.

The United States agree to grant by patent in fee simple to Taw-aw-ma-do-yaw,
Captain Harris, Isa-how-mu-say, Joseph Tawgyou, Captain Smith, Coffee-house, Run-
ning-about, and Wiping-stick, chiefs of the Seneca tribe and their successors in office
chiefs of the said tribe, for the use of the persons mentioned in the annexed schedule, a
tract of land to contain thirty thousand acres, beginning on the Sandusky River at the
lower corner of the section granted to William Spicer; thence down the said river to the
east side, with the meanders thereof at highwater mark, to a point east of the mouth of
Wolf Creek; thence and from the beginning, east so far that a north line will include the
quantity of thirty thousand acres aforesaid.

The United States also agree to grant by patent in fee simple, to Ca-te-we-ke-sa or
Black Hoof, By-a-se-ka or Wolf ; Pom-the or Walker ; She-men-etoo or Big Snake,
Otha-wa-keseka or Yellow Feather, Cha-ka-lo-wah or the Tails End, Pemthala or John
Perry, Wabepee or White Color, chiefs «f the Shawnee tribe residing at Wapakoneta.
and their successors in office chiefs of the said tribe residing there, for the use of the

TREATY AT FOOT OF MAUMEE RAPIDS IN 1817. 571

persons mentioned in the annexed schedule, a tract of land ten miles square the center
of which shall be the council-house at Wapakoneta.

The United States also agree to grant by patent in fee simple, to Pe-eth-tha or
Falling Tree, and to Onowas-kemo or the Resolute Man, chiefs of the Shawnee tribe
residing on Hog Creek [the present Ottawa River in .\llen County, Ohio] and their
successors in office chiefs of the said tribe residing there, for the use of the persons
mentioned in the annexed schedule, a tract of land containing twenty-five square miles
to join the tract granted at Wapakoneta, and to include the Shawnee settlement on
Hog Creek and to be laid off as nearly as possible in square form.

The United States also agree to grant by patent in fee simple, to (jua-ta-wa-pee or
Captain Lewis, She-kagh-ke-la or Turtle, Ski-lo-wa or Robin, chiefs of the Shawnee
tribe residing at Lewistown ; and to Mesomea or Civil John, Wa-kaw-ux-she-no or the
White Man, Oquasheno or Joe, and Willaquasheno or When You are Tired Sit Down,
chiefs of the Seneca tribe residing at Lewistown, and to their successors in office chiefs
of the said Shawnee and Seneca tribes, for the use of the persons mentioned in the annexed
schedule, a tract of land to contain forty-eight square miles, to begin at the intersection of
the line run by Charles Roberts in the year 1812 from the source of the Little Miami River
to the source of the Scioto River, in pursuance of instructions from the commissioners
appointed on the part of the United States to establish the western boundary of the
Virginia military reservation with the Aborigine boundary line established by the Treaty
of Greenville in ^'iU^> from the crossings aliove Fort Laurens to Loramie's Store, and to
run from such intersection northerly with the first mentioned line, and westerly with the
second mentioned line, so as to include the quantity as nearly in a square form as prac-
ticable, after excluding the section of land hereinafter granted to Nancy Stewart.

There shall also be reserved for the use of the Ottawa Aborigines, but not granted
to them, a tract of land on Blanchard's Fork [tributary] of the Great An Glaise River,
to contain five miles square the center of which tract is to be where the old trace crosses
the said Fork [about the present Ottawa, Putnam County] ; and one other tract to
contain three miles square on the Little Au Glaise River, to include Oquanoxa's village.*

Art. 7. And the said chiefs or their successors may, at any time they think proper,
convey to either of the persons mentioned in the said schedule, or his heirs, the quantity
secured thereby to him, or may refuse so to do. But the use of the said land shall be in
the said person ; and after the share of any person is conveyed by the chiefs to him. he
may convey the same to any person whatever. And anvone entitled by the said schedule
to a portion of the said land may at any time convey the same to any person by obtaining
the approbation of the President of the United States, or of the person appointed by him
to give such approbation. And the agent of the United States shall make an equitable
partition of the said share when conveyed.

Art. W. At the special request of the said Aborigines, the United States agree to
grant by patent in fee simple to the persons hereinafter mentioned, all of whom are con-
nected with the said Aborigines by blood or adoption, the tracts of land herein described :

To Elizabeth Whitaker who was taken prisoner by the Wyandots and has ever
since lived among them, twelve hundred and eighty acres of land on the west side of the
Sandusky River below Croghansville [now Fremont] to be laid off in a square form as
nearly as the meanders of the said river will admit, and to run an equal distance above
and below the house in which the said Elizabeth Whitaker now lives.

*The name of this Ottawa chief has become (ixed at Dehaiice in name of Street and Masonic
Chapter as Oc-co-nox-ee. It is spelled variously in treaties and references to hostilities as Knoxas.
Onoxa. and ' On-'ine-noK-seh, or the I'yly Fellow.' He was an inebriate, and very iiuarrelsoitie. The
villace here referred to was situate at the present Charloe. Pauldinjt County. Ohio, on the left bank of
the Anglaise River, several miles below the mouth of the Little Auulaise.

372 THE MAUMEE RIVER BASIN.

To Robert Armstrong who was taken prisoner by the Aborigines and has ever since
lived among them and has married a Wyandot woman, one section to contain six hundred
and forty acres of land on the west side of the Sandusky River, to begin at the place
called Camp [Fort] Ball and to run up the river with the meanders thereof one hundred
and sixty poles ; and from the extremity of these lines west for quantity.

To the children of the late William M'Culloch who was killed in August. 1812. near
Mauguagon. and who are quarter-blood Wyandot Aborigines, one section to contain six
hundred and forty acres of land on the west side of the Sandusky River adjoining the
lower line of the tract hereby granted to Robert Armstrong and extending in the same
manner with and from the river.

To John Vanmeter who was taken prisoner by the Wyandots and who has ever
since lived among them and who has married a Seneca woman, and to his wife's three
brothers. Senecas. who now reside on Honey Creek, one thousand acres of land to begin
north forty-five degrees west one hundred and forty poles from the house in which the
said John Vanmeter now lives, and to run thence south three hundred and twenty poles;
thence, and fi'om the beginning, east for quantity.

To Sarah Williams. Joseph Williams, and Rachel Nugent late Rachel Williams, the
said Sarah having been taken prisoner by the Aborigines and ever since lived amongst
them and being the widow, and the said Joseph and Rachel being the children of the late
Isaac Williams a half-blood Wyandot, one quarter-section of land to contain one hundred
and sixty acres on the east side of the Sanduskv River below Croghansville and to include
their impro\"ements at a place called Negro Point.

To Catherine Walker a Wyandot woman, and to John R, Walker her son who was
wounded in the service of the United States at the Battle of Mauguagon in LSI 2* a section
of six hundred and forty acres of land each, to begin at the northwestern corner of the
tract hereby granted to John Vanmeter and his wife's brothers, and to run with the line
thereof south three hundred and twenty poles; thence, and from the beginning, west for
quantity.

To William Spicer who was taken prisoner by the Aborigines and has ever since
lived with them and has married a Seneca woman, a section of land to contain six hund-
red and forty acres, beginning on the east bank of the Sandusky River forty poles below
the lower corner of said Spicer's corn field, thence up the river on the east side with the
meanders thereof one mile, thence, and from the beginning, east for quantity.

To Nancy Stewart daughter of the late Shawnee chief Blue Jacket one section of
land to contain six hundred and forty acres on the great Miami River below Lewistown to
include her present improvements, three-quarters of the said section to be on the south-
east side of the river and one-quarter on the northwest side thereof.

To the children of the late Shawnee chief Captain Logan or Spa-ma-ge-la-be. who
fell in the service of the United States during the late war. one section of land to contain
six hundred and forty acres on the east side of the Great Au Glaise River adjoining the
lower line of the grant of ten miles at Wapakoneta and the said river.

To Anthony Shane [Chesne] a half-blood Ottawa .Aborigine one section of land to
contain six hundred and forty acres on the east side of the River St. Mary and to begin
opposite the house in which said Shane now lives, thence up the river with the meanders
thereof one hundred and sixty poles, and from the beginning down the river with the
meanders thereof one hundred and sixty poles, and from the extremity of the said lines,
east for quantity.

'' Maeuaga. Monguaga or Mauguagon. was an Aborigine village fourteen miles below Detroit.
This battle Hth August. 1812. was by the small American force led by Lieutenant Colonel James Miller,
from Hull's Command at Detroit, when moving down the Detroit River to open the way to the Raisin for
reinforcements and supplies under Captain Brush. They were opposed by the British Major Muir's
troops and Aborigines under Tecumseh. Walk-in-the-\\'ater. etc. Compare ante page 'iT'-i.

ABORIGINE RESERVATIONS IN TREATY OF 1817. 575

To [ames M'Fherson who was taken prisoner by the Aborigiues and has ever since
lived among them one section of land to contain six hundred and forty acres in a square
form adjoining the northern and western line of the grant of forty-eight miles at I^ewis-
town, at such place as he may think proper to locate the same.

To Horonu or the Cherokee Boy, a Wyandot chief, a section of land to contain six
hundred and forty acres on the Sandusky Kiver to be laid oft in a sijuare form and to
include his improvements.

To .Alexander 1). Godfroy and Richard tJodfroy, adopted children of the Pottawa-
tomie tribe and at their special request, one section of land to contain six hundred and
forty acres in the tract of country herein ceded to the United States by the Pottawatomie,
Ottawa and Chippewa tribes, to be located by them the said .\lexander and Richard
after the said tract shall have been surveyed.

To ■ Saw-en-de-bans or the Yellow Hair or Peter Minor [Manard, Manor] an
adopted son of Tondaganie* or the Dog, and at the special request of the Ottawas, out
of the tract reserved by the Treaty of Detroit in 1807 above Roche de Boeuff at tha
village of the said Dog, a section of land to contain six hundred and forty acres to be
located in a square form on the north side of the Miami [Maumee] at the Wolf Rapids
[at the present Providence, Lucas (."ountv].

Art. U. The United States engage to appoint an agent to reside among or near the
Wyandots, to aid them in the protection of their persons and property, to manage their
intercourse with the Government and citizens of the United States, and to discharge the
duties which commonly appertain to the office of Aborigine Agent ; and the same agent
is to execute the same duties for the Senecas and Delawares on the Sandusky River ;
and an agent for similar purposes and vested with similar powers shall be appointed to
reside among or near the Shawnees whose agency shall include the Reservation at
\\'apakoneta, at I.ewistown. at Hog Creek [Ottawa Ri\'er] and at Blanchard Ri\'er: and
one mile square shall be reserved at Malake for the use of the agent for the Shawnees.
And the agent for the Wyandots and Senecas shall occupy such land in the grant at
Upper Sandusky as may be necessary for him and the persons attached to the agency.

Art. 10. The United States engage to erect a saw-mill and a grist-mill upon some
proper part of the Wyandot reservation for their use ; and to provide and maintain a
blacksmith for the use of the Wyandots and Senecas upon the Reservation of the Wyan-
dots ; and another blacksmith for the use of the .Aborigines at Wapakoneta, Hog Creek,
and Lewistown.

Art. 11. The stipulations in the Treaty of Greenville relative to the right of the
Aborigines to hunt upon the land hereby ceded while it continues the property of the
United States, shall apply to this treaty ; and the .aborigines shall for the same terra
enjoy the privilege of making sugar upon the same land, committing no unnecessary
waste upon the trees.

Art. 12. The United States engage to pay in the course of the year 1818 the
amount of the damages which were assessed by the authority of the Secretary of War
in favor of several tribes and individuals of the .Aborigines who adhered to the cause of
the United States during the late war with great Britain and whose property was, in
consequence of such adherence, injured or destroyed. .\nd it is agreed that the sum
thus assessed shall be paid in specie at the places and to the tribes or individuals herein-
after mentioned, being in conformity with the said assessment, that is to say ; To the
Wyandots at Upper Sandusky, four thousand three hundred and nineteen dollars and

*This name like all others has been spelled variously. It is perpelualed in TontOKany Creek and
the Village of Tontogany, both in Wood County, Ohio, across the Maumee River eastward from this land.

^ This name is uenerally known alone the Maumee and properly written as Roche de Bout, meaning
the point or bit of rock which stands separated from the crac on shore. See ennravinK on later pace.

574 THE MAUMEE RIVER BASIN.

thirty-nine cents ; to the Senecas at Lower Sandusky, three thousand nine hundred and
eighty-nine dollars and twenty-four cents: to the Aborigines at Lewis and Scoutashas
towns, twelve hundred and twenty-seven dollars and fifty cents ; to the Delawares for the
use of the Aborigines who suffered losses at Greentown and at Jeromestown, three thous-
and nine hundred and fifty-six dollars and fifty cents to be paid at Wapakoneta ; to the
representatives of Hembis. a Delaware Aborigine, three hundred and forty-eight dollars
and fifty cents, to be paid at Wapakoneta : to the Shawnees an additional sum of four
hundred and twenty dollars to be paid at Wapakoneta ; to the Senecas an additional sum
of two hundred and nineteen dollars, to be paid at Wapakoneta.

Art. K-J. And whereas the sum of two thousand five hundred dollars has been
paid by the United States to the Shawnees, being one-half of five years' annuities due
by the Treaty of Fort Industry ; and whereas the Wyandots contend that the whole of
the annuity secured by that treaty is to be paid to them and a few persons of Shawnee
and Seneca tribes; now, therefore, the commissioners of the United States, believing
that the construction given by the Wyandots to the said treaty is correct, engage that the
United States shall pay to the said Wyandot tribe in specie in the course of the year
181S, the said sum of two thousand five hundred dollars.

Am. 1 t. Tlie I'nitefl States reserve to the proper authorit\- the right to make
roads through any part of the land granted or reserved by this Treaty ; and also to the
different agents the right of establishing taverns and ferries for the accommodation of
travelers, should the same be found necessary.

Art. 1.>. The tracts of land herein granted to the chiefs for the use of the Wyan-
dot. Shawnee. Seneca and Delaware .Aborigines, and the Reserve for the Ottawa
Aborigines, shall not be liable to taxes of any kind so long as such land continues the
property of the said Abori.gines.

Art. K). Some of the Ottawa. Chippewa, and Pottawatomie tribes being attached
to the Catholic religion, and believing they may wish some of their children hereafter
educated, do grant to the rector of the Catholic church of St. Anne of Detroit for the
use of the said church, and to the corporation of the college at Detroit for the use of
the said college, to be retained or sold as the said rector and corporation may judge
expedient, each one-half of three sections of land to contain six hundred and forty acres
of land on the River Raisin at a place called Macon, and three sections of land not yet
located, which tracts were reserved for the use of the said Aborigines by the Treaty of
Detroit in 1.S07. And the Superintendent of Aborigine Affairs in the Territory of Mich-
igan [Governor Lewis Cass] is authorized on the part of the said Aborigines to select the
said tracts of land.

Art. 17. The United States engage to pay to any of the .\borigines the value of
any improvements which they may be obliged to abandon in consequence of the lines
established by this Treaty.

Art. 18. The Delaware tribe of Aborigines, in consideration of the stipulations
herein made on the part of the United States, do hereby forever cede to the United
States all the claim which they have to the thirteen sections of land reserved for the use
of certain persons of their tribe by the second section of the Act of Congress passed
March 'A, 1807, providing for the disposal of the lands of the United States between the
United States Military Tract and the Connecticut Reserve, and the lands of the United
States between the Cincinnati and Vincennes districts.

Art. 10. The United States agree to grant, by patent in fee simple, to Zee-shaw-au
or James Armstrong, and to Sa-non-do-you-ray-guaw or Silas Armstrong, chiefs of the
Delaware Aborigines living on the Sandusky waters, and to their successors in office chiefs
of the said tribe, for the use of the persons mentioned in the annexed schedule, in the
same manner and subject to the same conditions, provisions and limitations as herein-

PROVISIONS IN TREATY OF 1817. 575

before provided for the lands granted to the Wyandot. Seneca, and Shawnee Aborigines,
a tract of land to contain nine square miles to join the tract granted to the Wyandots of
twelve miles square, to be laid oft as nearly in a square form as practicable and to include
Captain Pipe's village.

Akt. 20. The United States also agree to grant by patent to the chiefs of the
Ottawa tribes of Aborigines for the use of the said tribe, a tract of land to contain thirty-
four square miles to be laid as nearly in a square form as practicable, not interfering
with the lines of the tracts reserved by the Treaty of Greenville, on the south side of the
Miami River of Lake Erie [Maumee] and to include Tushquegan or M'Carty's village
[part of the present City of Toledo and eastward] ; which tracts thus granted shall be
held by the said tribe upon the usual conditions of Aborigine Reservations as though no
patent were issued.

Art. 31. This Treaty shall take efiect and be obligatory on the contracting parties
as soon as the same shall have been ratified by the President of the United States by and
with the advice and consent of the Senate thereof.

In testimony whereof, the said Lewis Cass and Duncan M Arthur, commissioners
as aforesaid, and the sachems, chiefs, and warriors of the Wyandot, Seneca, Shawnee.
Delaware, Pottawatomie, Ottawa, and Chippewa tribes of Aborigines, have hereunto set
their hands at the Foot of the Rapids of the Miami of Lake Erie [Maumee] this twenty-
ninth day of September, in the year of our Lord one thousand eight hundred and
seventeen. [Signatures]

The schedule referred to in this Treatv contains the names of indi-
viduals among whom the several tracts of land were to be divided. To
anyone desiring' to study furthtr the Avondrrful names given h\' these
Aborigines, this long list will afford ample oi:>]^ortunity.*

This Treaty also provided that three sections of land to contain six

* See American State Papers Aborigine Affairs, volume ii panes 184. 135.

The late General John E. Hunt in his MS. reminiscences wrote the following anecdote as an
occurrence at this treaty, viz : .An Aborigine present named Mesli-ke-mau, who was a great warrior and
prided himself on being a British subject, had been bribed to oppose the treaty. When he saw the
tribes i;ivin« way to Cass and M'Arthur our Conunissioners he became very angry. He made a speech in
which he said that the palefaces had cheated the red men from their first landini; on this continent. The
first who came said they wanted land enouyh to put a foot on, They gave the Aborigines an ox for beef
and were to have as much land as the hide would cover — and they cut the hide into strings and got
land enough for a fort. The next time they wanted more land they brought a great pile of goods which
they offered for land. The red men took the goods, and the palefaces were to have for them so much
land as a horse could travel around in a day. They cheated the red man again by having a relay of
horses to travel at their utmost speed. In these ways they succeeded. IThese are some of the para-
phrases of the 'Walking Purchase' which were often employed to tease the Aborigines and to enliven
the evenings and dismal days around the campfires —and General Cass loved a good story.] ' Now. you
Cass ' pointing his finger and shaking his tomahawk over Cass' head. ' Now you Cass come here to cheat
us again.' Thus closing, he sat down. Cass replied: ' My friends, 1 am much pleased to find among
you so great a man as Mesh-ke-mau. 1 am glad to see you have an orator, a man who understands how
much you have been cheated by white people, and who is fully able to cope with them — those scoundrels
who have cheated you so outrageously. " Tis true what he has said, every word true. And the first white
man was your French father. The second while man was your English father of whom he seems to
think so much. Now you have a father, the President of the United States, who does not want to cheat
you but wants to give you more land west of the Mississippi River than you have here, and to build mills
for you. and help you till the soil." Mesh-ke-mau raved and frothed at the mouth. He went up to
General Cass, struck him on the chest with the back of his hand raising his tomahawk with the other
hand while saying. ' Cass, you lie. you lie ! ' Cass turned to Knaggs an interpreter and said : ' Take this
woman away and put a petticoat on her; no man would talk this way in council." INothing displeased
an Aborigine brave more than to be called a wouiaiil. Two or three Aborigines and interpreters led him
out of the council house. . . There were TCHRi Aborigines present at this Treaty, including women
and children.

576 THE MAUMEE RIVER BASIN.

hundred and forty acres each were to be reserved out of the tract of
twelve miles square granted to the Wyandots. One of these sections
was to be appropriated to the use of a religious missionary, one for the
support of schools, and one for the sup])ort of mechanics.

Following this treaty, which extinguished all claims of the
Aborigines to most ol the territory of this Basin, the civil jurisdiction
of Logan County with court at Bellefontaine became operative over
the Ohio part and so continued until the organization of counties here
in the year 1H20.

Upon discussion in Congress, some of the grants of land in the
Treaty at the Foot of the Maumee Rapids 29th September, 1H17, were
thought not sufficient, and that many of the individual grants with right
to convey same were not proper. Therefore the same parties convened
at the site of Fort Barbee, the present St. Marys, Ohio, the 17th Sep-
tember, IHliS, and ratified the following as supplementary to said
Treaty, viz:

• Article 1. It is agreed between the United States and the parties hereunto that
the several tracts of land described in the treaty to which this is supplementary, and
agreed thereby to be granted by the United States to the chiefs of the respective tribes
named therein for the use of the individuals of the said tribes, and also the tract
described in the twentieth article of the said treat\-, shall not be thus granted, but shall
be excepted from the cession made \)\ the said tribes to the llnited States, reserved for
the use of tlie said Aborigines, and held by them in the same manner as Aborigine
reservations have been heretofore held. But it is further agreed that the tracts thus
reserved shall be reserved for the use of the Aborigines named in the schedule to the said
treaty, and held by them and their heirs forever, unless ceded to the United States.

Art. 'i. It is also agreed that there shall he reserved for the use of the Wyandots,
in addition to the reservations before made, fifty-five thousand si.\ hundred and eighty
acres of land, to be laid off in two tracts — the first to adjoin the south line of the section
of six hundred and forty acres of land heretofore reserved for the Wyandot chief the
Cherokee Bov. and to extend south to the north line of the reserve of tweh'e miles
square at Upper Sandusky ; and the other to adjoin the east line of the reserve of twelve
miles square at Upper Sandusky : and to extend east for quantity.

There shall be reserved for the use of the Wyandots residing at Solomon's town,
and on Blanchard River in addition to the reservations before made sixteen thousand
acres of land to be laid oft in a square form on the head of Blanchard River, the center
of which shall be at the Big Spring on the trace leading from Upper Sandusky to Fort
Findlay; and one hundred and sixty acres of land for the use of the Wyandots on the
west side of the Sandusky River adjoining the said river and the lower line of two
sections of land agreed by the Treaty to which this is supplementary to be granted to
Elizabeth Whitaker.

There shall also be reserved for the use of the Shawnees in addition to the reser-
vations before made twelve thousand eight hundred acres of land to be laid off adjoining
the east line of their reserve of ten miles square at Wapakoneta ; and for the use of the
Shawnees and Senecas eight thousand nine hundred and sixty acres of land to be laid off
adjoining the west line of the reserve of forty-eight square miles at Lewistown, and the
last reserve hereby made and the former reserve at the same place shall be equally
divided by an east and w-est line to be drawn through the same ; and the north half of

SUPPLEMENT TO TREATY OF 1817. OTHER TREATIES. 577

the said tract shall be reserved for the use of the Senecas who reside there and the south
half for the use of the Shawnees who reside there.

There shall also be reserved for the use of the Senecas in addition to the reserva-
tions before made ten thousand acres of land to be laid off on the east side of the
Sandusky Kiver adjoining the south line of their reservation of thirty thousand acres of
land which begins on the Sandusky River at the lower corner of William Spicer's section
and excluding therefrom the said William Spicer's section.

Art. ;!. It is hereby agreed that the tracts of land which, by the eighth article of
the Treaty to which this is supplementary, are to be granted liy the United States to the
persons therein mentioned, shall never be conveyed by them or their heirs without the
permission of the United States.

Art. 4. The United States agree to pay to the Wyandots an additional annuity of
five hundred dollars, forever ; to the Shawnees, and to the Senecas of Lewistown, an
additional annuity of one thousand dollars, fore\'er ; and to the Senecas an additional
five hundred dollars, forever; and to the Ottawas an additional annuity of one thousand
five hundred dollars, fore\'er ; and these annuities shall be paid at the places and in the
manner prescribed by the treaty to which this is supplementary.

A treaty was made liath September, 1«1H, at Edwardsville, Illinois,
wherein the Peoria, Kaskaskia, Michisania, Cahokia, and Tamarois
tribes ceded to the I'nited States all their claims to the territory
between the Ohio River on the south and the headwaters of the Kas-
kaskia and northern Sanijamon to the Kankakee and Majde Rivers on
the nortii : the Saline Creek and Kaskaskia River valle\s, inclusive, on
the east, and the Illinois and Mississippi Rivers on the west. This
treaty was supplementary to one made Kvith Auj^ust, IHOy, to include
the Peorias, who were to remove to the Blackwater River in Missouri.
The Great and Little Osage tribes were also treated with at St. Louis.

At a treaty held at St. Marys, Ohio, "ind October, 1«1«, the Wea
Band ceded to the United States all the lands claimed and owned 'by
the said tribe within the limits of the States of Indiana, Ohio and
Illinois.' A reservation along the middle Wabash was granted them.
At the same place, and date, the Pottawotamis ceded their claims to
the region along the Wabash and between the Tippecanoe and Ver-
million Rivers in Indiana.

The r!rd October, IHIH, the Delawares of Indiana ceded all their
claims in that State, and agreed to remove to a reservation west of the
Mississijjpi for considerations of reservations, mone\', horses, i:>irogues,
provisions, an annuity of four thousand dollars in s])ecie in addition to
that promised in former treaty, and a blacksmith. Also, per Article H,
a sum not exceeding thirteen thousand three hundred and twelve dollars
and twenty-five cents was to lie ])aid by the I'nited States to satisfy
certain claims against the Delaware nation : and it was to be expended
by the Aborigine agents at Piqua and Fort Wa\ne agreeably to a
schedule that day examined and ajijiroved by Jonathan Jennings, Lewis
Cass and Benjamin Parke, the cominissioners of the United States.

378 THE MAUMEE RIVER BASIN.

The next treaty of ^reat im])ortance to this Basin reads as follows :

Articles of a Treaty made and concluded at St. Marys in the State of Oliio be-
tween Jonathan Jennings, Lewis Cass, and Benjamin Parke. Commissioners of the
United States, and the Miami Nation of Aborigines :

Article 1. The Miami Nation of Aborigines cede to the United States the follow-
ing tract of country ; Beginning at the Wabash River where the present Aborigine
boundary line crosses the same near the mouth of Raccoon Creek : thence with the lines
thereof to the St. Mary River, thence up the St. Mary River to the Reservation at the
Portage, thence with the line of the cession made by the Wyandot Nation of Aborigines
to the United States at the Foot of the Rapids of the Miami of Lake Erie [Maumee] on
the 2'.lth September. 1817, to the Reservation at Loramie's Store, thence with the present
Aborigine boundary line to Fort Recovery, and with the said line following the courses
thereof to the place of beginning.

Art. 2. From the cession aforesaid, the following Reservations for the use of the
Miami Nation of Aborigines shall be made ; One Reservation extending
along the Wabash River from the mouth of Salamonie River to the mouth of Eel River,
and from these points running due south a distance equal to a direct line from the mouth
of Salamonie River to the mouth of Eel River ; one other Reservation of two miles
square on the River Salamonie at the mouth of Atche-pong-qwa-we Creek ; one other
Reservation of six miles square on the Wabash River below the forks thereof ; one other
Reservation of ten miles square opposite the mouth of the River A Boutte [Aboite] ; one
other Reservation of ten miles square at the village of Sugar Tree Creek ; one other
Reservation of two miles square at the mouth of a creek called Flat Rock where the
road to White River crosses the same.

Art. ;i. The United States agree to grant by patent in fee simple to Jean Bapt.
Richardville principal chief of the Miami Nation of Aborigines the following tracts of
land ; Three sections of land beginning about twenty-five rods below his house on the
River St. Mary near Fort Wayne, thence at right angles with the course of the river
one mile, and from this line and the said river up the stream thereof for quantity ; two
sections upon the east side of the St. Mary River near Fort Wayne running east one
mile with the line of the Military Reservation, thence from that line and from the river
for quantity; two sections on the Twenty-seven-Mile Creek where the road from St.
Marys to Fort Wayne crosses it being one section on each side of said creek ; two sec-
tions on the left bank of the Wabash commencing at the forks [junction of Little River]
and running down the ri\'er.

The United States also agree to grant to each of the following persons being
Miami Aborigines by birth, and their heirs, tracts of land herein described : To Joseph
Richardville and Joseph Richardville, Jun., two sections of land being one on each side
of the St. Mary River and below the Reservation made on that river by the Treaty of
Greenville in 1 '7!>.^. To Pe-met-che or the Crescent one section below and adjoining
the Reservation of Anthony Shane [Chesne] on the west side of the St. Mary River and
one section immediately opposite to Macultamunqua or Black Loon : To Keen-qua-tak-
qua or Long Hair. Aronzon or Twilight. Pe-con-be-qua or a Woman Striking. Augh-
qua-mau-da or Difficulty, and to Miagh-qua or Noon, as joint tenants five sections of
land upon the Wabash River the center of which shall be the Wyandot village below
the mouth of Tippecanoe River. To Francis Godfrey six sections of land on the
Salamonie River at a place called La Petite Prairie. To Louis Godfroy six sections of
land on the St. Mary river above the Reservation of Anthony Shane; To Charley a
Miami chief one section of land on the west side of the St. Mary River below the section
granted to Pe-met-che or the Crescent. To the two eldest children of Peter Langlois
two sections of land at a place formerly called Village du Puant at the mouth of the

TREATY WITH Mi AM IS AT ST. MARYS IN 1818. 379

River called Pouce au Pichoux. To the children of Antoine Bondie two sections of
land on the border of the Wabash River opposite a place called I'lsle a I'Aille: To
Francois Lafontaine and his son two sections of land adjoining and above the two
sections grafted to Jean Bapt. Richardville near Fort Wayne and on the same St. Mary
I^iver. To the children of Antoine Rivarre two sections of land at the mouth cf Twenty-
seven-Mile Creek and below the same. To Peter Langlois youngest child one section of
land opposite the Chipaille at the Shawnee village. To Peter Labadie one section of
land on the River St. Mary below the section granted to Charley. To the son of George
Hunt one section of land on the west side of the St. Mary River adjoining the two
sections granted to Francois Lafontaine and his son. To Mesh-e-no-qua or the Little
Turtle one section of land on the south side of the Wabash where the portage path
strikes the same. To Josette Beaubien one section of land on the left bank of the St.
Mary above and adjoining the three sections granted to Jean Bapt. Richardville. To
Ann Turner a half-blooded Miami one section of land on the northwest side of the
Wabash River to commence at the mouth of Fork Creek on the west l>ank of the said
creek and running up said creek one mile in a direct line; thence at right angles with
this line for quantity. To Rebecca Hftckley a half-blooded Miami one section of land
to be located at the Munsee town on White River so that it shall extend on both sides to
include three hundred and twenty acres ol prairie in the bend of the river where the
bend assumes the shape of a horseshoe. To William Wayne Wells a half-blooded Miami
one section of land at the mouth of Fork Creek where the Reservation tor .\nn Turner
commences, running down the Wabash River on the northwest bank onf mile, thence
back one mile, thence east one mile to the boundarv line of the grant to .\nn Turner.
T^ Mary Wells a half-blooded Miami one section of land at the mouth of Stony Creek
on the southeast side of the Wabash River the center of which shall be at the mouth ot
said creek, running with the meanders thereof up and down the Wabash River one-halt
mile and thence back for (|uantity. To Jane Turner Wells a half-blooded Miami one
section ot land on the northwest side of the Wabash River, to commence on the west
bank of said river opposite the old limekiln, thence down the said river one mile and
back for quantity.

Art. 4. The Miami Nation of Aborigines assent to the cession made by the
Kickapoos to the United States by the treaty concluded at Vincenues !)th December, ISOil.

Art. •"). In consideration of the cession and recognition aforesaid the United
States agree to pay to the Miami Nation of Aborigines a perpetual annuity of fifteen
thousand dollars which, together with all annuities which by any former treaty the United
States have engaged to pay to the said Miami Nation of Aborigines, shall be paid in silver.

The United States will cause to be built for the Miamis one grist mill and one saw
mill at such proper sites as the chiefs of the nation may select ; and will provide and
support one blacksmith and one gunsmith for them ; and provide them with such imple-
ments of agriculture as the proper agent may think necessary. The United States will
also cause to be delivered annually to the Miami Nation one hundred and si.xty bushels
of salt.

Art. (1. The several tracts of land which by the third article ot this treaty the
United States have engaged to grant to the persons therein mentioned, except the tracts
to be granted to Jean Bapt. Richardville. shall never be transferred by the said persons
or their heirs without the approbation of the President of the L'nited States.

Art. 7. This Treaty shall be obligatory on the contracting parties after the same
shall be ratified by the President of the United States by and with the advice and
consent of the Senate thereof.

In testimony whereof the said Jonathan Jennings. Lewis Cass, and Benjamin
Parke, commissioners as aforesaid, and the chiefs and warriors of the Miami Nation of
Aborigines, have hereunto set their hands, at St. Marys the <>th October. ISbS.

380 THE MAUMEE RIVER BASIN.

The various tribes of Aboris<ines, and squads of tribes, liecame
much dispersed and amalgamated, latterly through their own volition.
To illustrate this, and the persistence of the United States Government
in tracing them, in treating with them individually, and in cultivating
relations of mutual benefit particularly for their betterment towards
civilization, the following additional treaties are mentioned, viz ;

A treaty at Chicago 2'.)th August, 1821. between Lewis Cass and Solomon Sibley,
Commissioners of the United States and the Chippewa, Ottawa, and Pottawotami
bands, wherein they ceded to the United States for valuable considerations their claims
to lands in Michigan along the River St. Joseph of Lake Michigan to the lands bordering
on this Basin ceded by treaty at Detroit in 1807. A treaty at Prairie du Chien. Wiscon-
sin, l!Hh August. 182.T. with Northwestern mixed tribes; also with the same 2!lth July,
1827. A treaty at the Wyandot Village near the Wabash River 11th February, 1828,
with the Eel River and Thornton bands of the Miamis. A treaty at St. Joseph River,
Michigan. 27th September, 1827, with dispersed Pottawotami bands to consolidate them
on reservations, they releasing their claims to lands in eastern Michigan along the rivers
Rouge, Macon, and Raisin.

Agents for the Aborigines, anu Their Disbursements.
The United States Agency for the Aborigines at Fort Wayne was
conducted during the years 1800 to 1811 by John Johnston, usually
called Colonel. He was transferred in 1811 to Old Piqua a few miles
north of the present Piqua, Ohio, where he retained headquarters as
Agent for thirty years, until the removal of the last of the Aborigines,
the Wyandots, from Ohio. He was succeeded at Fort Wayne by Ben-
jamin F. Stickney, usually called Major, who had served a short time
at Upper Sandusky. The Agency at Fort Wayne was necessarily
closed by the siege of that post in 1812. This agency was revived
after the war and the 1st April, IHI.S, Major Stickney was yet serving
there with salary of $750 per year and four militarv rations per day, it
being the same pa\' received bv Colonel John Johnston at Piqua.
Doctor William Turner succeeded Major Stickney as Agent at Fort
Wayne he being charged by the War Department for his draft for
$2,139.34 of the 1st April, 1820. From 3rd April, 1820, to 1st October
John Johnston Agent at Piqua drew four drafts on the War Department
against the Aborigine fund, amounting to $10,4yH. John Hays pres-
ent Agent at Fort Wayne ' (he succeeded Doctor Turner August 14) is
charged for amount advanced him 2i8th August and 1st October, 1820,
$4,303.60 and tor his draft of 31st December $1,661.77.* He was fur-
ther charged with drafts as follows: 31st March, 1H21 $l,104.913i( ;
1st July $(i22.7.'i and 6th July $410. The Sth April, 1822, John Hays
was yet Agent at Fort Wayne with salary of $1200 per year, and
assisted by Benjamin Kercheval as Subagent at $500. James Mont-
gomery was Subagent at this time for the Senecas bv the Sandusky

'■'American State Papers Aborigine AHaiis. volume ii paije iU2

EFFORTS FOR THE BETTERMENT OF ABORIGINES. 38!

River at a salary of S^4H9.H() : jamrs M'Flierson for the Senecas and
Shawnees of Lewiston with same pay; Heiijamin F. Stickney Subagent
for the Ottawas alonj^' the lower Maume(_' with residence at the site of
Fort Miami, at salary of $")()(); and John Shaw Suhayent for the
Wyandots at Upper Sandusky at same pay. The Interpreters for the
Agencies of this region at this time were: Tfiomas Duchoquet for the
Shawnees at Wapakoneta, William Walker for the Wyandots at Upper
Sandusky, each with a salary of $4()lt.8tl; and an Inter])reter at the Fort
Wa\ne Agenc\-, name not given, with salary of Sr)(l4. The blacksmiths
promised in the treaties were: R. Brodrick, Piqua: John Lewis, San-
dusky, with ])a\' of $470 ])er annum: and Richard W^hitehouse at Fort
Wavne at !!'fiH4. Other disliursements at and for account of these
agencies were: at Piqua, annuities for lb'20 SIH,;")!)!) : also at same
date for carrying into effect Aborigine treaties per Act of Congress of
March, 1H19, Sy,41:2.r)4 :* annuities for lH-21 §11,600. At Fort Wayne
the payment of annuities for lH'20 amounted to $21,121.00; for mills,
materials, etc., S5,m;-5S.40, and sam.- for 1^21 S;:i,2«4.50: annuities for
1M21 $ls,t)79.

The 1st March, l>i2;^, a length\- report was made to Congress
regarding the progress in abolishing thi' United States Trading Houses
for the .Miorigines according to the Act of the previous session.

In 1H24 John Tipton was Aborigine Agent at Fort W'ayne for the
Miamis. Weas, Eel River bands, etc., in Indiana, receiving $120Cl per
year salary, with no subagent named. In addition to the subagents
named above appears the name of Benjamin F. Stickney for the
Ottawas by the Blanchard River as well as those by the lower Maumee.

Later CiikisriAX Missionary Efforts.

About the time of the building of Fort Miami on the site of the
])resent \ illage of Maumee in the sjiring of 1794, Reverend Edmund
Burke built or occupied a log house there as a Roman Catholic Chapel.
Later Father Gabriel Richards and other priests from Detroit occasion-
ally visited the settlements along the Maumee and comforted those who
desired their ministrations. While such visits had been occasionally
made since the sujipression of the Jesuits in 17H4, few if anv worked
with the missionary fervor among the Aborigines that was lormerl\-
displaxed by that devoted sect. Several religious societies, however,
later than the <-arly Jesuits, founded mission stations and schools for
the education and Christianization of the Aborigines. The first of
these in this western region were;

"These sums include pay of superintendents, subapents, interpreters and blacksmiths; building
and repairing mills, aieency houses, and blacksmith shops ; provisions, presents, and medical aid for
Aborigines; tools, iron, steel and fuel for smiths; transportation of annuities, etc.. and ether contingent
expenses of the aiien :y j:!.9:r.>.0r for 1 20. and $T.4m.9r for IH21.

382 THE MAUMEE RIVER BASIN.

The Misshins of the Society ov Friends.

The Friends' (Quakers' ) Meetinti for Sufferers held in Philadelphia
in the year 1791, addressed a memorial to the United States Congress
urging pacific measures for settlement of the difficulties then exist-
ing with the western Aborigines; and in 1792 the Yearly Meeting of
Friends appointed a large committee to confer with the Meeting for
Sufferers on this subject. Early in 1793 the chiefs of several tribes,
mostlx' of the New York Iroquois, visited Philadelphia by request of
the United States authorities : treaty was made with them, and three
commissioners were appointed to attend the large council called in
179'2 to meet the next summer by the lower Maumee River — see ante
pages ir)7, 179. The Friends, with the consent of the President,
deputed six of their number to accompany the Commissioners to this
council in interest of peace, viz: John Parrish, William Savery and
John Elliott of Philadelphia, Jacob Lindlev of Chester County, Penn-
sN'lvania, and Josei^h Moore and William Hartshorne of New Jersey.
Part of this committee accomi>anied General Lincoln, Commissioner,
in boat by way of the Hudson, Mohawk and Oneida Rivers and Lake
Ontario, while the others went across country on horseliack in company
with Colonel Timoth\' Pickering and Beverly Randolph the other
Commissioners, all uniting at Niagara.'^

From the diaries of the Friends' experiences during this mission,
ke|)t hv Jacob Lindley and Joseph Mooret we learn that they dined
with Lieutenant Governor Simcoe at Niagara in company with the
Commissioners, and thought him 'a plain man and remarkably easy of
access.' Leaving the Commissioners with Simcoe, the Friends, after
visiting some members of that communion near-by, sailed from Fort
Erie l)v sloop for Detroit where they arrived June 9, 1793. Detroit
was mentioned as 'a small garrison town with a variety of inhabitants,
with much of the sound of drums and trumpets, but not much religion.'
There was as great a mixture of peoples as they had seen in the eastern
cities — of English, Scotch, Irish, E)utch, Germans, French, Americans
from different States, with blacks and yellows, and Aborigines of many
tribes. There was only one Church-house, Roman Catholic, on the
priest in charge of which they called and were civilly received.
Colonel England British Commandant of Fort Lernoult at Detroit,
received them kindly, invited them to dine with him, and called on them
at their lodgings. He told them that he had, with much pains and

* See Civilization of the Aborigines, by Halliday Jackson pai,'es 7. 8. ;^1 ; and Narrative of the
Mission of the United Brethren Among the Delaware and Mohegan Aborigines, by Jobn Heckewelder
paees iOl to 4li:).

t Printed in The Friends' Miscellany, volume it pa^es 49. 1.56; volume vi paces 389. 347 and onward ;
and Reprinted together at Lansiny, Michiuan, in 1892 by Ambrose M. Shotwell.

THE FRIENDS GO TO DETROIT FOR PEACE IN 1792. 583

expense, i)rocured more' than tilt\ jirisoners from the Aliorif^ines,
clothed them, and forwarded them liomeward and, in common witli the
generality of mankind, many of them did not express any s^ratitude ;
vet he felt the reward of beint; a Inend of mankind. Other officers
treated the Friends kindly which acts dul not i)revent the latter from
rebuking the lax morals of the former.

While awaiting arrival of the Commissioners, the Friends were
active in seeking opportunities to ])reacli to the people, which were
found in private houses and in the sail-loft bv the Detroit River, and in
the settlements above and In-low, even to the Moravian settlement by
the River Thames in Canada, where they fraternized with the United
Brethren missionaries. This Moravian settlement was called the sixth
place of retreat of this band of Delawares. The Friends experienced
difficulty in making themselves properl\- understood through their inter-
lireters who had no practice in translating anything but the ordinary
limited vocabulary of the .\borigines. ,\n enumeration of all the
middle North American tribi-s from Nova Scotia to the Gulf of Mexico
and tin- Mississii;>i)i Basin, prejiared for British use, was seen and
cojiied b\' the I'riends, the total ol indi\iduals numbering 5('),680. Blue
Jacket, war-chief of the Shawnees, was met. He was dressed in
scarlet cloth with gold tassels, and a laced hat. He had heard of the
Quakers hv told them, and that thi'V were harmless ])eople who did not
fight. He had expressed his opinion at the Grand Council which he
had just left by the Maumee, and was then on his way to Montreal.
The chiefs of the Cherokees and Creeks present at the Grand Council,
also visited Colonel England who sent them by sloop to Lieutenant
Governor Simcoe at Niagara to maintain the British influence over them.

The United States Commissioners arrived at the present Amherst-
burg, Canada, July 21st and the Friends who had awaited their coming
for over six weeks joined them there the "iath. Both parties had l^een
anxious to go to the Grand Council of Aborigines by the lower Maumee
River (see ante page 180) to present in person their importunities for
peace, and they now expected that the time had finally arrived : but the
British agents, M'Kee and Elliott, held them at the mouth of the Detroit
River until the last hope of a treaty with the Aborigines was gone.
The mosquitoes, and the noises of the drunken savages who were everv
day passing to and from the Council, (irevented sleep at night. Some
suffered attacks of malaria. Deputations of Aborigine chiefs came to
talk with the Commissioners, and it was evident to all that thev were
under the undue influence of the British. Not being permitted to go to
the Council, both parties wrote letters to be read there' by M'Kee or
Elliott who were also their carriers. The time ]iassed slowh' and
heavil\- with all, with their ph\sical unrest and their great nu-ntal

384 THE MAUMEE RIVER BASIN.

anxiety regarding the success of their mission. The Friends sought
relief in the study of the coming and going people, and in efforts to
impress them with their mission. They found here, as at Detroit manv
African and Pawnee slaves. One of the latter, a slave belonging to the
British agent Elliott, died of pulmonary tuberculosis at this time and
was hastily buried in a shallow grave by the river. The sloop Detroit
stopped there .\ugust 3rd, on her way to Fort Erie, laden with three
hundred and thirty-three packs of peltries most of which packs were
rated at twenty guineas sterling each : and they learned much regarding
the fur trade, including its great extent.

In the afternoon of August Ifith two young Wyandots arrived with
a message in writing, ostensibly from the Grand Council, to the Com-
missioners. After careful reading, it was declared to be of British
production, and contemptible : and the Friends approved the verdict.
General Lincoln said it was such an answer as he could have wished.
This expression was in consonance with the opinion of a Moravian
missionary who said to the Friends if a treaty of peace be signed it will
not last long — not until after the Aborigines are further chastised by
the sword': and Lindley wrote that 'the history of their barbarity,
treachery, and breach ot faith to the white people, and to one another,
which we have heard rehearsed by people well acquainted with the
facts since we arrived here, would be painful, tedious, and indeed too
shocking to rehearse.' Nathan Williams 'an intelligent man especially
in Aborigine affairs' in a friendly way expressed fears to the Friends
while in Detroit, that they would be either killed or kept as hostages if
thev ventured to the Council. 'And truly' wrote Jacob Lindley ' I am
not astonished at his idea, considering the spectacles of human misery
he is almost daily presented with, and the humours he hears — where
tribes of Aborigine warriors have so frequently passed with their dis-
consolate prisoners, and with poles stuck up in front of their canoes,
some with fifteen, others with thirty scalps suspended on them in trophy
of their courage and victory.'

The Commissioners and Friends started by sloop Dunmore for
Fort Erie August 1, 1793, on their return home without further hope
of success in their present mission, the Friends ' endeavoring to rest
quiet, leaving the event in this part of the world, where but little
morality, law or religion, appears to govern the people, to Him who
judgeth righteously.' And, after separating from the many vile scenes
he had witnessed, and arriving among his tried and congenial acquaint-
ances, Joseph Moore wrote ' I felt myself in some measure like one
let out of prison.'

The Baltimore, Maryland, Yearly Meeting of Friends in 1795
appointed a large committee to consider the affairs and needs of the

THE FRIENDS VISIT THE WY AN DOTS IN 1799.

585

Aborigines. This committef instituted investigations by visits each
year to different tribes and by inquiries at the I'nited States War
Office, then in charge of the Aborigines."'

At the Warlv Meeting of Friends in
Baltimore in ll'-JX a ' speech was presented
on a large belt and ten strings of white
wampum' inviting the friends to visit the
W'yandots and Delawares at Upyier San-
dusk\' and the eastern part of this Basin,
according to their re<.|uest. To this 'speech'
was appended the names of chiefs Tarhe
(the Crane) Skah-on-wot, Adam Brown,
and Mai-i-rai ( Walk-on-the-water ). Evan
Thomas, George EUicott, Joel Wright, and
Reese Cadwallader were appointed a com-
mittee to make such visit; and they per-
mitted the compan\' on request, of Gerard
fjrooke, Andrew Ellicott and Philip E.
Thomas. Those resident at Baltimore
started for this visit 7th May, 1799, and
were joined by the others on the way. They
traveled on horseliack by as direct course as
practicable. The record of their iournev"!"
is well written and interesting. They were
much delayed and inconvenienced in cross-
ing the swollen rivers and creeks. Ui^on
their arrival at Upper Sandusky, June 3rd,
they found shocking scenes of drunkenness
and Were subjected to indignities. Tarhe
was not able to meet them on account of his intoxicated condition
until late the next day, and then with three chiefs the meeting was
brief. Tarhe informed them that the council would not meet until the
middle of themontht when he would la\' the subject of theirmission for
instruction in religion, books, domestic affairs, agriculture, etc., before
the council and as soon as decided on he would send tlum a speech.
He presented four strings of white wamjuim for them to take
to their great men. The Friends then gavi' presents to the chiefs,
and the meeting ended. They exiierienced difficult\' in getting food

STRINGS OF WAMPUM.

* These proceedings and reports are sketched in tlie .Appendix to Gerard T. Hopkins' little hook
on A Mission to the Aborigines, etc., Philadelphia. lS(i2.

t Printed in tlie Friends' Miscellany for October, 183.5, volume vii, number 7.

i There was a misunderstandini; recardini; the time of this council's meeting. The necessity for
k'reat care in intercourse became niore and more apparent on account of the uncertainty of the .Abo-
riniiie's language, and their peculiarities.

586 THE MAUMEE RIVER BASIN.

at the town, and started homeward the same day by a more southern
route. Nothing' was heard from the Wyandots in direct response to
this committee's visit.

In the winter of 1803-04 Tarhe, and aliout one hundred hunters,
mostly Wyandots, went to the upper waters of the Mahoning River to
hunt bears. Snow fell to the depth of three feet which, with their
previous improvident use of their United States Annuity receipts and
their established habit of beggary, quite incapacitated them in their
opinion for any action but appeals for help to some families of Friends
who lived about twenty miles distant. The first appeal, written by a
lounging white man in their camp, reads in part as follows after being
straightened out : . . . Brothers, will you please help me to fill
mv kettles and my horses' troughs, for I am afraid my horses will not
be able to carry me home again. Neighbors, will you please to give if
it is but a handful apiece, and fetch it out to us, for my horses are not
able to come after it. [Signed] Tarhie. Their needs were supjilied
bv some of the nearest Friends, and then came another writing, in
part as follows: . . Brothers, I want you to know I have got

hel]) from some of my near neighbors. Brothers, I would be glad to
know what you will do for me, if it is but little. Brothers, if you can-
not come soon, it will do bye and bve, for my bellv is now full.
Mv Brothers, Uuakers, I hope our friendship will last as long as the
world stands. All I have to sa\' to vou now is, that I shall stay here
until two moons are gone. Tarhie.' More food was taken to them by
these Friends and members of the Redstone, Pennsylvania, Quarterly
Meeting.

The good name and fame of the Society of Friends (Quakers)
spread to the different tribes: and the latter jiart of the year 179(i
Chief Little Turtle of the Miamis visited Philadelphia with Captain
William Wells (who married his sister) as interpreter, for the purpose
of enlisting the assistance of the Friends in civilizing the Miamis at
Fort Wayne and its vicinity.* This visit was not immediately pro-
ductive of the result desired : but the Friends continued their inquiries,
and the following letter, probably written by Captain William Wells,
shows a result of the work of the Committee of the Baltimore Yearly

Meeting, viz :

The Little Turtle's Town. [Eel River, Indiana] Sept. IS, 1808.

To Evan Thomas, George EUicott, and others. Brothers and Friends of our Hearts :
We have received your speech from the hand of our friend Wm. Wells, with the imple-
ments of liusbandry that you were so kind to send to his care — all in good order.

Brothers, it is our wish that the Great Spirit will enable you to render to your Red
Brethren that service which you appear to be so desirous of doing them, and which their
women and children are so much in need of.

' Compare Count de Volneys View of ths Soil and Climate of the United States, 18(.)4. pane 3.57

INVITATION TO FRIENDS TO VISIT FORT WAYNE. 587

Brothers, we will try to use the articles you have sent us, and if we should want
more we will let you know it.

Brothers, we are sorry to say that the minds of our people are not so much inclined
towards the cultivation of the earth as we could wish them.

Brothers, our Father, the President of the United States, has prevented our
traders from selling liquor to our people, which is the best thing he could do for his Red
Children,

Brothers, our people appear dissatisfied because our traders do not, as usual, bring
them liquor and, we believe, will request our Father to let the traders bring them liquor,
and if he does, your Red Brethren are all lost forever.

Brothers, you will see from what we have said that our prospects are bad at present,
though we hope the Great Spirit will change the minds of our people and tell them it is
better for them to cultivate the earth than to drink whiskey.

Brothers, we hope the Great Spirit will permit some of you to come and see us,
when you will be able to know whether you can do anything for us or not.

Brothers, we delivered you the sentiments of our hearts when we spoke to you at
Baltimore* and shall say nothing more to you at present. We now take you by the hand,
and thank von for the articles you were so kind to send us,

[Signed] The Little Turtle, Miami Chief,

The Five Medals, Pottawotami Chief,

This letter was carefulh' considered bv the Committee on Aborig-
ine Affairs at its meeting in Baltimore in Feliruary, 1H(,)4, and it was
decided that a visit to these tribes would be the best means of obtain-
ing a knowledge of their disposition, and enable the Friends to ascer-
tain the best course to ]iursue to be useful to them. George Ellicott,
Gerard T. Hojikins, Joel Wright and Elisha Tyson were named a
special committee to make this visit: and the\' were authorized to take
one or more suitable persons with them to reside amongst the Aliorig-
ines, to instruct them in agriculture and other useful knowledge if it
should appear that they would be benefited thereby.'

Friends Hopkins and Ellicott started on this mission on horseback
February 23, 1804, taking along Philip Dennis to remain with the
Aborigines and serve as teacher if conditions were found favorable.
They crossed the Potomac River on the morning of the 25th and the
Shenandoah the same day. Continuing, their course led across the
south and north tril:>utaries of the Potomac, along and across the
different ranges of the Allegheny Mountains, through falling snow and
its accumulations to the depth of two feet with severe weather:
across the tributaries of the Youghigeny River, to and along the
Monongahela and through Redstone, Brownsville, and Washington,

* The Aboripine chiefs ■from the banks of the Wabash. Lake Erie, and Lake Michigan' of ihe
Pottawotami, Miami, Delaware, Shawnee, Wea (Ouiotenonl Eel River, Piankeshaw, Kickapoo, and Kas-
kaskia, tribes and bands, while on their way to visit the President of the United States, had conferences
with the Friends of Philadelphia and Baltimore the latter part of December, IKH, with Captain William
Wells, United States .^yent to these .Aborigines as interpreter. Wells was born in Kentucky, and was
taken captive by the Miamis in 1775 when eight years of age. He was fluent in English and .Aborigine
tongues and a good writer. The ' speeches ' were written as interpreted 'with accuracy by Gerard T.
Hopkins a stenographer of great ability.'

588 THE MAUMEE RIVER BASIN.

Pennsylvania, and across the Ohio River the 10th of March. Thence
throujj'h Zanesville, Ohio, Lancaster, and Chillicothe then the Capitol
where they received a call from Governor Edward Tiffin who supped
with them and favorably impressed them with his friendlv affability.
They arrived at Dayton the 24th of March and thence passed up stream
along the Miami River where there was scarcity of corn and feed for
their horses. Here they saw a flock of wild parrots winch they were
informed were there common. They were the size of doves and with
plumage resembling' that of -the green parrots of South America, the
head red and the wings tipped with red. The tail was long and the
bill and tongue were the same as those of the chattering parrot, as were
their notes. They also saw woodcocks with black heads and ivory-
colored bills.*

Continuing northward the Friends passed Fort Piqua, in one of
the houses of which they slept on the floor, thence to Loramie's Store,
and along the portage to a tributary of the River St. Mary where the_\-
camped for the night. Soon after their fire was kindled a whoop was
heard in the woods which, they had been informed, was a signal from
Aborigines to be answered in kind if their apfiroarh would be- tolerated.
The answer was given and soon two Aborigine men with guns on one
horse followed b\' two women and a girl on another horse, rode before
them smiling. They were the first Aborigines seen, the several camps
passed being empty although much game abounded. These Aborigi-
nes could onlv uttt-r 'Delawares, Delawares' in English and, after
shaking hands, soon passed on southward. March 29th the Friends
crossed the River St. Mary one at a time in a canoe owned by an Abor-
igine named Stephen who was intoxicated and fell from the boat into
the deep water here about IfiO feet wide. He was readily rescued and
afterwards worked steadier. The horses were led behind the canoe.
Stephen's charge was one quarter dollar per man, saving that his usual
charge to ]iackers was one dollar. Traveling northwestward in the
rain, the Friends arrived, on March 30th, withi;i thirty rods of Fort
Wayne when they were commanded by the sentinel to halt. A ser-
geant approached, inquired their names, their business and their des-
tination. Answers to these questions being satisfactory to the com-
mandant, the sergeant soon returned and conducted them to Cai)tain
\\'hij)lile to whom they presented their letter from Henry Dearborn
Secretarx- of War addressed ' To the commanding officer at Fort
Wayne, Mr. John lohnson Aborigine Factor [.\gent] and Mr. William

See A Mission to the Aborigines from the Committee oi Baltimore Yearly Meeting to Fort
Wayne in 1804. by Gerard T. Hopkins, Pliiladelpliia, 1X63. pate 4(1.

The parrots here mentioned were probably of the Carolina Paroquet. Conurus carotinensis L..
which formerly abotinded in Ohio, but unfortunately became extinct many years atro from the wicked
impulse of owneis of nuns to shoot every animal they saw, particularly if rare and beautiful.

COMMITTEE OF FRIENDS AT FORT WAYNE IN 1804. 389

Wells Aborigine Agent.' This letter was a liberal commendation of
the committee and their motives, reading turthir ' thev are entitled to
all the civilitii-'S in your power to In. stow.' . . General Dearborn
was personally acquainted with the members of the committee, was in
hearty symjiathv with their mission, and rodi.' on horseback from
Washington to Kllicott's Mills, a distance of fort\- miles, to present
letters of commendation to this committee. Johnston and Wells called
on them ; and Wells dispatched for Little Turtle at bis village eighteen
miles distant by Eel River, and to Chief Five Medals at his village bv
the River St. Joseph of Lake Michigan, a distance of forty miles.
They all dined with Captain Whipjile Commandant of the Fort, who
behaved with a freedom and gentility becoming a well bred man.'
The Fort was large and substantial . . commanding a beautiful
view of the rivers, as also of an extent of about four square miles of
cleared land, much of which was cleared by the army of the United
States. . . The garrison kept here at present consists of about
forty officers and soldiers.' . . The Friends were surprised to ob-
serve that no attention was given in fort and village to the pro]ier ob-
servance of the first da\- of the week ( Sunday ). In the afternoon Five
Medals and two sons called on them, first learning ' that some Ouakers
had come ' alter their arrival in the village : and the chief recognized
and greeted the committee heartilw Little Turtle arrived the next day
at noon and ai)iiroached the committee 'with a countenance placid
beyond description i took us by the hand with cordiality, and expressed
himself in terms of great gladness at meeting with us. . . About
two o'clock we dined. At the head of the table sat the interpreter's
[William Wells '] w^ife who is a modest, well-looking Aborigine woman,
the daughter of a distinguished chief [and sister of Little Turtle].
She had pre])ared for us a large well roasted w^ild turkey and also a
wild turkey boiled, and for these she had provided a large supplv of
cranberry sauce. The Little Turtle sat at the table with us, and with
much sociability we all jiartook of an excellent dinner.'

In the afternoon Five Medals and two sons called at Wells' house,
and a formal conference regarding the mission was entered upon.
Infirm health and family circumstances were presented bv the Friends
as reasons for the alisence of two members of the committee : that the
three had come not to talk, but to do something for the betterment of
the condition of the .Aborigines: and they suggested that a call be
issued for a general meeting of the Aborigine people of both sexes and
all ages. This suggestion was an unusual one to the chiefs who were
wont to sit in council individuall\-, and they urged that the general
meeting be at least deferred inasmuch as the voung men were hunting
at a distance, and many of the women were making sugar from the sap

590 THE MAUMEE RIVER BASIN.

of the maple trees in the woods. But the Friends urged that the
season was advancing, and immediate preparations should be made for
the first practical lessons in agriculture. The chiefs asked for eight
days time in which they could gather at Fort Wayne ' a considerable
number of their indolent people who were too lazy to hunt or make
sugar, but such they did not wish us [the committe<.-] to see.'

The Friends were entertained by John Johnston Agent of the
United States Trading House for the .Aborigines, and there the chiefs
took supper with the mission committee. Under the guidance of
Ca])tain Wells the following days, the Friends went over the lands most
suitable for cultivation, and at the same time observed the most historic
places and listened to their stories as told by Wells — the sites of the
villages : the places where General Harmar's men were slaughtered in
1790, see ante page 166 -. the field where Little Turtle assembled his
fourteen hundred men ( Wells being among the number as a captive)
to overwhelm General St. Clair's army at the present Fort Recovery
about fifty miles distant. The long vista of history, with numerous
shallow graves and other numerous evidences ol mortality, lirought
forcibly to the mind of Friend f-loiikins these lines from Young's
Night Thoughts:

Where is the dust that hath not been alive !
The spade, the plough, disturb our ancestors ;
From human mould we reap our daily bread.

The rides to the countrv included visits to large sugar camps, and
the 'prairie' between the St. Mary and Little River (the Glacial Drain-
age Channel, see Map ante page 28) the distance from one to the other
being but four miles in the then swampy land, and the watershed-ridge
but five fett high with rejiorts of canoes passing over in highest stages
of water. The subject of a canal through this ridge was also men-
tioned. Aborigines were constantly coming and going, the women
carrying the burdens of packs of skins and bark boxes of maple sugar
each weighing about fiftv pounds. The Government carpenter was at
work on a council house ordered to he liuilt 25 x 50 feet in size of hewn
logs b\' the Government on rec[Uest of the Aborigines ; and a black-
smith found ready work in repairing the Aborigines' guns.

The .Aborigines assembled at the house of William Wells, inter-
preter, on the morning of Ajjril lOth were Me-she-ke-nah-que or Little
Turtle Miami War Chief, O-bos-se-ah or the Fawn, Miami Village Chief
of distinction, and Os-so-mit Pottawotami Village Chief and brother of
Five Medals who could not return from infirmit\' : also a considerable
number of their principal voung men, and several women. There were
also present .\gent John Johnston, Cajitain Whijjple, Lieutenants
Campbell and Simms, and several of the more prominent citizens. The

FRIENDS TEACH AGRICULTURE AT FORT WAYNE. 391

Friends explained the cause and object of their comin^j, with strong
argument in favor of the Aborigim. s giving more attention to domestic
animals and cultivation of the land; and introduced Philip Dennis
whom they had brought along to gratuitouslv aid them in this work, the
men, not the women who could find work at sjiinning and \veaving in
addition to household affairs. Little Turtle alone spoke for the Abor-
igines'^ stating that his heart was overjoyed and warmed b\' what the
Friends had said : that all could not be done immediately : that it had
been agreed to place the farmer Friend, Philip Dennis, b\- the Wabash
River to prevent the jealousy that would arise if he was placed near any
village : and he was in full accord with what had been said regarding
the work of their women, ho])ing that the young men would flock to the
farm and get all the good ])ossible.

The morning of April 12th the Friends, William Wells, and Mas-
sanonga or Clear Sky a handsonu- young man of the Wea l)and who
had been chosen by the Aborigines as their guide and who said he
should be the first to take hold of Philii)'s Plow, started for the desig-
nated locality by the Wabash sr\in miles below the mouth of Little
River and called thirty-two miles southwest of Fort Wayne. Here
about twenty-five acres of fertile and desirable land was found cleared,
and the Wabash presented a good site for a dam and water-power for
mills. Massanonga killed a wild turkey with his knife, hastily dressed
and roasted it, thus affording them a good sujjiier. They slejit in the
open, wrapped in their blankets around the fire. Otters were noisy
during the night along the river : deer approached the fire and made a
whistling sound : wolves howled around : and at earlv morning the
whole region was vocal with wild turkeys, but the night was refreshing.
A place was staked for a humble dwelling for Philip Dennis. His
nearest neighbors were at Little Turtle's town eighteen miles east of
north, and the next at the Mississinewa town about thirty miles south-
west ; but Aborigines and traders, mostl\' Frenchmen, were frequently
passing along the Wabash less than two hundred feet distant.

The party returned to Fort Wax'ne Ayiril 13th, and the 15th the
committee of Friends said farewell to Philip Dennis, to the carpenter and
the blacksmith, and to the agents and officers of the Fort, and entered a
pirogue obtained by Captain Whipple and supplied with food by .Agents
Johnston and Wells, and manned for Detroit by Corporal King and a
private soldier from Fort Wayne. Their journey down the Maumee River
(chapter on which please see under date of 1804) was rapid and pleas-
ant, but they were detained at the mouth of Maumee Bay, and River

* This admirable address was taken stenoL'raphically by Friend Gerard T. Hopkins as interpreted
by William Wells, and was published in Hopkins' little book A Mission to the Aborigines . . . at
Fort Wayne in 1804. panes 79-M.

592 THE MAUMEE RIVER BASIN.

Raisin, by high winds and rough water. They arrived at Detroit April
25th and, as soon as possible ( May 2nd ) sailed for the east end of Lake
Erie on their homeward journey. The sequel of their efforts to aid the
Miamis and Pottawotamis can be told in few words. Philip Dennis
faithfully performed his duty. Only one, or at the most two, of the
.Vborigines could be induced to aid him, and then only in meager effort
for a rude fence. As long as the noveltv of his work lasted, and they
could share in his food, a few Miamis lingered around in the shade or
branches of trees, but would not work. Dennis jilanted and cultivated
a good field of corn (maize) and vegetables and, after gathering the
large yield into a house he built for the purpose, he left it in charge of
the chiefs to be handed out to the needy Aborigines during the winter,
and he returned to his familv in Marvland. This was the first serious
effort to found an agricultural school in the West.

During Christmas week, ISO?, Little Turtle and Richardville chiefs
of the Miamis, The Beaver and The Crow of the Delawares, two
Shawnee chiefs, and Marpau and The Raven of the Pottawotamis, on
returning from Washington visited the Friends at Baltimore. They
were here, as at W'ashington, treated with very kind regard and at-
tended the entertainments offered them with the exception of the
Pottawotamis who were full\- influenced bv the rising cloud of the War
of 1H12. Thev ever\' da\' w(5re their war-paint, and were defiant.

From the time of their arrival in America in 1656 The Society of
Friends manifested great interest in the welfare of the Aborigines.
The Shawnees, later in this Basin, were associated with the Delawares
in Friend William Penn's treaty, and purchase of their claims to land
in 1682: and after the migration of these tribes west of the Allegheny
Mountains early in the eighteenth century, the good offices of the
Friends followed them — sadly interrupted, however, many times by
their savage acts.

About the time of his Treaty at Greenville in 1795, General Wayne
read an address to the Shawnees from the Yearly Meeting of Friends
at Philadelphia, and delivered to them a few jiresents received there-
with. He highly commended the Friends, often called C)uakers, whom
he knew and much loved and esteemed for their goodness of heart and
their sincere love of peace with all nations. A deputation of Shawnees
headed by Chief Black Hoof visited the President at Washington in
1S02. They called on the Friends at Philadelphia on their way home,
were well received and given useful presents. During these years the
expenditures of the Friends in America for the feeding and bettering
the condition of the Aborigines were so large as to appeal to the
Friends in England who, in 1H06, sent to America the sum of €11,770
16s. Hd. to aid in this benevolent work. The work was suspended

FRIENDS KEEP SHAWNEES LOYAL TO AMERICANS. 595

during the War of 1812; but what had been done was a stronfr factor
in keepinj^ the Shawnees from going to the British to aid them against
the Americans.

At the close of the War of 1812 the work of the Friends recom-
menced among the Shawnees at Wapakoneta in more permanent
form. A dam was there built across the Auglaise River, also a
flouring and sawing mill for their instruction and benefit. These
improvements slowly led to less wanderings in the hunt of wild game
and to more cultivation of the soil, to the rearing of useful domestic
animals and to better dwelling places built from the lumber cut b\ the
mill. The Friends who had migrated from the East to new homes in
Ohio and Indiana, engaged liberally in this work of instruction, and
the supplies for its organization and maintenance were hauled hv them
for many miles of poor road. The Aborigines gave little, generally
no, help to forward these enterprises: but the Friends did the work
willingly, trusting that the example and the result of their work would
favorably influence many of them in time. Plow irons were brought
to Wapakoneta and there stalked by the Friends readv for use : and it
was the Friends who were obliged to use them in the preparation of
the ground and in the planting and cultivation of the crops. A woman
Friend in England contributi d a good su!n of mone\' to aid in the
purchase of domestic animals and agricultural implements. Notwith-
standing the objection of the Shawnees to the schools of the whiti'
man, a school in manual training was organized bv the Friends, it
being the first school of this kind in Ohio.

In the autumn of 1819 Friend Isaac Harvey of southern Ohio
removed his family to Wapakoneta to superintend the mills. The
Shawnees were then divided, one-sixth of the number dwelling bv Hog
Creek the present Ottawa River in Allen County. Much superstition
existed among them, and soon after the removal of Harvey's familv it
was stimulated to its highest pitch by Elskwatawa, Tecumseh's re-
puted brother who was at this time dwelling at Wapakoneta. On
visiting a sick Shawnee one day with some food, Harvey found Elsk-
watawa present and cutting the skin of the back of the sick man who
was bleeding profusely from the cuts. I'pon inquiring the cause of
this crueltN' Elskwatawa, who was acting the part of a sorcerer or
medicine man, informed him that the cuts were made to let out the
combustible or fiery matter that the witch Polly Butler"^ had put thert'.
Friend Harvey drove him away and dressed the wounds. That night
he was startled by the hasty coming of Polly Butler and her child to
his house asking protection from the Shawnees who were seeking to

* Polly Butler was the reputed dauiiliter of tlie late General Kicliarii Bullet by a Shawnee
mother.

394 THE MAUMEE RIVER BASIN.

put her to death as a witch. They were taken into the house b}'
Harvey who at once strangled a small dog accompanying them that it
might not betray their whereabouts. The next day Chief We-os-se-cah
or Captain Wolf came and told Harvey about the occurrences and the
resulting excitement, whereupon Harvey told him of the sinfulni.ss of
such proceedings. We-os-se-cah went away much disturlu-d in mind,
but soon returned and, intimating that Harvey knew the whereabouts
of the woman, was told that she was out of their reach; and if they did
not abandon their pursuit of her with desire to put her to death, he
would remove his family and abandon the mission entireh'. We-os-se-
cah desired Harvey to go with him to the Council House where
twenty or more chiefs and head men iiamted and armed were in session.
Harvey went to the United States Blacksmith, an important man with
the Aborigines on account of his keeping their guns and knives in
repair, and took him and his son along as interpreters. L'pon their
entering the Council House Chief We-os-se-cah commanded the
Council 'to be still and hear' whereupon he repeated what had trans-
pired between Harvey and himself, which caused great commotion.
Harvey then addressed them in a composed manner, interceding for
the life of the woman who had been so unjustlx' sentenced to be put to
death. But, seeing them determined to have blood, he felt resigned
and offered himself to be put to death in her stead ; that he was wholly
unarmed and at their mercy. We-os-se-cah stepjied u]), took Harvey
b\' the arm, and declared himself his friend, and called upon the chiefs
to desist, but if they would not, he would offer his life for the Oua-
kee-lee (Quaker) friend. The chiefs were astonished, but slowly, one
by one, thev came forward, took Harvey by the hand and declared
friendship. The blacksmith also was not behind in exhibiting his
sentiments. Chief We-os-st-cah then told them that the woman had
disappeared: that search had been made and she could not be found;
that if their Ouaker Friend had sent her to the white people for pro-
tection, and the chiefs did not ])ardon and recall her, it would be a
lasting disgrace to their nation ; and if their friend the Ouaker should
for this reason break up the mission that had been begun and carried
on wholly for their benefit, to whom, then, shall we look for help?'
After a short discussion among themselves, the Council to a man
(excepting Elskwatawa who at this moment slunk away) came forward
and cheerfully offered their hands and friendship. They promised
it the woman was restored to her people, that she should be protected:
and thev called on the blacksmith to witness their vow — and he be-
came surety for its fulfillment. It required considerable effort to
assure the woman of her safety, but eventually she returned to her
dwelling and was not afterwards molested. Agent John Johnston

THE FRIENDS CORRECT BELIEF IN WITCHCRAFT. 395

afterward assurt'd Isaac Harve\- that his success in savins' the life of
Polly Butler and thus breakinif up the heathenish practice of puttini;
to death for suppost'd witchcraft, was sufficient reward for all the
Friends' noble efforts and expenditures to iniiirove the sad condition
of these people.*

Isaac Harve\' returned with his faniil\' in 1H25 to a place Hvi- miles
south of Wapakoneta and there resumed his school with the Aborigine
children that had been discontinued partly in conseciuence of unsettled
condition of their parents. The i)upils were interested in their studies
and made good progress. In 1830 Henry Harvey took charge of the
school which had increased well in numbers, and he continued in charge
until the removal of the Shawnees to Kansas : and he followed them
thither.

To the Shawnees as to the other tribes, traders urged the purchase
of their goods on credit hojung for pay from the annuity money or,
failing in this, in money that might be received from the sale of their
lands to the I'nited States preparatory to their removal west of the
Mississippi as was then evident would soon occur. Thex' were not
long satisfied with the terms of the final treaty sale of their land and,
like children and as was usual in other cases and tribes, desired modi-
fications, particularK' such as would insure more jjav. Thev ap])ealed
to the Friends to help them ; and a committee from this Society
accompanied the chiefs to Washington in December, l^Ml, to ]ilead for
sympathy from the Ihiited States Government. The old and \alued
French interpreter, Francis Duchouquet whose name is preserved in a
Township in Auglaise County, died at Cumberland, Pennsylvania,
while on this journey. From the efforts of the Friends, Congress
reported a bill for S30,000 to be paid to the Shawnees in fifteen equal
annual installments as additional to the treaty compensation for their
Ohio lands. General Cass, Secretary of War, also paid the expenses
of this journey to Washington, amounting to six hundred and fort\-
dollars, and gave fifty dollars in money as a present to each of the four
chiefs in the party. In the \'ear 1853 the United States paid this tribe
sixty-six thousand dollars additional. Another evidence of the favorable
influence of the Friends upon the Shawnees was their holdings of about
twelve hundred cattle and twelve hundred hogs which were sold pre-
vious to their removal to Kansas. With the ])roceeds of these sales
they purchased clothing, wagons, guns, pro\-isions, and other things
not so useful. Not receiving all their pay when (.xpected, the\-
exhausted their supply of provisions and, again applying to the- Friends,
this Society appealed to the Secretary of War who sent to them as a

* See History of the Shawnee Aborigines From the Year 1681 to 1854 iiicliisi\'f. b\ Henry
Harvey, Cincinnati, 1855, paces 170 to IW.

396 . THE MAUMEE RIVER BASIN.

donation twenty beeves and large quantities of flour and bacon by way
of the Friends' Mission House. These devoted Friends worked con-
stantly' without compensation, and often divided their last food with
the needy whether wholly deserving or not. They taught as much as
thev could of religion, agriculture and other industrial arts ; from the
Bible, by precepts, and by e.xamiiles, and probably they produced as
great and good impression upon the lives of the .Vborigines as any
sect at that time.

The Presbyterian Church Missions.

Presbyterians were the next of these missionaries in priority. The
Svnod of Virginia collected funds for sending out agents to explore the
countrv around Sandusky, the Maumee River, Brownstown, Michigan,
and the River Raisin with the intention, if encouragements were given,
to establish a mission school. The .Aborigines who then dwelt in these
regions were the Wvandots prevailing about Sandusk}', the Senecas,
Mohawks, and Ottawas. The Reverend Thomas E. Hughes made two
missionary tours of these regions, one in the autumn of 1H()0, and the
other late in the year 1801. He was first accompanied by James Satter-
field, a licentiate of the Presbytery of Ohio, and in his second tour by
Reverend Joseph Badger, a missionary from Connecticut i see ante page
249) and by George Bluejacket, a son of the noted Shawnee chief Blue-
jacket. Reverend Hughes attracted this young man to him in Detroit
on his first visit, and was accompanied to his home in Virginia by him.
In his interest in the work of the missionaries and in his conduct for a
time, George Bluejacket encouraged his tutors in the thought that he
would become a Christian ; but he is not mentioned afterward. In the
year 1802 Reverend David Bacon visited Detroit, and on his departure
from there his rejiort reads, in jiart, as follo\\s:

I set out April 'i(lth for the Miami [Maumee] in a canoe with Beaumont and a man
I had hired, but by reason of unfavorable winds we did not arrive at the mouth of the
river until the 4th of May. We were very much fatigued with the hard rowing, and
were several times in danger by violence of the waves. I was ot>liged to go without the
public interpreter as he could not be spared ; but when I came to the Miami [Maumee]
I found an excellent interpreter in whom the Aborigines placed the utmost confidence,
and who served me faithfully for a much less sum than what either of the others would
have asked. His name is William Dragoo. Wlien I arrived at the mouth of the river
most of the [.\borigine] chiefs were drunk at the trader's above. .After remaining there
two days, and finding it uncertain when they would be down, we went up and stored my
provisions and farming tools at [the site of the former] Fort Miami eighteen miles above.
Hearing there that most of them had gone down, we returned the next day to the mouth
[of the Maumee]. The day after I found that Little Otter the head chief and one other
were all that remained in the main village where we were, and that the rest all lay drunk
at the neighboring village. In the afternoon I spent several hours with these two explain-
ing to them the origin and designs of the Missionary Society, and the benefits temporal
and spiritual that they might expect to receive from having me among them. They ap-

PRESBYTERIAN MISSIONARIES ALONG THE MAUMEE. 597

peared to pav good attention, and when I had concluded Little Otter observed in reply that
the Great Spirit had been listening, and that they and their young men had been listening
to all I had said ; that he believed it was true ; that the air appeared clear and no clouds
in the way. and that he would assemble his chiefs and hear me again as soon as possible,
but till then he could give me no further answer. This was Saturday the Hth [May. 1802],
Through the Sabbath following we enjoyed peace and quietness among them. Hitherto
the most of them had remained .sober. But the following night we were disturbed by the
rattles and drums of a number of individuals who spent the night in conjuring over a
poor sick child in order to save its life ; but it died within a day or two after.

Next day we started for the trading post. As we had a strong head wind it was
with difficulty that we got five miles up the river that afternoon. We encamped about a
quarter of a mile above their [the .Aborigines] dancing ground. My interpreter advised
me to go with him to see them that evening ; and 1 had a desire to be present as I sup-
posed I might acquire .some information that might be useful. But I thought it would
not be prudent to be among them that night as I knew some of them were intoxicated and
that such would be apt to be jealous of me at that time, and that nothing would be too
absurd for their imaginations to conceive, or too cruel for their hands to perform. But
as a son of the head chief was sent early next morning to invite me down, I went to see
them. I had the greater desire to go as this is their annual conjuration dance which is
celebrated e\'erv spring on their return from hunting, and at no other time in the }'ear. . .

Mr. .Anderson a respectable trader at Fort Miami told me that they had been grow-
ing worse everv vear since he had been acquainted with them, which is six or se\en
years ; and that thev ha\'e gone much greater lengths this }-ear then he has ever known
them before. He assured me that it was a fact that they had lain drunk this spring as
much as ten or fifteen days at several different traders above him, and that some of them
had gone fifteen days without tasting a mouthful of victuals while they were in that con-
dition. Mr. Anderson disapproved of the practice [of drinking to intoxication] and by
not complying with it has lost the trade and has turned his attention to his farm. He
treated me very kindly and seemed friendly to my designs, and very desirous to have me
come out there.

Reverend Jose]">h Badger was along the lower Maumee again in
Ii'^Ofi, and the 2r)th June addressed the Wvandots on temi^erance when
thf\' wt're gathered at Fort Indiistr\- near the mnuth of Swan Creek with
Charles Jouett American Commissioner, and the Commissioners of the
Connecticut Fire Land Company, just jirevious to the treaty there regard-
ing these Fire Lands. Mr. Badger was appointed by the Board of Trust
in February, IKOH, to labor as a stationed missionary at Sandusky
and he took up this work the first of April following. At first his work
was attended with some ajijiarent success. In the earl\ iiart ot lsi)H,
however, he op;)osed the further selling ol whiskey to the Aborigi-
nes bv a Scotchman named Patterson. This offended the liiiuor dealer
who complained to Governor William Hull. Mr. Badger was sum-
moned to Detroit where he well defended the justness of his efforts to
the Governor, and he was permitted to return to Sandusky. Pat-
terson thereuiion tallied the .'\borigines who jietitioned Governor Hull
for Mr. Badger's removal, and he was suspended pending an investi-
gation by the Missionarx' Board of Trust. Reverends Martjuis, Ander-
son, and Maciird\" were siiit west on this dut\' and, upon investigation,

398 THE MAUMEE RIVER BASIN.

thi'v accjuitted Mr. Badger of all hlamc ; and Patterson promised to
give them no further troul^le. It was thought, however, that the in-
terest ol tile mission would best be conserved b\' Badger taking" an-
other field : and Reverend Elisha Macurdy was chosen to take charge
of the Sandusky station. We get a description of the character of
these Aborigines, who often roamed along the Maumee and who were
very like all the others of that date, and with the trials and discourage-
ments attending the efforts of the missionaries among them, from the
few pages that have been preserved of the journal kept by Reverend
Macurdv after he took charge of this mission, viz:

Tuesday, September 13th [1808], Messrs. Marquis and Anderson started ttiis
morning for fiome. and I am to remain at Sandusky until the first of November to
struggle with the difficulties of the mission. If I do any good, it must be of God for no
man living is sufficient for these things. Little else is to be seen here but naked human
depravity, influenced by all the auxilliaries Satan can apply. Here Satan has his seat,
and this is the time of his peculiar sway. They (the Aborigines) have been collecting
for ten days past from difterent places and tribes, and this is to be the week of their
Great Council. Hundreds more are yet expected. The plains are now swarming with
them, and they appear to be full of devilish festivity, although they can scarcely collect
as much of any kind of vegetables as will allay the imperious demands of nature. They
are here almost every hour begging for bread, milk, meat, melons, or cucumbers ; and,
if they can get no better, they will eat a ripe cucumber with as little ceremony as a
hungry swine. And, notwithstanding this state of outward wretchedness and these
mortifying circumstances, they are swollen with pride and will strut about and talk with
an air as supercilious as the great mogul. Their ceremonies, also, are conducted with as
much pomposity as if they were individually Napoleons or Alexanders.

Their houses, when they have any. are wretched huts, almost as dirty as they can
be, and swarming with fleas and lice. Their furniture, a few barks, a tin or brass kettle,
a gun, pipe, knife and tomahawk. Their stock are principally dogs. Of these they have
large numbers, but they are mere skeletons, the very picture of distress. These unhappy
people appear to have learned all the vices of a number of miserable white men who
have fled to these forests to escape the vengeance of the law, or to acquire property in a
way almost infinitely worse than that of highwaymen. They are so inured to white men
of this description that it is next to impossible to make them believe you design to do
them good, or that your object is not eventually to cheat them. It is vain to reason with
them. Their minds are too dark to perceive its force, or their suspicions bar them
against any favorable conclusions. Such is their ingratitude, that whilst you load them
with favors they will reproach you to your face, and construe your benevolent intentions
and actions into intentional fraud or real injury. They will lie in the most deliberate
manner and to answer any selfish purpose. They will not bear contradiction but will
take the liberty to contradict others in the most impudent and illiberal manner.

This picture comes far short of the miserable condition of these wretched people.
In the midst of these people must the Missionary live. The dangers, difficulties, and
trials connected with them, must be the companions of his life. Surrounded with them
he lies down to sleep, and through them he walks all the day, without a friend to give
him counsel to help him to bear his load, or hear him tell the sorrows of his heart,
except one — that is Jesus, who says, Lo I am with you always, even unto the end of
the world. . . What patience, wisdom, fortitude, benevolence, and self-denial, must
enter into the composition of the man that is qualified to fill this important station !

PRESBYTERIAN MISSION STATION BY LOWER MAUMEE. .399

No honor or emolument that this world can confer can compensate him for the sacrifices
he must make, and the trials he must endure.*

It is herf seen that the sava^i' habits ol the Aborif^ines had been
but little changed for the better by their nearly two hundred years asso-
ciation with the French and British. These Presbyterian efforts to
educate and evangelize them in this region were soon discontinued.

The Presbyterian Society's record regarding a Mission to the
Aborigines by the Li)\\er Maunii'e River is summarized as follows:
Commenced in IH'2'2 b\' the I'rcsbyterian Synod of Pittsburg. Trans-
ferred to the United Foreign Missionar\- Societv October '2'), \^'2f).

LuoUiiik; uortliL-d^t Jo.'^ii ilic uirtui ciirfiiiiLi <^l ilic Mauiiicc Ki\t'r l.jlh April. I'.'l'l. tioiii .VI1..1 iiiine
or Wliitney Island. The tall trees beyond the houses of VoUniar Park, mark the mouth of Tomoyany
Creek, Wood County, Ohio. In the middle distance beyond, by the road, is seen the house of the
Presbyterian ^fissio^ to the AboriRines. built in IH23 for the residence of the Missionary Family, wiili
school rooms adjoining. This house has underdone two or more reductions and alterations and yet
remains a Kood size farm house. The property is now owned by a resident of Tontogany Village situate
a few miles to the right. Mission or ' Station ' Island is seen to the left of the boat. See Chapter on the
Maumee River.

Consolidated with the American Board of Commissioners for Foreign
Missions in June, 18'26. The report of this mission published b\- the
United States in lHi>4, gives the number of members of the mission
family as twenty-one and does not mention pupils. It received three
hundred dollars semiannually from the Congressional fund for the
civilization of the Aborigines. The rei>ort for 1824 gives twenty-one
teachers and ten pupils. Probably the adult members of the entire
household were counted as teachers, which they were in a wholesome
sense if only by exami)le. Some taught domestic science and art, others

' Life of the Reverend Elisha Macurdy. by David Elliott. .-Mlegiieny. 1K4H. page l-ii)e( sequent/a.

400 THE MAUMEE RIVER BASIN.

taught agriculture with the i)lanting and grafting of fruit trees, the
planting of mulberry trees and the care of silkworms, and others taught
the common school, and all were teachers of the Christian religion, at
least in a general way. November '20, ]ii26, this school was reported as
previoush' without increase of pupils. The only ordained missionary
for this station was Reverend Isaac Van Tassel. Assistant Missionary
Reverend Leander Sackett came in 1822 and departed in 1827. Hannah
Riggs from Franklin, Pennsylvania, arrived in November, 1827, and
departed in August, 1H33. Sidney E. Brewster farmer from Geauga
Countv, Ohio, came in April, 1831, and married in June, 1831, Miss
Sarah Withrow who came to the station in 1828. They remained until
June, 1833. William Culver came in 1833 and remained until the
next year. The Mission Church was organized in 1823 with twenty-
four persons nine of whom were Aborigines, and all were pledged
to abstain from the use of spirituous liquors. The plan of conducting
this Mission was like that of the others, to make it selfsustaining as
soon as possible, and to benefit the Aborigines as much as possible ;
to take all the young Aborigines they could get : board, clothe,
and educate thi'm with lessons from liooks and in farming while
getting as much manual labor from them as practicable. These
efforts were neither popular nor very successful. The Mission closed
in 1834 with the removal of these Aborigines west of the Missis-
sippi, having thirty-two pupils in attendance sixteen of whom were
recorded as of mixed blood, and fourteen as full blooded Aborigines.
The records show the whole number that had been under instruction as
ninety-two, mostly for brief periods of time.'

Methodist Episcopal Church Missions.

The first preacher of the Methodist Episcopal Church to hold
religious service in Ohio was Reverend George Callanhan at Carpen-
ter's Station or Fort, by the Ohio River near the present Warrenton,
in September, 1787. t Reverend William M'Lenahan also ranged
among the settlements along the upper Ohio River in the year 1791.
A great revival of religion occurred through the west in 1799 and 1800;
and the first Methodist Conference west of the Allegheny Mountains
was organized in 1802 with the name Western Conference. The Ohio
Conference was organized at Chillicothe in 1H12; and some of its

* After the close of this mission school. Rev, Isaac \'an Tassel and wife leriiained in the buildinps
and conducted a boarding and day school for the children of the American settlers for about live years.
See Article entitled Tlie Presbyterian Mission to the Aborigines at the Lower Maumee River, by Mrs.
Louise Atkinson one of the two yet livintr white pupils of this school, edited by Charles E. Slocuni in the
publication of The Maumee Valley Pioneer Association, Defiance, Ohio, 1901, pages 113 to 130.

1 Authority of Samuel W. Williams, quoted in the History of Ohio Methodism by John M. Barker,
Ph. D., Cincinnati, 1898, pane 83.

METHODIST MISSION AMONG THE WYANDOTS. 401

members occasionally passed through this Basin. A Methodist Mis-
sion was started at Detroit in 1H09. The first persistent mission work
by members of this Church, among the Aborigines of the West, how-
ever, was begun at Upper Sandusky among the Wyandots there and of
the headwaters of the Blanchard River in the summer of 1816, bv a
reformed mulatto inebriate with name of John Stewart.* This man
was then about twenty-one years of age, and his e.xcellent singing
quickly made him friends. With Jonathan Pointer another negro who
was living with the Aborigines and understood something of the
Wyandot language, as interpreter, and encouraged by William Walker
subagent and interpreter, they at once awakened a religious interest,
and a Methodist Class was formed in the autumn. Reverend Anthony
I^anning of Mount Vernon, Ohio, went to the aid of these missionaries
in the spring of 1819, and August 7th this mission was taken into the
regular work of the Ohio Annual Conference of the Methodist Episco-
pal Church at the meeting held in Cincinnati. Reverend James Mont-
gomery was then appointed as missionary to the Wyandots in conjunc-
tion with Stewart. Soon after his appointment to this mission Rev-
erend Montgomery was chosen by Aborigine Agent Colonel John
Johnston of Piqua as Subagent at Fort Seneca. He was released b\'
his Church for this appointment, and Moses Henkle, senior, was sent
to Upper Sandusky to take his ]ilace ; and he was reappointed b\' the
Conference of 1820.

This was the first mission to the .Vlmrigines distinctively, estab-
lished by the Methodist Church, and it, like all others, met with manv
trials and discouragements. But a good degree of success was accom-
plished from the first among the older people who could be kejit under
constant surveillance. At the meeting of the Ohio Conference in 1^21
in Lebanon Reverend James B. Finle\- was appointed missionarv to
these Wyandots and Miss Harriet Stubbs was employed as teacher.
Missionary Finley with his assistant George Riley built a cabin twentv
by twenty-three feet in size into which he moved his family when it
was yet without door or window. They also made a stable for their
live stock from one of the blockhouses of Fort Feree built in 1812 and,
in addition to their missionary work cut, hauled and hewed logs with
which to build during the next summer a Mission House with gr(5und
plan twenty by forty-eight feet, a story and a half high, with two rooms
on each floor and large porches. t

Missionary Finley being ill, Reverend Charles Elliott was ap-

* See Stevens' History of the Methodist Episcopal Church: and Life Among the Aborigines
by Rev. James B. Finley. pajje 2;W et sequentia.

t See Life Among the Aborigineshy Reverend James B. Finley. pai;e 384 and onward, for many
particulars of his work, and of the Wyandots includinL' their winter huntincs and sucar-makini;.

402 THE MAUMEE RIVER BASIN. .

pointfd missionary at the meeting of the Conference in 1822 and, the
numl)er of iiu\iils increasing, William Walker and Lydia Barstow were
added to the list of teachers. During the year 1^23 the expenditures
attending this mission were two thousand two hundred fifty-four dollars
and fifty-four cents. This included improvements on the farm, the
salaries of missionaries and teachers, also the feeding and clothing of
between fifty and sixty of the Aborigine children who lived with the
mission family. The Missionary Society of the Methodist Episcopal
Church and the Philadelphia Missionary Society contributed most of
the money to meet this expense, and added individual subscriptions
with minor societv collections left a deficit of only ninetv-three dollars
and sixty-eight cents. The following year the Secretary of War made
quarterlv pavments of one hundred and twenty-five dollars toward the
support of this Wvandot mission from the Congressional appropriation
of ten thousand dollars for civilizing the Aborigines. In September,
1823, Reverend James B. Finley was reappointed superintendent of
this mission, with Reverend Jacob Hooper superintendent of the farm,
and his wife as special teacher of the girls. John Stewart, who had
been connected with the mission ]:)art of tlu' time from its beginning
with good results, died December 17, 1823, from pulmonary tubercu-
losis.

The Ohio Conference instructed Reverend Finley to establish
missions among the more northern Aborigines and, December 2-fth,
accompanied by Monocue and Gray Eyes, converted Wyandots of
Upper Sandusky, and negro Jonathan Pointer as interpreter, he organ-
ized the first Methodist Aborigine Mission in Canada near the left bank
of the Detroit River above Amherstburg.

The Methodist Mission at Upper Sandusky, Ohio, was credited
this year, 1h24, with twelve teachers and sixty-five ]iujm1s. A Meeting
( Church ) House thirt\- by forty feet in size was liuilt this year for this
mission on the left bank of the Sandusky River, of limestone quarried
in the channel. John C. Calhoun Secretary of War contributed eleven
hundred and thirty-three dollars, from the Congressional appropriation,
toward its completion. This was an important addition to the Mission
Buildings which before consisted of a small schoolhouse, a small
parsonage and the four-room Mission House which was much crowded
in the accommodation of teachers and pupils. This mission acquired
one section of land (one mile square reserved for this purpose in the
Treaty of 1817, see ante page 376) of which nearly two hundred acres
were gradually cleared and cultivated after the style of frontiersmen,
the missionary or his assistant leading and instructing in the work.
Thus the mission became as near self-sustaining as possible. Novem-
ber 20, 1H26, the report shows this to be the most prosperous of the

EXTENSION OF METHODIST MISSION WORK. 403

forty established missions, it beiny credited with two teachers and
sixty-nine youn^' pupils, and y.ood results amonK the adults. Its
recei])ts from the Government fund were now eig^ht hundred dollars.
Many of the largest girls, in addition to reading, writing and other com-
mon studies and household work, had learned to sew, knit, spin and
weave — over two hundred yards of linen, linsey and flannel having
been made at the Mission House for their clothing : and the bo\s heljied
on the farm in producing the flax, corn, wheat and vegetables, and in
feeding and caring for the horses, cattle, hogs, sheep and poultry.

Reverend Thomas Thompson was appointed missionary to these
Wyandots by the Methodist Conference in lW-28, and he served this
station well for six vears. Reverend Elnathan Corrington Gavitt was
appointed his assistant in IHg^J. It was the policy of the Methodist
Church, then as now, to visit all settlements and preach to all classes.
The territory of these two active workers included northwestern Ohio,
eastern Michigan and part of the present Ontario, Canada, in each of
which northern regions Reverend Finley had established a mission to
the Aborigines. The station by the Huron River (Flat Rock)
Michigan, and at the Aux Cannard, Canada, was each visited every
four weeks by one or the other of the missionaries who remained nearl\'
two weeks in each place while the other remained at Upper Sandusky
thus keeping this station under constant observation.! There were
as yet few trails through the wilderness, and often to shorten the
distance between appointments they would take as direct a course as
possible, being guided by the sun and the moss on the trees which was
generally thickest on the north side ; and sometimes the route was
marked for the return by bending the top of an occasional shrub or
small tree to the right after cutting into it on the left. But, with all
precautions from loss of course or distance, it was sometimes necessary
to stop in the forest during the darkest hours of the night. In this
event the time would sometimes be iiassed, in warm weather, up a tree
to be free from attack of the wolves that were howling around ; and
lashing oneself to the tree was necessary to prevent falling to the ground
in the sleep that would come after the fatigues of the journe\-. In cold
weather a large fire or two would be maintained. The crossing of the
larger streams often gave trouble. Several of the Wyandots at the
Upper Sandusky Mission showed good evidence of conversion and,
after their probationary period, were ordained as local ministers. On
one of Reverend Gavitt's journeys to the northern stations he was

* See the American Stale Papers, Aboriuine Affairs volume ii. Histor}i of the Wyandot Mission.
Autobiography of Reverend James B. Finley. Reporr of Judije John L. Leib to the Secretary ot War,
1836. And Life Among the Aborigines, by Reverend James B. Finley.

t Crumbs from my Saddle Bags, by Elnathan C. Gavitt. Toledo. 18X4, pace [W.

404 THE MAUMEE RIVER BASIN.

accompanied by three of these ministers and four other Wyandots.
While leading the way across the lower Maumee the Aborigine Rev-
erend James Harrihoot was thrown from his pony, which became
frightened by some foam on the current. He was a good swimmer but,
becoming entangled with his long fringed frock coat, he would have
drowned had not help been given him b\' fishermen who were near-bv
in a canoe. Before the establishment of public ferries an Aborigine or
settler could occasionally be found and induced by a dollar to ferr^*
across stream the circuit rider ' who would lead his horse from the
canoe. This was the quickest and most comfortable mode of crossing
unless the horse attempted to get into the canoe mid-stream, in which
event the occupants would be unceremoniously thrown into the rapid
current, thoroughly wetting books and clothing and endangering their
lives. ' The later method adopted in warm weather was to undress, tie
the clothing and saddlebags high on the pommel of the saddle, start the
horse across and the rider float after clinging to his tail. Two or three
streams were sometimes thus crossed in one day.

.'\ppointments ^vere conscientiously met when possible In' these
devoted ministers. Their lot was a hard one at best, and occasionally
they suffered exceedingly. Some of the severest nights of winter they
could get even a bed of straw only by climbing a ladder on the outside
of the log house into the garret and there in their own clothes, and
under scant bed covering, they would be drifted under by snow that
came freely through crevices in the roof. And the pecuniary compen-
sation was very small — seventy-five dollars a year to an unmarried man,
and one hundred and seventy-five dollars a year to a man of experience
having a wife and child ; and generally most of these meager dues to
the ministers were received in part by expressions of good or indifferent
will by members of the congregation, part in products of the small
clearing or from the cow or sheep such as cheese, linen or wool cloth
or wool to make mittens, stockings and cloth: or in gatherings from the
forest of reputed medicinal plants, roots and bulbs, such as Bloodroot
( Sanguinaria Canadensis L J Crane's-bill ( Geranium maculatum 'L.) Crow-
foot ( Pulsatilla hirsutissima Y'uv'ih^Vrinon)^ Slipi)er\-elm bark ( Ulmus
fulva Michx.^ Prickly-ash buds I Xanthoxylum Americ'anum M'lW) Red-
root ( Ceanothus Americanus L.J Star-root ('Star-grass root, Aletris
farinosa L.J Yellow-root f Hydrastis Canadensis l^. ) and Black-salts made
b\- leaching the ashes from the burned logheaps of the land clearings
and evaporating the water of the lye thus obtained. .\11 of these (ex-

* Revprend EInathan C. Gavitt was subjected to sucli accident and dan[;er while tlnis crossing tlie
Huron River. Michiiran. See his Crumbs /row my Saddle Bags, paye 2.

t IVIost of the plants of the Crowfoot \RanuncuIaceae] Family are poisonous, but six or more species
have been used medicinally, the yellow-root mentioned above beiim of the number.

THE MOST SUCCESSFUL MISSIONS TO ABORIGINES. 405

cepting the good or ill will") could gL-nt-rally bu sold to advantagt- in the
cities, the herbs and roots to the druggists, and the salts to the chemist
for their separation and the manufacture of sodium carbonates including
saleratus and potassium carbonates or pearlash. Sometimes the pay
would be partly received in skins of the mink ( generally worth five
dollars each ) or of otter and beaver skins from which to make the pre-
scribed Uuaker and Methodist broad-brimmed hats which generally cost
from eight to ten dollars each: and deer skins from which trousers and
other clothing were made. This kind of clothing was very serviceable
in cold, dry w^eather, but it was hygroscopic and stretched unduly when
wet, and it shrunk lamentably in the drying.

This Methodist Episcopal Mission to the W'yandots at Upper San-
dusk\-, including those at Big Spring a source of the Blanchard River
and others scattered elsewhere in this Basin, records the most successful
work for the civilization of American Aborigines in the earlier historvof
these peculiar people. Before their removal in lw4;j to a new reservation
west of the Mississippi River, there were about three hundred members
of the Church, four of whom were licensed exhorters actively at work
and doing much good. Sixty-five children were in regular attendance
at school and making commendable progress. Before the advent of the
missionaries the use of intoxicating beverages was general and drunken-
ness was common in sjiite of the efforts of the I'nited States Govern-
ment for its suppression. Here, as throughout all history, the vender
of intoxicating beverages was the greatest enemy of mankind. The
moral courage of the untutored Aborigines was little above that of a
child to resist this evil. The work done by the missionaries was that
of heroic, unselfish people. Their success depended upon their con-
stant watchfulness of their flock to ward off temptation from within and
without. This was a difficult task. Notwithstanding the able efforts
of the missionaries, many of the Aborigines remained constant to the
heathen customs of their fathers, and subject to the intoxicating bever-
ages slyly presented by insinuating traders: and this class w-as con-
stantly seeking to tempt, and to taunt, those whose second, better judg-
ment inclined them to the missionaries' teachings of sobriety and mor-
ality. Many cases of violence by white men have also been reported
as inflicted upon these Aborigines who were striving to live upright,
commendable lives, even to murder. Two of the most devout would-be
Christians among the Wyandots — Summun Dewat and his wife — were
murdered and robbed in Hancock Countv, Ohio, about the time for the
tribes' removal to the west b\ three white men who asked, and were
hospitably accorded, shelter lor the night in their lodge. The murder-
ers were arrested, but escaped from jail and from justice. '

* Crumbs from my Saddle Bags by Elnatlian C. Gavitt. Toledo isw. page 147.

406 THE MAUMEE RIVER BASIN.

Baptist Church Missions.

The Board of Managers of the Baptist Missionary Convention for
the United States appointed Reverend Isaac M'Coy as missionary to
the Aborigines of the western part of this Basin October 17, 1H17, for
one year.* There were many obstacles causing delay in the beginning
of his work. November 24th he applied to General Thomas Posey
United States Agent to the Miamis, Weas and Kickapoos, for infor-
mation regarding these people: but General Posey sickened, and died
in March, lyl!i, without being of assistance to him. Some little
encouragement received from two half-breed Aborigine boys was dissi-
pated by their French fathers who were nominally Roman Catholics.
Missionary M'Coy continued to preach to the white settlers on the
frontier and to do what he could for the Aborigines until October 27,
1818, when he wrote "we set out for the mission premises [specific
site not mentioned but probably by the Wabash River not far from the
site of Fort Harrison] a distance from our former residence of ninety
miles. My commission from the Board had ere this expired. With
my wife and seven small children I went into the wilderness to seek an
0]ii)ortunity of ]ireaching Christ to the Aborigines without a promise
of patronage from any one, looking to Heaven for help and trusting
that God would dispose the hearts of some, we knew not whom, to
give my famih' bread while I should give myself wholly to the service
of the heathen." .

A school was opened November 2nd, IHlH, with one or two Abo-
rigine children with Corbly Martin as teacher, but the effort was
unsuccessful. The children could not be held, nor the parents inter-
ested longer than to learn that there would be no receipt by them of
intoxicating beverages and other temporal supplies. Communication
was held between the missionary and his desired patrons by means of
French interpreters of Roman Catholic instruction, some of whom did
not understand the English language thus making it necessary to have
a second one who did understand it but did not understand the Abo-
rigine. The school here soon closed and December 1st Missionarv
M'Coy left his family and, with Martin, started for the Delaware and
Shawnee lodges in eastern Indiana and western Ohio, hoping to find
more favorable opportunity. This journey through the forest was
attended with loss of way, great sufferings from cold, snow and ice,
while often sleeping on the frozen ground, and want of food, particu-
larly for the horses. They called at the United States Agency at
Piqua and had conference with John Johnston Agent whose advice
apparently gave missionary M'Coy the most practical ideas regarding

' History of Baptist Missions Among the Aborigines by Isaac M'Coy, Wasliint-ton. IH40.

BAPTIST MISSION TO ABORIGINES AT FORT WAYNE. 407

his work lit' had obtained : and this was tht- only practical ri^sult of
the journc-v. Much of the time during the next sixteen months, how-
ever, was passed in his journeyings to Vincennes, to the Aborigine
lodges where little was accom]ilished, and to Fort Wa\ni-, to which
place he decided to remove by advice of Doctor William Turner Abo-
rigine Agent there.

On May 3, 11^20, removal of this Bai)tist Mission to Fort Wayne
was begun. Then a liateau, loaded with household furnishings, food
supplies, and five Aliorigine children of the school, was started from
the site of Fort Harrison and poled up the Wabash by four Americans
who had been engaged for the purjjose. May 4th Missionary M'Coy
with wife and children started along the river bank on horseback,
accompanied by the hired man Johnston Lykins and an Aborigine
boy the sixth pupil of the school who drove the fifteen cattle and forty-
three swine belonging to the mission. .Aborigines swarmed around
this procession with offers of help until convinced that no intoxicants
or exhorbitant pay woidd be given them, when thev departed. Those
given a fee for messenger service were not seen again. The journey
was attended with great anxiety and danger from rains and from intox-
icated Aliorigines at the Mississinewa and other towns, who fre(|uently
killed one of their own number.* They arrived at Fort Wayne, how-
ever, without serious accident and were i)ermitted to use the Fort
buildings abandoned by the soldiers in 1H19 and about two acres of
plowed land for cultivation adjoining, free of charge.

Fort Wavne was described at this time by Missionary M'Coy as
a little village of traders, and of persons in the employ of the Gov-
ernment as interpreters, smiths, etc., some of whom were French of
Canadian and of Aborigine descent. The nearest settlements of white
people were in the Statt' of Ohio, and nearlv one hundred miles dis-
tant. By our neighbors we were treated with great kindness and
respect, which created affectionate recollections which years of separa-
tion have not oliliterated. I preached to them in my own house every
Sabbath." . . At the o])ening of this Bai^tist Mission School in Fort
Wayne Village May "29, lH'20, Missionary M'Coy served as teacher to
twenty-five pupils, ten being English speaking Americans, six French,
eight Aborigines (two in addition to those brought with his familv
from the Wabash ) and one negro. Soon after the opening of this
school the record reads "we had so much business on hand that everv-
thing could not be well attended to. .\ teacher for the school [from

Ohio, name written as Mr. P r, who arrived June 11th] promised

some relief. We hired an .\borigine woman to assist in domestic
labors, but she afforded little help. Besides the care of eight Abo-
rigine children, and six of our own, the whole charge of the family

408 THE MAUMEE RIVER BASIN.

consisting' of about t\vent\' persons, devolved on Mrs. M'Coy. She
also endeavored to instruct neighboring Aborigine females in the art of
knitting and other domestic labors. We had to work hard with our
own hands. The Aborigine children were clothed, fed and lodged at
the expense of the Mission ; they fed at the same table with my own
family. This course was necessary in order to silence the jealousies
of the Aborigines generally, and this course we ever after pursued."

The wife of Doctor William Turner Agent to the Aborigines, and
her sister Mrs. Hackley (both of half Miami blood) were converted bv
Missionary M'Coy's preaching and were baptised (Mrs. H. June IHth
and Mrs. T. Julv H, 1820) bv immersion in the Maumee River, the brink
of which is mentioned as being then about sixty yards from the gate
of the Fort. The necessaries of life were then verv expensive in
the Village ot Fort Wa\ne. Flour and meal were obtainable only
bv bringing them about one hundred miles. The price of corn
(maize) varied from one dollar and a half to two dollars per bushel.
Support from the Baptist Convention was slow and insufficient, and
discontinuance of this Mission must have resulted but for private con-
tributions dirict from Ohio and Kentucky-. Horatio G. Phillips of
Dayton was particularly considerate and liberal in the darkest hour.
While journeying on these collecting tours meetings were held at
Shane's Crossing of the River St. Marv. Here Mrs. Shane a Delaware
Aborigine was converted, her husband Captain Anthony Shane, a half
Shawnee, serving as her inter]jreter.

The journal record of the first anniversary of the Mission at Fort
Wayne May 29, 1H21, shows forty-two pupils in the school — Miamis,
Pottawotamis, Shawnees 'and Aborigines from New York.' They were
managed without difficultv. Five persons had been engaged, one at a
time from time to time, to aid in the teaching and conduct of the
Mission, but they remained only a short time. This made it necessary
for Reverend M'Coy to often take the place of teacher, also to lead in
the cultivation of the ground when his services were needed elsewhere.
Much traveling through the wilderness was necessary to visit larger
towns for donations and supplies, and the unavoidable exposures in
these travels conduced to much sickness and disability. There was
also more affliction from sickness at the Mission during the second year,
with deaths. As manv as forty members of the Mission household were
sick at one time with intermittent and remittent types of malarial fever
and gastric disorders.

While the Aborigines did not generally antagonize the Mission
directly, the general alcoholic intoxication and large number of murders
among them, particularly those in the vicinit}' of the school at the times
of the annuity payments, ke])t up an excitement of blood and evil that

BAPTIST MISSION TO POTTAWOTAMJS IN 1822. 409

Sreatlv detracted from the ([uiet, Cliristian influence in which it was
desired to preserve the pujiils. The besotted and squalid condition oi
these most wretched peojile, and the cause of it, are frequently men-
tioned, and described by Missionary M'Coy.* In the year \>^'2\ this
Mission was saved from closing by receipt from the United States
Government of four hundred and fifty dollars from the ten thousand
dollar annual fund approjiriated by Congress for Civilizini; the Abor-
igines ; Colonel William A. Trimble United States Senator from Ohio
visited the Mission August 9, IHi^l, while on his way to Chicago for
treating with the Aborigines, and his favorable report had yet more to
do for the Mission's success.

On account of request of Pottawotamis, their donating a Section of
land with the consent and further aid of the United States Government,
Missionary M'Coy decided to remove the Mission to Michigan about
one mile beyond the River St. joseiih of Lake Michigan, and nearl\-
one liundred miles northwest of Fort Wayne. This new station was
named Carey in honor of the noted Baptist Missionary to China.
Preparations for this removal were made during the year 1H22, includ-
ing the building of si.x houses of logs and, December Hth, the remaining
part of the Mission famil\- and belongings started from Fort Wa\ne,
viz : Three wagons drawn b\- oxen and one by horses in which rode
Mrs. M'Coy and her five remaining children with eighteen Pottawotami
]iupils. The Miami impils constituting the larger number of the school
were not permitted by their parents to go. Missionary M'Co\' and
Assistant Daniel Dusenbury rode on horseback, and six laborers for
the farm drove the oxen, horses, five cows, and fifty hogs. Other live
stock had been driven previously, and a large drove of sheep and cattle
donated by friends in Ohio, Kentucky and Tennessee, followed later.
This removal through the snow and ice was attended and followed with
great suffering and sickness, also with the loss of some food supplies
in the flooded river. Most of the food for the livestock was gathered
by them from the shrubs and snow-covered ground during the nights. t

The good resulting from these missions has not been, nor can it be,
computed by man. Evidences of it have not been numerous, nor par-
ticularly apparent to the casual observer in later years; but the phil-
anthropic motive of their establishing and the conscientious charity
attending their conduct, were but small efforts (on the ^lart of Christian
people generally) to comjjensate the besotted and wretched Aborigines

* History of Baptist i^isslons to the [North Aiiieiicaiil Aborigines. Washington. 1K41>.

t The reader desiring to learn more of detail reuardinn these missions is referred to the several
books mentioned on previous paces, includiny the American State Papers .\borieine .\ftairs, volnme ii.
Also to the Report of Judge John L. Leib in November. 1H24. to Governor Lewis Cass Superintendent of
Aboricine .Miairs in Michigan.

410 THE MAUMEE RIVER BASIN.

for the iniquitous violation of the laws of God and of the Nation bv the
venders of intoxicatinfj beverages.

Missions in General — Expenditures — Lands.

The report of the Secretary of War of the expenditures for educat-
ing and civilizing the Aborigines for the year 1823 from the annual ap-
propriation made by Act of Congress March 3, iHlit, gives the total of
§11,135.33. The only items of this sum relating to this Basin other
than those mentioned on previous pages are $120 expended by John
M'Donald of Ohio for the education of a Choctaw youth ; $1H3 expended
b}' John Tipton United States Agent to the Aborigines at Fort Wayne
to a school ( name not given ) for the education of Aborigines at Fort
Wavne : and $250 to Reverend James B. Finley for the Methodist Mis-
sion School among the Wyandots of Upper Sandusk>- and the Blanch-
ard River.

Interest in missionary efforts increased and, the 3rd March, 1824,
Application of the Board of Commissioners for Foreign Missions for
Pecuniary aid in Civilizing the Aborigines was communicated to Con-
gress. There was a party in Congress, however, who opposed such
appropriations and, the 6th January, 1H24, a resolution was passed
providing for a committee to inquire into the expediency of repealing
the Act of 3rd March, IHiy, entitled An Act Making Provision for the
Civilization of the Aborigine Tribes Adjoining the Frontier Settlements.
Mr. M'Lean, of Ohio, of the Committee on Aliorigine Affairs to whom
this resolution was referred, rejiorted the 23rd March, 1824, after a
careful examination and exposition of the subject 'that it is inexpedient
to repeal the law making an annual apjiropriation of ten thousand dol-
lars for the Civilization of the Aborigines.' Of the twenty-one mission
schools that had been established among the Aborigines previous to
1824, two were within this Basin, and one adjoining it, as heretofore
described.

The wisdom of the efforts to extinguish the Aliorigines' claims to
lands by the United States Congress, and the removal of the tribes to
more western reservations, became more apparent in 1824-25: also the
wisdom of the abolishment of the Trading Agencies. The report of
Thomas L. M' Kinney, who was in charge of the office of Aborigine
Affairs which was yet connected with the War Department at Wash-
ington, shows that on January 10, 1825, there were in Ohio 2350 Abo-
igines yet claiming 409,501 acres of land, viz: 542 Wyandots claiming
163,840 acres: HOO Shawnees, 117,615 acres: 551 Senecas, 55,505
acres: HO Delawares, 5760; 377 Ottawas, 50,581, with individual
holdings of 16,20(.) acres. In Michigan Territory there were 28,316
Aborigines claiming 7,057,920 acres, of which number there were but

PREPARATIONS FOR REMOVING THE ABORIGINES. 411

106 Pottawotamis in this Basin. In Indiana there were ol the Mianiis
including the Eel River band lt)7H, claiming 10,104,000 acres. In
Indiana and Illinois there were 3900 Chip])ewas and Pottawotamis yet
claiminK an unknown part of the land credited to the Miamis.

The 20th May, 1826, the Committee on Aboriy;ine Affairs reported
to Congress the estimated expenditures of this office during the year as
$1,082,474.68, it being an increase over that of the jirevious year, and a
very large sum for that date.

AiiurnoNAL Trkaties, anm) Removals.

A treaty was held bv the Wabash River near the mouth of the
Mississinewa the 16th October, 1826, by Lewis Cass, J. B. Ray, and
John Tipton, in which

Article 1. The Pottawatomi tribe of .Aborigines cede to the United States their
right to all the land within the following limits ; Beginning on the Tippecanoe River
where the northern boundary of the tract ceded by the Pottawatomies to the United
States by the Treaty of St. Marys in the year 1818 intersects the same ; thence in a direct
line to a point on Eel River half way between the mouth of the said river and Pierish's
village ; thence, up Eel River to Seeks village near the head thereof ; thence, in a
direct line to the mouth of a creek emptying into the St. Joseph of the Miami [Maumee]
near Metea's village; thence, up the St. Joseph to the boundary line between the
States of Indiana and Ohio; thence, south to the Miami [Maumee] ; thence, up the
same to the Reservation at Fort Wayne ; thence, with the lines of said Reservation to
the boundary established by the Treaty with the Miamis in I.SIS ; thence, with the said
line to the Wabash River ; thence, with the same river to the mouth of the Tippecanoe
River; and thence, with the said Tippecanoe River to the place of beginning. And the
said tribe also cede to the United States all their right to land within the following limits :
Beginning at a point on Lake Michigan ten miles due north of the southern extreme
thereof ; running thence due east to the land ceded by the Aborigines to the United
States by the Treaty of Chicago ; thence, south with the boundary thereof ten miles ;
thence west to the southern extreme of Lake Michigan ; thence, with the shore thereof
to the place of beginning.

For this cession, and a road from Lake Michigan southward
through their remaining claim, the Pottawatomies were given ' goods '
to the value of thirty thousand five hundred and forty-seven dollars and
seventy-one cents : an annuity for twenty-two years of two thousand
dollars in silver ; a blacksmith : an annual i)ayment of two thousand
dollars for education as long as Congress thought iiroper : a grist mill
on the Tippecanoe River with a miller, and one hundred and sixty
bushels of salt annually ; all payments to be made at Fort Wavne.
Also in this Treaty, with other grants on the Wabash and Eel Rivers,
there were granted within this Basin

To Eliza C. Kercheval one section of land on the Maumee River commencing at the
first place where the road from Fort Wayne to Defiance strikes the Miami [Maumee] on
the north side thereof about five miles below Fort Wavne, and from that point running
half a mile down the river and half a mile up the river, and back for quantity.

412 THE MAUMEE RIVER BASIN.

To James Knaggs son of the sister of Okeos chief of the River Huron Pottawotamis,
one half-section of land on the Miami [Maumee] where the boundary line between
Indiana and Ohio crosses the same.

To each of fifty-eight Aborigines by birth, [names given] who are now or have
been scholars in the Carey Mission School on the St. Joseph under the direction of the
Key. Isaac M'Coy, (see ante page 40!l) one quarter-section of land to be located under
the direction of the President of the United States.

To John B. Bourie of Aborigine descent one section of land to be located on the
Miami [Maumee] Kiver adjoining the old boundary line below Fort Wayne.

To Joseph Parks an Aborigine one section of land to be located at the point where
the boundary line strikes the St. Joseph near Metea's village.

The 26th October, IK'26, Lewis Cass, j. Brown Ray, and John
Tipton, concluded another treaty by the Wabash near the mouth of the
Mississinewa with the Miamis, as follows :

Article 1. The Miami tribe of Aborigines cede to the United States all their
claim to land in the State of Indiana, north and west of the Wabash and Miami
[Maumee] Kivers, and of the cession made by the said tribe to the United States by the
Treaty concluded at St. Marys October (ith, 1818.

Art. 2. From the cession aforesaid the following Reservations for the use of the
said tribe shall be made ; Fourteen sections of land at Seek's village. Five sections for
the Beaver, below and adjoining the preceding Reservation. Thirty-six sections at
Flat Belly's village. Five sections for Little Charley, above the old village on the north
side of Eel River. One section for Laventure's daughter, opposite the islands about
fifteen miles below Fort Wayne. One section for Chapine, above and adjoining Seek's
village. Ten sections at the White Raccoon's village. Ten sections at the mouth of
Mud Creek on Eel River, at the old village. Ten sections at the Forks of the Wabash
[junction of Little River with Wabash]. One Reservation commencing two miles and a
half below the mouth of the Mississinewa. and running up the Wabash five miles with
the bank thereof ; and from these points running due north to Eel River. And it is
agreed that the State of Indiana may lay out a canal, or a road, through any of these
Reservations ; and for the use of the canal, six chains along the same are hereby
appropriated.

Art. ;i. There shall be granted to each of the persons named in the schedule
hereunto annexed, and to their heirs, the tracts of land therein designated ; liut that so
granted shall never be conveyed without the consent of the President of the United
States.

Art. 4. The commissioners have caused to be delivered to the Miami tribe, goods
to the value of thirty-one thousand and forty dollars and fifty-three cents in part consider-
ation for the cession herein made ; and it is agreed that, if this Treaty shall be ratified
by the President and Senate of the United States, the United States shall pay to the
persons named in the schedule this day signed by the commissioners and transmitted to
the War Department, the sums affixed to their names, respectively, for goods furnished
by them and amounting to the sum of thirty-one thousand and forty dollars and fifty-
three cents. And it is further agreed that payment for these goods shall be made by the
Miami tribe out of their annuity if this Treaty be not ratified by the United States.
And the United States lurther engage to deliver to the said tribe, in the course of the
next summer, the additional sum of twenty-six thousand two hundred and fifty-nine
dollars and forty-seven cents, in goods. And it is also agreed that an annuity of thirty-
five thousand dollars, ten thousand of which shall be in goods, shall be paid to the said
tribe in the year 1827 ; and thirty thousand dollars, five thousand of which shall be in

READJUSTMENTS AND CURTAILMENT OF LAND CLAIMS. 413

goods, in the year 1S2<S ; after which time a permanent annuity of twenty-five thousand
dollars shall he paid to them as long as they exist together as a tribe, which several sums
are to include the annuities due by preceding treaties to the said tribe.

And the United States further engage to furnish a wagon and one yoke of oxen for
each of the following persons, namely: Joseph Kichardville, Black Raccoon, Flat Belly,
White Raccoon. Franpois Godfroy, Little Beaver. Mettosanea, Seek, and Little Huron ;
and one wagon and one yoke of oxen for the band living at the Forks of the Wabash.
And also to cause to be built a house, not exceeding the value of six hundred dollars, for
each of the following persons, namely : Joseph Kichardville, Francois Godfroy, Louison
Godfroy, Francis Lafontaine, White Raccoon, La Gros, Jean B. Kichardville, Flat
Belly, and Wauweassee. .\nd also to furnish the said tribe with two hundred head of
cattle from four to six years old. and two hundred head of hogs ; and to cause to be
annually delivered to them two thousand pounds of iron, one thousand pounds of steel,
and one thousand pounds of tobacco. And to provide five laborers to work three months
in the year for the small villages ; and three laborers to work three months in the year
for the Mississinewa band.

Art. .■). The Miami tribe being anxious to pay certain claims existing against
them, it is agreed as a part of the consideration for the cession in the first article, that
these claims, amounting to seven thousand seven hundred and twenty-seven dollars and
forty-seven cents, and which are stated in a schedule this day signed by the commissioners
and transmitted to the War Department, shall be paid by the United States.

Art. (i. The United States agree to appropriate the sum of two thousand dollars
annually, as long as Congress may think proper, for the support of poor infirm persons of
the Miami tribe, and for the education of the youth of the said tribe ; which sum shall
be expended under the direction of the Pre.sident of the United States.

Art. 7. It is agreed that the United States shall purchase of the persons named
in the schedule hereunto annexed the land therein mentioned, which was granted to them
by the Treaty of St. Marys, and shall pay the price affixed to their names, respectivel}' ;
the payments to be made when the title to the land is conveyed to the United States.

Art. S. The Miami tribe shall enjoy the right of hunting upon the land therein
conveyed, so long as the same shall be the property of the Uiiited States.

Art. !•. This treaty, after the same shall be ratified by the President and Senate,
shall be binding upon the United States.

In testimony whereof the said Lewis Cass, James B. Kay, and John Tipton,
commi.ssioners as aforesaid, and the chiefs and warriors of the said Miami tribe, have
hereunto set their hands, at the Wabash on the 2i!rd October, l.S2(i, and of the Inde-
pendence of the United States the fifty-first [year].

[Signed by the Commissioners and .\borigine ("hiefs. ]

Schedule of Grants referred to in the Third Article of the above Treaty.-

To John B Kichardville. one section of land between the mouth of Pipe Creek and
the mouth of Eel River, on the north side of the Wabash ; and one section on the north-
west side of the St. Joseph adjoining the old boundary line ; also one half-section on the
east side of the St. Joseph below Chappotee's village. To John B. Bourie. one section
on the north side of the St. Joseph including Chappotee's village. To the wife and
children of Charley, a Miami chief, one section where they live. To Ann Hackley and
Jack Hackley. one section each between the Maumee and St. Joseph Rivers. To the
children of Maria Christiana De Rome a half-blood Miami, one section between the
Maumee and the St. Joseph. To .\nn Turner, alias Hackley, Rebecca Hackley, and
Jane S. Wells, each one half-section of land, to be located under the direction of the
President of the United States. To John B. Kichardville. one section of land upon the
north side of the Wabash to include a large spring nearly opposite the mouth of Pipe

414 THE MAUMEE RIVER BAS!M.

Creek. To Francois Godfrey, one section above and adjoining said last grant to John B.
Richardville. To Louison Godfroy, one section above and adjoining the grant to Francois
Godfroy. To Francis Lafontaine, one section above and adjoining the grant to Francois
Godfroy. To John B. Richardville, junior, one section on the Wabash below and
adjoining the Reservation running from the Wabash to Eel River. To Joseph Richard-
ville. one section above and adjoining the Reservation running from the Wabash to Eel
River. To La Gros, three sections where he now lives, and one .section adjoining the
Cranberry in the Portage Prairie. One quarter-section of land to each of the following
persons, namely ". Charles Gouin, Pierre Gouin, and Therese Gouin, to be located under
the direction of the President of the United States. Two sections of land at the old
town on Eel River, to be reserved for the use of Metchinequea [Chief Little Turtle].

The Delawares at Littlf Sandusky i!rd August, 1K29, quitclaimed
to the United States the reservation granted them -9th September,
1817, of three miles square adjoining the Wyandot Reservation along
the Sandusky River, and engaged to remove west of the Mississippi to
join those gone before to the James River, where their annuity was to
be paid to them. Also the Delawares at St. Marys the same date
made treaty supplementary to that of 3rd October, 1818, wherein they
agreed to the removal to a reservation by James tributary of White
River in Missouri.

The Senecas of the Sandusky River at Washington, 28th Febru-
ary, 1831, quitclaimed the reservations granted to them 29th Septem-
ber, 1817, at the Foot of the Maumee Rapids, and 17th September,
181K, at St. Marys, and engaged to remove west of the Mississippi.
Also the Senecas and Shawnees mixed bands at Lewistown, Ohio,
20th July, 1831, being about three hundred in number, quitclaimed
their reservations of above dates and agreed to remove to a Missouri
Reservation of 60,000 acres of land. The United States were to pay
all expenses attending the removal, and to build and equip sawing
mill and blacksmith shop.

The Shawnees at Wapakoneta and by Hog Creek, the present
Ottawa River, about four hundred in number quitclaimed their reser-
vations 8th August, 1831, and agreed to remove to a reservation of
100,000 acres west of the Mississippi by those gone before. Among
the valuable considerations were : Money advanced to build homes,
presents of clothing, tools and agricultural implements, promises of
a flouring mill, a sawing mill, a blacksmith shop with supplies and a
blacksmith.

The Ottawas along the lower Maumee at Wolf Rapids and Roche
de Bout, at Occonoxee Village the present Charloe by the Auglaise
River, and those by the Blanchard River at the site of the present
Village of Ottawa, with total number of about two hundred quit-
claimed in Council at Maumee Bay 30th August, 1831, their claims
based on the treaties of 1807 and 1817, and engaged to remove to a

TREATIES FOR REMOVAL OF ABORIGINES WESTWARD. 415

reservation (il 4(),(K)() acres west of tin- Mississippi, for tfie consider-
ation of annuit\, sulisistence, ])resi.nts nl liiankets, horses, K'uns, a^ri-
cuitural inipiinunts, ti.nts, tools, etc. Tliis relin(.|uishnunt did not
include (i4;l acres patented liy the United States to Peter Manor
( Manard I or 'Yellow Hair' situated on the left liank of the Maumee
at Grand Rai)ids, jiart of which tract yet belongs to his descendants.
Several conditions and i)rovisions were also embraced in this relin-
quishment, viz: A three years' k-ase was granted Chief Wau-be-ga-
ka-ke of a Section ol land lielow and adjoining Peter Manor; also to
Muck-qui-on-a or Bearskin one and a half Section below Wolf Raj^ids
with use of the island there for no definite time. To Hiram Thebault
a half-breed Ottawa a quarter section of land, 160 acres, to include his
improvements at the Bear Rapids. Also to William M'Nabb a half-
breed Ottawa a (juarter section adjoining Thebaults. To the children
of Yellow Hair or Peter Manor, one half section of land, 320 acres, to
adjoin the north line of their father's section, the lines not to approach
nearer than one mile to the Maumee. This treatv also provided for
the pa\nient of debts as follows:

Article XVI. It is agreed by the chiefs! of Blanchard River and Occouo.xee
Village, and the chiefs of Roche de Bout [see Chapter on the Maumee River] and Wolf
Rapids, jointly that they are to pay out of the surplus proceeds of the several tracts
herein ceded by them, equal proportions of the claims against them by John E. Hunt,
John Hollister, Robert A. Forsythe, Payne C. Parker. Peter Minor, Theodore E. Phelps,
CoUister Haskins. and S. and P. Carlin. The chiefs acknowledged the claim of John E.
Hunt to the amount of S">l)O0 ; the claim of John Hollister for 8.')(K)0 ; Robert A. Forsythe
for S7.>24 in which are included the claims assigned by Isaac Hull. Samuel Vance, A.
Peltier, Oscar White, and .\ntoine Lepoint. They also allow the claim of Payne C.
Parker for $.")00 : of Peter Minor for Si 000 ; of Theodore E. Phelps for S.'iOO : of Collister
Haskins for $.")0 ; of S. and P. Carlin for s:!ll.S.2.") ; of Joseph Laronger for S'iOO ; of
Daniel Lakin for $70. [Notwithstanding these acknowledgments and allowances it was
expressly understood and agreed by the respective parties that the items composing the
several claims should be submitted to the strictest .scrutiny and examination by the
Secretary of War and the accounting officers of the Treasury Department, and such
amount only be allowed as was found just and true.]

Article XIX. The chiefs signing this convention also agree in addition to the
claims allowed in the sixteenth article thereof, that they owe John Anderson $200 and
Francis Lavoy 5200.

.Article XX. It is agreed that there shall be allowed to Nau-ou-quai-que-zhick SlOO
out of the surplus fund accruing from the sales of the lands herein ceded, inconsequence
of his not owing any debts, and having his land sold to pay the debts of his brethren.*

These councils with the Aborigines to secure their 'quitclaim to
lands were continued at every opiiortunity : with the Menomonis of Fox
River at Washington ^<th February, IHHl : with the Wyandots of Big
Spring, Crawford County, Ohio, at M'Cutcheonville 19th January, 1832:
with the Pottawotamis of the Prairie 20th October, 1832, at Camp

"Laws oj the United Slates volume viii, paue liiflfl.

416 THE MAUMEE RIVER BASIN.

Tippecanoe, Indiana; with the Pottawotamis of Tippecanoe River 26th
October, 1832; with the Tippecanoe River Pottawotamis of Indiana,
Illinois and Michigan 27th October, 1H32 ; with the \vestern tribes of
Delawares and Shawnees at Carter Hill near St. Louis, in 1832, to con-
firm former treaties in general and in particular.

Attention was also given to the preservation of the health of the
Aborigines. May 5, 1832, Congress made it the duty of the several
Agents to employ surgeons or physicians to 'vaccinate the Aborigines
with genuine vaccine matter to be supplied by the Secretary of War.'
For this purpose $12,000 was appropriated, on account of the former
great sufferings of these people with smallpox. Doctor Oscar White
of the Village of Maumee was employed for this purpose by James
Jackson, the Agent then residing at Maumee, and in the year 1833 he
vaccinated eight hundred Aborigines thereabout, the most of them
being Ottawas.

The closing treaty with the Ottawas of the lower Maumee River
and Maumee Bay, was held 8th February, 1833, by George B. Porter
United States Commissioner, when they quitclaimed their lands granted
at the treaties of 1807 and 1817, with the following exceptions:

Art. II. It is agreed that out of the lands hereby ceded, the following reservations
shall be made ; and that patents for each tract shall be granted by the United States to
the individuals respectively, and their heirs, for the quantity hereby assigned to each,
that is to say ; a tract of 1520 acres shall be laid off at the mouth of the river, on the
south side thereof, and to be so surveyed as to accommodate the following persons for
whose use respectively, each tract hereinafter described is reserved, viz ; .'J20 acres to
Au-to-kee [Ottokee] a Chief, at the mouth of the river to include Presque Isle ; 800 acres
to Jacques, Robert, Peter, Antoine, Francis and Alexis Navarre, to include their present
[1833] improvements; lliO acres for Way-say-on the son of Tush-qua-guan, to include
his father's old cabin ; the remaining 240 acres to be set off in the rear of these two sec-
tions ; 80 acres thereof for Petau, and if practicable to include her cabin and field ; 80
acres more thereof for Cheno a Chief, above or higher up the little creek, and the other
80 acres thereof for Joseph Le Cavalier Ranjard, deceased. Also the following tracts on
the north side of said river: KiO acres to Wau-sa-ou-o-quet a Chief, to include the
improvement where he now lives on Pike Creek, and to front on the Bay ; 80 acres for
Leon Guoin and his children, adjoining the last and on the south side thereof; 1(30 acres
for Aush-cush, and Ke-tuck-ee, Chiefs, to be laid off on the north side of Ottawa Creek
fronting on the same, and above the place where the said Aush-cush now lives. One
hundred and sixty acres for Robert A. Forsyth of Maumee, to be laid off on each side of
the turnpike road where Halfway Creek crosses the same; and KiO acres fronting on the
Maumee River to include the place where Ke-ne-wau-ba formerly resided ; KiO acres for
John E. Hunt, fronting on the said river immediately above and adjoining the last; and
also 1(30 acres to adjoin the former tract on the turnpike road. The said tracts to be
surveyed and set off under the direction of the President of the United States.

The said Au-to-kee, Wa-say-on. Pe-tau-che-no, Wau-sa-on-o-quet, Aush-cush, and
Ke-tuck-kee, being Aborigines, the lands hereby reserved for them are not to be alienated
without the approbation of the President of the United States.

The said Leon Guoin has resided for a long time among these Aborigines ; has
subsisted them when they would otherwise have suffered, and they are greatly attached

FINAL TREATIES WITH OTTAWAS. AND OTHERS. 417

to him. They request that the grant be to him and his present wife during their joint
lives, and the life of the survivor, and to their children in fee.

The said Jacques, Robert, Peter, Antoine, Francis and Alexis Navarre have long
resided among these .\borigines; intermarried with them, and been valuable friends.

The said Albert Ranjard, deceased, had purchased land of them previous to the
late war [of 1812] upon which he had paid them $:>ll(l for which his family had never
received any equivalent.

The reservations to the said Robert A. Forsyth and John E. Hunt being at the
especial request of the said band, in consideration of their long residence among them,
and the many acts of kindness they have extended to them.

Art. III. In consideration of which it is agreed that the United States shall pay
to the said band of Aborigines the sum of twenty-nine thousand four hundred and forty
dollars, to be, by direction of the said band, applied in extinguishment of their debts in
manner following, that is to say; To John Hollister and Company seven thousand three
hundred and sixty-five dollars which includes other claims, directed by the said Aborigines
to be by him paid, amounting to thirteen hundred and ninety-five dollars as per schedule
A, herewith ; To John E. Hunt nine thousand nine hundVed and twenty-nine dollars,
which includes other claims directed by the said Aborigines to be by him paid, amounting
to two thousand six hundred and seventy-five dollars and sixty-three cents, as per sched-
ule B, herewith : To Robert A. Forsyth of Maumee ten thousand eight hundred and
ninety dollars, which includes other claims directed by the said .\borigines to be bv him
paid, amounting to four thousand four hundred and ten dollars, as per schedule C here-
with, [none of these schedules are on file, and could not be published] ; to Louis Beaufit
seven hundred dollars; to Pierre Menard four hundred dollars; to John King one
hundred dollars ; to Louis King fifty-six dollars.

Within six months after payment by the United States of the said consideration
money, the said Aborigines agree to remove from all the lands herein ceded. And it is
expressly understood that in the meantime no interruption shall be offered to the survey
of the same by the United States.

And whereas the said Band have represented to the said Commisssoner that under
the treaty, as interpreted by them, entered into with John B. Gardiner. Commissioner on
the part of the United States, on the .'iOth day of August, 1S:!1, [noted on page 411] for
the cession of a part of their lands, there is due to them, jointly with that portion of the
tribe that has emigrated, eighteen thousand dollars, and for which they have made no
claim. Whenever this deficiency shall be paid, it is agreed that out of said fund there
shall be paid to Joseph Leronger in full satisfaction of all his claim, four hundred dollars ;
and to Pierre Menard in like satisfaction sixteen hundred dollars ; to Gabriel Godfroy,
Junior, in like satisfaction two hundred dollars ; to Waubee's daughter Nau-quesh-kum-
o-qua fifty dollars; to Charles Leway or Nau-way-nes fifty dollars: to Doctor Horatio
Conant two hundred dollars in full satisfaction of all claim; and to Joseph F. Marsac
fifty dollars.

The final treaties for the removal, westward, of the Aborigines who
had recently roamed at will along the Maumee River and elsewhere
through this Basin, are as follows: with five bands of Pottawotamis in
Indiana in 1834: also in 183H with five bands: with Wyandots 23rd
April, 1836, to reduce their claims : also with the Miamis at the
junction of Little River with the Wabash 6th November, 1838, wherein
they quitclaimed their former reservations, a few receiving smaller res-
ervation grants, one being " to O-zah-shin-quah and the wife of
Brouilette, daughters of the 'Deaf Man' [and his wife the near life-long

418 THE MAUMEE RIVER BASIN.

American captive Frances Slocuni, see ante page 235] as tenants in
common, one Section of land by the Mississinewa River [a tributary of
the Wabash having origin in Ohio] to include the improvements where
they now live ; " "^ two treaties with the Miamis in 1838, and two sub-
treaties; with the Pottawotamis of Hillsdale County and other parts of
southern Michigan: with the Miamis of the Mississinewa; and with the
Wyandots at Upper Sandusky 23rd April, 1842.

Descendants of the Aborigines, in General and in Partici^lar.

The study of mankind is the most interesting of studies, its interest
being enhanced by the natural inheritance liy man of elements which
impel toward the develojiment of civilization in the liroadest and best
sense — toward continual advancement in all things conducive to a
higher, better estate.

From the history of peoples we learn that primitive man, or man
at the beginning of written history, was in low estate in everything
excepting bone, brawn and liraver\' ; that some men held to their inward
propelling forces for the betterment ot their condition, and that their
succeeding" generations have struggled on against natural obstacles, the
temptations to evil habits and the tendencies to reversions to barbarism
and savagery that have beset the lives of all, and that have blasted
the lives of the multitude in relatively decreasing numbers to the
present time.

Man's development toward a better estate, even of the most pro-
gressive races, has been slow and tortuous, often impeded in the
succeeding generations, sometimes wholly suppressed among most
peoples and, at times, well nigh extinguished among all. It has been
shown on preceding jiages that great upheavals and depressions of the
earth's surface in extensive regions, and extreme changes of cliniatr
from heat to cold,- from snow to ice and to flood, have driven peopli-
widel\- from the native places of their ancestors, if they were not envel-
oped at once to their destruction. The survivors of different genera-
tions have been widely dispersed, both liy the angry moods of nature
and liy their warring neighbors, and necessitated to adapt themselves
to new and widely different retreats and conditions.

Yet, despite all these olistacles, some races continued to jirogress.
They successfully bore the doulile burden of defending themselves
against the warring and thieving habits of other tribes while accumu-
lating material wealth and knowledge and contriliuting their portion to
that development, material, mental, moral, and spiritual, which is the
true destiny of triumphant mankind.

Laws of the United States, volume ix, page 15*21.

LOW ESTATE OF ABORIGINES. THEIR MISNAMING. 419

Different races have tfius sliown varviny tendencies, and aliilities,
to evolve this destiny. The American Aborigines'' north of north
latitude 87° have been the lowest in the list for these tendencies. As
found by European's they were tht- most savaj^^e of mankind, and there
were no active influences at work for the betterment of their condition.
There had lieen some advancement by the probable ancestors of some
if not all of the tribes, the mound builders, who were somewhat hxed
in their habitations and who jiartook to a degree of the stone and
textile work of the more southwestern tribes, and from whom came the
polished stone imjilements and weapons possessed, by inheritance and
conquest, by the Aborigines wandering through this Basin when
discovered by the French.

The mysteries enveloping the prehistoric period of the .Amer-
ican Aborigines, the paradoxes, and the vagaries of their char-
acter including their religions, and their long-continued successes in
savagery displayed in their historic period, have made these people
fruitful subjects for all classes of writers: and from the nature of the
subject as well as from the character of the writers, much of misap|)re-
hension and of fiction have been indited. Their general taciturn
demeanor in the presence of strangers, generallv due to their igno-
rance, diffidence or suspicion, has been ascribed to their possession of
great wisdom. The poverty and uncertaintx' of their language con-
duced to the same result. T Their expressions on subjects other than
those most common were so involved or indefinite that it was impos-
sible to get exact interpretations of what they did sa\' and of their

* Christopher Columbus, when he landed on the Island of San Salvador, supposed he was in India;
and he therefore called the natives Indians in his report. A few other navigators were likewise
deceived; and their fabulous reports of the wealth and possibilities of the country for some lentjth of
time eclipsed the former reports of the real India. The term Indians, to designate the Aborigines of
America, thus became common amonR the people of maritime nations. When the true nature of the Con-
tinent became known, the use of this misnomer should have been discontinued, it had entered into the
lantjuajie of commerce and of war. however, and the peoples enyaced in these absorbing avocations cared
more for ready common words than for accuracy. But it is astonishing that scientists — archaeologists,
ethnologists, anthropologists — have continued to perpetuate, parrot-like, this erroneous and very objec-
tionable tern) ! A few of them at Washington have even done worse by trying to engraft into our language
the meaningless, bastard term .Amerind, made up of the first two syllables of the word .\nierica, and the
first syllable of Indian, necessitating an accompanying explanation. Nor are the terms red race or
American race appropriate. Color is of relative and uncertain signiticance when applied to peoples; and
it is'iuite well established that the American Aborigines are of the Mongolian race type. The theory of
their coming to America by way of Bering Strait is the most plausible one, unless we conceive that
they came before the present contour of the continents was established. The term Aborigines is suffi-
cient designation with occasional addition of local and tribal names. See the article ' A Plea for Greater
Simplicity, and Greater Accuracy, in the Writings of the Future Regarding the .Atnerican .Aborigines' in
Xhe American Antiquarian and Oriental Journal, volutne xxiv, January-February, 1902, by Charles E.
Siocum.

t The language of the average tribe was so indefinite and inexpressive that imperfect comprehen-
sions of each other was the rule on all but the most common subjects; and communications in the
dark or at a distance when gesticulations could not be seen, were impossible other than expressions of
alarm, call, and greeting.

420 THE MAUMEE RIVER BASIN.

meanings.'^ The impossibility of Europeans fully comprehending
their meanings, led to inferences in their favor; and the suggestive
catechisms by the former led to assents by the latter to what they
imperfectly understood, if understood at all. Here was the opportun-
ity of the 'able interpreter' and book compiler, who rose equal to the
occasions of presuming the sentiments and of rounding out sentences
in English that make the imputed author's speeches and myths equal
to those of cultured intellects — whose products thev really are. The
sentiments as imputed to the Seneca chief Logan in 1774, which have
been extensively imposed upon school children as an example of
Aborigine eloquence, were first formulated by Simon Girty and then
rewritten, amplified and embellished by the facile John Gibsont before
they were recast for the school-reader.

These Aborigines were wholly confined to the use of stone, stick,
bone, and horn weapons and implements that could be readih' gathered,
until the coming of the Europeans. Metal knives and hatchets were
traded to them for furs at New Amsterdam (now New York) as early
as the vear IHOy: and it is probable that some European weapons
were obtained from navigators jnevious to this date. Guns were sup-
l)lied later, and slowly at first as the price was high. The Miamis had
obtained but few guns up to the year 1670, but the tribes to the east-
ward and northward were earlier and more numerously supplied.
With these European weapons the savages became more formidable
foes; although where numbers were engaged in conflict at close range
bows and arrows were more destructive than fusees or flint-lock
muskets and pistols, then the only firearms. To the war-parties sent
out by the British against the Americans, guns and other weapons of
good service were freely furnished them. Although thev were taught
much of war by the French and British, they could not be brought to
strict military tactics or to discipline ; and they were prone to desert
when most needed.

The bond of union between members of tribes, was not strong,
although it generally required but little provocation for one member,
or all, to enter upon the defense of another against those of other
tribes or bands. The number of members of a tribe or band varied by
desertions to and from as well as by captivities and deaths. Thus
many small tribes and bands were being formed, and others extin-
guished. The authority of all chiefs was very limited at all times, and
often nil. Individuals were not obliged to obev. They joined a jiro-

* Compare Count de Volney's Views of the United States of America in 1796. paye '^h^i.

t Compare Whittlesey's Fugitive Essays pace 14."^; Brantz Mayer's Logan and Cresap and Butter-
field's W/story o/" (/]e Girtys pace 29; and per contra. State Department MSS. Jefferson Papers ."j-l. 4.
wherein Gibson declared to John Anderson, trader, that his writinji was a literal translation.

CHARACTERISTICS OF THE LATER ABORICINES. 421

posed excursion only when it offered a jirohahle increase of excitement,
sensuous indulj^ence, or jirofit; and anyone, or all, would forsake the
leader at will.

V'erv indifferent if any care was ^iven to feeble children and to the
decrepit of all ajjes ; and they, with the sick who did not soon recover
without care, or did not die from the barbarous demonstrations of the
sorcerers, were often left alone to their late and in other mood, their
dead were bewailed with much noise.

The shades of color, reddish or cojijier and darker, of the skin of
these Aborigines were due largely to the juices, greases, paints, smoke,
dirt, etc., to which their skins were constantly liesmeared, and to the
effects of the sun and weather. Man\' of those now conforming to
civilized usages do not vary materially in color from the average
American of like habits. ■"'

It was the custom of the men to keep their faces smooth by pluck-
ing the lieard as soon as it could be felt. This was universally' the
custom, fixed liy habit, and was done by grasping each hair between
thumb and finger and thus extracting it. A special appliance for pre-
vention of growth of beard at one time reported, was found to be a
pair of strong, close-joining mussel shells hx which the beard could be
more readily and uniformly extracted than by the thumb and finger.

Until their final subjugation by the United States, the Aborigines
continued cannibals as when first seen by Europeans, although in
deference to the European sentiment and larder the eating of human
f^esh was curtailed to times of great want and excitement. They ate
some of their captives, and even their own people, on occasions of
war, feast, and of famine. The hunting of game was their sport, and
when game was plentiful they were generall\- satisfiid with it as a food
supply. Before the teachings, examples, and feedings of the Euro-
peans, the choice ol their meat ( between that of game, their dogst or
human flesh ) was apparently more from the desire for convenience, and
a change, than from humane sentinnnt. In rare feasts, and particu-

* See ante pai,'e 60; and Count de Volney's Views of America payes ;i53. 361.

t The don was the only animal domesticated possessed by these Aborigines before the coming of
Europeans with horses and ponies; and, then, for other than these, they had little or no desire further
than for the ready supply of meat that the cattle afforded. The dogs possessed in this Basin by the
Aborigines resembled the wolves here in color, mu/zle, tail, and general characteristics, other than that
they were about one-third shorter in limbs than the wolves. They did not bark, but howled and
snapped like the wolves. They rendered good assistance in the capture of large game. They were
sturdy and courageous, says .\ugnstus Skiver the last and most successful of the wolf-hunters in
Defiance County. These dogs became extinct here with the removal of the last of the Aborigines from
thfs region in 1H4.S. Charles Darwin in his book on the Origin 0/ Species quotes James Pierce who
wrote in Silliman's Journal that ' there were two varieties of wolf inhabiting the Catskill Mountains
New York — one with a light grey hound-like form which pursues deer, and the other more bulky with
shorter legs, which more frecjuently attacks the shepherds' flocks.' Probably this last-mentioned wolf
was more readily domesticated than the former, when caught young.

422 THE MAUMEE RIVER BASIN.

larly in timis of triumph over their foes, human flesh continued to be
preferred. This was witnessed at the lower Maumee River as late as
May, 1813, even when the British larder was open to them."^

They were generally great gormandizers when food was plentiful.
Even Little Turtle, one of the most circumspect of Aborigines, was
addicted to this habit although he was temperate in the use of spirit-
uous liquors. The British Agent, Sir William Johnson, dreaded the
expense of feeding them during the necessary councils. He wrote "23rd
October, 1768, that nine hundred and thirty had then arrived for the
Treaty of Fort Stanwix (at the present Rome, New York) and others
were continually arriving 'each of whom consumes daily more than
two ordinary men amongst us, and would be extremely dissatisfied if
stinted when convened for business', t When game was scarce they
ate wild beans, artichokes, currants, mulberries, lichens, inner bark
and buds of trees, snakes, frogs, etc.; and the women gave more
attention to cultivating maize, pumpkins, squashes and potatoes.

The cause of these Aborigines being void of civilization up to the
time of the coming of Europeans has lieen attributed to the absence
here of native animals, as the horse, cow, sheep, etc., which could be
domesticated for their food and use.+ That this theory is not sufficient
we have but to refer for evidence to the great cities, temples, and a
civilization found by the Spaniards in Mexico and Central America
where there was the same dearth of animals for domestication : also to
the fact that no civilizing effect was apparently produced on many of
these people liy the first two hundred years association with and use of
these animals obtained from the French, the British, and the Americans.

It must be admitted that the early French and British, the coureurs
de bois. soldiers, voyageurs. and traders, with whom the Aborigines
came first into association, were far from being good exemplars of and
for civilization. The French settlements were often composed of a
lazy, idle peoi)k , depending chiefly on the savages for their subsistence,
for which they would exchange brandy and gew-gaws if any payment
was given. S These were evil times for both peoples. The gin of the
Hollanders, the brandy of the French, and the rum of the British,

''^ For stalemenls reyardinjj the caniiibalisni of the North American Aborigines see Index refer-
ences to previous payes. Also The American Pioneer vol. i p. 5it: Brice's History of Fort Wayne pages
I21-13.S. 310; Dunn's History of Indiana pai;es 34. 35; Map, an(e paye 1*7; New Yorii Colonial Documents
vol. ix paties 33H. .^78, .">9H, 639, G4i, etc, ; Documentary History of New York vol. i page 338; Journal of
William Trent: The Jesuit Relations: Alexander Henry's Travels: Rev. Isaac M'Coy's History of
Baptist Missions Among the Aborigines page 314, where women did the carving and cooking as late as
183.5; and Letters of Columbus describing his first and fourth voyages. New York 1893. pages 47, 337,

t London Document XL], New York Colonial Documents volume viii, page 11'.'),

i See Nathaniel S. Shaler's The United States of America, volume i, page 33.

S See Francis Parknian's writings on the French and English in North America,

THE UNITED STATES RECEIVED AN EVIL HERITAGE. 423

formed the great incubus which modified in all cases, and wholly
prevented in others, the efforts that have been exerted by missionaries
and the United States for the civilization of these savage people. The
Frence regime of over om.- hundred years in this Basin very freely
mixed the blood, and fully cngraftt'd the lowest vices of that Nation
upon these people. Then lollowtd the I^ritish who (during their great
efforts continued in full force from 1760 to IHIS*^ to appease and to ally
these savages to their selfish interest of conquest alone) outdid the
French in the debauchment of them by alcoholic beverages, and by the
incitement of their savage instincts and habits to revel in the blood of
the Americans.

Surely the United States received an evil heritage in the vices of
these European peoples thus for several generations thoroughly
engrafted on and cultivated in the nature and habits of these savages !
It would have been far better for the United States had these savages
all been driven to their friends and allies, the British, in 1814 or before,
there to remain 1 They had many times forfeited every right they ever
possessed to American soil, according to the laws of nations as well as
the rights of self-preservation of the several times conquering Americans.
The great leniency,- and magnanimity, of the United States Government
was here nobly exemplified, as it has been on many other occasions.

Some of the characteristics of these people that were thus the
results of changes wrought in them l^y association of succeeding gener-
ations with Hollanders, Frenchmen, and with the British, have been
recorded as the Aboriginal characteristics. The mixture of the aborig-
inal with the results of these engraftings, and the continuance of the
Aborigines in squalor and wretchedness, have given flight to the
imaginations and activity to the jiens of sentimentalists of all grades,
and often with unjust reflections u])on the United States Government.
These savages lived altogether in their present, and from impulse.
They had no familv names. They knew nothing of their pedigree, nor
of the story of the people who preceded them ; but when the Europeans
told them of their own Kings and something of the story of their
country, some imaginative jiersons there were among them who by
intimations and assents to suggestive questionings, left the impression
with their interlocutors of fabulous characteristics among these simple
people. The British sought to classify them, to apportion coats of
arms to them, and in every way to magnify the importance of supposed

* As late as July, 1832, the British attracted to Amherstburk. Canada, one of the largest gatherings
of Aborigines ever recorded on the American Continent. They were then again gathered bv them from all
parts of the United States, even the Flatheads of the'extrenie west. This gathering, and the great flow
of intoxicants, spoiled the work of the .American missionaries at the near-by station. See Rev. Elnathan
C. Gavitfs Crumbs from my Saddle Bags page 16.5.

424 . THE MAUMEE RIVER BASIN.

or desired characteristics.'^ The French writers contril)uted much to
the multiplication and confusion of the names of 'nations ' tribes, and
of the general nomenclature including the spellings, as they have
generally been responsible for similar confusion throughout the world.
They preferred to give a name that appeared to them as a characteristic,
rather than to adopt the uncertain name used liy the Aborigines.
Thus they could discuss the various tribes before them without exciting
offense by frequent reference to the names not understood by the savage
listeners. Most of the names listed by the early writers as separate
' nations ' and tribes, have been discontinued in accordance with the
later tendencv to simplify and elucidate the subject. Thus from the
first of their histor\- there has been much of misapprehension regarding
the Aborigines and their descendants, derived from misstalements of
those who wrote of them and of their alleged works. Even the earliest
pictures of them, of their towns and forts (those of DeBry, Hariot,
Champlain, .and LaHontan ) give a glamour of size, symmetry and
construction quite unlike those of later authentic accounts which show
very primitive tiiiis and huts made of poles and bark that the women
could readily gather and imt together in any timbered region. These
Were, at most, occasionallv reinlorcid by skins of wild animals or mats
of grass. Such huts were but little improved upon during two hundred
years association with the Europeans with their metal cutting tools and
later sawing mills — see ante pages 368 and 398.

Tribes that were more widely separated, and that had less com-
munication with each other, varied most in their speech : and the vari-
ation was so marked with some as to indicate several generations of
wide separation. Those tribes having nearest the same speech are
accepted as of the same linguistic stock, though many of them ma}'
have been captives from widely distributed tribes among whom the
speech varied most. Onl\' those who were most frequently known in
this Basin — of the Algonkins and Iroquois — will be here described,
although other distant tribes of these and of the Muskoki, Panis and
Dakota stocks often passed through this region.

The Aluonkin Linguistic Stock.

The Algonkins have been taken as typical specimens of the Abo-
rigines of the northeastern part of North America. The tribes of this
stock which have been prominent in this Basin were the Chippewas,
Lenapes or Delawares, Illinois and allied bands, Miamis and allied
bands, Menomonis, Ottawas, Pottawotamis and Shawnees.

* See Documentary History of New York volume ii. payes .S to 11. Baron La Hontan did the
same at the beyinniu^; of the ei^'hteenlh century, and he is responsible for much of the misinformation
regarding these people - see his Memoires de fAmerique Septentrionale. ou la suite des Voyages. 1703.

THE TRIBES THAT ROAMED THROUGH THIS BASIN. 425

Chippewas. Ojihwa was recorded by the French as the tribal
name of the ancestors of the present Chippewas, many of whom yet
dwell at the sites of the homes of their ancestors in northern Minne-
sota, northern Michigan and in Ontario, on the Kit hank of tlie River
and Lake St. Clair. The French also called them Sauteurs Ironi tluir
lingering near the Saut Sainte Marie. These sa\ages freely indulged
tlu-ir appetite for human flt'sh after their capture ol the liritish garri-
son of Fort Michilimackinac during Pontiac's War in 17fi3.''' They
were often and numerously through this Basin. In 171)4 a few of these
people by the lower Maumee so pleased thr British Cai)tain Thomas
Morris that he thought them the most pleasing entertaim^rs he had met.
In IHi^-J they were yet a numerous tribe viz: 5669 dwelt by Saginaw
Bay, Riven and vicinity in Michigan: H'i^'i]') from Mackinaw westward
to the Mississippi in nineteen settlements; 16(l(l with Ottawas along
Green Bay and west side of Lake Michigan; and ;"()() with Pottawot-
amies in Indiana. t

The Illinois (name also written Aliniouck, Ilinoucs Irini, Irinions,
Illinese, etc. )tribes embraced the Kahokia, Moingona, Peoria, Kaskaskia,
and Tamaroas bands. Thev were formerly also allied with the Miamis.
They were at war with the F"ive Nations ( Iroquois ) of New York,
sometimes meeting tlu'm with the Miamis at the Maumee River.
Later, they suffered severe reverses and depletion along the Illinois
River by these enemies. Later they were nearly destroyed by the
Sacs and Foxes. In 1822 only thirty-six Kaskaskias remained in Illi-
nois, the others had remo\-ed west of the Mississippi. In lHri4 the
Peorias, Kaskaskias, Piankishaws, and Weas were confederated.
Thev are now less than two hundred in number, reside in the Indian
Territory, wear the clothing of civilized [leople, and are inospering.

The Lenapes, Lenni Lenapes or Delawares, were found earl\- in
the seventeenth centurv b\' the large South River' which, after tin-
appearance there in the year 1610 of Lord de la Warre as Governor of
Virginia, received his name which has latterh' been written Delaware.
This name was also applied to these Aborigines. This was the ]irinci-
]ial tribe from whom William Penn i)urchased lands in 16s2. As with
other tribes they were divided, and with different names. The main
divisions at one time were called the Unami or Turtle, the Unalachigo
or Turkev, and the Minsi, Ministi Munseyi, or Wolf tribe. The French
had little knowledge of them while east of the .-Mleghenv Mountains,
but called them all Loups or Wolves, and confounded tlnni with the
Mohicans of the Hudson River between whom there was formerly mucli

* Alexander Henry's Travels. New York. ly(>9. Parkman's Conspiracy of Pontiac volinne
pace 357.

t See Report of the Regents of the Smithsonian Institution 1H?<,5. Pan 11 panes WKj, H8t5.

426 THE MAUMEE RIVER BASIN.

of intt-rcourse and rL4ationship. They were subjuj^atLci by tht- Five
Nations of NfW York and greatly humiliated, being called by them
the Saginaga and the Squaw Nation.

Leaving the Delaware River, probablx' from compulsion, thev
came westward. Part of the tribe came to Ohio in the vear 1724.*
The United Brethren Missionaries (Moravians) did a good work
with part of the tribe which had headtiuarters in eastern Pennsylvania
and later b\" the Tuscarawas River a tributary of the Muskingum in
Ohio. The missionaries' band was suspected by the British of favor-
ing the French. They were frequently visited by the hostile savages
of their tribe and other tribes and, during the Revolutionary War, they
were suspected by the Americans of being friends of the British, and
even accused of aiding the marauding savages — see ante pages 134,
146. The Delawares early became separated and scattered. Some of
the more warlike dwelt with the Miamis for a time, perhaps perma-
nently. One band can be traced in western Ohio and in Indiana in
the reports on previous pages of hostilities against .\mericans, and
in treaties of friendship and purchase of their claims to land. By their
early legends the\' gained the title among inany tribes of being the
most direct descendants known of the most ancient people, which idea
has been since exploited bv some writers. The Miamis, Shawnees,
and other chiefs when in peace councils (as at Greenville in 1795)
referred to them on this account as their grandfathers. Their great
warchief in the battles with Americans in and near this Basin, in the
last part of the eighteenth century and the first part of the nine-
teenth, bore the name Buckongehelas. The names of other chiefs are
also appended to the Treaty at Greenville; and others appear on
different pages of this book — see Index. Captain Piiie was principal
in authority among the Delawares of northern Ohio for many
vears, dating from \7Kj. He was much addicted to the use of intoxi-
cants, and had a general following of his people in this habit. In
1822 eightv Delawares were reported dwelling near Upper Sandusky,
Ohio, and 1700 mixed with Munsees Moheakunnunks' and Nanti-
cokes' dwelling near the Mississinewa and White Rivers, Indiana.

Miamis. It is probable that the first Europeans who visited the
Maumee River, and the southern j^art of Lake Michigan, met members
of the Miami tribe or nation. Cham]:)lain, early in the seventeenth
centurx', mentioned Les Gens de Feu the people of or near fire south-
west of Lake Erie — see map ante page 75. Later writings mention
the Mascoutens or ]5rairie tribes. These terms i^robably referred to the
bands of Miamis which roamed over the prairies and were each year

* Documentary History of New York volume ii, paye 5^<5.

LOCATIONS AND CHARACTERISTICS OF THE MI AMIS. 421

liable to be injured by prairie fires. In the years lt)57-5K it was written
of the Miamis that the Oumamick Nation has fully eight thousand men,
or more than twenty-four thousand souls.'' This estimated number
was probablv intended only for those about Lake Michigan, and was,
]ierhaps, too high. Charlevoi.x wrote that in 1H71 the Miamis were
divided into three villages — one by the River St. Joseph [probably of
Lake Michigan] the second by another river which bears their name
VRivihre des Miamis, the Maumee] and runs into Lake Erie, and the
third upon the Oubache [Wabash] which runs into the Mississippi.
Those of Lake Michigan in after years jiassed to the other Miami
villages, or united with other bands or tribes. Those at or near the
present City of Lafayette, probably mixed with the Kickapoos, were
early named l.>y the French Ouiotenons (which name was abbreviated
to Ouis, and later spelled Weas by the British); those b\' the Wabash
and Vermillion Rivers were called Piankeshaws: those by the Eel
River received this river's name: and those at the head of the Maumee
retained the name Miamis which name also generally applied to all the
other bands when assembled, excepting for treaty when the\- desired to
be designated separately that the presents and annuities might be
increased. .\s early as the year IfiHT the British called the Miamis
Twightwighs, Twigtwies, etc. In 17"_'l those by or near the Maumee
River numbered two thousand. + Bancroft, in his History of the United
States, mentions the Miamis as the most powerful confederacy in the
West, and this was probably true during the closer alliance with the
Illinois, Pottawotamis and jierhaps other tribes. A French traveler m
171B writes of the Miamis at the head of the Maumee River as follows:

The Miamis are sixty leagues from Lake Erie, and number 400. all well formed
men, and well tattooed ; the women are numerous. They are hard working, and raise a
species of Maize unlike that of our .\borigines at Detroit. It is white, of the same size
as the other, the skin much finer and the meal much whiter. This Nation is clad in deer
skin, and when a married woman goes with another man, her husband cuts oft her nose
and does not see her any more. This is the only Nation that has such a custom. They
love plays and dances, wherefore they have more occupation. The women are well
clothed, but the men use scarcely any covering and are tattooed all over the body. J

The Miamis, like all other tribes, were ver\- sui:>erstitious, exceed-
ingly so when an active sorcerer was near. Captain Thomas Morris
wrote in 1764 that they carried their god along the Maumee in a bag
which was hung in front of their encampment, and was visited by ncjne
but the sorcerer; if any other person presumed to advance between the
front of the encampment and that sjiirit in the bag, he was jiut to

*The Jesuit Relations, Cleveland ed. vol. xliv, paiie 247. New York Col. Docs. vol. ix, paye H91.
t London Document xxii. New York Colonial Documents volume v, iiate 623.
5 Paris Document VII. New York Colonial Documents volume ix, pa«e ^91.

428

THE MAUMEE RIVER BASIN.

death — which is probably an extreme statement. Their offerings of
tobacco, made by every individual each morning', were ranged in good
order on long slips of bark on shore and on rocks in the river.

The remnants of the Miami bands were mostly gathered around
Fort Wavne and along the Waliash River and its tributaries after the

Miami Abol■i^iine Descendants at Reserve, Indiana. 17th May, IVHHI, interspersed with people of
Caucasian blood ; at the Unveiliim of the Monument to the memory of Frances Slocum who was a Captive
with the Aborigines nearly all her life.* These Miamis are distinguished as follows; Seated at the left.
Mrs. William Peconga. who cannot speak English; the two old men with long hair William and Gabriel
Godfrey; tlie younger men and boys seated on the ground; the two girls and young woman between them
seated on the ground, also the one in white in chair; and men numbered 2 and IH. standing.

War of 1(^12 : and treaties after this date established numerous reserva-
tions for them as described on previous pages. General Harrison, in a
letter to the Secretary- of War in March, 1814, after their later debauch-
ment by the British during the War of 1812, wrote that they were a
' poor, miserable, drunken set, diminishing every year. Becoming too
lazy to hunt, they feel the advantage of their annuity ' . . It was

See History of the Slocums of America, by Charles E. Slocum, volumes i and ii.

THE MI AM IS RECEIVED PATERNAL CARE.

429

impossible for the American Governiiitnt to fulh- prevent the clandes-
tine sale of intoxicants to them as well as to the other trilu-s. They
frequented the rapidly ^rowin^" towns with their annuity mone\' and
would seek strong drink. The Gove-rnment endeavored to protect them
in ever\' wav ; hut it was imi"iossible. It was estimated that hillv five

Companion \"ie\v to that on opposite paye, the Miami Aboriyine Descendants beini: the man num-
bered 30 who. with his companions in opposite enyraviny, was in working attire for the purpose of
carinc for the hundreds of horses of the visitors outside the views; the yountt woman and her son seated
on tlie lifounii who, with the young woman in wiiite and tlieir cousin in wiiite in opposite view, are ureal
urand-dauuhters of tlie Captive — the two in white beint,' rlioseji to nnveil tlie Moiuinient.

hundred deaths resulted anion},; the Miamis from murders and accidt_nts
resulting' from the use of intoxicating;" drinks between the years IHiy
and 1830.* The number of Miamis in 1H2"2 with Wea and Eel River
bands, is given in the United States report as fourteen hundred.

The treaty of 1M40 provided for the removal to western reservation
of all the Miamis excepting the families of Chief Richardville i Pe-she-
wah ) living a few miles south of Fort Wavne, of Chiefs Godfro\' and

* See Count de Volney's Views of the United States, Pliiladeli>hia, IHiij, paue :iM

430 THE MAUMEE RIVER BASIN.

MeshiiiKomesia, both living near the Mississinewa River, and the
brothers of the last named who were permitted to live on their brothers'
reservations. The removal of the others was not effected until 1846,
and then it was necessary to send soldiers to gather them at Peru,
Indiana, where about five hundred wretched creatures were put aboard
canal boats and brought through Fort Wayne to Junction, Ohio, and
thence bv Miami and Erie Canal were taken to Cincinnati. During
their stop in this city, awaiting a steamboat down the Ohio River, the
scenes of their intoxication from liquors sold them by conscienceless
grogdealers, were disgusting and painful to the beholders.

In the 3ear 1854 delegations of the Miamis remaining in Indiana
and of those removed beyond the Mississippi, visited Washington
where another treaty was made in which the United States agreed to
pa}' the Indiana Miamis $221,257.86 at the expiration of twenty-five
years in lieu of the permanent annuity named in former treaty ; and to
pa\' five per centum interest annually on this sum, instead of the former
annuitv, until the principal became due and was paid. At the date of
this treaty, 1854, the Miamis remaining in Indiana numbered 302. At
the date of the final payment of the $221,257.86 at Wabash in 1881, there
were of all ages 318 to receive the money. They were then situated as
follows: eighty dwelt on the Godfroy Reservation b^' the Mississinewa
River a few miles above Peru; sixty on the Meshingomesia Reservation
in Wabash and Grant Counties; fifteen at Lafayette ; twenty in Hunt-
ington County; thirty in the vicinity of Fort Wayne; one family at
Napoleon, Henry County, Ohio; forty in Kansas and Indian Territory;
and the others were scattered in the States of Michigan, Illinois, Iowa,
and Minnesota. Fully one-half of the whole number were at this time
minors. With this final payment by the United States, these Miamis
assumed all the rights, privileges, and responsibilities of citizenship.
All tribal authority and relations ceased with this change. Before this
date, 1881, their reservations had been free from taxation, encumbrance,
and sale. These reservations were subdivided in the year 1873, and
the head of each family was allotted a tract in size according to the
number in his family. The farms of many of the Miamis remaining in
Indiana were later mortgaged to secure debts contracted since they
were given control, and some farms have been sold by the Sheriff to
satisfy these debts. Intemperate use of intoxicating beverages have
ruined many. Want of energy and want of good management have
characterized the most of them. They have clothed themselves in
the current styles of citizens; and their children have attended the
public schools to a limited extent. A few of the oldest people have
not learned the English language. The members of the Godfroy and
Richardville bands near Fort Wayne average little if any more thrifty

EARLY HISTORY OF THE ABORIGINES UNCERTAIN. 451

or worthy than those rifarer the central parts of Indiana: in fact those of
the Meshinffomi-sia band have lieen rated as tlie liest types of the tribe
in general. Over fifty treaties are recorded as having occurred between
the United States and the Miamis between the \'ears ITiTi and l'^ri4,
most of which were of minor significance.

There is so much of uncertainty regarding the pan-ntage of the
early Aborigine sachems and chiefs, and so much confusion regarding
those of the many bands as to their duties, powers, and the influence
they exerted, that it is impossible to sift and gather from the great mass
of conflicting writings even the modicum of truth they may contain.
Brief mention of thos'e Miamis who were more prominent, and of some
of their jiossible characteristics, will give sufficient glimpses of them,
and of their people in this connection, viz : Osandiah was the prin-
cipal chief, possibly from near the middle of the eighteenth century.
He was invited to a conference with President Washington who gave
him presents, including a writing on parchment to insure him a good
reception if brought back at any time. These presents of more durable
character were given to the Pottawatomis on account of the continued
jealousy and ill-will manifested by the Miami bands against the band
that jiosscssed them. A-taw-a-taw succeeded his father Osandiah < ? )
and he was succeeded in the chieftaincy liy his son Met-o-sin-yah, as
the legend runs, during whose time his band, that had been living at
Pickawillany or old Piqua, returned to Indiana southwest of Fort
Wayne.

The great war chief Aque-nah-que (spelled Kequenackqua ante
page 94) who flourished early in the eighteenth century, had a son
called Little Turtle b\- the British and Americans, who was a leading
war chief and for manv years had consideralile influence, which rapidly
waned at the beginning of the nineteenth century. Little Turtle could
not wear clothing at home of the style of Americans, or kee]) cows and
other profitable domestic animals on account of the bigotry of his
tribe, members of which would poison or otherwise kill them. He
lamented the inebriety of his people and tried to curtail it, but without
appreciable effect. Evidently he was a rare, good character among his
kind.* Probably the influence of Captain William Wells, and the
annuities of the llnited States, had much to do with liis later docility.

jean Bajitiste Richardville or Pe-she-wah was the Miami National
Chief from the year 1^12 until his death in 1841. He was a French
half-breed and always lived with the Miamis. He was selfish, secretive
and superstitious. He had six children. His son Joseiih, Wah-pe-
mun-wah the fighter, received some education in a Roman Catholic

''Compare Count de \'oIney's opinion of Little Turtle, in his Views of the United States, pane 3.57

452

THE MAUMEE RIVER BASIN.

school at Dftroit, and gave some attention to playing the violin and
flute. He early became intemperate in the use of intoxicating drinks
and was generally considered worthless, which his father attributed to
the schools of the white people and he therefore became more antago-
nistic to them. His other children were John Baptiste or Shap-peen-
e-mau and three daughters. All these children died previous to 1841
excepting Catherine or Pe-con-go-quah, who married To-pe-ah or
Francis LaFontaine a French half-breed who succetded her father in
1841 as National Chief, he being the last of such officers.

Of the village chiefs, Le Gros or Ma-che-ke-le-tah has been
confounded with Le Gris or Na-goh-quan-gogh who signed the Treaty at

Greenville in 1795 — see ante page '232.
The present Lagro a station on the
Wabash Railway southwest of Fort
Wayne was named from him. He was
among the number for whom the United
States built brick dwellings, his being
near the present Lagro, Indiana, where
he died in 1H31. Chief Little Turtle's
brick house was by Eel River a little
north of west from Fort Wayne ; and
Chief Richardville's a few miles south of
Fort Wayne. The village chief Big Ma-
jenica was a man of strong characteristics,
and managed to have his way with all
persons through their fear of him. Osash,
a war chief, is described hv Samuel
M'Clure a trader with these peo]ile, as a
mild-mannered man of small stature who
wore a broad-brimmed hat, thus present-
ing much the appearance of the (Quakers
who had a mission station l:)y the Little
River in 1804. He died about the year
IHHO, when Frank Godfro\- or Pol-oz-wah
was chosen the village chief, which office then became but a mere
name. One of the more thoughtful of the Ottawas along the Maumee
River gave the meaning mother' to the name Miaini (Me-au-me).
This was proliablv due to the tradition that the Miamis were formerly
a numerous people which separated from time to time to form different
tribes and bands.

Menomonis. The Menomonis were called Les Mangeurs de Avoine or
Oat Eaters by the French from their liberal use of the wild oats and rice
growing in the Rice Lake region west of Lake Sujierior. They were

M,.;-SHE-CON-0-gllAII
{Little Till lle( war cliiet of the Miamis.
He led the savayes at tlie defeats of
Generals Harmai" and St. Clair. Born
altont 1747 by the Eel River, Indiana,
of a Miami father and a Mohican
mother. He remained friendly to the
Americans after the Treaty of Green-
ville in 179.'">. Died July H. 1813, at
Fort Wayne.

THE ABORIGINE TRIBES OF THE MAUMEE REGION. 455

much at war. Thuy aided the Frt-nch against the British and, later,
aided the British against the Americans. .Vfter the massacre of Colonel
Dudley and many of his regiment at the Siege of Fort Meigs, warriors
of this tribe were i^rominent in hasting on the flesh of their victims.
(See ante page 381). Their numlur in XX'l'l was reported as "270 by
the Illinois River and H!H")(I in Wisconsin. Their present number is
less than two thousand, larg(l\ s;atiiered on a reservation near Shawano,
Wisconsin.

Ottawas. Ottawa, Outaouack, and various other sjiellings h\ the
early French, signified the nation or tribe with holes in the nose in or
suspended from which were worn as ornaments little stones or bright
objects. They incurred the disi)leasure of the Five Nations (Iroquois)
and were driven by them from the northern shore of Lake Michigan in
16^)0. They met the op])osition of the Dacotas in the upper Mississippi
region and returned to Mackinaw. Many of them wandered again into
this Basin and aided Pontiac in his conspiracy against the British.
After his defeat in 1764 they became more sedentary, and with the good
offices of the French and English were permitted by the Iroc|uois to
remain along the Maumee and its tributaries. Their number here in
1H06 has been written as eight thousand,'' which is probably far too
high an estimate. Their princiyml village b\- the lower Maumee was at
one time on the right bank near Maumee Bay. Tradition states that
this village e.xisted from the days of Pontiac, and that one of his sons
was head chief. Also, that Pontiac's widow ( ?) called Kan-tuck-e-gun.
and his son Otussa, dwelt in this village in b'^OG. Peter Navarre was
authority for much of this information and he stated that Otussa was a
man of good sense, free from the vices of many of his neighl^iors.
Mesh-ke-mau, chief of a village on the left bank of the Maumee near
its mouth, had the reputation of being the best orator of the Ottawas
as he was foremost on all public occasions (see ante page 375).
According to legend he was a nt])hew of Pontiac. A-be-e-wah a young
chief won the highest regard of Peter Navarre who thought he was the
most talented of his tribe. He died about the year ll-ilO, presumably
jioisoned as was often asserted bx the superstitious Aborigines about
sudden deaths.

Once a year these Ottawas had a feast and something of an aiijiar-
ent sacrifice, with some ceremonies including the burning of food they
could not eat. .\ few days before this feast they would blacken their
faces and eat only in the afternoon. They all assembled and built a
long, low, rudi' shanty in which the main feast occurred. This feast
v/as attended bv much of irregular and meaningless talk and gestures

♦Hosmer's Esrly History of the Maumee Valley.

434 THE MAUMEE RIVER BASIN.

which were dignified by Hosmer with the name religious ceremony. In
common with all tribes, feasting, or rather gluttonx', was of common
occurrence when food was plentiful and their much abused stomachs
would admit of it. The\' were passionatelv fond of gaudv attire and
ornaments, and much of the money received from the Government and
from the sale of peltries was expended in this wav : also much was
expended for spirituous liquors. L^ancing was common in the early stage
of their feasts, and was varied somewhat according to the occasion.
Their Ki-ah-wah dance indicated their desire or exi)ectation of war, and
was much iiracticed during the incitements of the Prophet and his
brother Tecumseh and the visits of the British in IHIO and iHll, pre-
liaratory to the War of \f<\'2. The Ottawas were induced to join the
liritish and, in common with the other tribis thus seduced, they were
greatlv reduced in number during the War of 1^12. The United States
report for [X'2'2 places their number as one hundred and seven bv the
Auglaise River; fort\-five north of Wajiakoneta : sixt\-four twelve miles
west of Fort Defiance ; fiftv-six at Roche de Bout : one hundred and fifty
not stationary about Maumee Ba\- : '2^13 along the east shore of Lake
Michigan in eleven villages : and a number with the Chippewas south
of Lake Sui-ierior. Those who returned to the Maumee and its tribu-
taries, and were here in b'^SJj, were removed to Kansas according to
treat\" (see ante ]>age 414). Ot those who remained in Michigan, some
were remo\ed to Kansas from Grand Traverse Bay in 1836, and the
descendants ol others remain with the Chippewas. For mention of
jirominent Ottawas see index reference to Pontiac, Charloe, Peter
Manor, Occonoxee, and the various treaties.

Pottawotamis. The name of this tribe was also variously spelled
by the French who also abbreviated it to Poux. They were also com-
batted b\- the Five Nations, and they wandered much. They were in
the region of Lake Michigan early in their historical period, but soon
came southeastward. The United States re])ort for 1S2"2 numbered 16t)
as dwelling b\- the Huron River, Michigan, and H40() scattered in
villages around the southern shore of Lake Michigan and southeastward
in Indiana. Thev wandered eastward again in Indiana and Michigan.
Those in Hillsdale Count\', Michigan, and vicinity were removed in
the year 1H4(1 to Council Bluffs, Iowa, and thence were transferred
about the \ear lH5t) to a reservation thirty miles square by the Kansas
River seventy-five miles west of its mouth. Here the Prairie band
remain, the others having removed thence to the -Indian Territory. In
l^^KT some of them acceiited the terms of the United States Govern-
ment, became citizens, and received patents for the land where they live.

Metea was frequently' mentioned as their chief during the W^ar of
\>^\2, part of the time friendl\- to the United States. One writer,

THE POTTAWOTAMI ABORIGINES.

455

without ii'ivinK' his authorit\-, mtntions the hnakini; of Metea's arm by
a shot fired by Major Mann when his tribe and others attempted an
ambuscade of American troops five miles southeast of Fort Wayne
while on their wa\' to succor thi' besieged Fort, and that the fractured
bones did not unite thus leaving his arm useless. The chief villages
of the Pottawotamis during Metea's time were on the north bank of
Cedar Creek in Allen County, Indiana, and on the north (right) bank
of the River St. Joseph about seven miles north of Fort Wayne.
Metea had the usual reputation of the savages as being a good orator
and warrior. He was a iirciminent s^seaker at the Chicago Council in
IS:^]." One writing portravs him as brave, generous, and intelligent.'
In June, lH2."i, he was mentioned as a worthless drunken Pottawotami'
by Major Long of the United States .\rmy who, with his escort, was
sent by the Government to ascertain the condition of the Aborigines,
and entered the .\borigine countrv in the neighborhood of Fort Wa3'ne
about the last of Mav.'+ Metea died in lSi>7 at Fort Wavne.

M h 1 1, A
A Ponawolanii Chief. Died about 1H27 at
Fort Wayne.

SH.\BONEE or CHAMBLEE
A Pottawotami Chief. Born near the Mauinee
River about 177.5.

Shabonee or Chamblee was presumably born in Ohio b\- the
Maumee River, about the year 1775 of an Ottawa father. The late
Gurdon S. Hubbard of Chicago said of him : ' He was, I thought, the
best looking man I had ever seen. He was fully six feet in height,

*This speech is printed in Samuel G. Drake's The Aboriginal Races of North America pages 635. 636.

t See Report of Major Lony's Expedition; also the North American Review for January. 1H26. No.
.oO, for very iTitercstine ' Remarks on the Condition. Character, and I-antuayes of the North .\mericau
.■\boriyines, including crilicisnis of the book of John D. Hunter of 1823, and book of John Halkett of 183.5.'

436 THE MAUMEE RIVER BASIN.

well proportioned, and with a countenance expressive of intelligence,
tirmness and kindness. He was one of Tecumseh's aids at the Battle
of the Thames, being" at his side when Tecumseh was shot. Becoming
disgusted with the conduct of Proctor, he, with Billy Caldwell the
Sauganash, withdrew their support from the British and espoused the
cause of the Americans.""

Winnemac or Wennemeg the Cattish is mentioned on preceding
pages (see index). The name of the later head chief Baw Beese is
perpetuated in the name of the lake adjoining the City of Hillsdale,
Michigan. A rejmted half-brother Bawbee was a subchief. The last
principal chief of the Prairie Pottawotamis was Waubanse or Wauponsi.

Shawnees. The name of this tribe was formerly written Chaou-
anons, etc., b\- the French, and Shawonese, etc., bv the British and
Americans. They were among the greatest wanderers. Man\- of their
wanderings in historic times even, are obscure to the historian. In the
\ear 17l.'4 the\- came from Penns\lvania into Ohio : and probably they
had ranged through this region before.! The Kickapoos were an off-
shoot from this trilie.

Of their chiefs, the name of \\'apakoneta is jierpetuated in the
name of the village embracing the present seat of Government of
Auglaise CountN', Ohio, which region was the headquarters of the
Shawnees from about the \ ear 17>^l2. The name of chief Pu-she-ta
is also perjjetuated as the name of a township and creek in this coimtw
Black Hoof or Cot-a-he-cah-sa was present at the defeat of Colonel
Braddock's arm\' in 175."), and m all the wars in Ohio subsequentl\' until
the treat\' at Greenville in 1795. ' His cunning, sagacity and experi-
ence were onl\- equalled by the fierce and desperate bravery with which
he carried into operation his military plans.' . . He was formerly a
great orator among his people. Colonel John Johnston described him
as the most graceful Aborigine he ever saw. He was small in stature,
not over five feet and eight inches, and of cheerful disi)osition. He
died at Wapakoneta in the year 1^>;:51 at the supisosed age of one hun-
dred and ten years. His funeral was largely attended by the Shawnees
who, with disheveled hair and clothing, marched in solemn i)rocession
(in which neither child nor dog was permitted) to the shallow grave.
The bottom of the grave was covered with puncheons, the body placed
thereon clad in the clothing worn in health, and a jiuncheon placed on
it. Some seeds were then scattered around b\- one man, and then in
single file they returned to the wigwam, leaving three persons to throw

* See The American Aborigine, by Elijah M. Haines, paire 591. It was the habit of the savaaes to
yet away <iiiick wlien the tide of battle turned against them, as they did when Tecumseh was shot: and
they turned to the sympathy of the .Americans from necessity as usual in other cases.

I See The Shawnees in Pre-Columbian Times by Cyrus Thomas 8vo 88 paues, Washint'ton. 1891.

THE SHAWNEES AND CHIEF BLUE JACKET. 437

a little dirt by the sides of the remains. A feast was then partaken of,
consisting of only wild animal meats and bread— twenty deer, a number
of turkeys, and some smaller animals — all placed in one pile from
which each person partook at will. It was a most quiet and orderly
funeral.""

The index to this volume refers to mentions of Captain ;\nthony
Shane ( Chesne ) a halfbreed French-Shawnee who did much harm to
Americans previous to the Treaty of 1795, and much good to them sub-
sequentlv : also to Tecumseh and the Prophet': to Captain John
Logan or Spemicah Lawbah a good friend to the Americans, who was
born by the Mad River, Ohio, about the year 17HK.

The great War-Chief Blue Jacket or Way-a-pier-sen-wah assisted
Little Turtle of the Miamis against Generals Harmar and St. Clair's
armies, and led the combined savages against General Wayne's army
in the Battle of Fallen Timber. The American cajitive 01i\er M.
Spencer, with his captor's mother, visited Chief Blue Jacket, 21st Jul\,
1792, at his village on the north bank of the Maumee one mile and a
quarter below the Court House of the present City of Defianct-, Ohio.
He afterward wrote of his \'isit, and ol the noted Chief and his visitors,
as follows :

We were kindly received by Waw-paw-waw-quaw [his captor] whose wife, a \'ery
pleasant and rather pretty woman of twenty-five, according to custom set before us
some refreshment consisting of dried green corn boiled with beans and dried pumpkins
making, as I thought, a very excellent dish. After spending a few hours with this family,
we went to pay our respects to the village chief, the celebrated Blue Jacket. This chief
was the most noble in appearance of any Aborigine I ever saw. His person, about six
feet high, was finely proportioned, stout and muscular ; his eyes large, bright and
piercing ; his forehead high and broad ; his nose aquiline ; his mouth rather wide ; his
countenance open and intelligent, expressive of firmness and decision. He was con-
sidered one of the most brave and accomplished of the .\borigine chiefs, second only
to Little Turtle and Buck-on-ge-ha-la. having signalized himself on many occasions,
particularly in the defeats of Colonel Hardin and General St. Clair. He held (I was
told) the commis.sion. and received the half pay. of a brigadier general from the British
crown [see ante page 2H,S]. On this day. while receiving a visit from the Snake, chief of
a neighboring Shawnee village, and from Simon Girty, he was dressed in a scarlet frock
coat, richly laced with gold and confined around his waist with a parti-colored sash, and
in red leggings and moccasins ornamented in the highest style of Aborigine fashion. On
his shoulders he wore a pair of gold epaulettes and on his arms broad silver bracelets,
while from his neck hung a massive silver gorget and a medallion of his majesty George
III. .\round his lodge were hung rifles, war clubs, bows and arrows, and other imple-
ments of war ; while the skins of deer. bear, panther, and otter, spoils of the chase,
furnished pouches for tobacco, and mats for seats and beds. His wife was a remarkably
fine looking woman. His daughters, much fairer than the generality of .\borigine
women, were quite handsome : and his two sons, about eighteen and twenty years old.
educated by the British, were intelligent.

''■' Here acain was seen the influence of the teachings of the Society of Friends. See History of the
Shawnee Aborigines From the Year I68I to 1854 Inclusive, by Henrv Harvey. Cincinnati. IK!.").

438 THE MAUMEE RIVER BASIN.

One of the visitors of Blue Jacket (the Snake) was a plain, grave chief of sage
appearance. The other visitor was Simon Girty. Whether it was from prejudice
associating with his look the fact that he was a renegade, the murderer of his own
countrymen, racking his diabolic invention to inflict new and more excruciating tortures,
or not, his dark shaggy hair;' his low forehead; his brows contracted and meeting above
his short flat nose ; his gray sunken eyes averting the ingenuous gaze ; his lips thin and
compressed ; and the dark sinister expression of his countenance, to me seemed the very
picture of a villian. He wore the Aborigine costume without ornament. His silk hand-
kerchief supplied the place of hat, and hid an unsightly scar on his forehead.*

The United States Census of Shawnees for 1H22 gives five hundred
and fifty-nine as dwelling' at Wapakoneta : seventy-tv>-o at Hog" Creek
(now Ottawa River) ten miles north of Wapakoneta: and one hundred
sixty-nine at Lewiston. They were finally started in removal for their
western reservation in September, 1832. David Robb, who had a long-
time experience with this tribe and was one of the agents for their
removal, wrote that intemperance prevailed among them; that they, in
common with all the tribes, were firm believers in witchcraft — see ante
page ;-393. There were many delays in their starting on their long
journey. He continues:

.\fter we had rendezvoused preparatory to moving, we were detained several
weeks waiting until they had got over their tedious round of religious [?] ceremonies,
some of which were public and others kept private from us. One of their first acts was
to take away the fencing from the graves of their fathers, level them to the surrounding
surface, and cover them so neatly with green sod, that not a trace of the graves could be
seen. Subsequently a few of the chiefs and others visited their friends at a distance,
gave and received presents from chiefs of other nations at their headquarters. Among
the ceremonies above alluded to was a dance in which none participated but the warriors.
They threw ofl all their clothing but their breechclouts, painted their faces and naked
bodies in a fantastical manner, covering them with the pictures of snakes and disagreeable
insects and animals, and then, armed with war clubs, commenced dancing, yelling and
frightfully distorting their countenances. The scene was truly terrifying. This was
followed by the dance they usually have on returning from a victorious battle, in which
both sexes participated. It was a pleasing contrast to the other, was performed in the
night in a ring around a large fire. In this they sang and marched, males and females
promiscuously in single file around the blaze. The leader of the band commenced singing
while all the rest were silent until he had sung a certain number of words, then the next
in the row commenced with the same and the leader began with a new set, and so on to
the end of their chanting when all were singing at once but no two with the same words.
I was told that part of the words they used were hallelujah. It was pleasing to witness
the native modesty and graceful movements of those young females in this dance.

When their ceremonies were over they informed us they were ready to leave. They
then mounted their horses, and such as went in wagons seated themselves, and set out
with their 'high priest' in front, bearing on his shoulders 'the ark of the covenant' which
consisted of a large gourd and the bones of a deer's leg tied to its neck. Just previous
to starting the priest gave a blast of his trumpet, then moved slowly and solemnlv while

■■'This scar was the resiih of a stroke from Captain .loseph Brant's sword as repl.v to an insult fron
Girty while intoxicated. See .American Captives anionc the .\borii;ines of Ohio, Reprint with Notes h
Charles E. Slocinn.

THE STRONGEST OF THE EARLY CONFEDERACIES. 459

the others followed in like manner until they were ordered to halt in the evening and
cook supper. The same course was observed through the whole journey. When they
arrived near St. Louis, they lost some of their number by cholera. The Shawnees who
emigrated numbered about 700. and the Senecas [including members of some of the
other tribes of the Six Nations, accompanying] about .■l.')0. Among them was also a
detachment of Ottawas which was conducted by Captain [John] HoUister from the
Maumee country.*

Some of their descendants are now in the Ouapaw Agency in the
Indian Territory, wearing the dress of citizens and are comfortahi}-
housed.

The Iroqi-()is Linctistic Stock.

The Iroquois tribes which ranged most through this Basin were the
Eries and Neutrals, the Six Nations, Wyandots, and Cherokees.

The Eries and Neutrals. Some of the earliest maps of the Lake
Erie region from that of Chamjilain (see ante page 75) designate cer-
tain regions as then inhabited by certain tribes or 'nations' as La
Nation Neutre south of Lake Erie, and again west of Lake Ontario ;
and the Eries or Nation du Cliat.^ There is but little authc^ntic recoid
of the Neutrals (located betwi-en the Vwv Nations in New York and the
Wyandots of Ontario, Canada, also south of Lake Erie) but it is pre-
sumed that they were allied to the Cat or Erie tribe if not identical with
it. They disappeared about the same time. The Jesuit missionaries
visited the Eries in the year 16'Jfi, and they were then called a neutral
nation. Charlevoix refers to the Eries as somewhat inclined to till the
land, as brave and skillful in battle, and that they fought with jioisoned
arrows. Their number is recorded as twelve thousand, four thousand
of whom were warriors. Also that they had twenty-eight villages, and
twelve forts. We could readilv supjiose that the prehistoric circular
and semi-circular earthworks along the south side of Lake Erie, by tlu-
Maumee, and in northeastern Indiana (see ante pages 62, 63) were the
foundations of their fortifications. The Five Nations comi)leted the
destruction of the Erie tribe about 1655-56, by slaughter, by captivity
and adoption, and by dispersion of the others to be absorbed by other
tribes. Their name is perpetuated by Lake Erie, and in the name of
counties, and of towns.

Five Nations is the name given hv the English, Iroquoys, Hiroquois,
Irocois, etc., the name forms given by the French, and Maquas the
name given by the Hollanders, to the strongest body of the Aborigines
in this latitude during the early history of this region. The date of
origin of the confederation of the Five Nations is obscure. The names
of the tribes, or 'nations' which composed this confederacy are the

* Howe's Historical Collections of Ohio Centennial Edition, volume i paye '^99.

t Tllis tribe was called the Cat Nation from their much weariiiL' of tlie skins of wild cats

440 THE MAUMEE RIVER BASIN.

Cayuga, Mohawk, Oneida, Onondaga, and Seneca, all of which names
are perpetuated in lake, river, county, township, or village, one or all,
in the interior ol the State of New York which was their principal head-
quarters, and elsewhere. About the year 171 Ti the Tuscarora tribe
came from Virginia into the confederation, after which it often received
the appellation of Six Nations: but as little was heard, however, of the
Tuscarora tribe afterward as before. The names of the different Six
Nations or tribes are of Aborigine origin excejiting that of Seneca.
This Roman proper name is sup])osed to have here originated with and
been applied by the Hollanders about the year 1614, from the great
love of these Aborigines for cinnabar (vermillion) as a war paint.
This, like the average long word, was variously si^elled, as sinnekars,
and Senecas.""' The Lenapes (Delawares) called the Senecas Mengwee,
which name became Mingoes to the Pennsvlvanians, particularly for
those Senecas who came to Ohio between them and the Muskingum
River and later came to northwestern Ohio. The Senecas were the
most numerous of the tribes composing the Six Nations.

The Six Nations claimed, bv right of conquest, a great extent of
country surrounding Lakes Ontario, Erie, and St. Clair, and to the
southwest. It was to their valor and success in liattle, and to their
hendish inginuit\ in mutilating thiir cajitured enemies alive and dead,
that kept the southern and western shore of Lake Erie comparatively
free from other tribes, even for a long time after the coming of the French.
The prehistoric circular earthworks shown on map ante page 54, were
probably built or occupied by them in their continued wars with the
Miamis, Illinois, and other tribes that were driven from this region to
the west and southwest. t These tribes, excepting i)Ossibl\' the Senecas,
were not so vivacious as some of the northwt'Stern tribes. Captain
Thomas Morris who passed along the Maumee River in the year 17()4
after having been some length of time commandant of Fort Hendrick
in the Mohawk River Valle\-, wrote that it is certain that a reserved
Englishman differs not more from a lively Frenchman than does a stern
Mohawk from a laughing Chip]iewa. For nii'ntion of some of the
Iroquois chiefs see Index references. The United States Census for
1822 gives the number of Mohawks by Honey Creek near Upper San-
dusky, Ohio, as fifty-seven: of Senecas by Sandusky River at 348, and
2(t;i at Lewiston thirty-five miles northeast of Piqua, Ohio.

Cherokees. written Chiraquis b\- the French, came into or near this
Basin to dwell in historic times oiiK' in small hands."' Some of their

"^^ In the oldest map of New York ptlblished ill Amsterdam. Holland, ttiis word is written Senne-
caas. Compare The Aboriginal Tribes of the United States by Francis S- Drake, Philadelphia,
vol. ii page 301,

t See the Jesuit Relations. Cleveland editiotr, and Paikinan's La Salle and the Great West.
The Cherokees in Pre-Columbian Times 13ino97 payes, New York, IHSK), !)>■ C>rus ThtHnas.

TRIBES OF THE IROQUOIS LINGUISTIC STOCK. 441

warriors against the United States Army remained near the headwaters
of the Au«;laise and Scioto until after the Treaty at Greenville in 1795
when, jirompted by Cii-neral \\'a>ne, they tound it to tluir interest to
return to their tribe in South Carolina - see ante ])aKi' -'■u'l.

Wyandots, Ouendats and Wendats, generic name of the f-Iurons by
the French, were once numerous, and strong in war. They were ]5rol~i-
able descendants of the Fi\'e Nations and, in common with other
separated tribes, they were hunted and decimated by that powerful
confederacy, being driven by them trom the \'alle\' ot the St. Lawrence
River in 1649. Their French name, Huron, is ])erpetuated in many
])laces other than m Lake Huron, by the shores of which Samuel de
Champlain met them in Itil"). The region of their last home in Ohio
was given the name Wyandot County at its organization iird Februar\',
i!^4r) ; and the name is also ])erpetuated in towns.

Charles Dickens, the English novelist, stojiiied over night at Upyjer
Sandusk\' when on his \va\' from Cincinnati to lUillalo via Sanduskv in
1^42. in his American Notes he writes thus:

It is a settlement of the \\'\'antloi ,\borigines who inhabit this phice. Among the
company at breakfast was a mild old gentleman [Colonel John Johnston] who h.id been
foi" man\ \ears emplo\ed l-)v the United States Go\'erment in conducting negotiations
with the Aborigines, and who had jnst concluded a treaty with these people by which
they bound themselves, in consideration of a certain annual sum, to remove next year to
some land provided for them west of the Mississippi. He gave me a moving account of
their strong attachment to the familiar scenes of their infancy, and in particular to the
burial-places of their kindred ; and of their great reluctance to leave them. He had
witnessed many such removals and always with pain, though he knew that they departed
for their own good. The question whether this tribe should go or stay, had been dis-
cussed among them a day or two before in a hut erected for the purpose, the logs of
which still lay upon the ground before the inn. When the speaking was done the ayes
;ind noes were ranged on opposite sides, and e\er\' male adult \'oted in his turn. The
iTioment the result was known, the minority (a large one) cheerfully yielded to the rest,
and withdrew all kind of opposition.

We met some of these poor Aborigines afterwards, riding on shaggy ponies. Thev
were so like the meaner sort of gypsies, that if 1 could have seen any of them in England
I should have concluded, as a matter of course, that they belonged to that wandering and
restless people.*

In .Aborigine villages the Legislature, with a very good and wise intention, forbids
the sale of spirits by tavern-keepers. The precaution, however, is quite inefficacious,
for the .Aborigines never fail to procure liquor of a worse kind, at a dearer price, from
traveling pedlers.

The United States Census for 1H2:2 gives the number of Wvandots
as follows: In Ohio, at Upper Sandusky ;-J64 ; by Mad River 44: Fort
Findlav 37: h\- the Miami River 97. In Alirhigan HI In Huron River.

*Count de Volney in 1796 compared the western .Aborigines to the Gypsies of France ni appear-
ance; but the former were far more drunken and bloodthirsty — A View of the United States of America
pawe '^nS et seq.

442 THE MAUMEE RIVER BASIN.

In July, 1H43, the Wyandots were started for their Kansas reser-
vation, about seven hundred in number, with the old, the youth, the
children, ponies and dogs, in motley procession to Dayton whence they
were transported by Miami and Erie Canal to Cincinnati, and thence by
steamboat to near their destination. This tribe was the last of their
kind to range along the Maumee and its tributaries as along the
Sandusky River. Their departure left Ohio ]Tractically, and finally, free
from such people.

The subjugation of the savages had been accomplished onl}' after
a long, bloody struggle, which had been greatly prolonged and made
far more expensive in life, in effort, and in money by the pernicious
intfuence of the British. Throughout this struggle the Ignited States
Government acted an honorable part. It was continuously lenient,
forbearing, kind, and liberal to a fault ; and it should not be held
responsible, even b\ indirect implication, for the acts of individuals
who sought to be avenged on the savages in kind, or for the acts of
those law-breakers who clandestinely sold them the intoxicating
beverages which caused so much of the trouble.

The savages had no right to this territory. Savage people have no
right to occupy lands anywhere to the exclusion of civilization. Great
Britain's right to this territor\- was not questioned bv civilized nations
after her conquest of the French -in 1760: nor had any nation right to
question the claim of the United States to it after the Treat}- of Paris
which closed the Revolutionary War. Notwithstanding this, and the
conquest of the savages with the British over and again — for the
purpose of creating a fund to establish these Aborigines as farmers on
smaller, yet sufficient, tracts of land the United States prescribed and
enforced the formula of buying all of this territory, parts of it repeat-
edly, from each tribe and band, in recognition of a felt duty to continue
the efforts for civilizing these people. Probably the task would have
been quicker and better done by more stringent measures.'^

'^ The descendants of the Abori^rines in the United States have latterly been increasing in number:
also makinj: more general advancement in education and civilization. It has been reported of some of
the tribes that they average tlie wealthiest of people through the continued supervision and paternal
care of the United States.

STE/^ THRou^f-i H A fw D i- £-

CHARACTERISTICS AND USES OF THE RIVERS. 445

CHAPTER XIII.

The Present Drainage System — The Nine Rivers and Their

Tributaries.

Thi.- drainafi'L' s\stem of this Basin is pi-culiar in arraniicnunt as
the result of thi- anji'alar or somt'what crescentic form of thf s'acial
moraines and of the beaches of the glacial lakes and bavs as described
in ChajHer II, and in the chai:)ters on the jsrincipal streams— see also
the Map of Moraines ante page '2>^. The svstem is comisosed of nine
rivers, viz: The Maumee, St. Joseph, St. Mary, Auglaise, Little
Auglaise, Blanchard, Ottawa of the Augiaise, Ottawa of Maumee Ba\-,
and tlu' Tiffin. There are, also, several important creeks tributary to
these rivers which will be named in their respective order when de-
scribing the rivers into which they empt\' their waters.

The water of these rivers is seldom clear, except at the more sand\'
and gravelly sources. Like all streams flowing through fertile soil the
waters contain, largely in suspension, more or less of the constituents
of their beds and shores, and the color ol the water is varied tln-nln'.
In wet seasons the turbidity is very consincuous, while in low stages
of water with slower currents and through sedimentation tlu- water
becomes comparatively clear. Althiuigh the bed of rnan\ of tlu'
streams is eroded and corraded in part to and into the native limestone,
the water is not so 'hard' or the percentage of lime and other earth
ingredients is not so great as in tlu' water ol the wells near-b\', even of
those that do not extend into the rock; and the river waters when free
from direct organic pollution, and are well filtered, afford pleasanter
and saft. r i>otable water than is obtained from wells.

In these days of numerous railroads which afford rapid and eas\-
means of travel, it is difficult to realize the imjiortance of these rivers
as highways of travel and transportation to the Aborigines, and to the
]iioneer Europeans. It has been estimated" that at least nineteen-
twentieths of all movement from jilace to jjlace in earlv tinii^'s was b\
way of the water courses. The ]irc)pi)i tidn was iven greater in this
heavily forested level Basin, most of which was earl\- given the name
Black Swamp. The river regions were the first entered and ex])l()red
by Europeans, and the larger streams were ranged along for a ])eriod
of over one hundred and fifty years befon- thi' more inland regions
were well explored. The Maumee and Auglaise were thi.' principal
thoroughfares, while the St. Mar\ , St. Joseph and Tiffin ranked next
in importance in the order named. Trails were well worn along the

Narrative and Critical History of America, '■ditrd h\- Iiisiin Winsor. volume i pace -^94.

444

THE MAUMEE RIVER BASIN.

river banks, while floats and canoes of various sizes and forms afforded
means of transjiortation on their waters.

Manv stvles ot li.i;hti.r cralt have been used on the Maumee and its
principal trilnitaries. Rafts, hastil\- made of dead timber held together
by withes were often used by both Aborigines and Europeans in early
times. Canoes, iiirogues, and bateaux, were the common forms of

AHORIC.INK WOMKN SPHARINC FISH - iFrnm Schoolcraft)

boats. There were but few keel boats made. Light bateaux, flat of
bottom and slightly curving upward and narrowing toward the ends,
were the best of the larger boats for general use by Europeans, partic-
ularly in the lower stages of water: while in higher waters and for
heavier and military freight, larger flat boats were made. Bark canoes
were in use by the Aborigines when first visited by Europeans: and
some of them were fair appearing and serviceable craft although macU-
bv means of stone and bone implements, and fire. Metal tools,
brought by the Europeans, gave great impetus to the ingenuitx' and
abilitv of a few o) the Aborigines, and added much to the shapeliness
and serviceableness of their river craft. Cadwallader Colden,
British Surveyor General of the Province of New York, in a Memoir
on the Fur Trade 10th November, 17:24, wrote :'^

"*' London Document XXIII, New York Colonial Documents volume v, panes 726, 727.

THE WATER-CRAFT OF EARLY TIMES.

445

The method of carrying goods upon the Rivers of North America into all the
small Branches [tributaries] and overland from the Branches [tributaries or headwaters]
of one River to the Branches [headwaters] of another was learned from the Aborigines
and is the only method practicable through such large Forests and Deserts [unsettled
country! as the Traders pass through in carrying from one Nation to the other. It is
this. The .Aborigines make a long narrow Boat made of the bark of the [white] Birch
Tree, the parts of which they join very neatly. One of these Canoes that can carry a
dozen men. can itself be easily carried upon two men's shoulders, .so that when they have
gone as far by water as they can which is further than is easily imagined because their
loaded Canoes don't sink six inches into the w-ater, they unload their canoes, iV carry
both goods and Canoes upon their Shoulders over land into the nearest branch [tributary]
of the River they intend to follow.

i_ A M O E

Tlif Frt-ncli wt-rc sjootl l>oat l)uildfrs: and tlie early Britisli were
unexcelled in boat makini; and hoat usin.t;". l^ut little birch ijrew in
this Basin, and that little was red biich the l)ark of which is not so
well adai^ted to canoe making. The larjj'tT canoes made of white birch
bark came irom the north and northiast. Him liark, in thick lar.tfe
sheets was easily olitained everxwhere and was employed for heavier
craft: also hickor\- bark. Canoes of bark were not much used here
after tlu' \\'ar of l^ll'. The readiness with which canoes could be
made from these barks is illustrated m the account of the Journex' of a
X'isit to the Aborigines I \\"\andots of I'pper Sandusky, Ohio, in 1799'
by Friends ( Quakers ) of Maryland and Pennsxlvania, viz :

We found this stream [Killlmck Creek in northern Ohio] fortv-five vards
wide and twelve feet deep. On ascertaining this our guide [a Delaware .Aborigine of
the Moravian band] turned his horse loose to feed and all the rest of us did the same,
expecting to remain there until the next day. He however went ofi. as he intormed us,
to build a canoe. Being desirous to acquaint myselt with their manner of constructing
these boats. I accompanied him. .\fter searching some time he found a tree which he
supposed would answer his purpose, and having first cut the bark round near the ground,
he then prepared two wooden forks with lateral prongs from the bottom to the top of
them, which served as steps upon which he could rest his feet. These he placed against
the tree and then walked up them, and cut the bark round the tree about eighteen feet
higher. He then, after splitting the bark from the top to the bottom, peeled it off. He
next shaved off the rough outside of the bark at both ends and. after making the proper
holes at suitable places, he drew up the ends into a liow and stern with hickor\ bark
ropes, which completed his work so that we returned down the river with a boat that was
capable of carrying three persons. We immediately embarked, transporting ourselves
and baggage over the stream, and swam our horses through it having been detained
here only aliout three hours.*

■Friends' Miscellany October. 18;i.5. volume vii. No. 7 paye 316,

446

THE MAUMEE RIVER BASIN.

PirogUfS were natiK-d b\- thu Fruncli and their manufacture was
])robably introduced here h\' them. They were called dugouts bv the
ISritisli and the Americans on account of the smaller ones being
hollowed and shaped from one log. This lorm of boat, or float, was at
first made from old hollow logs split through the middle and the ends
blocked. The Aborigines possibly first hollowed and shaped the logs
b\' fire controlled by wet clay. Pirogues were better than bark canoes
to withstand the rajiids and the rocks. They were often made of large
size, sixty to seventy- feet in length, five feet in width, and with carrying
capacity to five or more tons. The larger ones were generally made
from two logs hollowed, matched and pinned together, thus securing

PI H O G. IJ ti

greater width, stability and tonnage. These were known as slap-
togethers. In early times as many as forty packs of peltries, each
about one hundred ])ounds weight, and later one hundred and seventy-
five bushels of corn or wheat, were comfortably carried in good stage
of water by the larger pirogues, each managed by three or four men.
The last of the pirogues at Defiance were of the smaller class. Thev
became too much decayed in 1873 for further use, and were from this
date wholly succeeded by boats of modern build. Three recently
disabled pirogues were seen, however, by the writer high on the banks
of the Augiaise River in Perry Township, Putnam County in May, 1902,
the last of their class in this Basin. After the building of sawing mills,
from the vear 1H21 to 1840, flat boats became more common, and
convenient. Fifteen to twenty miles a dav was the distance generally
traveled against the current by boatmen when the water was at favor-
able height. Going with the current the distance could be made
several multi]iles of twenty. Against the current, poles, paddles, and
towing lines were the means of propulsion, though in the shallower
places, stejiping into the water and lilting and pushing the boat over
the rocks by hand was often necessary. A puncheon, or later a sawn
plank, was attached to each side of the larger boats above the water
and from ind to end, on which a man walked and pushed after standing
his pole on the bottom of the river from the bow. The boating of
freight was (jften heav\- work : but it was generally far easier than
carr\ing, or hauling b\' team during inuch of the year. Most of the
larger st\les of boats, for man power, declined from the year 1H43,
being largelx sujierseded along the Maumee and Auglaise Rivers by the
Miami and Erie and Wabash and Erie Canals : but for several vears

THE RIVERS FOR THOROFARES. FOOD AND HEALTH. 447

thert-aftt-r Krain and timlier wt-rt- taken down tht- streams durinj; lii^h
water. For account of larger and later boats, see next Chapter.

These rivers were of great service to the people who earl\- came to
the more central parts of this forest region to found homes. Their
families and goods were transported thereon and so, later, were their
products and supplies transiiorted to and trom their homes. These
streams have been, also, ver\- important sources ot food suiiplies.
During the earlier historic period the\' abounded in the various kinds of
water fowl; and with fish to the extent that the then numerous fish-eat-
ing animals including birds were well supjilied and, beside, great
schools were at the easy catch (they being here mor.e easily entrapped
than those in larger waters ) of the peoj^le along their courses, who at
times largely subsisted on them. Nearly all of the species of fish
living in Lake Erie abounded in these rivers, they having free access
from the lake even to the shallower waters near the sources of the
several streams. The fish multiidied in such numbers that ])arties from
Cincinnati formed a company previous to the year ls4(i lor tlu'
extraction of their oil at f^ort Wa\ne. The catching ot the hsh in
sufficient quantity for this jnirpose gave employment to man\- persons,
including Aborigines, for several years.* Since the increase of poi)u-
lation, however, the building of dams and mills, the pollution ol tlie
waters with refuse ot all kinds including that from ]iaper mills, gas
works, and petroleum wells, and the great increase in the number of
fishermen with their more destructive methods, the suppl\- of fish and
fowl have been materially lessened, even to the extinction of some
species. t The Ohio State Board of Health has alreadx taken action
for the prevention of river jiollution, and the Fish Commission has
begun the work of restocking the streams with good sjsecies of
food fish.

The removal of the large and dense forest growths, the clearing,
ditching, and underdraining of the lands, have wrought great change in
these rivers. F"ollowing heav\- or continued rains, and the rajiid melt-
ing of the deeper snows, the streams rise, and tall, with far greater
rapidity than formerly, and generally decline to a lower stage of water
during the dryer seasons. Storage dams have been thought desiral>le ;
and they will undoubtedl\- be built : and the great water ^lower thus
feasible along these rivers will be utilized.

Many of the beautiful shaded places along these rivers have of late
years attracted a large number of persons who desire wholesome and
inexpensive escape from the heat, noise, and dust, of towns. Summer

* Compare Wallace A. Brice's History of Fort Wayne, pa«e 29.^.

t See the Author's Clieck-Lisl of animals, includiuy tish and birds, of tlie Mauiiice Ki\er Basin.

448 THE MAUMEE RIVER BASIN.

houses have been built along the larger streams bv clubs and families :
and manv jiarts are occupied by campers' under restrictions by the
landowners. Island and shore picnic grounds are frequented by large
numbers of excursionists. And the rivers are yet frequented by the
large number of people who love to go-a-fishing— many driving manv
niiks across country to thi'ir favorite places, or to explore for better
ones, some for one day's outing, and others to remain for two or many
days. Thus, the tide of rest and pleasure seekers is turning more and
more to these rivers. It is being recognized that they possess more
attractive features, and are more enjoyable to the average familv, than
lakes. The erosions and corrasions of their beds and banks are inter-
esting alike to geologists and to the general students of natural history.
Their smooth stretches afford the safest and the best of boating waters
for the multitude, while their more shallow and rapid places are sources
of unfailing delight, particularly to ladies, children, and to the
microscopist.

The Mal.mkf. River.

The Maumee is a young river in the view of geologic time. At the
resting of the last glacier at the St. Joseph -St. Mary Moraine the
Rivers St. Joseph and St. Mary were formed and, with the continued
melting of the glacier, these rivers were increased in size and poured
their waters southwest of the present City of Fort Wayne to and
through the Wabash River. With the receding of the glacier by melt-
ing, a lake, the Maumee Glacial Lake, was formed between these
moraines and the edge of tht' glacier. This lake latterly found new
outlets southward, and northwest \vard and, subsiding, the Rivers St.
Joseph and St. Mary began to find outlet into this Lake. With this
beginning, small and \arying at first, the Maumee River had origin
l)erhaps ten thousand or more years ago. Its length increased with
the recession of the Glacial Lake, and until the present Lake Erie
was established.

The IVIaunn-e River, next to the Detroit River or Strait, is the
largest tributar\' of Lake Erie: and by some persons it is classed as the
largest river in Ohio, the Ohio River tieing within tht' Kentuck\' State
limits. The Maumee has origin within the City of Fort Wayne,
Indiana, liy the union of the Rivers St. Joseph and St. Mary as at the
earlv subsidence of the Maumee Glacial Lake. Its minimum volume
at this point has been gaged at six thousand cubic feet per minute.*

''^' Report of Major John M. Wilson of the Corps of Enyineers of the United States Army, in
United States Executive Document No. 55. 46tb Congress 3rd Session, pages 13, GO. The Division of
Hydrotiraphv t>f the I'. S. Geological Survey, has since established several Water Gages in the
Maumee, the last one at the The Sherwood Bridge in Delaware Township, Defiance County, Ohio, in
May, 1903. The tage at the Waterville Bridge, Lucas County, for the year 19(H showed the maximum
flow of the Maumee at that place at 27,600 second feet in March, and the mean llow for the year at

DESCRIPTION OF THE MAUMEE RIVER.

449

It flows in a ^t-neral northeasterly course throuiih the middle oi the
Basin, bearing a little south of a direct line from which it wanders but
ei^ht miles, and empties into Maumee Bay at the most westerly part of
Lake Erie. The distance from its ori^'in to its mouth in straight line is
one hundred miles ; but b\' way of its man\' windings the distance of

HEAD OF THE MAl'MEE R1\'ER

within llie City of Fort Wayne. Indiana, at medium stage of water. Looking nortli June H. 1902.
up the River St. Joseph on the rieht and across the River St. Mary on the left, which unite to form the
Maumee a few rods above the Columbia Street Bridae. The site of General Harmar's Ford is several
squares below this bridge; the site of Fort Wayne is just to the left and back of this point of view.

its flow is one-half, and more, greater. The first half of its course is
by far the most tortuous, the flow often changing so that in the aggre-
gate it is toward every point of tiie c()m])ass, although its meander belt
is relatively narrow. Throughout its course there is fall of one
hundred and sixty-four feet, averaging less than one and one-tenth foot
lier mile. There are numerous sluggish stretches, with intervening
rapids of varying lengths, from a few feet u]:)wards.

It is proliable that the different tribes of Aborigines had no names
for this and the other rivers of this Basin, or at most anv name that was

3,771.2 second feet. After three yeais and two months service this gage was abandoned in 19t)2 on
account of the great diversion of water at Grand Rapids into the Miami and Erie Canal, and other
difliculties. Flood gages were placed late in 190i at the Columbia Street Bridge in Fort Wayne, and the
County Bridge at Napoleon.

450

THE MAUMEE RIVER. BASIN.

generallv recognized or remembered before the coming of the French.
The Shawnees of later days called the Maumee the Ottawa Sepe
(Ottawa Sepon?) or Ottawa River, on account of some members of the
Ottawa tribe having headquarters by its course. The Wyandot name
Cogh-a-ren-du-te or Standing Rock River related to the French Roche
de Bout m the lower rapids: their Was-o-hah-con-die also referred to
the Maumee. The Miamis who had headcjuarters along its ujiper
waters left no name now authentically known to the writer.

The French explorers on meeting the Miami Aborigines, ]irevious
to the year IHTO, understood from them the name of their tribe as
Me-ah-me or Me-au-me which sounds they recorded in their language
as Miami; and on account of this tribe having a village much
of the time by the upper waters of this river the French
referred to it as the Riviere des Miamis, the River
of the Miamis or where the Miamis live
The rapid ])ronunciation ot tlii^
three syllable word, Miami,
led the Colonists
who settl-
ed

Maumt

n this
afterthe
to pro-
nounce it in two syllables, as
and so it has liecome fixed.

The name was, also, occasionally written
Omi and Omei- which ma\' have been a contraction
of the French au Miami and aux Miamis, meaning to
or at the Miami or Miamis. The name Miami was later applied
to the two rivers in southwestern Ohio flowing into the Ohio River:
and in writings of the latter jiart of the eighteenth and the first part
of the nineteenth century the Maumee was styled the Miami of the
Lake. Many of the earl\' French also styled the Maumee the /J/v/ere de
la Roche or Rock River. This name was also applied to the Great
Miami of the Ohio with like reason, the channels being eroded to the
rock in parts of their course.

The land that is more immediately drained by the Maumee River,
that is the Maumee Valley proper, is not of great extent. The portion
in Indiana has lieen competed a.\ 151,55 square miles, and in Ohio at

THE MAUMEE VALLEY DIFFERENTIATED.

451

l,103.9fi, making a total art-a of l/Jfi'i.ril siiuart- miles.* It receives
only local additions from the south between its source and the entrance
of the Auf^laise River at Defiance, a distance in straijj;ht line of forty-
five miles, and by the river's very tortuous course more than double
this distance. The channel varies from three to five hundred feet in
width and is eroded to the Corniferous Limestone at Antwerp, Ohio,
and from aliout seven miles above Defiance downward. Here within
a distance of four miles, extending to the head of the State Dam Slack-
water about three miles above the mouth of the Auglaise River, there
are seven rifffes, at irregular intervals, which formed obstructions to

Lookiiiy northwest lip the Maiiiiiec Ki\t-r finiii the iiorlht-asl cornet of Section i9 Dehance Town-
ship, November 2, 1903. In the inidiUe distance is seen the Second Stone Dam of ^tranite boulders, four
miles above Deliance. On the i iL'lit is a model brick farmhouse, and farm.

shiptiml)er rafts and heavv bi^ats during the lower stages of water.
To obviate this the raftsmen gathered the glacial boulders of the chan-
nel into rude dams leaving chutes through which they directed their
rafts. Locally these places became known as stone dams.

The flood plains are of limited extent and generally' incline to
about twelve feet above low water mark. The original banks are
Separated from one-sixth mile to out' mile, the interval between the

* Second Report of an Investigation of the Rivers of Ohio as Sources of Public i Water Suppliest
by the Ohio Slate Board of Healtli, Columbus. 191X1. pat;e 127.

452

THE MAUMEE RIVER BASIN.

present channel and the outer bank being' generally tar greater to the
left than to the right. The outer banks generallx' rise from thirtv to
fift\' feet above the flood plains, and often but little above the present
ronca\'e liank (bank being eroded) which is first on one side and then
on the other. At Bull Rapids in Maumee Township, Allen County,
Indiana, the channel is 3f)0 feet wide, and the concave bank is thirtx'
feet high. The banks being eroded are of Glacial Till conijiosed
mostly of gravelly cla\- in which are grooved or polished granitic stones
of various sizes, with varying layers of sand and gravel. The volume
of water in the channel is continuall\' augmented hv the seepage from

THE MAl'MEE RIVER
Lookinu east down stream fioni Clinton Street Bridjie. Dehance, Ohio, November 37. 19tll. Mouth
of Aunlaise River and site of Fort Defiance on the rit;lit, with smoke from larvte wajiOn manufactory'
beyond. Morninuside Park on the left aiui Pieston Island Park on the riylTt in middle distance.

the banks. Only ordinary erosive waverings of channel have occurred
in the ui)])er part of the river's course.

Several short, small streams enter from the north in Allen Count\-,
Indiana. Starting in the northeastern part of this county and flowing
in a general easterly direction are the north and south headwaters of
Marie de Lorme Creek (named in honor of a daughter of an earlv
French boatman) which unite in the northwestern township ( Carrvall )
of Paulding County, Ohio, and empt\ into the Maumee in the adjoining-
Crane Township. Gordon Creek, which has origin in the southwestern
township ( Hicksville.) of Defiance County, flows in a southeasterly

PRINCIPAL TRIBUTARIES OF THE MAUMEE RIVER. 455

direction and enters the river in Paulding County near the ^)^■t^a^ce
County line. Flowing i')ara]lel with Gordon, and from one to four
miles northeast of it, is Platter Creek, both creeks being named from
early settlers along their banks. Then only small runs ' are received
by the river until the entrance of Tiffin River from the north.

The principal tributary of the Maumee is the Auglaise River which
enters from the south, also within the corjjorate limits of the City of
Defiance, one mile and a half below the Tiffin. The words Tu-en-da-
wie and En-sa-woc-sa are fixed at Defiance as names of Masonic lodges
and street: legend says their meaning is aliout the same — the meeting

PKKSTON ISLAND I'ARK

Showiiic Foiiluon Brid^-e, Adiiiiiiistration Ihiildinc. Auditoiiuui. Pavillioii. and Restauram. The Athletic
Field with Grand Stand is outside this view to the left; and the Residence Tents to the ri^ht. Site of
the Shawnee Chief Blue Jacket's town in 1793 on the distant mainland. Looking northward across the
narrower branch of the Maumee. with t'limuses of the wider branch. October 14. 19111. Klectric railway,
and motor boats, connect here for Deliance which is one mile to tlie left.

of thi' waters — and that they were apjiliid to the site of the jiresent
City of Defiance from the meeting here of the Tiffin and Auglaise
with the Maumee. Tuendawie is of the Wyandot language, and F^nsa-
woccsa of the Shawnee: and both are iirobaby changed in form from the
original words. Below Defiance the tributaries of the Maumee are of
quite local nature excepting North and South Turkeyfoot Creeks which
enter nearly opposite each other toward the eastern part of Henry

454

THE MAUMEE RIVER BASIN.

County : Bad Creek on the north from Fulton County ; Beaver and
Tontogany Creeks from the south, draining part of Wood County: and
Swan Creek from the west, received at Toledo.

Below Defiance the channel is far less tortuous than above. It
widens materially from the Tiffin and the Auglaise tributaries, but the
beauty of the scenery is maintained. In fact, for ciuiet, jmstoral beauty,
the Maumee River is not excelled, particularly through Defiance County
and below. The commodious residences and barns, the everchanging
scenery showing fertile and well cultivated soil, with fringes of noble

MAUMEE WATER GAP THROUGH DEFIANCE MORAINE

Looking southeast from the crest of tlie Moraine UX) feet above tlie River l.ith October, l^tl. TIte
Moraine south of the River one mile, is of the same height from gradual incline.

trees remnants of a mighty forest, present pictures of peace, jilentv,
and of beauty, that linger pleasantly in memory.

The Islands here increase in size and in historic interest. Preston
Island, named from William Preston the first sheriff of this part of
Ohio, is one mile east ot Defiance. It contains about twenty-three
acres, is cleared in its upper part where the Aborigine women planted
corn and where the like crop has been cultivated bs' succeeding owners

THE HIGHEST LAND BY THE MAUMEE RIVER. 455

until the last few \-ears. It is beautifull\- timbered in its lower ])art
which for many years has been a pojiular resort for )>icnicin^;' parties."
From Defiance eastward the Maumee flows throuj^^h an eroded s'ap
in the Defiance Moraine, and the beaches of the extinct Defiance
Glacial Bay on the west and of Lake Whittlesy on the east. This
Maumee Water Gap was probably quite well be^un as an early drain-
age channel of Lake Maumet: and by the subsecpient washinjis of the
waves of Lake Whittlesev and ol Dc iiance Kay. There are terraces in

i^^A ^Mfc.

^^^^^^

i^t^^

^^^MifliiM

■kib

"'■««^fl^«SS^

i*\^\ .^^^^3

^Er^'.,vJ8P"^ '^ r.i-:" ■•" " - -■ ■^^■^— >3^^H

ril

1^1

>^|J

fB^^5

''~''^^^^^SB^B

i^I^H^^^^^^^^IhL^

^^^^

i?<5^H

^^^^^^^^^^^^Bfet^^ ^T "^[^T*^^ ' t ^i'jffv

Ei^'^^li*. -

j^BH^^^

Ij^^KBjH

H^^

^^^H^H

"^^tTB

BHHhV^^^BSm^'^

mam

^^^^H

!■

^■ttiiKlii

'.■>^ >• • >'■'? t'SM^^^J^^^^^^^^^^^^B

^Bk

1 '•y.^^.^j*!^

jg^^^^j

MAUMEE WATER (.'.AP THKOlCU DKT-IANCK MOKAINK

Companion to the opposite view. Lookini; south of west up the Maumee 13ih May, Uh)!. Tliis is the
highest land (100 feet) immediately above the River. The smoke of manufactories in the City of
Defiance, three miles distant, is seen on the left.

thf City of DL-fiance and below, some of which show that al^out sixty
feet of the later cut was done by tht- Maumee River. The crest of the
Moraine rises on the left ( north i bank three miles east of the Citv of

* In the spring of liKHT Preston Island was purchased by a new organization called The Island Park
Company, composed of citizens of Detiance, who opened it to the public as a park the 38th June, and

456 THE MAUMEE RIVER BASIN.

Defiance steeply to the height of one hundred feet above the present
surface of the river at ordinary staf,re, while to the ri^ht (southward)
the land inclines from the river in irregular terraces for the distance of
one mile to about the height of the crest on the north bank which is
the highest land immediately b}' the Maumee in all its course.

One mile and a half below the crest of the Defiance Moraine,
which is locally known as the North Ridge and South Ridge accord-
ing to the respective sides of the river, a dam was built across the
Maumee by the State of Ohio between the years 1839-1842 to supply
water to the Miami and Erie Canal below. This dam is seven hundred
and sixty-three feet in length. It was first built nine feet high, and in
the summer of 19C)1 it was rebuilt with cement concrete to the height of
ten feet. It supplies good depth of slackwater for canalboats, and for
steamboats accommodating two to three hundred pleasure seekers, for
a distance of eight miles up the Maumee. This slackwater also extends
up the .\uglaise River three miles and up the Tiffin two miles. The
canal here again enters its individual course along the left bank of the
river, taking the water through a guard lock just above the dam for its
supply through Henry County.

One mile below this dam, on the left bank of the river, is the site
of the historic Encampment Number Three of General Winchester's
army in ISl'J, where lie in yet unmarked graves many soldiers, mostly
Kentuckians, who here suffered exceedingly and died from privations
and disease — see ante pages 296, 297.

Girty Island, containing about thirty-two acres, is delightfully sit-
uated just above the turn of the Maumee to the north in the northwest
part of Flatrock Township, Henr\ Countv. It is cultivated in part
and in part used for picnics, steamboats connecting it with Napoleon.
It was named from James Girty (not the brother Simon as has been

later connected it with the south mainland by a stanch pontoon bridkic formed an athletic field with
track and grandstand; erected an auditorium, pavillion, restaurant, and other buildings for the comfort
and convenience of summer visitors, and charjied a small fee (from five to twenty-five cents) for admis-
sion. The electric street-car line was also extended to the south bank of the river at the bridge.

In 1902 the Maumee Valley Chautauqua was organized by Peter W. M'Reynolds then Dean and
now President ot Defiance College. This season of meetings and entertainments proved so enjoyable
and successful that an organization was effected for their continuance, viz: Directors, Fred. L. Hay.
Charles T. Pierce, R. VV. Mitchell, H. E. Myers, George W. Watkins, Rev. A. B. Murphy. Baptist, and
Rev. Peter W, M'Reynolds, Christian, of Defiance; Rev. James M'Alister, Christian, of New Bedford,
Mass., J. J. Grubb, Buckland, Ohio, and Rev. William J. Dempster, Presbyterian, Napoleon. Officers;
President. Rev. A. B. Murphy. Baptist; Vice Presidents, Rev. P. O. Rhodes, United Brethren, Rev. E.
D. VVhitlock, Methodist, Rev. H. Mueller, Lutheran, Rev. W. S. Culp, Methodist, Silas T. Sutphen. and
Christopher C. Kuhn, of Defiance. Secretary and General Manager Peter W. M'Reynolds and Treasurer
Edward P. Hooker. The session of 1903 was attended with greater success than the first, m^ny people
attending from Michigan, Indiana, and distant parts of Ohio, as well as from the country surrounding
Defiance, and many encamping in tents on the Island. Tlie same officers and directors were re-elected
with the addition of Rev. George Foltz, Christian, of Defiance, and C. A. Graham, of Lima. At the
annual meeting held at the close of the successful season of 19(14, nearly the same directors were chosen
as the year before, with Fred. L, Hay President, and Rev. A. B. Murphy Secretary and General Manager.

STATE DAMS AND GEOLOGIC FEATURES OF RIVER. 457

stated) who, after the Treaty ot Greenville in 179") and the removal of
the soldiers from Fort Defiance tlu' tollowin}; year, returned from his
retreat in Canada and reniauKcl opjiosite this island to the north, in
trade with the Aborigines lor several years.

The evidences of the Maumee having forsaken part ot its channel
of former ages increase in the lower half of its course. The site of
the present Village of NajKjleon was formerly an island. This point is
also the southwestern angle of the lieach or shore of the extinct Glacial
Lake Warren. Corniferous Limi'stone forms the bed of the present
channel which shows corrasions by the water and its transy)orted
material to the depth of thrti' and four feet in places at the rapids above.

Looking; southwest up the Maumee Kiver in hlKirock Town^^hip, Henry County, C)hin. IVith May,
1902. Girty Island seen in the distance.

At Grand Rapids Village, at the head of the Grand Rajiids in the
northwestern corner of Wood County, the second State dam e.xists, or
rather two dams from an island the north oni' bi-ing seventeen hundrt^'d
feet and the south one six hundred and si.xty-one feet in len.gth. The
slackwater from this dam su]>])lies the Miami and Erie Canal in its lowest
course to the lake level at Toledo. The dam is five and one-half feet high
and gives, with the natural depth of water, a good depth of broad slack-
water for pleasure steamboats to and above Girty Island, a distance of
about nineteen miles. This dam is at the brad ot the most historic

458

THE MAUMEE RIVER BASIN.

series of rapids in the Maumee River's course. They extend to the
\^i]laL;\' of Mannit^e, a distance of about fourteen miles, with a fall of

THE r.RAND RAPIDS OF THE MAUMEE

And Oliin State Dam for Canal supply in ilie distance. Looking southeast up the river from the north
end of the Toledo, St. Louis and Western Railway Bridge, at a medium staye of water 1st December,
1VH)2. A tilimpse of the old buildings of the Village of Gilead and of the later buildinys since the change
of name to Grand Rapids, are seen on the left.

THE GRAND RAPIDS OF THE MAVMEE

And Ohio State Dam. Looking west from the south end of the Toledo. St. Louis and Western (Clover
Leaf) Railway Bridge 15th April. 1902. The low stage of water shows the erosions of the Limestone in
the channel. A glimpse of the Village of Providence is seen on the right (left bank} where the Miami
and Erie Canal is situated and is fed from the slackwater above the dam.

THE MOST HISTORIC RAPIDS IN MAUMEE RIVER. 459

fifty-five feet. The names of this series of rajiids arc, the Grand,
Fowler, Bear, Wolf, Otsei;o, Roche de Bout, Presque Isli , and
Maumee ( Villaj^e ) with minor intervening ones without name or with
name of only local import. The term ' Thr Rajtids' as used in earliir
times, usually referred to the toot of the lowest rapids opposite the
present Villag'e of Maumee. At first the river flows on a nearly level
stratum of Corniferous Limestone, and near the \'illasie of Waterville
it is on the shelving;- smooth surface of the Lower Helderbert; or
Waterlime, the channel beins liberall\- strewn with the smalkr and
medium size granitic boulders washed from the Glacial Till above.

The earl}' settlers constructed low dams, wingdams of small
extent generalh", for grist mill purposes, at the Grand, the Fowler,
Roche de Bout, and one or two other rapids. Hedges Dam at thr first

or,S£GO K.-\P1US OF THE M.^UMEE

Showing Remains of the Dam constructed there in early years by individual enerprise for nnllini'.
Lookinc up the river 15th April, 1901, from a point six and a half miles below the Grand Kapuls State
Dam. Islands on the left. Low staee of water.

rajiids below Otsego, a wingdam of stone, drove only a sawing mill.
It was destroyed by flood in \>^4\> or before, it being the last one ol the
smaller dams. At Otsego Rapids a full dam was built. Probal>l\ the
first full dam was built in the latter part of the first t]uartir of tlie
nineteenth centurv on both sidi-s ol tlif large Dodd Island at W'ater-
ville. These full dams afforded power to both flouring and sawing mills
for manv vears. Thev were not substantially built, were injured by
floods and ice, and were not long repaired nor rebuilt after tin.' ojieiiing
of the Miami and Erie Canal along the river in 1^42. A hydraulic
canal was dug along the right bank of the river from the rapids about
five miles above to convey water to mills at Ferrysliurg. This canal.

460

THE MAUMEE RIVER BASIN.

which afforded about ei}j;hteen feet fall, was also abandoned after several
years' trial, its ownt-rs beinj*' unable to compete with tht power derived
from the six hii;h locks oi the Miami and Erie Canal at tlu- X'illati'L- of

GREAT ICE GORGE AT OTSEGO RAPIDS OK THE MAUMEE

This Gorjie formed early in February, 1904. from very heavy ice broken by the high waters of the late
January thaw. It was fixed by long continued cold weather in February, and augmented by another tliaw
the last of this month, attainim; its maximum the first three days of March. It remained into the last
week of March when it, and the other norees below. Kiadualiy broke away. Gorges also formed at Fort
Wayne for a short time; at the Paulding-Defiance County line, which held for several weeks; at Island
Park, Defiance, which held but a few hours %vith dammed water twenty-six inches lower than at the time
of the porye in February. 18S3, yet surroundint; about thirty residences; at Napoleon; at Grand Rapids.
the village of this name being damaged more than at any other flood in its history; at Waterville, with
severe damage ; at the Villages of Maumee and Perrysburg; at Toledo, where much damage was done
along Water Street and the Wharves, and from flooding of basements up to, and above the Spitzer
building; and gorge at the mouth of the Maumee. The bridges were much injured at Grand Rapids,
Waterville, Fassett Street Toledo, and the lower Railway and Terminal Company; and much injury was
done on the peneplains of the lower Maumee. The last gorge to break away was in Maumee Bay. This
moved out with the ice of the western part of Lake Erie the 26th March, at which date there was yet
much unbroken ice in all the upper Great Lakes.

Easter morning .\pril ;i, 1904, another flood culminated at Defiance, the central part of the Basin,
with water from natural rainfall to a depth of nine inches over the basement floor under the north build-
ing of Masonic Hall Block, number two hundred Clinton Street, whereas the first days of March it was
one inch over, and the 3Sth March three inches over. From the ice gorge of February, 1883. the water
was dammed for a few hours to a depth of about three feet over this floor. The rivers here also attained
about this last mentioned height in June, 1862. But the highest of all records was attained January .S,
1847. when water was dipped from the river by persons standing on the front doorstep of the brick farm-
house built 1834-36 and yet (1904) standing at 439 .Auglaise .^venue, Defiance: and a boat carried its
passengers to this doorstep, according to evidence of yet living people, including Edward P. Hooker,
and Jonathan Lewis a half-brother of the owner and then occupant of this house. William Lewis. This
stage was fully seven feet higher water at Defiance than any other record. The L'nited States water
gages, in their recent revised and more permanent condition, will insure more carefully recorded data
regarding river variation, and greater protection against the dangers of floods and water gorgings.

THE LARGEST ISLANDS. ROCHE DE BOUT. 461

MaumtL' ntarlx" opposite. Stock in this comjiany, however, was in
demand in 1903; and the power of these favorable witer privileges
will, doubtless, be better built upon and utilized in the future.

Ol^posite the mouth of Tonto^jany Creek the river is deep, about
one mill' in width, and inchides several islands, the two smallest having
names draw and Marston. The nixt larger, formerlv called Indian
Island and now known as Whitney, contains about ninety acres ; and
the next down the stream, the largest island in the Maumee, has W-vn
called Mission, and Station, Island and the broad expanse of deep,
still water around called Station Pond, from the former Presbyterian
Missionary Station for the Aborigines, on the opposite l)ank to tile
southward — see ante page 399. This island is about two miles long
and narrow at the lowest end. It contains about two hundred and
thirty acres, is ve''y fertile, and is cultivated in part.

One-half mile below Mission Island, seven miles liehiw Grand
Rapids, and one mile above Waterville, the river has worn thrijugh
the sectile limestone of the Onondaga, Lower Helderberg or Water-
lime, group to the depth of forty feet below the present rock
surface, the rock bluff being in the left bank, and a small high
island of the rock remaining at about one-third of the distance
in the present channel. This rock point in the stream was a land-
mark to the early French, and they gave it the name Roche de Bout''
a name yet current among the older people in the vicinity. A short
distance north (to the left) of the present shore bluff of Roche de Bout
is a deserted channel of the river in ancient times, which is about thirty
feet above the present channel — see engraving ante i>age 194. The
rock bluff covered with till rising fifteen feet and more abo\e this
deserted channel, was long an island in the river nearly a mile in length.
The increased distance to tlie outer banks — to two miles or more in
places — for miles above this ancient natural dam, and the terraces of
their sides, mark the great volume of water and the successive heights
at which the river flowed before the rock l)arrier gave way, and the
jjreseiit channel was worn.

Three miles below Roche de PSout there is a prominence of thickc-r
till, also on the left bank, and a like deserted Maumee channel to the

''' Pronounced very like Roosh de Hoo. This name simiities standiiiL' rock, or rock point. It li;is
sometimes been improperly written Roche de Boeuf. Peter Manor Manard: or ' Vellow Hair ' a half-
breed 'French-Ottawaj in the first 'luarter of the nineteenth century told the following leiieml relatinc to
Roche de Bout, viz: A party of Ottawas were encamped near-by when a boy, while playiuL' above the
preci|>itous edye of the shore rock, accidentally fell to the flat rock below a distance of about forty feet,
and was killed by the fall, the rock at tlie base of the ledee beinu bare at low stages of the river. The
father, upon his return from the hunt and learning of the death of his boy. became enraged at the mother
because she did not prevent the accident, and he Inn led her over the precipice. Her friends rallied and
treated him in like manner. This was the final signal for tiie gathering of the factious, and their angry
struggles for revenge did not cease until the strength of those above the precipice was exhausted and a
larye part of their number had been thrown to the rock below.

462

THE MAUMEE RIVER BASIN.

Kft (northwest). The peninsula-like appearance of this eminence was
so prominent that the early French named it Presque Isle — see engrav-
ing;' ante paije liH). This name was also applied by them to the ])oint
east of the mouth of Maumee Ba\', and to other prominent ]ilaces. It
was on and around this Maumee River Presciue Isle, particularly the
northwestern end, that the Battle of Fallen Timber was waged and won
l\v General Anthony Wa\ne "20th August, 17l)4--see ante pages 195, 19fi.
One mile above the foot of the lowest rapids is HoUister Island
which is near one-half mile long, and narrow. Several small islands
are in its vicinitv. Two miles below HoUister is Ewing Island oval in
form the sec<ind largest in the river, containing about two hundred
acres. It is situated between the Villages of Maumee and Perr_\sburg
— see Maji ante ]iage HOil, and engraving page 334.'^ In the channel to

ROCHE UE Bolt and r.apids

The Point of Rock on the Ki^zlit, to which the name applies, is about one-third across the channel from
the Rock Precipice formint; the Left Bank. Looking nortlieast down the Maumee at inedium low stasje
of water 1.5th April. 191)3- The Roche de Bout Rapids here seen are typical of the flat and ledgy sectile
Onondakia Limestone through which the channel has been corraded for thirty feet or more, this rock here
being a dam in prehistoric ayes.

the right of Ewing are Garden, War Clul), Hop, and Sandbar Islands ;
in the left channel are Willow and Corn Islands, and at the lowest end
Muskrat Island. Grassv Island is near the right bank at the mouth of
Grassy Creek: Delaware and Clark Islands near the left bank at the
mouth of Delaware Creek: Horseshoe, Corbut, and several other low
.grassx' islands near and within the upper limits of the City of Toledo,
belonging to the State, complete the list of the princii)al islands.

The head of the Maumee River's lowest natural slackwater, which
is practically the level of Lake Erie, is at the upper part of the Village

■■■ This Island is often locall\ called Pilliod Island from an early owner. The Geoijrapher of the
recent I'nited States Survey of this region has, however, recorded it as Ewing Island from a yet earlier
owner, which should permanently fix Ewing as the proper name,

DROWNED RIVERS OR ESTUARIES. EXPLORERS. 463

of Maumc-c about fifteen miles above tile mouth of the river at Maunnc
Bay. One mile and a half below the Villajie of Maumee a led^e of
limestone lessens 'the deep water below to a summer staf,'e of six and a
half feet in depth above, this ledj^e onl\' preventing' lake boats of heavy
draft from coming opposite Maumee and Perrysburt;'.

The increased distance to the rock in the channel ol th( Maumee
between this ledge and the lake, also of Swan Creek and the Ottawa
River of Maumee Bay, in common with this condition of drowned river
or estuary form of many other striams tributary to Lake Erie, signifies
preglacial channels at these jjlaces and a long period of corrasion
of the rock when the lake was at a much lower level than now, if there
was a lake then at these points. ' The average width of the Maumee's
lowest slackwater is about one hundred rods ( 16."i0 feet ) and the
average width above Perrysburg at the usual summer stage of water
is but little more than half this distance; while the former outer banks
are separated by a distance varying from one to two miles.

The earliest European exjjlorers left no record of their observations
and experiences along the Maumee. While it is true that the south-
eastern shore of Lake Erie was not so early written alxiut li\ the
explorers as those parts of the upper lakes readily accessible b\ the
Ottawa River route from Montreal, the western part of Lake Erie and
its main tributary from the southwest, the Maumee which afforded the
shortest and best route to the south and southwest, were undoubted h-
ranged along" at an early date. The early chroniclers observed among
the .\borigines along the Maumee articles which the\' supposed were
brought across the Atlantic by a French fleet in the vear ]o'27. Were
this statement authenticated bex'ond a doubt, we can only jiresume that
these articles were brought from the lower St. Lawrence b\- none other
than the Aborigines themselves.

The following is a list of dates, events, and of notable individuals
and parties who are on record as having passed along the shores of the
Maumee River, or its channel, viz :

Ifill-l'i. Samuel de Champl.'tin is reported as visiting the Mascoutin and Neutral
Aborigines, and Lake Erie.t

l(il4-!.'). Samuel de Champlain probably visited the Maumee River in one of these
years, if not at the date before written.

lli Coureurs de Bois. The date ol their lirst visit and their names and number

were not recorded so far as now known.

1() — . French Missionaries^ or explorers visited the Maumee River previous to the
years l(i.")4, 16.56, 1660 — see Maps of the F'rench Cartcgraphers ante pages T.i to HO.

* Geologists tell us that Lake Erie is the i esult of the k'lacial llllinu of the forinei drailiai;e channel
of its recion. probably underneath the N'alley of the present Grand River in Ontario. .Also that the
earth has been and yet is in process of beini; elevated at the eastern end of Lake Krie. and thai the
depth of the lake is thereby yet increasing.

t Paris Document 1\'. New York Colonial Documents vohune ix. pane 37H. i Idem paye ;iHS.

464 THE MAUMEE RIVER BASIN.

!()()'.). 'In l(i()!l possession was taken in the King's [Louis XIV of France] name of
the countries and lands in the environs of Lake Erie ; the Royal arms were erected there
at the foot of a cross with an inscription indicative of taking possession.' *

l(i()!l. Kene-kobert Cavelier. Sieur de la Salle probably passed up the Maumee in
the autumn of KKi'.l on his way to the Ohio River, t

1(>70. Sieur de la Salle probably passed down the river on his return from discov-
ering the Ohio and Mississippi Rivers.

H'mO. Jesuit Priests from France by way of Canada were along the Maumee River. J

l(i71. June I. Sieur de St. Lusson. or Loison, Subdelegate of M. Talon Intendant
of New France, by Proces- Verbal 'took possession of the country lying between the
East and West from Montreal to the South Sea.' 'i

1(172-74. See maps of the French Cartographers ante page 79.

I(i7(i. French priests from Canada were along the Maumee River. T

KiSO. The Maumee was known to Reverend Claude Allouez, and others.**

KiSO. Iroquois warriors from New York to and from battle with the Illinois
Aborigines, tt

KiSO, November 9. La Salle wrote as follows : There is at the end of Lake Erie
ten leagues below the strait [Detroit] a river [the Maumee] by which we could shorten
the route to the Illinois very much. It is navigable to canoes to within two leagues of
the route now in use.+^!

l(iS2. La Salle again wrote ; 1 could no longer go to the Illinois but by the Lakes
Huron and Illinois, as the other routes which I have discovered by the head of Lake
Erie and by the southern coast of the same, have become too dangerous by frequent
encounters with the Iroquois who are always on that shore. |^

l(iS2. The Miami Aborigines sent deputies to Montreal to meet Count de Frontenac.Ull

l(i83. The Iroquois of New York made war on the Miamis along the Maumee.

](i84. The Iroquois passed on their way to attack La Salle's Fort St. Louis, at the
present Peoria, Illinois.

KiSri. Nicholas Perrot. with twenty Frenchmen, marched into the Miami Country.
The French established a post near the Ohio boundary, probably at the present Fort
Wayne, Indiana.***

I()S7. War continued between the Iroquois and the Miamis.

1()90. French traders from Canada passed up the Maumee River.

l()9:i. .\mbassadors from Governor Benjamin Fletcher of New York with presents
for the Miamis.

1()9.'J. "The onlv disagreeable intelligence we got was. that the Miamis had re-
ceived some presents from the English through the medium of the Mohegans. This

^^ Pari^ Document \'l. New York Colonial Documents \olunie ix, paye 7H7.

t See the Ohio Archaeological and Historical Quarterly volume xii. paye 107 et seq.. article Sieur
de la Salle Alonj" the Maumee River, by Charles E. Slocum; also ante pages 77 to 79.

i Journal of Captain William Trent Cincinnati IS71, page 6.

^ Jesuit Relations Cleveland ed., vol. I\-, p. I(t7. Paris Document I\' New York Colonial Docu-
ments vol. ix, p. :W8.

' Ha.vmonds History of Indiana, paye :Si.

*■ Magazine of Western History volume x, pa«e 64>i. American Antiquarian volume ii. pane 133.

tt Parkmans La Salle and the Great West. And the Journal of Captain William Trent.

ti Pierre Marnry in his Decourvertes des Frangais dans 1' Amerique Septentrionale, volume ii,
paiie 9H. SS Idem 298.

HI Trent p. 7.

*^'''^ Harper's Encyclopaedia of United States History volume ix. page 4^6.

EARLY TRANSIT AND BUSINESS ALONG THE MAUMEE. 465

afforded a just subject of apprehension lest that Nation liad recei\'ed them in order that
they might trade in their country, and lest they would possess, by this means, free
intercourse with all the others, which would bring about the entire ruin of Canada, both
in regard to trade and war. The Count [Frontenac] was, therefore, under the necessity
of sending a much larger number of Frenchmen, Regulars and Militia, than he had at
first proposed, to expel the enemy from that post [at the head of the Maumee] if they
had seized it, or to prevent them entering it. This is to be done by Sieurs de Manteth
and de Courtemanche whom also he dispatched at the head of all the Frenchmen, whose
orders are, to think more of fighting than of trading.'*

Ui'.l.'l. Captain Nicholas Perrot built a trading post at the west end of Lake Erie.
lli'.l."i. Severe war continued between the Iroquois and Miamis.
liilMi. The Iroquois, instigated by the British, again made war on the Miamis.
l(i!)7. .\ bloody engagement occurred by the Maumee between the Miamis and the
Senecas, of the Iroquois, resulting in the defeat of the latter.

KiilT. Captain de Vincennes was dispatched with soldiers from Canada for a
'Post' among the Miamis, probably at the head of the Maumee. He was 'very expressly
forbidden to trade in beaver.' t

l(i!)!). Messengers from the British Earl Bellomont Governor of New York to the
Miamis, were captured by the French along the Maumee and taken prisoners to Canada.
1(>09. Pierre Lemoine d'Iberville passed up the Maumee with a colony of French-
men on their way from Quebec to Louisiana. M. du Tessenet followed with other
colonists. +

1700. Frenchmen built a trading post within the limits of the present City of
Toledo, by the Maumee.

1700. September 24. Reverend Father tiravier wrote while passing down the
Mississippi River as follows ; The 2tth we found a quantity of grapes, but much fewer
than I had been told ; and they are neither as good nor as large as those found on the
Riviere des Illinois, and especially on the Riviere des Miamis [Maumee] where they are
found in greater quantities.

1702. A treaty of peace was effected between the Miamis and the Iroquois, with
some exchange of prisoners.

1702. Messengers from Lord Cornbury (F-dward Hyde) Governor of New York,
came to the Maumee to invite the Miamis to visit him for the purpose of entering into
trade arrangements.

1702. Captain Francis Morgan (') de Vincennes, with French soldiers and others
from Canada, established posts along the Maumee and the Wabash as far southwest as
Vincennes, Indiana.

1704. Captain de Vincennes or ' Sieur de Vinseine, formerly commandant at the
Miamis [head of the Maumee River Fort Miami] by whom he was much beloved' was
sent with six men, two canoes, and 'some goods' as .special messengers from M. de Vau-
dreuil Governor of Canada to the Miamis. ^

1707. M. de Cadillac with French Soldiers passed up the Maumee against
the Miamis.

1 io.s. .\ company of Miamis passed along the Maumee to and from .\lbanv. New
York, on invitation of Lord Cornbury Governor, to arrange terms of peace and trade.

1712. t^aptain de Vincennes was again sent as a messenger 'of peace or war' to
the Miamis on account of their trading with the British; whereupon the Miamis again
promised loyalty to the F'rench.

* Paris Document V. New York Colonial Documents volume ix. page .t69. 1 Idem paye 676.

* MSmoire de la Marine et des Colonies. Beck%vith's Notes page 97.

g Paris Document Vl. New York Colonial Documents volume ix, page 759.

466 THE MAUMEE RIVER BASIN.

in."). British traders from New York again came among the Miamis along the
Maumee and Wabash.

1710. The Maumee River and Wabash route had become of general use.

1718. .\ French traveler wrote; The entrance of the Miamis River from Lake
Erie is very wide, and its banks, on both sides for the distance of ten leagues up, are
nothing but continual Swamps, abounding at all times, especially in the fall and spring,
with game without end; swans, geese, ducks, cranes, etc., which drive sleep away by
the noise of their cries. This river is sixty leagues in length, very embarrassing in
summer in consequence of the lowness of the water. Thirty leagues up the river is a
place called La Glaise [at the mouth of the Auglaise River] where Buffaloes [Bisons]
are always to be found ; they eat the clay and wallow in it.*

171i). Eight or ten canoes of Miami Aborigines passed down the river on their
way to Albany, New York, with furs; and the same year they returned with firearms,
ammunition, and trinkets received in exchange.

1719. The French endeavored to remove the Miamis along the rivers to the south
to their brethren along the St. Joseph River above the French fort. This was an effort
to get them away from the British traders, but it was not successful.

1719. Sieur Dubuisson, by command of M. de Vaudreuii, passed up the Maumee
with his guard to take command of Post Vincennes made vacant bv the death of Sieur de
Vincennes at Kekionga the present Fort Wayne.

1720. M. Frani;ois Morgan passed with his command, on his way to build
Ouiotenon, near the present Lafayette. Indiana, the first distinctly military post on the
Wabash above Post Vincennes.

1721. A company of travelers from Canada, tiy way of Niagara, with merchandise
to trade with the Miami Aborigines.

1721. The Maumee route was recorded as the shortest way from Lake Erie to the
Mississippi River, it being the most public announcement of this fact made among the
British up to this datc.t

M'S.i. A company of Miamis passed to and from New York to invite British traders
to continue coming to the Maumee with supplies.

1 724.. The British traders trom New Y'ork passed up the rix'er with supplies for
the Miamis.

172.5. Frenchmen from the Governor ot Canada with presents, passed up the
Maumee River to induce the Miamis to cast out the British.

17M.T. Sieur d'Arnaud with troops from the post at Detroit, came in expedition
against the Aborigines by the Maumee and Wabash who were 'rebelling' against the
French in fax'or of the British.

17. '14. Several French families passed up the Maumee, on their way from Canada
to settle at Vincennes.

1 IHrt. .\ company of Frenchmen passed for the Wabash settlements.

1 ?HSl. M. de Longueuil with soldiers from Detroit, came against British traders in
Ohio and Kentucky.

1742. A company of F^rench Herdsmen with !i\'e stock from Detroit, came along
this route on their way to the forts on the Maumee and Wabash, including Vincennes.

1744. M. de Lon.gueuil from Detroit, with a guard of soldiers and a company of
Ottawa .Aborigines, passed up the Maumee on their way to rout British traders in Ohio
and Indiana.

1 747. Coldfoot, Piedfroid of the French, chief of the Miamis, Pore-epic

* Paris Document \'I!, New York Colonial Documents volume ix, pa^e 8yl.
t London Document X.\II, New York Colonial Documents volume v, paye i5'2'2

STRIFE OF FRENCH AND BRmSH ALONG MAUMEE. 467

(Hedgehog) and their young men, passed down the river on their way to Montreal to
■ council ■ with the French Governor, and to join his war excursions against the British.
1747. Frenchmen with peltries from the White and Wabash Rivers passed down
the Maumee. They were massacred at Sandusky by Chief Nicolas' band.

1747. Many Aborigines passed up and down the river in conspiracy with Chief
Nicolas against the French, in the interest of the British.

1717. Coldfoot and his guard, came on their return from Montreal with presents
from the (rommandant at Detroit, M. de I^ongueuil, for the rebelling Huron Chief
Nicolas and his bands.

1717. .\utumn. The French Fort Miami at the head of the Maumee was captured
by the Aborigines, followers of Chief Nicolas' conspiracy, in interest of the British.

174S, February. Sieur Dubuisson with French soldiers from Detroit, passed up
the Maumee to recapture and rebuild F'ort Miami.

1748. Companies of Frenchmen established trading posts along the Maumee, from
its mouth to its source.'*

174!), September 27 to October .")th. Captain Pierre Joseph de Celoron and his
command passed down the entire length of the Maumee on his return to Montreal, from
his taking formal possession of the country north and south of the Ohio River, and
burying lead plates so inscribed by order of Marquis de la Galissonniere Captain General
of New France. He was accompanied by two hundred French soldiers and thirty-five
eastern Aborigines. Rev. Pierre Jean de Bonnecamps accompanied this expedition and
wrote as follows regarding their passage down this river, viz ; The Riviere des Miamis
[the Maumee] caused us no less emliarassment than Riviere a la Roche [the Miami of
the Ohio] had done. .-Vt almost every instant we were stopped by the beds of flat stones,
over which it was necessary to drag our pirogues by main force. I will say, however,
that at intervals were found beautiful reaches of smooth water, but they were few and
short [this was a season of drouth with low stage of water]. In the last six leagues the
river is broad and deep and seems to herald the grandeur of the lake into which it dis-
charges its waters. At six leagues above Lake Erie I took the latitude, which was found
to be 42" O'.t We entered the lake on the -Ith of October. On entering it, there is to
the left the bay of Onanguisse. which is said to be very deep. t Soon after one
encounters to the right the Isles aux Serpents [islands where there are snakes].

17411. Eighty-eight Miamis. with eleven canoes and seventy-seven packs of furs,
passed down on their way to market at Oswego. New York.

K.-jl. F'our British traders from Pennsylvania were taken prisoners by the French.
Three were taken to Detroit, and one to (Quebec 'on account of his mutinous conduct
and threats.'

17.")1. Chevalier Paul Joseph le Movne de Longueuil and M. Belletre. with French
soldiers, traders, and 'two hundred Orondack Aborigines' passed up the Maumee on
their way to suppress the Miamis and British traders at La Demoiselle's Fort, known by
the British as Pickawillanv. on the Miami of the Ohio at the mouth of Loramie Creek.

17.)2. Winter and spring. The Miamis suffered severely from the smallpox. The
Aborigines caught this disease from the Europeans.

17.')2. May. M. St. Orr (Our?) from Detroit, with companies of French and
Canadian soldiers and a large body of Ottawas and Chippewas, under Charles Langlade,
passed up the Maumee on their way to suppress the returned British traders, French

* The Firelands Pioneer. Jiint; 1866, pane 118.

t These litiures are too larpe. Ttie latitude of the central part of the Cit.v of Toledo, ten miles
above Lake Erie and five miles above Maumee bay. is 41° 39'. Re.verend Bonnecamps' records average
well, however, for the lime given to them with the means at his command.

? This reference is to the arm of Maumee Bay at the mouths of Ottawa River and Halfway Creek.

468 THE MAUMEE RIVER BASIN.

deserters, and their Miami allies at Pickawillany. This was the first considerable
massacre of the French-British War, ending with the British succession in 171)0.

1 7.")2. .\iitumn. Chevalier de Longueuil* with four hundred Canadians, a small
detachment of French regular troops and Senecas. passed up the river to treat with the
Miamis. He marched into their towns with great display, and deeply impressed them
by his elaborate ceremonies and presents.

17.')<i. French .Embassadors, by way of f)etroit, passed up the river to arrange terms
of peace between the warring Miami and Illinois tribes.

17.1?, Spring, lames Smith, twenty years of age, came with his Aborigine captors
from the Cuyahoga Kiver along the south shore of Lake Erie in canoes laden with
peltries, and 'put in at the mouth of the Miami of the Fake [Maumee River] at Cedar
Point, where we remained several days and killed a number of turkeys, geese, ducks,
and swans.' They passed on to a Wayndot town opposite Fort Detroit where they sold
the peltries, taking part payment in fanciful clothing ; but most of the pay was taken in
brandy on which the Aborigines became intoxicated and so remained until all the brandy
was gone. Returning, they again stopped at Maumee Bay and engaged in a deer drive.
The squaws and boys remained in the canoes along the shore, and the others ranged
along the land some distance from the shore. Thirty deer were secured. t Part were
shot on the land, and part were killed in the water b)- tomahawks. Many escaped. "We
had now great feasting and rejoicing as we had plent\- of homin\-, \'enison. and wild
iowl. Piere our compan\' separated. The chief part of them went up the Miami
[Maumee] River that empties into Lake Erie at Cedar Point, whilst we proceeded on
our journey in company with Tecaughretanego. Tontileaugo. and two families of the
Wyandots."+ Smith further wrote: The Aborigines are a slovenly people in their
dress. They seldom ever wash their shirts, and in regard to cookery they are exceed-
ingly filthy. . . It is a common thing among them for a young woman, if in love, to
make suit to a \ oimg man , though the first address may Ije bv the man. vet the other is
the most common. The squaws are generally ver\- immodest in their words and actions,
and will often put the young man to the blush. The men commonly appear to be
possessed of much more modesty than the women. . Thev have their children

under tolerable command; seldom ever whip them, and their common mode of chas-
tising is by ducking them in cold water ; therefore their children are more obedient in
the winter season than they are in the summer, though they are not so often ducked.

I ;.")?. A large body of Miami warrior's passed down the Maumee River on their
way to Fort William Henry at the head of I^ake George. New York, to assist the F'rench
in its siege and capture from the British.

17.")!t. Captain .Aubry with three hundred French regular soldiers and militia and
six hundred Aborigines gathered on the route passed down the Maumee carrying 200.000
pounds of flour from western Illinois. Their route was 1»\- way of the Mississippi, Ohio,
and Wabash Rivers, down the Maumee and along the southern shore of Lake Erie, to
help protect Fort Venango, and thence to aid Fort Niagara. Captain Aubry was taken
prisoner by the British at Niagara which fort the British captured July 25, 17.'ii).|

1700. November 22. Major Robert Rogers' command on its way to receive the
surrender of Detroit from the French commandant M. Picote de Belletre to the British.

''' Paris Dociiinem X. New York Colonial Documents vehiiiie x, pai^e 2.^1.

f See Life Among the Aborigines by Reverend James H. Finley. page 3H4 where 'riny hunts ' are
mentioned, as many as .5(XI deer beinn killed in one such hunt, also numerous other animals.

t James Smitii's Captivity Among the Ohio Aborigines from 17SS to 776;. written by himself.
Lexinyton. Kentucky. 1799. and printed in Aborigine Captivities by Samuel G. Drake. Auburn, 1852.
Reprinted in Cincinnati in 1H7I>.

S Paris Document X\'l. New York Colonial Documents volume s, payes 986, 989,

RELATION OF MAUMEE TO CONSPIRACY OF PONTIAC. 469

encamped about ten miles east of Cedar Point the northeast point at the mouth of Maumee
Bay ; and the next morning they sailed to Cedar Point where they again encamped to con-
tinue negotiotions with a 'large encampment' of Ottawa and Wyandot Aborigines.* The
next morning the command passed across the mouth of the Bay by Turtle Island. The
weather was so foggy that the drum was necessarily beaten all day to keep the boats
together.

17B0. December i'. ' Mr. Butler of the Rangers set ofl with an officer and partv to
relieve the Garrison at the Milineys. 't . They passed up the Maumee.

17(53. May 1. A large number of .\borigines passed down the Maumee on their
way to Detroit to aid Pontiac in the siege of that fort.

17fi8, May iH. Jacques Godefroy with four other Canadians, and Aborigines, from
near Detroit, passed up to the head of the Maumee to aid in the capture of the then
British Fort Miami in aid of Pontiac's Conspiracy.

1703. Summer. Pontiac returned to the Maumee from the Siege of Detroit. It is
recorded that Pontiac was born by the Maumee River at Defiance — see ante page lO.'i.

17(54. A part of Colonel Henry Bouquet's army was along the River St. Mary and
at the head of the Maumee.

I7(i4, last week of August. Colonel John Bradstreet's army was at the mouth of
Maumee Bay. This army against the savages excited by Pontiac. was subjected to
great losses by desertions and storms, and did but little good — see ante page IH.

r7(i4. Captain Thomas Morris of the British 17th Regiment Infantry was detached
by General Bradstreet from his command and sent as an ambassador to the Aborigines
along the Maumee and to the southwest. He left Cedar Point, the northeast point of
land at the mouth of Maumee Bay August 'id. accompanied by two Canadian Frenchmen,
two servants, and upwards of twenty Aborigines including five Mohawks of the Six
Nations Iroquois of New York among whom Captain Morris had been commandant of
Fort Hendrick at Canajoharie. They found Pontiac with six hundred warriors at the
Ottawa village either near the Grand Rapids of the Maumee or further up the river as
noted ante page 1 1.1. Here, after escaping many dangers, the Captain purchased three
horses for riding, and hired two canoes to carry their little remaining baggage, and they
continued to the Miami villages at the head of the Maumee where other serious dangers
awaited him. J Escaping from his persecutors, the Captain and Godefroy returned to
Detroit with but few attendants. They rode horses most of the wav ; and detourred to
the left, northward from the Maumee. to avoid the Ottawa villages.

17().'>, August 1. George Croghan Commissioner from Sir William Johnson, with
Aborigine chiefs and British prisoners surrendered to him by their tribes, arrived from
the Wabash River at the Portage to the Maumee. (Dn the (ith August they started down
the Maumee in canoes -see ante page 12'2.

17().'). September 1. Deputations of several Aborigine tribes, from Commissioner
Croghan at Detroit, passed up to confer with the Illinois and other tribes.

1774. A French record^ describes ' The Road from Detroit to the Illinois by way of

* Possibly this is where Major RoL'ers first met Pontiac — see ante pape lOM; and Croirhan's Journal.

t This is supposed to be the French uarrison of Fort Miami near the Head of the Maumee ~ see
map ante pace ST: and these Rancers were soon succeeded by a small number of the Royal Americans
commanded by Lieutenant Robert Holmes. See George CroL'ban's Journal, reprint by The Arthur H.
Clark Company. Cleveland, 1904.

+ See ante pane llti et seq. .\!sn the Captain's Journal of this embassy in Miscellanies in Prose
and Verse London, 1791, In- Captain Thomas Morris; or re()rint of this Journal by The .Ailhui 11. Clark
Company, Cleveland, 1904.

S From ' DocumeiUs Relating to the French Settlements on the Wabasir gathered by Jacob P.
Dunn and printed in the Indiana Historical Society Publications volume ii. Number 11, page SS.

470 THE MAUMEE RIVER BASIN.

the Forts Miami, Ouiatanon and St. Vincent with some Remarl<s' as follows, namely :

From Detroit to Lake Erie, eighteen miles.

To the River Miamie [Maumee], thirty-six miles.

To the Foot of the Rapids, eighteen miles.

To the Top of the Rapids, eighteen miles. N. B. Part of the Ottawas & a few of
the Hurons inhabit this part of the River. In the former when the water is low. Canoes
cannot pass the Rapids otherwise than by being dragged over the stones c& frequently
the Traders are obliged to carry their goods the whole eighteen miles.

To the end of the Stillwater, twenty-four miles [to near the present Florida, Henry
County, Ohio],

To the Top of the next Rapids, nine miles [to the present State Dam four and a
half miles below (east of) Defiance].

To the Grand Glaise, a River so called on the left going up, six miles. N. B. A
few Ottawas live here [at the mouth of the Auglaise River within the present City of
Defiance ; this record showing a distance of seventy-five miles from the mouth of
the Maumee].

To the Little Glaise on the right, three miles [the present Tiffin River. The
distance by River is but one mile and a half. Other distances given in this table are
only approximate].

To the King's Glaise on the right, twelve miles, A few Ottawas live here [mouth
of Platter Creek, Defiance County].

To the Elm Meadow [nearly opposite the present Village of Antwerp, Paulding
County, Ohio] fifteen miles.

To Sledge Island (so called from a stone resembling a sledge) twelve miles.

To the Split Rock, six miles.

To the Wolf Rapid [latterly, known as Bull f'lapid. in Maumee Township. .Allen
County, Indiana] twelve miles.

To the Great Bend, twelve miles.

To Fort Miamie [by the River St. Joseph see map ante page '.17] fifteen miles.
N. B. The Miami Nation live opposite the Fort and consist of about ,')0 Men able to
bear arms. The Fort is inhabited by Eight or Ten French F'amilies.

From Fort Miami to Cold Feet where the old French Fort was, three miles. [This
was the site of the first Fort Miami by the River St. Mary — see map ante page '■>7. The
distance here gi\'en is too great; l:)ut the distances given from the mouth of the Maumee
aggregate one hundred antl sixty-two miles which is nearly correct. " Cold Feet ' was
the name of the village of the Miami Chief Coldfoot's band]. The carrying place to the
Little River, nine miles. To the River a Boite, six miles. To the Flats, twenty-one
miles. To the Little Rock [Little Rock River, now known as Bull Creek] three miles.
To the Ouabache, six miles. [Ouabache, the French spelling of Wabash. This was at
the mouth of Little River, one mile and a half below the site of the present Village of
Huntington, Indiana], N, B. Between the Miamie [Maumee] iV the Ouabache there
are Beaver Dams which when water is low Passengers break down to raise it, & by that
means pass easier than they otherwise would. When they are gone the Beaver come
and mend the Breach, for this reason they have been hitherto sacred as neither Aborigines
nor White people hunt them. " This account is continued to the Illinois country, it
giving the entire distance from Detroit as S?!) miles, 240 of which being across ' Plains
and extensive Meadows' from the lower Wabash River.

1 777 (?) John Edgar, a well-known merchant of Detroit, passed up the Maumee on
his way to Ka.skaskia, Illinois, his place of banishment by the British on account of his
sympathy with the Colonists. His goods were confiscated. Con,gress in after years
gave him 2000 acres of land as compensation for his loss.

1 7 7IS, Spring. Daniel Boon and ten other Kentuckians were taken prisoners by the

THE MAUMEE ROUTE IN THE REVOLUTIONARY WAR. 471

Aborigines, and taken down tlie Auglaise and Maumee to Detroit. They were soon
thereafter returned to 'Old ("hillicothe' whence Boon soon escaped from his captors.

1778, June. The Miami. Shawnee. Pottawotami, Wabash and other savages passed
down the Maumee on their way to a .great council with Lieutenant Governor Hamilton,
Abbott of \'incennes, John Hay Aborigine .\gent. and M'Kee, at Detroit. This council
of the middle of June was attended by KiSH Aborigines of both sexes.*

1T7S, .\ugust 10-1.1. M. de Celoron passed up the Maumee with war-belts from
Hamilton of Detroit to the Miami and Wabash savages, to hold them firm with the
British against Colonel George Rogers Clark's successes in the southwest.

1778. August. Captain de Quindre with a company of Canadians and Aborigines
from Detroit, passed along the Maumee on their way to and from their raid on Boons-
boro, Kentucky, in interest of the British against the Americans.

1778, August 2.1. A war party of fifteen Miamis started from the head of the
Maumee for a raid along the Ohio. They were followed on the :iOth by a chief and
thirty warriors.

1778, September 14 to 'i:i. Charles Beaubien British .\gent among the Miamis at
the head of the Maumee River, passed down with his escort on way to report to Hamil-
ton at Detroit.

1778. September 2!( to October 1. Captain .Alexander M'Kee British Superinten-
dent with escort, belts of wampum and presents, passed up the Maumee as a war
messenger from Lieutenant Governor Hamilton at Detroit to the Shawnees.

1778, October 1st to 11th. A Lieutenant and militia from Hamilton at Detroit
passed up the Maumee to its head to assist in repairing the Portage Road to Little
River, and Fort Miami.

1778, October 10th to '^4th. Lieutenant Governor, and Colonel, Henrv Hamilton of
Detroit pa.ssed up the Maumee on his way to recapture Vincennes from Colonel Clark's
detachment. He was accompanied by Captain William Lamothe's company of volun-
teers composed of Major Jehu May in general charge, including a large amount of
presents for the Aborigines ; Captains Norraond M'Leod and Alexis Maisonville; Lieu-
tenants Jacob Schieffelin. Joncaire Chabert. Chevalier Chabert and Pierre St. Cosme;
Adjutant Medard Gamelin; Quartermaster Chapman; Surgeon John M'Beath; Com-
missary of Provisions at Head of Maumee Charles Louvain ; Commissary for the Expe-
dition Adhemar St. Martin : Storekeeper Nicholas La Salle ; Armorers Augustine
LeFoi and Amable Cosme ; Boatmaster Francis Maisonville : Master Carpenter Amos
Ansley : and seventy-one private soldiers. Also about sevtnty Aborigines led by Captain
Charles Reaume and Lieutenants Lepiconiere De Quindre. Fontchartrain De Quindre
and Joseph Bondy. Regular soldiers of the King's Eighth Regiment were to soon
follow, viz : one lieutenant, two sergeants, and thirty-one private soldiers ; also one lieu-
tenant firew-orker and two matrosses [artillerymen].! This expedition progressed
laboriously up the Maumee with its many bateaux and large pirogues, (see ante page 188)
heavily laden with food, supplies, including one six-pounder cannon, and presents,
valued at SoO.OOO.J It had been a fall of unusual low water, but some recent rains

* See Haldimand MSS. .-Kko History o/ George R. Clark's Conquest by C. W. Biiciei field, paee
l'^^ et seq.

t From Hamilton's letter.'! to General Frederick Haldimand Governor of Canada, in the Haldimand
MSS. There has been much fiction of statement reqardink' this important expedition as. also, recardinc
most other events in history. See Bancroft's History of the United States; Mounetlf;^ History of the
Valley of the Mississippi: Enelish's Conquest 0/ (/le Country N. W. of the Ohio Annals of the West:
Michigan Pioneer and Historical Collections : Bimertield's History of Clark's Conquest: Ante
page 137. etc.

t Oxen, carts, and beef-cattle preceded the boats. Most of the army supplies were left dnrinK the
winter at Fort Miami at the head of the Maumee where. Colonel Hamilton wrote, there will be a depot.

472 THE MAUMEE RIVER BASIN.

had given hope of rise in the rivers. They arrived at the rapids October 11th and at
the head of the Maumee in the good time of thirteen days.*

177i*, Early spring. Aborigines with several prisoners from Kentucky, including
Captain Nathan BuUit. and Jesse Coffer, passed on their way to Detroit to surrender them
to the British 'who were then paying more for live meat than for scalps.'

1779. Last part of March or first of April. The militiamen who accompanied
Colonel Hamilton to Vincennes in the fall of 1778 and were there taken prisoners by the
American force under Colonel George Rogers Clark and paroled by him. passed down the
river on their return to Detroit.

1779, June. Simon Kenton, Captain Nathan Bullit and Jesse Coffer, passed up
the west side of the Maumee Valley on their return home after escaping from the British
at Detroit.!

1779, October. Captain Matthew Elliott, Simon and George Girty, and Aborigines
passed on their return to Detroit with prisoners and booty captured from David Rogers'
company of seventy Americans by the Ohio River near the mouth of the Licking, 4th
October.

1780. Early June. Colonel Henry Bird with six hundred British soldiers. Cana-
dians, Simon. James, and George Girty, and Aborigines, and two pieces of artillery,
from Detroit passed up the Maumee and Auglaise to the massacre of Americans at
Bryant's and Riddle's, or Ruddell's, Stations, Kentucky. +

17S0, Last of July. Colonel Henry Bird's command returned down the rivers to
Detroit, with about one hundred and fifty American prisoners and many scalps to sell to
the British.

1780, October 27. One of the common great gatherings of .\borigines was held at
the lower rapids with much drunkenness as usual, following the payment of British
bounties for their savage work against Americans during the Revolutionary War.

1780, Autumn. M. la Balme, of France, with a small company from Kaskaskia.
came up the Wabash to the head of the Maumee against the British and Aborigines.

a store of provisions, perhaps of amnmnition and i^oods for the Aborigines. As soon as I arrive there I
shall order a redoubt to be thrown up, the houses to be fortified, or such other precaution taken for its
defense as may appear best suited to the number of inhabitants and nature of the around. . . thus the
time spent in councils with the .^boriyines [which are sometimes very deliberate) may be employed at
the Miamis in fortifying that depot. . . If the rebels LAmericansI at Fort Pitt, with the assistance of
the Delawares in their interest, could effect the surprise of such a place, they would not only possess
themselves of our ma^iazine but cut off one of our communications with Detroit, as we mi^ht in that case
be obliged to return by the way of St. Joseph [near Lake Micliiuanl and be distressed for provision. I
shall represent this to Captain Lernoult [Commandant at Detroit] who will judye how far a detachment
sent to the Miamis [at head of Maumeel will be a cover to Detroit, and facilitate and secure our corres-
pondence and communication.'

^ At Fort Miami Hamilton reported they met several tribes of Aboriiiines previously summoned
there and held several conferences, made them presents, dispatclied niesseni;ers to tlie Shawnees and
other tribes on their route inviting their company, ' or at least to watch the motions of the rebels
[Americans] on the frontiers, for which purpose I sent them ammunition.' The leport also gives the
following experience after leaving Fort Miami: Having passed the portage of nine miles we arrived at
one of the sources of the Ouabache [Wabashl called the Petit Riviere [Little River], The waters were
so uncommonly low that we should not have been able to have passed but that at the distance of four
miles from the landing place the beavers had made a dam which kept up the water; these we cut
through lo give a passage to our boats, and having taken in our lading at the landing passed all the
boats. The beaver are never molested at that place by the traders or Aborigines, and soon repair their
dam. which is a most serviceable work upon this difhcult communication. See Michigan Pioneer and
Historical Collections, volume ix : also ante page 13S.

t John M'Donald's Biographical Sketches, page -2:^.

i Lossing's Pictorial Field-Book of the Revolution, volume ii page::»94.

SAVAGES COUNCIL WITH BRITISH. HARMAR'S DEFEAT. 475

His company was successful at first, then in an unguarded moment they were massacred
by the rallying savages near the Aboite River on their return. See ante page 1-tt.

V7.S1. George Holman and Richard Rue captives with an .Aborigine party led by
Simon Girtv were brought down the Auglaise. and taken down the Maumee and to Detroit.
Holman was taken back to Wapakoneta. and Rue was taken to the Mississinewa. He
escaped to his friends after a few years. See Firelands Pioneer.

1781. The Maumee River at the mouth of the .\uglaise was the refuge and abode
for a time of the survivors of the Moravian Christian Aborigines (Delawares) after the
sad massacre of their brethren at the Tuscarawas River.

IT.Sl-SH. War parties of savages continued to come from and return to the Kritish
at Detroit, passing up and down the river or across its lower course.

r7.S7. A large council of .\borigines was held at the foot of the lowest Maumee
rapids, on the right bank. The British Deputy .\gent (a deserter from the .\mericans)
Alexander M'Kee. was present, also the noted Joseph Brant of New York.

178S. Another council of Aborigines was held by the lower Maumee, with the same
British emissaries present as in 1787. The United States was also represented by Thomas
Girty who continued loyal notwithstanding the influence of his three renegade younger
brothers Simon. James, and George, who were active among the Ohio savages engender-
ing disaffection against the .Vmericans in favor of the British. The savages, however,
decided to attend council with the .\mericans at Fort Harmar.

1 7s:i to 1 7'.MI. But tew white people passed along the river other than l'"rench.
British, and a few .\merican. trailers with the .\borigines.

17'.MI. Colonels Joseph Brant and .\lexander M'Kee. and others of the British troops.
had storehouse at the foot of the lowest Rapids for supplying the savages with food and
the munitions of war.

1 riKI. .\pril I'i. Freeman and Gerard, messengers of peace from

f-irigadier General Wilkinson of Fort Washington, to the Aborigines, were murdered by
them at the lower rapids of the Maumee.

1790, April 23. Antoine Gamelin with guard arrived at the Miami town at the
head of the Maumee. with a letter from Governor .Arthur St. Clair by way of Major John
F. Hamtramck at Post Vincennes. This letter, addressed to the -\borigines along the
Wabash and Maumee. expressed the desire of the writer that these tribes be at peace
with the United States. There were British traders then along the Maumee who kept
alive antipathv to the .Americans, and the .\mericans could not secure peace.

1 7'.tO. (iabriel Godfrey and John Baptiste Beaugrand. from Canada, established a
trading post at the foot of the lowest rapids.

17'.K1. Pirogues of Canadian make, laden with Aborigines, supplies and munitions
of war obtained from the British, passed up the river against General Josiah Harmar's
command.

17110. September or early October. James (iirty pa.ssed down the Maumee to the
site of the present City of Defiance, fleeing with his stock for trade from his trading
house at St. Marys before General Harmar's army.

1790, October 1.) and 17. General Josiah Harmar arrived from the south along
the headwaters of the Maumee with an army of 14.13 U. S. Regular troops and militia,
and three pieces of artillery, against the .Aborigines who defeated him- see ante
page 1()3.

1791. May '2."). Two hundred .Aborigines, in war parties, moved from Sandusky to
Roche de Bout. .Also June 11th. large war parties from Detroit passed up the river to
the Miami towns at its head. Simon Girty and other British agents were present and
active with the savages against the .Americans.*

Thomas Rhea's Report in the American Slate Papers. Aborigine Affairs vohi

474 THE MAUMEE RIVER BASIN.

1 702. The largest gathering in the history of the Aborigine councils was held at
the junction of the Auglaise with the Maumee, at the northern part of the First and
Second Wards of the present City of Defiance. Over three thousand and six hundred
were reported present — see ante page 178.

1794, April. The British under direction of Lieutenant Governor John Graves
Simcoe built Fort Miami on the left bank of the Maumee about two miles below the
lowest rapids, and garrisoned it with four hundred and fifty men and ten pieces of
artillery.

1794. James Girty fled from the site of the present City of Defiance down the
Maumee with his merchandise to Canada before the coming of General Wayne's army.

1794, .August. General Anthony Wayne with an army of about two thousand men
came down the left bank of the Auglaise. established Fort Defiance from the 8th to the
loth, and passed down the left bank of the Maumee to the Battle of Fallen Timber
August 20, which occurred on the left bank of the river about four miles above the foot
of the lowest rapids. He started on his return August 28rd and arrived at Fort Defiance
the 27th where he remained, strengthening the fort, until September Kith, when he
started up the left (north) bank of the river to build Fort Wayne.

1794, October 28. Colonel Richard England, Commandant of the British garrison
at Detroit, wrote to Francis Le Maitre Military Secretary, complaining of the great
amount of food supplies taken bv Colonel M'Kee to the Maumee at the mouth of Swan
Creek for the .\borigines ; also for those taken 'for the garrisons at Fort Miamies [by the
lower Maumee] and at Turtles Island" near the mouth of Maumee Bay. He paid the
soldiers of these garrisons ' a Dollar a chord for Cutting & piling the Fire wood neces-
sary for these Posts for the Winter.' . Loss by death at these posts 'by that unfavor-
able Climate' was very severe. At this date of Colonel England's writing there were "of
the 34th Regiment only one hundred & fifty-four on the Surgeon's sick list Report.
Those who survive will not I fear be fit for any Duty this Winter, as their disorder
is of such a nature as to give but little hope of a speedy or permanent recovery.
Every attention is paid to them that this [Detroit] Post will admit of. but from the very
unusual Consumption of Medicine, Our Stock, as well as all that could be purchased here,
is totally Expended, and we look with impatience for a supply from Lower Canada."*

1795, Sprin.g. Many Aborigines passed up the Maumee on their wav to the Treat}'
at Greenville.

1795. At the Treaty at Greenville Chief Little Turtle desired for the Miami
Aborigines the exclusive control of the Portage between the Maumee, or the lower waters
ot the River St. Mary, and the Little River ; but it was not granted to them. They had
succeeded in monopolizing it for a long time previous to the coming of General Wayne's
army. The transportation of peltries, merchandise, etc., between the Maumee and Little
River had become so great that they boasted of having received as tolls for it as much
as one hundred dollars a day, which is probably an extreme statement. As the Aborig-
ines did not like work, it is presumed that they desired the exclusive control for the
purpose of levying toll contrary to Article ["V of the Ordinance of 1787, and not for the
purpose of organizing facilities for the transportation of goods. Some of their horses and
men could be hired, however, to aid in the work.

1790, Early summer. Count Constantine Fran<^ois Classeboeuf de "Volney, French
traveler, writer, and philosopher, passed down the Auglaise and Maumee on his way
from \^incennes to Detroit and Philadelphia, coming by wav of the Ohio River, Frank-
fort and Lexington, Kentucky. He was under charge of a military convoy from Cincinnati
' through the kindness of Major Swan [U. S. Army] by a road formed by the army through
over two hundred and fifty miles of forest. Five palisaded forts, neatly constructed

"* Michigan Pioneer Collections, vol. xii pai-es 148-1,t0. .Also see ante pajies 194, :in and onward.

AMERICANS TAKE FULL POSSESSION MAUMEE RIVER. 475

[Forts Loramie, St. Marvs, Auijlaise. Detiance and Miami) were the only stages in
this journey.'*

1 rOli, May 17. Colonel John Francis Haratramck, leaving a small garrison at I'"ort
Wayne, passed down the Maumee with his command to Fort Defiance which was
probably dismantled and abandoned about jimelst; and the garrison moved down the
Maumee to Fort Deposit.

179(). July .1th. Captain Moses Porter with his company of sixty-five soldiers,
moved from the lower Maumee to Detroit where he took possession of ?"ort Lernoult upon
its evacuation by the British garrison July 11th.

170(), July 11th. The British garrison, according to the terms of the Jay Treaty,
evacuated Fort Miami by the lower river, which was at once taken possession of bv
Captain Marschalk and his company, of Colonel Hamtramck's command.

179(), July 11th. Colonel John F. Hamtramck 'embarked all the troops' from the
lower Maumee for Detroit, where he arrived the Kith.

17iMi. James Girty returned from his retreat in Canada, and had for some time a
trading post on the north bank of the Maumee opposite Girty Island to which he would
retreat when there were signs of danger. Later he removed to the Shawnee town on the
left bank of the Maumee three miles below Fort Wayne. On the approach of General
Harrison's armv to raise the Siege of Fort Wayne in ISl'^, he again fled to C'anada where
he died \Mh .April, 1S17.

180'i, |une ['']. t~oloiie-l Thomas Hunt and the 1st Regiment V. S, Infantry from
Detroit, passed up the Maumee iu fifty Montreal Bateaux, on their way to St. Louis. t
These boats were hauled across the Portage to the Little River by the soldiers.

IS(1(, April 1."), Two members of the Society of Friends from the Baltimore
Yearly Meeting who went to I'ort Wayne on horseback to establish an agricultural and
('hristian mi.ssion among the Aborignes (see ante page i'!)l) started down the Maumee in
a pirogue propelled by Corporal King and a private soldier of the Fort Wayne garrison.
There were many Aborigines along the river, mostly Ottawas, with hunting and maple
sugar camps, and children including infants bandaged tightly to boards, with faces
painted very red, silver bracelets around the wrists and heavy silver rings in the ears.
Larger children were in calico frocks to which were attached numerous silver brooches
from top to bottom with like ornaments around the wrists and neck and in the ears.
Their huts were made of two upright forked sticks with one stick horizontal in the forks
and bark from trees leaning against it, and sometimes covered with rushes sewn together
into mats with thready fibers obtained from bark of the buckeye tree bv pounding it.
Occasionally a pointed tepee was seen. Game was plentiful, and
■ The prowling wolf howled hideous all night long,
.And owls vociferated the dread response.'
A maskalonge was speared by the occupants of this pirogue, measuring four feet two
inches in length, and larger ones were reported to them. They stopped to view the
remains of Fort Defiance. ' The situation is very beautiful and commanding at the
junction of the River Great Au Glaise with the Miami [Maumee]. The two rivers make
a large body of water, the width being about two hundred yards. A Canadian trader
only resides here.' They pas.sed Girtytown, the former trading station of James Girty,
opposite Girty Lsland. They passed from the head of Grand Rapids to the foot of the
lowest rapids, fourteen miles, in one and a half hours, carefully noting Roche de Bout or
standing rock on the way which was described as thirty feet high above surface of water,
circular with diameter the same, and top of the regular appearance ot the roof of a

* A View 0/ the Soil and Climate of the United States of America, eic. By C. F. \'olney.
Philadelphia, 1804. pat'e 3.56.

t Maua/ine of Western History, volume .v.

476 THE MAUMEE RIVER BASIN.

house. ' Its appearance is additionally handsome from the circumstance of the roof, as
it is called, being covered with cedar' trees. Below the lowest rapids their progress was
slow from strong head wind and "prudence seemed to dictate that we should put into a
harbor, which we did at the mouth of Swan Creek where is a small fort [Fort Industry]
and garrison lately established by the United States. Introductory letters were given us
at Fort Wayne to Lieutenant Rhea the Commandant, which we delivered. He treated
us with respect, and with him we spent the remainder of the day and lodged. On our
way we stopped to view an old fort called F"ort Miami which was garrisoned by the
British at the time Wayne defeated the Aborigines.'* iVIany Aborigine villages and
wigwams were seen on both sides of the lower Maumee, and many French dwelt there,
having married into the tribe and adopted the tribe's customs. Some of these houses
were of a better class, built of small round logs, and roofed with bark.

1801) to 1811. Tecumseh and other Chiefs, and numerous other Aborigines, passed
along the Maumee many times on their way to and from the British at .\mherstburg and
the Wabash to confederate the Aborigines against the Americans.

1812. September 2.)-28. A strong force of British and savages from Maiden passed
up the Maumee to about twelve miles above Fort Defiance, and then retreated before
the on-coming Americans.!

1812. (ieneral James Winchester, with about two thousand soldiers of the Army of
the Northwest, started down the river from Fort Wayne September 22nd and arrived at
the ruins of Fort Defiance the 30th. Here he built a large 'handsome fort' (Fort
Winchester) and remained until December 30th. the main force occupying alternately
five encampments where they suffered from cold, want of food, and disease as much,
probably, as any American troops have endured. Leaving Fort Winchester December
3(Uh, his army, now reduced to near one thousand men, arrived at Presq'ile, the Battle
F'ield of Fallen Timber, January 10th, 1813, where he built F'ort Deposit No. 2 about
two miles below the site of General Wayne's Fort Deposit No. 1.

1813, January 12. General Payne, of General Winchester's army, routed a
gathering of Aborigines from an old stockade post on the north bank of Swan Creek near
its mouth (ruins of Fort Industry ?)

1813, lanuary 17. Colonels Lewis and Allen, from General Winchester's force,
were dispatched with five hundred and fifty men against the British and Aborigines at
Frenchtown (Monroe).

1813, January 19. General Winchester moved from the lower Maumee to his
complete defeat at Frenchtown (Monroe) Michigan.

1813, February, March, and April. Fort Meigs was built, by order of General
William H. Harrison, on right bank of Maumee at the foot of the lowest Rapids just
above the present Village of Perrysburg, Wood County. Ohio.

1813. Colonel Richard M. Johnson with a regiment of Kentucky cavalry, passed to
and from Fort Meigs several times along the Maumee.

1813. Many large boat loads of army supplies were taken down the river, from
Fort Wayne and from the Auglaise to Fort Meigs.

1813, May 1st to .")th. I~ort Meigs was besieged by the British with heavy cannon
and a strong force under General Henry Proctor. They were successfully resisted by
the garrison under General Harrison.

1813. General Green Clay's command of twelve hundred Kentucky and other
soldiers left Fort Winchester May 3rd to aid the besieged Fort Meigs. They had

* A Mission to the Aborigines, from the Aborigine Committee of Baltimore Yearly Meeting lot
the Society of Friends] to Fort Wayne in 1804. pace 96. Compare ante payes 3H6 and onward,

t See ante page 387; .'Vnd the Michigan Pioneer Collections, volume xv pat;es 1.51-1.S4.

THE MAUMEE THOROFARE IN THE WAR OF 1812. 477

eighteen large flat scows with high thick sides to shield the troops against bullets of
attacking foes.

lyiii, May 4. Colonel William Dudley's Kentucky troops, of General ("lay's coin-
mand. were defeated on the west side of the river opposite and below Fort Meigs, and he
with six hundred and thirty of his force of eight hundred, were captured and many were
massacred.

ISi:;, July 21. Second (bloodless) investment of Fort Meigs by British and
savages.

bSl.'i-lSl.'). There was much of passing down and up the Maumee of troops and
supplies for the armies during and at the close of the War of FSIi.

ISlf. Major John Whistler passed up the Maumee from Detroit with troops to
assume command of Fort Wayne.

181.). May l."). Fort Meigs was dismantled by its garrison of about forty men. Its
armament, including four heavy pieces of ordinance and military stores, was taken to
Detroit on the schooner Blacksnake commanded by Captain Jacob Wilkinson.

liSl."), and onward. The influx of permanent settlers was considerable, particularly
at the head of the river, foot of the lowest rapids, and at Defiance, increasing in number
each year.

l.Hl.") K;. Fort Wayne was rebuilt by its garrison under Major John Whistler.

1S17. Major Joseph H. V'ose. of the ')th U. S. Regiment Infantr\, succeeded to
the command of Fort Wayne.

ISli), ,\pril I'.l. Major Joseph H. Vose. in compliance with orders, dismantled Fort
Wayne and passed down the Maumee with the garrison of ninety-one men, and equip-
ment including one six and one twelve pounder cannon, on their way to Detroit, thus
removing from this Basin the last garrison of United States soldiers.

I.S22. General Lewis Cass and Henry K. Schoolcraft historian of the .\borigiues,
with attendants, went up the Maumee in canoes on their way from Detroit to the
Mississippi. They returned by this river. Cieneral Cass had before this journev been
up and down this river several times by boat in his public dealings and treaties with the
.aborigines.

The foregoinK is but a lirief outlint- of the former im])ortance of
this waterway as a thoroughfare. Its full imiiortance in early times
cannot well be comjirehended at this distance in time and develojjment,
j)articularl\- by those not conversant with water transjiortation and the
great scope of country which focused along this river. Hundreds of
warring Aborigines of the many tribes, in addition to the foregoing
list, Were often i^assing u]) and down its course; and their women,
children and aged found their greatest pleasure along its waters. In
the later history of the Aborigines here, about the time annuities were
to be j)aid at Fort Wayne, there was an esi)ecial assemliling of their
entire number for the journey thither, many traveling far from direct
route for the i:)urj)Ose of passing along the river. The\- came along
the Maumee from villages east and west ol its month, and down the
'.\uglaise and Tiffin to Defiance where two thousand or more havt been
encamjied for a time before renewing the journe\' u]) the river to receive
thi- Go\ernment"s bounty. The da\s of e\clusi\el\- licensed traders
had passed, and every tradesman was alert to get his share of traffic.
Some even accompanied them to Fort Wayne (the late Brice Hilton of

478 THE MAUMEE RIVER BASIN.

Brunershurv. among the numbtr ) piroguing tlieir stock for trade up
the Maumee while the Aborigines generally went by land, some on
horseback and others on foot, to meet at night in or near the same
camping place. It was generally necessary to trust the Aborigines for
their purchases until the receipt of their annuity. It was also necessarv
to be close at hand with the demand for payment u]:>on its receipt: and
even tht-n some bills would remain unpaid. These Aborigines, who
loved the Maumee River so well, have long since departed to far distant
western reservations, and to the Spirit Land, leaving but little
expression of the sentiment that the more thoughtful of them must
have felt in their better moments.'*"

The commerce of and for the settlers along the Maumet- River
above the lowest rax>ids culminated in 1^42, to be largely superseded
the following year by the Miami and Erie and the Wabash and Erie
Canals. The river transportation, on all streams above and below
Fort Wayne, w'as led prior to L'^SO b>- Francis Minne and Jacob Bush :
and subsequently by Patrick Ravenscraft and John Barber. Individ-
uals, or two or more neighboring farmers, however, would do their own
transporting by pirogues, even to Detroit. The boating from Fort
W^ayne to Maumee Village or Perrysburg and return usually required
one week's time. All kinds of products and merchandise then current
were transported.

■■' In the late Isaac Van Tassel's Journal of the Presbyterian Mission to the Aborigines at the
middle of the lowest series of rapids we find the statement, printed in the Missionary Herald of Decem-
ber, 1H31, that " Since the Treaty lof ]><'2H whereby they were to be removed to the far westward reser-
vation! some of the Abori^!i^es have said they will never leave this country. If they can find no place to
stay, they will spend the rest of their days in walkinc up and down the Maumee, mourning over the
wretched state of their people." Usint; this sentiment as a subject. Josiah D. Canning, of Gill, Massa-
cliusetts. communicated to the American Pioneer, volume il. 1843, page 78, the following poem entitled

thp: hanks of maumee.

I stood, in a dream, on the banks of Maumee!

'Twas autumn, and nature seem'd wrapped in decay,
The wind, moaning, crept thro" the shivering tree —

The leaf from the bough drifted slowly away :
The gray-eagle screamed on the marge of the stream,

The solitudes answered the bird of the free;
How lonely and sad was the scene of my dream.

And mournful the hour, on the banks of Maumee I

A form passed before me — a vision of one

Who mourned for his nation, his country and kin;
He walked on the shores, now deserted and lone.

Where the homes of his tribe, in their glory, had been :
And thought after thought o'er his sad spirit stole.

As wave follows wave o'er the turbulent sea;
And this lamentation he breathed from his soul.

O'er the ruins of home, on the banks of Maumee:

' As the hunter, at morn, in the snows of the wild.
Recalls to his mind the sweet visions of night ;
When sleep, softly falling, his sorrows beguiled.
And opened his eyes in the land of delight —

EARLY COMMERCE OF THE MAUMEE RIVER. 479

A few passt-ngers sought conveyance in these boats. Going down
the stream in a good stage of water, the ride was rapid and exhilarating.
But some amusing stories were told of persons who engaged convey-
ance on freight boats at I^ort Lawrence, Maumee and Perrysburg u]i
the river, particularly during low stages of water. During the journi_\-
the\' were obliged to either wade in thi' water and he]]) to lift and ])ush
the boat up the rajiids, or work w ith a iioli' to push the boat U]) the
deeper and more sluggish current. They would soon 'recognize the
joke' forsake the boat, and make the journey much easier and (piicker
in walking along the shore path unencumbered.

The means and system of transportation across the Portage be-
tween the Maumee and Little River developed with the river commerce.
Some of the more enterprising Frenchmen led the liusiness, at first in
the name or partly in the interest of the Miami chiefs, who sought to
levy tribute on the portage notwithstanding Article IV of the Ordinance
of 1787, and then for themselves. Louis Bourie of Detroit established a
store at Fort Wayne, and his chief clerk conducted the Portage Trans-
portation business largely from 1^03 to 1H09. This business increased
to large proportions, horses and carts being used: but land transporta-
tion was here wholl\- sujierseded b\ the canal which was com])leted
from Fort Wayne to Huntington in iHof).

The first of the larger sailboats, recorded bv the newsi)aper Miami
of the Lake in April, lH4(i, and others, as built by the lower Maumee to

So, backward I muse oi\ the dieaiii of m> youth;

Ve peace-givinK hours I O. where did ye flee :
When the Christian neglected his pa^es of truth,

.\nd the Great Spirit frowned, on the banks of Maumee.

'Oppression has lifted his iron-like rod

And smitten iny people, a^ain and ayain:
The white man has said there is justice with God —

Will he hear the poor Aborigine before him complain ?
Sees he not how His children are worn and oppressed —

How driven in exile? — O, can he not see?
And I, in the Garments of heaviness dress'd.

The last of my tribe, on the banks of Maumee?

' Ye trees, on whose branches my cradle was hung.

Must I yield you a prey to the axe and the fire?
Ye shores, where the chant of the pow-wow was sunt:?

Have ye witnessed the liiiht of the council expire?
Pale ghosts of my fathers, who battled of yore.

Is the Great Spirit just in the land where ye be?
While living, dejected I'll %vander this shore,

.\nd join you at last from the banks of Maumee.'

There is but little poetic literature relating to the Maumee known to the \vriter: ajiil this fact
induces the reprinting of the foregoing effusion. Rev. N. H. C. Love, D.D.. who has resided many years
by and near the Maumee River, dedicated in IHHT 'To the Pioneers of the Maumee Valley, Living and
Dead' a poem of iSB lines entitled The Maumee which, though faulty in construction, embraces more
correct sentiment than does the foregoing. It is (irinied in the pamiihlet of the Maumee Valley Pioneer
Association for 1897, and separately.

480 THE MAUMEE RIVER BASIN.

coast alont; Lake Erie, wert- the sloop or schoontr Miami of 25 tons
ca])acit\", built at Perrysburg in the year IJ^IO tor Detroit owners. The
Blacl<snakeo{ the same size was in use from ll-il4, and the Leopard from
IHI'.l. The Guerriere of 75 tons was built at Swan Creek. She was
sold at auction January 1, l'"!-^, in Sandusky by John Hollister and
Compan\' of Perrysburt;. Then were built at Pcrrysburg;, the Eagle of
K)0 tons in \X'21 which continued to plv- ([uitt.' reyularl\- between the
Maumee and Buffalo, Captain David Wilkinson being master in LSiJ^ ;
and the Antelope of Tfi tons built in IH^H, the last three being owned at
Perr\sburg. Up to the year b'^4fi the list of such vessels had increased
to the number of twent\', the largest being of about 150 tons burden.

The first steamboat built for the Great Lakes was the Walk-in-the
Water of ;;4() tons, built at Black Rock, Buffalo, by Doctor J. B.
Stewart of Albany, New York, and other parties interested in land
about Perr>sburg. She was completed in the year 1818. Noah Reed,
a passenger on her, wrote in his Memoirs that she left Black Rock
August 18, 181H, arrived at Detroit September 15th. Job Fish was
then captain and he ran the boat up the Maumee to Perrysburg. This
and the two succeeding summers she continued to make successful
runs between Buffalo and Detroit, and June 10, 1820, she left the
Maumee on the first excursion to the upper lakes. On a dark night,
later in this vear, she was driven near the Canada shore at Pointe Albino
twelve miles from Buffalo, and her captain dropped anchor there. The
trough of the sea was so low that her rudder struck the rock and was
torn loose. To avoid the- disastrous shipwreck on the rocks that seemed
imminent, steam was raised as high as practicable, the cable was slipped
and, with a hawser trailing from each aft quarter to aid in guiding her
course, she was driven on the sandy shore of Buffalo Bay where a
sailor took a line ashore and made it fast to a tree. No lives were
lost; but the boat was wrecked.* The Enterprise was the next steam-
boat to come to the Maumee, in 182o. The next was probably the Otiio
built at Sandusky in 1h;-j2. This boat was in later years abandoned by
the shore of the 'Middle Ground' between the Maumee and Swan
Creek near their junction, and her hulk «as there burned. The steamer
General Gratiot. Captain Arthur Edwards of Detroit, made weekly visits
to Vistula, Port Lawrence, Maumee and Perrysburg in 18o2. The men
active in ])romoting the develojiment of Vistula (now part of Toledo)
endeavored in 1832 to induce the regular Buffalo-Detroit steamboats to
call there. Not being successful in this effort arrangements were made
for the steamer Pioneer of Sandusk\ to ply between that port and
Vistula, hoiiing to attract settlers by advertising at Buffalo direct coni-

'* On authorit\ of officer Slocuin. Compare M;c/7;gan Pioneer Collections volume iv, page 80.

STEAMBOAT BUILDING ALONG THE MAUMEE RIVER. 481

nuinication with N'istula 1)\' chan^iiiK trom tlu- Detroit lioats to tlu-
Pioneer Rt Sandusky. This arrangement was soon discontinued, how-
ever, from want of iiatronage. A canalboat built and changed for
steam ]iower at Rochester, New York, \vas lirouglit to tlie Maumee
early in li-^iiM. In the spring ol this year she ]3assed up the Maumee
to Fort \Vayne in charsieof Cai>tain Deniele, taking as pilot Isaac
W'oodcox ot Antwer]). She then Ixire thi iiaiiii Phenomenon, and the
people of Fort Wayne called her ' <iuite a large, elegant boat.' She
was there accorded a general welcome and a general public dance was
held on board.''' This boat was afterward run on tht lower river by
Captain C. K. Bennett.

From this date steamboats were built along the lower Maumee,
viz: at Toledo, the Z)e?ro/f of liOd tons in b'^SS for Cleveland owners:
Don Quixote HO tons in 1h;-j6, and the Indiana 434 tons in iHot). .\t
Perrysburg for owners there w^ere built the steamboats Commodore 0.
H. Perryt 382 tons in 1834: Anthony Wayne, 390 tons in 1837: John
Marshall. 3.'i tons in 1.^37: General Vance, 7") tons 1839; Wabash. 44
tons 1H3H: St. Louis. ()b^ tons 1^44: Superior. 507 tons 184.'); and the
John Hollister. 300 tons in 1848. At Delaware Creek was built the
steamboat Chesapeake of 410 tons in 1838. At Maumee Village the
Miami in 1I-*;!H: General Harrison, 293 tons in 1839; James Woolcott. 80
tons 1H40: Troy, .^47 tons in 1^4.'): G. P. Griffith. 587 tons 1H4(3: Albion.
132 tons 1H48: and the Minnesota of 749 tons in 1851-52.

A steamboat was built in lH3(i at Brunersburg on the Tiffin River
one mile and a half above the Maumee. She was of 18 tons capacity
and bore the name Anthony Wayne. She made several runs along the
Maumee in trade between Fort Wayne and the towns on the lower
river. For the winter of 1^^36-37 she was tied up at Fort Wayne and
during this time was sold to a man of the Village of Maumee. At the
going out of the ice towards spring she was torn from her wharf and
carried down stream. She was caught, and afterwards was used along
the lower river, with tht- name Dave Crockett.

The first boat run b\' screw ]iropeller on Lake Erie was built at
Perrysburg in 1843. She was called the Sampson and was of 250 tons
capacity. The Princeton of 4llO tuns was also built there in 1845. Also
the Globe of 3H() tons was built at Maumee in 1H45. The first steam
barge, the Petrel, was built by or for Joel W. Kelsey of Toledo in 1^49,
and used largely to bring lumbi'r from Saginaw.

* Compare History of Fort Wayne by Wallace .\. Hrice. 1868, page 323.

tThe steaniers Commodore 0. H. Perry. Captain David Wilkinson: Anthony Wayne. Captain .-Vnios
Pratt: and Rochester, were advertised in the first ninnber of the newspaper The Ohio Whig. Periysburj;
18 ."Vui-usl. 183H. as niakini; re^:iilar runs between Perrvsbury and Buffalo. .^Iso the Caroline. Captain C.
Perry, between Perrysbiut'. Maumee. Toledo. M.inhattan and Cleveland : and the Sun, C. K. Bennett
master, between Toledo, Maumee and Herrysburi;. Knapp's History of the Mat/mee Valley. pai!e4.34.

482

THE MAUMEE RIVER BASIN.

Tht-re had been up to this date about forty-six additional steam-
boats stopping' at the different wharves in the Maumee River, which was
the small beginning of the river's commerce hv steam power. The first
tug"-boat was brought to Toledo as late as iMiiT, from Philadelphia via
New York and Erie Canal, by Captain David Miller who was yet living
in Toledo in 1903.

The lower Maumee River affords the best harbor of Lake Erie and,
everything considered, it is the best harbor of the Great Lakes with
facilities sufficient for all their commerce. The hardor has no shij^ping
docks, and but few jsiers. As yet whar\'es ol the qua\' form are amjile
and more C(in\'enient. The shi|)]iing at this i)0rt has keyjt pace, quite
well, with the great increase ol tlie lake commerce. Latterly the in-
crease has been \('r\ rapid, now excelling all ports in coal, and there
are goud rrasons \\li\' llie im ri-asi- sliduld CMiitinui.- with gri-ater ratio.

(,l,lMI'Sh (IF loLI-Jm SH1FFI\(,
A conipdi ati\ ely short sketch ot Maumee Rivei Wharf 'i<Juay in I9il2.

The im])rovement ot the aggraded main channel, vet in progress but
Hearing completion at the bar with large lunds in hand, to a straight
channel twent\'-two feet in depth ami four hundred feet in width, has
already lieen favorably lelt. In addition to this im]>rovement a new
lighthouse has been built, which was comi>leted for service the last of
May, 1904, and is ofilicially designated The Toledo Harbor Light. It
is situated near the mouth of the extended channel, al)out two miles
eastward from the former Turtk- Island Light. Notwithstanding it
having been substantial 1\' built ol stone, steel and brick, the crib was
injured by the thick ice and high waters of the S])ring of 1904. The
residence is three stories high and the tower rises to a height of ninety
feet. The illuminating api>aratus is of first class; was made in Paris,
and it was a feature of the United States exhibit at the Pan-American
Exposition, Buffalo 190:^. Improvements along the Maumee, Swan
Creek, Ottawa River and Maumee Bay, would afford conveniences for
near one hundred miles ol |)ier line— equal to the increase of |)assenger,

TOLEDO HARBOR. AND SHIPYARDS.

483

merchandise, grain, ore, coal, and other commt-rcc for gent-rations to
come. The convenience and safety of this jiort are being more recog-
nized, and owners of the large steamers have latterly been sending a
greater numl)er of these shi])S to the Maumee for winter quarters.

The shipyards at Toledo have for some years been building some
of the best boats of the Lakes; and they have, also, produced a goodly
number of ships which are now |il\ing betwttn distant ports on the
Atlantic and Pacific Oceans. Two ships of this character were completed
at the Craig Yards m 1K99, three in lUOO, three in 1901, and two in lltO-J.

FKKIGHT SHIPS Ol TIIK (.KKA'I I.AKKS IN WINTER iJl'ARTEKS
At Tuiidn, |>Fr. iiil"-i. n««

The largest of this fleet is the Meteor of '2'iiOl gross tonnage, it being
about the largest that can jiass through the Welland and St. Lawrence
Canals on the way to the Ocean. There is ample capacity at these
yards for the building of large ships for commerce on the Great Lakes.
In A])ril, 1903, the Toledo-built steamship George L. Craig ran to
Uuluth on her trial voyage with a cargo of 5100 tons of coal : and a
contract is in hand for a ship nearly twice this size. This yard was
opened at Toledo in 1HH9 : and in 1890 the first iron steamer, the John
W. Moore, was built in Toledo. There are now iron furnaces, steel
works including machine shops and wood works, in connection with
these shipyards, and the entire ship is here constructed. The one

484

THE MAUMEE RIVER BASIN.

hundrt-dth ship built by this com]5any was launched at the yards in
Birniinyiiain, Toledo, March 17, lit04. She was the side-wheel steamer
City of Benton Harbor for service between Benton Harbor and Chicago.
Her engines have capacity of 3000 horse power, and her carrying;'
capacit}' is 3000 jiassengers. She is one of the best and speediest
boats on the Great Lakes. The launchinj^- of another vessel, the
Indianapolis, follow^'d on Ma\- 4th, built for the Indiana Transportatirjn
Company.

The exhilarating' recreation of yachting has received considerable
attention on the lowest Maumee slackwater in connection with Maumee

THE L.M'NCHING OF THK STH.AMS1IIF lUCKMAX

At the Crai^; Yards, Toledo, in lytll. 'riiis ^llip is now of tlie L'liiletl I-iiiit Company's Fleet. plyiiiL'
with passeniiers between Philadelpliiii and the West Indies. Her sister ship Watson, of tlie same fleet,
launclied here in 19(11. runs from \ew York to the West Indies.

Ba\' and the western i^art of Lake Krie. The Maumee River Yacht
Club and the Toledo Yacht Club ' name changed February 12, 19f)4,
from that of Toledo Yachting Association ) have for some years had
creditable fleets composed ol different classes n{ boats, which have
been increasing in numln-r of latt,- years. They were formerh' all sail
yachts, but latterly steam and other modern i)OWers have been added
in new b(5ats. Several interesting regattas have been held which have
suggested improved cjualities dear to the yachtsman's heart. These
clubs have occupied comfortable quarters for meetings. An impetus

TOLEDO YACHT CLUBS. AND NA VAL TRAINING SHIP. 485

was added to the sport, however, by the completion and occupancx' in
the spring' of \90i\ of the Toledo Yacht Club's new and com-
modious club house on the shore of Bay N'iew Park. These clubs
have connection with the Inter-Lake \'achtinK Association of which
Commodore Tracy's yacht, the Dolomite of Toledo, was the Flag-Ship
for 19(IH. The Toledo Canoe Club has also been in flourishing con-
dition, with l>oat house on the left shore at the mouth ot the river.

Toledo is e.xceediny;ly fortunate in her waters for commerce and
for all kinds of aquatic recreation. Coursing through her business
center is the broad river with deej) water extending for miles above the
cit\', free from unpleasant current, while the widening Maumee Bav
adjoining the city and extending an additional five miles below, opens
into Lake Erie which is studded with island gems at varying distances
to serve as goals, all affording a variety and comjileteness unexcelled.

Toledo in 1903 exhibited inducements tor the location of a United
States Naval Training School for the Great Lakes by Maumee Bay or
a few miles distant on Put-in Piav Island near the place of Commodore
Perrx's victory in 1^*1;).

The United States Steamship Essex of i;!7ri tons dispilacenunt, which
had been in service on the Atlantic Ocean since her completion in 1^7(5 and
is yet in excellent condition, was loaned in 1904 to the Toledo members
of the First Battalion of Ohio Naval Militia, usually styled locallv the
Toledo Naval Reserves, by the Navy Department for training purposes.
This vessel is a man-of-war of the third rate, bark-rigged tor sails and
also carrying steam propulsion indicating MOO horse ]iower. Hvv length
is 185 feet, with 35 feet beam and 14 fei't draft of water. The Oliio
Legislature, session of 1903-04, appropriated S9300 for bringing this
man-of-war to Toledo and maintaining her there for use of the Toledo
Naval Militia. Orders were received b\- them 27th Ma\-, 1904, from
Governor Myron T. Herrick through Adjutant General Critchfield, for
Lieutenant .Vnthony L Nicklett, four officers and forty pettv officers
and seamen, volunteers from the Toledo one hundred and ten mi-mbers
of the Naval Militia to proceed at once by railwax- to Portsmouth, New
Hampshire, and there receive from the commandant of the United
States Navy Yard charge of the United States Steamship Essex, which
received recent improvements and repairs, and to conduct her to
Toledo. She was manned entirely by these Toledo volunteers who
required only the aid of jiilots familiar with the Atlantic Coast, Gulf
and River St. Lawrence, and Canals, through which she jiassed. This
is the first United States Shii") brought to the Great Lakes hv militia.
After many delays she arrived in the Maumee Ri\'er at the Elm Street
Wharf, Toledo, in the evening of August 7, 1904: and upon invitation
the people generally were received aboard on the 9th.

486 THE MAUMEE RIVER BASIN.

Defiance also has had a number of citizens who loved the rivers,
but the time has been very limited in which they could court and enjoy
the pleasures of them. The rivers in and near this city afford the best
of waters for small boats pro]ielled by i^addle, oars, steam and other
modern powers : and a f^oodly number of such craft has been in
occasional use. In 1H80 a good canalboat was here fitted with steam
power for ))leasure purposes by a small ]>art\' of friends. This boat
was much enjoyed for a season or two after which it was sold for com-
mercial use. A promising' boat club was organized in 1H72 which
gave a creditable regatta with shells in 1H73. This attracted consider-
able attention, bringing a glow and life before unknown on these waters.
The club, however, soon declined from removals and business engage-
ments. In 1k7B another club was organized and named the Farragut
Boat Club. Some accidents befalling the frail boats, and hunting
desires diverting the leaders, this club also languished.

An occasional modern steam launch was brought to these waters
by individuals : and in 1891 the steamer Laurina was brought to Defiance
for passenger traffic. She was a boat of graceful lines, built at Geneva,
Ohio, steel hull A'l x 9 feet size, with carrying capacity of from T'l to
115 persons. She was often chartered by fishing and hunting" parties,
and for runs about the rivers, and for long distance excursions through
the canal, being well patronized. She was sold in the fall of UtO'2 and
shipped b\' car to Louisiana for use on the Latannier River of the Mis-
issippi Delta. A flat bottom steamer, the Goldie, was built at Defiance
in the winter of 1899-1900, with large stern paddle w^heel mostly above
the water like many of the boats in the southern rivers. She would
carry from 175 to 200 people, and became popular. She was sold to
Napoleon parties in the summer of 1901 for use principally on the
Maumee between Napoleon and Girty Island : and she has been run
back to Defiance, through the Miami and Erie Canal, when wanted
there on special occasions. Boats have often come up the canal from
Toledo to ply on the Defiance slackwater in passenger traffic. These
have been comparatively small boats, but they have given much
pleasurable recreation to thousands of passengers, without jihysical
injury, both of which features are not small items in the affairs of life.

A number of houseboats have, also, been in use along the central
Maumee and the Canal. These had beginning here with the cabins on
floats placed in the timber rafts early in the second half of the nine-
teenth century, in which the raftsmen carried their cooking utensils,
and where they slept at night. /Vfter the completion of the Miami and
Erie Canal in 1843, and with the rafting through it, these cabins were
better built to be returned by the horses that towed the rafts to Toledo.
Manv of them formerlv wintered at Defiance, being occupied bv a

DESCRIPTION OF THE DIFFERENT RIVERS. 487

raftman's faniilv or 1)\- one or more hacbelors. The owners of the later
houseboats have wandered in them about the rivers and canal at will.
The beauties and advantages of the Maumee River have thus far
been but little sun}^, and been comi)aratively but little ajipreciated by
the masses since tlu- makinji' of the- canals and the railroads. The
residents along its course have, as \et, generally been too busy in the
very serious business of making their lives secure against the Al)ori.t;i-
nes : in clearing the forests to ]iroduce the necessaries of lite; in the
sharp competition for fortunes : and in various other work or diver-
sions of a necessary, speculative, or of sporting character, to enjox' the
attractions of the river and the bav as they will yet be ajijjreciated.

The Rn'F.K Sr. Joseph

Has origin on the northwest side of the Maumee River Basin, in
Hillsdale County, Michigan, most of the southern half of which countv
being drained hv the several streams composing its headwaters. Its
sources have altitude of about IC.'iO tiet aboxi- the tide water and 477
feet above Lake Erie. Some ol tlusc streams s])ring Irom small hikis
which are but short and eas\ ])ortage distance Irom the headwateis ol
its brother St. Joseph River draining the northwestern jiart of the
county and flowing westward into Lake Michigan, and ol the three other
rivers near-b>-, Hillsdale Count\' being also drained in part by the head-
waters of the I-valamazoo River in the north, the Grand I-^iver in thr
northeast, and the Tiffin of this Basin in the east, thus gi\ing origin to
five rivers. From the principal source of the St. Joseph of the Maumee
to its mouth at Fort ^^'ayne, in direct line tin- distance is about one
hundred miles. It flows through the northwestern countv of Ohio,
Williams, and about thirty-five miles through northeastern Indiana, in
a general southwestern direction on the southeast side of the com-
mingled moraines and the Aboite Moraine, and along the west side ol,
and guided in its course by, the St. Joseph Moraine before described. Its
present channel is replete with short meanderings through the course of a
much larger prehistoric stream. The average fall is about two feet per
mile in its course through Indiana; but there were many sluggish ])laces
in its current before the building of dams across its channel man\- \ears
ago for milling purposes. It has rather a narrow bottom, and its valle\'
is cut through the till from '27> t<i .'lO f(_'et. The area of tin- St. [oseph
watershed is 1,132.29 square miles, 24;!. '.Mi being in Michigan. 22." . Ili in
Ohio, and 662.^7 in Indiana.

The tributaries of the St. lose|ih, other than of a verv local nature
are important, but few in number. Burt Creek, a northeastern triliu-
tary, drains Bird Lake and the southern part of Jefferson Township,
Hillsdale County, Michigan. .\t the beginning of this outlet a dam has,

488 THE MAUMEE RIVER BASIN.

during the past years, furnished water power for carding and sawing
mills. The chief central tributary drains six lakes through the western
part of Cambria Township, namely : Big Bear (see engraving ante page
42), Wilson, Brock, Pike, Bear, Hog, and Cub Lake. A dam at
Cambria Mills forms a large pond which has afforded ]iower for impor-
tant flouring and sawing mills. The tributary next west forms the
outlet of the Turner chain of four small lakes near the southwest corner
of Reading Township. It formerly turned like mills at four or five
places in Camden and Amboy Townships, Michigan ; but in several of
these places greater and more constant steam power has in later years
been adopted. Silver Creek, with its accessions, flowing in a southerly
course through the central and eastern parts of Hillsdale County,
Michigan, receives Clear Creek from the west, south of the Michigan
State line. On account of its nearness to the St. Joseph Moraine on
the east all iirominent lat;.r tributaries come from the westward.

In thi- northeastern part of Indiana there is a group of small lakes,
the largist of which have the names Clear and Long, which have outlet
through Michigan and Ohio into the St. Joseph — see engravings ante
pages 40, 4o. These lakes are popular sumnitr resorts. Clear Lake
is two miles long, over one mile wide, and with greatest depth of over
one hundred feet. In Williams County, Ohio, Nettle and Eagle Creeks
are recei\'ed, the former having source in Nettle Lake which was
formerh' of considerable area. About a mile below this lake its outkt
was, many years ago, raised by a dam which afforded water power to a
small mill. Steuben County, Indiana, contains over one hundred intra
and mter-morainic lakes which have names on the local map: and here
is one of the best of places for the study of the geologic historv of the
formation and decline of such lakes. Thev are the 'kettle holes ' within
and between these commingled morainic deposits, their great depth and
extent with impervious clay bottoms and sides being the cause of their
continued existence. Most of these lakes drain westerly into the St.
Joseph River of Lake Michigan, the southern headwaters of which are
thus, like the northern, very near to those of the St. Josejjh of the
Maumee.

Fish Creek drains most of the eastern portion of Steuben County.
Its west tributary has source in Fish or Hamilton Lake which has
a length of about two miles, a breadth of one mile, with uneven
bottom giving depth of water to sixty-eight feet. Its elevation is ;]14
feet above Lake Erie. The large area of this lake, furnishing a broad
expanse of water visible at one sweep of the eye, its irregular outline
and prominent islands, its bold shores of encircling moraines, and the
beauty and profusion ol its aquatic vegetation, form a combination of
characters which render it one of the most interesting and attractive in

THE RIVER ST. JOSEPH AND [TS TRIBUTARIES. 489

the State*— see engravinj; anfe iiayc 41 . llainilton Lake and Ball I^ake
near-bv are now owned by the h'ort \\"a\ nc Water Power ComjianN'.
The su^tjestion has been made to use them as reservoirs lor the water
supply of the City of Fort W'axne torty miles distant. About the \ xar
1840 a dam out hundred feet lonj^j was built across the outlet ol this
Lake at Hamilton thus raising the lake's level eight feet and affording
good water power to a flouring mill. Fish Creek is a considerable
stream. It enters the St. Joseph near Edgerton, Ohio, having cut a
channel through glacial drift in places to the dei)th of twenty-five to
fortv feet below the general level. In the earh davs of the settlement

THE RIVER ST. JOSEPH .-^ND THE H.'M.TIMORK AM) (.)}ll() RAILWAY BRIDGE

In soiilheasteiii UeKalb Comily. Iiuliana Lookini^ nortii '.ilst Ocfibei, I'iK'] . from public bridue.
Broad Terraces outside the view, to the riebt. extending to the crest of the St. fosetib Moraine two to
three miles eastward.

of this region a dam and mill were built near its mouth, lioth ol which
were long since swejit away by the currents ol flood, ice, and ol time.
The largest and the last important tributar\- ol the St. |ost ph Ri\tr
is Cedar Creek which has origin in Indian Lake, Cedar Lake, and several
smaller bodies of water in DeKalb County, Indiana, with accessions of
streams trom the north, and from Noble County to the west. These
lakes are being filled in liy a<iuatic vegetation and natural accumulations.

* See Dr. Charles R, Dryer's Survey of Steuben County in the Indiana I7th Annua! Geological
Report. 1891.

490

THE MAUMEE RIVER BASIN.

and afford interfStinK studies of nature's lake-extin!j;uishint( ])rocesses.
Alrt:'ad\' much of the water line cannot well be a])|)roached on account
of the soft, peat\' Imi; surroundniL; it to a witie extent/' The crests of
the moraines in the northwestern and western portions ol I5eKalb
County drained liv Cedar Creek are nowhere less than 1 ()()() leet above
tide water, and vary from one hundred to one luindrtil and fiftv feet
above the Cedar Creek Valley, which N'allev \aries in width from one
mile at Aldrich Lake to five miles in Butler Township. Cedar Creek
affords water ]iower b\ dams at Ciloyd, at Kells three and a lialt miles

THE KIVEK ST. JOSEPH AT ROBINSON PARK

Lookinj; noith up tlie Ri\ei lime S. 19t)5. six miles above Fni t Wa\ne and one mile abnve Ilie
former Wabash and Erie Canal Feeder Dam across tlie River.

above, Vanzille ln-low, and at Cedarville, Allen County, Indiana, six
miles below, and near where the Creek enters the River St. Joseph.

The Valley of the St. Joseph in Indiana affords some of the best
illustrations of river terracing; in tne Maumee Basin. The St Joseph
is one of the oldest rivers in the Basin. There is abundant evidence
of its having" existed in sflacial times, long before the present Maumee
River had existence. It then discharged larger (juantities of water, at
one time flowing at a level of fift>' feet and more higher than now, with

See Chapter on Moraines. Also the Indiana 16th Annual Geological Report, paye 101.

THE VALLEY AND BASIN OF ST. JOSEPH RIVER. 49!

outlet down the \'allev of tile Wabash Kiver. Its \'alle>' is well
abutted with moraines and blutis and \'aries in width, avera^int; less
than one-half mile but occasionallx' extending to one mile and more,
the general exiianse being west ot the river. In the east bank in New-
ville Tinvnshi)), Allen County, there is a wide terrace twentv-five feet
high, extending along tlu' ri^•er lor a distance of three miles. Near the
crossing of the Baltimore- and ()liii5 Railroad there are three terraces.
In fact the moraines, the erosions in the drift, the washings, the sand
dunes, and the clay knobs of the St. Joseph afford interesting studies in
glacial and fluvial history.

At Hursh and at Leo, about three miles apart, above the mouth
of Cedar Creek, there are dams with flouring mills yet in operation.
About six miles bv river above the mouth of the St. Joseph a dam was
built by the State of Indiana in lH;j'2-3y to supply water for the Wabash
and Erie Canal southwest and northeast of Fort Wayne. The slack-
water of this dam affords delightful opjjortunity for pleasure boating
which is well utilized, by numerous boats varj'ing from the canoe to
the steamer, at Robinson Park one mile above the dam : and the
former Canal Feeder has latterly given water-power to the electrical
plant in Fort Wayne. Tlu' ujjper St. Joseph and its tributaries were
taken into consideration as sources of water supply in the proposed
enlargement of the Miami and Erie, and the former Wabash and Erie,
Canals with favorable report. See Chapter on these Canals.

There was formerly a mill-dam about one mile below the State
dam, su]>plying power to Antrap's Mill. Near the mouth of the
St. Joseph in Fort Wayne the channel is about 300 feet in width; and
it was here dammed in early days for mill jiurposes.

Being derix'ed from lakes and springs, and flowing over a bed com-
posed more largely of sand and gravel than the other rivers in the
Basin, the waters of tlu- St. Joseph average clearer, and maintain a
greater relative volume in dry seasons than the others, the minimum
natural flow at its mouth being 4000 cubic feet per minute. In times
of highest floods its waters with those of the St. Mary rise to a level
within ten feet of the summit of the divide between the Maumee and
the Wabash in the ancient drainage channel of the Maumee Glacial
Lake.

The name St. Joseph was gi\en to this river h\ the French at an
early date. Some of the Aborigines called it We-a Se-pe or Sepon,
the River of the Wea band of Miamis who were then bv it.

Thk Ri\kk Si. Mm<v

Drains the southwestern ])art of the Maumee River Basin, its eastern
headwaters springing near the western source of the Aurlaise River.

492 THE MAUMEE RIVER BASIN.

Its headwaters consist principally of Clear, Muddy, Center, Clark, and
West, Creeks, which last-named was near the eastern headwaters of the
Wabash River before their absori>tion b\- the Grand or Mercer Reservoir
for the Miami and Erie Canal. These streams originate in Shelb\- and
Auglaise Counties, Ohio, and there is but short portage from them,
particularly from West Creek, over the divide to the south to Loramie
Creek, tributary to the Miami River. This was the principal portage
path between the waters tributary to western Lake Erie and those
tributary to the Ohio River other than that leading southwest of Fort
Wavne to connect with the Wabash. The St. Mary was sometimes
called the Miami of the Lake or the Maumee, considering it in name,
as it is in fact, one of the headwaters of the Maumee.''

The highest altitude of these small streams is about 975 feet above
tide water, 238 feet above the mouth of the St. Mary, and 402 leet
atiove Lake Erie. Probably there was temporary drainage of the
Maumee Glacial Lake over this divide to the Miami River southward.
This dividing ridge or watershed between the Maumee River Basin and
the Mississippi River Basin, is the Salamonie Moraine^ see map ante
page 28. The River St. Mary at the City of St. Marys flows through
a gap in the Wabash Moraine at the vertical erosion of sixty-two feet,
with sloping banks to the crest the lateral erosion of which is about
two miles in extent. t Most of this St. Mary Water Gap was made by
the waters of the Maumee Glacial Lake draining across the Wabash
Moraine and down the Wabash River. The cut was thus made deeji
enough, and the washings and deposits to the south side of the Moraine
high enough, that upon the subsidence of the Lake the land drainage
waters reversed the tfow, thus forming this part of the River.

Father Bonnecamps, the diarist of Captain de Celoron's expedition
through Ohio in 1749, writes t that "a little more than half way [from
the mouth of Loramie Creek to Fort Miami at the head of the Maumee
River 'five days journey by land'] we began to skirt the River of the
Miamis [the St. Mary] which was on our left. We found therein large
crabs in abundance. From time to time we marched over vast prairies,
where the herbage was sometimes of extraordinary height."

About the year 1783 James Girty, with his Shawnee wife Betsey,
settled in a palisaded trading post at the site of the present City of St.
Marys, and a mongrel village formed around which received the name
Girty Town. Here he held for several years a monopoly of the trade
with the Aborigines, having the peltries received in trade boated to

'■" See the Chapter on the Auglaise River for description of the near-by portayes eastward; also
the Chapter on the Miami and Erie Canal for fnrther description of this St. Mary-Loramie Portage,
t See Early History of Auglaise County by J. D. Simkins, page 97.
+ The Jesuit Relations, Cleveland edition, volume Ixix, page 189.

THE RIVER ST. MARY AND ITS HISTORY.

493

Detroit b\' way of thf St. Mary and Maumee Kivcrs, and receiving his
supplies up the same channel. At the coming of General Harmar's
arni\- in ITiK), lu- boated his stock in trade to the head of the Maumee
and thence to the site of the present Cit\" of Defiance, where he remained
until the api)roach of General Wayne in 1794.

Fnrt St. Marys, built by General \\'ayne late in 17!)4 or earl\- in
IT'.'.'i, and Fort Harbee Iniilt b\- Colonel Joshua Barbee in Sei)teml)er
and October. 1^1:^, orrupied about the same site on the west bank of

SH.-VIvE CROSSING OF THE RIVKR ST. M.\RV

The \'iUai:e to the ie;ii was later called Shanesville, aiui now Kockfotd. Mercer County. Ohio.
Looking west of nortli on a rain.\ morniny 29th April, 1902, down the former river chainlel, now closed by
the roadway on the ritiht built in 1891, and across the river at the historic crossing (fording) place. The
old mill buildin« on the left marks tlie site of the first log building used by Anthony Shane (Chesnei as a
iradiny station and taverti. His Reservation was beyond the river — ak>ng the north 'right] bank.

the river just below the union of the creeks before mentioned. Other
Storehouses for army supplies were built in fortified camji near-bv for
the War of \><\'2. Sujiplies for Fort Wayne were boated down the St.
Mary ; also those for Forts Defiance, Winchester, and Mei^s, during
wet seasons. In seasons of better roads, supj^lies for the three last
named Forts were carried about twehe miles east of north across to the
site of Fort Amanda to be boated down the larger .\uiilaise River.
Stockade stations were maintained at Fort .\dams, Shane Crossing
the present Rocktord, and about the present Decatur or within about

494 THE MAUMEE RIVER BASIN.

twt/nty miles of Fort Wayne, where boats could be lightened, or the
loads increased according^ to the stages of water. About 100 barrels of
tlour capacity' was considered a large boat for the St. Mar\' : and seven
days time a good average run from St. Marys to Fort Wayne in
moderate stages of water, the boat being tied up each night. After the
War of 1812 settlers made use ol its waters and, up to the completion
of the Miami and Erie and Wabash and Erie Canals in 1H4.'), the St.
Mary River was a thoroughfare for supplies, and products. Adam
Millman was one of the leaders in transportation, controlling a fleet of
boats between St. Marys and the lower Maumee.

The general course of the River St. Mary is northwest, tending
somewhat in its general meander to the southward. In direct line its
length is about sixty-five miles, and by way of the river's manv and short
windings its length is over one hundred miles. It has an average fall
of 2.38 feet per mile, being far less than this, even quite sluggish, in its
course in Indiana; and its waters are sluggish and muddy in much of
their course. Its watershed embraces 783.62 square miles, of which
427.54 are in Ohio and 356.08 in Indiana. The channel averages less
than two hundred feet in width in most of its course. It courses within
four miles, on average, of the south side of the lateral St Mary Moraine
named from it; and consequently it is fed on its north bank only by
springs and runs of very local extent.

Its watershed on the south is the north side of the Wabash Moraine
and, being but ten to fifteen miles distant, the streams entering from the
left are also of short length and small size, Black Creek and Twelve-
mile Creek in Mercer County, Ohio, and Blue Creek in Adams Count}',
Indiana, being the largest ; hence the highest rise in the river seldom
overflows the general banks of its channel. This channel generally
beds in the glacial drift, seldom more than 25 feet in depth; but it
touches Niagara Limestone at Mendon and again at Willshire, near the
Indiana line. Several stone quarries have been, also, easily operated
in later years at Decatur, Indiana.

At the south line of .\llen Countx', Indiana, the St. Mary Moraine
on the north bank of the river rises to a height of eighty feet; then a
more level surface prevails, to be succeeded by undulations, eskars,
etc., to a height of nearly eight\' feet near the river's mouth in the City
of Fort Wayne. The regions of the lower river afford interesting
opportunities for the study of its ancient channels, long since success-
ively deserted. At the great bend of the river in Marion Township,
.Mien County, Indiana, is the first deserted channel, in descending the
river, through which a branch or part of the river flowed northeast for
a distance of seven or eight miles, into the Maumee Glacial Lake by
the present Village of New Haven. The summit of this old channel is

THE VALLEY AND BASIN OF THE RIVER ST. MARY. 495

now about ttn fett above low water, so that the highest rise of the river
yet sends some water through this course, which is an erosion through
the St. Mary Moraine. The near banks of this old channel have an
average height of fifteen feet; and the bottom of it is sixty feet below
the summit on the west, and fort\ feet below that on the east.''
Probably the water and the ice of the Maumee Glacial Lake were the
first til ( ut tliTiiUL;!) this moraine and, later as the Lake sulisidi'd, the
river re\ersetl tln' How. .Vnotlur ancient channel is found on tile other
(left ) bank of the present river, about five miles below the first. This
was the way of the river's dischargi, at one period of its history, in a
southwesterly direction about si.x miles to the last drainage channel
south and southwest of the Maumee Glacial Lake, leading t<j the
Wabash River. This second aliandoned channel is about hfteen feet
above the river's jiresent channel. .\ third deserted channel, of lower
level and consequently of later use, has origin one mile below the
second and courses westward two and one-half miles to the same outlet
as the second. The width of these abandoned channels is, of the hrst
mentioned, one-quarter of a mile in its hrst part and one mile and a half
wide in its lower jjart ; of the second, one-half mile; and of the third one
quarter mile wide. The region around these deserted channels affords,
also, an interesting study in eskars or osars, kames, and in post-glacial
ridges - see ante page 4y.

Near the center of Wayne Township, Allen Count\', Indiana, the
St. Mar\- River has undermined the crest of the St. Mar\^ Moraine for
a mile or more and, returning to the soutlK-rn edge, it then follows the
southeast liank of the Maumee Glacial Lake outlet for another mile or
more until its waters unite with those of the River St. Josejjh in the
Cit\' of Fort Wayne. It was at the e-xtreme western bend of the St.
Mary within this city that ttre Portage Path of the Maumee-W'abash
travel began — see map ante page 97.

Different mill-sites haye been utilized ahjiig the St. Mar\'. The
first dam and mill were built in li^'I'I at the present Willshire, Ohio,
near the Indiana line, by Cai^taiii James Riley one of the United States
land surveyors. The short rai)ids at this jioint in the river were then
known as The Devil's Race Ground. Samuel Hanna and James
Barnett built a dam and mill in ]H'2-i-'J.^t about three miles from P'ort
Wayne which later became known as the Hea\'er Mill. .-Xt Williams-
port, about ten miles above Fort Wayne, a dam and grist mill were
built: also at the north jjart of the present Village of Decatur, .\dams
Count\', Indiana, as late as the 1860's, and another at Pleasant Mills,
five miles above Decatur. These earl\' dams afforded better boating

' See the Sixteenth Annual Geological Report foi Indiana, pajic 113.

496 THE MAUMEE RIVER BASIN.

waters above them, but each one necessitated a portajje around the
dam that was annox'ins ti) the boatmen. The minimum volume of the
conti iiuitiiin ot the St. Mar\' to the Maumee is from 1500 to 2000 cubic
feet ot water per minute, it beint; less than one-half that of the
St. Joseiih.

The Rivers St. Mary and St. Joseph were named by the Frtnch
who explored them earl\- in their visits to the head of the Maumee in
the seventeenth centurw The St. Mary was later sometimes called
Pickaway River, and the Delaware Aborigine towns by its lower
course were called Pickaway Towns, because these Aborigines came
from Pickaway, Ohio. In common with other rivers, it was sometimes
called Ottawa River on account of some Ottawas dwelling bv it. The
Shawnees called it Ca-ko-the-ke Sept or Kettle River, but neither of
these names became common.

The Augl.msk River and its Triiutakies, the Ottawa, Blan-

CHARD, AND LiTTLE AuGLAlSE RiVER.

The Auglaise River originates in the western part of Hardin,
southeastern part of Allen, and the southern part of Auglaise County,
Ohio, at the southern and southeastern parts of the Maumee River
f^asm ; also at the crest of the Salamonie Moraine which is here the
dixidi between Lake Erie and the Ohio River. The greatest altitude
ot the divide in this region is 486 feet above Lake Erie and 1059 feet
above tide watiT. The general course of this river is but little
west of north, and the distance fiom its source to its mouth in the
Maumte River within lli Cily of Di fiance is about fifty-five miles in
direct line, and ly \\a\' ol the river's channel seventy-four miles or
more. The average lall of the river proper is 4.4 feet per mile, it having
generalh- the most rapid current in the Basin. The Auglaise River
and its tributaries dram an art-a ol 2,508.6.) square miles.

The name Auglaise was apjilied to this river by the French in the
seventeenth century, it being the first of the rivers in the Basin to
receive permanent name. The first record of it found by the writer is
in a description of the Maumee River under date 171H, see ante page 466.
The French word glaise means cla\-, and loam, the character of the
river's banks at Defiance, and of the water of the Auglaise River at
its month there as first seen. The article au (contraction of ale) sig-
nifies to or at the, hence Riviere au Glaise denotes the river to the
glaise, or the river at or of the clay and loam banks. The region of its
debouchement into the Maumee was later often termed Le Grand Glaise,
also its lower course, to distinguish them from the Little Auglaise
River ( La Riviere Petit au Glaise) its largest tributary from the west.
The .\borigines sometimes called it the River of the Falling Timber

THE AUGLAISE RIVER AND ITS TRIBUTARIES. 497

from the erosion of the banks under large trees, the Shawnee words for
this being- Cow-the-nah-ke Sepe, and the Wyandot, Qus-quas-run-de ;
but they were not of general use.

The main travel from the east and north to the southwest in early
times probably continued up the Maumee River and down the Wabash;
but no inconsiderable part turned up the Auglaise and passed down the
Miami, or continued further up the Auglaise and over portages to the
Mad River or to the Scioto. The most southern tributaries of the
Auglaise, Pusheta Creek and Quaker River a yet smaller stream named
from the Quaker mission school on its banks (see ante page 395) have
source near Loramie Creek and yet nearer Wolf Creek, both of which
are the principal of the headwaters of the larger Miami River. A
traveler in the year 1803 mentions the Auglaise and the Portage Path
of the divide as follows: 'The Au Glaise, one of the branches [tribu-
taries] of the Miami of the Lake [the Maumee] sometimes called
Omee and Maumick, is navigable with canoes to the portage towards
the head of Loramie Creek, a head water of the Great Miami. The
portage is three miles. It is said that in the time of the spring floods
the waters of these two rivers are blended.' ' This bknding of the
rivers was through somewhat of a prairie marsh.

The accessions to the Auglaise in Auglaise and Allen Counties are
from springs and of a local nature. In Auglaise County the river banks
average from ten to fifteen feet above the summer stage of water, other
than at the watergaps through the Wabash and St. Mary Moraines and
the glacial lake beaches (drainage channels of the Maumee Glacial
Lake) where the banks vary from 25 to 50 feet in height — see Moraine
Map page 28, and illustration of Wapakoneta. It was at the Auglaise
Water Gap through the St. Mary Moraine that General Wavne I)uilt
Fort Auglaise at the head of navigation ' late in 1794- or early in 1795
— see ante page 218. This was also the site of Fort Amanda in the
War of 1812 — see page 289. The channel is eroded to the nati\'e rock
only at one place in Auglaise County, in Logan Township, where the
Onondaga Limestone (Waterlime) appears. The river also touches
this rock several places in Allen and Putnam Counties. In the channel
near the middle of Jackson Township, Putnam Countv, there is a
boulder of Corniferous Limestone near the left bank which measured
fifteen feet above ground before two large pieces were blasted from it
a few years ago — see ante page 35. In Jackson and Perry Townships,
Putnam County, within the distance of four miles, the Auglaise receives
two material additions, of the Ottawa and Blanchard Rivers.

* The Journal of a Tour into the Territory Northwest of the Allegheny Mountains. Made in the
Spring of the Year 1803. by Thaddeus Mason Harris, A. M., pace 115. For descriplion of this divide
see Chapters on the moraines, and the Miami and Erie Canal.

498

THE MAUMEE RIVER BASIN.

The Ottawa River* springs from the former Hog Creek Marsh in
Hardin County and is augmented by tributaries arising in Auglaise,
Hancock, and Allen Counties. It flows through the City of Lima on
the rock, the banks of its course occasionally rising to a height of
thirty feet. Its tributaries also often expose the Ohio Shale and the
Onondaga Limestone; and an occasional exposure of the Niagara
group is seen. The first general course of the Ottawa is westward,
and then to the northward, receiving considerable additions from the
southeast in Putnam County by Sugar Creek and Plum Creek. In
1836 Messrs. Guthrie and Sarber built a dam across the Ottawa and a

flouring mill at Kalida, about
three miles above its entrance
into the Auglaise. This was
the second mill built in this
region. The water in the Otta-
wa becomes very low in dr\'
seasons and much polluted
with the sewage of the City of
Lima, including refuse from a
paper manufactory and other
mills. This has had disastrous
effect on lish and most other
forms of aquatic animal life.
A narrow channel has been cut
in the rock bed of this stream
through Lima to deepen and
facilitate the flow of sewage.
In high stages of water this river has done considerable damage to
residences and manufactories along its rather narrow flood plains, the
flood of April 1, 1904, being reported the most injurious of all, the
water then being two feet higher than ever before noted. t

MEANDER OF THE BLANCHARD RIVER
in Central Putnam County.

* The Ottawa River of the Auglaise was formerly called Hog Creek from the larpe number of
hoRS that flourished along its banks, a drove being abandoned there by an army contractor in the War of
1812 on account of his being pursued by the savages. Another account regarding the source of these
hogs, is as follows: Alexander M'Kee the British Aborigine Agent had a force at the Machachac towns
by the Mad River during the incursion against the savages of General Logan from Kentucky in 1786: and
they were obliged to move towards Canada, which they did with the plunder accumulated from the
.American settlements but abandoned the hogs at this stream. See. also, Henry Howe's Historical
Collections of Ohio. The later Aborigines called the stream Kosh-ko Se-pe, meaning Hog River.
Andrew Coffinberry. in his poem entitled Tlie Forest Rangers, refers to this region of the river as
Swinonia.

t A llnited Slates Water Gage was placed in the Ottawa River at Lima in November, 1903. There
are different streams called Ottawa in and near this Basin, and confusion often results therefrom.
Ottawa River on the north line of the Basin, draining part of Lenawee and Monroe Counties. Michigan,
and more of Lucas County, Ohio, flows into Maumee Bay at the Ohio-Michigan line with a deep channel
in its lowest course, it being of the 'drowned river' series like the Maumee. The name came from the
Ottawa Aborigines who were much along these streams.

THE OTTAWA AND BLANGHARD IN AUGLAISE BASIN. 499

The Blanchard River is the largest tributary of the Auglaise; and
it is named Auglaise on some of the older maps. Its sources are in the
eastern part of the Basin, draining a small part of Seneca and Wyandot
Counties, and more of Hardin and Hancock. The principal tributaries
in its upper course are Lye, Eagle, and Ottawa Creeks, all entering
from the south. Its general course is northward to the southern slope
of the Defiance Moraine in the eastern-central part of Hancock County,
and thence westward. The City of Findlay (see engraving in descrip-
tion of HancockCountv) and the Village of Ottawa are built on its banks.

CASCADE NEAR CLOVERDALb. PKKKV ruW.NbHlP, PLTNAM COUNTY. OHIO

Lookinc south, up the Auglaise River at Kilcannon Rapids, low stage of water 29th May, ltX12. The
former Mj'ers" flourinc mill, high dam, and slackwater, show beyond the wa^ron bridge. The Bridge of
the Findlay, Fort Wayne and Western Railway (now operated by the C. H. & D. Ry, Co.} crosses a few
rods below. Cascade Park, a summer resort, is beyond the mill.

The River being very tortuous in its course, particularly at Ottawa, parts
of these towns have suffered considerably from floods. The highest flood
known up to that time culminated 28th February, 1903, the water then
being ten inches higher than in February, 18S3, which was the highest
water noted up to that date. A part of Findlay was flooded, and the
press dispatches reported three men drowned thereby in and near the
city. There were about as high floods, also, the latter part of Janu-
ary, the first and last parts of March and the "2nd .Ajiril, 1904, the last
being the highest. The area drained by the Blanchard is 924.47 square

500

THE MAUMEE RIVER BASIN.

miles; and a United States Water Gage was placed in the river at
Ottawa in November, 1902, to determine the quantity of run-off. This
river was frequentl}' traversed by the earlier French. The name
Blanchard is that of one of the early French settlers, a tailor by trade —
and from this the Aborigines called it the Shah-po-quah-te Se-pe or
Tailor River. The French called it navigable to the site of the present
Citv of Findlay, about forty miles above its mouth. The Blanchard

LdoKINC SOl'TIl ACRnsS Till-. MDI'Tll 1)1- I'.LANCI I AKl ) KI\'I-:R <)\ TIIK I.KFT

And up the Aimlaise on the riiiht 39th May. ]9t)2. Here, and below, is a lony stretch of deep water and
beautiftil river scenery. In Perry To\vnship, Putnam County. Ohio.

has generally been called a slu,ggish stream, but several dams across
the river and its tributaries have furnished, at good stages of water,
fair water power for the small mills built in pioneer times. John D.
Bishop built a sawing and a flouring mill on Eagle Creek in Eagle
Township, Hancock County, in 1S32, at which place mills have been
operated nearly every year since that date. Dams and mills were built
on the JBlanchard in Delaware, Marion and Findlay Townships. Two
and one-half miles below Findla\' the dam is two hundred feet in length
and five feet in height, its slackwater extending to the city. A flouring
mill has been in operation by this dam for many years. Joseph Stout
built a dam and flouring mill on Riley Creek at Pandora in the south-
eastern part of Putnam County in lb35 In 1837 Elisha Stout built a

THE AUGLAISE RIVER AND ITS TRIBUTARIES.

501

dam and flouring; mill on the Blanchard at Gilhoa in the eastern part of
Putnam County. These mills, and the one above near Findlay, ground
corn and wheat for some of the early settlers in Paulding County, and
for pioneers in more distant places. The main tributaries of the
Blanchard in Putnam County are Riley and Cranberry Creeks the beds
of which, with that of tin- river, show frequent exposures of Onondaga

THE LITTLE AUGLAISE RIVER

Lookintr upstream from near its mouth toward the site of the first flourinc and sawint^ mills in Paulding
County, Ohio.

Limestone. The river at Findlay and its more eastern tributaries are
eroded to the Niagara Limestone.

The Auglaise River has rapids in Perry Township, Putnam County,
three miles below the mouth of the Ottawa River and a mile above the
Blanchard, which received the name of Kilcannon Rapids the name of
one of the first settlers in this region. Samuel Myers from Maryland
purchased the land thereabout and in 1834 constructed a dam across
the river. A sawing mill was built at the west end of the dam, and in
1840 a flouring mill was completed at the east end. The dam was
destroyed by ice and flood, and a second one was completed in 1860.
The first frame of the flouring mill yet stands but it has been resided

502

THE MAUMEE RIVER BASIN.

and recovered. These were among the earlier mills for a great extent
of country during many years. At the building of the Findlay, Fort
Wayne and Western Railroad in 1892, a town was platted at this place
and named Cascade, since which time this part of the river has been
much frequented by summer pleasure seekers.

In the year 1H36 Doctor Jacob Dewees platted a town on the left
bank of the Auglaise a short distance above the mouth of the Blanch-
ard, which he named Franconia. He also built a dam across the

THE MOUTH OF THE LITTLE Al^GLAISE RIVER . -

Looking northward down stream, and across the Auytaise which begins about UK) feet beyond the Bridge.
The view overlooks the military road along the left [proximal) bank of the Auglaise, the route of General
Wayne's army to Deliance in 1794, and of many of the soldiers during the War of 1812. Fort Brown was
situated along the banks of these rivers at the point to the right of the Bridge. This view and its mate
on page 501 were taken 29111 May, 19(^2, in an exceeding high wind, with Camera at full diaphragm
and exposure of I-IOt)th part of a second. Standpoints forty feet above the water.

Auglaise at his projected village, and a mill. He did not build securely
and, fortune and the floods proving adverse, he abandoned his work
here in 1839.

The Little Auglaise River is received as an important tributary of
the Auglaise from the south-southwest in Brown Township, Paulding
County, five miles below the mouth of the Blanchard. This river's
headwaters and tributaries, from the southwest, are Dog Creek and Town
Creek flowing through the City of Van Wert, Maddox, Hagerman and
Prairie Creeks, which drain the most part of Van Wert County and the
southeastern part of Paulding Count)'.

THE AUGLAISE RIVER. ITS VALLEY AND BASIN. 50S

The other tributaries of the Auglaise River in Paulding, other than
of very local nature, all flow northeast and are as follows: Blue Creek
from northwest Van Wert County; Crooked or Flat Rock Creek, drain-
ing southeastern Allen County, Indiana, and intervening territory;
Little Flat Rock Creek; and Six-Mile Creek, from Indiana, north of
Crooked Creek. The north tributary of Six-Mile Creek is often within
one mile of the Maumee River, which River the Creek nearly parallels
for about thirty miles — see maps pages 28 and 450.

LOOKING NORTH DOWN THE AUGLAISE RIVEK

Mav 29. 1902. The Village of Cliarloe (named from an AboriKine chief) Paulding County. Ohio, is on tlie
left beyond the bridge. This is the site of one of the Ottawa towns mentioned in the Diary of General
Wayne's Campaign in 1794; and after the wars Ottawas returned here and remained until their removal
to their Kansas Reservation. Their corntields were on the lower lands on the right bank. In the treaty
the Aborigine village is styled Chief Occonoxee's Village or town. Charloe was for several years the
second seat of justice for this region — see description of Paulding County.

About the year 1840 Doctor Jacob Dewees came from the mouth
of the Blanchard and built a dam across the Auglaise in the Northeast
Quarter of Section Nine, Defiance Township. He also built a flouring
mill on the left bank. The high waters carried away the dam and
injured his mill, and he discontinued his efforts here after a year or two,
as he had done at Franconia above.

In the autumn and winter of 1902-03, surveys were made of the
lower rapids of the Auglaise River to determine the amount of its

504

THE MAUMEE RIVER BASIN.

available water power for the generation of electricity', and the feasi-
bility of developing it. The reports of the surveyors were very favorable,
and the Auglaise River Power Company was organized in June, 1903,
with capital stock of $200,000; but construction work has been delayed.
In Mav, 1903, a Water Gage was placed at the English Bridge across the
Auglaise in Defiance Township, by United States authority, for daily
record of the flow; and the last of November, 1904, a more complete
Gage was placed by the Hopkins Street Bridge across the Auglaise
in Defiance.

Powell Creek is the only important tributary of the Auglaise River
in Defiance County. This, with its several feeders including North

THE AUGLAISK RIVER ANO TWO OF ITS SMALL ISLANDS

In the Southeast part of Section 34. Defiance Township. Lookine east 30th October. 1901. into the
mouth of Powell Creek which extends from the white bank on the rifht to near the timbered land
on the left.

Creek and South Creek, drains the northwest part of Putnam and the
southeast part of Defiance County. Many years ago a dam and sawing
mill were built on this creek in Section Nineteen, Highland Township,
Defiance County, which have done efficient work during good stages of
water; but in dry seasons the water ceases to flow. After an extreme
meandering course of a general northwest direction Powell Creek enters
the Auglaise River one mile above (south of) Defiance City limits the

PECULIAR FEATURES OF LOWER AUGLAISE RIVER. 505

channel, like that of the Auglaise at this jilace, hi-ing corradrd into the
thick bed of Ohio Shale. The erosions, Hood-plains, monadnocks or
former island prominences that have withstood the general wear, and
the irregular banks about this region are interesting studies. Blodgett
Island, sixty acres in extent, the most important island of the Auglaise
system, is in this region just below the mouth of Powell Creek — see
illustration ante i>age ."i9.

The Auglaise River discharges large quantities of water in wet
seasons, but is greatly reduced in dry seasons. In fact it became a dead
river, that is ceased to flow, from many miles south to its mouth during
the season of great drouth from the latter part of July, during August,
and until near the middle part of September, iHtlS, according to per-
sonal observation and notes made at the time by the writer. Pioneers
have assured the writer that the Auglaise 'ceased to flow also in the
exceeding dry summer of lH;j,S. The waters of this river, and man^• of
its tributaries, have worn through the Glacial Drift in many places.
Through Paulding and Defiance Counties the river bed is corraded into
the Onondaga and Corniferous Limestone almost continuoush- ; with
frequent quartzose boulders that have been washed from the Drift,
strewing the channel. A very large, probably the largest, granite boul-
der lies in deep water about half mile below the Frances Street Bridge
in the City of Defiance. On account of the rocks in the channel of
shallower water the evaporation during the hot summer days is very
great. Also, from the past failure of shallower sjarings and wells in
seasons of drouth, thousands of barrels of water have been hauled from
the streams for family use, and live stock has been driven to them from
great distances, all being material causes of their depletion.

Until the building of the Miami and Erie Canal, and railroads in
their vicinity, the Auglaise River and its larger tributaries were import-
ant thoroughfares. Large pirogues, flatboats, and rafts of timber,
carried products to Defiance, and the boats were returned laden with
merchandise and other necessaries for the increasing settlements along
their banks, and for much inland countrv as well.

The public roads along these streams have been greatlv imjiroved
the last few years, and now afford delightful drives, with frequent and
beautiful changing views, along their banks. The slackwater from the
Ohio State Dam across the Maumee, four miles and a half below the
mouth of the Auglaise, extends about three miles up this river and, in
connection with the Maumee and the Tififin, affords the best of waters
for the use of smaller pleasure boats.

The Tiffix River

Has origin in the northwestern and western parts of Lenawee County,
Michigan, and the eastern part of Hillsdale County. Several streams

506

THE MAUMEE RIVER BASIN.

of its headwaters come from small lakes, the largest of which are
named the Horseshoe, Devils, Posey, and Bear, in Lenawee, and Lake
Mallory and Lime Lake, in Hillsdale County. A number of the lakes
in this region are without visible outlet, their level being regulated bv
percolation through the sand and gravel composing their beds and
shores. Springs thus abound which serve as feeders of the river, the
waters of which in its upper course being therefrom clearer than in
most of the streams in the Maumee Basin : and a more uniform flow is

TH?: VILLAGE OF HUDSON, MICHIGAN, AND UPPER VALLEY OF TIFFIN RIVER

Looking northeast from the Tower of the Hi^h School Building late afternoon of 5th July, 1903, in high
wind. The standpoint is on the highest of the many knoU extensions of the St. Joseph Moraine and its
beaches, about K»0 feet above the river, and about on level with the horizon, that to the right being of
the Defiance Moraine.

maintained, also partly from the less relative evaporation on account of
there being a less number of boulders, washed from the drift, in
its channel.

The western headwaters of the Tiffin River are quite near those of
the St. Joseph of the Maumee, the St. Joseph of Lake Michigan, the
Kalamazoo, and the Grand River; and its eastern sources are quite near
those of the River Raisin. Along and between the headwaters of these
several rivers the tide of Aborigine wanderings, to and fro along the
portage paths, was considerable, from time immemorial.

THE TIFFIN RIVER. ITS COURSE AND CHANNEL. 507

The mouth of the Tiffin is directly south from its most northern
source. ■ It debouches into the Maumee River one mile and a half above
the mouth of the Auglaise, the three rivers at and between these points
being within the City of Defiance. The present Maumee slackwater for
the Miami and Erie Canal uses, extends about two miles up the
Tiflfin.

The Tiffin's bed is wholly in the Glacial Drift to within four miles
of its mouth where it exposes the Ohio Shale, here of the darker color;

A GLIMPSK OI- TIIFIN KHER

Looking east up the River in the south part of Section Four Noble Township, Ohio, 34th October,
1901, The two small white spots in the distant water are Corniferous Limestone Boulders, the last seen
in going up the River,

and in places the corrasions extend into the Corniferous Limestone.*
Its course is often very tortuous, doubling upon itself usually in short
bends, (see map of its meander under heading Public Lands ) at first
generally inclining somewhat eastward into Fulton County, Ohio, and
then westward, but at no point extending much further than six miles
east or west from a central north and south line. The distance from
its source to its mouth in direct line is about fiftv-five miles, and by
way of its channel eighty miles and more. The average fall in the

•These formations are termed Huron Shale, and Hamilton Shaly Limestone in the early Geo-
logical Surveys.

508 THE MAUMEE RIVER BASIN.

river proper is about four feet per mile.* The channel in Fulton
County is between the First and Second, and in Defiance County
between the First and Third Glacial Lake Beaches — see map ante
page 2l~>.

The Tiffin is usually termed a narrow and deep river with frequent
precipitous banks, risin;^ in some places to forty feet or more in height,
first on one side and then on the other according to the trending and
erosion of the current. The opposite, advancing, shore shows usually
but a small skirt of peneplain or bottom land ; but at the longest and
most narrow bends, where the current has cut through the narrow neck,
shortened its course, and worn away the high ground intervening be-
tween the former and the new channel, as in the north part of Defiance
County, the extent of this lower level eroded land or made shore admits
the river to spread its waters to near one mile in width in time of
greatest fioods. In highest floods the water rises twenty feet or more ;
and in the dryest seasons there is neither record nor tradition of its
having been a dead river, that is the current has not ceased to flow,
like many of the smaller western rivers. t In Ma}-, 1903, a Water Gage
for daily record of flow was placed by United States authority' under
the county bridge one mile above the county bridge at Brunersburg, in
Noble Township, Defiance County.

The Tiffin's principal tributaries are Beach Creek from the east
and Deer Creek from the west in Fulton County, Ohio : Leatherwood
and Beaver Creeks from the west, and Brush Creek from the east in
Williams County; with Lick Creek a perpetual stream. Mud, and
Buckskin Creeks from the west, and Webb Creek from the east in
Defiance County. The tributaries from the east drain the westward
slope of the Defiance Moraine north of the Maumee River, and those
from the westward drain the northeastern slope of the St. Joseph
Moraine.

The Tiffin, like the larger rivers of the Maumee Basin, was much
traversed by the Aborigines, the early French, the Coureurs de Bois and
other traders, and by the Colonists. From the beautiful cove appear-
ance of the mouth and lower waters of the Tiffin, and the plentiful
natural growth of beans along its fertile banks, the French early gave it
the name Anse des Feves Cove or Creek of the Beans, and Crique Feve
Bean Creek in English ; and so it is yet called by many farmers along
its course notwithstanding the fact that at the United States Survey

* In the Second Report of an Investigation of the Rivers of Ohio as Sources of Public Water
Supply^ by the Ohio State Board of Health. 1H09. pak'e 126, it is stated that the Tiffin has a length of
about sixty-five miles, with an average fall of 4..T feet per mile. Its watershed is also there civen as 669
square miles.

t This information has been obtained by the writer from farmers wlio have resided on the banks of
the Tiffin since the year 1830.

THE TIFFIN RIVER, ITS NAMES AND MILLS. 509

and Platting of the lands in this region in 1820-22, it was officially
given the name Tiffin River in honor of the then Surveyor General of
the West, Edward Tiffin, M. D., who had served Ohio well as the first
Governor, then United States Senator, etc. The north central Land-
and Civil Township in Defiance County, through which this river flows,
was also given the name Tiffin.

In 1820—22 John Perkins luiilt a dam across the Tiffin River two
miles above its mouth. At the east end of this dam a primitive 'up
and down' sawing mill was built, the only iron or steel about it being
the straight saw: the connections, bearings and i^ins being made of

THE MAUMEE RIVKR AND THE MOUTH OF THE TIFFIN

Looking northwest within the City of Defiance, Ohio, 1.5th April, 19tll. The course of the Maumee
is seen in the distance. The army of General Wayne in ITiM, and of General Winchester in 1812,
encamped on the hi^h bank of the Maumee just back, and to the left, of this standpoint.

hickory. It was soon in operation cutting plain boards for doors, roofs
and floors for use in log houses, and lumber for the first frame houses
built in Defiance, and in the Village of Uruiiersburg which soon sprung
up at the west end of this dam. A grist (flouring) mill was soon
(1822?) built at the west end of the dam. These were then the onlv
water-]50wer mills in the Basin, excepting possibly one at the Grand
Rapids of the Maumee and one at Willshire on the St. Marv. Thev
were patronized by settlers from great distances. As the number of
settlers increased, Brunersburg became a very bus\- place. The

510

THE MAUMEE RIVER BASIN.

general mode of conveying the grists to and from the mill was by boats
— pirogues at first. They came down the Tiffin from Michigan, down
the Auglaise, and from both ways along the Maumee. Daniel Bruner
(from whom the village was named) who bought these mills in 1833
(1839?) and Brice Hilton, who some years later bought and operated
them and their successors until the final destruction of the dam in 1884,
had boats that ran regularly along the Tiffin and the other rivers in
those early times, usually pirogues of from three to five tons or one
hundred and seventy-five bushels of corn and wheat capacity. Pay-

LOOKING NORTH UP THE TIFFIN RIVER

October 19, 1903, from the northwest corner of Section 1.5 Noble Township, Defiance County. Ohio, the
Village of Brunersburg on the left [right river bank). The remains of the John Perkins Mill-dam, one of
the first in the Basin, are seen in the distance beyond the small island.

ment was made for the grain in money, lumber, or flour according to
the desire of the producer; thus the boats usually carried loads both
wavs. Contracts were occasionally made, principally between the
years 1830-1843. for the entire product of wheat, corn, oats, hogs, etc.,
even before planting time. The demand for these products came from
the increasing number of immigrants, the numerous villages that were
platted along the rivers, and the thousands of laborers brought from
the East to make the Miami and Erie, and the Wabash and Erie Canals.
A much larger boat was soon built at Brunersburg by William
Bridenbaugh and Solomon Stoner for Gilbert C. Coffin a Delaware Town-

THE TIFFIN RIVER. ITS BOATS AND COMMERCE. 511

ship farmer. This was a very large boat for those days, and substan-
tial. It carried cargoes of 2500 bushels of wheat to Maumee City: was
afterward sold to John Tuttle an early warehouse man at Defiance and
was used in the Miami and Erie Canal after its completion in 1843. In
1837 a steamboat was built at Brunersburg for Sargent and Mudgett,
traders at that place. This boat was christened Anthony Wayne and
plied mostly on the Maumee River — see ante page 481. These were
days of enterprise and emulation in the developing countr\-. A grain
boat was built at Evansport on the Tiffin with capacity for six hundred
bushels of wheat: but this experiment (which was also the name of the
boat) proved unprofitable. She was sold for the Maumee River trade
and, later for many years, was run in the Canal, retaining her first
name. Experiment, to the last. The maximum of this active business
along the rivers was attained during the building of the Miami and
Erie Canal during the years 1840-41-42.

In 1835 a dam and flouring mill were completed at Evansport by
Jacob and John Coy and John Snider. Two years later they added a
sawing mill. Soon thereafter a flouring mill was built at Pulaski on
Beaver Creek: and about 1H46 a flouring and sawing mill were built at
La Fayette, later called Lockport, on the Tiffin River. Other mills
were constructed — flouring mills at Edinburg, Fulton County, Ohio,
and at Hudson, Michigan, and yet later a sawing mill at Addison,
Michigan. Only the one last named remains as a water-power mill.
Objections to the dams were raised on account of the increased over-
flow of 'bottom' lands therefrom, and some explosives were used under
those at Lockport and Evansport l)y unknown parties. The mills were
also consumed b\' fire one after another, those at Brunersburg and
Evansport in 1884-85.'' Another flouring mill was built at Evansjiort
and is operated by steam power.

Scarcely any commercial boating has been done on the Tiffin River
in later years. By way of experiment the jiassenger steamer Laurina
was run, with little cargo, three times from Defiance to Evansport dur-
ing a favorable stage of water in March, 1892. The first time she
brought down from the Evansport steam mills fifty barrels of flour, the
second time sixty, and the third time sixty-eight barrels of flour and
two tons of choji fei'd.' The time occupied in going up was about
four hours on account of the strong current. The return required onlv
one hour and three-quarters. The distance by wagon road is twelve
miles : by river about twentv-four miles.

'■ In the spring and summer of 1903 indictments were found against several citizens of Williams
County for arson. A number, even those with property and of u'Ood standinc, plead guilty to a repetition
of this crime for many years, and they with others were sentenced to the penitentiary. The writer is not
aware, however, that any attempt was made to connect their operations with the destruction of these mills.

512 THE MAUMEE RIVER BASIN.

CHAPTER XIV.

The First American Settlers — The Division into Counties — The
Orc;antzation of Counties.

But few Americans settled in this Basin until after the surrender
by the British in 1796 of Fort Miami by the lower Maumee and of Fort
Lernoult at Detroit. Then American traders with the Aborigines in-
creased in numbiT, while British and French traders, yet probably in
the majority, continued their traffic: thus there was a mixed competition
for the Aborigine trade. This competition changed as the British more
and more attracted the Aborigines to Maiden: and yet more when the
United States established trading posts with desire for the better con-
trol of the Aborigines within their territory — see ante page 259.

People desiring to found homes began to gather along the lower
Maumee River earl}- in the iHth centurj-. It is supposed that Colonel
John Anderson was at Miami, site of the British Fort Miami two miles
below the foot of the lowest Maumee rajiids, from the year 1796 as a
trader and farmer — see ante page 397 ; also William Dragoo — see ante
page 396. Several American families were with or near the Ottawa
Aborigine villages there and below in 18t)6. The French were in the
majority on the right bank at the mouth of the river, among the number
being the Navarres, Peltier, J. B. Beaugrand, Mominie, and Antoine
La Pointe. It is also supposed that in 1807 there dwelt by the lower
Maumee, at the site of Fort Miami, families of, or individuals named,
William Carter, Andrew and William Race, three families named
Ewing, and David Hull a trader and tavern keeper with the assistance
of his sister. These were joined in 1807 bj' James Carlin a former
Government blacksmith from Detroit by way of Frenchtown, now
Monroe.

During the year 1810 there came to and near Miami, Major Amos
Spafford as Collector of the Port of Miami, Erie District, Thomas and
Halsey W. Leaming, Stephen Hoyt, George Blalock, Daniel Purdy,
James Slason or Slawson, Jesse Skinner, Thomas Dick, William
Peters, Ambrose Hickok, David and Robert Race, Daniel Murray,
Samuel Merritt, Richard Gilford, and Captain Jacob Wilkinson who
built a schooner for the river and lake trade. At the opening of the
War of 181'2 there were sixty-seven families of Caucasion blood at or
tributary to the small Village of Miami, as seen by General Hull's
army — see ante page 271. Among the reminiscences of Mrs. Amelia

* See Hezekiah L. Hosuier's article in Howe's His. Collections of Ohio, vol. ii. page 859.

REMINISCENCES OF THE EARLY SETTLERS.

513

W. Perrin, daughter of Captain Wilkinson, regarding the alarms of

these times is the following:

One morning in the summer of 1811. a man came riding down the river warning the
settlers that a large body of savages, hideously painted, was forming above and their ap-
pearance and actions indicated that they were upon the war-path. The rumor created

AN EARLY HOME IN THE WILDERNESS

Generally of but one room, built of logs shaped with the axe. Sometimes one or two other tools were at
hand, an augur and the hunting knife, used in pinniuk- together the split plank to form the door, the win-
dow blind, and the family table, as fre<iuently no nails were at hand. The door hinges and latch were
also of wood. A string attached to the latch and threaded throuKh a small opening in the door above
enabled friends without to raise the latch and enter, hence the form of invitation ' you will find the latch-
string out." This string was usually kept drawn within the door to prevent sudden and unwelcome intru-
sion of foes. When the open spaces between the logs were chinked and daubed with mud as protection
against the savages and to shut out the cold, greased paper was stretched across the one or two window
holes for light by day when safe and the open firelight was not sufficient. For special lighting there was
used a piece of hickory bark, a saucer of grease with a narrow cutting of cloth protruding qf, later, a
dipped tallow candle. The ground served as floor until convenient time to make a floor of puncheons.
Beds were often composed of boughs of trees, covered with skins of the large wild animals dressed with
hair on, placed on the floor or on poles supported above the ground. The gun was constantly at hand,
necessary to supply game as the only meal for the table or as protection against savage wild beasts and
Aborigines. The loft often had portholes for observation and defense. Nuts, tubers, berries, nettle tops
and other wild edibles were gathered in season and stored in the loft for use in times of need, the first
crops of grain being uncertain.

terrible alarm in the vicinity, and the thoughts of each were immediately directed to
finding a place of safety for themselves and their children. Father took his family to the
woods, some distance away, and there left them (mother and her four children) concealed
in a brush heap, with the promise to return as soon as he was assured of their safety, and
enjoined them to keep quiet and closely concealed. All that long day they remained
there, scarcely daring to move for fear of attracting the attention of some lurking savage.
In his haste father had forgotten to bring anything to eat, but fear of the Aborigines kept

514 THE MAUMEE RIVER BASIN.-

the little ones quiet and caused them to forget their hunger, except the baby which nursed
until it drew blood. As the dread hours of that long, weary, terrible day passed slowly,
one by one, and father did not come, mother's anguish grew almost unendurable, for she
imagined he had fallen at the hands of the savages. When he finally appeared, just as
the darkness of night was closing around us, there was a most joyous reunion. It seems
that the uncertainty of the purpose of the Aborigines had prevented him from returning
to us sooner. The savages were merely out upon ' a lark ' and had gobbled up a number
of white men, father among the number, and pestered them just by way of amusement.*

The following is also taken from the reminiscenses of Mrs. Hester
Green, daughter of Daniel Purdy:

We lived in security until a messenger arrived informing us that General Hull had
sold his army, and that we would have to leave. Then all was fright and confusion.
We and most of the others, excepting the soldiers, gathered what we could handily and
left. We stopped at Blalock's a short time, and there an Aborigine messenger arrived
and told us to come back as they would not kill us, but only wanted some of our property.
Looking around until he found Blalock's gun he took it, went out and got a horse my
mother had ridden to this point, and departed. We went back and remained three days
in which time the Aborigines were pretty busy in driving off our live stock (we lost sixteen
head) and in plundering the houses of such as had not come back. Mr. Guilliam was one
who tied leaving everything behind ; and had not the presence of danger filled us with
alarm, we would have been amused to see the Aborigines plundering his house. The
feather beds were brought out, ripped open and the feathers scattered to the winds, the
ticks alone being deemed valuable. But our stay was short, only three days, when the
commandant of the fort [for other mention of this fort see ante page 272] informed us that
he would burn the fort and stores and leave, inviting us to take such of the provisions as
we might need. Consternation again seized upon us, and we hastily reloaded our wagons
and left. We stayed the first night at a house eight or ten miles south of the [foot of the]
Rapids. In the Black Swamp the load became too heavy, and they rolled out a barrel of
flour and a barrel of meat which they had obtained at the fort. Mr. Hopkins, John Car-
ter, Mr. Scribner, and William Race went back the next fall [1812] to gather their crops,
and they were all killed by the savages. John Carter was attacked while in a boat on the
river, and they had quite a hard fight before they got his scalp. After many years the
Government gave the Purdys four hundred dollars for the crops and stock left behind
them in their flight.

Mrs. Philothe Case Clark wrote for the Firelands Pioneer volume
V page 114, that her father Isaac P. Caset came to the Vicinity of Fort
Miami May 1, IHU. She pathetically describes much sickness, and
several deaths in the family, with the unavoidable privations of the wil-
derness. The dead were buried in coffins made bv the friends from

* See Firelands Pioneer: and History of Wood County, Ohio. 1897, page 359.

t Isaac P. Case was born at Sinisbury, Connecticut, March 3, 1772; married at Cooperstown, New
"Vork, Miss Eunice Tracey. They came to southern Ohio and down the Ohio River in 18t)8 with three
daujihters and one son. In the spring of 1811 this family, with another and two young men named
Scribner and Lapeer, started northward for the Maumee. At Wapakoneta they made a large pirogue of
two basswood logs, and in it they passed down the Auglaise River to the ruins of Fori Dehance. Here
they found Burgess Squire and wife and her inother who were also mother and sister to Case. They had
passed the winter here in company with the only white settler, a French trader, and his Aborigine wife.
Taking all his relatives and crew into his pirogue. Case passed down the Maumee and arrived at the foot
of the lowest rapids May 1, IHll, after exciting experiences on the river.

EARLY EXPERIENCES ALONG LOWER MAUMEE RIVER. 515

basswood trees, split and htwn with axes. After the surrender of Hull
at Detroit some of the families left Miami by open boats. Her father
and family, in company with twelve other families, went bv wagons
drawn by oxen. Their route was southward along the way of Hull's
army. After a toilsome journey of two weeks through the mud, greatly
annoyed by mosquitoes, sometimes with no water except what was
gathered from the cattle-tracks, thev arrived at Urbana where they drew
military rations until recruited in strength to resume their journey to
their relatives.

Some of the families residing at Fort Miami were French, and some
of them went to the British, or to Canada, at the outbreak of the War;
others remained there or thereabout, and a few of their number did good
service for the Americans in common with Peter Manor ' Manard ) and
Peter Navarre. All the American families retired to the protected parts
of Ohio soon after the surrender of Detroit to the British by General
Hull and the abandonment of the small fort at Miami by Lieutenant
Davidson — see ante page '27'2. Major Spafford was the last to leave
with his family and immediate friends; and they escaped the savages in
a rude and shaky barge by way of Lake Erie to Milan. The crops of
these refugees were harvested and destroyed in part by the British, the
savages, and the American soldiers.

At the close of the War of 1812 many of these families returned
to Miami, with some friends and former soldiers who desired places for
settlement with their families; and immediately after the departure of
the garrison in May, 1815, the buildings of Fort Meigs were occupied
by the successive arrivals until houses could be built on choice
locations. Contentions were engendered, however, regarding the
pickets and other timber of the Fort, and finally one of the parties to
the quarrel set the remaining ones on fire. Amos Spafford and others
built their dwellings in the summer of 1815 partly of timber obtained
by taking apart flat boats that had served their purpose in transporting
army supplies from Fort Winchester. John Carter and John Race
were shot and tomahawked by Aborigines at their cabin near Turkey-
foot Rock (at upper Presqu'ile) the summer of this year; and later
in the season Levi Hull went to drive in the cattle from the woods on
the present plat of Perrysburg; several gun reports were heard, and he
not returning in due time, a search party was organized and he was
found where the Methodist Church building of Perrysburg now stands,
shot dead and scalped.* These were the last of the murders by-
savages along the Maumee River for some length of time.

A village plat was surveyed at Fort Meigs, principally along the
river under the bluff and given the name Orleans, or Orleans of the

* From the MS. of the late Willard V. Way, copied into the History of Wood County, 1897.

516 THE MAUMEE RIVER BASIN.

North. A few log cabins were here built. Captain Jacob Wilkinson
who (assisted by his nephew afterward Captain David Wilkinson who
became a prominent boatman for the lower Maumee) had taken the
garrison and equipment of Fort Meigs to Detroit in May, sailed his
schooner Blacksnake. of about twenty-five tons burden, to Buffalo for
supplies, and on his return brought other settlers among whom were
the families Hunter, Mulholland, Hopkins, Scott Robb, and probably
others. Of the other settlers, David Hull and Thomas M'llrath
opened supply stores and taverns. Jesse Skinner, Samuel Ewing, a
bachelor Irishman named Thomas Dicks, and others built cabins near
the river and on the b.luff above. Ephraim and Thomas Learning car-
penters and mill-wrights built dwellings near the river in what is now
the west part of Perrysburg. In the spring of 1818 they removed to
Monclovaand rebuilt the sawing mill begun there on Swan Creek before
the War of 1812 by Samuel Ewing. This was the first mill in the
Basin, and it was well patronized by the settlers. Previous to this
time the settlers went to the River Raisin, Michigan, for their lumber
and flour. In 1816 Captain Jacob Wilkinson returned to remain and
he built a house at Orleans : also Seneca Allen, Charles, Christopher,
and Elijah Gunn, who settled on the north side of the river. Allen
opened a store for trade with the Aborigines at Roche de Bout where
Isaac Richardson was building a mill. Joshua Chappel arrived in
April, 1H17, and about this time Samuel V^ance and his brother Wilson
opened a general store for their brother Joseph Vance who was later
elected Governor of Ohio. About the first of June John and William
Hollister arrived with a stock of goods and opened a general store. A
great flood, experienced at the going out of the river ice in the spring
of 1818 damaged the Village of Orleans, and this, with the insufficient
building space and the number of competing towns, soon caused the
decline and abandonment of the town.

Those who were driven from their homes at Miami at the beginning
of the War of 1812, claimed compensation from the United States on
their return for their property used and destroyed during the War. A
meeting was held at the dwelling house of Amos Spafford * in the
evening of 8th November, 1815, and the minutes show the appointment
of Amos Spafford and Captain Daniel Hull as a committee, to meet
General Harrison on his wav to Detroit and to request of him such
information and certificates as the said General may have in his
possession respecting the corn that was found standing in possession
of the inhabitants on his arrival at this place in the winter of 1812-13,
which cori'w was made use of bv the armv under his command." The

* The later residence of this pioneer by the lower Maumee was on the rieht bank of the River,
where he died in 1817,

CLAIMS OF REFUGEES. SURVEYS. P.RICES CURRENT. 5/7

24th November Amos S]jatford was appointed agent and attorney to go
to Washington and apply to Congress for the payment of the claims of
the following named persons : William Carter, Daniel Hull, William
Peters, Samuel H. Ewing, Samuel "Carter, Thomas M'llrath, Samuel
Ewing, Chloe Hicox or Hickok, William Skinner, James Carlin, Stacey
Stoddard, John Redoad, and Jacob Wilkinson. Among the other
claimants were George Blalock, James Slawson or Slason, Jesse
Skinner, Thomas Dick, Ambrose Hickok, Daniel Purdy, Baptiste
Mominie, and Richard Gifford. There were claims other than for corn.
Those of James Carlin, blacksmith, were for dwelling house or cabin
valued at §ll(h blacksmith shop $55: one two years old colt taken by
Wyandot Aborigines $30. Oliver Armstrong also claimed for one horse
stolen valued at $60; wheat of six acres in the barn, burned ; four tons
hay; clothing and bedding burned or stolen, amounting to $525. The
total of the former settlers' claims was somewhat over four thousand
dollars.

The United States Reservations on the lower Maumee at the
Treaty of Greenville in 1795, included the land on both sides of
Maumee Bay and the river above to the extent of one hundred and
eighty square miles (six and twelve miles square). The boundaries of
these Reservations were marked in 1K()5 by Elias Glover Deputy United
States Surveyor, with assistants: but the first American settlements
were made on these Reservations without permission, that they might
have choice possession claims when the Reservations were opened to
settlers. In 1H16 parts of these Reservations were surveyed for settlers
by Agent Alexander Bourne and Surveyors Joseph Wampler and
William Brookfield, including the plat of the present Village of
Perrysburg according to Act of Congress that year; and the lands and
lots were offered for sale in February, 1817, by officers of the Land
Office at Wooster, Ohio. This village plat was named in honor of
Commodore Oliver H. Perry at the suggestion of Josiah Meigs Com-
missioner of the General Land Office. Several log houses were built
in Perrysburg that year, and in 1H17 the first frame house there was
Iniilt by David W. Hawley of Black Rock, Buffalo, of lumber brought
from Buffalo by Captain Jacob Wilkinson in the schooner Blacksnake.
Doctor J. B. Stewart of Albany, New York, and J. J. Lovett, bought
the river tracts 65 and 66, including the site of Fort Meigs and the
settlements next to the river. The prices current following the War of
1812, taken from the account book of John T. Baldwin, were: for
common laborers $25 per month and board; shoes $2.50 per pair;
half-soling a pair of boots $3.00; making fine shirt $1.00; making
woolen trousers $1.50; making linen trousers 50 cents; flour four cents
a pound ; bacon 20 cents : beefsteak 10 cents ; pork 18;'4 cents ; butter

518 THE MAUMEE RIVER BASIN.

31 cents ; cider $8.50 a barrel ; chickens 25 cents each ; beaver hats
$7.00 ; tobacco 50 cents a pound ; whisky 50 cents a pint ; tin plates
31 cents each ; nails 25 cents a pound : salt $8.00 a barrel. At
the close of the year 1819 the ntimber of Americans along and with
settlements adjacent to the lower Maumee River, was estimated to be
but little over six hundred.

The First Masonic LonoEs, and Churches.

Army Lodge No. 24 Free and Accepted Masons held meetings in
Fort Meigs from 1813 until the abandonment of the Fort by the soldiers
in May, 1815.* March 5, 1817, Henry Brush Grand Master of the
Grand Lodge of Ohio Free and Accepted Masons granted from Chilli-
cothe a dispensation for Northern Light Lodge No. 40 at Wavnesfield,
the present Village of Maumee and vicinity. There were along the
Maumee at this time about fort\' families scattered from Waterville
above to Delaware Creek below, of which families five men were Free
Masons. The dispensation named Almon Gibbs W. M. William
Griffith S. W. and Charles Gunn J. W. D. J. Thurston and James
Adams were the other members. Seneca Allen was the first applicant
for the degrees. A charter was granted to this Lodge 21st December,
1818. Its meetings were held in the second story of a building erected
by the Cincinnati Land Company which owned the village site. Owing
to the great anti-Masonic excitement, this Lodge discontinued meetings
from December 27, 1827, after electing officers as follows: James Wil-
kinson W. M. J. H. Jerome S. W. R. A. Forsyth J. W. Harry
Conant Treasurer: Thomas R. M'Knight Secretarv : John Hollister S.
D. J. S. Herrick J. D. David Hull, Tyler. This Lodge remained
voluntarily suspended about eighteen j-ears. Upon petition of Andrew
Young in October, 1845, the charter was renewed and meetings again
began the 21st of November. Meantime, Wood County Lodge No. 112
was organized under dispensation granted 29th April, 1843. The
Charter was received in October of this year. The meetings of this
Lodge were held for man}- years in the garret of the log dwelling house
of Emilus Wood, a short distance northwest of the site of the present
Village of Tontogany. The first officers were: Jarius Curtis W. M.
Emilus Wood S. W. Morris Brown J. W. The present members
claim this as the Mother of Lodges in Northwestern Ohio. Toledo
Lodge No. 144 was the next one here organized a few years later.

The first Protestant society among the Americans liy the lower
Maumee River was a Methodist Episcopal Church organized at Or'eans
in 1819 by Reverend John P. Kent. Aurora Spafford was appointed
class leader, with William Kelly, John Knowles and Sarah Wilkinson

History/ of Wood County, Ohio, 1897, page ;

ORGANIZATION OF SOCIETIES AND GOVERNMENT. 519

members. Captain Jacob Wilkinson's dwullins' house was their first
meetinji^ place, and Hollister's store the second. Later, the meetings
were held in Perrysburg. The succeeding ministers were Paul B.
Morey of the Detroit (Monroe) Circuit in iMiO, Elias Patten in iHL'i,
S. Baker in 1824, John Baughman in IH-if), G. Walker in lH-27. The
next church organized was the Presbyterian Kith November, l!-i;:i4 * but
their clergymen had previously visited there.

" Division into Counties.

The claims of the Aborigines to the lands in this Basin and its
vicinity having been largely purchased by the United States (see
Treaties, Chapter XII) the Legislature of Ohio, by Act of 12th Febru-
ary, 1820, provided for the division of northwestern Ohio into fourteen
counties. This Act was carried into effect 1st April, 1820, in the divis-
ion and the naming of the following counties wholly or partially em-
braced in this Basin, viz: Allen, Hancock, Hardin, Henry, Mercer,
Paulding, Putnam, Seneca, Van Wert, Williams, and Wood. Some of
these counties were in after years divided and others organized to form
the present list — see table ante pages 4 and 5. Some of the counties
first named were not organized for several years, their territory being
placed under the jurisdiction of those that were organized until each
gained population sufficient to sustain the expense of individual gov-
ernment. Thus Hancock, Henr\-, Paulding, Putnam and Williams,
were subject to Wood County, and Allen and Van Wert were for a time
governed by Mercer. At the organization of Williams County in 1824
with court and officers at Defiance, the previously outlined territory of
Henry, Paulding, and Putnam, Counties were attached to it for their
government.

Wood County, Ohio,

Was named in honor of Colonel Eleazer D. Wood, Engineer of Fort
Meigs. The first Commissioners, appointed April 1, 1820, were Samuel
H. Ewing, John Pray, and Daniel Hubbell, the latter acting as clerk
or secretary at their first meeting held in the Village of Maumee 12th
April, 1H20. William Pratt was then appointed County Treasurer.
The next meeting was held May Hrd when Seneca Allen, County Audit-
or, was appointed clerk for the Commissioners. The bond of David
Hull as Sheriff was then accepted, with Samuel Vance and Peter G.
Oliver as sureties; also the bond of William Pratt, Treasurer, with
Samuel Vance and Aurora Spafford sureties; and the bond of Seneca
Allen, Auditor, with Almon Gibbs and Thomas R. M'Knight as sure-

* For the names of later ministers in these and other Churches in this recion, the reader is referred
to the report of Charles W. Evers in the History of Wood County, Ohio. 1H97, page ."iTS; also to the history
of Missions ante page 399.

520 THE MAUMEE RIVER BASIN.

ties. The Auditor was chosen by joint ballot of the Ohio General
Assembly. General John E. Hunt was allowed $11.25 for services as
lister of taxable property and house appraiser ; and David Hull was
apjiointed Collector of Taxes. The Commissioners, at this meeting,
rented for one year at forty dollars the room over Almon Gibbs' store
in the Village of Maumee, where their meetings had been held, for
their use and for the meetings of the court. At the session held 12th
December, 1820, Daniel Hubbell, John E. Hunt, and John Pray,
appeared as Commissioners. March 4th, 1822, they appointed Thomas
W. Powell Auditor of the County; and declared the Township of
Wavnesfield, which was organized in 1816 for the government of the
United States Reservations hereabout, to be coextensive with the
Counties of Wood and Hancock: and they organized the Township of
Auglaise to be coextensive with the Counties of Henry, Williams,
Paulding and Putnam. At their session June 3rd, Doctor Walter
Colton was appointed Treasurer.

The United States Congress vested May 7, 1822, the right to all
unsold lots and outlots of the town plat of Perrysburg in the Commis-
sioners of Wood Countv, Ohio, on condition that the public buildings
of the said County be permanently located there. A special session of
the Board at Perrysburg 19th March, 1823, was 'convened for the
purpose of attending to the erection and repairs of the public buildings
of the Countv.' The Commissioners at this time were John Pray,
Samuel Spafford, and Hiram P. Barlow. They examined the County
Jail 'which had J>een removed from the town of Maumee and erected in
the town of Perrysburg agreeable to a contract entered into for that
purpose with Daniel Hubbell ' at a cost of $48. It was further "ordered
that so much of the Township of Wavnesfield as is included in the
organized County of Wood, and lying and being on the south of the
south channel of the Maumee River, from the west line of the County
to the line between the original surveyed Township in Number One and
Four in the United States Reserve, thence along the north channel to
the State line, be set off and organized into a township by the name of
Perrysburg ; and that the election for Township Officers be held on the
19th day of June, A. D. 1823, at the house of Samuel Spafford in said
Township."

A Court House for Wood County was built at Perrysburg in 1823
b}' Daniel Hubbell and Guy Nearing under contract for $895. This
Court House was succeeded in 1H43 by one of brick at a cost of $20,000.
In April, 1^70, the County Records and offices were removed to a new
Court House in the Village of Bowling Green which was used until the
year 1894, when the records were removed to the Citj' Hall and work
was begun on the present ornate stone structure which was completed

THE CIVIL BEGINNINGS IN WOOD COUNTY. 521

in the fall of 1896 at a cost of $255,746.84 including- the lots and their
improvement.

The first newspaper published in or near the Maumee River Basin
was The Miami of the Lal<e, first issued 11th December, 1H33, by Jesup
W. Scott a lawyer who later removed to Toledo and Henry Darling who
brought the type and hand press from New York. This newspaper
passed into the hands of J. 11. MTiride; and it was succeeded in name
August 18, 1838, by The Ohio Whig under the management of H. T.
Smith. Other newspapers were started and had brief history. In ]S7"2
but one newspaper was continued in Perrysburg, The Journal, edited
by James Timmons.

The first court in this Basin was held over Almon Gibbs' store in
the Village of Maumee beginning 3rd May, 1820. This Basin was then
in the Third Judicial Circuit. George Tod, father of David Tod
Governor of Ohio in 1862 to 1864, was President Judge, and Doctor
Horatio Conant, Samuel Vance and Peter G. Oliver were Associate
Judges. Their commissions were for seven years from March 1, 1820.
Thomas R. M'Knight was appointed Clerk. John T. Baldwin, Aaron
Granger, Parris M. Plum, Aurora Spafford. Jeremiah Johnston, Wil-
liam Pratt, Richard Gunn, CoUister Haskins, Ephriam H. Learning,
Josephus Tiler, Daniel Murray, John Hollister, Norman L. Freeman,
John Jav Lovett, and William H. Bostwick, composed the Grand Jury,
the last named being foreman. Ebenezer Lane was the second Presi-
dent Judge in 1825, and David Higgins the third, in 1830.

The illegal sale of spirituous liquors in less quantity than a quart,
and in some cases without license, resulted in many indictments and
fines during the early years of this Common Pleas Court. Samuel
Ewing was found murdered at Roche de Bout in May, 1822, and the
verdict of the Coroner, Francis Charter, was ignored on motion of
Thomas H. Powell Prosecuting Attorney, and an indictment for man-
slaughter against John Lewis was returned instead. Lewis was found
guilty, and was sentenced to the Ohio Penitentiary for three years. He
soon escaped from the County Jail and was not caught. One F"rench,
convicted of passing counterfeit bank notes, was also sentenced to the
Penitentiary for three years by Judge Tod.

The first capital punishment in this Basin was inflicted 5th Novem-
ber, 1830, on George Porter a half-breed Mohican who expiated his
crime in the ravine at the east end of Fort Meigs. In brief the story
runs as follows: About the year IMIT Isaac Richardson and one
Thompson purchased land including Roche de Bout and, later, built a
dam across the Maumee at the rapids there and completed flouring and
sawing mills and began their operation. DifSculties arose and con-
tinued from the insecurity of the dam which bred endless strife and

522 THE MAUMEE RIVER BASIN.

litigation. The one would one day tear down and destroy what the
other had built up the day before.

Without saying any thing about Thompson, Richardson was in every sense of the
word a bad man. he was a tall man with a well-proportioned figure, flaxen hair and cor-
responding features ; and it was then remarked that he would make a good model for an
ancient Anglo-Saxon. If a bad man was needed for such a model, certainly they could
scarcely obtain a better one. Porter had labored for Richardson at the mills as a car-
penter and laborer, and had considerable claims for such labor, while Richardson could
not be induced to pay nor do anything except to taunt Porter with the assertion that he
could not collect his claims. This taunt, without denying in any manner the justice of
the claims, he would cast up to Porter in the most aggravating manner. At last Porter
became indignant and irritated beyond the powers of his endurance. One evening after
dark while Richardson was sitting in his hall with his family and others around him.
Porter came unexpectedly and immediately shot Richardson dead in his chair.

The late Thomas W. Powell, from whose reminiscences the fore-
going is taken'^ was Prosecuting Attorne\', and David Higgins, after-
wards President Judge of Common Pleas, was appointed to defend
Porter who had the sympathy of the Community; but he was con-
victed and hung as before stated.

The first bridge across the lower Maumee River was built in 1839
by the citizens of Maumee City at the site of the present structure, at
the cost of about $4000. Ferry boats were used up to this date.

One of the largest meetings held in this Basin was at Fort Meigs
on the 11th June, 1840, during the Presidential Campaign and in favor
of General William H. Harrison's candidacy. The number in atten-
dance was variously estimated at from 40,000 to 60,000 people who
came from various parts of Ohio, Michigan, Indiana, New York and
Pennsylvania. The principal speakers were General Harrison and
Thomas Corwin. Many of the soldiers who had served under General
Harrison at Fort Meigs and elsewhere were present and great enthusi-
asm prevailed. t Among the enlivening incidents of this meeting was
the degrading of a hickory pole that had been brought to the site of
the Fort by some Democrats to be erected to display their party flag
in opposition. Whigs of Maumee and Perrysburg gathered in the
night and thrust this pole little end down into the deep water well
outside the Grund Traverse — Well No. 1, see Ground Plan of Fort
Meigs ante page 316. During the meeting the contrast between this
reversed pole and the stately oak which held aloft the Whig banner,
afforded much amusement. This 'Pole in a deep hole' can yet be
seen extending above the filled-in well. It is now, however, nearly
gone froin decay.

* Compare The Defiance Democrat, weekly newspaper of 2nd May, 1868.
t See The Toledo Weekly Blade for the \veek of 11th June, 1840.

FIRST SETTLERS IN MIDDLE OF THE BASIN. 523

A reunion, called for the Survivors of the Siege of Fort Meigs,
was held on the site of the Fort in June, 1870, at which forty-four
responded to the roll-call. Some of these men were about eighty vears
old, and all were approximating this age. Their enjoyment of the
occasion was great and heartfelt. Captain Leslie Combs was present,
now bearing the title General, but not with full historical accuracy of
speech in his address. The able Colonel Charles S. Todd, and Peter
Navarre, were also present. These veterans were accorded a warm
reception by the citizens of Perrysburg, Maumee, and vicinity. At the
head of the large procession to the site of the Fort, was carried a flag
that waved over the Fort during the Siege. It was owned by David
M'Chesney of Warren County, Ohio, and was carried on this occasion
by his father-in-law Colonel Irvine, one of the veterans. This flag
was torn and time-stained, but its gilt inscription was yet legible, viz :
2nd Com'd, 1st Squad, 3rd Brigade, 1st Div., Ohio Militia.

The Site and Village of Defiance — Williams County.

Both the French and English had trading posts for the .Aborigines
at convenient places along the rivers from early dates — the former from
the latter part of the seventeenth century, and the latter from the first
half of the eighteenth; and occasionally a post assumed an air of
permanence. Defiance was a favorite place for all parties on account
of its being the central part of the Basin, and the point of union of
three rivers. The following account by Oliver M. Spencer, who was
for some time a captive of the Shawnee Aborigines at the site of the
present City of Defiance, describes the settlement at this place in the
year 1792, two years before the coming of General Wayne's army, viz:

Extending from the Maumee a quarter of a mile up the Auglaise, about two hundred
yards in width, was an open space on the west and south of which were oak woods with
hazel undergrowth. Within this opening, a few hundred yards above the point [between
the rivers] on the steep high bank of the Auglaise. were five or six cabins and log houses
inhabited principally by traders with the Aborigines. The most northerly, a large hewed
log house divided below into three apartments, was occupied as a warehouse, store, and
dwelling by George Ironside the most wealthy and influential of the traders on the point.
Next to his were the houses of Pirault [Pero] a French baker, and M'Kenzie a Scot who,
in addition to merchandizing, followed the occupation of a silversmith exchanging with
the .Aborigines his brooches, eardrops, and other silver ornaments at an enormous profit,
for sj<ins [of wild animals]. Still farther up were several other families of French and
English, and two American prisoners — Henry Ball a soldier taken at St. Clair's defeat,
and his wife Polly Meadows captured at the same time — were allowed to live here and by
labor to pay their masters the price of their ransom, he by boating to the [lower] rapids
of the Maumee, and she by washing and sewing. Fronting the house of Ironside, and
about fifty yards from the bank [of the Auglaise], was a small stockade enclosing two
hewed log houses, one of which was occupied by James Girty (brother of Simon) the
other occasionally [occupied] by M'Kee and Eliott British Aborigine .-Agents living
at Detroit [by the lower Detroit River, and the lower Maumee].

524 THE MAUMEE RIVER BASIN.

I spent this day very pleasantly among the traders, dining with Mr. Ironside who
treated me with great kindness. I found him a very sociable and intelligent man,
humane and benevolent. He seemed much interested in the story of my captivity and
appeared to sympathize with me, gave me some useful advice and direction for the regu-
lation of my conduct, and a great deal of information relative to the Aborigines, their
history, customs and manners. On the following day. I was highly gratified in seeing at
our cabin [on the north side of the Maumee opposite the point] my late townsman William
Moore [also a prisoner wilh the Aborigines], who had just returned from the rapids about
sixty miles below.* .

Occasionally an Antrican trader tarried here for a time during the
garrisoning" of Fort Defiance, but no permanent settlement was then
attempted bv Americans. The British practically held possession of
the Maumee, or largely dominated the Aborigines to within a few miles
of Fort Wayne, until the coming of the Army of the Northwest in
181'2, and the traders and families at the central and upper parts of the
Basin, so far as we know, were mostly if not all French and British.!

Several of the soldiers who served at Fort Winchester and along
the Maumee in the War of 1812, returned to Defiance and its vicinity
at the close of the war. Among those who returned in 1815-16 as
settlers in the true sense and were the first to occupy the buildings of
Fort Winchester after their abandonment by the soldiers, were John
and William Preston + lirothers : James Partee, John Plummer, John
Perkins, and Montgomery Evans. The buildings of the Fort thus
again served an excellent purpose, post bellum auxillium, as homes for
successive new comers so long as their timbers remained in fit condition
for their occupancy ; and then the better timbers were used to piece
out new buildings in the neighborhood, while the poorer ones served as
ready supplies for the winter fires.

John Preston married a daughter of Judge Ewing of Troy, Ohio.
He died about the year 1H20. William Preston became the first sheriff
in this part of Ohio, in 1H24. He married a Miss Butler whose brothers
dwelt at the site of the present Florida, Henry County. He removed
to a farm in St. Joseph Township, Williams County, probably in 1827,
where he died about 1828. His surname is perpetuated at Defiance in
island and creek or 'run.' John Perkins came from near Chillicothe,
and dwelt some years at Camp No. Three — see map ante page 191.
He assisted m the United States Survey of these lands, and then built
the first sawing and flouring mills in this part of Ohio at Brunersburg
in 1822 — see ante page 509. About the year 1833 (or 1839?) he sold

* See Captivities Among the Ohio Aborigines, Reprint with Notes by Charles E. Slocum.

t There were many Scotch and Irish in the early armies in America ; and the term British as used
in this book includes all persons who remained friendly to the British Rovernment.

I It is supposed that this William was the Captain Preston with General Wayne's army, see ante
pat'es 201, 302.

BEGINNING PERMANENT SETTLEMENT AT DEFIANCE. 525

these mills, and built others at Lafayette-', Williams County, where he
died. He was one of the first three Associate j udsfes of Williams County.
James Parti'e died man\' vears later on his farm in Noble Townshi]) on the

r^T^

FORT Dt-tlANLh I'AKK AND CENTENNIAL BLOCKHOUSES

Looking west across the ice and snow covered mouth of the Auglaise River and up the Mauniee. tlie
Clinton Street Bridge in the distance, 13th December, 1900.

These Blockhouses were built in July. 1894, for the Centennial Celebration of Fort Defiance August
8th and 9th. 1M94. William M'Kinley, then Governor of Ohio, was the principal orator. The logs com-
posing these Blockhouses were of many species of timber, and were donated and delivered by the citizens
of town and country around. The roots began to decay and, having fulfilled the purpose of their con-
struction, the buildings were sold by the Defiance (City) Park Commissioners to the highest bidder for
$14;i.33 and they were removed in Septeinber and October. 1901. Each Blockhouse was 22 feel sijuare on
the ground, the logs being hewn (in this instance sawn) to lit closely together. They were two stories in
height, tlie first story being nine feet high. The second story was seven feet from floor to eaves; and it prc-
jected over the sides of the first story, all around, so as to leave an opening of eight inches between the inner
wall of the second story and the outer wall of the first. This, as well as the diagonal or bastion setting
of the houses (see ground plan ante page 199] enabled the soldiers on the floor above to keep the outer
walls of the first story under full observation. The east Blockhouse carried a square, protected outlook
above the roof with inside stairs leading to it. Each of the original Blockhouses carried a cupola — see
ante page 200. The centennial houses were otherwise built as near like the original ones as possible to
determine, and they well fitted the existing embankments. But a stiort section of Palisade, to illustrate
the connection of the inner corners of the Blockhouses, was built for the Centennial Celebration; it is
seen in the engraving between the two houses to the left.

The trees in the Park (Honey Locust. Cleditsia triacanthos. L.^ have grown from the seed since the
War of 1813. The largest is somewhat over sixteen feet in circumference at the smallest part of its trunk.

The platform seen at the Point bore no relation to the Fort. It was a resting place and outlook for
visitors. Becoming unsafe, it was removed in 1903.

right bank of the Tifhn Kivtr. He married a dau.^hterof John Perkins.
John Plummer also cleared a farm in Tif^n Townshi]^.

William Travis, father of the present citizens William C. and
Forman E. Travis, first visited Defiance in l^UK In addition to the

526 THE MAUMEE RIVER BASIN.

Americans before named there were then here John Driver and famih'.
He was a silversmith and was soon joined by his brother Thomas who
settled on a farm a few miles up the Maumee. There were also here
at this time five French traders, three having cabins near Fort Defiance
point, one being kept by Peter Lombard who later lived in Delaware
Township, two were situated near the Maumee at the present Perry
Street, and two at the top of the bluff on the north side of the Maumee
near the present Clinton Street. About this time John and George
Hollister established a store at the top of the bluff and there continued
for several vears, the trade being conducted for them part of the time
by Peter Bellaire and George Lantz. They were of the four brothers
Hollister (Frank and William being the names of the other two) who
came from Pittsfield, Massachusetts, through Buffalo. They had a store
at Orleans and later at Perrysburg, and perhaps elsewhere along the
Maumee, for trade with the Aborigines for furs and other peltries, also
for their annuity money. William Travis brought the first wagon into
the central part of the Basin to Defiance* taking it apart at St. Marys
on account of poor road and shipping it by boat via the River St. Mary
to the Maumee at Fort Wayne. The oxen and horses were driven by
land along the Auglaise military road laden with part of his goods.

These were years of scarcity of money. The gatherings from the
forest that could be exchanged as yet were mainly skins of wild
animals which, with the little produce that could be spared from the
clearings, comprised most of the medium of exchange. The incoming
settlers brought a little money, mostly in bills of banks in the larger
towns of Ohio, of nineteen ot which banks for a short time seven were
called good, and those of the other twelve were rated as decent, mid-
dling, and good-for-nothing; and their condition was liable to change
to worse any day. A few coins were also in circulation, but many of
them were clipped and were rated by their weight by the receiving

merchants. t

In the year 1820 the Village of Defiance contained three stores
and* about one hundred people of the Aryan race; and in 1830 Defiance
Township contained a population of 307. The Village of Defiance
was platted in November, 1822, by Benjamin Leavell of Piqua and
Horatio G. Phillips of Dayton, the proprietors. The plat was
acknowledged before Charles Gunn Justice of the Peace April 18,
1823, and the same date it was received for record by Thomas R.

* The first spring carriage to pass through this Basin was probably the one in 1815 in which General
Lewis Cass, then Governor of Michigan Territory, transported his family from Ohio to Detroit. It is
not known to the writer whether they passed along General Hull's road or along the military road down
the left bank of the Auglaise River.

t Compare the Detroit Gaze^e newspaper of October 22. 1819.

THE PLATTING AND DEVELOPING DEFIANCE VILLAGE. 527

M' Knight Recorder of Wood County to which Williams County (then
including Defiance) was subject. The plat was recorded April 2Sth.
It extended from the Auglaise River on the east to Jackson Street on
the west ; and from the Maumee River on the north to Fourth Street
on the south, embracing one hundred and fifty lots. Fort Defiance
point between the Maumee and Auglaise Rivers and Front and Jeffer-
son Streets was donated for public use and is now known as Fort
Defiance Park, and the Court House square was donated for county
buildings. The affairs of the newly platted village were administered
by Mr. Leavell as Mr. Phillips retained his residence at Dayton.

Robert Shirley removed his family from Ross County to Defiance
in the spring of 1821, and was among the last to occupy a building of
Fort Winchester. He became a prominent citizen. His sons James,
Elias and Robert settled on farms up the Auglaise River, and a few of
their descendants yet live in that direction. Among the early settlers
by the Maumee were Samuel Kepler three miles east of Defiance
in 1^21; Joshua Hilton two miles west of Defiance in 1822: and
farther up the river came that year Benjamin Mulligan, Henry, Denni-
son and Samuel Hughes, Oliver Crane, Widow Hill and family, Sam-
uel and William Gordon. The next year came Richard, Thomas and
William Banks, Frederick W. Sperger, Gad Bellaire, James Shirley
from the Auglaise, Horatio N. Curtis, William Snook and several sons,
one of whom, Wilson N. is yet living near Antwerp. Thomas Warren
and Parmenas Wasson came to Defiance in 1822, and the former be-
came a farmer in Delaware Townshij) and later a good citizen in the
town with a large family of which only one member, Isaac, now
remains.

The Evans family became further represented here in 1823 in the
persons of John and Forman, brothers, and Pierce Evans their cousin;
and they continued prominent citizens for many years, rendering effi-
cient aid in the development of Defiance and the adjoining counties.
John, generally known as Doctor, opened a general store some vears
after his arrival, and often dispensed medicine to the sick. Montgom-
ery Evans, before mentioned, was distantly if at all related to these
families. He became a trader with the Aborigines, a farmer and a
real estate dealer. The last representatives of these families at De-
fiance was Rinaldo Evans a farmer, son of Pierce, which Rinaldo died
without children over sixty-six years of age April 27, 1886, at the home-
stead of his father one mile and a half east of Defiance on the north
bank of the Maumee. Moses Heatlev and familv from Miami County,
settled near Blodgett Island in the Auglaise in 1H24. David and Isaac
Hull, Timothy S. Smith, James Craig and Robert Wasson came to
Defiance in 1825. Payne C. Parker came in 1827 and was a general

528 THE MAUMEE RIVER BASIN.

merchant for fourteen or more years selling medicines and being called
Doctor. Within the next six years came C. C. Waterhouse, tavern-
keeper, William Semans, Frederick and Peter Bridenbaugh, Walter
Davis the first cooper, David and James Jolley the first tanners, Jacob
Kniss the first shoemaker, and Pierce Taylor.

At the organization of Wood County in 1820, the outlined Counties
of Henry, Paulding, Putnam and Williams (then including Defiance)
were attached to Wood for government. The Commissioners of Wood
County organized the Township of Auglaise to include the territory of
all these Counties. The Court appointed March 7, 1820, John Perkins
and William Preston of Defiance Justices of the Peace in and for
Auglaise Township for a period of three years, the former qualifying
August 12th before Charles Gunn Justice of the Peace, and the latter
the 14th August before John ferkins. Timothy S. Smith and Charles
Gunn were appointed in April, 1823, in place of William Preston.

Williams County was organized for self-government February 2,
1824, and the Counties of Henry, Paulding and Putnam were attached
to it for their government. Defiance was chosen the seat of govern-
ment by Act of the Legislature January 13, 1825. The first Court of
Common Pleas for these Counties was held at Defiance April 5, 1824,
in the second story of Benjamin Leavell's store, by the appointed
Ebenezer Lane as Presiding Judge, and Associate Judges Robert
Shirley, John Perkins and Pierce Evans, whose commissions from the
Governor were signed February 4th. John Evans was appointed
Clerk, and he produced a bond for $2000 signed by himself, with
Forman Evans, Pierce Evans and Moses Rice as sureties. At the next
meeting of these Judges, May 8th, John Evans was appointed Recorder
of the County. The other County officers had been named, as follows:
Timothy- S. Smith Auditor ; William Preston Sheriff, and Samuel
Vance Assessor. Benjamin Leavell was licensed to sell merchandise
one year on payment of ten dollars into the County Treasury : and he
was also licensed, on payment of one dollar and fifty cents for one
year, to operate a ferry across the Maumee River. George Lantz was
also licensed to operate a ferry across the Maumee at the crossing of
the State Road [at Jefferson Street] at Defiance one year for one dollar.
The prescribed schedule of charges for ferriage was as follows: One
person six pence [6/4 cent piece of silver]: man and horse 18^ cents
[one shilling and six pence]; loaded wagon and team $1.00; four-
wheeled carriage and team 75 cents ; loaded cart and team 50 cents ;
empty cart and team, sled or sleigh and team 37/'2 cents ; horse, mare,
mule or ass, one year old or upwards 6/i. cents ; neat cattle per head 4
cents ; hogs and sheep per head 2 cents.

At the convening of the Judges 25th October, Charles W. Ewing

ORGANIZATION OF WILLIAMS COUNTY OHIO. 529

was appointed Prosecutor for the County, and Jesse Hilton as Justice
of the Peace. Benjamin Leavell was licensed to keep tavern one vear
at his residence on payment of five dollars. Leavell was indicted for
operating a ferry across the Auglaise without license. He plead guilt\^
and was fined one dollar and costs as was, also, Enoch Buck for keeping
a ferry across the Maumee without license. Thomas W. Powell exhib-
ited to the Court a diploma of admission to practice law before the
Supreme Court. Isaac Hull was licensed to sell merchandise one year
for ten dollars, and Samuel Lance to keep tavern at his residence on
payment of five dollars.

The County Commissioners, appointed by the Ohio General
Assembly, reported to the Court at this session. They were Cvrus
Hunter, Charles Gunn and Benjamin Leavell. Their first formal
session, of which we have record, was held December (i, 1S-J4, also in
the second story of Leavell's store at the present 41o Front Street,
Defiance. Timothy S. Smith was chosen Clerk, and it was then
determined that the members should serve one, two and three years
respectively in the order named above. They granted a public road
along the north side of the Maumee from opposite Jefferson Street,
Defiance to the east line of Henry County which was attached to
Williams for government. William Preston, John Evans and Arthur
Burrows were appointed viewers of this road, and John Perkins,
surveyor. Pierce Evans and Robert Shirley gave bond to the com-
missioners for all costs in surveying and viewing 'on conditions the
road should' not become a public highway.' A State Road along this
line was certified to the Commissioners of Wood Countv, to which tiiis
region was then attached, in 1822, and this action of Williams Count\-
appears unnecessary further than a recognition of the State's action —
see subchapter on Public Roads on later page. It was also ordered
that the name of such part of Auglaise Township as organized bv the
Wood County Commissioners, and is situated in the latelv organized
County of Williams, be changed to the name Defiance Township,
according to the petition of sundry electors. The road on the south
bank of the Maumee River from the east line of Henrv County south-
westward to the farm of Samuel Kepler, three miles below Defiance,
was accepted as previously laid out by David Delong, Samuel Bowers
and Payne C. Parker, viewers and surveyor. The contemplated road
from Samuel Kepler's farm up the Maumee along the south bank to
'Delaware Town' (on the right bank of the river nearly opposite the
present Village The Bend ) and thence on the north side of the river to
the Indiana line, was rejected on account of the viewers' non-com]ili-
ance with the Statutes.

At the Commissioners' meeting June 7, 1825, William Semans was

530 THE MAUMEE RIVER BASIN.

appointed Treasurer of Williams Count}'. His bond and oath of office
were accepted the same date. Specifications were given for a jail as
soon as the permanent seat of justice shall be established, in the same
manner as heretofore described in a former order of said Commission-
ers.'* . . . The listers and appraisers of property for taxation were
this year allowed for their services b\' townships as follows : Defiance
$12.50; Delaware $3.75: Richland $3.12/^ : Damascus, which included
all of Henry County, $1.87/2.

At a public sale July 20, 1825, John Blair was the lowest bidder at
six per cent for the collection of the County tax. Pierce Evans and
James M'Connell were his bondsmen. At a special session of the
Commissioners August 22, 1825, Timothy S. Smith resigned the office
of County Auditor, and Thomas Philbrick was appointed to fill the
vacancy until the next election, but George Lantz served instead.
October 15th Isaiah Hughes was appointed by the Court, Commissioner
in place of Benjamin Leavell, resigned. Clark Philbrick was allowed
two dollars December 6th for making a standard half bushel measure,
and a brand, for the County. A County Road was this day granted, to
cross the Auglaise River at the present Hopkins Street and extend
along the south bank of the Maumee eastward to Samuel Kepler's farm
at the Defiance Moraine or South Ridge; also a County Road from the
Indiana line along the north side of the Maumee to cross Bean Creek
[Tiffin River] at or near Perkins' Mill [the present Brunersburg] and
thence to the ford of the Maumee River at Defiance opposite
[James] Jolly's Tannery in said town.' It was also ordered at this
meeting that twenty in-lots be offered for sale on the first Monday of
February, 1826, they being one-half of forty lots donated and deeded
by the proprietors of the village plat to the Commissioners for the
benefit of the County.' Others of these lots were sold later.

Horatio N. Curtis, a pioneer to Paulding County, wrote for the
Antwerp, Ohio, Gazette newspaper in later years that his second visit to
this region was in the year 1825. There were then at Defiance one
small store, one tavern, and five or six families. Isaac Hull also had a

■■■ It is evident from this record that there was a former meeting of the Commissioners of which
no record is found. The jail here mentioned was built of logs in the most primitive way. It was
situated in Defiance on the west side of Wayne Street near Second, on the site of the present jail. The
only prisoner at one time in the summer of 1H36 was a vagabond Aborigine who had been arrested on the
charge of stealing a watch. The time of the next court when he could have legal trial, was several
months distant; and several young rnen, among whom were Allen Braucher. Frederick Bridenbaugh and
James Spafford. perhaps at suggestion of some of their adult friends, determined upon his release. One
evening when Sheriff Preston was at his home, a double log house east of the Auglaise River about the
present 429 Auglaise Avenue, the party took the key from the nail near the door of the jail where the
sheriff kept it. unlocked the door and told the prisoner to get out of town. His steps were quickened
by two rows of young men between whom he was made to pass and who smartly plied the whips in their
hands to his back — in fact he was forced to run a mild kind of gauntlet somewhat after the manner of
his people — and he was not again seen.

CENTRAL PART OF BASIN GOVERNED AT DEFIANCE. SSI

store on the north side of the.Maumee opposite Defiance, and had an
extensive trade with the Aborigines.'

The year 1825 was one of increased activity and extension of the
work of the Methodist Episcopal Church. The Detroit District was
organized this year with two appointments in Michigan Territory
(Detroit Station and Detroit Circuit) and two appointments in Ohio,
the Defiance Mission and the Wyandot Mission at Upper Sandusky.
Reverend William Simmons of Xenia, Ohio, was the first Presiding
Elder, and probably the first preacher at Defiance, in 1825. He soon
sent Reverend Weir to Defiance as missionary. In 1826 Rev. Elias Pettit

GERMAN REFORMED CHURCH BUILDING AND PARSONAGE

Southwest corner Wasliin^ton and Fourth Streets, Defiance. This Church house was the second one bull'
in Defiance by the Methodists, in 1841 on the southwest corner of Wayne and Third Streets. It was sold
to and moved by its present owners in 1872. The original form is retained. From photograph of
May 11, 1904.

( Patten or Pattee?) was sent to this mission which was then in the Mon-
roe, Michigan, Circuit following division of the Detroit Conference.
Meetings were held in the dwelling house of Benjamin Leavell until
later in 1826 when a Class was organized and a small Church house was
built of logs at the present 40(5 W'ayne Street. The names of these
first members have not been preserved. Fort Defiance charge included
all the Maumee Vallev from the Indiana State line to about Waterville
which was included with the \'illage of Maumee. William Sprague was
the preacher at Defiance in 1832-38, and Jacob Martin and John W.
Coolev in l8o4.

532

THE MAUMEE RIVER BASIN.

J. B. Semans, Thomas Warren, James Ward, Isaac Craig and
Nathan Shirley, were chosen a new board of Trustees June 26, 1841,
and it was then decided to erect a new Methodist Church building on
the north corner of their lot, site of the present building 400, 402
Wavne Street. The contract for this building was let to J. B. Semans
at the price of S1050. This was a substantial frame building which
served the Church well until the spring of 1S72 when it was sold to the
German Reformed society and removed to give place for the present
two storv brick house erected in this year. In 1834 Defiance Methodist
Circuit consisted of eleven preaching places with only one Church

.>t : -^s^'

:vv*^:

'"'■.' ir^'JM:

^.^-•'

, ^ :^^.

^s.w^-

GLIMPSE OF SHAWNEE GLEN, CITY OF DEFIANCE. OHIO
Looking northeast down a tributary 11th October, 1901. Part of Mornincside Park.

building — the log house at Defiance. The Church services at the other
ten places were held at private houses named from their owners in the
minutes, the situation of only a part of which are now known, as fol-
lows : [John] Perkins [at the i^resent Brunersburg] Bowen's, Richard-
son's [probably on the present Bryan road] Coy's [at the present
Evansport] Hamilton's, Runyan's, Banks', Quick's, Snook's [in the
present Delaware Township north of the Maumee] and Shirley's [by
the Augiaise River several miles south of Defiance]. Defiance was
made a station in 1857 and Reverend Abraham B. Poe was assigned to
the charge.

FEATURES OF DEFIANCE PAST AND PRESENT. 553

James Lee Gajje of Columbus, contributed to The Firelands Pioneer
(magazine) of June, 1H65, as follows:

I opened a law office in the winter of IHifi in Defiance, Williams County. I think
the first in Williams County. It was in an upper room in the inn of Benjamin Leavell.
an upright man in whose excellent family I boarded. He was one of the proprietors of
the town. My office was also my bedroom and, on public days, it was also the bedroom
of many others. Land and lots were far more abundant than dwellings. There were
but few families in town -I remember only those of [Kobert] Wasson, Benjamin Leavell,

SH.WVNEE GLEN WITHIN CITY OF UEFl.WCE, OHIO
From near the mouth of the principal tributary. Sulphur Sprinys in the distance.

Doctor John Evans the Clerk of the Court, George Lantz the Recorder, and Forman
Evans. All these have, I believe, passed to the spirit land, unless Judge Forman
Evans survives.

There were, when I removed to the Maumee country in 1824, in all the fourteen
northwestern cotmties [now by subdivision nineteen counties] but few more white people
than are now in the present restricted limits of Williams County. Within these limits
[of the present Williams County] there was not then a solitary white man. The settle-
ments were confined to the borders of the rivers, and did not extend far above Defiance.
There were on the lower Maumee quite a number of mongrel French and Aborigines; and
in the fourteen counties there were more savages than white people. These savages
were mostly a degenerate, drunken remnant of Ottawas and Pottawotamies. There were,
also, a few Wyandots and Miamis who were splendid specimens of physical man. The
sugar consumed in Williams and Wood Counties at that time was mostly made by these
savages ; and it was a most filthy product inasmuch as they would boil their game in it [in
the sap of the sugar maples while condensing to sugar] and that too, I was told [with the
game] in undressed condition. They brought this sugar in bark vessels, called Mococks,

554

THE MAUMEE RIVER BASIN.

holding thirty to fifty pounds each. They were so shaped as to be carried like a knap-
sack. They used small brass kettles for evaporating the sap. These Aborigines also
brought in most of the honey that was used. It was always strained, but it was strained
through their blankets, which were never washed except after straining this honey. The
Aborigines also supplied us with cranberries and whortleberries, both of which were
abundant and cheap.

There were then in Williams [that part now Defiance] County, Montgomery Evans,
Pierce Evans, Judge [John] Perkins, the two elder Hiltons [Joshua and Horace, brothers]
Judge [Robert] Shirley and his two sons [James and Robert] Christian Shouf, Major
Rice, Mr. Byers, and an old man named Myers who was drowned in .\pril, 1S27, in a

THE FIRST BRICK COURT HOUSE IN NORTHWESTERN OHIO

Looking northeast 21st April, 1902. It was built in 1826 near the northeast corner of Wayne and Second
Streets, Defiance. It served the present Defiance, Williams, Paulding, and Putnam, Counties as a Court
House and it was also used for reliyious meetings, schools, etc. The late Chief justice of the United
States Supreme Court, Morrison R. Waite of Toledo, made one of his earliest legal pleas in this house.
It has for many years last past been in comfortable use as a private residence by the Hon. Henry Hardy.
The First Presbyterian Church to the right was begun building in 1848, and was dedicated in June. 1856.

little bayou while intoxicated. Judge Samuel Vance and Charles Gunn also resided within
the judicial limits of Williams County at Prairie du Masque [now Damascus, Henry
County]. So did the half-breed Mohegan named Porter, who was afterwards hung at
Perrysburg for the murder of Isaac Richardson [see ante page .i21].

One day a party put fire to a shell [to the fuse of a six-pounder cannon shell that
had been left at the abandonment of Fort Winchester in the spring of 1815] which
exploded. One piece struck Mr. Leavell's house eight or ten rods distant, breaking the
siding ; another piece struck a house nearer with greater force. . . No person was
injured.

In 1S2() I paid the whole of the Williams County State Tax with Wolf-scalp Cer-
tificates, and drew a heavy percentage besides from the State Treasury in payment of
the balance due the wolf hunters of Williams County for wolves killed that year within

RELATION OF DEFIANCE TO NORTHWESTERN OHIO. 555

the limits of that County [which then governed the present Defiance. Henry, Paulding,
and Putnam Counties].

Ebenezer Lane was the second Judge of Common Pleas in north-
western Ohio. He succeeded George Tod in 1H25, and was the first
President Judge to hold Court at Defiance or b\' the Maumee in Ohio
above Perr\-sburg. He was succeeded by David Higgins, who wrote
as follows:*

A CORNER IN THE AfTHOR'S COLLECTION OF RELICS

June 18, 1903, in all comprising many hundreds of articles that have served important use here in history
of man, and have been supplanted by modern inventions. The thrifty pioneers made their clothiny from
flax and wool. In cases of necessity, usually before flax [Linum usltatissimum L.l could be cultivated,
the women and children Rathered the stalks of hemp [Cannabis sat/va L.) or of nettles, probably the
Clearweed [Adicea pumila L.. Raf.) and possibly they found some wild yellow flax [Linum striatum Wait.)
which they stripped, dressed, spun, and wove into linen cloth that did Rood service.

I was elected by the General Assembly Judge of the Second Judicial Circuit of Ohio
in February, IHHO. The Circuit lying in the northwest corner of the State, included
about one-fifth part of the territory of Ohio, . . and was composed of the counties of
Huron. Richland, Delaware, Sandusky, Seneca, Crawford, Marion, Wood, Hancock,
Henry, Williams, Putnam, Paulding and Van Wert. The Counties of Henry, Paulding,
Putnam, and Van Wert, were unorganized and attached to adjacent counties [from which
Allen, .\uglaise. Defiance, Fulton, and Lucas, have been since formed].

We had been attending Court at Findlay. Our Circuit route from that town was
first to Defiance, and from there to Perrysburg. A countryman agreed to take our horses

* Compare Knapp's History of the Maumee Valley, pane 379.

556 THE MAUMEE RIVER BASIN.

directly through the Black Swamp to Perrysburg [along the milkary road, see map ante
page 2S]. We purchased a canoe [the good pirogue Jurisprudence] and taking with us
our saddles, bridles, and baggage, proposed to descend the Blanchard and Auglaise
Rivers to Defiance. Our company consisted of Rodolphus Dickinson, J. C. Spink,
'Count' I Andrew] Coffinberry, myself, and a countryman whose name I forgot. The
voyage was a dismal one to Defiance, through an unsettled wilderness of some sixty miles
[and more]. Its loneliness was only broken by the intervening Aborigine settlement at
the Ottawa village, where we were hailed and cheered lustily by the 'Tawa Aborigines as
would be a foreign warship in the port of New York. From Defiance we descended the
Maumee to Perrysburg where we found all well. In descending the Maumee we came
near running into [a part of] the rapids where we would probably have been swamped ;
but we were hailed from the shore and warned of our danger.

Defiance was incorporated as a village in January, 1836, and the
election of its first officers was held the second Tuesday of the next
April resulting as follows: John Lewis Ma\'or : James Hudson, Jonas
Colbv, Amos Evans, Horace Sessions and Jacob Kniss Trustees. The
Mayor 'qualified before Forman Evans Associate Judge of Common
Pleas Court, and the other officers before the Mayor, excepting Horace
Sessions who declined to serve and John Oliver was qualified instead.
George W. Crawford was appointed Recorder in place of E. S. Per-
kins elected but ineligible; John Hilton was appointed Marshall;
E. C. Case Assessor, and Alfred Purcell Treasurer. John Lewis

resigned the office of Mayor December 30, 1836, and Doctor

Crawford was apjjointed to fill the vacanc}'. An ordinance at the first
meeting of the Trustees provided that Any person or persons destroy-
ing the public point lying in the junction of the Maumee and Auglaise
Rivers [the earthworks of Fort Defiance] either by shooting, chopping
or digging, or in anv manner whatever, upon conviction before the
Mayor shall be subject to a fine.'

In the year 1839 Williams County voted to remove the, seat of
government from Defiance — Hicksville, Milford, Farmer and Wash-
ington Townships in the present Defiance County being most active in
this movement — and in July, 1840, land for a Court House was ac-
cepted as a gift from the American Land Company at the site of the
present Williams County Court House in Bryan, which was then but
little cleared of forest trees, and which village there platted was named
in honor of John A Br^'an, and a Court House was built in 18-10-41.
The brick Court House at Defiance was sold for private use.

Defi.\nce County, Ohio,

Was organized by Act of the Legislature 4th March, 1845, to become
operative after the first Monday in April. This County was composed
of townships taken from other counties as follows; From Henry,
Adams Township which had as taxpayers in 1837, Phineas Adams,
George Briggs, Jacob Becker, Jonathan Davidson, Joseph Frantz,

ORGANIZATION OF DEFIANCE COUNTY OHIO. 5Z1

John Hornish came 1836, John Hively, Jacob Hivel}-, Darius Jones,
Eli Markel, William Mosher (the first settler in RidKeville) Jacob
Shock, Amos Shivelv, John Scott, Jacob Tittle. Richland Township
which had as settlers in IHHT, Edward Bean, Isaac E. Braucher came
1824, Erastus Carter, Christopher Braucher, Susanna Craig, Christo-
pher Cooper, Elizabeth Derum, William Dany, Jacob Davis, Jonathan

Evans, J. C. Freedy, Groves
Hully Gulick, Jeptha Groves,
lidward Hughes, Joseph Hive-
ly, Michael Hively, Thomas
Hively, Jacob James, Samuel
Kepler came 182'2, | a s p e r
Landes, Thomas Lewis, George
Luckinbill, M. James, James
Moorehead, Jacob Markel, John
Richart, Frederick Rich art,
James Lewis, William Rohn,
came 1822, Charles Rohn,
Samuel Rohn came 1822, John
Stout, Solomon Shaw, Edward
Shasteen, George Tittle, Wil-
liam Shasteen, Peter Tittle,
Ishmael Wilson, Benjamin
Weidenhamer came 1H34;
Highland Township taken in
part from Henry Putnam and
Paulding Counties, having as tax
paying settlers in 1837, Henry
Brechbill came 1835, Isaac
Fisher, Philip Bellinger, James
S. Greer, William Griffith, Henr\- Graper, Hiram Griffith, Jacob Greer,
Sawyer Gonard, Tarleton M'Farland, John M. Sanford: from Pauld-
ing County was taken the south part of the present Defiance Town-
ship; and from Williams County came the townships of Hicksville,
Milford, Farmer, Mark, Delaware, Washington, Tiffin and Noble.

The first term of Common Pleas Court for Defiance Countv was
held April 2, 1^45, in a small brick schoolhouse than standing at the
present 506 Wayne Street, Defiance. During the years 1845-46 a new
and rather pretentious Court House was built facing Clinton Street
between Second and Court Streets, one square west of the first Court
House — see engraving ante page 534. The cost of this second Court
House was about $7500. It was razed in the year 1870 to give place
to the present building. The first jail was built in 1825 at the site of

FIRST DEFIANCE COUNTY COURT HOUSE

I845-I87I : the second in the VillaEe of Deliance. See
ante page 534. Photographed in 1H66.

538

THE MAUMEE RIVER BASIN.

the present jail on Wayne Street, and opposite the Court House built
in 1h26 by the Commissioners of Williams County. This jail was a
log building sixteen feet square, one story high, and with a shake roof.
In 1835 a new jail was built, after the plan then current, of squared
logs, doubled in first story the inner course being upright. The second
storv was for the imprisonment of persons convicted for non-payment
of debt. It was of single wall, and was entered by outside stairs.
This building did service for Williams County for ten years, for De-
fiance County twenty-five years, and was replaced in 1870 by the
present commodious and modern structure of jail and Sheriff's resi-
dence facing Second Street, corner of Wavne.

DEFIANCE, OHIO, IN THE YEAR 1846

Sketched by Henry Howe. Lock Number One. enterini: the Miami and Erie Canal into the Maumee
River on the ripht; Exchange Hotel with belfry beyond at corner of Clinton and Second Streets; Court-
house built in lf^4.i-46opposite tothe left. Trading: and Warehouses at south end of Clinton Street Bridge.
Mouth of the AuKlaise River and site of Fort Defiance by the flagpole on the left. Looking southeast.
Defiance and vicinitv had a population at tliis time of between four and five hundred people.

The era of great speculation and purchases of lands began in the
central part of this Basin in the year 1834 when James Samuel Wads-
worth of New York, from 1861-64 General in the war against the
Southern Rebellion, and his brother, purchased many thousand acres
of land along the Maumee and Auglaise Rivers. Much of these lands
were managed in later years by John F. Deatrick of Defiance. The
Hicks Land Company of New York City, and the American Land
Company, purchased land in 1835-36, the former in the western part of
the i^resent Defiance Countv and the latter in Williams County, to the
aggregate of over 100,000 acres. Parties from Columbus, and other

THE ERA OF LAND SYNDICATES AND SPECULATION. 559

parts of Ohio, also purchased larffely of land in the Basin. Henry W.
Hicks of the firm of Samuel Hicks and Sons shipjjing merchants,
New York City, and Isaac S. Smith of the firm of Smith and Macy,
Steamboat Owners and Commission Merchants of Buffalo, New York,
composed the firm of the Hicks Land Comjiany. John A. Bryan of
Columbus, then Auditor for Ohio acted as assent in selecting lands for
this company and Ephraim Burwell of Columbus was sent to the land
to open a road, to choose site for a town and start the sale of lands.
The site of the present Hicksville was chosen for the village. Its
survey was completed 3rd September, 1836, and the present Hicksville
and Antwerp road as far as the Maumee River was surveyed. Mr.
Smith sold his interest in the land to Mr. Hicks who sent Alfred P.
Edgerton a young bookkeeper in his business house to Hicksville to
take charge of his interests. Mr. Edgerton arrived at this embryo
town in the wilderness the 17th April 1837. He was a man of great
energy and of good judgment. He remained agent for the American
Land (Company until the remainder of their land was divided among
the members and the company dissolved. He also continued as agent
for his first employer, Henry W. Hicks of the Hicks Land Company,
until his death "2-tth September, 1867, and continued to act for his
widow until her interest was purchased.''' He also , represented the
present Counties of Defiance, Williams, Paulding, Van Wert, Mercer,
Auglaise, Allen, Henry, Putnam, and part of Fulton, in the Ohio
Senate in 1845 ; and in 1850 he was chosen Representative in Congress.
In 1885 he was appointed United States Civil Service Commissioner.
He died at Hicksville 14th May, 1897, aged eighty-four years, favorably
known throughout the Basin.

The Legislature of Ohio in 1H49 ordered the removal of the State
Land Office at Lima to Defiance for the sale of United States Grant
of alternate land Sections in aid of the Miami and Erie Canal, and of
the Ohio section of the Wabash and Erie Canal. Hamilton Davison
who had been elected Receiver at this office in Lima for four years,
established the office in Defiance. The State Land Office that had for
some length of time been open at Perrysburg by the lower Maumee,
was also united with the Defiance Office by the same Legislative Act,
and Mr. Davison had entire control. The former appraisement of
these lands at price varying from $1.25 to $3.00 per acre, was now
ordered at one-third discount to actual settlers in quantity not to exceed
160 acres ; and this order brought many purchasers. The wood huild-

'■' These early land purchases did not prove very profitable. The tirst cost, taxes, assessments-
expenses of agencies, the lencth of time required to sell the lands, with competing dealers, low prices
and often lone terms of payment, and interest on the investments, left little if any profit. It was only
from quicker and fortunate disposal of timber or land, that profit resulted.

540

THE MAUMEE RIVER BASIN.

ing in which this office was located, on the south bank of the Maumee
River, northwest corner of Clinton and Front Streets, was destroyed
by fire before daybreak of April 10, 1851. The second story was
occupied jointly with the United States Land Office, the Registrar of
which (Abner Root who usually slept in the office) was absent at the
time of the fire, and most of the United States plats and papers were
burned, necessitating the sending of duplicates from Washington.
Receiver Davison succeeded in entering the office and pushing his
little iron safe to and down the stairs, thus saving the plats of the
State Lands and other papers which enabled him to immediately con-

FORT DEFIANCE PARK, DEFIANCE, OHIO, AND FIRST CENTENNIAL BLOCKHOUSES

Lookini! southwest lOth April, 1900. Second Street Bridge Across Auglaise River on the left; St. Mary
Roman Catholic Church beyond. Beyond the tree at the riaht Blockhouse is seen the spire of St. Paul
Methodist Episcopal Church. To the rifht is the smoke of the Erie Flourinc Mill, and The Defiance
Machine Works. The Court House tower and chimneys are further to the right, with the City Hall tower,
and spire of St, John Roman Catholic Church to their right and beyond. The logs in the foreground
are near the last of an unexcelled forest.

tinue sales in the upper room of a store by the Canal Lock No. 1 near-by.
After most of the State Lands were sold, the Legislature abolished the
offices of Registrar and Receiver, and General Reuben H. Gilson was
given charge of the remaining State Lands with the title of Land
Agent. He kept the office in his bank at the southwest corner of
Clinton and First Streets, Defiance. He was succeeded in 1854 by
Levin Porter who nearly completed the sales by 1857 when all the
papers of the office were sent to the Auditor of State, Columbus.
Some of these lands by the Canal were sold for from eight to fourteen
dollars per acre.

THE ERA OF SHIPTIMBER GUTTING AND SHIPPING. 541

Early in the 1850's the British shipyards became acquaintc-d with
the superior qualities of size, solidity and toughness of the oak timber
of this Basin, whereupon an increasing tide of foremen with companies
of choppers, scorers and hewers, brawny and expert axmen, mostl\'
French from Lower Canada, swept up the Maumee River each year to
Defiance as their headquarters. They came not like their forebears of
two centuries before, but with keen axes that during each winter con-
tinually sounded and echoed the destruction of the mightv forest, and

RAFT OF SHIPTIMUER iSQUARKD OAK TI.MIUCR IN THE MAUMKH RIVKK

At Defiance, Ohio, 4tli June, 1902, This is a small but complete Raft, contaillinij fourteen Canal Lock-
ings and about 11.76(1 cubic feet — the last run of a k'real industry. The Shanty is the Cookinn and Lodj:-
iuc House of the Rafters, and it carries the hay on its roof for the horses that draw the Raft throuyh the
River and the Miami and Erie Canal. Lookinn southeast from the Clinton Street Bridyc. Fort Defiance
Park and the Mouth of the Auiilaise River beyond the raft — see ante paue 53.5.

betokened the advent of a numerous population of tillers of the soil.
"At first the timber was sold for two cents per cubic foot, the purchaser
to cut wherever and whatever he desired, he also to do all the meas-
uring, and to re]:>ort as he desired. This at first related to the oak
only. The large trees of softer woods required in the rafts as floats to
keep the oak from sinking were not considered here of value worth
mentioning although they were of \alue in Toledo whert^- the rafts were
separated and the oak loaded on vessels for Ouebec there to be
reshipped to Europe. As the largest, fairest of the trees near the

542 THE MAUMEE RIVER BASIN.

rivers and canals were cut, the axmen moved back into the forest.
The lands were soon purchased by the increasing and competing
timbermen, the price paid varying from five to ten dollars per acre;
and these purchasers after cutting the timber as fully as they thought
desirable would sell the land to others at a great advance, and the new
purchaser would sell to others or would himself cut the largest trees
left. This process has been repeated a number of times, first with the
oak timber and later with the softer woods. This work continued
activeh' for a third of a century, with twelve to fifteen years in the
decline. Joel Dils was one of the active leaders in 1855; Sherrel
Weaver from above Rochester, New York, in 1856; Seraphin Daoust
from Coteau, Canada; Alonzo Chesbrough from Lockport, New York;
Calvin and Breck from Kingston, Canada, with Alpheus A. Aldrich
and Samuel Booth as helpers: Sylvester Neelon of St. Catharines,
Canada; also Charles J. Chenevert of Quebec who came in 1868 to
remain and whose son Charles Edward has gathered up the last of such
trees in this Basin during the last few years. There were many others,
business men with capital, contractors, and foremen, at work in this
shiptimber cutting, squaring and rafting during the earlier years.

Formerly the staves for barrels, like shingles, were riven and shaven
by hand from the smaller oak trees and from other timber that could
be easily split. The heavy growths of elm were thought valueless, and
in the clearings they, with noble growths of hickories, black walnut,
ash, and maple that were in the way and could not readily be turned to
better account than their ashes were cut down and, when dry were
gathered promiscuously into log heaps' and burned with the brush.
Demand soon came for the more valuable timber ; and about the year 1863
it was determined that the elm trees, which had been looked upon as
worthless cumberers of the ground, would make valuable staves for
lighter barrels. The tenacious fibres of this wood, however, made its
splitting impracticable, but here as in other affairs the ingenuity of man
overcame the difficulty. A strong, sharp, horizontal blade was set in
strong frame with downward motion to slice staves from short sections
of logs or parts of the larger logs that had been boiled or steamed in
compartments made for the purpose. This was the beginning of the final
era for the conquering of the forest. These stave-making mills ' fac- '
tories' multiplied in the succeeding years into hundreds along the
canals, and along each succeeding railway.

The preparation of hoops for barrels also became a great industry.
At first, and so long as sufficient supply lasted, the hickory saplings —
the younger trees which were found in countless number — of proper
size were cut, split, smoothed, and sent in straight bundles to the city
markets. No machiner}' was required for this work and, in fair, mild

THE ERA OF GENERAL CLEARING OF THE FOREST. 545

weather, the work was done in the open air, and at other times in
shanties. The money received for the right, the cutting, and the prep-
aration of hoop-poles, was an important item in the paying for the land
and in furnishing the food and suiijilies for many of the first settlers.
This important liranch of the timber industry was sometimes sneered
at bv residents of older and less fortunate parts of the State, and even

THE VILLAGE OF DEl-IANCK IN \stv, LOOKING SOUTH

to this time their former members of the Legislature in their reminis-
cent moods speak of the representatives from the Maumee region as 'of
the Hoop-pole District.'

About the year IHHO hoops Irom elm tree bodies began to be made
by slicing them from boiled plank that had been sawed to proper thick-
ness for the hoop's width. This process was followed after a year or
two by small saws to cut hoops of right thickness from planks without
the boiling. .-Miout 1HM7 rotary veneer cutting machines were employed
wherein the cutting blade is stationary and the rotating steam-boiled
logs are sliced into continuous sheets for thickness, which are then
divided into hoops of proper widths by the downward blade of another
machine. Yet another machine rolls several of these hoops, from eight
to twelve as desired, together into compact coil for convenience of
counting and shipping.

544

THE MAUMEE RIVER BASIN.

These stave and hoop making' mills became inciters of new villages
the existence of manv of which is now but a memory since the scarcity
of timber caused removal of the machinery to other places; and the
timber has become so scarce that only an occasional stave and hoop
'factory' can now be found in the Basin. They well fulfilled their
mission as agencies for the final clearing of the land from which the
oak and other more generally valuable trees had been taken. The
prices of the later timber also increased with the competition until the
elm that had been rejected for so many years by timber dealers, in later
years netted the owners far more money than did the heavy oak removed
in former years.

Manv other manufactories were estal^lished in this Basin which
used much of this large growth of timber of all kmds, among the

principal ones being those for hubs,
spokes, fellies, etc., for wagons
and carriages ; agricultural imple-
ments of various kinds, trucks,
boxes, shipping crates, wheelbar-
rows, furniture, pails, handles of
all kinds including knobs, and
dimension lumber of all kinds.

There have been many trees of
different species in this Basin that,
even among the general very large
growths, have been very notable for
their size and grandeur. But few
of these will here be mentioned in
addition to those already' named —
see Diary of General Wayne's Cam-
paign beginning ante page 19 5
where encampments are named from
large trees. The Council Elm on
the left bank of the Maumee River
at the Grand Rapids was for gener-
ations a great landmark — see map ante page 309. So were the
large apple tree and the Council Elm at Fort Wayne — see map
ante page 97 ; and the Council Oak and the Great Apple Tree at
Defiance — see map ante page 191. The pioneer settlers in the
Maumee River region marveled at the large number and size of the
appletrees found here at the time of their advent, particularly at
Defiance and Fort Wayne. None could tell them of the age of these
trees; but they were undoubtedly planted by the fruit-loving pioneer
French, like the apple trees along the Detroit and St. Lawrence

THE GREAT APPLE TREE AT DEFIANCE
A man six feet in height standing by it.

THE MORE NOTABLE OF THE LATER GREAT TREES. 545

Rivers.* General Wayne siiarud the great apple tree on the bank of
the Maumee opposite his Fort Defiance in 17'.l4. It was also simred
b}' General Winchester and the other commanders who led their soldiers
past it in the War of 1812. For many years after the permanent settle-
ment began, this and other trees in the vicinity supplied every man,
woman and child with all the apples they wanted, and very good apples
they were as all the old residents of Defiance can yet testify. Records
began to be made, and the tree on the north bank of the Maumee
opposite the site of Fort Defiance became recorded as the largest
apple tree in America. Benson J. Lossing visited Defiance in the year
1860 in interest of his Pictorial Field-Boole of the War o] 1812. and he
wrote 0f this 'aged and gigantic tree.' Decay had begun in it, how-
ever, at this time.t

There have been many other trees in this Basin that partook of the
endurance, the magnitudf, and the grandeur of the massive oaks sur-
rounding them. About the middle
of March, 1901, a black walnut tree
fJuglans nigra 'L.) was cut in east-
ern Williams County, Ohio, that
measured over eight feet in diam-
eter, and over seventy feet to the
first limb. This tree was valued at
over $4000 but was sold to a Boston
firm for $;i300.+ This kind of timber
was used lavishly in the early frame
buildings, and for fencing. A dwell-
ing house taken down at Defiance
in 1901 yielded valuable quantity
and quality of heav}' black walnut
timber in its frame, and of like lumber in its heavy interior finish. A
Button- wood or Plane-tree ( Platan us occidentalis 'L.) commonly called
sycamore, was cut 18th February, 1902, near Junction, Paulding County,

THE SECOND HOME

Deserted several years ago for a more modern
structure, but yet (I9(M) standinc near Sherwood.

'^ There were a large number of apple trees alony the Detroit River in 1718. Compare Paris
Document VII, New York Colonial Documents volume ix, page 8K6.

t According to writings by Joseph Ralston and Benjamin B. Woodcox, the latter living many years
in the yard with the tree and a carpenter used to measurements, this venerable tree measured twenty-one
feet and nine inches in circumference four feet above the ground: another record gives it twenty-seven
feet. It was upwards of forty-hve feet in height, and was over sixty feet in foliage diameter. About
18,50 the branches began to split the trunk from its decay and their weight, and in IKw tlie two larger, the
east and west, branches were bolted together with an iron rod three-fourths inch in diameter and foiu teen
feet in length for their support. The south branch fell to the ground about the year 1875: and the last
branch went down from the wind in 1887. ' In the year 1862 upwards of one hundred and twenty-hve
bushels of fair size tart apples were picked from this tree ' — from printed leaflet now in the writer's
possession. See Addresses. Memorials and Sketches by the Maumee Valley Pioneer Association 1901,
page ,54.

+ Toledo Daily Blademh Apnl, 1902,

546 THE MAUMEE RIVER BASIN.

for John Marshall and Son of Defiance, that measured seven feet and
four inches in diameter, and that was estimated to cut 15,000 feet of
Iunil)er. Man\' elm trees previously bought by this firm, furnished
ei^ht K^ood logs each over twelve feet in length.

Fort Wayne and Northeastern Indiana.

The white people at Fort Wa\'ne after the Treaty of Greenville in
1814, in addition to the Garrison, were: Benjamin F. Stickney Aborig-
ine Agent and Perry B. Kircheval his clerk: George and John E. Hunt
with a store of goods for the Aborigine trade; also John P. Hedges
with a store, and Peter Oliver. Prominent among the settlers who
arrived in 1815 were Doctors Turner and Samuel Smith from Lancaster,
Ohio, and the French traders Louis Bourie and Charles and James
Peltier with their families. Doctor Trevitt came in 1816.

This year a new United States building was erected, principally by
the soldiers, on the site of the one burned by the savages in 1812 south-
west of the Fort. This was for use of the Agent in paying annuities to
and counselling with the Aborigines who, after the War of 1812 and the
renewal of treaties, gathered around to be fed. .The condition of these
Aborigines at this time is mentioned on page ante 428.

Indiana was admitted to the Union as a State 19th April, 1816, the
Act of Congress providing that latitude 41 ^ 46' should be the northern
boundary, or about ten miles north of the territorial line. This line
was not surveyed and marked until the spring of 1827. Northeastern
Indiana was yet included in Knox County, with capitol at Vincennes.
This County was represented in the Constitutional Convention held at
Corydon by John Badolet, John Benefiel, John Johnson, Benjamin
Parke, and William Polk, none of whom then lived in the northeastern
part of the State. In the year 1818 Randolph County was organized to
include all this part of the State, with Winchester as the seat of justice.

The withdrawal of the soldiers, and the abandonment of Fort
Wayne in 1819 by the United States, was greatly lamented by the
settlers thereabout, as they had been indebted to the garrison for nearlj^
all their social stimulus and diversions. This loss was gradually com-
pensated for, however, by the arrival of new settlers, prominent among
whom were Samuel Hanna from Dayton, Ohio, and Captain James
Riley who came the 24th November to survey the United States lands.
There were then in the vicinity of the head of the Maumee River less
than thirty dwelling houses, occupied by French and American families.
Captain Riley was verj' favorably impressed with the country.

There was a rapid influx of people to Fort Wayne Village during
the summer of 1820* as shown by Captain Riley's letter of November

See ante pane 407 for description of Fort Wayne al this time by Reverend Isaac MacCoy.

EARLY AMERICAN SETTLEMENT OF FORT WAYNE. 547

20th to Edward Tiffin Surveyor General. He also j;ave account of the
unsavory business then conducted there. He estimated the number of
white people there at this date as about one thousand, made up largely
of traders from Ohio, Michigan, Indiana, and New York. They were
attracted thither with their stock for trade (which was mostly composed
of spirituous liquors) for the annuity payments to the Aborigines.
The competition of so many traders, stocked with so much of intoxi-
cating beverages, among the several thousand Aborigines who gathered
there to receive the United States bounty and who, from nature and
habit, were unable to resist the teinptations to drink with which the\-
were surrounded, produced a bedlam of scenes that were shocking in
the extreme to all but those whose consciences had become blunted
and calloused by long association with the vices of unbridled sensuous
indulgences. These abuses had been increasing in American territory,
transferred from Canada since the War of 1812, from the rall_ving and
competition of the worst characters among the French, British and
American traders who, like the grog dealers of all times, generally
eluded the attempts to curtail their iniquitous business. The remedy
suggested by Captain Riley for these disgraceful scenes was the speedy
survey and marketing of the land along the Maumee and Wabash, and
encouragement for its occupancx- bv farmers.

The establishment of a Land Office at Fort Wayne for eastern
Indiana, was approved 8th May, 1822. Joseph Holman of Wayne
County was appointed Registrar and Captain Samuel C. Vance of
Dearborn County was appointed Receiver. The lands were advertised
for sale, to begin 23rd October, 1823, at the site of the Fort, to the
highest bidder above $1.25 per acre the Government's minimum price.
About forty acres around the site of the Fort were reserved by the
United States. Congress gave authority May 31st, 1830, to the
Associate Judges of the County of Allen to enter at the Land Office at
minimum price, for the use and benefit of the County, so much of this
Reservation of forty acres "including Fort Wayne and the reserve for
the use of the Aborigine Agency established there, as may not fall to
the State of Indiana under the Canal Act of 2nd March, 1827." * The
remains of this Reservation were later set apart for the benefit of the
Wabash and Erie Canal : and were sold to Cj'rus Taber who platted it
into forty building lots loth April, 1835, and it has since been known
as Taber's Addition to the City of Fort Wayne.

In 1821 Alexis Coquillard opened a store for the Aborigine trade at
Fort Wayne. William G. and George W, Ewing also began trade
there in 1822 and remained jjrominent dealers with the Aborigines for

* Laws oj the United States volume viii, pane 'itH.

548

THE MAUMEE RIVER BASIN.

many years, extending their trade among other tribes than the Miamis.
Major Stephen H. Long, of and with the Corps of Topographicai
Engineers white on their way from the East in 1823, wrote in his
Expedition to the Sources of the River St. Peter in Minnesota, regarding
Fort Wavne as follows:

At Fort Wayne we made a stay of three days, and to a person visiting the Aborigine
country for the first time, this place offers many characteristic and singular features.
The village is small — it has grown under the shelter of the fort, and contains a mixed and
apparently very worthless population. The inhabitants are chiefly of Canadian origin,
all more or less imbued with Aborigine blood. The confusion of languages, owing to
the diversity of Aborigine tribes which generally collect near a fort, makes the traveler
imagine himself in a real babel.

CITY OF FORT WAYNE, INDIAN.'^

Lookint! south of west from the Tower of the Allen County Court House 14th July. 1902. The
River St. Mary flows from left to rifht by the first trees on the right. The Portage Path to Little River
met the St. Mary toward the left of the view near the French Post Miami built about 1680; and further
on the left the view is down the middle of the ancient channel that drained the Maumee Glacial Lake
before the Maumee River beyan to form. It is now a fertile country.

The business of a town of this kind differs so materially from that carried on in our
cities, that it is almost impossible to fancy ourselves within the same territorial limits, but
the disgust which we entertain at the degraded condition in which the white man, the

DESCRIPTION OF FORT WAYNE VILLAGE IN 1823. 549

descendant of the European, appears, is perhaps the strangest sensation which we exper-
ience. To see a being in whom from his complexion and features we should expect to
find the same feelings which dwell in the bosom of every refined man, throwing off his
civilized habits to assume the garb of a savage, has something which partakes of the redic-
ulous as well as the disgusting. The awkward and constrained appearance of those
Frenchmen who had exchanged their usual dress for the breech-cloth and blanket was as
visible as that of the Aborigine who assumes the tight body-coat of the white man. The
feelings which we experienced while beholding a little Canadian stooping down to pack up
and weigh the hides which an Aborigine had brought for sale, while the latter stood in an
erect and commanding posture, were of a mixed and certainly not of a favorable nature.
At each unusual motion made by the white man. his dress, which he had not properly
secured, was disturbed, and while engaged in restoring it to its proper place he was the
butt of the jokes and jibes of a number of squaws and Aborigine boys who seemed already

CITY OK FORT WAYNE, INDIANA

Lookini; north from the Tower of the Allen County Court House Uth July. I9t>3. The River St.
Mary is seen on the left. The trees in the middle distance mark the course of the River St. Joseph
which joins the St. Mary near the left of the Columbia Street Bridce toward the rJKht of the view.
The trees to the right of the Bridce mark the course of the Maumee River which turns to the east in
the distance. The white Flaa Staff to the riyht of the Bridk'e is on the small triangular piece of
ground — all that is left free to the public as a park — of the site of General Wayne's Fort Wayne, corner
of Main and Canal Streets. Beyond is the site of the ancient Kekionca (blackberry patch) the main
Village of the Miamis: and yet further up the east bank of the St. Joseph is the site of the second
French Fort Miamis. built in 1749-50 and surrendered to the British in 176(). Westward from this Fort,
on the opposite side of the St. Joseph, was another early prominent Miami \'illaee.

550 THE MAUMEE RIVER BAStN.

to be aware of the vast difference which exists between them and the Canadian furdealefs.
The village is exclusively supported by the fur trade, which has, however, gradually
declined, owing to the diminution of the Aborigine population. The traders seldom leave
the town but have a number of Canadians called engages in their service who accompany
the Aborigines in their summer hunts, supply them with goods in small quantities, and
watch them that they shall not sell their goods [furs] to traders other than their em-
ployers. The furs brought in consist principally of deer and raccoon skins. Bear, otter
and beaver have become very rare. The skins when brought in are loosely rolled or tied,
but they are afterward made into packs which are three feet long and eighteen inches
wide, after being subjected to a heavy pressure in a wedge press. Skins are worth : Deer
(buck) $1.2.); Deer (doe) $1.00; Raccoon $..')0 ; Bear $3.00 to $.5.00. The values are
nominal, as the furs are paid for in goods which are passed off on the Aborigines for more
than double the prime cost and transportation. The furs are usually sent down the
Maumee to Lake Erie and thence to Detroit, where they are for the most part purchased
by the American Fur Company,

The settlers for citizenshi]} increased slowly. In 1823, after the
division of Indiana into two Congressional districts, there were but
fifty votes cast in the northern part of the State. Notwithstanding the
sparse settlements, Allen County was organized 17th December, 1823,
with jurisdiction over what is now Wells, Adams, and Huntington
Counties and all other territory of northeastern Indiana. This year
Allen Hamilton settled at Fort Wayne, and others followed who, like
hiiu, were an honor to the town and State, contributing to their mater-
ial interests. Fort Wa\'ne was chosen as the seat of government of
Allen County by Legislature committee composed of W. M. Conner of
Hamilton County, Abaithes Hathaway and James Ray of Indianapolis,
early in 1824; and the last week in May the county election resulted in
the choice of Anthony L. Davis for Clerk; Allen Hamilton Sheriff;
Samuel Hanna and Benjamin Cushman Associate Judges; Joseph
Holman Treasurer: H. B. MacKeen Assessor; Lambert Cushoois
Constable of Wayne Township then embracing the entire County ;
W. T. Davis Overseer of the Poor; R. Hars Inspector of Elections;
Israel Taylor, Joseph Troutner, and Moses Scott, Fence Viewers;
Samuel Hanna Road Supervisor.'''

The first Circuit Court held in Allen County, for all northeastern
Indiana, was called at Fort Wayne 9th August, 1824. This court
granted citizenship to Francis Aveline from Vincennes, father of
Francis A. Aveline whose name is perpetuated in several ways at Fort
Wayne. Indictments were reported for selling spirituous liquor with-
out license, and the accused were each fined three dollars and costs.
Another man was fined ten dollars for gambling. There was then no
newspaper at Fort Wayne; and the nearest one at this time was the
Enquirer printed at Richmond, Indiana, about one hundred miles
south.

* Compare History of Fort Wayne by Wallace A, Brice, 8vo pages 334, 1868, page 297.

THE ORGANIZATION OF COUNTIES.

SSI

Fort Wayne was incorporated as a town in ]h25; and the 14th
November of this year the first Court of Probate was instituted, the
Associate Judges having had charge of Probate business previous to
this date. People came and went, the resident population increasing
slowly for some years. In 182H there were about 500 citizens; in 1880,
800; in 1840, 1200; in 1850, 4200; in 1900, 45,115 within the City of
Fort Wayne.

Hancx)ck County, Ohio,

Was formed 1st April, 1H20, from Aborigine territory, and was attached
to Wood County for its government. The Township of Waynesfield,
now alone in Lucas County, was then extended to embrace Hancock

THE BLANCIIAKD KI\I,K Al IIMM.AV. OHIO

Looking south of east, up stream. May 1. 19(12. at low stat'e of water. The site of Fort Findlay is to
the right of the Main Street Bridce seen in tlie distance. Pier and abutments for new bridge in middle
distance.

County and other territory. .\t a special meeting of the Commissioners
of Wood County, held at Perrysburg 19th March, 182r!, among other
business it was ordered that so much of the Township of Waynesfield
as is included in the unorganized County of Hancock, be set off and
organized into a Township by the name of Findlay, and that the
election for Township officers be held on the first day of July, A. D.
1823, at the house of Wilson Vance in the said Township. Wilson

552

THE MAUMEE RIVER BASIN.

Vance was chosen Justice of the Peace at this election and he qualified
September 9, 1823, before Thomas R. M'Knight of Perrysburg.
Robert M'Kinnis was also elected Justice and qualified before Wilson
Vance 4th October.

In common with the sites of other forts of prominence, that of
Fort Findlay became a station for travelers in quest of desirable places

to settle after the War of lHl-2. One Tharp remained at the

Fort with other members of the
garrison after the abandonment
by the United States in the fall
of 1814, and he traded with the
Aborigines. Benjamin Cox re-
moved his family from Greene
County, Ohio, to Fort Findlay
in 1815, this being probably the
first family to settle there; and
his daughter Lydia was born
there in 1817, she being the first
white child. An older daughter
of Mr. Cox in after \-ears wrote
of their experiences as follows :
My mother, my sister and my-
self gathered the stalks of net-
tles which grew on the river
[Blanchard] bottoms below the
town from which we stripped
fiber enough, that on being
dressed like flax, was spun and woven into linen to the amount of forty
yards, and was made into clothing for the familv.'''

Other families came and, not liking the level and then wet country,
passed along the military road to the lower Maumee. Wilson Vance
came in 1818, and his brother Joseph, afterward Governor of Ohio,
obtained claims and, with the assistance of Elnathan Cory, set stakes
for a village at Fort Findlay in 1821. In 1822 the settlement was
increased by the arrival of John P. Hamilton or Hambleton ; Robert
M'Kinnis or MTnnis and family including sons Charles, Philip, James
and John, and son-in-law, Jacob Poe : Squire Carlin, Nathan Frakes,
William Moreland, Joseph Sleight, Matthew Riley; William Taylor,
James B. Thomas and John Simpson. Others followed to the number
of ; seventy-four electors the 7th April, 1828, when Hancock County
was organized for independent government. Abraham Huff, Wilson

Born in Franklin County, Pennsylvania, in 1770
removed to Ohio in 1795; died in Cincinnati in IH'A^.

Historii of Hancock County. Ohio, by D. B. Beardsley 8vo pages 472. 1881, page 30.

THE ORGANIZATION OF COUNTIES. 555

Vance, and Mordecai Hammond wvw thf Juds't-s of Election, with John
C. Wickham and Edmund S. Jones, Clerks. In 1829 the Village of
Fort Findlax' was more fully surveyed, and buildings were located and
constructed with more system.

The first record of the County Commissioners bears date ^nd
March, 1H29, John I^. Hambleton, John Lons', and Charles M'Kinnis
comprising' the Board. Don Alonzo Hamblin was Assessor,
William Hackney Auditor, and William Taylor Surveyor. The first
Court of Common Pleas was held in November, 1829, with onlv one
case for trial. Ebenezer Lane was President, with Abraham Huff,
Rofiert M'Kinnis, and Ebenezer Wilson, Associate Judges.

Henry County, Ohio,

Was formed from Aborigine territory .^pril 1, 1820, and was named in
honor of Patrick Henr\- the ]>atriot statesman. It was attached to
Wood County for goviTnment until the organization of Williams
CountY in 1M24 when its seat of government was moved from PerrYsburg
to Defiance. The first American settlers came to Prairie du Masque h\
the Maumee in tin- easti-rn part of the count\' soon after the close of
the War of 1H12. Their names were John Butler, David and William
Delong, Charles Gunn, George Gilson, David Bucklin and Samuel Vance ;
and tlu' taxpa\ing residents of the township in l^oT in addition to some
of the before named were: Charles Bucklin, Paulina Bucklin, Levi
Billings, David J. Cory, David Edwards, Samuel Frederick, Richard
and Carver Gunn, John Goss, Samuel Seman, Edward Mur]ihY, Jonas
Pratt, Abram and U. N. Scribner, Daniel C. Smith, Andrew Storts and
Ashbell Wilcox.

At the meeting of the Wood County Commissioners h(.'ld in the
Village of Maumee August 12, 1H20, a petition was presented from
sundry citizens of the settlement of Damascus * in the eastern part of
Henry County, asking to be attached to the Township of Auglaise,
which petition was granted. At the special meeting of the Commis-
sioners March 19, 182.3, it was ordered, on jietition, that so much of
the Township of Auglaiset as is contained in the unorganized CountY
of Henry, be set off and organized into a Townshiji by name of
Damascus. This township embraced the entire County of Henrv, then

* Here is an illustration of the remarkable change that a name often undergoes. The early
French name for a camping station by the Maumee River a little above the Grand Rapids was Pra/r/e
du Masque, so named from a grass-covered bank or island resembling in outline an uncouth woman.
This Prairie du Masque, like Roche de Bout and Presqu'ile. was a landmark to travelers: and the early
American settlers transformed the name to Damascus.

t Auglaise Township, organized by the Wood County Commissioners early in 1820. embraced all
of Henry County also Williams including the present Defiance, Paulding and Putnam Counties. It has
been taken from until only one-half of a land township plus four s.mare miles (twenty-two square miles
in all) remain in northeastern Paulding County.

BB4

THE MAUMEE RIVER BASlM.

much larger than now, and the lister and appraiser of its property for
taxation returned $20S and was allowed for this work only one dollar
eighty-seven and a half cents by the Commissioners of Williams
County, June 7, 1825.

Another camping place h\- the Maumee River in the present Henry
County with mongrel French-Aborigine lingerers, was given the name
Snaketown (at the present Florida) previous to the campaign of Gen-

HENRY COUNTY'S FIRST COURT HOUSE
From 1835 to 1844. In rear of Tavern.

eral Wayne in 1794 — see ante page 193: and the taxpaying settlers
here and near in 1837 (then as now in Flat Rock Township) were:
Lee Armstrong, Thomas Brown, William Bowen, James A. Brewer,
William C. Brownell, William Chambers, Amos Cole, Joseph Heath,
Richard Hughes, Jesse King, Washington, George and John Lowry,
John B. Rundell, Christian and John Stout, Senior, Michael Shuman,
Jacob Fronisman, William, Silas and Reuben Waite, and J. P.
Whipple.

The Legislature enacted for the organization of Henrv County in
1834; and in 1835 the embryo Village of Napoleon which was platted
in 1832 was chosen as the seat of government and Count\' ofhcers were
elected as follows: Commissioners Amos Cole, Isaac E. Braucherand
Xenophon Meade; Auditor Hazel Strong; Treasurer Israel Waite;
Sheriff E. Husted: Surveyor William Jackson; Clerk J. N. Evans
whom the Associate Judges, David S. Cory, Reuben Waite and Pierce

THE ORGANIZATION OF COUNTIES. SSS

Evans, also appointLd to act as Recorder. The first Court of Common
Pleas was held in li^ijii in the lofj tavern of George Stout. David Hi^-
gins was Presiding Judge and Frederick Lord Prosecuting Attorney,
During this vear Henrv Leonard under contract with the Commission-
ers liuilt with logs a two-story Court House adjoining his tavern in the
rear on the east side of Perry Street near the Maumee. The upper
floor of this house was used for the Court sessions and the lower floor
liy the Commissioners, Juries, and other County officers. In 1H44 a
frame Court House of larger size was built on the site of the present
building. This house of wood with most of the records was destroyed
by fire in .\pril, 1>^47. The lousiness of the County was conducted in
different tiuildings for several years following this fire. An endeavor
to move the seat of government a few miles down the Maumee to the
competing Village of Texas delayed a new building. In December,
1H49, plans were obtained and in January, 1850, contract was made
with James Durbin, Achilles Smith and William Russel to construct a
Court House and Jail in one liuilding of brick and a separate building
to contain four fireproof offices: and December 2H, 1852, the Commis-
sioners accepted these buildings at a cost of eleven thousand dollars.
These buildings were in use nearh' thirt}' years when the Court House
was destroyed by fire the first i^art of November, 1879: and the pres-
ent commodious structures were built in 1880-82.

Mercer County, Ohki,

Was formed from Aborigine territory 1st April, 11^20, and remained
attached to Darke County for its government until 1824. St. Marys,
then in this Countx', was chosen the seat of government, and the 17th
April, 1824, the first Board of Commissioners convened, composed of
Ansel Blossom, Thomas Scott, and Lucas Van Ansdall. At the June
meeting of the Board John P. Hedges was appointed Treasurer. He
executed a small bond and, desiring to go to Fort Wayne, he appointed
as his deputy Samuel Hanson who agreed to collect all the taxes of
both Mercer and Van Wert Counties for a compensation of five dollars.
The valuation of Shanesville, platted by Anthony Shane 23rd June,
1820, (formerly and latterly called Shane's Crossing from the French-
Shawnee half-breed Antoine Chesne, and since the building of the
Cincinnati Northern Railroad called Rockford ) was $20.87: Dublin
Township valuation was $4m.6() : and St. Marys, $76.70 the lots being
one dollar and the tax five mills on each lot. At the session in June,
1825, Ansel Blossom, Solomon Carr, and Isaiah Duncan, Commission-
ers, orders were issued as follows: to John P. Hedges for $2.91 being
his legal per centage on $72.75 received and paid over as Treasurer :
an order for $2.00 to William B. Hedges, Auditor, for paper and one

556 THE MAUMEE RIVER BASIN.

day's services ; and $2.25 to each of the Commissioners for services
during the session. John Manning was appointed Treasurer, and
required to give bond for $500.

The first Common Pleas Court was first held in Mercer County in
Februarv, 1H25, with Joseph Crane Presiding Judge and Joseph Greer,
Thomas Scott and James Walcott Associates. A case of Samuel
Duncan against Edmund Gilbert in chancery was disposed of. The
second term was held in April 1H27 ; and the third term in April, 1H29,
with George B. Holt President, and Joseph Greer, William B. Hedges
and John Manning Associates. There was not a state case for several
years. Most of the cases were of probate, with a few in chancery.

The Village of Celina was platted by James Watson Riley son of
Captain James Riley 8th September, 1834, for the joint proprietors of
the land, viz ; Peter Aughenbaugh, Robert Linzee 2nd, James W.
Riley and Rufus W. Stearns. This plat was named from the Village
of Salina, New York, with change of first syllable to Ce to prevent
confusion. In the year 1840 it became the seat of government though
possessing but a small collection of log houses.

The first newspapers published in the present county limits were
started in 1848 namely. The Mercer County Advocate Whig in politics,
and the Western Standard Democratic. The latter is continued with
the namt- Mercer County Standard.

Van Wert County, Ohio,

Is of the number formed April 1, 1820. It was named from Isaac Van
Wert one of the captors of Major Andre ; was attached to Darke
County for its government until the organization of Mercer County in
1824, when its government was transferred thither.

The first settler in Van Wert County was Ansel Blossom in 1819 ;
the second was a former mariner Captain James Riley who, while
engaged in the survey of the Public Lands for the United States, made
choice of land on both sides of the River St. Mary at the rapids near
the Indiana State line. He removed his family to this place in January,
1821, built a log house, began clearing land for cultivation, and making
preparation of timber for a dam across the river, and for flouring and
sawing mills which were built. In 1822 he surveyed a village plat on
the west bank of the river opposite the mills and he named the
prospective village Willshire in honor of an Englishman of that name
who redeemed him from Arab cajitivity after a shipwreck on the coast
of Africa. Captain Riley was a man of sterling qualities and his
influence was exerted for good among many pioneer settlers. In 1823
he was elected to the Ohio Legislature as the sole representative of
what is now the Counties of Allen, Darke, Defiance, Henry, Lucas,

THE ORGANIZATION OF COUNTIES. 557

Mercer, Miami, Paulding, Preble, Putnam, Shelby, Van Wert,
Williams, and Wood. He strongly favored building the Miami and
Erie Canal and fostered other useful legislation including the providing
of a permanent fund for common schools. His health, which was
imjiaired by his African experiences, became yet more impaired l)y the
malaria of the new country. He was taken by boat to Fort Wayne
for medical treatment , in the spring of 1828. Recovering somewhat,
he was transported on bed down the Maumee, across Lake Erie and
through the New York and Erie Canal and Hudson River to New York
where he recovered sufficiently to make several voyages abroad and
transact considerable business. He died 13th March, 1^40, and was
biiried at sea three days out from New York. His children remained
in Van Wert and Mercer Counties.*

At the Presidential election of 1836 only fifteen votes were cast in
the Township of Willshire. Van Wert County was organized in 1836,
the first meeting of the Commissioners being held 29th April at Will-
shire. The first court was also held there 3rd October, 1H37, by
Associate Judges Benjamin Griffin, Oliver Stacey, and Joshua Watkins.

The Village of Van Wert was platted 30th March, 1835, by the
proprietors, Peter Aughenbaugh, George Marsh, and James Watson
Riley a worthy son of Captain James Riley, and the first public sale of
lots was held 17th June, 1837. Settlers came slowly. In 1H37 there
were but two families — those of Daniel Cook and John F. Dodds —at
the site of the present thriving City of Van Wert which has for man}-
years been the seat of government.

Paulding County, Ohio,

Is one of the fourteen counties formed 1st April, 1820, from former
Aborigine territory. It was named in honor of John Paulding one of
the three patriot captors in 1780 of Major John Andre the British spy.
It was attached to Wood County for government until the organization
of Williams County in 1824, from which time Defiance w^as its seat of
government until the year 1839 when Paulding County was organized.
It was a part of the great Auglaise Township (see ante page 528) until
June 6th, 1825, when it was included with Putnam County in Perry
Township (see Putnam County).

New Rochester, situated on the right bank of the Maumee River
about one mile north of the present Village of Cecil, was then the only-
village in the County and the seat of government was located there.
New Rochester was platted in 1835 by Doctor John Evans of Defiance,
Robert Clemmer and Reverends Joseph Miller and Nathaniel Ladd
Thomas. Isaac Savage built the second house soon after the first one

* See Reminiscences of W. Willshire Riley in Howe's Historical Collodions of Ohio,

558

THE MAUMEE RIVER BASIN.

A BEGINNERS HOME

in the Stove Era. Yet (190-t) in use in Paiiklinv;
County.

built by Reverend Thomas who has been described as 'a tavern-keeper,
merchant, banker, postmaster, and preacher' a good man withal for a
wilderness settlement. The population of New Rochester in 1839
numbered thirty-five families. There were three taverns, three general
stores each dealing in spirituous liquors according to the custom of the

times, two blacksmithing and two
tailoring shops. All the buildings
were small and built of logs. The
making of the Wabash and Erie
Canal two and a half miles south of
New Rochester in the years 1839 to
1842 caused a decline in this vil-
lage, and the last vestige of it dis-
appeared from its site several years
previous to this writing.

At the organization of Paulding
County in l!->39 Nathan Eaton, John
Hudson and Oilman C. Mudgett
were appointed Associate Judges of
Common Pleas.* They met in the fall of 1839 and appointed Horatio N.
Curtis Clerk, and Andrew J. Smith Sheriff. The first Court of Common
Pleas was held in the spring of 1840, Judge Emery D. Potter presiding.
In 1841 the seat of government was removed to Charloe on the left
bank of the Auglaise River near the eastern side of the County and by
the Miami and Erie Canal then being made — see engraving ante page
503. Charloe was platted this year by Benjamin F. Hollister at the
former village of the Ottawa Chief Occonoxee, and it was given the
name of the less savage Ottawa Chief Peter Charloe. Here a small
Court House was built of brick. These towns were near the center of
the Ottawa Aborigine Reserve of four miles square, the lines of which
conflict with those of the later and regular Land Survey. August 10,
1850, Ezra J. Smith Count}' Surveyor platted the Village of Paulding
near the center of the County, for the proprietors George Marsh and
James Watson Riley. By a special Act of the Legislature the seat of
government was removed in 1851 to this embr\'0 village in the
wilderness.

The Presiding Elder of the Lima District in the Delaware Confer-
ence, the name of which was changed in I860 to the Central Ohio
Conference of the Methodist Episcopal ("hurch, reported in 1857 that
there were then two workers in the Paulding Mission Field, viz: Enoch

* Tlie tliree Associate Judges for earh County, appointed from the more or less prominent citizens
who were without special knowledge of law, were discontinued by the new State Constitution of (he
year IWl,

THE ORGANIZATION OF COUNTIES.

559

G. Longworth who lived at Charloe and John Priddy who lived on a
farm in Van Wert County. They had twenty-three appointments with
one hundred and sixty-two members, and six Sunday schools with
about one hundred scholars. Their appointments were filled every
four weeks which required two hundred and fifty miles travel with week-
day meetings and pastoral visitings. There were no church buildings,
and meetings were held in the woods, in dwellings or in schoolhouses.

Alt.en Ci.iUNTY, Ohio.

The first settlers in the jiresent Allen County, Ohio, were Peter
Diltz, William Van Ansdall and Andrew Russell, in and about the year
1817, and by the Auglaise River at and near the site of Fort Amanda.
Here the first white child was born to the latter, a daughter who became
the wife of Charles C. Marshall and who resided later in Delphos where

LIMA. OHIO. AND THE OTTAWA RIVER
As sketched by Henry Howe in 1846.

she died in IbTl. Samuel M'Clure settled bv Hog Creek (the present
Ottawa River) five miles northeast of the yiresent Lima in November,
1825, and he was followed in March, 1H26, by Joseph Ward (brother of
General John Ward) and Joseph Walton, .\bout the same time
Christopher Wood, a Kentucky scout against the savages, Joseph
Wood, Morgan Lippincott, Samuel Jacobs and Samuel Purdy, settled
by Sugar Creek, the first named perhajis in 1^24.

Allen County was organized in June, 1M31, with James Daniels,
lohn G. Wood, and Samuel Stewart as the first Commissioners. They
purchased a quarter section of land (160 acres) at $1.25 per acre, and

' Compare Crumbs from my SaddJe Bags, by Reverend Elnathan C. Gavitt, pane iHi.

560

THE MAUMEE RIVER BASIN.

dccidt'd upon the site of the present City of Lima for the seat of gov-
ernment. The village was platted this year by W. L. Henderson of
Findlay, and lots were then offered at public sale, but purchasers and
buildings came slowly. The first white settler at Lima was Absalom
Brown whose daughter Marian Mitchell Brown was the first white child
there born. In the year 1834 there were living in or near the Village of
Lima, Colonel James Cunningham, Doctor William Cunningham,
General John Ward, Doctor Samuel Black, Doctor William Henry
who came this year, John F. Mitchell, Daniel D. Tompkins, Charles
Baker, James Anderson, David Tracey, Hudson Watt, Miles Cowan,
Crane Valentine, John Bashore, John Mark, Abraham Aldridge,

.;-%•.

I-

* '' ' '

CITY OF LIMA. OHIO ,

Looking southeast 30th April, ]9*.)2. from an upper window of the Hotel Nerval corner of Main and
North Streets, across Valley of the Ottawa River to the St. Mary Moraine.

. Alexander Beatty, William Scott, Thurston Moshier, David Reese,
Daniel Musser, Martin Musser, Daniel Musser Junior, Elisha Jolly,
Abraham S. Nicholas, Reverend George Shelden, Presbyterian, Elder
William Chaffee, Baptist, John Jackson, Hamilton Davison who re-
moved to Defiance in 1848 where he died December 9, 1889, about
eighty-four years of age, Amos Clutter, Robert Terry, F. H. Binkley,
and Abraham Bowers. Reverends John Alexander and James B.
Finley were Methodist Episcopal Ministers on the circuits of this
vicinity in 1834. '

The first Court of Common Pleas for Allen County was held in
May, 1833, in the log cabin residence of James Daniels near the cross-
ing of the river at the east end of Market Street. George B. Holt of

'■' Compare the address before the Pioneer Association at Lima 23nd September, 1IS71, by T. E,
Cunningham, Esq., as copied in Knapp's History of the MaumQe Valley.

THE ORGANIZATION OF COUNTIES.

561

Dayton was the Presiding Judyc, and Christopher Wood, James
Crozier, and William Watt, Associates. John Ward served as Clerk,
Henry Lippincott Sheriff, and Patrick G. Goode of Montgomery
County served as Prosecuting Attorney by appointment of the Court.

PuTNA.M County, Ohio,

Is one of the original lourteen counties formed 1st April, 1^20, after
the more general extinction of the Aiiorigine claims. It was four vears
attached to Wood County for government, and then ten years to Wil-
liams Countv with seat of government at Defiance, it being organized

THE FIRST PROMINENT HOUSE IN PUTNAM COUNTY

Built by Sebastian Schrauf on the left bank of the Aunlaise River in Section Twenty-one. Perry
Township. This sketch was made by Henrv Howe in June, 1H46, when the house was an Inn kept by
Samuel Holden a United Brethren clergyman. ' A charminv; place.' See Howe's Historical Collections
of Ohio, Centennial Edition, volume ii paue 465 et seq.

for self-government in 1H34. Frederick F. Stevens removed from
Putnam County to Defiance in iH'iti, where he died over sixty years
later. He remembered the residents of Putnam in 1825 as follows:
.•\ndrew Craig who claimed to be the first settler lived at the mouth of
the Blanchard River, and John Ridenour lived one mile above. These
were the only families then on the Blanchard in the County. Sebastian
Schrauf lived by the Auglaise River one mile above the Blanchard, and
William Bowen a mile and a half above Myers Mill ; and yet further
up were Elias W'allace, James J. Martin, Daniel Sullivan, David
Murphv who also claimed to be the first white settler in the County,
and a Mr. Harris whose family was the only one at Fort Jennings.
Above the site of this fort were Mr. Hill, Joseph Sutton, \N'illiam
Cochran, Josiah Closson, John Welch, Daniel and \\ illiam Sunder.
land, Thomas and William Berryman, and Samuel^Washburn,

562

THE MAUMEE RIVER BASIN.

The Commissioners of Williams County organized Perry Town-
ship from the former Auglaise Township (see ante pag'e 52S) with
boundaries 'to include the whole County of Putnam and as much of
the County of Paulding- as lies west of the County of Putnam.' Jen-
nings Townshiii was organized lunc (*), IH'JC).

\1LLAGE OF WAPAKONKTA, OHIO

Looking north oi west ;Wth April, 19t)2. from Tower of the Auylaise County Court House. The trees in the
distance toward the left, mark the course of the Auylaise River as it here turns northward through the
Water Gap in the Wabash Moraine first cut by drainage southward of the Maumee Glacial Lake, then
on the subsidence of these waters and the origin of the Auglaise River, the flow was reversed. The
Auglaise River is glimpsed llowing from right to left beyond the town, in low stage of water.

The first seat of government was at Kalida (from the Greek Kal-
lidinus, suggested by the then beautifully whirling or gyratory current
of the Ottawa River here) which village was platted in 1834. Judge
George Skinner, who moved to Kalida in 1839, was authority for the
statement that the first Court of Common Pleas was held in the dwel-
ling house of Christian Sarber half a mile south of Kalida, Judge Wil-
liam Helfenstein presiding. The family table used for meals (there
was but one table in the house) also served as Judge's and Clerk's

THE ORGANIZATION OF COUNTIES.

563

desk, bar table, etc. The room was small, and the table was neces-
sarily near the family bed which the judge utilized as a seat — in fact
made it his judicial bench. The jur\' went into the near-by woods for
their private consultations. A Court House was built at Kalida in due
time. In the year lH6(i this house was destroyed by fire, whereupon

XII.LAGE OF WAPAKONETA. OHIn

Lookint; north of east 30th April. 19(V2. from Tower of Auglaise County's beautiful new Court House up the
Valley of the Auglaise River. The Wabash Moraine is seen in the distance, and the northern slope of
the Salamonie Moraine on the riuht -see ante paye 38.

the ijuestion of movin!.,^ the seat of jiovernment was discussed and,

upon beinji submitted to ballot, the electors of the County gave a

maiority of 455 in favor of the Village of Ottawa, where it has since

remained,

Aucn.AisE County, Ohui,

Was formed and organized in the year 1H4H from portions of .Mien, \'an
Wert, Mercer, Darke, Shelb\', and Logan Counties. The first term of
Common Pleas Court was held in May with Patrick G. Goode Presid-
ing Judge, and George W. Holbrook, David Simpson and John M'Lean,

564 THE MAUMEE RIVER BASIN.

Associates. Wapakoneta was chosen as the seat of justice. This town
was platted in 1833 by its proprietors Robert J. Skinner, Thomas B.
Van Home, Joseph Barnett, Jonathan K. Wilds and Peter Augenbaugh.
At the first public sale eighty-four lots were sold at prices ranging from
$20 to $140. Lot No. 13 by Auglaise Street, on which stood the
Aborigine trading house, brought $120. Wapakoneta is built on the
site of a Shawnee Aborigine town and the name is that of a Shawnee
Chief who was somewhat club-footed, but whether the name had any
reference to this deformity or not is not known. Wap-agh-ko-netta,
Waugh-paugh-kon-net-ta, and other long forms of spelling have been
used to express this name, but the United States Geographer has
eliminated all superfluous letters. The old Shawnee Council House,
about 2.^x35x8 feet in size, roughly built of small logs or saplings
blocked, was on Lot No. 3, Auglaise Street, about the center of the
town as now platted, and it was in a fair state of preservation when
razed in 1859 to give place to a brick business building.

The first election for county officers was held 10th October, 1848,
resulting in the choice of S. M. Dreese, Shadrack Montgomery and
Hugh T. Rint hart as Commissioners ; Marmaduke Smith Auditor; John
Elliott Sheriff ; John 1. Rickley Treasurer ; Simon Dresher Recorder;
George W. Andrews Prosecuting Attorney'; Amos S. Bennett Coroner,
and Dominicus Fleitz Surveyor.

Lucas County, Ohio,

Organized from Wood County in June, 1835, was named in honor of
Robert Lucas then Governor of Ohio, who was active in the settle-
ment of the serious Ohio-Michigan boundary contention that disturbed
the peace of the northwestern part of Ohio for several years, and
threatened the loss to Ohio of Toledo, the best port of the Great
Lakes, and a strip of otherwise valuable territory.

The history of Lucas County is coincident with that of its mother
County, Wood — see ante page 519. In the year 1816 Doctor Horatio
Conant and Almon Gibbs opened a store on the left bank of the
Maumee River nearly ojiposite Fort Meigs. John Elliott Hunt also
soon became a trader there. In 1817 the Village of Waynesfield was
platted at this place. Major William Oliver was one of the proprietors
of the plat of Waynesfield Village which later, for many years was
called Maumee Cit}', then was changed to the name South Toledo and,
after several j'ears, was changed to its present name, Maumee. For
several years after the surveys, however, this region on both sides of
the Maumee River was called Fort Meigs by people at a distance.

The first Township in the Basin was organized in 1816 to embrace
the two United States Reservations at the Treaty of Greenville in 1795,

WAYNESFIELD THE FIRST TOWNSHIP ORGANIZED. 565

of twelve and six miles square. This Township was named Waynes-
field in honor of General Wayne and, after the extinction of the Alio-
rigine claims at the Treaty at the foot of the Maumee Rapids in 1H17,
the jurisdiction of this Township was extended over the territory thus
acquired. At the organization of other townships, beginning Ittth
March, 1823, Waynesfield Township was divided from time to time to
its present limited area in Lucas County, yet embracing the Village of
Maumee.

In February, 1817, a company from Cincinnati, with Micajah T.
Williams, William Oliver, and Martin Baum, as the more active
members, purchased of the United States two tracts of land amounting
to four hundred acres. One tract embraced the mouth of Swan Creek
and for this tract the price was $76.06 per acre. The terms of pay-
ment were one-fourth the price at the time of purchase with agreement
to pay the remainder in three equal annual amounts. This company
platted into village lots the land between the left banks of the Maumee
River and Swan Creek, and named the plat Port Lawrence. A num-
ber of these lots were sold at auction the next September, 1817, Major
Benjamin F. Stickney the United States Agent to the Aborigines,
stationed here or at Miami above, being the leading purchaser. A
revulsion in financial affairs was experienced within the year and, the
purchasers being unable to comply with the terms of second payment.
Congress passed a Relief Act by which the Port Lawrence tract reverted
to the United States in payment for other parts of the tract purchased.

Early in the 19th centurs' Congress endowed 'a seminary of learn-
ing' (which afterward became the University of Michigan) with two
townships of land with privilege of locating the same wherever desired.
The trustees, by resolution of May 27, 1827, authorized the committee
' to locate such tracts at the mouth of Swan Creek by the Maumee
River in this [Michigan] Territory as shall seem to them expedient.'
This committee selected River Tracts numbers one, two, seven, eight,
nine and ten, including the former Port Lawrence plat ; and a letter
from the General Land Office declares these River Tracts reserved and
appropriated as University Lands. Small parts of these lands were
sold, and later Major William Oliver effected an exchange with the
trustees of the remaining 401/^ acres of Tracts one and two for Tracts
three and four containing 777 acres. Subsequently Major Oliver
purchased for his company these Tracts three and four of the Univers-
ity of Michigan trustees for $5000. Some of these Tracts of land
embrace a large part of the most valuable business district of the
present Toledo. The other University Tracts were sold in 1H44 and
1850 at an average price of $19 per acre. The entire receipts to the
University did not exceed $17,000.

566 THE MAUMEE RIVER BASIN.

In September, 1H20, Maumee was a considerable village ' with
two good taverns, one kept by Peter G. Oliver brother of Major
William Oliver ; two or three stores, and buildings equal to the
convenience, comfort, and business of a frontier town. In addition to
the men named above, there were then here as residents Judge Robert
A. Forsythe, Judge Ambrose Rice, John HoUister, and two or three of
his brothers. These and others constituted a society at Maumee which
would be acceptable anywhere on account of the intelligence and enter-
prise of its members. Settled also along the Maumee in various places
from Swan Creek to Roche de Bout were the Keelers, Hubbells, Hulls,
Spaffords, Wilkinsons, Prays, Pratts and Nearings.

The map of the Territory Northwest of the Ohio River used by
Congress for the Ordinance o) 1787, and at the outlining of the Terri-
tory of Ohio, was not correct; the relative position of Lake Michigan
was shown too far north, but this was not then known. The north
line of the Territory of Ohio was then named as a line extending due
east from thi' most southerly end of Lake Michigan. Ic was then
supposed that this line would touch the Detroit River about midway
between the Cit\' of Detroit and the river's mouth.* To avoid all later
misunderstandings, however, the framers of the Constitution of 1802
for the State of Ohio defined the northern boundary of the State to be

An east and west line drawn through the southerly extreme of Lake Michigan, run-
ning east, after intersecting the due north line aforesaid from the mouth of the Great
Miami, until it shall intersect Lake Erie or the territorial line, and thence with the same,
through Lake Erie to the Pennsylvania line aforesaid ; provided always, and it is hereby
fully understood and declared by this Convention, that if the southerly bend or extreme
of Lake Michigan should extend so far south that a line drawn due east from it should
not intersect Lake Erie, or if it should intersect the said Lake Erie east of the mouth of
the Miami River of the Lake [the Maumee River] then and in that case with the assent
of the Congress of the United States, the northern boundary of this State shall be estab-
lished by and be extended to, a direct line running from the southern extremity of Lake
Michigan to the most northerly Cape of the Miami [Maumee] Bay, after intersecting the
due north line from the mouth of the Great Miami River [the line between Ohio and
Indiana] as aforesaid, and thence northeast to the territorial line, and by the said
territorial [Canada] line to the Pennsylvania line.

The United States Congress accepted this Constitution without any
provisions and the State of Ohio rested in the belief that the question
was permanently settled. The Legislature of the Territory of Michigan,
however, adhered to the line extending due east from the south shore
of Lake Michigan, and persisted in extending its legislation to it. The
first official inquiry addressed to Return J. Meigs, Governor of Ohio,
was the following letter :

'■' Tliis error in map making was repeated for many years. The map made by Shelton and Kensett
in 1816 was a copy of this early map.

ORIGIN OF THE OHIO-MICHIGAN BOUNDARY DISPUTE. 567

Miami [Maumek] Rapids, January 'i.'i, 1M12.

Sir : It appears to be the general wish of the people in this settlement (which con-
sists of about .')() families) to have the laws of the State of Ohio extended over them, as we
consider ourselves clearly within the limits of said State. The few who object are those
who hold offices under the Governor of Michigan and are determined to enforce their
laws. This is considered by a great majority of the inhaf>itants as usurpation of power
which they are under no obligation to adhere to. If no adjustment should take place, I
fear the contention will ere long become serious. Sir, will you have the goodness to in-
form the people here whether there has been any understanding between the State of
Ohio and the Governor of Michigan on the subject of jurisdiction, together with your
advice.

I am,' sir, with high esteem, your most obedient servant,

Amos Spafkord, Collector of Port Miami.

The war with Great Britain, which began in June, 1S12, over-
shadowed the boundary question. The surveying of the United States
Reservations along the lower Maumee River and Bay in 1H16 led to
the suggestion of the survey of the boundary line. The United States
Agent to the Aborigines, Benjamin F. Stickney, was directed to obtain
consent to this survey from the Aborigines through whose territory the
work would be done; and the Surveyor William Harris was directed to
make the survey. The line thus surveyed in 1S17 extended to North
Cape in Maumee Bay; and it not being so far south as the people of
Monroe County, Michigan desired, thev reported to Governor Lewis
Cass who, ui^on investigation, found that the Surveyors had been
furnished a copy of the Constitution of Ohio as their guide instead of
the Ordinance of 1787 as he desired. He thereupon made such vi.gor-
ous complaint and protest that President James Monroe directed John
A. Fulton to make another survey ; and Governor Cass was careful to
note that he made it along the due east line.

Thus the lines of dispute were definitely drawn —the Harris Line,
claimed by the State of Ohio, extending from the most southern part of
Lake Michigan to the point of North Cape in Maumee Bay ; and the
Fulton Line, claimed by the Territory of Michigan, extending from the
same point of beginning due east, it being the present dividing line
between Lucas and Wood County east of the Maumee River. The
distance between these lines at the northwestern corner of Ohio is
about five and a half miles, and the strip of intiTvening land .gradually
widens to the eastward to a width of about eight miles south of North
Cape, the intervening space embracing about five hundred square
miles — see maps at pages 1 and 309. For several years no
definite action was taken to settle this boundary question and, mean-
time, Michigan exercised principal jurisdiction; and some of the
enactments were very wholesome, as witnesses the following:

Be it enacted by the General Legislature of the Territory : That any Justice of
the Peace, on conviction, may sentence any vagrant, lewd, idle or disorderly persons.

568 THE MAUMEE RIVER BASIN.

stubborn servants, common drunkards, common night-walkers, pilferers, or any other
persons wanton or licentious in speech, indecent behavior, common raiders or brawlers,
such as neglect their calling or employment, misspend what they earn, and do not provide
for themselves or their families, to be whipped not exceeding ten stripes, or to be deliv-
ered over to the Constable to be employed in labor not exceeding three months, by such
Constable to be hired out for the best wages that can be procured, the proceeds of which
to be applied to the use of the poor of the County.

Made, adopted and published at Detroit, the 27th day of July, 1.S1.S.

Lkwis Cass, Governor of the Territory of Michigan.

In the spring of 1S21 Major Benjamin F. Stickney was a ruling
spirit at the mouth of Swan Creek and continued such thereabout for
many years. There was then but a small settlement in the vicinity,
including Major Keeler who lived on his farm and a few Frenchmen.
Major Sticknev procured the recommendation of these peojile with
which he proceeded to Detroit, and returned after a few days with a
commission from Governor Lewis Cass appointing him Justice of the
Peace in and for the Territory of Michigan; and from this time he
claimed this region as part of Michigan. Thereafter the Ohio officials
were opposed in all their efforts in the region around the lower Maumee.*
The question was further complicated by the United States engin-
eers surveying the public lands to the southern (Fulton) line claimed
by Michigan, from the Base' Line of that Territory. The influence of
Major Stickney was exerted in Congress, and became manifest to his
up-the-river neighliors as evidenced by the following letter, viz :

Fort Meigs [Maumee City] 9th February, 1822.

Dear Sir : Feeling considerably interested in the measures proposed in Congress
relative to this section of country, and not doubting your willingness to attend to any rep-
resentations that might be communicated, I take the liberty of addressing a few lines to
you on these subjects.

I understand it is in contemplation to so alter the route of the great eastern mail to
Detroit that it shall not pass this place, but go by Port Lawrence nine miles below on
the Maumee River. Also to establish a land office at the River Raisin in Michigan for
the sale of lands in this vicinity. Also to remove the Port of Entry to Port Lawrence.
And also, I presume, from a motion of Mr. Sibley to open a road under the provisions of
the Brownstown Treaty not from Sandusky to Fort Meigs according to the terms of said
Treaty, but from Sandusky to Port Lawrence.

I have been astonished at the fact that one delegate from Michigan [Mr. Sibley]
should be able to have the brain not only of a majority of Congress, but even of a con-
siderable part of the Ohio Representatives; but from the success attending his motions I
am obliged to admit the fact is true.

Port Lawrence has no claims to notice by Congress much less to be honored by the
proposed sacrifices. The River Raisin has no claim in any shape superior to Fort
Meigs ; and, in point of situation for a Land Office, or any other business, is far inferior.
It is within little more than thirty miles of the Land Office at Detroit. Fort Meigs is
not within one hundred miles of any office except that at Detroit, and is seventy miles
from that.

See Reminiscences of Thomas W. Powell in the newspaper Defiance Democrat 3nd May. 1H6H.

INCIDENTS IN THE EARLY SETTLEMENT OF TOLEDO. 569

Respecting Port Lawrence [the first settlement on the site of the business part of
Toledo] there is not, nor has there been for years, nor is there likely to be. more than
three English [speaking] families including all within three miles of the place ; and what-
ever public business is done there must be done by one man who is already Aborigine
Agent and Justice of the Peace for Michigan. The distance propo.sed to be saved by
altering the route of the mail, ought not to come in competition with the increased risk in
crossing the Maumee River which in that place is very wide and open to the unbroken
surges of Lake Erie. The same objection will lie with increased weight against opening
a military road to cross the river there. It might as well cro.ss the mouth of the [Maumee]
Bay, or any other part of Lake Erie. If there was any business done at the place, or
was likely to be done there, I should not so much object to the Customs Collector's office
being removed there ; but at present I should esteem it ridiculous to entertain the idea.

I did not suppose it entirely necessary to make all the above statements to you, sir ;
but it is difficult to say less, and say anything. Vou must pardon the apparent haste and
carelessness with which this is written, as I have just returned from a week's absence,
and the mail is on the point of being closed.

Yours very respectfully,

Hon. PUhan .•K. Brown. Senator in Congress. Horatio Conant.

This year additional settlers came to Port Lawrence. One of the
most enterprising;' was Joseph Prentice who was the most active in
building;. He built for his use the first frame house near this part of
the Maumee. It was situated near the present Perry Street, Toledo,
between the alley and St. Clair Street. In this house his son Frederick
Prentice was born December 6, IH'2'2. He was the first white child
born within the limits of the present Toledo, and he was yet livin,>; in
1903 in New York City. Marquis Baldwin came to Port Lawrence in
1823 to establish a store. There were then, in addition to the Joseph
Prentice house, a log warehouse, a frame warehouse which later served
as the first Custom House, a log cabin near the site of the present
police station, and a small hewn log house near the corner of the
present Summit and Jefferson Streets. Several other log dwellings
were scattered within the present Toledo limits, and near : those of
Major Coleman I. Keeler and Noah A. Whitney near Adams and
CoUingwood ; Major Benjamin F. Stickney at Summit and Brush : F.
Loveway (Lovering?) below the present Manhattan Mills, and Leo
Guire at the mouth of the Maumee. Eli Hubbard also had dwelling
north of Ottawa River (Ten-Mile Creek) near the present crossing of
Lagrange Street. This vicinity soon became prominent from the store
of Calvin Tremain bv the Postroad and the establishment there of the
first postoffice for the present ToK'do district — see subchapter on
United States Mail on later i>age.

In the autumn of iHi^'i Reverends John ,\. l->aughman and Solomon
Manier formed the first Methodist Fiiiscoi^al Church Class at Tremain-
ville for the present Toledo region. It was then composed of twelve
members, some living at Port Lawrence, as follows : Frances Maria
Whitney, Catherine Martin, Fleanor Wallworth, Sarah Wallworth,

570 THE MAUMEE RIVER BASIN.

Sophronia Horton, Hannah Horton, Elizabeth Martin, Lydia Martin,
Elizabeth Holmes, Mary Keeler, Mary Mills, and Margaret Miller. Mrs.
Whitney, wife of Noah Ashley Whitney, was appointed leader. This
was then in the newly organized Detroit District or Circuit of the Ohio
Conference. The first sermon preached within the present limits of
Toledo was by the Reverend Elnathan C. Gavitt * late in October,
1832 in the store of Lewis Goddard on the bank of the Maumee in
Vistula. The audience consisted of twelve persons most of whom
were women.' The meetings were generally held in the dwelling of
Eli Hubbard until the building of the first schoolhouse which was of
logs. This was then in the Monroe, Michigan, Circuit. The first
Methodist-Class was organized in the Village of Maumee by Reverend
E. C. Gavitt in the autumn of 1832 in the dwelling of James Jackson
the Agent to the Aborigines. Continued meetings followed with
accession of forty-two members to the Church, including Sophia, wife
of General John E. Hunt. The Maumee District was constituted
in 1834.

Increase in the number of settlers, the agitation of the Miami and
Erie Canal, the platting of new towns and their competition in the sale
of lots and for the increasing business, gave the Ohio-Michigan bound-
ary question new significance and greater importance. The 27th May,
1827, Port Lawrence Township was organized as part of Monroe
Countv, Michigan, and its jurisdiction was sought to be exercised over
about one half of the present County of Lucas. At the election
twentv-seven votes were cast, electing the following officers: Assessors
Noah A. Whitney, John G. Forbes, and Daniel Murray; J. V. D. Sut-
phen Clerk ; John T. Baldwin Supervisor; Tibbals Baldwin Collector;
John W^ahvorth and Coleman I. Keeler Overseers of the Poor: Eli
Baldwin, and William Wilson Collector of the Port of Entry, Com-
missioners of Highways ; John Root and Tibbals Baldwin Constables;
and Benjamin F. Stickney Pound Master.

The Village of Vistula was platted in January, 1832, a little below
(north of) Port Lawrence by Benjamin F. Stickney and Cajitain
Samuel Allen of Lockport, assisted by Giles Bryan Slocum who after-
ward made a fortune along Detroit River and in Michigan land and
timber. Mr. Slocum's letter to his father at Saratoga Springs, New
York, dated 9th January, 1832, states that public land near Port
Lawrence was then being bought at $1.25 per acre ; that efforts were
being made to induce the Buffalo steamboats to stop at Port Lawrence
that spring, the passenger boats having previously gone direct to
Detroit — see ante page 480 ; that a flouring and sawing mill were being

Crumbs from my Saddle Bags or Reminiscenses of Pioneer Life by Elnathan C. Gavitt, 1884.

EVENTS IN THE EARLY SETTLEMENT OF TOLEDO. 57;

built by Swan Crutk about tlirtt- miles from Port Lawrcncu ; that boy
iron orf was found near, and tfiat the building' of an iron turnace was
being discussed ; that wheat was sold at from ten to twelvi' shillings
($1.25 to $1.50) per bushel •. that a great many hogs had bi-en driven
from Ohio to Detroit for market where many were killed and sold into
Canada, and that wild hogs, turkeys, and deer were killed daily about
Port Lawrence. Mr. Slocum was then associated in charge of a stock
of goods, valued at three thousand dollars, belonging to Lewis Godard
of Detroit, and he wrote that business was good; that the clearing
of land, surveying, getting of timber, building of wharves, and the
arrangement with the builders of other towns near whereby orders
were to be paid at the store ' made it to the interest of all to turn off. as
nianv goods as possible.'* Sanford L. Collins, who came to Port
Lawrence in December, 1831, wrote in later years as follows :

Vistula was laid off and platted in ISll'i, and the clearing of the plat of brush and
timber commenced : also the putting in of a long line of docking [\vhar\'es of the quay
form] in front of the property at the foot of Lagrange Street, extending down toward
Kim Street some forty rods, or thereabouts. This line of docking [quay] was built upon
the ice and, notwithstanding its great weight, it being some nine feet high, it did not
break through until the ice began to give way in the spring ; and of cour.se while kept up
by the ice it presented a very formidable appearance, so much so that it attracted the
attention of our enterprising neighbors of Perrysburg who came down upon the ice with
a large party to pay their respects to the new proprietors and witness the new mode of
fjuilding docks [quays] without piling, .\fter examining carefully they said it looked very
well, but they thought it would disappear with the ice in the spring, and perhaps the
same might be the case with many of the new inhabitants in the coming months of July
and August with fevers and agues which they most assuredly would have. The spring
came and, contrary to the predictions of our Perrysburg neighbors, the dock [quay] did
not disappear, but it became greatly displaced; and so it was with the new settlers, they
did not disappear, but had a great amount of shaking, t

In the autumn of ls;-]l and spring of 1^32 Captains Hiram Brown,
John Baldwin and Tibbals l:5aldwin, constructed a large siene with
which large quantities of fish were caught from the Maumee opjiosite
Port Lawrence. Other prominent men at this place in January, 1K32,
were Otis Hathaway, William Loudon F"avour, and H, S. Piatt. .\
number of others arrived that spring and summer from Lockport, New
York, including the brothers Daniel O. and Stephen B. Cornstock,

* See Chronography of Notable Events in the History of the Northwest Territory and Wayne
County, by Fred Carlisle, Svn Detroit. tKXI.

t Compare History of the Maumee Valley by H. S. Knapp. page 617,

In the summer of 1899 while tishing in tlie Maumee C. E. Haynes and E. C, Crosby discovered the
submerged remains of these first wharves at Toledo. They kept the discovery to themselves and, in
19t>3 after the purciiase of rights by the railway companies, they secured the privilege of taking out the
logs; and with the aid of five men and a donkey engine the work began in June with much promise. It
is estimated that there are here ,i,(HXl,tHK) feet of white oak. walnut, and hickory timber of the best qualily
preserved and improved by its long submergence, and probably worth $1.t<1,(XX1. One black walinu log
taken out was sold to a Massachusetts tirm for Ji.'j — see Toledo Blade (Jlh June, I9(t3,

572 THE MAUMEE RIVER BASIN.

Munson H. Daniels, Daniel Washburn, C. G. Shaw and family, Oliver
Stevens and famil\', James M'.iddocks, Philander Wales, Doctor Fassett
(the last named four settlinjf on the east side of the Maumee ) Richard
Greenwood, Oliver Sjiauldini;, and Edward Bissell who became the

ONE OF THE THREE PETROLEUM REFINERIES IN TOLEDO IN 19(14

most active builder at Vistula. Port Lawrence Township also pos-
sessed other active residents, as William Riley, Hiram Bartlett, Doctor
J. V. D. Sutphen, Michael T. Whitney, James M. Whitney, Harmon
Crane, Noah A. Whitney, Peter Berthoff and a few others.

In the year 1833 the plats of Port Lawrence and Vistula were
united under the name Toledo. The honor of suggesting this name
has been attributed by different elderly people to Willard J. Daniels,
Pierre M. Irving, and Two Stickney second son of Major Benjamin F.
Stickney who named his sons numericalh' in the order of their birth.

The Toledo Herald, the second newspaper published in the Maumee
River Basin, was started in weekly publication about the middle of
August, 1834; and about October 1st The Toledo Gazette appeared.
These newspapers were soon united under the name Gazette and Herald
with James Irvine Brown as editor and agent for the proprietors who
lived at Easton, Pennsylvania. The location of the northern terminus
of the Miami and Erie Canal was becoming a live question at this time
and the association of Mr. Brown with Doctor Jacob Clark, merchant,
J. Baron Davis, J. W. Fellows, and other enterprising men many of
whom also came to Toledo in 1834, led to a revival and active discus-
sion of the Ohio-Michigan State boundary question, the climax of
which was soon thereafter attained. A public meeting was held in
Toledo in November, 1834, and the majority of the sentiment then
expressed was in favor of Ohio asserting and maintaining jurisdiction
over the disputed region. Petition for such action was signed and
forwarded to Governor Lucas who recommended this movement to the
Legislature which, in turn, passed an Act February' 23, 1835, asserting

THE OHIO-MICHIGAN BOUNDARY DISPUTE. 575

the claim of Ohio to all territory south of the Harris Line. Under this
Act three commissioners were appointed to re-survey and mark this
Harris Line as the boundary, the survey to begin April 1, 1H35.

President Andrew Jackson having been appealed to, sent Richard
Rush of Pennsylvania and Colonel Howard of Maryland as Commis-
sioners to confer with Governors Lucas and Mason regarding the
boundary. This conference was held 7th Ai)ril, bs^"), the Commis-
sioners agreeing with Governor Lucas, that the Harris Line be re-
surveyed and marked: 2nd, that insomuch as both Ohio and Michigan
civil officers had been elected for the disputed territory (those for Ohio
were elected April 6th) that the people residing there be left to their
individual choice as to which of these officers should be accepted as
authority in government until the next session of Congress, with the
provision that Michigan discontinue the arrest and prosecution, already
begun, of persons claiming citizenship in Ohio. Governor Mason
would not sign this agreement for Michigan.

The Legislative Council of Michigan had, meantime, been alert
and active. An Act had been passed making it a criminal offense
punishable with a fine of SIO(X) and five years imprisonment for any
person other than United States or Michigan officials to exercise or
attempt to exercise any official authority in the disputed tract. For the
full enforcement of this unwise Act Governor Mason directed IS.Hh
February, 1835, Brigadier General J. W. Brown Commander of the
Third Division of Michigan Militia to prevent Ohio officers exercising
any authority, and to use the Militia if necessary to preserve the rights
of Michigan north of the Fulton Line; also to rejjort the names of all
Michigan civil and military officers therein favorable to Ohio, and by
visitation ascertain proiJer persons to be api)ointed in their jilaces.

Public sentiment was aroused and meetings were htld. Ui)on
learning of the Ohio election of local officers at Toledo, the Sheriff of
Monroe County, Michigan, proceeded with a posse comitatus to Toledo
April 8th and arrested Messrs. Goodsell and M'Kay, who were, how-
ever, later released on bail. A few days later the Sheriff with a posse
numbering about two hundred persons again visited Toledo but made
no arrests. The 26th April the party re-surveying and marking the
Harris Line by authorit}' of the Ohio Commissioners, was fired upon
about twelve miles southwest of Adrian by Michigan Militia and the
surveyors with most of their assistants were cajitured by the assailants
led by the Deputy Sheriff of Lenawee Countv.

Governor Lucas arrived at the Village of Maumee A()ril 27th with
two hundred Ohio Militia (one account reads that he was there March
21st with six hundred soldiers under command of General John Bell)
but pacific counsels prevailed and he sent the soldiers home the 2nd

574 THE MAUMEE RIVER BASIN.

May. Four days later Major Stickney went to Monroe on the Detroit-
bound steamboat on which President Jackson's Commissioners Rush
and Howard were passengers. He was there arrested and imprisoned
for acting as a judge at the Ohio election of local officers in Toledo the
6th April. Mr. Stickney had, like others, undergone a change of mind
and a transformation from a justice of the Peace for Michigan to an
officer favorable to Ohio. He was considered an important prisoner,
and many gibes were made regarding him. Tiie military spirit was
rife and one of the popular sayings at Monroe during bis imprisonment
was the one started at Toledo which referred to their despoiling his
garden there, it being in the form of the toast 'Here's to Major Stick-
ne\''s potatoes and onions — we drafted their tops and their bottoms
volunteered.' Governor Lucas called a special session of the Legis-
lature for June 8th, 1835. In his message he wrote regarding this
contention as follows:

The honor and faith of the State is pledged in the most solemn manner to protect
these people [of Toledo] in their rights, and to defend them against all outrages. They
claim to be citizens of Ohio. The Legislature by a solemn act has declared them to be
such, and has required them to obey the laws of Ohio which as good citizens they have
done ; and for which they have been persecuted, prosecuted, assaulted, arrested, abducted
and imprisoned. Some of them have been driven from their homes in dread and terror,
while others are menaced by the authorities of Michigan. These things have been all
done within the constitutional boundaries of the State of Ohio, where our laws have been
directed to be enforced. Are we not under as great obligation to command respect and
obedience to our laws adjoining our northern boundaries as in any other part of the State ?
Are not the inhabitants of Port Lawrence [Toledo] by the Maumee as much entitled to
our protection as the citizens of Cincinnati by the Ohio River? .

An Act to further protect the citizens of Ohio was then passed for
the counteraction of the enactments of Michigan. Arrangements were
also completed for the organization of Lucas County, to include the
northern part and all west of the Maumee River of the fortner Wood
Countv. A Common Pleas Court was also ordered for session Sep-
tember 7th in Toledo the provisional seat of justice; all of which was
duly proclaimed by Governor Lucas.

The Sheriff of Monroe County, Michigan, again visited Toledo in
the evening of 18th July with a posse of about two hundred and fifty
armed men and made sevtii or eight arrests chiefly for individual
grievances. This Michigan posse committed several overt acts, among
them being damage to the Gazette and Herald newspaper office. Pub-
lic sentiment in Michigan was kept as belligerent as possible; and it
was determined to prevent the holding of the proclaimed Ohio Court,
For this purpose the Detroit Militia arrived at Monroe the evening of
September 5th, and with volunteers from Monroe and Lenawee Counties
thev rendezvoused near Toledo whence they inarched into Toledo on

WISE TURN IN OHIO-MICHIGAN BOUNDARY DISPUTE. 575

the 6th in number variously estimated at from eight to twelve hundred,
led by Governor Mason and General Brown. The President Judge
and his Associates had assembled at the Village of Maumee
ten miles distant with Colonel Van Fleet and one hundred soldiers sent
by Governor Lucas for their protection ; but wise peace counsels pre-
vailed, and Ohio won the victory without shedding a drop of
valiant Michigan blood. At one o'clock in the night the officers
accompanied by the Colonel and twenty soldiers, started on horseback
down the Maumee and went (]uietly to the schoolhouse by Washington
Street where, about three o'clock, the judges opened the Court, ap-
pointed a Clerk, three Commissioners for the new County of Lucas,
transacted the other necessary business, and adjourned in due form. The
Clerk's minutes, hastily written on loose sheets of paper, were depos-
ited in his hat according to the custom of men in those davs, and all
present hastily started through the woods up the Maumee. In their
haste the Clerk's hat was knocked from his head bv coming in contact
with the limb of a tree, and not a little apprehension was experienced
until the scattered papers containing the invaluable minutes of the
Court were found. All arrived safely at Maumee City, clearlv outside
the disputed territory but yet within Lucas County, where Michigan
civil officers or troops dare not pursue. Here the first victory was
quietly enjoyed, and ])lans matured for complete discomfiture of the
enem}'.

While addressing his soldiers, and such citizens of Toledo as
desired to hear him, that day an order from Washington was handed to
Governor Mason removing him from the office of chief executive of the
Territory of Michigan. The Secretary, John S. Horner, became acting
Governor. The time now came to the citizens of Michigan for second
thought, which showed them the absurdity of their action. Like true
Americans they took a wise view of the matter, and turned from the
belligerent to the humorous treatment of the question as did the
victors. The troops returned to Detroit on the steamboat General
Brady the 10th September, lH;-i5, the 22nd anniversary of Perry's
victory on Lake Erie, and they turned the day into as good a celebra-
tion of that event as possible, with witty references to their campaign.*

* Here are two stanzas tliat have been preserved of a 'war sonw ' of the period that was afterward
much enjoyed by both parties :

old Lucas Rave his order all for to hold a Court.

And Stevens Thomas Mason, he thoucht he'd have some sport.

He called upon the Wolverines, and asked them for to k'o

To meet this rebel Lucas, his Court to overthrow.

Our independent companies were ordered for the march.

Our officers were ready, all stiffened up with starch:

On nimble-footed coursers our officers did ride.

With each a pair of pistols and sword hung by his side.

576

THE MAUMEE RIVER BASIN.

The representative men of Michigan desired statehood for their
Territory, and they were prone to believe that Ohio would defeat the
admission unless there was reconciliation. All those in custody- of
Michigan authorities were released by order of Acting Governor

i.-f^l^ir^^^^^^«i

-fr-f^^f.iifr-tiiMtr"Ti "

_ -

"»

^»TW|

:;. ^

^nmi

j':^^:1iy^?M.j 1

■ ''■■■ 1

CITY OF TOLEDO, OHIO

Lookinjj northwest I3th November, I9<.)2, from Tower of the Nasby Building. Lucas County Court House
in middle view. Young Men's Christian Association's unfinished Building at the left; and Masonic
Temple now (1904) being built at trees this side of the Y. M. C. A. Building.

Horner, he officially stating under date of oth October, 1835, that 'In
consequence of an anticipated change of Territorial to State Govern-
ment on the first Monday of December next, the Executive lost all
legal control over the ministerial and executive officers, the District
Attorney James O. Adams absolutely refusing to enter a Nolle Prosequi
The country was in a great state of excitement, and the officers
of insubordination. Salus populi suprema lex.' . . The Ohio offi-
cials acted in like spirit, and the Grand Jury of Wood County reported
no indictment when charges were adduced against Governor Mason and
his officers. The survey and marking of the Harris Line was com-
pleted in November without opposition.

The United States Congress considered the boundary question
early in the session of 1835-36, and there was some warm discussion
regarding it. Governor Lucas, who was present, charged Louis Cass
then Secretary of War with using his official influence in favor of Mich-
igan, which Cass denied. The Senate Committee reported favorably to
Ohio for the reason That Congress had in the most solemn manner
accepted her State Constitution, recognized it as made pursuant of

SETTLEMENT OF OHIO-MICHIGAN BOUNDARY DISPUTE. 577

lawful authority to maku it confL-iT(_-d by an Act which reserved the ri^ht
to annex to Ohio at any future jieriod a country embracing the whole
territory in dispute, and has by these means assented to the terms of
the proviso, which is one of the essential features of the Constitution."

CITY OF TOLEDO, OHIO

Lookiny east K^th November, 1902, from Tower of the Nasby BuildiriH, down Madison Street. The flatjs
in middle view are over the United States Custom House and Postoffice. First Congregational Church
toward right. Glimpse of the Maumee River, and of the city beyond.

The records of Port Lawrence Township which had been kept by
Michigan officials of Monroe County, were given over to the Ohio
officials of Lucas County 11th .|ul\', iHrifi, in compliance with the
decision of Congress. The proposition for Michigan to accept the
Upper Peninsula in exchange for the strip of land between the Fulton
and Harris Lines, was rejected in Michigan Convention in September,
1836. The politicians finally triumphed, however, in Convention held
in Ann Arbor December U, IHI-Jti; the Upper Peninsula was acce]>ted,
and without opposition Michigan was admitted to the Union as a State
26th January, 1H37; and her Legislature appropriated S13,658.76 to
pay the expenses incurred in the unwise and unsuccessful efforts to
wrest from Ohio the triangular strip of territory between the Fulton
and Harris Lines — see map ante page 309. The last events relating
to this dispute were enacti^d in 1846 when the Ohio Legislature in
February appropriated SHOO for the payment of Major Benjamin F.
Sticknev for the damage his |)roperty sustained in Toledo, and for the
time he passed in prison at Monroe; also an appropriation by the Mich-

578 THE MAUMEE RIVER BASIN.

iiian Lej;islature of fifty dollars and inturcst from 1H3(3 to Lewis E.
liailfv for a horse lost while in the service of the Territory with the
militia at the time of the boundary dis]iute.

The great newspaper, the Toledo Weekly Blade, was founded in the
year 1836. Toledo was incorporated as a City by the Legislature of
Ohio in the winter of 1«36; and at the election held 20th March, 1H37,
John Berden was chosen Mayor and George H. Rich Cits' Clerk. The
members of the City Council were: Northeast Ward, Junius Flagg,
James S. Way, Elijah Porter; Southeast Ward, George B. Way,
Stephen B. Comstock, Samuel R. Bradley. Treasurer J. Baron Davis ;
Attorney D. O. Morton: Fire Engineer Charles MacLean: Street Com-
missioner A. G. Hibbard; Marshall Calvin Comstock; Assessors
Munson H. Daniels and Samuel Eddy.

The seat of government for Lucas County was removed from
Maumee to Toledo in the year 1852. The population of this County
has increased from y3S2 in 1S40 to 153,559 in 1900, notwithstanding
the loss of territory for the organization of Fulton County. The
greatest ratio of increase has been during the later years and in the City
of Toledo — see ante page 5. ■

Fulton County, Ohki,

The last Count3- organized in this Basin was formed 28th Febru-
ary, 1850, froin Lucas, Henry, and Williams Counties. Its seat of
justice, Wauseon, was platted in 1854. In 1860 it had a population of
37m, and to 1870 it had increased to 1474. This village was named
from an Ottawa chief who with his band often roamed along the
creeks and over the beaches of the Glacial Lakes Whittlesey and
Warren which are prominent in this County. The name Wauseon in
the Ottawa speech signifies far off. The chief known by this name
was a large and fair specimen of physical manhood, and quite intelli-
gent withal. His three reputed half-lirothers were also prominent in
this County and along the Maumee River a few miles to the southeast.
The name of the older one, Ottokee, is also perpetuated in the name
of a village three miles north of Wauseon. He was six feet in height
with weight of about two hundred pounds, and was called eloquent in
speech according to the standard of some people of the present time, of
the plane of these Aborigines, who think a speaker not worthy a hear-
ing who is not very vehement in voice and gesture regardless of what
is said. No-tin-no (the calm) and Wauseonka were the names of the
other reputed half brothers of Wauseon. The last named was at one
time the head chief of the Maumee Ottawas but on account of his later
habits of dissipation he became worse than useless. The last of these
Ottawas were reriioyed to the Osage River in Kansas in the spring of

FIRST DEVELOPMENTS BY AMERICAN SETTLERS. 579

1838.* The first Common Pleas Court for Fulton County was held
early in 1H50 in the dwelling house of Robert A. Howard in Pike
Township. The hamlet of Ottokee was soon thereafter chosen as the
seat of t(overnment, and in 1851 a two-story frame Court House was
built there. This house was used by the county officials until Julv 16,
18(;)4, when it was destroyed by fire with most of the records. The
Commissioners had a new Court House constructed of brick one story
high, on the site of the house burned, with offices in a separate build-
ing. The Air Line division of the Lake Shore and Michigan Southern
Railwaj' having been put in operation meantime through Wauseon this
village became a competitor for the seat of government. By legislative
enactment an election was held in October, 1869, resulting in favor of
Wauseon which village in January, 1^70, paid to the Commissioners
the required sum of S.")CH)0 which had been subscribed for use in the
construction of county buildings. The present brick Court House was
contracted for, and was completed early in 1872 at a cost of near
$46,000. The jail at Ottokee continued to be used until the completion
in Wauseon of the present jail and Sheriff's residence.

The area of Fulton County embraces about four hundred and
twenty square miles, no part of which is 'waste land.'

CHAPTER XV.

Development of Communication — Public Lands — Schools —

Libraries.

The first regular United States Mail route to the Maumee River
Basin, other than by military couriers, was by way of Cleveland in 1802,
Horace Gunn being the carrier. Mails had been carried before this
date through the Basin to its military posts and to Detroit, but not
regularh', nor did regularity long continue from this time. In the year
1809 Benoni Adams was the mail carrier. The water courses gave him
much trouble, he generally being obliged to make a raft on which to
cross them. Much of the journey was often made afoot, tediously
picking his lonely way through the swampy forest. Fortunately for
him the mail was not heavy. His route extended from Lower Sandusky
(now Fremont) to Monroe, and two weeks time was generally required
to make the journey and return. The Collector of the Port of Miami
of the Maumee River, Amos Spafford, was the first acting Postmaster so
far as determined: his commission as Deputy Post ^Master of Miami in

■■'' See mention of prehi^loiij mounds in Hike Township ante, page 60. Also Colonel Dresden
W. H. Howard's communication to Howe's Historical Collections of Ohio, vol. ii, page 661.

580 THE MAUMEE RIVER BASIN.

Erie District State of Ohio ' bearinj^ date Dth June, 1M](), was signed
by Gideon Granger Post Master General. Previous to these dates, and
later durinji the wars and the hostilities of the savages, the mails were
carried with the army dispatches when carried at all.

In the year IHKi Almon Gibbs was in charge of the Miami Post-
office the receipts at which in that year amounted to !i^l4.i^^. The
military postoffice at Fort Meigs was discontinued after the removal of
the garrison to Detroit in May, 1815, and letters afterward directed to
settlers at Fort Meigs were delivered at the Miami office until a post-
office was established at Perrysburg "JHth January, 1823, with Thomas R.
M' Knight master. An office was opened at Maumee in February,
1824.

The influx of settlers that incited the division of the Basin into
Counties in 1(^20, also stimulated the general Government to organize
additional mail facilities. In 1821-22 a route was established from the
Village of Maumee through Defiance to Fort Wayne, and thence by St.
Marys to Piqua. The carrier, Thomas Driver, made the round journey
every two weeks on horseback with a small mail bag, which was some-
times empty.

Fort Defiance was the name of the postoffice at the junction of the
Auglaise River with the Maumee until 10th March, li->24, when the
word Fort was dropped. Timothy S. Smith was the first postmaster
here; and his residence on the north bank of the Maumee served for the
office until a postoffice building of logs, 10x12 feet ground size and one
story high, was completed in the autumn of 1822 on the south side of
the Maumee by the Jefferson Street Ford and Ferr\'.

The first postmaster at Fort Wayne was Judge Samuel Hanna who
kept the office in his store by Columbia Street. The Chicago mail was
often sent this way, a Mr. Bird of Fort Wayne for a time carrj'ing it
afoot. The route along the Maumee River soon developed to dail}'
service. One William Daggett, son of William King Daggett of
Middlebury, Vermont, came to Ohio in 1834 and was one of the mail
carriers on this route in 1836, then driving four horses hitched to a large
wagon bearing two cross planks as seats for passengers.

September 29, 1838, the first postoffice was established at Hicks-
ville, the first off the main line in the middle part of the Basin, and
Alfred P. Edgerton served as its first postmaster. The mail was
carried thither by David Landis from the Cranesville Postoffice on the
main line at the embryo Village of New Rochester, Paulding County,
one mile north of the present Cecil.

The first regular mail along the Hull Road was carried by Joseph
Gordon, beginning 7th February, 1823, from Perrysburg on the main
eastern line to Bellefontaine, Logan County, eighty-one miles, Fort

FIRST MAILS AND POSTAGE RATES. 581

Findlay was tlK-n the only interveninji postoffice. The word Fort was
drop]ied from the name of this office about the year IH'24. At first this
mail was carried once every three weeks. The period was later
shortened to a weekly mail and,Tst Januar\', 1H40, to semi-weekly.

Vehicles for carrying the mails, and passengers, began to be used
through Ohio to Detroit in 1H27. Late in 1830 provisions were made
for a daily line of stage coaches between Buffalo and Detroit. The
first coach crossed tfre Maumee River near Perrx'sburg the 2nd January,
1831, and passed the postofiices at Maumee, Miami, and the settlement
of Calvin Tremain a storekeeper from Vermont. Treinain was post-
master at this point, which was called Tremainville. It was within the
northwestern limits of the present City of Toledo, and the postofSce at
the embryo Toledo ( Port Lawrence) was served three times a week by
Tremain until the road along the left bank of the Maumee River was
opened, or until 3rd March, 183.5, when the mail route was changed to
the river road through Toledo, which office then supplied the Tremain-
ville office, and through Manhattan the site of which is now within the
northern part of the City of Toledo.

With the completion of the Miami and Erie and Wabash and Erie
Canals, and the establishment of lines of Packet Boats in 1843-44, the
use of Stage Coaches along these lines ceased, the mails as well as
passengers being transported by boats. The development from canal
packets to steam cars was welcomed but a few years later.

In the year 1^36 it required thirteen days and nights to transmit
mail from Perrysburg to New York City. In 1^43 the time was reduced
to eight days and nights. At this writing the time is less than twenty-
four hours.

The postage rates have been as follows: F"ebruary 20, 1792, for
thirty miles or less six cents: thirty to sixty miles 8 cents: HO to 100
miles 10 cents: 100 to 150, 12^2 ; 150 to 200, 15 ; 200 to 250, 17 : 250 to
350, 20; 350 to 450, 21 : over 450 miles 25 cents. March 2, 1799, to 40
miles 8 cents u 40 to 90, 10: 90 to 150, 12>'2 ; 150 to 300, 17; 350 to 5t)0,
25. April 9, 1816, to 30 miles 6 cents: 30 to HO, 10 : 80 to 150, 12 '2 ;
150 to 400, 1834 ; over 400 miles 25 cents. March 3, 1845, to 300 miles
5 cents; over 300 miles 10 cents. March 3, 1851, to any distance in the
United States under 3000 miles three cents. October 1, 1883, the
postage on ordinary letters was reduced to two cents.

Envelopes for letters were first used in 1H39, but they did not come
into general use for fifteen to twenty years later : the letter or large
sheet being folded, tucked in, and sealed with wax. Postage Stamps
soon followed the law for their use of 3rd March, 1H47. Those of five
and ten cents were the first denominations; and thej- served quite
general use also as fractional currency.

582

THE MAUMEE RIVER BASIN.

The Registering of mail matter went into operation 3rd March,
1855 ; and Domestic Postal Money Orders were first issued in 186-1.
The Foreign Orders followed, first on Switzerland in 1869; England
1871; Germany 1872; Canada 1K75; Italy 1877. Postal Cards were first
used in the spring of 1873.

The contract for the first Telegraph Line through this Basin, to con-
nect Buffalo and Milwaukee across the lower Maumee, was let in the
fall of 1846, and the Line was used in part the next year. The
Telephone followed in the year 1878.

The early Postoffices in the Maumee River Basin, with the net
amount of their receipts in the years 1827, 1828, and 1830, have been
gathered from the American State Papers Volume XV, as follows:

Name, and Present County.

1827

1828

1830

Adrian. Lenawee County, Michigan.

J. .58.. 57

Amanda, Auglaise County, Ohio,

6 .7.".

Defiance. Defiance Couuty, Ohio,

$ 28.. =54

r!2.8:i

10.70

Findlay, Hancock County, Ohio,

.T.OS

8.14

25.84

Fort Wayne, Allen County, Indiana,

I2:i.4:!

i.-i8.2(;

l(i(i..55

Maumee, Lucas County, Ohio,

fiO . 78

.51 .(ill

.58.01

Miami, Lucas County, Ohio,

10.11

18.21

23.88

Perrysburg, Wood County, Ohio,

4().lli)

.57. i 1.5

00.00

Port Lawrence, Lucas County, Ohio,

1S.0()

15., 84

20.20

St. Marys, Auglaise County, Ohio,

12.38

Shane Crossing. Mercer County, Ohio,

lO.OJi

12.8.3

13.02

Wapakoneta, Auglaise County, Ohio,

0.35

Waterville, Lucas County, Ohio,

5.76

Waterloo. DeKalb County, Indiana,

.-).n.-,

(1 . 2:!

8.87

Willshire. Van Wert County. Ohio,

2.(14

4 .•!8

1.16

The Toledo Postoffice, the successor of Port Lawrence, received

during the year ending 31st March, 1903, the sum of $459,368.98 it

being over twenty-one per cent increase of the receipts of 1902. During

February 1904 the receipts were $38,418 being an increase of $2220 over

February, 1903.

United States Custom Houses.

The first United States Port for the collection of Import and Ex-
port Duties in this Basin was at Miami, the northeasterly part of the
present Village of Maumee, Lucas County. The Act of Congress to
establish the Customs District of Miami was passed March 3, 1H05, but
some length of time elapsed before the office was opened here, the
office at Sandusky, the original port in Ohio as a subdivision of the
District of Erie, continuing to make what few collections were neces-
sar\' and jjossible.

FIRST CUSTOM HOUSES AND PUBLIC ROADS. 583

Amos Spafford was Collector of the Port of Miami in IWIO. His
report to the Government for the three months ending;' HOth Junt', IHH),
shows the exports to have been of liut two classes of articles, named and
valued as follows: Skins and Furs $r),61(I.H5: 20 Gallons Bears' Oil
$30. He was obliged to leave the Port to the British and savages at
the time of the departure of the other Americans after the surrender of
Detroit b}' General Hull. He returned, however, after the liuilding" of
Fort Meigs, or near the close of the War of l!^12, as his report shows
that his salary for 1814 was $2.50; office rent $10; fuel and stationery
$15.75. No affidavit was affixed to this report, but the following ex-
planatory statement instead, viz: 'There being no officer legally
authorized to administer oaths nearer than sixty or seventy miles, I
have not been able to attend to that part of the duty as the law re-
quires.' The writer has been unable to determine the date of the dis-
continuance of this office at Miami.

There was a Custom House at Port Lawrence, within the present
Toledo City limits, in the year 1832 and possibly before, William
Wilson being then the Collector of this Port. The collections at the
Port of Toledo have since increased to large amounts, particularly since
the change of the law permitting the receipt of goods in bond from the
Atlantic and other seaports.

The Development of Public Roads.

Good Roads are developed l^y two great forces — civilization and
wealth. The first settlers in the Maumee River Basin possessed the
full average for their class and time of the former recjuisite, but their
means for the expensive work of making good roads through this ' Black
Swamp' region were very limited. The beginnings and the develoji-
ment of this important work is a good part of the story of the remark-
able development of this Basin.

The States, the General Government, and the early settlers, each
and all gave early consideration to the necessity of connecting settle-
ments and markets by public highways. The Enabling Act providing
for the admission of Indiana into the Union, granted to the State three
per centum of the net proceeds of the sales of the Public Lands to
be reserved for making public roads and canals ' under the direction
of the Legislature.* All parts of this western country received the like
governmental benefaction. The receijits were very small for the needs,
and much delay and misdirection of effort attended all movements.

The General Assembly of Ohio resolved Fel:)ruary 22, 1820, that
the Ohio Senators and Representatives in the United States Congress
be requested to use their influence to have expended for its proposed

" Acts of Congress, Section VI Clause 3. April 19. I>I16.

584 THE MAUMEE RIVER BASIM.

use the sum of six thousand dollars which sum was appropriated by
Coni^^ress 12th December, IHll, for defraying' the expenses of exploring,
surveying, and opening the road ])rovided for in the Treaty of Browns-
town 25th November, bSOH (see ante page 256) from the Foot of the
Rapids of the Miami of the Lake (the Maumee) to the western line of
the Connecticut Reserve, and south from Lower Sandusky to the Treaty
Boundary Line. ITpon investigation it was found that this fund had
been expended during the War of 1H12 for other purposes.

At the May, 1820, meeting of the Commissioners of Wood County,
Ohio, Seneca Allen Auditor was allowed one dollar for publishing in
The Columbus Gazette the rates of tax on land for road purposes. June
30, 1S20, James Carlin, Ephraim L. Leaming and Norman L. Freeman
were appointed by the Commisioners Viewers of a State Road from
Fort Meigs liy Fort Findlay to Bellefontaine, a section of which now
forms the Main Street in Ijowling Green. In February, 1H21, the
Commissioners viewed personally the State and other roads, declared
the contracts for their making completed, and settled with all persons,
Thomas M'llrath, Francis Charter and Isaac Richardson being the
principal contractors. A Legislative Act of February 2, 1821, provided
for a State Road from Fort Meigs to Wapakoneta, and the 21st Novem-
ber John Johnson of Miami Count\' and Samuel Marshall of Shelby
submitted the Plat and Field Notes. Such plats and notes were copied
into a blank book which is yet kept subject to the inspection of every
citizen. The lines of these first surve^-s often varied that the road
might be made along the most convenient or practicable way, in cross-
ing streams and marshy places particularly. In later years they have
been much straightened other than in the occasional places where not
practicable to place the road along Land Section lines. October 28, 1822,
there were certified to the Commissioners the Field Notes and Plat of a
State Road from the Village of Maumee up the north side of the Maumee
River, along the Military- Road to Defiance, thence across the Maumee
at Wa3'ne Street to Second Street and 'up the west side of the Auglaise
River eight miles, thence up the north bank of Crooked Creek [Flat
Rock] to the Indiana State Line in the direction of Fort Wa\'ne'
— distance sevent^'-seven miles and sixty-three chains. At their meet-
ing in June, 1823, James H. Slawson presented a petition asking the
appointment of viewers to examine and lay out a County Road com-
mencing at the River in front of Tract No. 28 of the United States Re-
serve of twelve miles square at the Foot of the Rapids of the Miami of
the Lake [Maumee River] in said County: thence on as direct line as
the nature of the ground would admit to the sawing mill of Leaming
and Stewart on Swan Creek.

Meantime the State of Ohio was authorized bv Congress, 2Sth

SURVEYING AND PLATTING OF PUBLIC ROADS. SS5

February, 1H:^;-J, to lay out, oiicn, and construct a road from the Lower
Rapids of tile Miami of Lake Erie [Maumee River] to tile western
lioundary of tlie Connecticut Western Reserve, in sucli manner as the
Legislature of said State nia\- by law provide with the ai)i)robation of
the President of the United States, said road to forever remain a put)lic
highway. To aid the State in this work the one hundred and twentv
feet wide for roadway and one mile in widtli on each side adjoining
according to the Treaty of Brownstown, were given to the State with
power to sell and convey all land not needed for the road at not less
than$L25 per acre. The proceeds were to be applied to making the
road and if in e.xcess it was to be applied to keeping the road in
repair. This land was to be bounded by Section lines as run bv the
United States Surveyors. The road was to be made within four years
of the passage of the Act, from the ford near the foot of the lowest
rapids of the Maumee east to Fremont and to the Western Reserve.
Congress also authorized thv Prt'sident "2(')th May, b'^'24, to appoint
three commissioners to explore, survey, and mark 'in the most eligible
course' a road to connect the last named road with Detroit. The Pres-
ident 'was authorized to employ the troops of the United States to
make or assist in making said road ' and the Act also appropriated
$20,000 for the work. May 19, 1«2k, Congress further appropriated
$5900 to complete the Maumee-Detroit Road.

Among the first acts of the Commissioners of other counties beside
Wood as before mentioned, were those relating to roads, viz: In Allen
County, Indiana, 22nd October, 1H24, notice of the location of a State
Road from Vernon in Jennings Count}', by way of Greensburg, Rush-
viHe, and New Castle, to Fort Wayne : those of Williams County,
Ohio, Hth December, 1H24, authorized the opening of a County Road
on the north side of the Maumee River from the Ford at Jefferson Street,
Defiance, to the east line of Henry County, or the Grand Rapids.
This, howevi'r, appears to be along the line of the j^roposed State
Road of IH-^'i. They also ordered opened 7th March, ll~(2i'i, a County
Road from the east line of Hinry County up the south side of the
Maumee River to Defiance: also HJth June, 1H27, a Countv Road from
Defiance along the General Wayne Military Road up the north side of
the Maumee to the Indiana State Line. The Commissioners of Williams
County, then governing the present Counties of Defiance, Henry,
Paulding and Putnam, ordered June H, 1H26, that the three per centum
fund on net receijjts for the sales of United States Land, allowed by
Congress for road improvement, be applied to the building of bridges
and crossings in W'illiams and the other Counties attached to it. The
Commissioners of Hancock County provided September IH, ls2!), for
what is now called the Findlav and \'anlue Road.

586 THE MAUMEE RIVER BASIN.

About the 3'ear 1827 a State Road was surveyed and opened from
Upper Sandusky to Findlay, and by way of thie north side of the
Blanchard River to the present Ottawa, Putnam County, thence
straightening the Aborigine Trail to form the present Defiance-Ottawa
Road, a total distance of seventy-seven miles.

In 1827 the first road was laid out by Michigan authorities in Port
Lawrence Township, which then included the present Toledo and about
half of the present Lucas County. The last official act of the Michigan
officers of Port Lawrence Township, before surrendering to the Ohio
officials in 1835, was the laying out of a road from Tremainville to
Toledo, three miles and twenty-three chains in length, which road has
developed into the present Cherry Street, Toledo. This road connected
with the road then recently opened along the river from Vistula and
Port Lawrence to Fort Miami, and which was about this time extended
from Vistula to the Village of Manhattan at the mouth of the Maumee
River, by whose citizens it was continued northward to the Harris Line,
there connecting with the National Road to Detroit before noted.

The 5th December, 1831, the Survey and Plat were certified to of a
State Road from Bellefontaine, Logan County, through Lima, Allen
County, the present Kalida, Putnam County, crossing the Auglaise
River above the mouth of the Blanchard and thence down the west side
of the Auglaise to Defiance; thence across the Maumee and in a north-
westerly direction across the Tiffin River at the present Brunersburg,
and on through Ney and crossing the River St. Joseph three miles
above Edgerton, Williams County, and on the same course to the
Indiana State Line, a distance of one hundred and eighteen miles.
This road was later extended through Steuben County, Indiana, to
Pleasant Lake.

A County Road was certified in June, 1832, from Defiance up the
Tiffin River to the Michigan State Line, a distance of twenty-seven
miles and thirty-nine chains. In November, 1832, a State Road Survey
was certified, extending from Defiance eastward along the south side of
the Maumee River a few miles and then across country to the i^resent
Fremont, Sandusky County, sixty-six miles. Also, 15th January, 1834,
a State Road from Defiance southeast, through the present Ayresville
and along the Defiance Moraine (South Ridge) through the northeast
part of Putnam County and the northwest part of Hancock to Tiffin,
sixty-six miles. This road is in line, diagonally across the Townships,
with the Bellefontaine Road northwest of Defiance, and it has errone-
ouslv been called the Bellefontaine Road.

All of these roads remain most important thoroughfares. They
have been varied somewhat from their original courses, but they were
generally wiselj^ located ; and the numerous later roads that have been

EARLY CROSSING OF RIVERS. TURNPIKE ROADS. 587

made intersecting and connectinti with ttum, have but added to tluir
importance.

The streams were forded at the most convenient shallow places.
On the more prominent lines of travel primitive ferry boats were in use,
particularly in hij^h stages of water. The first licensed ferry boat at
Defiance was in use in April, 1^24, across the Maumee and Auglaise
Rivers, see ante page 528. The first bridge across the .\uglaise here
was built at Hopkins Street in 1853, and the ferry continued in use at
this point until this date. The first bridge across the Maumee at
Defiance was a toll bridge built in iHiJG at Clinton Street by Sidnev S.
Sprague and other enterprising citizens. The piers and abutments were
of timber insecurely anchored, and they were carried away by the high
water after two or three years. Other succeeding bridges at the same
place were destroyed in the same way, as was a toll bridge across the
Tiffin River at Brunersburg, built between the years 1838, 1840 by
Samuel A. Sargent and (iilman C. Mudgett.

In particularly marshy places in these public roads, teams and
wagons were kept from miring by sections of small trees laid across the
roadway, often several lavers deep. Such corduroy construction,
though at best hard to travel over, was the only means at hand until
the opening of ditches and the procuring of a smoother hard surface,
which required many years of labor in preparation.

The first toll road in the middle Maumee region was made by
Alfred P. Edgerton for the Hicks Land Comjiany liy Act of the Ohio
Legislature of ir)th January, 1845, to connect Hicksville, Defiance
Count}', with the Wabash and Erie Canal at the present Antwerp,
Paulding County, the Maumee River being forded in low stages of
water and ferried in higher stages. This road was transferred to the
Commissioners of these counties by Mr. Edgerton in lHri4 with the only
condition that they keep it in repair.

The era of Turnjiike Roads began also in Wood County about the
year 1845. March 10th the Commissioners effected the purchase from
the Perrysburg, Findlay and Kenton Turnpike Comi^anx-, recently
organized, of the part of their line in Wood Count\- for the sum of !?25'2
expended for engineering and other i^ayments, and their acceptance of
the contracts made. These turnpikes were made by turning and throw-
ing the mud from the sides into the middle of the road. The ditches
thus formed on each side were generally too shallow to drain the road
and it continued impassable much of the time in wet seasons. Febru-
ary 3, 1849, the Perrysburg and Findlay Plank Road Comjianx' was
chartered by W. H. Hopkins, Collister Haskins, Schuyler N. Beach,
E. D. Peck, George Powers, joseiih Sargent, Willard \'. Wav and
others. Perrysburg To'vnshiii subscribed $5000 and Plain Township

588 THE MAUMEE RIVER BASIN.

voted §2000. Two steam sawing mills were built between Pern-sburg
and Bowling Green, and about the year 1853 the laying of plank was
completed along the roadway between these villages, and tollgates
established.

Sidewalks were not provided for by town enactment until the year
1840 at Defiance : and on account of the plenitude of forest products,
they were rough wood affairs which but few of the towns have yet out-
grown. Nothing was done in the central part of the Basin to place a
hard, smooth covering on a iniblic road until the years 1849, 1850, when
there was formed at Defiance and the two-mile distant competing town
of Brunersburg, a company composed principally of Brice Hilton,
William D. Haymaker, Edwin Phelps, H. R. Major, John Tuttle, and
])robably a few others, who iilaced oak plank, cut at the Hilton sawing
mill in Brunersburg, along the Bellefontaine Road from the Maumee
River at Defiance northwest for a distance of about five miles. Two
tollgates, with cottages for the keepers' families, were built by this
road, one at one mile and the other at four miles from Defiance. This
road was also extended southeast five miles to Ayresville with one toll-
gate. The demand for tolls became very unpopular, particularly after
the first wet season when the plank became displaced and were not
well looked after. Tolls were insisted upon, however, until the debts
of the Company were paid and then after a few years the company
abandoned the road, losing all the efforts and money invested; and
leaving the wav in worse condition than it was before the plank were
laid. The company efforts with Plank Roads in other parts of the Basin
resulted similarly. The most extensive of these efforts centered at Fort
Wavne, being stimulated, as at Defiance, b\' the increasing amount of
farm products hauled thither for canal shipment. The longest of these
early road improvements, with plank laid over the worst parts, led from
Sturgis, Michigan, to Fort Wayne, a distance of about sixty miles.

Beginning with the years 1872-73, the writer, who was driving,
and on horseback, through the country in all directions, contributed a
series of articles to the Defiance Express newspaper on the best methods
for permanent road imiirovement, the advantages to be derived there-
from, and the convenient locations of gravel and stone for such
improvement. He then obtained the signatures of the property owners
along the business part of Clinton Street, Defiance, petitioning the
Common Council to improve this very miry thoroughfare; but such
proposition was then considered chimerical by this body the members
of which made little use of the roads, and no favorable action was taken.
The agitation bore fruit, hovyever, and after the election of other men
the street was macadamized, being completed early in December, 1877.
Ferry Street was macadamized in part in the year 1878. The County

SURVEYING AND PLATTING UNITED STATES LANDS. 589

Commissioners now acted under improved road laws and in IHHO six
roads radiating' from the Court House of Defiance County, were beinj^
thus improved. The era of road improvement t\v gravel then besj'an ;
and the improvement throu^rhout the County by l)oth i;ravel and stone
has since lieen encouraging in degree; and sucli is now the case in manv
parts of the Basin.

The United States Lands.

The extinction of nearly all the claims of the Aborigines to lands
in this Basin by the United States Treaties and purchase, given in
Chapter XII, was followed by the survey and marking of these lands in-

ROCK yUAKKY AND CRL'SHER FOR ROAD IMPROVEMENT

Of Corniterous Limestone in the Northwest Quarter of Section Nine. Defiance Township, Loolsins;
northeast 21st November, 1902. Auglaise River at the left.

to Townships and Sections. This system of survey is the perfection of
the plan of Thomas Hutchins Geographer of the United States who
began the more eastern survey in 17H6. It deserves consideration as
the simplest and best system of land survey for record yet devised.
The necessary starting points are a Base Line and a Princi]ial Meridian.
Three each of these lines are in principal use in this Basin.

In the Ohio Survey the 41st Parallel of Latitude, the line di\iding
Paulding and Van Wert Counties, was surveyed as the Base Line in
May, 1819, by Sylvanus Bourne. The Land Townships are numbered

590

THE MAUMEE RIVER BASIN.

north and south of this line, every six miles forming a full Township.
The west boundary line of the State of Ohio was taken as the Principal
Meridian and the Rang'es number east from this line, every six miles of
Land Sections forming a Range. An irregularity occurs along the
lower Maumee River on account of the want of line accord with the
previous Survey (in 1H16) of the Greenville Treaty Reservations of
1795; and in central southernmost iiart of the Basin with want of
accord with the Virginia Military Survey.

For Michigan the Base Line is about Latitude 42" 20'; and the
Principal Meridian about Longitude 7' 19' west from Washington it
being the dividing line between Hillsdale County and Lenawee, making
the Ranges in the former West, and in the latter East; the Townships
in both these Counties being south of the Base Line. The Michigan
Survey did not stop at the Ohio boundary line, the liarris Line(see
ante pages 567-8) but extended about five and one half miles south of it
at the northwestern corner of Ohio, and thence along the Fulton Line
due east, it being about eight miles south of North Cape in Maumee
Bay the location of the north Ohio State Line.

Indiana and Illinois have the same Base Line, well toward the
southern part of these States, near Bellevue. All of the Indiana Land

Townships in this Basin are, conse-
quently, North, the most northern one
being number Thirty-eight. The In-
diana Principal Meridian is west of the
central part of the State near Labanon
or 9" 30' west of Washington ; hence
all the Indiana Ranges in this Basin
are East — see Township Map.

The Base and Meridian Lines here
were surveyed in the \-ears 1819-20;
and several following years were nec-
essaryto survey and mark the Township
and Section Lines. Each complete
Springfield Civil Township, and Land Land Townshiji is as near six miles
Township No. Si. North Ran.e No. Four ^^^^^ ^^ ^j^^ converging meridians

East, Williams County, Ohio, ShowjnH the cr* o

system of numbering the Land Sections, each admit, and SUch Square is surveyed

one mile suuare; and the Meander of the -^^^^ thirtV-SlX Sections beginning at

Titnn River and its tributaries. - o (^

the northeast corner and numbering
from right to left, then numbering the next lower tier of Sections con-
tinuously from left to right, and continuing this forth and back
numbering to Section Thirty-six which is the southeast Section of
the Township — see accompanying plat. Sections are divided into
iiuarters of one hundred and sixty acres each, which quarters are

TOWNSHIPS LAND AND CIVIL. SCHOOLS. 591

readily subdivided with simple descri])tion into an\' fraction desired.

While many Land and Civil Townshijis corresjiond in size, there
are Several reasons why all do not. The irretj'ular size and form of
some Counties often deform the Civil Townshi])s: the irreKularit\- of
many of the United States and .\boriijine Reservations that extended
alonfr rivers deform some Land Townships : and abutting surveys
making fractional Sections necessary; these in the Indiana Survey
at the Ohio State Line and the Michigan Survey at the Ohio and
Fulton Lines which could not come even, are the principal causes for
variance. Lucas County, Ohio, exhibits the greatest irregularity.

The United States established several offices for the sale of the
Public Lands as soon as their survey was sufficiently advanced. The
first office for northwestern Ohio was established at Piqua in IHIU or
1820. Then followed one at Fort Wayne for northern Indiana: and
one at Monroe in 1H23 for Michigan. An office was later established at
Wapakoneta: and this was moved to Lima in the winter of 1^34-35.
In the year 1H4H this office was removed to Defiance where it remained
for several years until the United States Lands were sold, when it was
removed to Chillicothe. "^

February 2, 1.^21, it was estimated that there were 13, H24, 000 acres
of Public (United States) Land in the State of Ohio of which
12,642,000 acres were surveyed; and in Indiana 21,565,440 acres of
which 9,926,020 acres were surveyed. These estimates were 'from
calculations from printed maps, and cannot he relied on for accuracy'
was the report of the General Land Office at Washington.

The early laws provided that Section Sixteen in every Land Town-
ship should be set aside for the benefit of Public Schools according to
the Ordinance of 17^7. Congress passed an Act February 1, 1«26,
enabling Ohio to sell School Lands, with consent of the people resident
in the Township, and with the receipts to establish a permanent fund
the interest of which could be applied to school use.

The Private .and Public Schools.

The Ordinance of the United States Congress 13th Julv, 1787 — the
Magna Charta of the five States formed from the Territory Northwest
of the River Ohio, which everyone should read — proclaims in Article
III that religion, morality, and knowledge being necessary to good
government and the happiness of mankind, schools and the means of
education shall forever be encouraged. The Constitution adopted 29th
November, 1802, for the organization of Ohio, provided in .Vrticle \TII,
Section 25, that no law shall be passed to iirevent the poor in the
several Counties and Townships within this State from an eiiual

* For account of Land Offices for the sale of Ohio State Lands, see ante page 539.

592 THE MAUMEE RIVER BASIN.

participation in the schools, academies, colleges, and universities
within this State which are endowed, in whole or in part, from the
revenue arising from donations made by the United States for the sup-
port of schools and colleges. These provisions are repeated, and
fortified, in the Constitution as amended 10th March, 1851.

There being no public school fund, a private school was maintained
by the settlers at Miami, about two miles below the foot of the lowest
rapids of the Maumee, previous to the War of 1H12. Soon after the
close of this war there was opened a private school in the vicinity of
Fort Meigs. And wherever a settlement was started, a school teacher
soon appeared.

The General Assembly of Ohio enacted a law 22nd January, 1821,
requiring the favorable vote of the majority of the electors of a Town-
ship for the organization of a school, and that the district wherein the
school was organized must contain at least twelve householders. It is
doubtful if any settlement in the central part of the Maumee River
Basin at this date could have organized a school under this law.
Schools were maintained, however, and in a few instances schoolhouses
were built, by private contributions of labor and money.

The first school at Defiance was organized in 1824 in a house that
was tN'pically primitive in every respect. By union effort a building
about 20x28 feet in size was built of logs on the fractional lot at the
northwest corner of Perry and First Streets, facing eastward. As in the
Early Home in the Wilderness pictured on page 513, oiled paper was
used in the windows instead of glass. The fire was kept against a large
backlog in an enormous chimney fireplace. The seats were first of
puncheons, and later some of slabs cut by the Brunersburg sawing
mill which were thought superior to those hewn with an axe. They
were supported on the rough puncheon floor bv four spreading legs
stuck into augur holes on their under surface. The feet of the smaller
children could not touch the floor when they were seated, and there
were no backs to the seats. Planks declining from the side walls above
the benches were used for writing exercises by the larger pupils.
William Semans was the first teacher. For several years only a private
school could be had. The tuition fees were generally named at two
dollars for each pupil per quarter, the teacher being obliged to gather
the pupils as best he could, and also to act as collector of tuition
fees.

The first public school house in Fort Wayne was a one-story brick
building constructed in 11^25, which building also served, like all early
schoolhouses and many later ones, for meetings political, masonic,
town, and religious. John P. Hedges was the first teacher; and he
had the room plastered in the winter of 1826 at his individual expense.

SCHOOLS. THE FIRST AND THE LATER. 595

Findlav's first sclioolhousu was as iirimitivu in material and con-
struction, and somewhat smaller than the one at Defiance. The first
teacher there was John C. Wickham. The above named are types.

The changes in material surroundings since this meager beginning,
through a series of three or four successive buildings to the present new,
commodious, and elegantly appointed structures which generally
abound, have been great. Many improvements have been made, also,
in the school law, and in some places in the modes of imparting instruc-
tion. There is vet, however, lamentable want of a State supervising
bodv to bring all the teaching bodies to definite and uniform require-
ments ; to put a stop to bickerings, and to get them away from the present
easy discipline or want of discipline, and from the general deference to
the intolerant spirit of anything savoring of reverence and of tasks. In
comparison with the former eastern school in the higher grades some
of the present school days — in which the minds of the pupils are full of
the affairs of the sporting field, of night parties and receptions, and of
everything but discijiline through reipiired tasks by wholesome appli-
cation; when schools of some towns are generally dismissed for the day
whenever a circus or anything of an exciting or sporting character
comes to town — appear elusive, delusive, and damaging; even defeat-
ing the true object of education or the forming of sterling character
by teaching the young to overcome obstacles, to see aright, to observe,
and to de\'elop wholesome thought ; to endure all things, to feel more
dispassionately and reverently, and to act wisely in all things.

The number of academies, seminaries, schools of music, book-
keeping, etc., that have been opened, and closed, in this Basin has been
large. Every smaller county has had one or more, and the more
populous centers have had, and yet have, several of varying aims and
grades. And yet many of the young people desiring advanced studies
have been sent to older parts of the State, or eastward.

The Fort Wayne Female College was advertised in the Defiance
Democrat Septemlier 23, 1^^47, by Samuel Brenton, Secretary. A. C.
Huestes, A. M., was Acting President, assisted in teaching by Misses
Abigail Kies and Elizabeth F. Irving. There were Juvenile, Prepara-
tory, and Collegiate, Departments, giving instruction in languages
and ' Music on the Piano or Seraphim, Drawing and Painting, Wax
Flowers, Plain and Ornamental Needle Work.' This school was
under the patronage of the North Indiana Annual Conference of the
Methodist Episcopal Church. Its plan was changed a few years later
to include pupils of both sexes and the name changed to that of Fort
Wayne College; but not meeting with the desired success it was
removed to Upland, Indiana, some years ago as the nucleus of Taylor
Universitv.

594 THE MAUMEE RIVER BASIN.

In the early history of Mercer County, Ohio, there was a combina-
tion of efforts to found a colony of and an educational institution for
colored people. These efforts were attended with apparent success for
some length of time to be finally defeated in pathetic manner. Augus-
tus Wattles, a native of Connecticut who was a prime mover in this
work, wrote to Henry Howe as follows:"^

My early education as you well know would naturally lead me to look upon learn-
ing and good morals as of infinite importance in a land of liberty. In the winter of
1833-.'U I providentially became acquainted with the colored population of Cincinnati,
and found about 4000 totally ignorant of everything calculated to make good citizens.
Most of them had been slaves, shut out from every avenue of moral and mental improve-
ment. I started a school for them and kept it up with two hundred pupils for two years.
I then proposed to the colored people to move into the country and purchase land, and
remove from these contaminating influences which had so long crushed them in our cities
and villages. They promised to do so provided I would accompany them and teach
school. I travelled through Canada, Michigan and Indiana, looking for a suitable
location, and finally settled here [in the present Marion Township, Mercer County, Ohio]
thinking this place contained more natural advantages than any other unoccupied country
within my knowledge. In l,S.'i.> I made the first purchase for colored people in this
County. In about three years they owned not far from .'iO.OOO acres. I had travelled
into almost every neighborhood of colored people in the State and laid before them the
benefits of a permanent home for themselves and of education for their children. In my
first journey through the State I established, by the assistance and cooperation of aboli-
tionists, twenty-five schools for colored children. I collected from the colored people
such money as they had to spare and entered land for them. Many who had no money
then, succeeded in raising some and brought it to me. With this I bought land for them.

I purchased for myself one hundred and ninety acres of land to establish a manual
labor school for colored boys. I had sustained a school on it al my own e.xpense till the
11th November, 1842. While in Philadelphia the winter before, I became acquainted
with the trustees of the late Samuel Emlen of New Jersey, a Friend [Quaker]. He left
by his will $20,000 for the 'support and education in school learning and the mechanic
arts and agriculture such colored boys, of African and Aborigine descent, whose parents
would give them up to the Institute.' We united our means, and they purchased my
farm and appointed me the superintendent of the establishment, which they called the
Emlen Institute.

A large two-stor^' brick house was built as a nucleus for the home
and school for these boys. In 1846 Judge Leigh of Virginia purchased
five sections of land, 3'200 acres, in this settlement for the freed slaves
of John Randolph of Roanoke. They arrived in Mercer County in the
summer of 1846 to the number of about four hundred, and were by
many of the white settlers of the County forcibly prevented from making
settlement. Hostilities were commenced and continued against those
already settled there, with many threats of violence if thej' did not
abandon their homes and lands. While this opposition did not drive
away all of the negroes it, and the death of the promoters, destroyed
Emlen Institute. A letter to the writer from Thomas J. Godfrey an

Historical Collections of Ohio Centennial Edition, volume ii pace 341,

r-. n r 1 / /I -r- r- ^ir-T-c IT/n n UinUCO IS n I I r- A T I O M 595

)ws:
was
ship
lege
only
and
If is

OSes
ober
Feb-
y of
later
es of
Arts
o be

tract

and

the
ural
lum.
later
ined
able
hese
tees,
id to
luni-
mbi-
want
itus,

nam
John

inty,
re he
ct of
1888
lund

_...,.„..„. „....„ ^^^..^., ^ ,..„.,, x^.....v..„w^ shi]),

a creditable brick buildin.u; to accommodate about live bundrrd pui>ils:
and in 1889 two dormitories were built near-by. School has been

594 THE MAUMEE RIVER BASIN.

My early education as you well know would naturally lead me to look upon learn-
ing and good morals as of infinite importance in a land of liberty. In the winter of
]S.'i3-34 I providentially became acquainted witfi the colored population of Cincinnati,
and found about 4000 totally ignorant of everything calculated to make good citizens.
Most of them had been slaves, shut out from every avenue of moral and mental improve-
ment. I started a school for them and kept it up with two hundred pupils for two years.
I then proposed to the colored people to move into the country and purchase land, and
remove from these contaminating influences which had so long crushed them in our cities
and villages. They promised to do so provided I would accompany them and teach
school. I travelled through Canada, Michigan and Indiana, looking for a suitable
location, and finally settled here [in the present Marion Township, Mercer County, Ohio]
thinking this place contained more natural advantages than any other unoccupied country
within my knowledge. In 1S8.~) I made the first purchase for colored people in this
County. In about three years they owned not far from iiO.OOO acres. I had travelled
into almost every neighborhood of colored people in the State and laid before them the
benefits of a permanent home for themselves and of education for their children. In my
first journey through the State I established, by the assistance and cooperation of aboli-
tionists, twenty-five schools for colored children. I collected from the colored people
such money as they had to spare and entered land for them. Many who had no money
then, succeeded in raising some and brought it to me. With this I bought land for them.

I purchased for myself one hundred and ninety acres of laud to establish a manual
labor scliool for colored boys. I had sustained a school on it at my own e.'ipense till the
11th November, 1842. While in Philadelphia the winter before, I became acquainted
with the trustees of the late Samuel Emlen of New Jersey, a Friend [Quaker]. He left
by his will $20,000 for the 'support and education in school learning and the mechanic
arts and agriculture such colored boys, of African and Aborigine descent, whose parents
would give them up to the Institute.' We united our means, and they purchased my
farm and appointed me the superintendent of the establishment, which they called the
Emlen Institute.

.V large two-story brick house was built as a nucleus for the home
and school for these boys. In 1846 Judge Leigh of Virginia purchased
five sections of land, 3200 acres, in this settlement for the freed slaves
of John Randolph of Roanoke. They arrived in Mercer Count}' in the
summer of 1846 to the number of about four hundred, and were by
many of the white settlers of the County forcibly prevented from making
settlement. Hostilities were commenced and continued against those
already settled there, with many threats of violence if they did not
abandon their homes and lands. While this opposition did not drive
away all of tlie negroes it, and the death of the promoters, destroyed
Emlen Institute. A letter to the writer from Thomas J. Godfrey an

* Historical Collections of Ohio Centennial Edition, volume ii pa^e 341.

LIST OF THE MORE GENERAL EDUCATIONAL INSTITUTIONS NOW EXISTING IN AND ADJACENT TO THE MAUMEE RIVER BASIN OTHER THAN TH K

PUBLIC AND THE COMMON PAROCHIAL SCHOOLS

Ada. Ohio

Adrian, Michigan

Angola. Indiana

Carthagena. Ohio

CrawfisColleBe. Ohio

Deliance. Ohio

Fayette, Ohio

Findlay. Ohio

Fort Wayne. Indiana
Fort Wayne, Indiana
Fort Wayne, Indiana

Fort Wayne. Indiana

Hillsdale, Michigan ..

Lima. Ohio

Toledo, Ohio

Ohio Northern University*

Adrian College

Tri-State Normal College

St. Charles Seminary

Crawtis College (ante page 595)

Dehance College

Fayette Normal University

Findlay College

Concordia College

St. Augustine Academy

Fort Wayne College of Medicinet,..
) Hope Hospital Training School for '
* Nurses \

Hillsdale College

Lima College^

Manual Training School^

Toledo Normal School

Ursuline Academy

The Smead School

St. Johns College

Toledo Medical Collegell

j St. Vincent Hosp'i Training School I

( for Nurses II f

j Toledo Hospital Training School (_
I for N urses \

Notre Dame Academy

1859

1884

1863
18t-9

1885
1887
1886
1839

1879

1897

1875
1893
1875
1893

1884
1898
1880

1893
1904

M. E. Church

Meth. P. Ch.

Individual

Rom. Cath.
Tp. Trustees
Chr'n Church

Individual
Church of God
Lutheran
Rom. Cath.
Individual

Medical

Free Baptist

Lutheran

Trustees

B'd of Educ'n

Rom. Cath.

Individual

Rom. Cath.

Individual

Medical

Medical
Rom. Cath.

Ref 'nee

Ref'nce

1,000

500

1,000

5,000

800

200

10,000
1,000

5,000
Ref'nce
Ref'nce

3,000

Branches Taught

\ Business, Art, Music. Oratory, Chemistry, Phar- 1
■. macy. Civil and Electrical Engineering, •
I Pedagogy. Preparatory, College. Law j

Bus., Art. Ped'y, Prep., College, Theological.. .
\ Bus.. Art, Music, Oratory^ Chemistry, Phar., I
I Engineering, Ped'y, Prep., College, Law. f

Preparatory and Theological

Common and Secondary

Bus. Art. Music, Ped'y. Prep., Col., Theolog'l...

Business. Art, Music. Pedayogv, Prep., College...

Bus., Art, Music, Ped'y, Prep., Col.. Theolog'l. ,

Preparatory and College

Common and Secondary

Medical and Surgical, four years

Nursing Sick and Injured, three years' course. . .
Bus., Art, Music. Ped'y, Prep., Col., Theolog'l...

Business, Art, Music, Preparatory, College

Secondary and Manual Training

Pedagogy, two years' course from High School. . .

Elementary, Secondary, Art, Music

English, College Preparatory

Preparatory and College

Medical and Surgical, four years

Nursing Sick and Injured

Primary. Preparatory. Business, Science

Degrees Conferred

) Phar. C. Phar. G., B. Pd., B. L.. I
I B. Ph., B. S.. B. A., LL. B f

B. Pd., B. L., B. Ph.. B. S„ B, A. ..
) Phar. G., B. Pd., B. Ph.. B. L., "(
' B. S.. B. A., LL. B. f

B. Pd.,B. L.,B.Ph.,B. S.,B.A.
B.Pd., B. L..B. Ph.,B. S.,B.A.
B. Pd,. B. L.,B. Ph..B. S..B. A.
B. A

M. D

B. Pd.. B. L., B. Ph.. B. S., B. A.
B. Pd., B. L.. B. S., B. A

B. A

M. D

o J

Both
Male
Both
Both
Both
Both
Male
Both
Both
Female

Boih
Both
Both
Both

Female
Both
Male
Both

Female

Female
Female

* The Trustees of this School 28th July, 1903, changed its former name of Ohio Normal University to Ohio Northern University,

t Became a nominal department of Ohio Northern University in the year 1903.

t The grounds and good will of this school were sold in the autumn of 1904 to private individuals to be opened for the winter term as an undenominational school.

§ See ante page 595 for further description of this school.

H Became a nominal department of the ' Toledo University ' in the summer of 1904,

II A Training School for Nurses, with two years course, was also established at the Lucas County Intirmary. Toledo, in February. 1905.

594 TRF MAIIMFF PIVFP RA'^ihr

tioi
coll
son
tus
woi

ing

183.=

and

Mos

men

I the

rem'

and

scho

loca

thin'

with

Cou

into

bent

lirst

tioui

such

then

labo

llth

with

by h

arts

vvoul

farm

Emh

and
five
of J
sum
mar
sett
aire
aba
awa
Emlen Institute. A lett<-T to the writer trom 1 tiomas J. Uodtrey an

* Historical Collections of Ohio Centennial Edition, volume ii page 241.

PRIVATE GIFTS FOR HIGHER EDUCATION. 595

old settler at Celina, dated 16th May, 11103, reads practically as follows;
In 1H56 the Emlen Institute was a thing of the past. The farm was
then owned by a German as private property. It changed ownership
a few times, and the Roman Catholics bought it and have a college
there now, at Carthagena. The old building is remembered by only
the old citizens. Negroes here are not so numerous as formerly and
they are yet located in and near Carthagena. The condition of some is
fairly prosperous, but that of the majority is not prosperous.

Two other donations from individuals for educational purjioses
within the Basin have been attencKd with some success, viz : October
23, 1872, Jesup Wakeman Scott (b(Mn Ridgefield, Connecticut, Feb-
ruary 25, 1799: came to Perrysburg, Ohio, in May, 1833, b\- way of
Norwalk, from residence in South Carolina, and a few years later
removed to Toledo) and Susan his wife executed a deed for 160 acres of
land in trust to eleven 'Trustees of the Toledo University of Arts
and Trades' for buildings and for maintenance from the leases to be
granted on the parts of the land not wanted for the school's use. No
school building has been constructed on this farm, and the entire tract
of land (situated three miles westward of the Toledo Postofiice and
lying west of Farada\- Street and between Nebraska Avenue on the
north and Hill Avenue on the south ) has been leased for agricultural
purposes, the rentals netting the trustees about 5^600 per annum.
Meantime a school for secondary grades and for manual training (later
called Polytechnic School, and Toledo University) has been maintained
in a building on lot of Toledo Central High School. Considerable
friction, however, has been engendered between the pupils of these
schools and also between the City Board of Education and the Trustees,
arising at times to a degree inimical to the dignity of the latter and to
the educational welfare of the former. Under the State's new Muni-
cipal Code, of 1903, the Trustees have attempted to organize a combi-
nation of nine colleges to be termed The Toledo University; but want
of funds and court proceedings involving questions of their legal status,
prevents the realization of these aspirations.

The other corporate beneficiary is Blanchard Townshij), Putnam
County, Ohio, which received $25,000 in 1880 from the estate of John
Crawfis by will. Mr. Crawfis was born in Berne, Fairfield County,
Ohio, in 1809, and in 1^33 settled in Blanchard Township where he
lived an honorable life and accumulated a good estate. The object of
his bequest was the organization of a Township High School. In 18SH
the trustees of this fund constructed on a plat of four acres of ground
in the southeastern part of Land Section Twenty, Blanchard Township,
a creditable brick building to accommodate about five hundred pupils:
and in 1889 two dormitories were built near-by. School has been

596 THE MAUMEE RIVER BASIN.

maintained in these buildings, which have borne the name Crawfis
College; and such is the name of the postoffice established in the hamlet
of M'CuUoughville which has formed adjoining the school lot.

Church and private schools have increased in number, in variety of
subjects taught, and efficiency. Private schools for the teaching of
bookkeeping and business usages, and of telegraphy, abound in the
larger towns with competition sharjj between them. Also private
schools of kindergarten work for the children, with the different grades
for the youth of separate and both sexes, including evening schools for
those working by day, also schools for music and for various specialties.
Many persons of different ages have latterly also entered upon more or
less of a course of study in 'Correspondence School.' Some of the
larger towns have maintained lectures in the courses of University
Extension work. All these with numerous clubs of somewhat literary
character abounding in every town, have had elevating effects and
presage general improvement in the future. Some of the church and
more formal schools are fairly well equipped and have been doing fairly
good work; but their requirements for degrees are yet moderate. They
supplement tlie iiublic schools, and often take the work of them by
assuming the early and the last short educational training of many
jjupils. Many young people at these schools, however, obtain a busi-
ness or pedagogic training who would not, or could not, go to distant
and more fully endowed institutions. The influence of these schools
has also been wholesome and elevating in the main to the entire
communities surrounding them. The number of pupils in attendance
vary from a few score in some to over three thousand at Ada during the
school year. The tuition fees must needs be very low to compete with
the jiublic schools of the neighborhood, and the State Universities.

The Miami and Erie and the Wabash and Erie Canals.

The subject of canals to connect the headwaters of adjacent rivers,
including those of the Maumee and Wabash and the St. Mary and
Miami, was advanced by Washington* at different times beginning
with those in the East as early as the year 1773 or before. Other
persons also early recognized the utility of such waterways. Generals
Wayne and Harrison in their campaigns noted the feasibility of a Mau-
mee-Wabash canal, as did officers in the army of the latter. t

* The Writings of George Washington edited by Jared Sparks, volume IX papes 30, 59, 80, U.'j, et
passim. The canals thereafter built in Virginia, Maryland. Pennsylvania, New Jersey, and New York
are yet in use ; and in 19t>3. the State of New York voted to atjain enlarfre the New York and Erie
Canal, this time sutticiently to accommodate larye barges.

f The Maumee is navigable for boats from this place [Fort Wayne] to the Lake [Erie] : and the
portage to the nearest navigable branch [Little River tributary] of the Wabash is but seven or eicht miles
through a level marshy prairie from which the water runs both to the Wabash [through Little River] and

MAKING CANALS FOR COMMERCIAL WATERWAYS. 597

The most persistently active and ]iractical ])iomul^"ator of a general
s\'Stem of canals, however, was De Witt Clinton of New York who be-
gan to agitate the subject in the latter part of the eighteenth century.'^
He conducted correspondence on this subject with the Governors of
several States while he was yet Mayor of New York City; and he so
impressed the Governor and Legislature of Ohio in favor of the New
York and Erie Canal that, the 7th Januar\-, 1812, the Legislature
passed a resolution declaring that the expense of the canal from the
Hudson River to Lake Erie ought to be provided for by the United
States Congress. Governor Return J. Meigs communicated this resolu-
tion to the United States House of Representatives 3rd February, ]K13.

The War of 1812 and the depleted condition of the United States
Treasury made impracticable the undertaking bv the general Govern-
ment of any extensive public works other than those for defense. But
Mr. Clinton was indefatigable in his labors, and while the war delayed
it could not defeat the favorable result of his plans. His labors and
influence committed New York to the great work. Major Benjamin F.
Stickney Agent to the Aborigines at Fort Wayne in 1812, and later at
Miami by the lower Maumee communicated to Governor Clinton in 1818
his ideas of a canal to connect the Maumee and Wabash Rivers which
so pleased him that he replied . . I have found a way to get into
Lake Erie and you have shown me how to get out of it. . . You
have extended my project six hundred miles. t •

The New York and Erie Canal was begun 4th luly, 1H17, and com-
pleted 16th October, 1825. Governor Clinton had the proud satisfac-
tion at the consummation of this great work of heading a remarkable
marine procession which ended outside the lower New York Bay by his
pouring into the Atlantic Ocean a bottle of water brought from Lake
Erie to signalize the closer union of the Great Lakes dnd the Sea.

During the years of his assuring of this great thoroughfare, he
wrote to the Governors of Ohio, Indiana and Illinois, urging that the
work be carried forward to the connection of the Great Lakes with the
Mississippi River Basin. In this great work Governor Clinton contin-
ued his interest and aid to its consummation. In one of his later letters
8th November, 1823, to Micajah T. Williams one of the Ohio Canal
Commissioners, he wrote that

The State of Ohio from the fertility of its soil, the benignity of its climate, and its
geographical position, must always contain a dense population, and the productions and

to the St, Mary [and thence into the Maumee near-byl, A canal at some future day will unite these
rivers. — History of the Late War [of 1HI2I in the Western Country pace 137, by Captain Robert M'Afee,
Lexington. Kentucky, IHIC.

■'' See Life of De Witt Clinton by James Renwick, LL, D,. pace \n'^ et sequentia.

t Early History of the Maumee Valley by H, L. Hosmer. pase 2a,

598 THE MAUMEE RIVER BASIN.

consumptions of its inhabitants must forever form a lucrative and extensive inland trade,
exciting the powers of productive industry, and communicating aliment and energy to
external commerce. But when we consider that this canal will open a way to the great
rivers that fall into the Mississippi ; that it will be felt, not only in the immense valley of
that river but as far west as the Rocky Mountains and the borders of Mexico ; and that
it will communicate with our great inland seas, and their tributary rivers ; with the ocean
in various routes, and with the most productive regions of America, there can be no ques-
tion respecting the blessings that it [the Canal] will produce, the riches it will create, and
the energies it will call into activity.

The first public movemtjnt in Ohio toward a canal across the State
was a resolution in the Lejjislature in January, 1817, on the recommen-
dation of Governor Thomas Worthington. No definite action, however,
was then taken. In 1819 Governor Ethan Allen Brown, also at the
request of Governor Clinton, recommended action, and the next \'ear a
resolution was passed providing for three Canal Commissioners with
authority to employ an engineer and assistants to make a survey,
])roviding that Congress would donate United States' lands along and
near the line of the canal to aid in its construction. Action rested here
for about two years.

Meanwhile renewed attention was being given to the desirability of
a canal across the portage to connect the Maumee with the Little River.
The ease with which such canal could be made was apparent at a
glance to all persons passing along the ancient Glacial Drainage
Channel southwest of Fort Wayne, who had been reading about canals
in general or about the construction of the New York and Erie Canal
in particular. Captain James Riley, then a surveyor, reported to
Edward Tiffin Surveyor General, that on the 19th November, 1820, he
went southwest of Fort Wayne about one and one-half miles up the
River St. Mary, crossed that stream and measured the distance to Little
River a tributary bf the Wabash 'and navigable in times of high water
without improvement' the distance being a little less than sev^n miles.
From the summit level in this course back to the River St. Mary he
reported a decline of about twenty feet, for which two locks would be
sufficient. A canal to connect these rivers he estimated 'would not be
beyond the means of a few individuals of enterprise and ordinary capital.'

The 21st January, 1822, by a joint resolution of the Ohio Legisla-
ture a Canal Board composed of Alfred Kelly, Benjamin Tappan,
Thomas Worthington, Isaac Menor, Jeremiah Morrow, and Ethan A.
Brown, was appointed to have surveys made for the improvement of
the falls of the Ohio River, and to examine four routes for a canal or
canals from Lake Erie to the Ohio River. For these purposes $6000
was appropriated. Nothing was done by the Canal Board, however,
toward the survey of the Falls of the Ohio, as that work belonged to
the United States.

BEGINNING OF THE CANALS IN OHIO. 599

The preliminary surveys for canals were alony; thu water courses:
up the Maumee and Auglaise and clown the Loramie and larger Miami;
up the Scioto and down the Sandusky; ui> the Cuyahoga and down the
Tuscarawas and Muskingum ; and up the Mahoning and down the
Grand, or these courses reversed. James Geddes of Sj'tacuse, New
York, who had been employed on the New York and Erie Canal, was
chosen chief surveyor and Isaac Jerome assistant. Only one surve\'ing
instrument could be obtained, but during the summer of 1K:22 a prelim-
inary survey was made of over eight hundred mik'S of i^rospective
canal routes.

The Board reported in favor of the route up the Cuyahoga River
from Cleveland, probably on account of tht- largest population being
along this route. This report caused a serious protest, particularly
from the friends of the Sandusky route, and in Frliruary, 1824, the
Maumee and Sandusky routes were resurveyed, with a decision in favor
of the Maumee route for the second canal. January 25, 1825, the Com-
missioners reported the distance from the foot of the Maumee Rajiids
to the Ohio River as 265 ,'j miles, and the length of the necessar\- canal
feeders 25K miles. The altitude of the summit above Lake Erie was
given as 378 feet: and this summit above the Ohio River as oll/o feet.
The estimated cost of the Ohio Canal by the Cuyahoga River was a
little more than that by way of the Maumee.

The Legislature authorized the Commissioners 4th February, 1H25,
to begin work on the Miami-Maumee route between the Mad River at
Dayton and Cincinnati ; and the 20th July contracts were let for the
first twenty miles, work beginning the next da\-. Work on the Ohio
Canal was previously in good progress between Cleveland and Ports-
mouth. The section of the Miami and Erie Canal from Cincinnati to
Dayton was completed in January, 1H29, but the locks connecting it
with the Ohio River were built later.

The 24th May, 1828, Congress granted to the State of Ohio to aid
in extending the Miami Canal to Lake Erie by the Maumee River "a
quantity of land equal to one-half of five Sections in width on each side
of said canal between Dayton and the Maumee River at the mouth of
the Auglaise [Defiance] so far as the same shall be located through
the public land, and reserving each alternate Section, of land unsold,
to the United States to be selected by the Commissioner of the General
Land Office under the direction of the President of the United States;
and which land so reserved to the Ihiited States shall not be sold for
less than $2.50 per acre." This Act, like all others for canals, required
that the canal should always remain a luiblic highway, free to the
United States from tolls or other charges. Work was to begin within
five years, and the canal was to be completed within twenty years from

600 THE MAUMEE RIVER BASIN.

the date of the Act. At this same date Congress further granted to
Ohio 500,000 acres of land to pay the debts of and to complete the
canals — those commenced to be completed within seven years. The
Ohio Legislature did not act for the extension of the Miami Canal un-
til February, 1830, when the Commissioners were authorized to ex-
amine into the practicability of such canal. Theii report was ren-
dered favorabh' in January, 1831, and work was begun at Dayton in
1K32. The 2nd March, 1833, Congress extended the time for its com-
pletion another five years.

Owing in part to the difficulties attending the Toledo War I ante
page 572) against the claims of Michigan to her territory and the strife
between Toledo and the villages of Perrysburg and Maumee for the
ending of the Canal at the Lake level, contracts were not let on the
northern end until May, 1837. The citizens of Perrysburg and Mau-
mee desired the Canal to end there, at the foot of the rapids. Toledo
made urgent claim to the terminus : and residents of Manhattan near
the Maumee Bay desired that to be the place where connection with
the river was made. Meantime the claim of Ohio to the Harris Line
as the northern l)oundar\' of the State was sustained bv Congress. The
22nd August, 1836, the Canal Commissioners met at Perrysburg, and
there the rival parties gathered the next day in great numbers and
asserted their different claims with such warmth that each place was
granted canal connection with the Maumee. This decision was con-
firmed by Governor Lucas at his visit to the several places the 11th
November. 1836.

Representative Jennings of Indiana reported a bill 23rd January,
1823, from the Committee on Public Lands favorable to a canal, but it
was not until May 26, 1824, that Congress authorized the State of
Indiana to survey and mark through the Public Lands of the United
States the route of a canal by which to connect the navigation of the
rivers Wabash and the Miami of Lake Erie (Maumee); and ninety feet
of land on each side of said canal was to be reserved from sale on the
part of the United States, and the use thereof forever be vested in the
State aforesaid for a canal, and for no other purpose whatever. The
Act further provided that if not surveyed and map furnished within
three years, and the canal not completed within twelve years, or if
said land shall cease to be used and occupied for the purpose of con-
structing and keeping in repair a canal suitable for navigation, the grant
shall be void. The right of way being also granted by the Miami
Aborigines by treaty in 1826 (see treaty ante) a Board of Canal Com-
missioners was appointed in the winter of 1826-27, composed of David
Burr of Jackson County, Indiana, Robert John of Franklin, and Samuel
Hanna of Fort Wavne who became one of the most active and efficient

JUNCTION OF THE OHIO AND INDIANA CANALS. 601

members.* Mr. Hanna made a journey to New York by wav of the
Maumee and Detroit, Lake Erie and the New York and Erie Canal, for
the purpose of purchasing a surveying instrument; and he returned in
quick time for such modes of travel. The Indiana Legislature also
ajipropriated $500 to enable these Commissioners to determine the
practicability of an Erie and Wabash Canal.

March 2nd, lf^27. Congress granted each alternate Section of land,
and in quantitx' equal to one-half of five Sections in width on each side
of said Canal to the State of Indiana to aid in constructing the Canal.
This was the year previous to the grant to Ohio; and it is believed to
be the first large grant for the promotion of a public work, also the first
grant of alternate Sections.'''

The magnitude of the work kept constantl\- unfoldin;' and increas-
ing to its ])romulgators. It soon became evident to the engineer that a
short canal to connect the head of the Maumee with Little River, as
first contemplated, would not suffice; that for an efficient canal with
stable depth of water, it was necessary to extend an independent canal
to and well down tliL' Wabash, also northeastward to the Miami and
Erie Canal near Defiance, not relying upon the Maumee River at all
above Defiance. The place of connection with the Miami and Erie
Canal being determined at a point named Junction, in Paulding County,
Ohio, May 24, 1828, Congress authorized Indiana to sell and relinquish
her land grants northeast of her State Line to Ohio. The east end of
the Wabash Canal now becoming a joint work of the two States, W.
Talmage was appointed Commissioner for Ohio and Jeremiah Sullivan
for Indiana: but it was not until February 1, 1834, that Ohio — with her
own different canal projects on hand, and the Michigan dispute compli-
cating the northern terminus of the Miami and Erie Canal — fullv
decided on the conditions for giving the Wabash and P^rie Canal, as a
competitor, a connection with Lake Erie.t

Indiana was indemnified 1)\' other lands for those of the former
grants disposed of by the United States in individual grants to Aborig-
ines by treaties before their survey or determination. The Indiana
Legislature organized a Board of Canal P^und Commissioners 31st

* See Life and Character o; Samuel Hanna by G. W. Wood. Also Brire's History of Fort
Wayne.

t Peter Buel Porter of Western New York advocated Concressional aid for this and other simitar
improvements. He introduced a resolution in tlie Hotise of Representatives providing for a committee
to examine into the expediency of appropriating a part of the Public Lands, or the proceeds tliereof. to
the purpose of opening and constructini: such roads and canals as may be most conducive to the getieral
interest of the Union.— >4nna/s of Congress 1S09. 1810. pai,'e 1401. See. also, report for I.KtlH of .Albert
Gallatin Secretary of the L'nited States Treasury: and Donaldson's Public Domain, paces 2.">7. 2.V.

+ See House Journal of the Kith Session. No. i;i pace M : Session Laws of HiO. l.^;?0; Laws of Ohio
1H40, 1H41,

602

THE MAUMEE RIVER BASIN.

January, 1832, and after examination they reported the State Canal
Fund as $28,651.00.*

Jesse L. Williams of Fort Wayne was appointed Chief Engineer,
and ground was formally broken Februar}- 22, 1832; and in the
spring of 1834 the Feeder of the Wabash Canal was completed, ex-
tending from Fort Wa\'ne to the Feeder Dam across the River St.
Joseph, a distance of about six miles. This Feeder was necessary to
carry the boats over the summit a little southwest of Fort Wayne at an

altitude of one hundred
and ninety -seven feet
above the mouth of the
Maumee River and, also,
to feed eastward to the Six
Mile Reservoir in Pauld-
ing County, Ohio. The
4th July, 1H34 'the entire
population' of Fort
Wayne went to this Dam
on a hastily built boat for
the purpose, and there a
grand celebration of the
day and Canal was held.
During the next year the
Canal was completed to
Huntington and the Fort
W'avne people celebrated
the event by a grand ex-
cursion to that place. In
1837 this Canal was com-
pleted to Logansport: and four years later to Lafayette. The division
between Fort Wayne and the Ohio State Line was given to the con-
tractors in the summer of 1837.

On account of the sparse settlements in northwestern Ohio, and
the scarcity of money, the Legislature of Ohio did not urge the com-
pletion of the northern part of the Miami and Erie Canal as did Indiana
that of the Wabash. Becoming impatient the Legislature of Indiana
enacted, 22nd January, 1840, a joint resolution "that it shall be the
duty of the Chief Engineer to proceed immediately to the seat of gov-
ernment of the State of Ohio, and in a respectful manner to urge upon

The (former) Wabash Canal lucdtii Dam Across the
River St. Joseph six miles above Fort Wayne. This is the
Highest Dam in the Maumee River Basin, the water here
shown in lower stage falling fifteen feet upon the Apron.
Looking north of east 14th July, 1902. The former Feeder
Canal, beginning just above this view, is now used by the Fort
Wayne Electric Light and Power Company for water power.

* This Canal Fund was to be gained from various sources, viz: From sale of the lands donated by
the United States ; from donations, grants, or other sums set apart for this purpose ; from loans procured
under authority of the State and predicated on the amount likely to be obtained from the sale of Cana|
Lands: and from Canal Tolls, and Rents received for the use of all privileges created by the construction.
See Session Laws of Indiana, 1831, 1833, Chapter I, Sections 2 and 4; Chapter CVllI. page 113.

DELAYS IN NORTHWEST PART OF OHIO CANALS. 603

the consideration of the membt-rs of the Legislature of that State the
necessity of speedy completion of the Wabash and Erie Canal from the
Indiana State line to the Maumee Bay, in compliance with the com-
pacts heretofore made between the two States in relation thereto." This
joint resolution, with a letter of the Indiana Chief Engineer setting
forth the urgent reasons for the early com])letion of this Canal, were
duly transmitted to the Ohio Legislature Januarx' Hist, l'^40.

Contracts for the making of this Canal had been awarded by the
Ohio authorities as follows: from the mouth of the Maumee River at
Manhattan to the Grand Rapids, at the Village of Maumee in the s]>ring
of 1H37 ; and at Defiance 25th October, 1837, from the Grand Rapids to
the Indiana State Line. The contractors gathered about two thousand
laborers and liegan their payment in Michigan 'Wild Cat' bills that
they had borrowed. Then came the financial panic of l!-i37. In Ma\-,
1H3K, the contractors had trouble with the laborers on account of non-
payment of them for five months. The difiicultv was compromised,
however, in many cases b\' orders on stores and due-bills: and full
payment of these- obligations in good money was made in June. These
contractors from the commencement laliort d under difticulties to an
exti'Ut that no other work in the State has been subjected, reads the
Annual Report of the Board of Public Works December 30th, 1830. The
high price of ]irovisions which were necessarily brought from long dis-
tances : the consequent high price of labor, and severe sickness which
drove the men out of the valley during the summers, were the reasons
assigned. The report of January ll!, li~^41, states that the prospect of
obtaining money for completing the work was so doubtful that con-
tractors were advised of the fact at the close of 1H39, and were recom-
mended to use their own discretion and consult their own convenience
in prosecuting the jobs ; conset]uently not much work was performed
during the first three months of 1M40. After the 1st April, however,
work progressed In-tter than in 1H3'.I on account of there being less
sickness. From Defiance to the State Line, the want of proper material
(stone) rendered it necessary to build the locks of wood. The locks
north of the summit to the Wabash and Erie Canal were also built of
wood. South of the Summit Level and below Defiance the locks were
all built of cut stone. In June, 1H42, the Canal was opened for traffic
from Toledo to the Grand Rajiids. The Annual Report of the Board of
Public Works January 2, 1843, reads that the whole of this work is now
so far completed as to admit the water when the proper season for using
the same shall arri\-e, and nothing but unforeseen accidents will from
this time forward prevent, at all proper seasons of the year, an uninter-
rupted navigation. For the last fifteen months there has not been paid
one doUai" in money I i th ■ cintractors on this Canal, and the n.mivmt

604

THE MAUMEE RIVER BASIN.

now due is equal to $500,000. Almost the whole resources and credit
of that portion of the State in the vicinity of this work have been used
up and invested in the construction of the same.' Indiana was in the
same condition, but not to such decree as Ohio. Various inomises to

INTERIOR VIEW OF EMPTY CANAL LOCK NO. 3, DEFIANCE, OHIO

The Levers of Lock No. 1, and the Maiimee River, show under the First Street Bridge. Looking north

19th November, 1902.

pav, both public and private, were in general circulation with depreci-
ated values ; and many had to be renewed from wear before their
redemption occurred.* Some of these were finally replaced b}' the
semblance of bank notes issued from certificates of the Chief Engineer
and in smaller denominations for convenience of circulation.

The Canals were opened to traffic from Toledo through Fort Wayne
May 8, 1843. The first boat to pass to Lafayette was the Albert S.
White, Captain Cyrus Belden, of Toledo. She was greeted along the
way with great joy, the larger towns giving the Captain and crew
public receptions. The first packet or lighter boat fitted for passengers,
soon followed under Captain William Dale.

* A white-paper scrip issued by the State and based on the Canal Lands east of Lafayette became
generally and jocularly known as White Dog; and colored scrip issued on the Canal Lands west of
Lafayette were called Blue Dog; while fractional currency issued on this foundation was known as
Blue Pup.

COMPLETION OF MIAMI AND ERIE CANAL.

605

Fort Waynu advertised a grand Canal-openini;- Celebration for the
4th July, 1M43 : and representatives were present from Toledo, Lafay-
ette, Detroit, Cleveland, and intervening places. General Lewis Cass
delivered the principal address to this the largest civil meeting held at
Fort Wayne up to that date.

There was delay in the construction of the Miami and Erie Canal
through the dense forest south of Junction, Paulding County, Ohio,
ten and a half miles west of south of Defiance, and the ))oint where the
Wabash and Erie Canal connected with the Miami and Erie ; and the
first boat from Cincinnati did not arrive at Toledo until June 27, 1845.
This vear the United States Government made first use of this Canal in
the transportation of soldiers from Toledo and jiorts southward to
Cincinnati on their way to the Mexican War. The soldiers from
Detroit, southern Michigan, and northwestern Ohio, were taken this
way, the commissioned officers being carried on packets and the non-
commissioned officers and privates on freight boats. Until the vear
1856 these Canals were recognized as part of the great national militarv
highway between New York City and New Orleans.*

These Canals now came into full use as the cheapest, easiest and
safest mode of communication and transportation devised up to this
date. The\- soon developed into great thoroughfares which exceeded
the fondest hopes of their promulgators, not only for freight t of all
kinds to and from the rapidly developing country for many miles on
each side of their lines, but for passengers — business men eastward
bound to purchase goods, and immigrants of all classes from farmers
to clear homes in the wilderness to men and women learned in the
schools of the East for teachers and the professions. New faces, new
activities, and new developments of all kinds were seen in every direc-
tion. Many of the laborers who were attracted in thousands from the
older States bj- the good wages paid during the making of the Canals,
remained along the lines or bought lands on which thev settled with

* See Executive Document 1st Session aSth Congress, vol. iv. No. 134.

t The value of Ihe produce transported to Toledo by the Canal during the season of 1J<46 exceeded
$3.(XX).0(XT : and the value of the cargoes sent from Toledo during this season was estimated at $.5.lHK),tK*0.
The relative receipts of grain at Toledo for three years before the completion of the Canal, and two
years afterward, are shown as follows;

Year

Wheat. BfSHELs

Flolk. Barrels

Corn. Bl-shels

1840

85.000

51,000

1841

!27,c9S

45,781

1842

llti.7.30

.37.3K)

1846

KHi.KK!

lt>l,6«9

l,l,59..115

1851

\.ta«.7U

242.677

2,775.149

.Andrews' Report on Colonial and Lake Trade, page 56 e( sequentia.

606

THE MAUMEE RIVER BASIN.

their families to add to the general thrift. Children and grandchildren
of many of these people are j'et among the prosperous citizens of
ever}' important town along the lines and in the country adjacent.

The flow of water from boats passing through the locks afforded
power at lower levels to numerous sawing, flouring, and other mills

SIX CANAL BOATS AND LARGE RAFT OF LOGS IN THE MAUMEE RI\ER. DEFIANCE, OHIO

Awaiting lockage southward, the boat in the right foreground entering the hrst lock. Looking northeast
under Clinton Street Bridge in August, 1900.

which were necessary factors to the subsistence of the increasing popu-
lation, the clearing of the forest, and to the revenues of the States
from water rentals and general taxes.

Packet boats became quite numerous, some of which came from
the New York and Erie Canal. The better class of them were well
fitted for the convenience of passengers. The sleeping berths for the
first class passengers were ranged on each side of the upper cabin
generally in two rows one above the other but occasionally in three
rows, and some were made to shut up or swing out of way by day.
Hammocks and cots were provided for the overplus passengers, and
many would sleep on the deck. The dining room was below, generalh'
midboat but sometimes forward, and the food was generally good.
These boats carried express freight, and some of them carried
the United States Mail. They were drawn by two to six horses
according to the size of the boat and the load ; and they were gener-

PASSENGER AND FREIGHT BOATS AND THEIR SPEEDS. 607

ally kept on a trot by the driver who rodu the saddle ( left rear) horse,
attaining: a pace of from six to eight miles an hour. Relays of horses
were sometimes carried in a narrow stable in the central part of the
packet as on freight boats ; but generally the packet relays were
stationed at convenient ports. These boats were considered a rajjid
and comfortable mode of traveling. The journey from Toledo to
Lafayette, about 242 miles, was advertised to lie made in fifty-si.x hours.*
June 28, 1847, the packet Empire Captain Wiggin, left Dayton and
arrived at Toledo 'the morning of the 30th, the distance being l.sO
miles. Among the passengers were Governor William Bebb, ex-
Governor Thomas Corwin, Robert C. Schenck, John G. Lowe, II. G.
Phillips, J. Wilson Williams, Edmund Smith, Edward W. Davis, and
A. H. Dunlevy, who expressed in a card published in the Toledo Blade
great appreciation of the comforts and accommodations furnished to
them on the boat. The rate of fare was generally three cents a mile
on the packets, and two and a half cents on the freight boats which
also accommodated many passengers. For the longer distances meals
and lodgings were included in these rates. Thirty-five to fortv pas-
sengers were considered a good load, but double these numbers would
not be turned away. There was competition between all the boats for
speed ; and in the meeting and passing of boats of all kinds, the rules
for position of horses, towlines, and of precedence of packets over
freighters, must needs be closely observed or a strife of words, and
sometimes of blows, resulted. The greatest stress occurred at the
wharves, and at the locks particularly, where the slightest unnecessarv
detention was quickly resented. The writer has been manv times
called by messenger from a lock in Defiance, to meet a boat as it
approached another lock, to examine and prescribe for a sick member
of the crew while the boat was being raised, or lowered, in the lock :
and he always received courteous treatment from the boatmen — he
being always alert not to unnecessarily detain the boat.

The time required between Toledo and Cincinnati was reduced to
four days and five nights. This was considered good time. It in-
cluded the numerous stops for passengers and freight, the latter often
reijuiring considerable time to load and unload, and the time passed at
the numerous locks which averaged one about every hour and ten
minutes, with frequent delays on account of the jirecedence of other
boats. The average speeds on the navigable waters were then esti-
mated as follows : On the lake six miles an hour : on the canals four
miles ; on river or other slackwater, six : on the Ohio River, ujistream
five miles and downstream seven miles an hour. Time consumed in
lockage one minute per foot depth of water.

*Fort Wayne Times and People's Press October 21, IS47

608 THE MAUMEE RIVER BASIN.

The largest boat on the Canals for a long time was the Harry of
the West which was brought through Lake Erie from the New York
and Erie Canal in 1H44 by Captain Edwin Avery. The first steam
canal boat, the Niagara, was built in 1H45 at a cost of about $10,000
for Samuel Doyle, but could not successfully compete with those of
horse power. Another steamer, the Scarecrow, was more successful.
She made her first run from Toledo in November, 1859, with a load of
lumber for Franklin. She had a small portable engine with fly-wheel
carrying a belt to a pulley on the propeller wheel shaft. Steam was
used for propelling a few other boats, but objections were raised to
their use on account of the commotion of the water to the detriment of
the canal banks, and to other boats. May 25th, 1862, the Canal Pro-
peller Union, Captain William Sabin, arrived at Toledo from Lafayette
containing a cargo of 1750 bushels of wheat, and having in tow a boat
containing 2050 bushels of grain, 20 barrels pork, and two casks of
hams, the total being 115 tons weight. The distance of 204 miles was
run in 5 days S% hours.

It was not unusual at this time for the boats to accumulate in
Toledo to the number of fift)' to sixty, unloading and reloading at the
wharves and grain elevators, or awaiting their turn. Corn was at first
carried for eight cents per bushel medium distance, and a little more
was charged for wheat. These prices were profitable to the boatmen ;
but later prices varied according to the quantity of freight and the
competition, and but few owners of boats made constant large or even
good profits. The Miami and Erie Canal and that part of the Wabash
and Erie from Junction to Fort Wayne, were in better favor with boat-
men than that along the Wabash River on account of the larger size of
the former and the want of a uniformly good depth of water along the
Wabash.

The completion of the Canals marked the beginning of the active
era of clearing the forest and in developing the great agricultural wealth
of the Maumee River Basin. Logs, shiptimber (see ante page 541)
lumlier cut bv power from canal-water, and firewood, were taken to
market on the Canal by rafts as well as in boats. Between the j-ears
1861-64 Graft, Bennett and Company i,or Evans, Rogers and Company-?)
of Pittsburg, established on the north bank of the Wabash and Erie
Canal in Crane Township, Paulding County, Ohio, one mile and a half
south of the present Cecil, a Catalan Bloomery and Forge for the
reduction of iron ore by the direct process. Cobb, Bradley and Com-
pany of Cleveland also established a like furnace in 1862-63, eight
miles further west and adjoining the Village of Antwerp on the east.
These furnaces were near the center of the comparatively unbroken
forest. Land was very cheap, and the timber was yet looked iipon as

IRON FURNACES BY THE WABASH AND ERIE CANAL. 609

a detriment to be gotten rid of as easily as possible by the settlers.
Six acres of land were donated b}- George M'Cormick to the first named
company which proceeded to construct thereon from twenty-three to
thirt\' beehive-shaped charcoal kilns of brick, jilastered without, each

r=^-

ICT

THE CHARCOAL BURNERS AND IRON FURNACE

By the Wabash and Erie Canal near the present Cecil. Pauldiniz County. Ohio. From photograph sketched
in Ho\ve"s Historical Collections of Ohio, Copyricht 1888 by Henry Howe.

fifteen feet in diameter and the same in height. Each of these kilns
was capable of furnishing forty-five to fifty bushels of charcoal from
every cord of wood after four days burning. .\ furnace of seven fires
and a forge were built close to the Canal. The charcoal kilns at
Antwerp were not so numerous nor the furnace so large. These
industries were instrumental in clearing many farms and in distributing
much money for wood and labor. The Cecil furnace employed as manv
as 250 choppers and sawyers at one time. .\s many as 1:20 cords of
long wood were used per day in making 4") tons of iron.'* The great
trip-hammer of this furnace gave out a sound that reverberated through
the forest for manv miles. The iron ore was brought from Lake
Superior mines by lake vessels to Toledo and there given to the canal-
boats. The reduced iron was taken by boats part to Cleveland by
way of Toledo, and part to Pittsburg by wav of Cincinnati and the
Ohio River.

The Antwerp furnace declined in the early IHSD's with the .\ntwerp
section of the Wabash and Eric Canal. The company owning, or

* Some estimates give the requirement of three tons of iron ore and two and a half to three tons
of charcoal to produce one ton of bar iron. The wood for trip-hammer power is included in this estimate.

670 THE MAUMEE RIVER BASIN.

operating, the furnace near Cecil favored the building of the Cincinnati,
Van Wert and Michigan Railroad, now called the Cincinnati Northern,
which passed by the furnace, as an additional help for the supply of wood
which was becoming scarce in the vicinity of the furnace. After the
destruction of the Six Mile Reservoir (see the following few pages)
just above in 1888, and their being necessitated thereby to the use of
the railroad only for all shipments, they dismantled the plant and
abandoned the region.

The locks connecting the Miami and Erie Canal with the Ohio
River at Cincinnati for the distance of .62 of a mile were abandoned by
Act of the Legislature 24th March, 1863. The two locks connecting
with themouth of the Maumee River at Manhattan were abandoned by
Act of 26th March, 1864; and this Manhattan extension in Toledo with
the aqueduct over Swan Creek amounting to 3.75 miles was abandoned
by Act 31st January, 1871. On or about the 26th March, 1864, the
locks to the Maumee River at the Village of Maumee were also aban-
doned; thus, since this date the only canal connection with the lower
Maumee River has been through Swan Creek at Toledo.

The Legislature of Indiana abandoned the Wabash and Erie Canal
southwest of Fort Wayne previous to the year 1870. A dam was made
across the canal prism in the City of Fort Wayne and boats continued
to run from this city to and through the Miami and Erie Canal for six
or eight years, when the State of Indiana wholly abandoned the Canal.
The dam across the River St. Joseph and the Feeder Canal from it were
sold to the Fort Wayne Power Company which now uses the water for
electric lighting and other power. The State of Ohio built a dam
across the canal prism near the Indiana line and continued the use of
the Canal with water supplied by the Six-Mile Reservoir ( see map ante
page 450) of 2000 or more acres situated just east of Antwerp. This
Reservoir received its name from it occupying the vallev of, and receiv-
ing its supply from. Six Mile Creek which has its source in Indiana and
debouches into the Auglaise River six miles from its mouth at Defiance,
hence the name of the creek. The dam, dikes and bulkhead of this
Reservoir, like all the wood locks above Junction, were neglected and
the waters remained low. The farmers around the Reservoir united
their influence with those who desired the land under the water, and an
effort was made to induce the Legislature to enact its abandonment.
The friends of the canals rallied, and the bill was defeated. Conspiracy
and malicious destruction of State propert}' followed. About two
hundred men, residents of the vicinity of the Reservoir and their friends,
assembled in the night of April 25th, 1888, captured the guards who
had been kept on duty since a malicious attempt to drain the Reservoir
a few weeks before, and with dynamite destroyed the two nearest locks

THE CANALS ANTAGONIZED AND DEFENDED. 611

and the bulkhead, then cut the dikes, thus completely disabling the
remaining part of the Wabash and Erie Canal to the lock within a mile
of the Miami and Erie Canal at Junction. Governor Foraker at once
issued a proclamation ordering all disorderly persons to disperse; and
ordered General Axline to at once proceed to the scene of destruction
with several companies of the Ohio National Guard to protect the State
property. Prompt response was made and the amateur soldiers, a
Toledo company among the number, were soon on guard. Of course
neither enemy nor disorderly person could be found and, after a few
days of guard service, the soldiers were ordered to their homes. By
Legislative Acts of 12th A|)ril, 1888, and 3rd March, 1891, the Ohio
Section of the Wabash and Erie Canal from the State Line to the first
lock about one mile above Junction, seventeen miles in extent, was
declared abandoned, together with the Six Mile Reservoir. This, with
different side cuts, made a total of 39.12 miles abandoned, leaving, as
exists at present, 262.82 miles of Miami and Erie Canal in operatir)n.

With the increase and competition of railroads, the business of the
canals declined, first in grain and other of the more valuable freight.
Opposition to the canals increased, it being led by their competitors or
those who desired their right of way for individual or company uses.
These factors were so strong in 1861 as to induce the Legislature to
lease the canals for seventeen years to private companies. During
this period their business still further declined, and as little attention
was given to repairs as possible to avoid. When returned to the State
in 1878 their 'condition was deplorable' and they have since been
repaired, maintained and operated, at an annual expense to the State
of from §5,000 to $40,000. Yet parts of the Canal system has continued
to pay very good tolls notwithstanding their poor management and
condition.*

The enemies of the canals have been for fifty years, and yet are,
active in their opposition; but there have been, and yet are, friends to
these internal waterways who have thus far defeated the many attempts
to abandon the main lines of the Miami and Erie and the Ohio Canal
sj'stems. The friends have done more. The^- have secured two sur-
veys of these lines, and of the suggested Sandusky-Scioto route, by
United States Engineers for their prospective enlargement to barge

♦The Collector reported the business done by the Miami and Erie Canal at the Port of Deliance
during the summer of 1899, as follows: Received. 813 barrels Lime and Cement: 1043 barrels Salt:
700 bushels Coke ; 101,201 pounds Batreaue and Furniture: 3,030 pounds Crockery; 72,*>,921 pounds Iron;
9TI, 428 pounds Merchandise: 3,796 empty Barrels : 6,491 Hoop Poles: 73.3.91S Lath: 9.947 RaihvayTies:
47,300 Shincles: ,i, 43.3,1X10 feet Lumber ; 4,021 perches Stone ; 7,240 cords Bolt Timber; 9,33.H cords Fire-
wood. Shipped, 5;)2,41M pounds Merchandise: 24H,92:i bushels Building Sand: 794, tW Brick: ,3„328
Hoop Poles; 4. UX> Lath; 70,tXX) Staves and Heading; 8.."il6,748 feet Lumber; 697.423 feet Timber; 5,127
cords Firewood: !,6t)3 barrels .-Me and Beer; 2t.>9 bushels Potatoes; 1,6.31 bushels Corn; 921 bushels
Flaxseed; 48,000 bushels Oats; 1,000 bushels Rye; 39.000 bushels Wheat; 873,947 pounds Iron.

612 THE MAUMEE RIVER BASIN.

canals.* In this connection more details of the Miami and Erie Canal
through this Basin will be here given with a few items of the prospec-
tive enlargement in comparison :

From the lower miter-sill of the outlet lock at Manhattanville,
mouth of the Maumee River, to the head of the Toledo side-cut into
Swan Creek a distance of five miles, there was an elevation of fifteen
feet which was overcome by two locks near the river. This Manhattan
extension was declared abandoned by the State by Acts of 26th March,
1864, and 31st January, 1871, as before mentioned. The course of this
abandoned canal is now occupied in its northern part by the Wheeling
and Lake Erie Railway to Cherry Street, Toledo, thence the course
turns nearly south, crossing Oak Street at Allen, crossing Adams be-
tween Ontario and Michigan, Madison at Ontario, Jefferson a little
nearer Ontario than Erie, Monroe nearer Erie, Washington at Erie,
thence turning westward to cross Lafayette at Ontario, thence south-
ward crossing Nebraska Avenue just west of Thirteenth Street, and
Swan Creek just east of Wyandot Street.

Since the abandonment of the Manhattan extension, the connec-
tion with the lower Maumee has been through the Toledo side-cut
which drops fifteen feet into Swan Creek by two locks. From the head
of the Toledo side-cut, one mile from its entrance into Swan Creek, the
Canal ascends forty-eight feet, to the Village of Maumee a distance of
eight and five-sixths miles, by six locks to No. 9 of the present list.
Here there was formerly a side cut to the Maumee River with fall of
sixty-three feet by six locks. This side-cut was abandoned about fortj'
3'ears ago. The size of these locks is ninety feet in length and fifteen
feet in width. The dimensions of the Canal are various. Between
Toledo and Junction, ten and one half miles southwest of Defiance and
sixty-nine miles in all, the prism is sixty feet wide at the water's surface,
forty-six feet wide at the bottom, and six feet deep, being the largest
on account of the greatest traffic. The Section from Junction to Dayton
is 50 x 36 X 5 feet in size, and that from Dayton to Cincinnati 40 x 26
x 4 feet which last named dimension is the same as that of the Ohio
Canal. All sections embrace expansions at the ports and necessary
intermediate points for turning the boats when desired.

The surveys for the prospective enlargement provide for the
Canal's northern beginning eight and seven-tenths miles above the
mouth of the Maumee River, at the debouching of Delaware Creek, by
twin locks two hundred feet long by twenty-six feet wide, and for
water in the Canal ten feet deep.

* See U. S. Senate Executive Document No. 55. 46th Congress, 3rd Session, 25th February, 1881.
Also House of Representatives Document No. 278, 54th Congress 1st Session. 4th March, 1896. These
printed reports of surveys for enlargement, have been consulted for many of the details of this Chapter;
and they contain much more of interesting and valuable information.

PROFILE OF THE MIAMI AND ERIE CANAL.

615

The present Canal from the head of the former Maumee Village
side-cut, at Lock No. 9, to the head of the Grand Kajjids is fifteen and
a half miles without lock. At Grand Rapids is the first Maumee River
State Dam, or rather two Dams 0(11 and 17(H) feet in lent;th, with

MIAMI .\ND ERIE CANAL AND OHIO STATE DAM
Across Maumee River, four and a half miles east of Defiance. Lookini.' southwest 13th April. 1901.

island intervening, and five and a half feet in height. Here is a Guard
Lock, No. 10, to protect the Canal against high water, and above this
Guard Lock boats run in the river slackwater nearly one mile. Leaving
the Maumee, the Canal ascends twenty-three feet bv three locks to No.
13, to the Defiance Level. At the northeast part of this level there is a
Guard Lock, No. 14, it being the last of this series of stone locks; and
here is the second and last dam across the Maumee River for Canal use.
It is 763 feet long and was rebuilt in 1901 to the height of ten and a
half feet. Entering the Maumee through the Guard Lock the boats
continue up the slackwater four and a half miles to the City of Defiance
where the horses cross the Maumee on the State Bridge rebuilt of iron
about 1881. Here the Canal leaves the right bank of the river in a
southerly course and ascends fifty-seven feet in four and one-half
miles by seven locks, to No. 21. Six of these locks are within the
City of Defiance, four near the river, the fifth being one mile and the
sixth one and three-fourths mile distant. In the days of lesser require-
ments these locks afforded abundant power for the mills built bv their
side. These are the first of the wood locks which prevail southward
across the Basin on account of the difficulty of transporting stone at
the time of their building, and the abundance and cheapness of lumber
close at hand. From Junction to the Indiana State Line, a distance of
eighteen and a half miles, the former Wabash and Erie Canal ascended
twenty-eight and a half feet by three locks, to an altitude above the
mouth of the Maumee of 176}-' feet ; and by two other locks beyond

614

THE MAUMEE RIVER BASIN.

Fort Wa\'ne boats were carried over the Summit at an altitude of 197
feet. The profile of the Miami and Erie Canal from Junction to the
twenty-three miles Summit Level south from New Bremen is given in
the Ohio Geological Survey, volume one page (372, as embracing thirty-

ENTRANCE OF MIAMI AND ERIE CANAL INTO THE MAUMlUi RI\'EK AT I)EFIAN-CH. OHIO

The State Canal Bridye on the right; St. John Roman Catholic Church bej'ond; City Hall near
center: Court House on left with spire of St. Paul Methodist Episcopal Church between its tower
and cliimneys. Lookinji south Hth April, 1901.

two locks which raise the Canal from a level of 147.25 feet at Junction,
above the mouth of the Maumee, to 886.50 at New Bremen. The
number of locks and altitudes from Junction between the more import-
ant towns are, to Delphos ten locks 63.75 feet rise; Spencerville eight
locks 63 feet: to St. Mark's two locks 17.25 feet: and to New Bremen
the Summit Level twelve locks 95.25 feet or to a total of 386.50 feet
above Lake Erie.'''

The Summit Level is fully supplied with water from the
Loramie Rest-rvoir produced by a dam across Loramie Creek near
Minster. This Reservoir is seven miles long, narrow in its upper part
and about two and a half miles wide at its lower part. It covers
about 1H(I0 acres. The Lewistown Reservoir supplies the Canal south-
ward. The principal su]iply of water, however, for the IMiami and

* There is variance between di&'erent surveys. An Auglaise County Surveyor has recorded the
altitudes hii^her than those given by the Canal surveyors: and the records of the railways, and of the
Ohio State Geological Survey, vary seveial feet between the others.

GRAND RESERVOIR FOR MIAMI AND ERIE CANAL. 615

Erie Canal from St. Marys to the Maumee River at Defiance is derived
from the Grand Riservoir produced bv a dam about four miles lon^,
and from ten to twenty-five feet hi^h, south from Celina, Mercer
County, across the Valley of Bi^ Beaver Creek, a triluitary of the

NILLAi.l:, 111- MlVV liKKMKN. Ulliu

Shovvinc the Nortll End of the Twenty-three Mile Summit Level of the Miami and Erie Canal on the
Summit of the Salamonie Moraine — see Map an(e patie 38. Lookinv; north liotli April. 19t)2. First Lock
northward in the foreground, toward the Wabash Moraine.

Wabash River. This Reservoir is about nine miles long and from two
to four miles wide, the upper or east end having a retaining wall about
two miles long. The Canal Feeder Outlet is at the south line of the
Citv of St. Marys. Thus by the Loramie Reservoir much water that
formerh- passed southward into the Miami River of the Mississippi
River Basin is diverted northward through the Maumee River Basin to
the Basin of the Great Lakes and the St. Lawrence ; and yet far more
water is diverted this way from the Wabash by the Grand Reservoir.

Samuel Forrer Canal Commissioner employed an engineer named
Mitchell in 1830 to run the first survey for this Grand Reservoir. In
1837 there was another survey b}' Messrs. Barney and Forrer, encom-
passing about 18,000 acres. Settlers had located in the upper Beaver
Creek Basin, among them being Josejih and Thomas Coate, and families
named Large, Mellinger, and Hugh MilK'r, on the south side: and
families Bradlev, Crockett, Sundav, judge Linzee, Hollingsworth,
Nichols, Gibson, Hull, Kampf, Pratt, and Reverend Asa Stearns, on

676

THE MAUMEE RIVER BASIN.

the north side. The Legislature had unanimously passed an Act,
introduced b\- Justin Hamilton of Mercer County, providing that no
water should be accumulated in the Reservoir before the owners of
farms were paid for their land, nor before the land was cleared of trees.

THE VILLAGE OF CELINA, OHIO, AND THE WEST END OF THE GRAND RESERVOIR
Lookins west of south from Tower of the Town Hall 29lh April, 1902.

There was also an appropriation of money from which to pay for the
land and the work ; but it was either not sufficient for this purpose or
was misapplied. Work was begun in 1837 and the west wall or dam
was completed in 1^43. When the lowest gap was closed the water
rose and submerged thirty-four acres of wheat belonging to Mr. Sunda\',
and slowly covered all of his farm but one acre ; also the whole of
Thomas Coates' farm ; sixty acres belonging to Judge Holt of Dayton;
nineteen acres of Judge Linzee's land ; nearly forty acres of Abraham
Pratt's, and nearly all of Mr. Mellinger's land. The contractors com-
plied with the requirements onl}' in part regarding the clearing of the
land. Many of the trees were left untouched, and others were only
girdled. The accumulation of water was slow, the evaporation was
great, and the great sufferings of the people from malaria were
attributed by them to the water ; also farms were being flooded that
had not been paid for. Disaffection spread among the neighbors in
and around the Reservoir limits, and led to their gathering and cutting
the dam. Many of the generally law-abiding citizens aided in this
work. The Grand Jury of Mercer County declined to indict any one
charged with this misdemeanor. Arrests were made, but no convictions

OPPOSITION TO CANALS. THEIR COST AND EARNINGS. 617

could be obtained by the State. The proper officers of the State then
paid for all the lands to be suhmergt-d, restricted the Resesvoir by an
east wall, and repaired the dam at an t'X])(_-nse of several thousand
dollars. In August, 1H04, some malicious ]iersons, who had been
irritated by the high waters of the previous spring and the threatening
waves of tht- Reservoir, or seeking revenge on some persons who would
be injured by flood, attempted to destroy the outer liulkhead near St.
Marys by dynamite. P'ortunately this crime was not j^roductive of
much harm ; and the State authorities acted iJromiitlx' in rujiairing thr
damage and in jilacing guards for tht- protection of the walls.

This Mercer County, or Grand, Reservoir has been called the
largest of artificial lakes. It covers about twenty-seven square miles,
or seventeen thousand acres. It is resorted to every year by fishermen
from long distances, its stock of fish having been generallv varied and
abundant. The beauty of the Reservoir is yut much marred bv the
trunks of trees protruding aliove the water, charred and distorted by
their having been fired to light the fishermen at night, or by others who
desired to destroy them during low stages of water in dry seasons.
Petroleum abounds under as well as around it, and many productive
wells have been drilled from anchored flatboats — see ante page 17.

The length of the Canal-navigation year has generally been supjiosed
to be about 275 days ; but some years it is longer. During the winter
of 1899-1900 boating was done in every month, but not continuously.

The original cost of the Canals of Ohio was $15,967,65'2.r)9 — that
of the Miami and Erie being $8,06"2,6k0.80 and the Ohio (eastern linesj
§7,904,971.89 — and their estimated present values are near the same
amounts. A Columbus corresjiondent of the Toledo Blade l.")th Feb-
ruary, 1902, under the heading Canals have been a Great Burden, gives
the expenditures and receipts of the Canals of Ohio each year from 1^^27
to 1900, inclusive. The total receii^ts are §16,(171 ,229. HI and total
expenses §11,447,551.06. The excess of receipts over expenditures
came prior to the decline of the canals from railroad competition. W.
P. Craighill, Brigadier General and Chief of Engineers, in his re])ort
27th February, 1H96, of the last United States Survey of these Canals
with view to their enlargement, states that under existing conditions
the Canals do not return in tolls tlie cost of maintenance and are a
burden to the State, and will continue to be a burden to any owner
unless increased materially in carrying and earning cajiacity. Of the
three routes surveyed, he says the great advantages of the western route
[Miami and Erie] are its superior water supply, its important terminal
points [Toledo and Cincinnati] and the magnitude of its local traffic.
Its principal drawbacks are its length, lockage, and original cost.*

* House of Representatives 54th ConKress, 1st Session. Document No. 27x. page 67

618 THE MAUMEE RIVER BASIN.

A Miami and Erie Canal Transportation Company composed
largely of Cleveland men, secured of the Ohio Legislature in 1901 the
right to construct and operate an electric railway along the towpath of
this Canal for towing boats. A short section of this line was put into
operation at Hamilton, Ohio, 4th April, 1902, to aid in further con-
struction. Six boats in line were laden with material and were
satisfactorily drawn five miles to the other end of the completed section.
If completed the entire length of the Canal this new motive power
(which is now suspicioned by the friends of the Canal as the beginning
of the usurpation of the entire canal-way by railway interests) should
greatly increase the carrying capacity, not alone from the towing of
boats in fleets, but also in lessening the running time on the levels.
Heretofore the time required for a freight boat from the mouth of the
Detroit River to Cincinnati has been 80.90 hours. Propulsion of boats
by gasoline engines, and by steam power, has also been under renewed
discussion. Another evidence of renewed interest and life in this
important waterway, is the building in 1903 of a steel aqueduct over the
River St. Mary, and aqueducts over smaller streams northward.

Following the introduction of steam, and later power to pleasure
boats, there have been seen on this Canal such boats from New York
City and intermediate points, on their runs to and from the Mississippi
and its various tributaries. This transit has lessened somewhat since
the abandonment of the connection with the Ohio River at Cincinnati.
But hunting and fishing parties bound for the Grand Reservoir, and
pleasure parties occasionally of both men and women yet make excur-
sions by boats along the Canal.

Speculation was rife with manj- of the early settlers in the Maumee
region ; and frequently manv promoters abounded for a time who did
not desire to remain. Speculators in town lots, and in land, predomin-
ated, particularly during the survey and making of the Canals, and in
this as in general, but few of the speculators won. Between the foot of
the lowest rapids and the mouth of the Maumee River, a distance of
about fifteen miles, fifteen village plats were made : Perrysburg of 1816
and Maumee of 1817 remain, the last including Miami of 1810. Port
Lawrence of 1817 and Vistula of 183'2 united in 1833 as the nucleus of
Toledo which, later, absorbed Manhattan of 1834-37 at the mouth of
the river on the left bank, with Presqu'ile opposite, Oregon of 1834-37
and Lucas City above. Austerlitz of 1834-37 six miles above the
mouth of the Maumee, Marengo of 1834-37 nine miles, Orleans of the
North of 1815 under Fort Meigs near the foot of the Rapids, with
Havre de Grace, Ottokee, Yondota, and Florence, intervening — all
have disappeared from the map, and the average residents or owners of
their sites know not their stories, nor even their names. So with Otsego

SPECULATIVE CANAL TOWNS. FIRST RAILROADS. 6/9

above Roche de Bout, and ottur tarly jiopular SLttlements along the
canals and rivers, including' Independence three-and-a-half miles east
of Defiance, Newburg of li^^iS at the bend ol th(' Mauin<_e in Delaware
Township, Defiance County, and New Harrison of iHiJH in Indiana near
the Ohio Line where it was thought the Wabash and Erie Canal would
be locked into the Maumee. Other towns, in plat and in reality, that
have disappeared, have been mentioned in otlur places. Brunersburg,
on the Tiffin River two miles from its mouth and two miles overland
from Defiance, had a beginning in the early 1820's. It was platted in
1834, and a village soon sprung into vigorous existence. Hopes were
entertained of its being a port on the Canal ; and supplies and exports
were moved by canal boats. There were also hopes of a railroad (see
Railways). One addition after another was made to this town, and its
business for a ft'W years rivalled that of Defiance. Beside the flouring
and sawing mill then,' were several leather tanneries, a potter\-, and
boatbuilding. Ijut decline began in 1^44 ; and now there are verv few
residents in tln' village. Also along the Miami and Erie Canal in
Paulding County and southward, the f(.)rnier Canalport, St. Andrews,
Newburg, Murat, Timberville, with others are but memories that are
fast fading into oblivion.

The First Railroads.

The subject of railroads was overshadowed for some years by that
of canals. The argument ran that every new country possessed tlu-
means for making canals — the earth, stone, wood, water, and horse
propelling power — whereas the iron and steam machinery for the less
eflicient railroad must needs be imported at great expense. The experi-
ence of England lor some years was that tlu' earning capacit\' of the
canal far exceeded that of the railroad.

The first railroad built and operated west of the Alleghen\- Moun-
tains was on the line of the jiresent Michigan Southern line between
Toledo and Adrian. The Miami and Erie Canal had been projected
along the Maumee River, and this railroad line was chosen as far from
it as possible and across the country. It began lousiness at Toledo over
five years before the canal but it continued for many yiars a small begin-
ning of the present marvelous system of railway transportation. It
was projected in the winter of lH)'r_'-i]i) by Doctor Samuel (J. Comstock
of Toledo. It was incorporated with the name Erie and Kalamazoo
Railroad by Act of the Legislative Council of the Territory of Michigan,
passed '2'2n(\ April, 1^<;>.'), with perpetual succession "to build a railroad
from Port Lawrence [now Toledo] through Adrian to some point on
the Kalamazoo River : to transport, take and carry property and per-
sons u|>on the same, b\- the power and force of steam, animals, or ol

620 THE MAUMEE RIVER BASIN.

any mechanical or other power, or anv combination of them." An
amendment to this Act, passed 26th March, IbSS, provided that when
"the road shall have paid the cost of building the same, and expenses
of keeping the same in repair, and seven per cent on all moneys
expended as aforesaid, the said road shall become the property of the
Territory, or State, and shall become a free road except sufficient toll to
keep the same in repair." A subsequent Act terminated the road
at Adrian.

Manv meinbers of the Legislative Council viewed the question as
'a mere fanciful object out of which could come no harm [to Michigan
Territory] and it would greatly please the Comstocks of Toledo.'
Stephen B. Comstock and Benjamin F. Stickney were among the
charter members ; and the company held a view regarding the success
of the road different from that of the council. Upon receipt of the
charter they at once completed their plans for building. The selection
of persons to locate the road and superintend its construction fortu-
nately resulted in the choice of Edward Bissell of Toledo and George
Crane of Adrian, men of good judgment and energy. The construction
plan embraced only ties, and oak rails four inches square. The work
was pressed rapidly forward and, on account of the level country and
the light ground work, the road was completed to Adrian in the sum-
mer of 1836 : but the wear on the green oak rails in transporting
material for construction soon demonstrated the necessity for an iron
covering, whereupon strap iron rails five-eighths of an inch thick and
two-and-a-half inches wide were procured and nailed to the oak. It
was also decided to purchase a steam locomotive. The road was
opened for business in the fall of li^36 with horses as motive power,
and the following rates of fare for a "Seat in the Pleasure Car upon
the Railroad : Toledo to Whiteford 4 shillings [fifty cents] : White-
ford to Blissfield 4s; Blissfield to Palmyra '2s; Palmyra to Adrian 2s;
Through ticket from Toledo to Adrian [thirty-three miles, continuous]
12s; 50 lbs. baggage free to each seat." Through freight, on a light
barrel bulk equal to 200 lbs. was 4 shillings per hundred.

The terminus of this railroad at Toledo was in the former Village
of Vistula at the foot of the present Cedar Street, the road passing
through the former Port Lawrence about the present Perry and Water
Streets and extending along the river over a trestle. The run to
Adrian generally required the full day's time at first if no mishaps
occurred ; but accidents and exciting incidents were of frequent
occurrence.

February 15, 1837, a dividend of five per centum was declared on
the stock discounted and held b^- the bank. April 7, 1837, the fare was
advanced to $2.25 from Toledo to Adrian in the Pleasure Car, and it

FIRST RAILROAD WEST OF ALLEGHENY MOUNTAINS. 621

was further "resolved that former rates for the Pleasure Car be charged
[for passengers riding] on the Lumber Cars."

The first locomotive brought west of Schenectady, New York,
being the one ordered in lH;:!(j, was received at Toledo in June, 1^(37,
its route being from Philadeljihia to New York City bv water, thence

THK FIRST LOCO.MOT1V1-. AND THE SECOND 'PLEASIKE CAK

Of a Pretty tliouirh 1 atlier Sinjiular and Kanciful Model' of the Erie and Kalamazoo Railioad running
from Toledo in July. 1K:^7. Fn>m an old print.

Up the Hudson River to Troy, thence by New York and Erie
Canal to Buffalo, and thence b\' a lake boat. This locomotive was
number yo of the noted Baldwin Locomotive Works. It was very
small and light in comi>arison with the average locomotive of the
present, and it was without protection for the engineer. In July, 1M37,
the accommodation of this railroad was increased b\- a new 'Pleasure
Car of a pretty, though rather singular and fanciful model' as shown
in the accompanying engraving. This was the second passenger car
used bv this road. It was divided into tour comjiartments, three to
accommodate eight passengers each on two facing seats, and the fourth
was a small space in the lowest central part between the wheels, for
baggage. By this equipment passengers were transported at a speed
of less than ten miles an hour when no accidents were experienced, and
this permitted one round journey a day, from Toledo to Adrian. But
accidents often occurred, entailing long delays. The soil supporting
the ties was slippery and unstable after even light rains, while the
knowledge and the means were not at hand for stable ballasting. With
the spring of'the rails came a breakmg or loosening of the nails and a

622 THE MAUMEE RIVER BASIN.

curling of the ends of tfie strap-iron rails which during the greatest
speed occasionally curled so high and with such force as to pierce the
floor of the car and endanger the passengers. The exciting experiences
of such dangers related by several passengers caused fear and hesita-
tion among would-be travelers on the line.

In October, 1837, this railroad company was awarded the contract
for carrying the United States Mails, and little by little it grew in better
favor with the public. Expenses increased, however, and unpaid bills
accumulated. The largest single item in the list of delinquent taxes in
Toledo for the year 18-11 was S203.12 assessed on the depot and
machine shop of the Erie and Kalamazoo Railroad, which propert\- was
valued at S34ol. The company's troubles increased and in June, 1842,
its property was levied upon by the sheriff. In May, 1849, the road was
leased in perpetuity to the Michigan Southern Railroad Company: and in
1869 it became part of the great Lake Shore and Michigan Southern sys-
tem through consolidation with the Northern Indiana: Cleveland and
Toledo organized in 1850 and completed December 20, 1852: Cleveland,
Painesville and Ashtabula: and the Buffalo and Erie Railroads.

In 1836 there was a bill presented to the Legislature for incorpor-
ating a railroad from Brunersburg to Hicksville, but nothing came of it.
The Toledo, Wabash and Western Railwa\' was broached July 11,
1847; but the plan did not assume definite and active form until 1852.
It was completed from Toledo to Fort Wayne in July, 1855. To facil-
iate its construction, rails and a locomotive were transported by Miami
and Erie Canal from Toledo to Defiance. This road became a strong
competitor to the canals, and it has been the strongest factor in the
decline of the Wabash and Erie Canal. For many years it has been
operated under the name of the Wabash Railway. The Dayton and
- Michigan Railroad, built in 1859, and its connection with the Cincinnati
'-^' and Davton road, has been the great competitor of the Miami and
\ Erie Canal.

-f The first railroad to enter Fort Wayne was the Ohio and Indiana

j which was located in 1852 and completed in 1854. Its first rails and
locomotive were received by the Wabash and Erie Canal by way of
Toledo. The arrival of this locomotive excited great interest and it
was soon visited by nearly the entire populace. The Fort Wayne and
Chicago Railroad was located in 1854 and was completed from Fort
Wavne in 1857. This road was consolidated in 1856 with the Ohio and
Indiana, and the Ohio and Pennsylvania roads to form the Pittsburg,
V Fort Wayne and Chicago Railroad which is now the prominent line of
the great Pennsylvania Railroad system.

The Chicago line of the Baltimore and Ohio Railroad Companv
was built through this Basin in 1873-74. The double tracking of this

RAILWAYS STEAM AND ELECTRIC. LIBRARIES.

623

railway, which is a part of the principal line of this company, was com-
pleted in 1905.

This Basin, from its large business interests, its central position,
and its level landscape, is an ideal repjion for the huildinff and operating
of railroads: and those of both steam and electric power have accordingly

increased to a large number, ex-
tending in every direction. Each
of the largest cities is a railway
center, with the chief center at
Toledo which has become one of
the principal railway centers, of
both steam and electric lines, in
the United States — and yet
greater business is soon to be
realized from the completion in
1903 of two beltlines. The Toledo
Belt Railway, intermural, and
The Toledo Railway and Term-
inal Company which is mostly
without the present city limits
thus affording rare opportunities
for manufactories along its line —
See adjoining map. The last
named line was opened for inspection and dedicated September
16, 1903, by an excursion given around its course to nearlv three
hundred-representative business men of Toledo.

Libraries, Public and Private.

Libraries have been increasing to a considerable degree during the
past few years, both in their number and in the number of their books.
The Public Libraries represent a change from the Public School and the
Sunday School libraries which were formed from the recommendation
of the Ohio State Convention of the friends of education held in Col-
umbus in January, 1«3(3. This recommendation was based upon the
plan of the District School Libraries of New York and New England
which, though small, were composed of books, like Abbott's histories,
that were instructive on useful subjects : and the wholesome influence
of which was carried throughout the Nation.

The changes are, in some respects, not for the better, largely from
the increased number of books of fiction that have been published and
the hasty, indifferently-considered selection. The funds for the sup-
port of these Public Libraries have come from individual gifts, from
public entertainments, or from public tax, and in bulk, often making the

TOLEDO'S DOL'BLE BELT RAILWAYS

624 THE MAUMEE RIVER BASIN.

purchase of several hundred volumes possible at a time ; and the
commitee, already fully occupied each member with his own affairs, or
too often the librarian alone, has taken the latest fiction in bulk without
regard to its character or probable influence. Thus the books of these
libraries have exerted a powerful influence on many persons of all ages
to thwart the efforts and the desires of the considerative taxpayer or
philanthropist by making the libraries very much of an evil instead
of a blessing. Pernicious habits of reading have been directlj- en-
couraged by giving unbridled opportunity for reading as a time eutha-
nasia, or mental and time dissipation ; for reading that inflames the
imagination and passions ; for the formation of the habit that always
leads to the choice of books that take the readers into an unnatural
state of mind, impracticable in the everyday relations of the reader's
life ; fictions that lead to day-dreaming, to deteriorations of mind and
even to disorders of the nervous system and of the bodily health ; and
to repugnance for books on practical and useful knowledge. The
desires and intentions of philanthropists are best met by those libraries
which are a part of well adjusted and carefull\' supervised educational
systems.

The Public Library of the City of Toledo. The first effort to es-
tablish a Public Library in Toledo came from the organization 1st
December, 1838, of the Young Men's Association of the City of Toledo
incorporated under the Act of the General Assembly of 13th March,
1838. The constitution of this Association is an interesting document
and contains the names of sixtv-six subscribers. To establish upon a
liberal and public basis a Lyceum and Public Library in the City of
Toledo are two of the olijects named in the constitution. This Associa-
tion survived a number of years ( Hiram Walbridge being secretary in
1845) and it was then succeeded by the Young Men's Christian
Association.

In the year 1864 a few citizens of Toledo decided to form a sub-
scription library. The 18th October a meeting was held at the office
of Doctor Chesliro when it was reported that $2ii00 had been subscribed,
and it was resolved to jjroceed with the organization. At the adjourned
meeting, three days later, the committees reported and the constitution
was adopted. October 27th, a charter of the Toledo Library Associa-
tion having meantime been obtained, John Sinclair, E. Jackson,
Charles A. King, D. E. Gardiner, W. A. C. Converse, Morrison R.
Waite, and William Krauss, were elected Trustees and W. H. Fish
Clerk, to serve until May, 1865. The work was carried forward with
spirit, and soon a reading room was opened with eight hundred books
and with newspapers and magazines. A course of lectures and further
subscriptions netted an additional thousand dollars. Overtures were

THE FREE PUBLIC LIBRARIES.

625

now made to add thu books held by the Young Men's Christian Asso-
ciation which had been organized since 1838: and in October, 1865,
this collection of eight hundred books was added. The lilirarv in-
creased in popularitN'. During the year lHfi5 there were 15,000 circu-
lations. A course of lectures this winter netted nine hundred dollars,
and another course the next vear thirteen hundred dollars. In May,
1867, the Association had four thousand books and five hundred mem-
bers, thirty-three of whom were life members. Its officers were :
John Sinclair President, Robert A. Wason Vice President, Charles F.

I 1)1. EDO PUBLIC LIBRARY BlILUlNl,
Lookinc southward

Adams Secretary and Elijah H. Norton Treasurer. Trustees: Charles
A. King, Neh. Waterman, \V. A. C. Converse, Calvin Barker,
W. H. H. Smith, Stephen H. Camp, Henry Hall, and Albert E.
Macomber. This Association continued in successful operation until
1873 when it became evident to the few more considerative and
unselfish members that a library sustained by the subscriptions of a
few could not be of such direct and general benefit to the general
public as was desirable : and that a free library sustained by general
taxation was as necessary as free schools. Action from these oi)inions
resulted in giving Toledo the honor of being one of the first cities in
the west to provide a Free Public Library. The Legislature was peti-
tioned for this purpose. An Enabling Act was passed 18th .\pril, 1873,

626 THE MAUMEE RIVER BASIN.

and it was formally adopted by the Common Council of Toledo 24th
June, 1873. The nine Trustees, to serve \vithout compensation,
were then named, four by the Board of Education and four by the
Common Council with the Mayor ex officio. They were chosen chiefly
from the officers of the Toledo Library Association, which now turned
over to the new organization its propert}' including 4878 books. There
also came to the new organization 1320 books from the Public Schools,
the law directing that all books there not needed for reference be thus
transferred. These 6198 volumes were opened to the public in the
second story of the King Block at the northwest corner of Summit and
Madison Streets as soon as practicable as a Free Public Library: and
here they remained, being added to each year, until the completion of
the present building when the books were removed and the library
there opened to the public 23rd June, 1890.

This library building is nominally fire proof. Its walls are of
brick faced with sandstone on its fronts northward on Madison Street
and westward on Ontario. Its cost was about $75,000. Its architec-
ture is composite and pleasing exteriorily, but rather disappointing in
its interior arrangement, light, and capacity' which is possibly about
sixty to seventy thousand volumes. The number of volumes cata-
logued was reported April 1, 1903, as 50,552, and the volumes possessed
January 1, 1905, were reported as 56,576. During the year 1904 there
were added 6833 volumes ; and the number of tattered volumes of
fiction discarded was large. The net increase of borrowers' cards was
4746 during 1904.

This librar}' is popular. It is open day and evening during
business days, and Sunday afternoons. During the year ending 1st
April, 1902, there were 231,303 withdrawals of books for home reading ;
52,955 of these being fiction for children and 79,683 of fiction by adults.
During this year there were 45,174 consultations of reference books in
the reading room.

The five substations, that were in operation from the autumn of
1899, were abandoned during the year ending 1st April, 1903; but
many books are distributed to residents of different parts of the City
by teachers of their schools.

The open-shelf system was established 12th December, 1899: also
a juvenile room, and a newspaper room, which have become popular.
The books of fiction drawn by the children have been as high as ninety
per cent of their entire reading. Later reports lessen this ratio.

The general management of the library has been conservative.
The receipts for 1902 were, from City Tax $20,928.37; Mott bequest
$1000; M'Bride $12. The expenditures were, for bonds and interest
$4,977.50; repairs $79.54; furniture $15.35; salaries $8,706.49; books

THE FREE PUBLIC LIBRARIES. 627

purchased $867.48; binding books $11.70; newspapers and magazines
$407.51; fuel and light $1,393.45. Amount to the credit of the Library
Fund 1st April, 1903, $9,564.20.

Mrs. Frances D. Jermain, who had been an employee of this
library for twenty-five years, several years as librarian, terminated her
connection with it at the close of the 3'ear 1903. Her work was effi-
ciently and pleasantly done. She is succeeded as librarian by Willis
F. Sewall.

An architect was called in December, 1904, to consider the prac-
ticabilit>- of increasing the book storing cajiacity within the present
walls of the building, and the desirability of extending the building to
double the present capacity. There is ample space for extending the
building on the City's land adjoining, the lot being 106 fuet in width
and extending from Madison to Jefferson Street.

The Way Public Library, Perrysburg, Ohio, is the result of a
betpiest by the late Willard \'. Way, EsC|., who was born in Sjiringfield,
Otsego County, New York, 3rd August, 1H07, and n-moved to Perrj's-
burg in 1^34. He was a lawyer, a man of sterling character and useful
in a good degree to his fellows during his lifetime. He died at Perrys-
burg 25th August, 1S75. His bequest was $15,000 to lie jjermanently
invested and the interest, $600 per year, alone used for the purchase of
books ; also the sum of near $12,000 for a lot and library building.
Gifts by citizens purchased an adjoining lot, and $1100 from the \'illage
purchased the heating furnace, shelves, etc., and graded the yard. The
building was completed and occupied in lH90. It is of Kilbuck brown
stone 50 x 60 feet ground size, mainly one story high with basement.
The two outer main entrances lead through a vestiliule under a tower
of Louisville sandstone, facing two streets. The plan includes a cata-
loguing nook 11 X 13 feet, a hall 7 x 16 leading to the stack room which
is 19x30 feet, with paneled ceiling and mouldings. To the left of the
main entrance is the room for reference books 14x15 feet in size, and
to the right is the general reading room 16 x 22 feet, furnished witli
heavy chairs and tables of oak.

The building and invested money are held in trust by a Board of
seven Managers, three chosen by the Village Council, two liy the Board
of Education whose President and the Mayor are ex officio members.

The books numlier aliout 7000, and the circulations number from
10,000 to 12,000. The hours are from 1 to 5 and from 6:30 to 8:30
P. M. excepting Sundays and public holidays. The rooms are lighted
by electricity donated by the electric comiiany. A children's depart-
ment has recently been added. The expenses for the care of the build-
ing and library, amounting to between $300 and $400 per year, are paid
by a special \'illage Tax. Mrs. Ann E. Frederick is librarian.

628 THE MAUMEE RIVER BASIN.

The Defiance Public Library was organized in June, 1895, with
about ySO books that were donated by the surviving members of the
Defiance Library- Association which was formed the 1st April, 1873.
This Association started with a membership fee of five dollars and two
dollars annual dues, and gathered about forty members. The expenses
were kept at a minimum b}' the librarian keeping the books in his
office without charge.

The Public Library has been maintained by City Tax, three-tenths
of one mill being levied for this purpose. It contains something over
five thousand volumes many of which are fiction, and a few hundred
are in the German language. The circulation cards numbered 2647 in
June, 1904; and the book circulations numbered upwards of 20,000
during the year, the average daily withdrawals being 65 and the maxi-
mum weekly 601, with short hours. The books were first kept in one
room at 508 Court Street, but in July, 1901, they were moved to three
rooms over a drygoods store at 314 Clinton Street.

Andrew Carnegie expressed readiness November 25, 1903, to give
$17,500 for a library building at Defiance if the City would provide the
site and not less than §1750 annually for the library's maintenance.
The general tax levy for this sum was unanimously voted by the City
Council; and Januar\' 5, 1904, upon the unanimous vote of the Librar}-
Trustees and by a vote of five to two by the City Council, Fort De-
fiance Park was chosen, and granted, as the site for the building. The
west end of this centrally and beautifully situated Park was chosen as
the building site, it being well removed from the earth works of Fort
Defiance. Ground was broken August 9, 1904, and the cornerstone
was set October 9th by the Grand Lodge of Free and Accepted Masons
of Ohio before a large concourse of people. Addresses were made by
Henry B. Harris President of the Board of Library Trustees, by Mrs.
Laura S. Sneath President of the Federated Women's Clubs of Ohio,
and bv Charles Dick United States Senator. The building is two and
a half stories high, in principal part, faced on all sides to the eaves
with the Mansfield red-variegated sandstone, 60 x 66 feet in size, the
sides and ends with central-extended lines and the corners buttressed
to good effect. The roof, with skylight and large tile glazed in red,
green and chocolate colors, was laid in December, 1904, and January-,
1905. The contract for the building did not provide for its completion
on account of insufficient funds. The sum of $1000 subscribed b}'
citizens residing in the vicinity, for making permanent walks and other-
wise beautify'ing the Park, was added to the building fund and yet it
was not sufficient to finish and furnish the building according to later
desires. Uyion presenting the facts to the benefactor he generously
added in February, 1905, S4500 to his former contribution. The

THE FREE PUBLIC LIBRARIES. 629

building was occupied in the summer of 1905. The library was then
largely enhanced by gift of the book and museum collections of Charles
E. Slocum — see description on following pages, and engravings on
pages 58, 73, 175, 279, 535, etc. Miss Jewel Fouke is librarian.

The Fort Wayne Public Library was established in lb93. Largely
through efforts of The Women's Cluli League the City Council and the
Board of School Trustees were induced this year to establish the librar\'
as part of the Public School system : and the title to property- apper-
taining to it, and the library control, were vested in the Trustees of the
Public Schools under Act of the Indiana Legislature in 1881. The
entire support is derived from City Tax, which levy cannot exceed one-
third of one mill. The money thus collected in 1903 amounted to
about S8(.)00.

The books now number about 12,000 volumes. The}- were housed
in a private residence previous to the completion of the new library
building in the winter of 1903-04. This building was constructed by
the fund (at first of $75,000 and later of §15,000) donated to the City
of Fort Wayne for this purpose by Andrew Carnegie on his usual terms
in such cases. It is situated in a quiet, pleasant place on the south-
west corner of West Wayne and Webster Streets, two squares west of
Calhoun Street the principal thoroughfare. The walls of the north,
east and west sides are faced with Bedford Limestone in smooth finish.
The building is of general fireproof or slow-burning construction, and
in accordance with well-considered plan. The capacity is about
80,000 volumes. Miss Margaret M. Colerick is the efficient librarian.

The Public Library at Bryan, Ohio, is the outgrowth of the Bryan
Library Association which was formed in lbb2 by a few book-loving
women. By social and literary entertainments, and subscriptions, a
few books were opened to the public in July, 1883, the families using
the books paying one dollar a year therefor. During later years the
Williams County Commissioners have granted the use of a basement
room in the Court House for storing the books, and there books could
be drawn at certain hours in the week. The books now number about
3200 volumes.

Early in 1903 .\ndrew Carnegie tendered to the \'illage of Brvan a
donation of ten thousand dollars for the erection of a free public library
building on his usual conditions that a site be obtained by the village
and at least ten per cent of the sum donated be raised each j-ear for
the library's support. The gift was accepted, a Village Tax of one
mill was levied, a building site facing High Street southward near the
east side of the Public Square was bought, and the building was com-
pleted for occupancy late in the tall of 1904. riif liooks belonging to
the Library Association were formalh- transferred December 20, 1904,

630 THE MAUMEE RIVER BASIN.

to the care of the Trustees of the Public Library previouslj' chosen,
and they were shelved in the new building. Alice M. Walt has been
the efficient librarian.

The John Sanford Brumback Library of Van Wert County, situate
in the City of Van Wert, was formally dedicated 1st January, 1901.
The building is of stone 60 x 70 feet in extreme ground plan, cruciform,
a story and a half high, with basement : with gothlc roofs and two
castellated towers two stories in height situated in the angles front of
the transept, the one to the right of the approaching visitor being
round in form and the one to the left square. It has arched ceilings,
tile floors, marble mantel and wainscoting, polished oak woodwork and
furniture. The naturally flat surface of its site in the small City Park
was elevated b^' 10,000 wagon loads of earth hauled from a distance.

The Ladies Library Association of 1890 was the origin of the suc-
cessful public library movement in Van Wert. By small membership
fees, yearly assessments, and entertainments, the ladies accumulated a
few books, and in 1896 the Common Council came to their assistance
with a levy of three-tenths of a mill tax which produced $575 a year.
With the increased expenditure for rent and care, but little of this fund
was left with which to purchase books, and it was feared that the effort
would fail like a similar effort some j'ears before. At this time the will
of Mr. Brumback was made public, in which he provided for a good
building for the City or, if his heirs thought best, for the County. This
suggestion of the County prevailed. An Act of the Legislature enabled
the County Commissioners to levy a tax for the purchase of books and
the maintenance of the library. This tax at present is one-half mill.
The Ladies Association turned over their 1600 books to the new
organization which now possesses a better rounded collection of 9000
volumes, with space for forty thousand : and the prospect for the future
usefulness of this County Library, the first in Ohio, is encouraging.
Fifteen local points of distribution have been established in well-chosen
parts of the County, and are in successful operation. The Library
Board consists of seven members, three chosen by the County Commis-
sioners, two by the Brumback heirs, and two by the Ladies Library
Association. Miss Ella Louise Smith is librarian.

The Findlay Public Library Findlay, Ohio, was organized a few
3-ears ago, and now has about 3500 miscellaneous books. It is housed
in the basement of the Hancock County Court House, is freely patron-
ized, and is moderateh' supported by City Tax.

The Lima Public Library was opened in September, 1901, in three
rooms in the Black Block, Main Street in the City of Lima, Ohio. The
books then on the shelves were principally six hundred volumes,
belonging to the public, which had been kept in the rooms of the Young

THE FREE PUBLIC LIBRARIES. 651

Men's Christian Association. Money was raised to sui)i)ort the new-
enterprise by subscription and by selling lite memberships for one
dollar each. The number of books increased during; the Hrst three
years to 3500 volumes 'one-third being fiction, one-third juvenile, and
one-third classified.'

The Third Annual Report, for the year ending Sei)tember i!l, l!i(.i4,
shows S'lW) membership cards, oy'i having been issued the last \tar and
181 cancelled. The largest issue of books in one dav was 320 on March
12, 1904, and the smallest issues were July 2r)th and August 25th of 51
volumes each day. The largest circulation in one month was 4121
books in March, 1904, and the smallest was 2510 in August. The
average daily issue was 124, an increase of nine over 1902-03. The
whole number of issues during the year were 38,132 of which 33,063
were fiction. At first the library was open eight hours a dav and e'\-en-
ing excepting Sunday's and during the summer when it was closed
evenings other than Mondavs and Saturdays. It was also closed two
hours at midday and two hours for evening meal. Latterly the hours
have been from 9:f)0 to 5:01) bv day and 7:00 to S:00 evt'nings, Sundays
excepted.

This library is sustained mostl}' by City Tax, only a few meml)er-
ship tickets being sold to country or distant residents. The receipts
for th(.' year ending October 11, 1904, were S2,7(')5.3f) and the ex])endi-
tures were, for salaries S997.0O, for rents and maintenance !>309.45,
books and supplies $500.73.

In the fall of 1901 Andrew Carnegie offend to donate the Citv of
Lima $30,000 with which to erect a lil)rary building on his usual condi-
tions of a free unencumbered site and the raising annuallv of ten per
cent of the amount donated for the upkeep of the library. No move-
ment being made by the city authorities, or the business men, to secure
a building lot, the members of the Women's Federated Clubs
took action. They were offered the net proceeds that might accrue
from their editing and circulating of one day's issue of the Republican-
Gazette newspapvr ; and their Library Edition of Novemlur 25, 19t)2,
netted them $1000 as the beginning of a Library-site Fund. In April,
1904, these ladies gave a Twilight Recital, and in June they held a
Lawn Fete at MacBeth Park for the benefit of this fund, both enter-
tainments netting them $1274 which sum was placed on interest with
the other. October 17th a lot one hundred feet square was purchased
for §6500. It is situate at the corner of Market and MacDonald Streets,
four squares west of the business center at Main Street, and is con-
sidered most desirable. Other public entertainments were given by
the ladies for this fund in the winter of 1904-05. Medora Freeman is
the enterprising librarian.

632 THE MAUMEE RIVER BASIN.

The Paulding Library Association was organized in Paulding, Ohio,
late in the year 1903, by the Women's Federated Literary Societies,
some contributing books and others money, and a library of about two
hundred and fifty volumes was opened to the members February 16,
1904. The membership payment has been named at two dollars, and
the dues at one dollar a year. A report the first part of December
shows eighty members, and three hundred and eighty volumes on the
shelves. The officers are Mrs. Andrew Durphy President, Mrs.
Charles Baughman Secretary, and Miss Catherine Travis Librarian.

Ottawa, Putnam County, Ohio, has no public library. At the
death there of Charles Clippenger in 1904, it became known from his
will that he bequeathed to this village fifteen hundred dollars for
library use, to be paid after the death of two heirs who are to receive
the income from this sum during their lifetime.

Other towns have recently become beneficiaries of Andrew
Carnegie for library buildings in the following amounts : Wauseon,
Fulton County, $7500: Celina, Mercer Count\-, $10,000 ; Columbus
Grove, Putnam County, $10,000.

The Public School Libraries. The Public Schools having the
largest number of books are as follows: In the part of Indiana within
the limits of this Basin, Ashley 500 volumes; Auburn 1200: Butler
300; Decatur 1900: Fort Wayne 3000; Garrett 500; Waterloo 400.
In Michigan: Addison 300 : Adrian 16,500 ; Hudson 1500 ; Hillsdale
1100. In Ohio: Antwerp 600: Bluffton 400 : Celina 400 : Columbus
Grove 500; Criderville 401) : Defiance 2000 : Delphos 800 ; Delta 600
Deshler 200; Findlay 700: Hicksville 500 ; Latty 400 : Lima 700
Maumee 500 ; Napoleon 300 : New Bremen 600; North Baltimore 300
North Lima 300 : Ottawa 500: Pandora 250 : Paulding 300 ; St. Mary's
2000 ; Toledo 700 reference books, others were turned into the Public
Library; Van Wert 400 ; Wapakoneta 1700 : Wauseon 300 ; Weston
300. These books have generally been chosen with the erroneous,
and pernicious, notion that fiction is necessary to form the habit
of reading.

Other Educational Institution Libraries are noted at page 595 ante.

The Young Men's Christian Associations possess a small number of
books, also other societies, but reports from them are not at hand.

The Private Library of Colonel Robert S. Robertson, Fort Wayne,
Indiana, comprises over three thousand volumes. History predomi-
nates, and next rank belles-lettres, art, and science. There is here one
of the best collection of books relating to Mormonism possessed in the
middle west. A number of first editions, a few fine bindings, and
several rare old works are on his shelves. These books are free to all
literary inclined persons who desire to consult them and, with a few

THE PRIVATE LIBRARIES OF CITIZENS. 633

reservations, books are loaned. This collection of books and its
owner have been authoritx- to many citizens, and of inestimable value
to the community in their far-reaching influence for good. In the
same rooms with the liooks are kejjt many of the Colonel' and Mrs.
Robertson's collections of prehistoric and historic relics, minerals,
fossils, paintings, engravings, and other works of art, manv of which
were collected during their travels in .\merica and Europe — all pre-
senting evidence of culturt' and good discernment.

The Library of the late Allen H. Hamilton is the largest [irivate
collection of liooks in Fort \\'a\ne. It contains yirobably something
over eight thousand volumes, and is yet retained by Mrs. Hamilton.
It is strong in folk-lore, ]ioetry, and rare old works.

The other of the larger private libraries in Fort Wayne have been
reported as follows: The collection possessed by Reverend and
Bishop Alerding numbering about five thousand volumes : Reverend
Samuel Wagenhals four thousand; Margaret Hamilton three thousand
five hundred : and John H. Jacobs about one thousand volumes in
which latter collection English History and Literature of the eighteenth
century are best represented, and general historv, biography, and
political economy, are next in rank.

Charles E. Slocum's Private Library at Defiance, Ohio, shows the
accumulations of about thirty-five years, after giving many books to
his friends. It contains some poor and some indifferent books which
have been of use as warnings to their possessor to be more circumspect
in other purchases.

This library, now numbering over five thousand titles and vet
increasing, is permitted to be reported only as an encouragement to
book-loving people by illustrating what can be accomplished with
moderate means and persistent efforts: its owner believing that it is
better to own the obtainable books necessary for mental expansion than
to be dependent on the neighbors or a public librar\-. This collection
contains something relating to every subject — books, general and
special, on the different phases of anthropology, language, history,
science, literature, philosophy, art, politics, religions and education.
Books on science, history and literature predominate. But little space
has been given to modern fiction on account of its demoralizing influ-
ence on mind, and on ttie time at command for reading.

Books relating in varying degree to the 'Territory Northwest of
the Ohio River' are well represented, including the Jesuit Relations
Burrows Brothers edition in seventv-three volumes, the Paris and
London Documents, and most of the other authorities referred to in the
footnotes of this volume. There are also the Narrative and Critical
History of America eight volumes, Parkman's writings twelve volumes,

634

THE MAUMEE RIVER BASIN.

and special histories of Canada, the Pacific Slope, Alaska, Labrador,
the United States of Mexico, and of the countries of Central and South
America.

In addition to several special works treating different phases, the
History of the United States of America is represented by the works of
Bancroft seven volumes, Bartlett three, Bryant and Gav four, Ellis six.

LIBRARY OF CHARLES ELIHU SLOCUM, DEFLANCE, OHIO
Looking east 1st November, 1^99.

Shaler two, Lossing eleven. Battles and Leaders of the Civil War four,
Hildreth six, Wilson five, the American Nation twenty-eight volumes
edited by Albert B. Hart, Harper's Encyclopaedia of United States
History ten volumes. National Cyclopaedia of American Biographv at
present twelve volumes, National Portrait Gallery four, the Writings of
George Washington edited by Jared Sparks twelve volumes. Writings of
John Adams second President ten, of Alexander Hamilton seven, of
James Madison four, and of other public men; also special histories of
the wars, of States, sections, cities, and citizens : also writings of
Greely, Grant, Sherman, William T. and John, Fiske, Blaine, Bryce,
Roosevelt, Earle, etc., etc. There are also many books relating to the
Aborigines and their archaeology, illustrated with sketches in the field

THE PRIVATE LIBRARIES OF CITIZENS.

635

and some with colored portraits from the United States Bureau at
Washington. There are over fifty volumes on the fauna and flora of
the United States including fifteen or more volumes on cryptogamic
botany with many colored plates. Other countries are similarly rejire-
sented, also in the French and German languages.

The medical and surgical sciences are well jiortravt-d bv several

I.IHKAKV OF CHARLES ELIHT SLOCIJM, UKFIANXE. OHIO
Looking west 1st N'oveinber. IS99.

special and recent treatises on each subject. Special treatises on the
different phases of biology and psychology are also in this department,
as well as in that of the educational ; and over fiftv volumes of the pub-
lications of the American Medical Association, and thirtv volunus ot
the Ohio State Medical Society.

Long time membership in other societies has added many volumes
of their publications, among which are those of the American Micro-
scopical Society twenty-five volumes, of the New P2ngland Historic
Genealogical Society twenty-five, oi the American Academy of Political
and Social Science twenty-three, .\merican Association for the Advance-
ment of Science twenty. National Geographic Society eleven volumes,
the Ohio State Archaeological and Historical Society fifteen, etc. A

656 THE MAUMEE RIVER BASIN.

number of other books, including periodicals, relating to special science
— anthropology, ethnology, archeology, sociology, psjxhology, zoology,
botany, history- and literature, have been regularly received.

In addition to the usual standard and some rare histories of
England, Ireland and Scotland, there are here Rapin de Thoyras and
Tindal's great work in five thick folio volumes edition of 1743 to 1747
with many page portraits and other illustrations from copper plates bv
George Virtue, Bosc, Gravelot, etc.: Knight's History eight volumes;
Knight's Old England two large folio volumes with profuse illustrations
of ancient buildings, monuments, domestic customs, costumes, etc.:
Spencer's Complete English Traveler of the eighteenth century, illus-
trated folio, and man^' special smaller works of ancient, medieval, and
modern times.

Every other country is represented in its history, general and
natural, many with well illustrated works, such as the General History
of China four volumes from the French of P. du Halde edition of 1736,
the ancient classic poetry, and later works; DuRuy's Rome in eight
volumes profusely illustrated, and others: also Grote's Greece in twelve
volumes and several other richly illustrated works each relating to
Greece, Egypt, Syria, the islands of the seas, to the ancient home of
Man in the far East and to the recent research excavations there;
Tissot's Life of Christ and of the Old Testament six volumes imperial
quarto size illustrated in colors ; the different works of DuChaillu,
Stanley, and of many other explorers and travelers including the latest
efforts and observations in the more distant and obscure parts of the
world, as in Alaska, Central America, Patagonia, Siberia, Australia,
and in the Arctic, Antarctic, and other glacier regions. There are also
several large well illustrated works on art, general and special, with
several large volumes of bound photographs of paintings, sculptures,
and architecture, ancient and modern, that have been gathered during
the owner's travels in America and Europe.

The department of reference books is particularly well stocked,
including the recent large publications.

Being widely removed from large libraries from which to draw, it
has been incumbent upon the owner of this library to purchase the
books he needed ; and being in full sympathy with the methods of
modern science he has endeavored to gather literature illustrative of the
results of such methods. Little attention has been given to vagary or
hobby in the selection of books. There are a few handsome bindings,
but generally a good cloth binding has been preferred to any other kind
on account of its better withstanding atmospheric changes and wear.

This private library has been freely open to the public, and many
persons have consulted it, its owner being pleased to offer his aid in

THE PRIVATE LIBRARIES OF CITIZENS. 637

any line of study desired. The books have been arranged in four
rooms under Masonic Hall in the business part of Defiance: and these
rooms have been freely open as the meeting place of the Fort Defiance
Science Club and of other organizations, as well as to individuals who
desired to confer regarding questions of luihlir utilitv and on matters
literary, scientific or musical.

This collection of books was divided in the year 1905, some
volumes going to friends, others to Defiance College, others to the
Charles Elihu Slocum Library of the Ohio Wesleyan University at
Delaware, others to the Orrington Lunt Library of the Northwestern
University, Evanston, Illinois, and yet more to the Defiance Public
Library. The last named institution is also the beneficiary of the
Charles E. Slocum collection of jirehistoric and historic relics, including
those of Geology, of minerals, fossils, shells, marine algae, archaeology,
and other museum objects, all of which are arranged and displaved in
the new library building for the benefit of all persons who conform
to wholesome rules for their study.

The Library of George H. Keicham, Toledo, Ohio, is among the
largest private collections of books in librarv form in the Basin, it
comprising about nine thousand volumes. It is general in character,
well supplied with special works of reference, and histories of all
countries. There is a largi- number of limited editions, but no special
attention has been given to bindings. This librarv is open onlv to the
owner, to his family, and to his friends.

William H. Tucker of Toledo possesses a library of about four
thousand volumes, largely of the standard works of fiction, history,
particularly English, and French, art, science, literature and biography.
Special works for reference are also well represented. This librar}'
contains a number of first and rare editions of small volumes for con-
venient use and handsomely bound in tree calf or Russia leather. Good
bindings are seen throughout. Considerable attention has been given
to collecting letters and autographs of prominent persons — George
Washington, LaFayette, Thomas Jefferson, James Monroe, Jared
Sparks, and George Bancroft, being among the more prominent ones
represented by a letter: and Rol)ert Morris^ Ulysses S. Grant, Benja-
min F. Butler, and Charles Francis Adams, among those represented
bv autograi)h. A number of engravings and bronzes, embellish the
room containing these books. The owner has generously invited the
public to free enjoyment of his treasures, and he experiences pleasure
in aiding literarv efforts.

George B. Orwig's library in Toledo numbers about two thousand
volumes well exhibiting the standard works of American and English
authors. He has no place for current fiction. Historv and science

658

THE MAUMEE RIVER BASIN.

are well represented. He has given the subject of religion much atten-
tion, and has sought books descriptive of the religion of all peoples.
Books on travel have also received due attention, and the historical
and picturesque parts of the earth may be enjoyed in description and
illustration at his own fireside. He has preferred half morocco bind-
ings, believing them more substantial and durable: and in all things
he has sought the practical. This library' is accessible to all friends
of its owner.

Robinson Locke of Toledo has a library of about four thousand
volumes of general literature, mostly in special limited editions. This
is the rarest collection of books reported to the writer. Special atten-
tion has been given to gathering books on early printing, of illuminated
manuscripts, fine art works, and extra illustrated and extended books.
It is probably the best collection of books on the drama in the west:
and possibly the best private collection in this country regarding the
later actors. Being a man of cultured taste and means, and having
resided abroad several years, Mr. Locke has been enabled to gather a
collection of great credit to himself and to his city.

The other private libraries in Toledo that have been reported to the
writer as containing over one thousand volumes each of general char-
acter, are possessed by John W. Dowd, Harry E. King, Noah H.
Swayne, Rathburn Fuller, George E. Pomeroy, Charles M. Spitzer,
and Thomas W. Tracy.

INDEX.

An asterisk (*) after page number indicates an engraved illustration of the subject.

Aborigines, as first described 64-74, in gen-
eral and in particular 418-442 : the
fiercest savages known 65, 69 ; complex-
ion, hair, beard, clothing 06, 4111 :
shelters from storm and cold 67, 308,
.398, 409, 424 ; were cannibals 69, 97, 99,
100, lOS, 160, 175, 266, 277, 331, 334,
421-2, 425, 433 ; dog the only domesti-
cated animal 71, 421 ; religion and medi-
cine vague, various superstitious sor-
cery 72, 73* 74* 257» 307-8, 393, 427,
437-S ; food, fire 67, 422 ; filthiness 08,
5.33 : bred to savagery and war, weapons
fi0» 55» 68, 125* 420 ; use ot captives
69 (See Captives for names) ; scalps of
enemies, use of 70, 93, 133. 108, 329,
331, 384; dances 71, 434, 438 (calumet)
91 (scalp) 134*; ornaments 58* 70; en-
tertainment of expensive 71-2, 91-3,
103-4. 140-1. 149, 422; industries 70:
feasts 71, 433 : fecundity and mortality
72; mode of burial 72. 282. 436; blood
freely mixed with French 80, 423 ; wam-
pum S6. 90-92, 99. 107, 117. passim;
waver between French and British trade .S3,
85, 87, 89, 96 ; council with French in Mon-
treal (1701) 87; nearly all t,-vvor French
(1721) 89: send warriors to Montreal
90, 102 : all join Nicholas' conspiracy
against French 90 ; war parties sent by
French against British 92, 102 ; war
parties sent by British against French
93 : smallpox desired among by French
99, by British 111; were very intemperate
71. 103-4, 422 passim ; their sanguinarj'
and intemperate training by French and
British and their measure of fealty 83.
85, 92, 93, 102, 103, 149, 363 : Pontiac
conspires against British 105-113. cap-
tures British posts lOS-9 : tree flow of
rum among suggested as surer death to
than war 113 ; persecute Capt. Morris by
Maumee (1764) 115-118; curious as to
cause Revolutionary War 124: British
plan to govern them 124; 130-150;
defrauded by British traders 125-6 ;
federated by French and British against
Americans 127-150, 162-76, 178-83, 240,
256, 262, 280 : would not live in peace
with Americans from British influence
130. 133, 140. 149-50. 157-60, 163, 171.
173, 181, 183, 185, 208, 217, 237, 254,
261 ; Americans not faultless toward 168 ;
battle against British and Americans
102. 110. 112. 128, 145, 148. Ilarmar
(1790) 163-7, St. Clair (1791) 171-3,

Aborigines — Continued.

Wayne (1794) 193-4; maraudings 130-
48. 154, 157, 160 ; murder American
peace messengers 178 ; christian converts
massacred by Americans 146 ; condition at
close Revolutionary War 149 (in 1794)
219 (in 1795-6) 236-41, 252 (1808) 398
(in 1814-15) 364, 428; Tecumseh con-
spires against Americans 256-68 ; U. S.
efforts to civilize them 367. 419. 422-3
(trading posts) 259. 263 (agents, black-
smiths, mills and interpreters) 373, 375.
377. 379-81, 393-5 (taught agriculture and
domestic arts 386, 393, 395, 400, 403, 408,
414-15 (domestic animals to) 259, 395,
403. 413 (trading agencies) 259, 264; U.
S. pays their debts 395, 415-17,
guards health of 416 (see Treaties) ;
great gatherings of 90, 99, 106, 114, 127.
132, 141, 147, 178, 180. 233. 241, 319,
337. 364. 423 : land boundary taught
them by French against British 103, 126,
by British against Americans 151 : U. S.
forbids individual purchases ot land from
151 : claims to land not valid 152, 442 ;
U. S. policy of narrowing their range
152-4, 158, 369, 410; were the aggressors
in strife 160; number of (1782) 146,
(1789) 158, (1816) 366, (1792) 383,
(1657. 1718) 427, (1822) 425-6, 429,
433-4. 438. 440-1 ; U. S. expenditures for
365. 380, 410 (see also Treaties) ; low
in scale ot advancement and language,
fiction regarding, misnaming of 419-20 ;
christian missionaries among 65, 382-409 ;
names 370-1, 375 ; dispersion of volun-
tary 380 ; resemble gypsies 441 ; pipes
58* 73* 117, 121, 125* pipe of peace
(calumet) 91, 107 note, 121, 123* 225;
scouts ot for Americans 301-2 ; linguistic
stocks, Algonkin 424, Iroquois 439 ; final
departure for the west 442.

Cherokecs 440. prompted by Gen.
Wayne 233 ; in conspiracy ot Tecum-
seh 266.

Chipprwas in conspiracy of Nicholas
91; punished by French 92; sent in war
parties against British 93 : at capture of
Pickawillany 99 ; cannibals 100, 422 : at
general council for federation (1792)
179; sketch and chiefs of 425. 440.

Crcc-ks at councils by Maumee (1792)
179: in conspiracy of Tecumseh 266.

Dclajrarcs at Lancaster treaty (1748)
94; capture of 113; in Ohio 117, 121,
123 ; bad character of 118 ; sold scalps of

INDEX.

ABORIGINES — Concluded.

Americans to British 133 ; christian band
of incited against Americans 134 ; taken
to Detroit by British and massacred by
Americans 146 ; continue sale of American
scalps to British 1S5 ; surrender captives
to Fort Defiance 224, 235 ; at Greenville
treaty (17951 225-239; return from
Indiana to Auglaise River 305; tin 1813)
341 ; Captain Pipe's village 375 ; sketch
and chiefs of 425.

Cat Nation, Eries and Neutrals,
sketch of 439.

Five Nations (Six Nations from 1714)
patrolled this Basin 53 ; at war with Mi-
amis at dawn of history til, 4*34-5,
menaced by French and Miamis (1697) 86 ;
in conspiracy of Nicholas 91 ; French
send war party of against British 92 ;
at Lancaster Treaty (1744) 94; expul-
sion of from New York favored 152 ; at
Ft. btanwix Treaty (1784) and relin-
quish claims to this Basin 152 ; sketch
of tribes of 439-40 ; Col. Proctor peace
commissioner to 169 ; at Philadelphia
Treaty (1792) 178-9; tribes or 'nations'
of 440; origin of name 'Seneca' 440;
wavering and dreaded 113; (in 1813)
341; treaty with (1817) 369; chiefs 370;
other names for Senecas 371 : number re-
moved 439.

Hurons, see Wyandots.

Kickapoos, see Shawnees 436.

Illinois tribes, sketch of 425.

Menomonis, savagery and cannibalism
of 327, 329. 331 ; sketch of 433.

Miamis at war with Five Nations at
dawn of history 64, 86, 464-5 ; French and
British traders among (1680, 1702) 86-
87 ; waver between French and British 87,
93 ; in conspiracy of Nicholas, dance the
calumet, burn part of Ft. Miami, and ask
French to return to head of Maumee 91 ;
at Lancaster Treaty (1748) for sale of
this Basin 94 ; continue to waver be-
tween French and British 96 ; in con-
spiracy of Pontiac 107 ; persecute Capt.
Morris at head of Maumee 116-17 ; maraud
Kentucky 133 ; peace commissioners to
159 ; cannibalism of 160 ; chiefs 222-3,
225, 232, 390, 431-2* ; join conspiracy
of Tecumseh 282 ; expedition against hos-
tiles (1812) 304; religious missionaries
among 386, 407 ; U. S. builds houses for
chiefs and supplies cattle, wagons and
supplies for tribe 413 ; later treaties with
417-18, 429, 431 ; sketch of tribe and
chiefs 426-33 ; superstitions 427 ; very in-
temperate 428-30 ; called Twighwighs and
Twigtwies 427.

Ottawas in raid on Pickawillany 99,
in conspiracy of Pontiac 104-6 ; by Mau-
mee River 113, 122, 434, 470 ; were can-
nibals 277; chiefs 105. 232, 371, 396,
416 ; religious missionaries among 396-

ALLEN COUNTY.

400 : U. S. pays debts of 415 ; number
(in 1822) 434; sketch of tribe 433-4.

Piankeshaws at Pickawillany (1749)
95 ; a band of Miamis 427.

Pottuwotainis join conspiracy of Nich-
olas 91 ; regain favor of French 92 ; de-
ceitfulness in conspiracy of Pontiac 109 ;
chiefs of 232, 260, 263, 266, 280-2, 390,
392, 434-5* ; were cannibals 277 note ;
ungratefully burn village of Ft. Wayne
2S2 ; religious missionaries among 386-7,
389, 407-9 ; visit President 392 ; sketch of
tribe 434.

ahawnees at Lancaster Treaty (1748)
for sale of Ohio 94 ; bad character of
117-18 ; Dunmore's expedition ag'ainst
129, Bowman's 139, Clark's 148 ; maraud
Kentucky 132 ; sell American scalps to
British 185 ; at Treaty of Greenville
(1795) 231, 235; game of ball (1796)
244 ; were intemperate 244, 438 ; religious
missionaries among 392-6 ; names 370-1 ;
were kept from aiding British in War
of 1812 by Quakers 393 ; death sen-
tence for witchcraft stopped by Quakers
393-4; chiefs 231, 370-1, 394, 436-7, 564;
sketch of tribe 436 ; Kickapoos offshoot
from 436 ; number and removal of west
of Mississippi 438-9..

r wight wighs, Twixtwees, etc., see Mi-
amis 427.

Wgandots conspire with Nicholas
against French 90 ; return to Sandusky
92 ; in conspiracy of Pontiac 109 ; bad
character of 118 , chiefs 90, 231, 370 ;
385 , few friendly to Americans in War of
1812, 341, 345-6, 365 ; scouts for Amer-
icans 345-6 ; names 370 ; intemperate
385 ; religious missionaries among 385,
400 ; sketch of the tribe 441 ; Charles
Dickens mentions 441 ; number in 1822,
441 ; the last of the Aborigines to leave
Ohio 442.

Adams, Benoni 579, James 518, Phineas
536, Charles F. 625.

Adams County, Indiana 4, B.

Agents, superintendents and peace messeng-
ers to the Aborigines 104, 111, 121, 124,
126-7, 129-30, 134, 149, 159-60. 178-9.
208, 213, 252, 254, 259, 262-4, 267, 279,
365, 367, 373, 380-2, 388-9, 394, 401,
406-7, 410, 416, 438, 441, 565, 567.

Agriculture and domestic arts, efforts to
teach to Aborigines 385-6. 391-3. 395,
399-400, 403, 408, 414-15.

Aldrich, Alpheus A. timberman 542.

Aldridge, Abraham (1834) 560.

Alexander, Rev. John, Methodist 560.

Alien, Col. John 274, 292, 309, Capt. Sam-
uel 570.

Allen, Seneca 516, 518-19, 584.

Allen County, Ohio 4, 519, 559*

Allen County, Indiana 4, 550.

INDEX.

ALTITUDES.

Altitudes 16, 28. 41, 487, 492, 496 ; of
canals 599, 602. 612-14.

Anderson, John 397. 415. 512. James 560.

Andrews. George W. (1S48) 564.

Animals, domestic given Aborigines 259.
395. 403. 413 : dog the only one before
held by them 71. 421.

Animals, extinct wild 1, 61. 388.

Armies, three British against Pontiac's con-
spiracy (1763) 112, 114.

Armstrong. Oliver 517. Lee 554.

Army of the Northwest, under Gen. Harmar
(1787-91) 91, 155-67; Gen. St. Clair
(1791-2) 169-74; Gen. Wayne (1792-6)
177-241; Gen. Wilkinson 241; Gen. Hull
(1812) 269-72; Gen. Harrison (1812-14)
273-82. 288-358; Gen. Winchester (1812)
282-90 ; Gens. Gano and M'Arthur 358-62 ;
divisions of 290-1 ; continual need of re-
cruits for 316. 318 ; Aborigines in 345,
352-3, see also under Scouts ; advance of
into Canada 352-6.

Army lite, incidents in 274, 294, 296-306.
336, 340. 351-2.

Arowin, Luke captured at Ft. Miami 99.

Artillery in Hamilton's expedition and at
Ft. Sackville 138 ; with marauders 141 ;
with Gen. Harmar (1790) 161, 165; with
Gen. St. Clair (1791) 175. 185; at Ft.
Defiance 201. 224-5. of British 287-8 ; at
Ft. Wayne 205. 277-S. 477 ; at British Ft.
Miami 214. 239 ; at Greenville Treaty 225 ;
surrendered by Hull to British 272 ; at Ft.
Dearborn 278; poor (1812) 304; want of
306 ; at Ft. Meigs 321-3, British spiked
325. sent from 352. 363 ; at Ft. Stephen-
son 344-5 ; of squadrons on Lake Eric
350-1 ; captured at Battle of Thames 357 ;
at Ft. Winchester 534.

Aughenbaugh, Peter 556-7. 564.

Auglaise County, Ohio 1, 563.
Aveline, Francis A. (1824) 550.

Baker, Rev. S. 519, Charles 560.

Baldwin, John T. 521. 570-1, Marquis 569.
Eli 570, Tibbals 570-1.

Banks, Richard, Thomas and William 527.

Baptist missions among Aborigines 406-9.
412 ; received land for 409.

Barbie. Gen. 209, Col. Joshua 284, 289-90.

Barker. Calvin (Toledo 1867) 625.

Barlow. Hiram P. (1823) 520.

Barnett. Joseph (1833) 564.

Bartlett, Hiram (1832) 572.

Base Lines in land sun'eys 590.

Bashore, John (1834) 560.

Battle, Sham at Defiance 1813, 352.

Battles with Aborigines, at Parent Creek
110. Bushy Run 112, Great Kanawha 128.
Old Piqua 143, Ohio River 145. Miami
River 148. Head of Maumee 163-7. Wab-
ash 171-3. Fallen Timber 193-4. 195*
196* 208-13. Tippecanoe 265. Misslsslnewa
304, Raisin River 309-12, 357, Thames

BOWMAN, Col. John
River 356-7, Maguaga 372.

Baughman, Rev. John A. (1825) 519, 569,
Mrs. Charles 632.

Baw Beese, Pottawotami chief 4:;ii.

Beach, Schuyler N. (1849) 587.

Bean Creek, see Tiffin under River-s.

Bean, Edward (1837) 537.

Beatty. Alexander (1834) 560.

Beaugraud. J. B. (1806) 512.

Becker, Jacob (1837) 536.

Bellaire, Peter (1820) 526, Gad 527.

Bellinger. Philip (1837) 537.

Bennett, Amos S. (1848) 564.

Berdan, John (1837) 578.

Berryman, Thomas and William 501.

Berthoff, Peter (1832) 572.

Binkley, F. H. (1834) 560.

Billings, Levi (1837) 553.

Bird, Capt. Henry commanded marauding
savages 139, 141-2.

Bison, American, extinct 1812, 1, 4*

Bissell. Edward (1832) 572.

Black Hoot, Shawnee chief 392. 394, 436.

Black, Dr. Samuel (1834) 560.

Black Swamp 2, 303, 443.

Blair, John (1825) 530.

Blalock, George (1810) 512, 517.

Blossom, Ansel (1824) 555-6.

Blue Jacket. Shiiwnee chief 176, 213, 231,
235 ; a British officer 238, 243 ; daughter
Nancy Stewart 372 ; in 1 792, 383 ; son
George 396 ; description of with lodge and
family at Defiance (1792) 437.

Boats, military 289 note. 317. 325. 471, 475,
493. 515; canoes 444» 445» pirogues 446*
467 passim; commercial 478-9. 510;
lower Maumee and Lake 479-81. 482*
483*

Bondie, Antoine reports plans of British and
savages 280.

Boon. Daniel a prisoner 132.

Boonsboro marauded (1778) 132.

Booth. Capt. Samuel (1872) 542.

Bostwick. William H. (1820) 521.

Boundary between Aborigines and settlers,
French-British 126, 181; United States-
Aborigine treaty 153, 158, 227. see also
Treaties ; American-British 149.

Bouquet. Col. Henry requested to send small-
pox among Pontiac's hostile Aborigines
111; sketch of 112; Battle of Bushy Run
112; army for Ohio 118; new mode of
dealing with the savages 119 ; captives
surrendered to 119-20 ; campaign com-
pared with Col. Bradstreet's 120.
Bourie. Louis (1815) 546.
Bourke. Thomas captured at Ft. Miami 99.
Bourne. Alexander U. S. Agent 517.

Bowen. William (1837) 554. 561.
liowers. Samuel 529. .\braham 560.
Bowling Green, Capitol Wood Co. 520.
Bowman. Col. John disperses Shawnees In
Ohio (1779) 139.

INDEX.

BOYER.

Boyer, Lieut, diary of Gen. Wayne's cam-
paign to Maumee River (1794) 189-206.

Bradley, Samuel R. (1837) 578.

Bradstreet, Col. Jolin led army against Pon-
tiac's savages and was deceived by them
114 ; bad effect of 118 ; opinion of Dela-
wares and Stiawnees 118 ; campaign com-
pared with Col. Bouquet's 118-20.

Braucher, Allen 530 note. Christopher 537.
Isaac E. 537, 554.

Brechbill, Henry (1835) 537,

Brenton, Samuel (1847) 593.

Brewer, James A. (1837) 554.

Brickell. John captive with Aborigines 174,
193, 219, 224.

Bridenbaugh, Fredericli 528, 530 note, Peter
528.

Bridge, first across lower Maumee 522 ; turd
for 585 ; at Defiance 587 ; across Tiffin
587.

Briggs, George (1837) 536.

British, compete with French for trade with
Aborigines along Maumee 81-93, treaties
with (1748) 94 (17i31) 104 (1763) 114
(1765) 120; claim America 82; French
outdo them with Aborigines 85 ; under-
price French 89 ; promote conspiracy of
Nicholas against French 90 ; suffer from
war parties of savages sent by the French
92, and send war parties against French
93 ; warned by French to keep away from
Ohio 95 ; French capture four Pennsyl-
vania traders at Ft. Miami 99 : shut out of
Ohio 100 ; defeats of by French and Abor-
igines 101 ; conquer French 103 ; diffi-
culty with Aborigines from scant supplies
104; Pontiac conspires against 105-112;
suggest that Col. Bouquet send smallpox
among Pontiac's savages 111 ; three armies
formed against Pontiac's savages 112-14 ;
bid for favor of Senecas 113 ; first
entrance of soldiers into Illinois country
123 ; broadly plan tor control of Abor-
igines 124; traders defraud Aborigines
125-6 ; sell them metal tomahawks 125*
religious missionaries suggested for Abor-
igines 126 ; revival of French influence
against 126 ; fear confederation of sav-
ages against them by French but they
federate them against Americans 127, 162-
76, 178-83 ; appoint Henry Hamilton to
incite savages against Americans 130,
and ally them to themselves 130-48 ; en-
courage savages at Detroit 131-42; buy
American scalps 133 ; bids tor American
disloyalty 142 ; conduct toward Aborigines
begot later troubles 150 ; arrogant med-
dlesomeness with Aborigines cause of
American trouble with 149, 151 ; refuse to
turn over forts in American territory ac-
cording to treaty 151, 152, 154, 156 ;
again meddle with Aborigines 153, 154 ;
again strengthen Fort Lernoult instead
of turning it over to the United States

CANADA.
156 ; oppose peace between United States
and Aborigines 179-81; build Ft. Miami
and Ft. Turtle Island by lower Maumee
(1794) 184, 474; assist Aborigines against
United States 185-7, 192, 213-21 ; Shaw-
nees present American scalps to 185 :
surrender forts in United States territory
239 ; general bad conduct of 240 ; long-
continued desire for country west of Alle-
ghenies 221, 240 ; continue aggressions
249, 254 ; conspire with Tecumseh 256-
68 ; supply savages lavishly 263 ; plan
for and promise savages indulgences 280 ;
retreat from Defiance before Gen. Win-
chester 287-8 ; massacre of Gen. Winches-
ter's men 311, of Col. Dudley and men
328 ; siege of Ft. Meigs 320-33 ; untruth-
ful reports of 333 ; could but would not
control savages 330, 353 ; maltreat United
States surgeon 345 ; run before Americans
355 ; captured at Battle of Thames 356 ;
appeals to by Gen. Harrison for less
savagery 358 note k infamy of 362-3 ; kept
tbeir influence of American Aborigines as
late as 1832, 423.

British-French, wars from 1613-1747, 81-
93 ; each claims America 81. 82 ; the
Aborigines and their catch of furs the
cause of their constant quarrels 83-103 ;
difference in conduct 85 ; impossible to live
as neighbors in peace SS ; purchase each
other's scalps 93 ; last British-French war
in America (1754-1760) 94-103.

Brown, Morris 518, Thomas 554, Absalom
559, Capt. Hiram 571, James Irvine 572.

Brownell. William C. (1837) 554.

Brutuback, John Santord. gives library
building to "Van Wert 630.

Brush, Capt. Henry, bravery of 1812, 273,
372.

Bryan, capitol Williams County 536, 538.

Bryan, John A. (1840) 536, 539.

Buck, Enoch (1824) 529.

Bucklin, Charles, Pauline and David 553.

Buckongehelas, Delaware chief 176, 231,
234, 426, 437.

Buffalo, see Bison Amcricauus 1, 4*

Buruey, Thomas (1752) 100.

Burrows, Arthur (1824) 529.

Burwell, Ephraim (1836) 539.

Butler, John (1815) 553,

Calumet, Aborigine pipe of peace dance 91 ;
described 107 note; 123*

Camps, sites of Gen. Wayne's 189-'206, 191*
plan of daily 197* sites of Gen. Winches-
ter's 191* No. 1. 288, No. 2, 290-1* H
295, J 296, No. 3, 296* 297* great suf-
ferings with deaths at 295-298, 305 ; huts
built 302.

Camp No. Three, settlers at site 524.

Camp, Stephen H. Toledo 1867, 625.

Canada, American military expedition thru
355, 360-1.

INDEX.

CANALS.

Canals, Miami and Erie and Wabash and
Erie 596-619 ; right of way reserved
thru Aborigine grants 412 : termi-
ni 600-1 ; Junction 601, 613 ; feeders, St.
Joseph River 491, 602* Six Mile Reser-
voir 450* 602. 610, Loramie Reservoir
014, Grand Reservoir 615-16' Maumee
River Dams 45S* 613* ; congressional aid
599-601 ; contracts for making 602-3 ;
Hnancial stress 602-4 ; wood locks 603-4*
completed G02-5 : summit levels 599, 602,
614 ; varying dimensions 608, 612 ; im-
portance of 605, 609, 617 ; a national
military highway 605 ; boats awaiting
lockage at Defiance 606* passenger and
freight boat speeds 606-7 ; aid in clearing
forest 60S-9 ; iron furnaces built by 608-9*
steam power on 60S ; electric power 618 :
partial abandonment of 610-11 ; enemies
of 610-11, 616 : leased for seventeen years
and depreciated 611 ; business at Defiance
60G* (1899) 611 note; two surveys tor
enlargement with size comparison and
profile 611-14: cost and receipts 617;
speculative towns along 61S ; views along
194* 450* 452* 453-4* 458* 538* 604*
606* 613* 614* 615*

Cannibalism of the Aborigines 70, 160, 277
note, 331, 422.

Canoes, easily and quickly made of bark
445*

Captives by Aborigines, adopted or tortured
and eaten 69, 70, see also under Cannibal-
ism : cruel treatment of 109, 142 ; sur-
rendered to Col. Bouquet 119 and some re-
turn to the savages 120 ; surrendered to
Col. Croghan 122 ; surrendered to Fort
Defiance 224, 235, to Gen. Wayne 235 ;
taken at siege of Fort Meigs 329. 333.
Names of the few known :
Armstrong, Robert mar. a Wyandot 372.
Ball, Henry with Shawnees 1792, 523.
M'Cullough, William mar. Wyandot 372.
M'Pherson, James received land 373.
Meadows, Polly at Defiance 1792, 523.
Moore, William at Defiance 1792, 523.
Slocum, Frances with Delawares and
Miamis sixty-nine years 235, 418 note.
Spencer. Oliver M. at Defiance 1792. 523.
Spicer. William mar. a Seneca 372.
Vanmeter. John with Wyandots 372.
Whitaker, Elizabeth with Wyandots 371,

376.
Williams. Sarah with Wyandots 372.

Carlin, James 512, 517, 552, 584.

Carnegie, Andrew gives library building to
several towns 628-9, 631-2.

Carr, Solomon (1S25) 555.

Carter, William 512, 517, John 515, Samuel
517. Erastus 537.

Case, Isaac P. 514. E. C. 536.

Cass, Gen. Lewis on British encouragement
of savages against Americans 133, 142

COLONIES'.

notes ; appointed Governor of Michigan
Territory and Superintendent of Abor-
igines 357 ; incident in treaty at lower
Maumee (1817) 375 note; took active
part in Ohio-Michigan boundary dispute
567-8. 576; see also War of 1S12 and
Treaties with Aborigines.

Catholic, Roman, missions among the Abor-
igines 65 ; grant of United States laud to
374.

Celina, Mercer County, platted 1834, 556.

Celoron, Capt. sent with soldiers thru Ohio
to the Maumee to warn the British away
95-6, 99 ; ofters inducements for French
farmer settlers 102 ; 471,

Chaffee, William (1834) 560.

Chambers, William (1837) 554.

Champlain, Samuel de explorer 1615-18,
map of 75*

Chappel, Joshua (1817) 516.

Charloe, Peter, Ottawa chief 503, 558.

Charloe Village (1841) 503* 55S.

Chartier, Francis (18221 521, 584.

Chautauqua. Maumee Valley 456*

Chesbrough, Alonzo 542, Doctor 624.

Chillicothe 132, 139, 143, 216 ; near Head
of Maumee 163, 165.

Churches, first at Orleans (1819) 518,
Perrysburg 519, Defiance 531* 532, 534*

Clark. Col. George Rogers plans and executos
his remarkable expedition for capture of
(he Illinois country (1778) 135; cap-
tures Col. Hamilton with his command
and supplies 138-9; expeditions thru Ohio
against savages 143, 148 ; plans to cap-
ture Detroit 144 ; against Wabash tribes
154 ; unwisely organizes against Spanish
155.

Clark, .Mrs. Philothe Case 514, Dr. Jacob
572.

Clay. Erie 35-6 ; lacustrine 36 ; composition
36. See also under Glacial Till.

Clay. Gen. Green with twelve hundred Ken-
tuckians arrives at Defiance 321, at Grand
Rapids 325, at Fort Meigs 332 ; in com-
mand of Fort Meigs 335* orders Col.
Johnson from Defiance 337-8 ; advances
toward Canada 352.

Clemmer, Robert (1S35) 557.

Clinton, Gov. George writes of British re-
wards tor scalps 93; replies to Gov.
.Jonquiere 98.

Clippenger, Charles bequest for library 632.

Closson, Josiah (1825) 561.

Clutter, Amos (1834) 560.

Cochran. William (1825) 561.

Cofflnbury, Andrew, poet 498 note ; 536.

Colby, Doctor Jonas (1836) 536.

Cole, .\mos Henry Co. 1837, 554.

Coleman. Major 1823, 569.

Colleges and special schools 595.

Collins, Sanford L. (18311 571.

Colonies, American depletion of 111 ; cost

INDEX.

COLONIES — Concluded.

to for protection against French and sa\-
ages 124.

Colton. Dr. Walter (1816) 520.

Combs, Leslie messenger (1812) 305. 321;
Capt. at Dudley's defeat 325-31 : Gen. at
Fort Meigs reunion (1870) 523.

Communication and transportation, early
difficulties of 269. 299, 303-4, 306-7, 443,
526.

Comstock, Daniel O. 571. Stephen B. 571,
578, Calvin 578.

Conant. Harry 518, Dr. Horatio (1816) 417,
521, 564. 569.

Connolly, Dr. .John endeavors to turn
Americans to the British 130. 156.

Conspiracy, of Chief Nicholas against
French in favor of British 90 : of Pon-
tiac against British 105 : of Tecumseh
against Americans in favor of British
256.

Converse, W. A. C. Toledo 1864. 624-5.

Cook, Daniel (1837) 557.

Cooley, Rev. .John W. (1834) 531.

Cooper, Christopher (1837) 537.

Coquillard, Alexis (1821) 547.

Corniferous limestone, fossiliierous 6, posi-
tion 8. water and iron of 14, composition
16, .glacial groovings of 1:7, boulder 35*

Coruplanter, Seneca chief friendly to United
States (1792) 178.

Cory, Elnathan 552, David J. S. 553-4.

Counties, first division into 519.

Coureurs de Bois or rangers of the forest,
became libertines SO. government could
not control and treated with them 81. en-
couraged S5. in 1747. 92.

Court at Detroit (1796) for Wayne County,
iucidents of journey to from Cincinnati
242 ; more courts needed 247 ; Wood
County court first in Basin 521 ; associate
judges common pleas discontinued 558
note.

Court Houses at Deflauce 534* 537* 538*
540* Napoleon 554* Lima 559* Toledo
576*

Cowan, Miles (1834) 560.

Cox, Benjamin Findlay 1815, 552.

Craig, .James 527. Isaac 532, Susanna 537,
Andrew 561.

Crane, Oliver 527, .Joseph 556. Valentine
560, Harmon 572.

Crawfis. John. Crawfis College 595.

Crawford. George W. 1836, 536.

Crawford, Col, William (1782) 147.

Croghan. George sent by Gov. Hamilton to
pacify Ohio Aborigines (1748) 96; sent
by Sir William Johnson to hostiles of
Ohio and southwest (1765) 121; received
British captives 122: journal of 122-3.

Croghan. Capt. George bravery and suc-
cess of at Ft. Stephenson (18131 344-6.

Crozier, James (1833) 561.

Cunningham, Col. James, T. F, and Dr.
William 560.

DELAWARE ABORIGINES.

Curtis. Lieut. Daniel letter describing siege

of Ft. Wayne (1813) 275-9.
Curtis, Jarius (1843) 518, Horatio N.

1822, 527, 530. 558.
Cushman, Benjamin (1824) 550.
Cushoois, Lambert (1824) 550.
Custom Houses, United States 582.

Daggett, William (1836) 580.

Dalzell, Capt. battles with Poutiac's con-
spirators (1763) 110.

Dances of .-Aborigines, feast 71, calumet 91.
scalp 134* 438 passim.

Daniels, James 559-60, Munson H. 572, 578,
Willard J. 572.

Dany, William (1837) 537.

r)oaust. Seraphin timberman 542.

Darling, Henry (1833) 521.

Davidson, Jonathan (1837) 536.

Davison, Hamilton Receiver Ohio Land Office
at Derif.rc? 539-40 (1834) 560.

Davis, Walter 528, Jacob 537, Anthony and
W. T. 550, J. Baron 572, 578.

Defiance, deep water-wells 15 ; Moraine 27,
28* 30* 40-1, 44, 454-5* Moraine Glen
45* Glacial Bay 28* 30* 45; map of and
vicinity 191* Fort built by Gen. Wayne
192, 199* 200* its naming 207, report of
217-18 ; captives with Aborigines surren-
dered at 224, 235; Fort in 1796, 236;
murders by savages at (1811) 267;
scouts sent to 274 ; Gen. Winchester at
(1812) 191* 288-91* 295-6* 297* Ft.
Winchester built at 290-3* great suffering
and deaths of soldiers from want of food
and clothing 296-305 : huts built by sol-
diers 302; military road to (1812) 28*
191* 284; British force with cannon pass
for Ft. Wayne and retreat before Win-
chester 287-8 ; Gen. Harrison restores
order among troops at 289 ; sham battle
between soldiers (1813) 352; Chief Blue
Jacket's cabin and family (1792) 437;
site of in 1792, 523 ; soldiers first Amer-
ican settlers at 524-9 ; Village in 1820,
platted 1822, 526, in 1826, 533-4, incor-
porated 1836, 536, in 1846, 538* in 1866,
543*; capitol Williams County 528-36;
court houses 534* 537* Ohio and U. S.
Land Offices 539-40 ; Fort Park and Cen-
tennial Blockhouses 525* 527, 540* Fort
earthworks preserved 536 ; first churches
at 531-2* 534* Shawnee Glen 532* 333*
Aborigines at 477 (in 1826) 533-4; the
timber center 540* 541* 542-4 ; large trees
191* 544* ; first postofflce 580 ; 'Fort'
dropped from name (1824) 580-2; busi-
ness on Miami and Erie Canal at 605-6*
607 (1899) 611; libraries 628, 632, 633,
634* 635* See also Fort Winchester.
Defiance County organized (1845) 536.
Delaware Aborigines, bad character of
(1764) IIS; Moravian band influenced In
favor British 134 and taken to Detroit

INDEX.

DELAWARE ABORIGINES — Concluded.

146 ; some massacred by Americans
146-7 ; chiefs visit President and Kriends
(1807) 392.

Delong, David 529, 553. William 553.

Dennis, Philip teaches agriculture to Abor-
igines (1804) near Ft. Wayne 387-92.

Denny, Adj. Ebenezers' diary Gen. Har-
mar's expedition (1790) 161-7, of Gen.
St. Clair's expedition and defeat (1791)
171-3.

DePeyster, MaJ. Arent Schuyler reports
mode of British encouragement to savages
against Americans 133 ; commandant of
this Basin 140 ; sends out savage war
parties 141-8.

Derum, Elizabeth (1837) 537.

Detroit, Ft. Pontchartrain built at (1701)
87 ; Ft. Detroit described in 1765. 123 :
commandant of governed this Basin 129 ;
Ft. Lernoult built to replace Ft. Detroit
(1778) 140; headquarters of British dur-
ing Revolutionary War 143 : desire of
Americans to capture 143-6 ; forces at
1782, 146 : described in 1792, 382 1 Brit-
ish retain notwithstanding treaty closing
Revolutionary War 151, 154. 156, also
Fts. Miami and Turtle Island built by
lower Mauraee (1794) 184, 474; Ft.
Lernoult strengthened after Battle Fallen
Timber 215 ; surrendered to V. S. by .Tay
Treaty (1796) 239; scarcity food at 240;
Gen. Wayne at 241 ; Wayne County pro-
claimed with Detroit as capitol 241-2;
represented in legislature at Cincinnati
and Chillicothe until 1802. 247-50 ; sur-
rendered to British by Hull early in War
of 1812, 272 ; desire of Americans to re-
take 273-4, 284-5, 298. 302 ; retaken by
U. S. Army of the N. W. 1813. 354 : name
of Ft. Lernoult changed to Ft. Shelby in
honor of Governor of Kentucky 357.

Dick, Thomas 512, 517, Charles, senator
628.

Dickinson, Rodolphns (1830) 536.

Dils, Joel shiptimberman 542.

Diltz, Peter Allen County, O. 1817. 559

Discipline, first civil and criminal 521, 550;
imprisonment for debt 538.

Dodds. .John F. Van Wert (1837) 557.

Dongon. Gov. Thomas writes to M. de
Denonville of Aborigines and boundaries
83-4.

Douglas, Ephraim V. S. Com. to Aborigines
at close Revolutionary War, did not tor
see dangers 149.

Dowd, ,Iohn W. private library Toledo 63S.

Dragoo. William (1802) 396. 512.

Drainage channels, preglacial 16-18;
changed by glaciers 25 ; altitude of 29 ;
of Glacial Lake Maumee 37* ; present
system 443.

Dreese, &'. M. (1848) 564.

Dresher, Simon (1848) 564.

Driver, John 525, Thomas 580,

FISHER, Isaac

Dubuisson, Ensign was sent by French
with soldiers to hold Ft. Miami at Head of
Maumee against conspiracy of Nicholas
(1747) 91.

Dudley, Col. William at Defiance with sol-
diers 321 ; approaches Ft. Meigs 325 : de-
feat and massacre of 326-33.

Duncan, Isaiah 555, Samuel 556.

Dunmore, Earl of Gov. of Virginia exi»edl-
tion against Ohio Aborigines (1774) 128.

Durbin, James (1850) 555.

Durphy, Mrs. Andrew, Paulding 1904, 032.

Eaton. Nathan (1839) 558.

Eddy, Samuel Toledo 1837, 578.

Edgerfon, Alfred P. 539, 580. 587.

Edwards, David (1837) 553.

Elliott, Matthew deserts Americans for Brit-
ish (1778) 133-4; buys William May
from .Aborigine captors 178 ; entertains
American peace commissioners to keep
them from accomplishing treaty with
Aborigines 180; 186, 213-14. 239, 273;
at Defiance (1812) with invading army
287 ; at siege of Ft. Meigs and Dudley
massacre 328 ; described 329.

Elliott, John (1848) 564.

Emlen, Samuel. Emlen Institute 594,

English, see British.

Eskar. in Indiana 43, 44; Highland in Ohio
44-6*

Evans, .Tohn 527-9, 533, 557, Forman 527,
533, 536, Pierce 527-30, 534, 554-5,
Montgomery 524, 527, Rinaldo 527. Amos
536. J. N. 554.

Ewing, Samuel 516-17. 521. Samuel H. 517.
519. Charles W. 528, George W. and Wil-
liam G. 547.

Explorers, Chaniplain 75* LaSalle 78* Cour-
eurs de Bois 79.

Fallen Timber. Battle of (1794) 193-4; site
of 11902) 195* 196*

Fassett, Dr. Toledo 1832. 572.

Fasting and prayer, day of in wilderness
(1812) 351-2.

Favour, William Loudon (18321 571,

Fellows, J. W. Toledo 1834, 572.

Ferries, early 522, 528-9, 579. 585. 587.

Fiction-reading, extent and demoralizing ef-
fects of 624, 626, 632.

Findlay, Gen. James 247. 269. 284, 288.
552*

Findlay City 9* water supply 14; 551* plat-
ted (1821) 552-3; 'Fort' dropped from
name (1824) 581 ; library 630.

Finley, Rev. .Tames B. (1834) 560.

Firearms, flint-lock musket (fusee) 137*
rifled (1764) 118; double barrel 144.
172; pistol 175*; 261. 263, 267. 274.

Fish and Fowl of the rivers 447-8, 466.

Fish, W H. Toledo 1864. 624.

Fisher, Isaac near Defiance 1837, 537.

INDEX.

FIVE MEDALS.

Five Medals, Pottawotaml chief 282, 386-7.
389, 390.

Flagg. Junius Toledo 1837, 578.

Fleitz, Domlnicus (1848) 564.

Fletcher, Gov. Benjamin reports on quarrels
with French (1696) 85, 86.

Food, scarcity of and kinds eaten 140, 240,
291, 297, 302-3, 358, 364, 513.

Forbes, John G. Toledo 1827, 570.

Forest, most valuable 1, 540-5, 608-9.

Forsyth, Robert A. 417, 518, 5i;6.

Forts, prehistoric circular 61, 62* 63* 439-
40 ; British in American territory not sur-
rendered according to treaty 151-2, 154,
surrendered in 1796, 239; utility ot
among Aborigines 167, 266 ; tor refuge
on frontiers 179 : blockhouses of 200»
204* 270* 293* 338* 525* ; in Maumee
River Basin (1796) 236 (1801-3) 251;
supplies at in 1813. 337: garrisoning of
357 ; widespread 359 ; dismantled 1814-
15, 363; Fort Adams (1794) 189* 190*
In 1796, 236; Amanda (1812) 28* 289;
Auglalse (1794) 216. 218, 227. 236 ; Ball
(1812) 291; Barbie (St. Marys 1812)
284, 288; Brown (1813) 28* 502*
Bryan 142, 148 ; Cahokia 135 ; Chartres
(1717) 106, 108, 111-112, 123; Dearborn
272, 276; Decatur (1813) 493; Defiance
(1794) 28* 191* 192, 199* 200* 201,
207, 217-18, 224, 235-6. 267, 475, 524-5*
see also Ft. Winchester; Deposit (1794)
28* 193, 194* 238; Deposit (1813) 28*
308-9* 312; Detroit (for names ot dif-
ferent forts at this place see under De-
troit) 1701. 87. 107-12 (U65) 123. 136
(1778) 140 (1813) 357, 512 ; Feree (1812)
28* 291; Findlay (1812) 28* 270* 337.
353, 552; Finney (1786) 154; Green-
ville (1793) 182; Hamilton (1791) 171;
Harmar (1788) 158-9; Harrison (18121
280, 407 ; Harrodsburg 131 : Henry
(1776) 131; Industry (1804) 253, 308,
476; Jefferson (1791) 171; Jennings
(1812) 28* 284* 337; Kaskaskia 135-6,
138; Laurens (17781 136, 143; LeBoeuf
(French 1753) 109; Logan 132; Loramie
(1794, 1812) 28* 216, 218, 236;
M'Arthur (1812) 28* 269; M'Intosh
(1778) 136, 148; Mackinaw 109, 272,
360-1; Maiden (British) 239, 354; Mar-
tin 142; Massac 135. 342; Meigs (1813)
314-17, 320-33, 334* 338* 339* 3*0-3,
353. 359, 363. 515. 523: Miami (French
1686) 28* 86, 91, 95-97* 98, 103,
106-9, 116, 120, 122, 126, 471-2: Miami
(British 1794) 28* 184, 193, 198* 211-
12, 214, 236, 239, 272, 512; Miami
(1812) 272, 515; Necessity (1812) 28*
269; Oulotenon (French) 109: Piqua
(1794) 28* 216. 218. 388: Pitt 112, 121,
136, 146, 154, 159: Portage (1813) 312.
342, 359 : Presque Isle 109 ; Recovery
(1793) 182, 184-5, 215; Ruddell 141;

FRIENDS. Society of
Sackville 138; St. Clair (1791) 179, 182;
&t. Joseph 108, 472 note: St. Marys (1794
see also Barbie) 28* 227 ; Sandusky
(1755) 108 (1795) 221; Seneca (1813)
28* 341; Shane Crossing (1813) 493*;
Shelby (see under Detroit) 357 ; Stephen-
son (1812) 28* 291, 344-6, 353-4;
Steuben (1789) 159, 170; Turtle Island
(British 1794) 474; Venango (French
1753) 109: Washington (1789) 159, 161,
170-1; Wayne (1794) 28* 203, 204*
205-6, 217, 254, 259-60, 274-82, 294,
3S0-1, 388-90, 546, 549* ; William Henry
(1757) 102; Winchester (1812 see also
Defiance) 28* 191* 290-3* 294-8, 302-3,
305, 307, 313, 337-8, 351, 359, 363, 524,
534.

Fort Jennings Village 284* 561.

Fort Wayne Village and City, deep water-
wells 15: burned (1812) 275: short sword
of Aborigines found at 279* annuities
paid at 377, 411; in 1804, 389, in 1820,
407-S. in 1823, 548-50 ; incorporated
1825, 551 ; first U. S. postofBce 580, 582 ;
views ot in 1902, 449* 548* 549*
libraries 629, 632-3.

Fortiner, Joseph captured at Ft. Miami 99.

Fourth of July celebrations ot soldiers In
the forest (1795) 225 (1813) 340-1.

Frakes, Nathan (1822) 552.

Frantz, Joseph (1837) 536.

Frederick, Samuel (1837) 553.

Freedy, J. C. (1837) 537.

Freeman, — peace messenger murdered by
Aborigines 178.

Freeman, Norman L. 521. 584.

French the first explorers and cartographers
75-80 ; war with British 81-103 : coureurs
de bois 80, 81, mix their blood freely
with that ot Aborigines SO ; claim Amer-
ica 82 ; oppose British advances 83 ; ad-
vantages over British 85 ; huild and
strengthen posts along Maumee (16S0-
86) 86-7; charge British with teaching
Aborigines to use poison 86 ; underprlced
by British 89 ; British promote conspiracy
of Nicholas against 90 : send savage war
parties against British 92, 102 : warn
British to keep away from Ohio 95 : cap-
ture four Pennsylvania traders at Ft.
Miami 99 : shut British out of Ohio 100 ;
defeat the British 101 : encourage French
colonists 102 : overthrown by British 103 :
taught Aborigines to claim Ohio 103 ;
promote conspiracy of Pontiac against
British 105, 120 ; bad character of many,
at Ft. Miami (1765) 120. 122. at De-
troit 123 ; 138, 153, 169, 245-6, 249,
422-3 : scheme to separate the West from
the United States 183, 244-6 ; individuals
favor United States 212, 217, 221. 223,
280, 310. 515; timbermen 541* 542.

Friends, yociety ot (Quakers) Influence al-
ways for peace 114, 392 ; missions to the

INDEX.

FRIBNDS. Society of — Concluded.

Aborigines 382-96; to Detroit (1791-2)
382-4; (1795) 384-5: to Wyandots
(1799) 385: (1803-4) 386; to Miamis
and Pottawotamis (1804) 386-92: to
Sliawnees (1815-43) 392-6: taught agri-
culture and peaceful arts 386, 392-3. 396 ;
first manual training school in Ohio 393 ;
taught against superstition and stopped
death penalty for alleged witchcraft
394-5.

Fronisman, Jacob (1837) 554.

Fulton County Ohio, organized 578.

Fulton, .John A. U. b'. Surveyor 567.

Fulton Line 309* 567-8, 573, 577.

Fur trade, importance of and general in-
clination to 81 : British and French quar-
rel about 84-6. 89 ; governments restrict
87 : British overbid French for SS : in
1809, 260, in 1792, 176. 384; 550.

Fusee. Fusil see under Firearms.

Gage. .Tames Lee at Defiance 1826. 533.

Galissonniere, Gov. de la writes to Ft.
Miami (1748) 92; sends Capt. de Celeron
to warn British away 95.

Gano, Gen. .lohn S. reports (1814) 358.

Gardiner, D. E. Toledo 1864. 624.

Gas, natural, discovery of high pressure in
Trenton limestone 7, 9 : origin of 10 ;
composition 11-14.

Gavitt, Rev. Elnathan Corrington, Metho-
dist 403 passim ; 570.

Geddes, .James canal surveyor 599.

Geology 6-46 : chart of .strata 7.

Gibbs, Almon (1816) 518-19, 564. 580.

Gilford. Richard (1810) 512-17.

Gilbert. Edmund (1825) 556.

Gilson. Reuben H. 540. George 553.

Girty family 134-5 ; George 134-5. .Tames
135. 275. 473-5, Simon 133. 135, 435.
Thomas remained loyal to U. S. 135. 473.

Girtytown. from .lames Girty (St. Marys)
206, 227, 275, 473, 492 : by Maumee 475.

Glacial Till (or drift) 16, 33, 35: com-
position 30 : arrangement and thicknc.-s
36.

Glaciers, evidences of extinct 18* 19* 27 ;
epochs of 19; groupings 20; till of 16.

30. 33, 35 : movements and load 25. 26,
28* 30* 34* ; boulders brought by IS*
19* 34* 35* 38: cause of 21, 29: date
and duration of 21. 29 : extent, thickness
and phenomena of 23-46 : the Muir in
Alaska 25* : moraines of 26-46 : directions
of groov ings by 27 ; lakes caused by 29.
40* 41* 42* 43* time-measurers since

31. 32 : benefits of 33.

Gladwin. Maj. Henry commands Detroit dur-
ing Pontiac's siege 104-13. 115.

Glover. Ellas sur\'eyor 1805. 517.

Goddard, Lewis (1852) 570-1.

Godfrey. Alexander D. and Richard adoptid
by Pottawotamis 373.

Godefroy, Jacques with Pontlac's warriors

HAMTRAMCK, Col.
at capture Ft. Miami 109 : taken prisoner
by British and released to accompany
Capt. Morris 114.

Gonard. Sawyer (1837) 537.

Goode, Patrick G. (1833) 561, 563.

Gordon, Samuel and William (Defiance
1822) 527, Joseph 580.

Goss, John (1837) 553.

Governmental organizations, subject to
military commandant at Detroit 129 ; the
Quebec Act 129 ; Botetourt County Vir-
ginia 136 ; Illinois County 136 : suggested
divisions 153* Ordinance of 1787, 157*
Washington County 158 : Hamilton County
159, extended 177* St. Clair County 159:
Knox County 161 : Wayne County 242*
divided in townships 246 : first territorial
Legislature 247 : Ohio and Indiana terri-
tories 248; counties in Ohio (1802) 25ii*
Ohio State 251: Illinois Territory 256:
counties 519.

Granger. Aaron (1820) 521.

Graper. Henry (1837) 537.

Green. Mrs. Hester (1810) 514.

Greenwood. Richard (1832) 572.

Greer. Joseph (1829) 556.

GrifBn. Benjamin (1837) 557.

Griffith, William 518, 537. Hiram 537.

Groves. Jeptha (1837) 537.

Guire. Leo Toledo 1823, 569.

Gulick. Groves Hully (1837) 537.

Gunn. Charles 516, 518, 525. 529. 534, 553.
Christopher and Elijah 516, Richard 521.
553, Carver 553, Horace 579.

Gypsies. Aborigines compared with 441.

Hackney, William (1829) 553.

Hall. Henry Toledo 1867, 625.

Hamblcton. .lohn P. Findlay 1829. 553.

Hamhlin. Don Alonzo (1829) 553..

Hamilton. Allen Fort Wayne 1823. 550.
633. Margaret 633.

Hamilton. Gov. James of Pennsylvania
sends George Croghan to pacify Ohio
Aborigines 96 ; writes to Gov. George
Clinton 98.

Hamilton. Henry sent to Detroit as Lieut.
Gov. and S'upt. Aborigine affairs 130;
sends war parties of Aborigines against
American settlers 132-38: buys American
scalps 133 : encourages and receives
.\merican deserter^ 134: indicted at Mon-
treal for tyranny to British subjects 136:
allies Aborigines to British 137; marches
vip Maumee for Vincennes 137. 471-2:
captures Ft. Sackville. and surrenders to
Col. Clark 13S : supplies also captured by
Clark who sends Hamilton to Virginia
1 39.

Hammond. Mordecai (1828) 553.

Hamtramck. Col. John Francis effects treat-
ies with Aborigines 177 ; at Battle of
Fallen Timber 209 : names and commands
Ft. Wayne 206 ; described 221 ; letters to

INDEX.

HAMTRAMCK, Col. — Concluded.

Gen. Wayne 222-4, 236 ; letters to Gen.
Wilkinson 237-9 ; takes possession of
British Ports Miami and Detroit 239 ;
died at Detroit (1803) 205.

Hancock County, Ohio 519, 551, 553.

Hanna, Samuel 550, 580, 600.

Hanson, Samuel (1824) 555.

Hardin, Col. John expedition against hostile
Aborigines 159 ; with Gen. Harmar's ex-
pedition to head of Maumee 162-5 ; defeat
of 166 ; killed at the Maumee by Abor-
igines as a peace messenger 178.

Harmar, Gen. .Josiah takes Vincennes from
Gen Clark's garrison 155 ; expedition thru
Ohio 160 ; expedition to head of Maumee
161-7 ; defeated by hostile Aborigines
164-6: resigns commission 167; 170.

Harris, 561 ; William U. S. Surveyor

567 ; Henry B. Defiance 625.

Harris Line 309* 567, 573, 577.

Harrison, Gen. William Henry, on Gen.
Wayne's staff at Battle Fallen Timber 210 ;
chosen secretary N. W. Ter. (1798) 246;
first representative from N. W. Ter. to
U. S. Congress" 247 : appointed first Gover-
nor Indiana Ter. and Supt. Aborigine
affairs 248 ; effects treaties with Abor-
igines 252-3 : reports conspiracy of
Tecumseh 258-67 ; in treaty with Abor-
igines at Ft. Wayne 259 ; receives visit
from Tecumseh and his hostile band 262 ;
sends peace messengers to the 'Prophet"

264 ; commands in Battle of Tippecanoe

265 ; commissioned General by Kentucky
and United States 273 : marches thru
Ohio to relief of besieged Ft. Wayne
274-5 ; incident in army life 274 ; yields
command to Gen. Winchester 283 ; de-
scribes path from Ft. Wayne to Detroit
284 ; appointed commander Army of the
Northwest 285 : restores order at Deflanre
289 ; plans Ft. Winchester 290 ; difficulties
of situation 298, 302-3, 306-7. 313, 317-
18 ; orders to right wing 299 ; orders to
left wing 313 ; builds Ft. Meigs 314 ; por-
trait 314* ; successful defense of Ft.
Meigs against British siege guns 320-33 ;
address to garrison at beginning siege of
Ft. Meigs 322 : successful strategy 332
note ; activity of 353 : advance into Canada
and captures British army at Battle of
Thames 356 ; appeals to British tor less
savagery, goes to Niagara, resigns com-
mission 358 : presidential political meet-
ing site Ft. Meigs (1840) 522.

Hars, R. Ft. Wayne 1824, 550.

Harvey, Isaac and Henry mission workers

among Shawnees 393-6.
Raskins, Colllster (1820) 521, 587.
Hathaway. Otis (1832) 571.
Hawley, David W. 1817, 517.
Haymaker, William D. 1849, 588.
Hays, John U. S. Agent at Ft. Wayne 380.
Heald, Capt Nathan commands Ft. Wayne

HULL, David

205 ; reports hostilities from Ft. Dear-
born 266 ; evacuates Ft. Dearborn 276.

Heath, Joseph (1837) 554.

Heathcote, Col. Caleb writes of French in-
citements of Aborigines 88.

Heatley, Moses (1824) 527.

Hedges, John P. (1814) 546, 555, 592, Wil-
liam B. 556-6.

Helfenstein, Judge William 562.

Henderson, W. L. (1831) 560.

Henry County, in Auglaise Township 553,
555, organized 554.

Henry, Dr. William (1834) 560.

Herrick, J. S. (1827) 518.

Hibbard, A. G. Toledo 1837, 578.

llickok, Ambrose 512, 517, Chloe 517.

Hicks, Henry W. and Samuel 539.

Hicksville platted 539, P. O. 580.

Higgins, Judge David 521, 535, 555.

Hilton, Joshua 527. 534. Jesse 529, Horace
534, John 536, Brice 588.

Hively, John, Jacob, Joseph, Michael and
Thomas 537.

Holbrook. George W. (1848) 563.

Hollister, John 417, 516, 518, 521, 525,
566, William 516, George and Frank 525,
Benjamin Frank 558.

Holman, Joseph 547, 550.

Holmes, Elizabeth (1825) 570.

Holmes, Ensign receives surrender Ft,
Miami from French (1760) 103; com-
mands Ft. Miami (1763) 106; reports
conspiracy of Pontiac 107 ; murdered by
Miamis 108, 114.

Home, early in the wilderness 513* ; a
beginner's in the stove era 558* ; a first
in Putnam County 561*

Holt, Judge George B. 556, 560.

Hopkins, W. H. (1849) 587.

Hornish, John (1836) 537.

Horton, Hannah and Sophronia 570.

Howard, Robert A. (1850) 579.

Hoyt, Stephen (1810) 512.

Hubbard. Eli (1823) 569-70.

Hubbell, Daniel (1820) 519-20.

Hudson, James 536, John 558.

Huestes, A. C. Pres. Ft. Wayne Coll. 593.

Huff, Abraham (1828) 552-3.

Hughes. Henry, Dennison and Samuel 527,
Isaiah 530, Edward 537, Richard 554.

Hull, William appointed Gov. Michigan Ter-
ritory 253 ; superintendent Aborigine
affairs and treats with them 254-6 ; re-
ports conspiracy of Tecumseh with British
258-68 ; given command Ohio troops 269,
and Army of the Northwest 271 ; his
military road 28* 269-71, ford of Maumee
271 ; his thoughtlessness, loss of commis-
sion, muster rolls and baggage 271 ;
orders Ft. Dearborn evacuated 272 ; sur-
renders Detroit to British without battle
272.

Hull, David 512, 516, 518-19, 527, Levi
515, Isaac 527, 529-30.

INDEX.

HUNT, MaJ. Thomas

Hunt, MaJ. Thomas, commands Ft. Defiance

(1795-6) 201, Ft. Wayne (1796-9) 205;

passes up Maumee with 1st Regt. U. S.

Inf. (1803) 475.
Hunt, Gen. John Elliott, 205, 417. 520, 546,

564, 570, George 546.
Hunter, Cyrus (1824) 529.
Husled, E. (1835) 554.
Hutchins, Thomas land surveys 589.

Ice Age, evidences, time, duration and epoch
of lS-27. See also under Glaciers.

Ice gorge in Maumee River 460*

Illinois Coxmtry. captured by George R.
Clark 135 ; Illinois County organized 136 ;
St. Clair County 159 ; Illinois Territory
organized 256 ; communication with 470.

Immigrants, French inducements to 102;
bad character of some British 128 ; large
numbers in 17^9-80, 140 ; suffer during
winter 140. 143 ; number in 1786, 154,
in 1788, 157, 236. See al.so under Set-
tlers.

Implements of the stone age 47, 48, 50* 55*
5S* 73* ; metal introduced by Europeans
125, 444. See also under Agriculture.

Indiana, Territory organized 245 : State
546 ; Knox County 161, 546 ; Randolph
County 546 ; Allen County organized 4.
550.

Indians, misnomer. See under Aborigines
and tribal names.

Intemperance of Aborigines begotten by
French and British sale of intoxicants 80,
96, 103, 104, 113, 116, 125, 130, 137,
140-1, 149. 244, 257, 311; impossible
later tor U. S. to keep intoxicants from
them 367, 369, 371 note, 383, 385. 388,
396-8, 405, 407-9, 422; U. S. received an
evil heritage 423, 426, 428-30, 432, 435,
438, 441.

Interpreters of Aborigine languages, impos-
sible to get accurate 406, 419-20 ; Names
of the few known : Simon Girty 135, 180,
Crainte, LaSalle. Christopher Miller. M.
Morans, William Wells (233, 391), Abra-
ham Williams, Cabot W^ilson, Isaac Zane

233 ; Knaggs 375 ; Francis Ducho-

quet 395; William Dragoo 396.

Ironside, George good opinion of Gen. Wayne
219 note; at Defiance 1792, 523.

Iro(]uois Aborigines described 439.

Irvine, Gen. William reports on Detroit 14ti.

Irving, Pierre M. 572, Elizabeth F. 593.

Islands, Ulodgett 59* 505 ; Roche de liout
194* 461-2* Mission or Station and Whit-
ney 399* 461 ; Preston 453* Girty 456-7*
Dodd 459 ; Graw and Marston 461 ; Hol-
lisler 462; Ewing, Garden, War Club,
Hop, Sandbar, Willow, Corn, Miiskrat
334* 462; Grassy, Delaware, Clark,
Horseshoe, Corbut 462, Kelley 18*

JacksoD. William 554. John 560. James 570,
E. 624.

LANCE. Samuel

Jacobs, Samuel (1825) 559, John H. library
Ft. Wayne 633.

James, Jacob and M 537.

Jennings, Col. William (1812) 284.

Jerome, J. H. (1827) 518.

Jesuits description of Aborigines early In
17th century 64 ; early map of 77* ;
abolished (1704) 381.

Johnson, Sir William writes of scalps pre-
sented and no money to pay for tbem 93 ;
sent to appease Pontiac's conspirators
104, 113, 120; plans tor British control
of Aborigines 124; suggests religious
missionaries 126; death (1774) 129.

Johnson, Col. Richard Mentor commands
cavalry 288 ; activity of 337-8, 351-3* ; at
Battle of the Thames 356.

Johnson, John (1821) 584.

Johnston. John U. S. Agent to the Abor-
igines at Ft. Wayne 260, 389-90, 394, at
Piqua 267, 380, 406, mentioned by Dick-
ens 441.

Johnston, Jeremiah ( 1820) 521.

Jolley. David and James (1825) .n2S, 530,
Elisha 560.

Jones, Darius 537, Edmund S. 553.

.lonquiere. Gov. writes to Gov. Clinton of
lioundaries and British trespasses 97-8.

Kaiida, first capitol Putnam Co. 562.

Karnes in Indiana 43.

Keeler, .Maj. I. 1821, 568-9, Coleman I. and
Mary 570.

Kelly, William (1819) 518.

Kent, Rev. John P. (1819) 518.

Kentucky suffers attacks from Maumee
Aborigines 130-48; supplies soldiers
freely for all the wars 135 passim.

Kepler, Samuel 527, 529, 537.

Kercbeval, Benjamin 380, Perry B. 546.

Ketcham, George H. library Toledo 637.

Kettle Holes, glacial theory of 39.

Kickapoos, offshoot from Shawnees 436.

Kies, Abigail teacher Ft. Wayne Coll. 593.

King, Jesse 554, Charles A. 624-5.

Knaggs, interpreter 375. James 412.

Kniss, Jacob (1836) 528. 536.

Knowles. John (1819) 518.

Knox County organized 161, 546.

Krauss, William, Toledo 1864. 624.

I.a Balme. Col. Augustin M. killed near Ft.
.Miami (1780) 144.

I^afontiiine. Francis. Miami chief land to
379; I!. S. builds house for 413; 432.

Lakes, beaches of extinct 28* 30* 35, 38*
39* 44* 46* ; Maumee Glacial 28* 29,
35. Whittlesey and Warren 31, drainage
channels of 29, 37*; yet existing: Erie
deepening in later years 16. battle on 346-
51, commerce of 480-1, 482* 483* in
Indiana and Michigan 38, Clear 40*
Hamilton 41* Big Bear Chain 42* Long
4.';* ; process of obliteration 39.

I.anie, Samuel (1825) 529.

INDEX.

LANDS.

Lands, desire for (1766) 125 (1785) 153;
boundary for Aborigines 103 (1765) 126
(1785) 153 (1789) 158 (1793) 181 (1795)
227, 250» (1805)253(1807) 255 (1808)
256 (1809) 259, see also under Treaties;
Frencli 136 ; individual purchases forbidden
151 ; unlawful settlements on and first pro-
visions for surveying in Ohio 153 ; claims
of Aborigines not valid 152, 442 ; claims of
States ceded to U. S. New York (1781)
145, Virginia (1784) 152, Massachusetts
(1785) 153, Connecticut (1786) 155
(1817) 253; land companies, Ohio and
Symmes 94, 96, 154, American 5:16, 538,
Hicks 538; laud offices (1800) 248,
Wooster (1817) 517, Piqua (1819) 591,
Ft. Wayne (1822) 547, Monroe (1823)
591, Wapakoneta, Lima, Defiance (1848)
591 ; Lands to churches : Roman Catholic
374, to Methodist 402, Baptist 409 ; wis-
dom of narrowing Aborigine claims to
410, amount claimed by them (1824)
410-11 ; era of speculation in 538-42 ;
United States Survey of 546 ; Land and
Civil Townships and Sections 589-90*
variance of 591 ; sectional surveys with
Base and Principal Meridian lines 589-
91 ; grants of to canals 600.

Landis, Jasper 537, David 580.

Lane, Judge Ebenezer 521, 535, 553.

Langlade, Charles captures Pickawillany
(1752) 99.

Lantz, George 525, 528, 530, 533.

La Salle, Sieur de along Maumee River
(1669-70) 77, 464; portrait 78*

Latitude and longitude, of Basin 1, Ft.
Miami and Ft. Wayne 96, 97* Defiance
191* lower Maumee 309* 467.

Leaming, Halsey W. 512, Thomas 512, 516,
Ephraim H. 516, 521, Bphraim L. 584.

Leavell, Benjamin proprietor of Defiance
(1822) 526-7, 528-30, 533.

Le Gris, Miami village chief 223-5, 232.

Le Gros, Miami chief, U. S. builds house
tor 413-14, 432.

Leonard, Henry (1835) 555.

Lernoult, Capt. Richard B. builds and com-
mands Fort Lernoult (1778) 140.

Lewis, John (1822) 521, 536, James and
Thomas (1837) 537.

Libraries : College 595. Public : Toledo
624-5* 626, Way 627, Defiance 628, Fort
Wayne 629, Bryan 629, Van Wert 630,
Findlay 630, Lima 630-1. Celina, Colum-
bus Grove, Ottawa, Paulding, Wauseon
632. Public School 632. Private : Fort
Wayne 632-3, Defiance 633-634* 635*
636-7, Toledo 637-8.

Librarians : Mrs. Frances D. Jermain, Willis
F. Sewall, Mrs. Ann E. Frederick 627,
Margaret M. Colerick, Jewel Fouke 629,
Ella Louise Smith, Alice M. Walt 630,
Medora Freeman 631, Catherine Travis
632.

MALDEN, Fort
Lima (1831) 560 (1846) 559* (1902) 560;

Public Library 630.
Linzee, Robert (1834) 556.
Ijippincott, Morgan 559, Henry 561.
Little Turtle, Miami war chief 165, 176,

226, 232, 237, 265-6, 282, 265-6, 386-7,

389-92, 431-2* 437.
Locke, Robinson private library Toledo

1905, 638.
Logan, Capt. John Shawnee scout 274,

death and burial of 301-2, 437 ; land to

children 372.
Lombard. Peter (1819) 526.
Long, Maj. Stephen H. 548. John 553.
Longueuil, M. de against British traders

90-1 ; wishes smallpox spread among

Aborigines 99 ; wins back Miamis by

spectacular display and presents 100.
Longworth, Rev. Enoch G. 559.
Lord, Frederick (1819) 555.
Louisiana Purchase quiets many dangerous

schemes 249.
Levering, F. 1823, 569.
Lovett, John J. 517. 521.
Lowry. John and Washington 554,
Lucas. Gen. Robert 270, 572-4, 576.
Lucas County organized 4, 564-75.
Luckinbill, George (1837) 537.

M'Arthur, Gen. Duncan with Gen. Hull to
Detroit 269 ; continues in War of 1812,
342 passim ; commands Ft. Meigs 352 ;
makes expedition thru Canada 361 ; com-
mands 8th District and reports 362.

M'Bride, J. H. 1836, 521.

M'Bryer, Andrew escapes from massacre at
Pickawillany (1752) 100,

M'Clure, Samuel (1825) 559.

Macomber, Albert E. 1867, 625.

M'Connell, James (1825) 530.

M'Cune, Capt. messenger from and to Ft.
Meigs (1813) 342.

M'Farland, Tarleton (1837) 537.

M'llrath. Thomas 516-17, 584.

M'Inuis, Robert, Charles, James, Philip and
John (1822) 552-3.

MKee, Alexander in 1774, 127; deserts to
British 133 ; his offices and works against
Americans 134, 143, 147-8, 185-7, 215,
222-4, 238 note, 254, 261, 383. 471.

M'Keehan, Dr. British maltreat at Maiden
(1813) 345.

M'Keen. H. B. 1824, 550.

M'Knight, Thomas R. Maumee 1820, 518-
19, 527, 552, 580.

M'Lean, John 563, Charles 578.

M'Pberson, James 373. 381.

Maddocks, James (1832) 572.

Mail, first routes 579 : by canal packets 581 ;
postage rates 581 ; postoffice receipts
(1827-30) 582.

Malaria (1792) 383 (1813) 339-40 (1821)
408 (1871-5) 3. See also under Sickness.

Maiden. Fort (British built 1796) 239;

INDEX.

MALDEN, Fort — Concluded.

headquarters for savages during Tecum-
seli-British couspiracy aud War of 1812,
2yi ; plan tor buruiug 315 ; occupied by
American Army 354.
Man, early existence of 47-9, In Maumee
River Basin 50* 52-4» 56* 59* 58* 61,
62* 63*
Manler, Rev. Solomon (1825) 569.

Manning, John (1825) 555-6.

Manor, Peter given land 373.

Manufactories, woodworking 542-4.

Maps, of townships 1 ; of moraines, glacial
lake beaches, Defiance Bay beaches, forts,
military roads, drainage system, etc., 28 ;
Highland Eskar 46, prehistoric mounds and
circles 54, 62, 63; Champlains (1614-32)
75; Covens and Mortier's (1654) and
Sanson's (1656) 76; Creuxius' (1660)
and Jesuits' 77 ; important addition to 78 ;
Basin of the Great Lakes and Joliet's
smaller (1672) 79; Franquelins of 1682,
79, of 1684, 80 ; Head of Maumee River,
with prehistoric and historic sites 97 ;
N. W. Territory. Jefferson's plan for
division of 153, by Ordinance of 1787,
156, civil divisions in 1792, 177 ; incor-
rect of Lake Michigan 157, 566 ; Fort
Adams 190; Defiance and vicinity 191,
Fort Defiance 199 ; General Wayne's daily
encampment 197; Wayne County (1796)
242 tlSOO) 248, 249; Ohio (1802) 250;
Lower Maumee River 309 ; Fort Meigs
:^16; meander of Maumee River thru
Paulding Co. 450 ; meander of Blanchard
River in Putnam Co. 498 ; civil and land
township 590 ; Toledo double belt rail-
ways 623.

Mark, John (1834) 560.

M.irkel. Eli and Jacob 537.

Mar Poe ( Marpau, Marpack) hostile Potta-
wotami chief 263, 266, 392.

Marsh, George (1835) 557-8.

Marshall, John 546. Charles C. 559, Samuel
584.

Martin, Rev. Jacob 531, James J. 561,
Catherine 569, Elizabeth and Lydia 570.

.Masonic Lodges first (1817) 518.

Maumee Bay, important adjunct of Toledo
Harbor 482.

Maumee River Basin,- situation and de-
.scription of 1-5 : topography 2, 8* 33
passim : first outlining of 31 ; claimed by
Five Nations and ceded to British ( 1684,
1744) 82, 90, 94, 97 ; government mili-
tary 129, 242, 250* 252 ; included in
Botetourt Co., 'V'a. and Illinois Co. 136.
in Wayne Co. (1796) 242, in Hamtramck
Tp. (1798) 246; State claims to ceded to
U. S. 145. 152-3, 155; forts in (1796)
236 (1801-3) 252; first election 246:
claims of Aborigines to northeast part
purchased and reservations apportioned
255, sec also under Treaties ; U. S. Trad-
lug Agency In 2C0, 2C4 ; African slaves

MINGOES

265. 384. Pawnee slaves 384 ; population
1811 265. See also under Governmental
organizations. Military movements and
Northwestern Territory.

Maumee Village 323* 518-20, 564, 506,
568-9, 570. 580, 582. See also under
.Miami Village.

May. William a spy among hostile Abor-
igines (1792) 178; escapes and reports
to Gen. Wayne 178-9 : captured by Abor-
igines and shot 193.

Meade, Xenophon (1832) 554.

Mercer County organized 4, 555.

Meridian, Principal in United States Land
Sur\'eys 590.

Merritt. Samuel (1810) 512.

Meshkemau, Ottawa chief 255 ; anecdote of
(1817) 375, 433.

Metea. Pottawotami chief 280, 435*

Methodist Episcopal Church, first at Orleans
(1819) 518, Perrysburg 519, Defiance
531* 532, Paulding 558. Toledo 569-70;
missions among Aborigines 400-5.

Miami Aborigines, hostilities and promises
of peace 120-1, 159-60, 282, passim;
number and condition of 367-8, 427-32 ;
villages plundered by La Balme (1780)
144. destroyed by Gen. Harmar (1790)
163-5, Gen. Wayne arrives at 202,
.Miamis invited to return to 222, short
sword found at 279*. See also under
Aborigines.

Miami Village (within present Maumee)
271, 512-17; also called WaynesHeld
(1817) 518; postofflce and custom house
at 579-80, 582-3.

Michigan, Territory organized (1805) 253;
population in 1811, 265 ; 355 ; State
(1837) 577; Ohio boundary 556-77.

Military Movements (16S6) 86, 464 (1693)
465 (1697) 87, 465 (1702) 87, 465
(1707) 465 (1712) 465 (17191 466
(1720) 466 (1733) 466 (1739) 460
(1744) 466 (1748) 467 (1749) 467 (1751)
467 (1752) 467-8 (1759) 468 (1760)
46S-9 (1764) 469 (1778) 471 (1779)
472 (1780) 472 (1790) 473 (1794) 474
(1796) 475 (1803) 475 (1812) 476
(1813-15) 476-7 (1817) 477 (1819) 477.
See also under Wars.

Military Posts (1680-G) 86 (1749-50) 95-6
(1789) 159 (1796) 230 (1801-3) 252.

Military Roads dotted on map 28*

Military Supplies scant 296 passim ; accu-
mulated by Auglaise River 314, 317, by
Maumee 317, 337-8, 359, 362.

Miller. Rev. Joseph 557, Margaret 570.

Mills and mechanics supplied by the ITnited
States to Aborigines 373, 376, 379. 393-4,
411. 414; first mills by settlers 459-60.
487-91. 495. 498, 500-4, 509-11, 516,
556. 571.

Mills, Mary Toledo 1825, 570.

MiDgoes, Mengwees, see Senecas 134.

INDEX.

MISSIONARIES.

Missionaries, see Religious workers.

Mitchell, John P. 1834, 560.

Mominie, Baptiste (1815) 517.

Money, legends of burled 60 ; wampum used
as 237 note; form in 1796, 241 note;
scarce and at discount (1S12-14) 358-9
(1820) 526.

Montgomery, James 380, Shadrack 564.

Moraines. St. Joseph-St. Mary 27, 2S» 40,
43, 44* 506* Defiance 27, 28* 30* 40,
41, 506* Glen 45* Erie-Saginaw Interlo-
bate 27, 28* 37, 39* Misslssinewa 27,
28* 37, Wabash-Abolte 27, 28* 37* 38,
Salamonie 28* 37* Map of 28* crests of
30* 37* 38* 39* 44* highest altitude of
28* 41, soil of fertile 30, 42, 44.

Moorehead, James (1837) 537.

Moreland, William (1822) 552.

Morey, Rev. Paul B. (1820) 519.

Morris, Capt. Thomas ambassador to Pon-
tiac's hostile Aborigines along Maumee
(1764) 114; his life saved by Pontiac 115 ;
persecuted by Miamis at Head of Maumee
115-18; 427.

Morton, D. O. Toledo 1837, 578.

Mosher, William 537, Thurston 560.

Mounds of earth 52* 59* artificial prehis-
toric 54* 56* 59* circular 61, 62* 63*

Mudgett, Oilman C. 558, 587.

Mulligan, Benjamin (1822) 527.

Murphy, Edward 553, David 561.

Murray, Daniel 512-21, 570.

Musser, Daniel and Martin 560.

Names, Aborigine 370-1. 375, 412 passim.
See also under Aborigines, Captives, In-
terpreters, Librarians, Religious Mission-
aries, Scouts, Settlers, Soldiers, and the
Surname desired.

Napoleon platted 1832, 554.

Naval, squadron on Lake Erie 346-8 ; vic-
tory of over British 348-51 ; Toledo
Militia and U. S. Training Ship Essex
485.

Navarre, Peter 310, 320* 336, 416-17.

Nearing, Guy (1823) 520.

Neelon, Sylvester, timberman 542.

Nelson, John reports difference between
British and French dealings with Abor-
igines (1696) 85-6.

Newspapers 247, 521-2, 530, 550, 556, 578,
584.

Nicholas, Wyandot chief conspires against
French 90 ; sues for peace 91 ; treachery
of 92; burns Ft. Miami (1748) 92.

Nicholas, Abraham S. 1834. 560.

Northwestern Army 269, 274, 283, 290-1.
See also under Army of the Northwest.

Northwestern Territory, claims to by Five
Nations relinquished (1684) 82 (1744-
1784) 94, 152, see also under Treaties;
claims of States ceded to United States,
New York (1781) 145, Virginia (1784)
152, Massachusetts (1785, 1800) 153,

PHILLIPS, Horatio G.
Connecticut (1786, 1805) 155, 253; map
of 156* organized (1787) 157; letters
from military posts reporting conspiracy
of Tecumseh with British 258-68. See
also under Governmental organizations,
Maumee River Basin, and Military move-
ments.
Norton, Elijah H. (Toledo 1867) 625.

Occono.xee, Ottawa chief 371 ; village of
503* 558.

Ohio, the center of Aborigine warrings 90 ,
British purchase from Aborigines (1084)
82 (1744, 1748, 1784) 94, 152; new
route to over Alleghenies 94 ; French warn
British to keep away from 95, and shut
them out 100 ; desirable as a British
colony 101 ; Aborigines were taught by
French (against British) and by British
(against Americans) that Ohio belonged
irrevocably to them 103, 181 ; organized
as a Territory 248, as a State 251-2 ;
Ohio-Michigan boundary dispute 556-7,
570, 572-7. See also under Governmental
organizations and Lands.

Oliver, William 260. 281-2, 321, 564-5,
Peter G. 519, 546, 566, John 536.

Orwig, George B. private library 637.

Ottawa, Blanchard River at 498* Capitol
Putnam County 563.

Ottawa Aborigines 91-3, 284, 371, 433-4,
558, 578. See also under Aborigines and
Treaties.

Ottokee, Ottawa chief 416 ; Village capitol
Fulton Co. 1851, 578-9.

Ouiotenon 109, 169, 228 passim.

Parker, Payne C. 415, 527, 529.

Pathen, John captured at Ft. Miami 98-9.

Patten (Pettit?) Rev. Ellas 519, 531.

Paulding County organized 4, 557-8.

Paulding Village capitol Paulding Co. plat-
ted 558 ; library 632.

Peace, efforts with Aborigines tor 157-60,
168-70, 176-81, 192, 208-12, 217-40,
382-4.

Peck, E. D. plank road 1849, 687.

Peltier, Charles and James 546.

Peltries, see under Fur trade.

Perkins, John (1815) 524-5, 528-9, 534, E.
S. (1836) 536.

Perrin, Mrs. Amelia W. (1810) 513.

Perry, Master-commander Oliver H. victory
over British on Lake Erie 349*

Perrysburg platted 1816, 517, 520-3, 580,
582 ; Way Library at 627.

Peters. William (1810) 512, 517.

Petroleum, discovery of in Trenton Lime-
stone 7, 9* origin of 10, 11 ; product 12-
14; refineries of 11* 572*

Pettit (Patten ?) Rev. Ellas 519, 531.

Phelps, Edwin (1849) 588.

Philbrick, Thomas and Clark 530.

Phillips, Horatio G. 408, 525-6.

INDEX.

PICKAWILLANY.

Pickawillany (1748) 94-5, 98-9.

Pioneer experiences 403, 406, 409 passim ;

relics 535*
Pipes of Aborigines 58* 73' 117, 121. 125*
442* Calumet or pipe of peace 91, 107
note. 121, 123* 225.
Piqua, old in 1749, 94-5, in 17S0, 143 ;

Fort (1794) 21G, 218 ; 377.
Pirogues (boats) 317, 446* 478, 510.
Piatt, H. S. (1832) 571.
Plum, Parris M. (1820) 521.
Plummer, John (1815) 524-5.

Poague. Col. builds Ft. .\nianda 289.

Foe, Rev. Abraham B. 532, Jacob 552.
Pontiac, Ottawa chief confronts Maj. Rogers
104 ; conspires against British and cap-
tures torts 105* 100 ; retires to the
Maumee, befriends Capt. Morris 113 ;
meets Col. Croghan 121; visits Sir Wil-
liam Johnson 123.
Port Clinton, troops at 352-3, 357.
Port Lawrence platted (1817) 565, in 1822.
56S-9, in 1832, 570; first wharf 571;
united with Vistula to form Toledo 572 ;
postoflBce 581-2 ; custom house 583.
Port Lawrence Township 570, 577.
Portages protected by Gen. Wayne 219, 226 ;
from lower Maumee eastward 311, 359 ;
Maumee-Wabash (1774) 470 (1778)
471-2 (1795) 474 (1803-9) 390, 479;
River St. Mary to Miami 492; River St.
Mary to Auglaise 493 ; Auglaise to Sciolo
and to Miami 497 ; from Tiffin 506.
Porter, George 521, Elijah ilS37) 578.
Postal routes, first 579-82.
Pottawotami Aborigines, tribe of 434, See

also under Aborigines.
Potter, Judge Emery D. 1840, 558.
Powell, Thomas W. 1822, 520-2, 529.
Powers, George (1S49) 587.
Prairie du Masque 530, 553.
Pratt, William 519-21, Jonas 553.
Pray, John (1820) 519.
Prentice, Joseph and Frederick 569.
Presbyterian missions among Aborigines 114,

396-9* first churches 519, 534*
Presque Isle, upper 195* 196*
Preston, William 524, 528-30 note.
Priddy, Rev. John (1857) 559.
Proctor, Gen. cruelty of at Battle of R.ilsui
River 311 ; defeated at sieges of Ft. Meigs
and Stephenson 333, 343. 345 ; defeated
at Battle of the Thame? 35G ; savagery
and unfairness of 330. 358.
Prophet, the Shawnee aids the conspiracy of
Tecumseh with the British 257* evil prac-
tice of 393', cowardice of 394.
Purcell, Alfred (1836) 536.
Purdy, Daniel 512, 517, Samuel 559.
Putnam County organized 4, 561-2.

Quakers, see under Friends, Society of.
Quebec Act, obnoxious 129.

RIVERS.

Race. Andrew, David. Robert and William
512, John 515.

Railroads, first 019-23.

Raimond, M. commandant Ft. .Miami (1T49)
95-6 ; report of 99.

Ralston, Joseph (1860) 545.

Redoad. John (1815) 517.

Reese, David (1834) 560.

Relies of Aborigines 50* 55* 58* 62* 63*
73* 123* 125* 206* 235* 279* 385* 442*
of pioneer settlers 137* 175* 313* 363*
535* 545*

Religious work and workers, among the
Aborigines ; the Jesuits 65-74 ; for ad-
justment of civil, iqilitary and religious
sentiment 113; suggested to British 126;
converts to massacred 146 : in 1800, 249 ;
by the Society of Friends 382-96, Philip
Dennis 387, 391, Isaac Harvey 393, Henry
Harvey 395 ; Presbyterians 396-4iiO,
Thomas E. Hughes, James Sattorfield,
Joseph Badger, David Bacon 396. Marquis
Anderson. Elisha Macurdy 397-8. Isaac
Van Tassel. Leandcr Sackett. Hannah
Riggs. Sidney E. Brewster, Sarah With-
row. William Culver 400 ; Methodist 400-
405, John Stewart, Jonathan Pointer,
William W^alker, Anthony Banning, James
Montgomery, Moses Hinkie, James B.
Finley, Harriet Stubbs, George Riley.
Charles Elliott 401, Lydia Bar.stow, Jacob
Hooper 402. Thomas Thompson. Elnathaii
Corrington Gavitt 403 ; Baptist 406-9.
Isaac McCoy, Corbly Martin 406. Johnston
Lykins 407, Daniel Dusenbury 409; United
Brethren (Moravians I 383; in general
410; among soldiers, Capt. Josiah H.
Vose 205 ; 351-2.

Reservations for Aborigines and the United
States 153. 411-13, 415-16. 517. 547,
See also under Treaties.

Rhea. Capt. James commandant of Ft.
Wayne 205. 267, 277-79, 281 ; at Ft.
Industry 476.

Rice, Major 534, Ambrose 566.

Rich, George H. 1837, 578.

Richardson, Isaac 516, 521-2. 584.

Richardville, Jean Baptiste Miami Aborigine
chief 222, 378, 392, U. S. builds house
for 413, 431.

Richart, John and Frederick 537.

Rickley. John J. 1848. 564.

Ridenour. John (1825) 561.

Riley, Capt. James U. S. Surveyor 54G-7.
556. 598. James Watson 556-8, Matthew
552, William 572.

Rinehart, Hugh T. (1848) 564.

Rivers, early modes of crossing 404, 587 ;
have been great thoroughfares 443, 464-
79; boats on 444* 445* 446* 479-S4 ; val-
uable for food supply 447, 466 ; effects on
of clearing the forest 447 ; future storage
dams 447 ; valuable as pleasure and rec-

INDEX.

RIVERS — Concluded,
reation resorts 448.

Aiiglaisi-', map of 28* large boulder in 35*
at Garman Run 50* Blodgett Island in 59*
former torts by: Auglaise (1795) 216, 218,
227, 236, Jennings (1812) 28* 284* 337,
Amanda (1812) 28* 289, Winchester

(1812) 28* 191* 290-3 passim. Brown

(1813) 28* 502* Gen. Wayne's military
road 28* 216; Delaware Aborigines return
to 305 ; large quantity military stores
gathered by 314, 337 ; description and
views of 496-505, portages from, channel,
water-gaps 497, at Ft. Jennings 284*
Ca.scade (Myers Mill) 499* at month of
Blanchard 500* mill*; by 501-3, at Charloe
503* at mouth Powell Creek 504* water
gages 504, channel, dispersion ot water
and flow 505, entrance into the Maumee
466, 525* 540*

Aujilaise, Little 28* 501* 502*
Blanchard, Fort Findlay built by 28*
270* Ottawa towns by 284, 371; mission
work by 401, 405 ; description of 499-
501 ; meander of 498* mouth of 500* at
Findlay 551*

Maumee, maps of, general 1* 28* of
the Head 97* thru Paulding County
450* central 191* last thirty miles 309*
view of Head 204* 449* origin of, size,
course and length 448-9 ; origin of name
and meander 450* tributaries, flood plains
and channel 451* glacial granite boulders
in channel 19* 34* valley of 8* 52* 450*
flow 448 ; water gages 448-9 ; view of at
Defiance 200* 293* 525* 540* Islands:
Preston 453* Girty 456-7* Grand Rapids
458* Dodd 459, Graw, Marston. Mission
461, Whitney 399* 461, Roche de Bout
194* 461-2* Hollister 462, Ewing, Garden.
War Club, Hop, Sandbar, Willow, Corn,
Muskrat 334* 462, Grassy, Delaware,
Clark, Horseshoe. Corbut 462 ; prehis-
toric semicircles of earth by 62* H.'::*
beauties of 454* water gap thru Defiance
Moraine 455* flr.st State dam of and site
of Camp No. Three 456, 296* 297* de-
serted channels and ancient natural dam
457, 461 ; second State dam and Grand
Rapids 457-8* former dams 459* ice
gorge 460* ; Aborigine villages by 163.
165 ; Gen. Harmar's defeat at Head of
161-7; former Forts by: Miami (1680-6)
86. 464, Miami (1749-501 96, 467, De-
fiance (1794) 28* 191* 192, 199* 200*
201, 207, 217-18, 224, 235-6, 267, 475.
524-5* Deposit (1794) 28* 193, 194*
238, Deposit (1813) 28* 308-9* 312.
Wayne (1794) 28* 203, 204* 205-6, 217,
254, 259-60, 274-82, 294, 380-1, 388-90,
546. 549* Miami (British 1794) 28* 184,
193, 198* 211-12, 214, 236, 239. 272, 512,
Miami (1812) 272, 515, Industry (1804)
253, 308, 476, Meigs (1813) 314-17, 320-

ROCKS.

33, 334* 338* 339* 340-3, 353, 359, 363,
515. 523, Turtle Island (British 1794)
474 ; fort at mouth suggested by Gen.
Wayne 221 ; view of at Presque Isle Bat-
tlefield Ii"allen Timber 195* 196* a great
thoroughfare 102 ; record of transit and
incidents along 463-77 ; in lower course
a drowned river 463 ; fords of : at Ft.
Wayne 204, at Defiance 200* 5S5, Hull
28* 271, near foot of lowest rapids 300,
404. 585. Winchester 287*; 587;
soldiers along, see under Military move-
ments ; British cannon in at Defiance 288 ;
French account of in 1718. 466 ; Count de
Volney along 474 ; Friends account of
(1804) 475-6; mission by 339* Aborigines
later along 477-8, reservations by lower
414, 416 ; later commerce 478-9 ; river and
lake boats 480-1 ; Toledo Harbor and late
shipping 482* 483* boatbuilding 484*
487 ; ferries 522, 528, 587 ; first bridge
across lower 522, central 587 ; the Maumee
as a canal harbor 60O. 606* 60S, 612;
Swan Creek, prehistoric earthworks by 63*
Aborigines by 219, port of 239, an adjunct
to Toledo Harbor 482, early mills by 516.
571, 584, Port Lawrence 565, as canal
harbor 600, 610, 612.

Ottawa of the Maumee. an adjunct of
Toledo Harbor 482, 498 note.

Ottawa of the Auglaise, view of at Lima
559* description of 498.

St. Joseph, maps of 1* 28* sources 40*
41* 42* 43* Fort Miami by (1749-501
95, 97* source, length, direction, channel,
area drained 487 ; tributaries, lakes, mills
488-9* 490* 491; portages from 487;
terraced banks 490 ; discharge 491.

St. Mart/, maps ot 1* 28* sources, water
gap thru St. Mary Moraine, described in
1749 and 1783, 492 ; Fort Miami by
(1680-6) 95, 97* Forts Adams and St.
Mary (1794) Barbee (1812) Shane and
Decatur (1813) 493; portages from 472,
474, 479, 492-3 ; boats and boating on
303, 493-4; general course, fall, water-
shed, meander 303, 494 ; abandoned chan-
nels of 495 ; mill sites by 495.

Tiffin, 'Bean Creek' 213, sources and
portages from 506* channel, meander,
length 507* 509* 510* French names and
origin 508; mills and commerce of 509-
11 ; meander of 590*

Roads, military 28* 242, 299, 303-4, 306-7 :
first post-roads 249, 256; public 529-30,
583-6, turnpike 587, plank 587-8, gravel
and stone 588-9.

Robb. Scott (1815) 516.

Robertson, Col. Robert S. 55, 632.

Roche de Bout 194* 461-2* 475-6.

Rocks, chart of strata 7 ; Corniferous Lime-
stone 6, 8, 14, boulder 35* Trenton Lime-
stone 7, 9, 10, 14, 15, porosity ot 9, 14,

INDEX.

ROCKS — Concluded.

gas and petroleum from 9-14; potable
water from 14, 15 ; drillings thru strata
10. 12, 14, 16 ; composition of 16, 18 -,
glacier grooved IS* 19* 27, 34* granite,
foreign or erratic brought by glacier IH*
19» 23, 30, 34* 38*

Rocktord (Shane Crossing) P. O. 582.

Rogers, Maj. Robert meets Pontiac, and re-
ceives surrender of Detroit from French
103.

Rohn, William (Camp No. Three 1822)
Charles and Samuel 537.

Root, Abiier (1851) 540, .lohn 570.

Rundell, John B. 1837, 554.

Russell, William 555, Andrew 559.

St. Clair, Gov. and Gen. 130, 156-8, 161,
expedition against hostile Aborigines and
signally defeated by them 169-74, 176-7 ;
opposed organization of Ohio as a State
251.

St. Marys City 555, 580, 582.

Sandusky 91-2, 108, 114. 126, 218, 220,
228, 264.

Santord, John M. 1837, 537.

Sarbar, Christian (1S34) 562.

Sargent, Joseph and Samuel A. 587.

Savagery encouraged by British 130-42
passim ; begot batred that endures 358
note.

Savages, see under Aborigines.

Scalps, human 70, French buy 85 ; British
and French buy each other's 92-3 ; 131*
American bought by British 133, 185 ;
scalp dance 134* scalp parade 168 ; dis-
play and use of 329, 384 ; wolf-scalps,
bounty on used to pay taxes 534.

Schools, land for Aborigines 374, 376, 402,
409, manual training for 392-3, 395,
400-3, 409, 595 ; town.-hip School Sections
of land 591 ; private and jtublic 591-6 ;
for negroes 594.

Schraut, Sebastian (1825) 561.

Scott, Gen. Charles successful expedition
against hostile Aborigines 169 ; joins Gen.
Wayne's campaign 188 ; disciplines
soldiers 203 ; suggests name of Fort De-
fiance 207 ; in Battle of Fallen Timber
209 ; promptness with soldiers as Gover-
nor of Kentucky 273.

Scott, Jesup W. 521, manual training 595,
John 537, Moses 550, Thomas 555-6. Wil-
liam 560.

Scouts, daring deeds of American 186-8 ;
John McDonald 184 ; Capts. Ephraim
Kibby and William Wells 186 ; Robert
.vrclellan, Henry and Christopher Miller,
— Hickman 187. 286, — Thorp 187 ;
John Logan 274, 301-2. 372; Capt. Bal-
lard. Lieut. Harrison Munday. Ensign Leg-
gett 286 : A. Riddle 286, 302. 305 ; Ser-
geant M'Coy 287 ; Bright Horn and Light-
foot 301-2.

SLOCUM. Charles E.

Scribner, Abram and U. N. 553.

Semans. William 528-9. 592. J. B. 532.
Samuel 553.

Sessions. Horace (1836) 536.

Settlers, first American at- lower Maumee
255. 512-18, 564-6. 569-70, incidents of
513-18. sufferers from War of 1S12 com-
pensated 516 ; at Defiance 524 ; at Fort
Wayne 546-51 ; at Findlay 552 ; in Henry
County 553 ; in Mercer County 555 ; in
Van Wert County 556 ; in Paulding
County 557 ; in Allen County. Ohio. 559 ;
in Putnam County 561. See also under
Immigrants, and the individual name
desired.

Shabonee. Pottawotami chief 435*

Shane. Anthony 337, 372 ; wife of 408 ; 437,
555.

Shane Crossing 275, 493* 582.

Shasteen, Edward and William 537.

Shaw, John U. S. Agent 3S1, C. G. 572,
Solomon 537.

Shawnee Aborigines 118, 129, 132, 139, 148,
436. See also under Aborigines, and
Treaties.

Shawnee Glen, Defiance 532* 533*

Shelby, Gov. Isaac 352, 357.

Sheldon, Rev. George (1834) 560.

Shiptimber 541* See under Timber.

Shirley. Robert 527-9. 534. James. Elias.
Robert. Jr. 527. Nathan 532.

Shively. Amos (1837) 537.

Shock. Jacob (1837) 537.

Shuman, Michael (1837) 554.

Sickness, sanitation and surgeons of the
armies and Aborigines 181, 197, 199, 290.
295-6. 298. 339-40. 345. 359. 408, 416.
514. See also under Malaria and Small-
po.x.

Sieges, of Fort Wayne 274-82. 294-5 ; of
Fort Meigs 320-35, 342-3.

Simcoe, Lieut-Gov. of upper Canada 176,
179; efforts of to federate Aborigines
against United States 183 ; builds Fort
Miami by lower Maumee and otherwise
conspires against U. S. 184, 214, 217,
382-3.

Simmons. Rev. William (1825) 531.

Simpson. David 563. John 552.

Sinclair. John (Toledo 1864) 624-5.

Sink holes of lake origin 40.

Simms. Lieutenant (1804) 390.

Skinner. Jesse 512, 516-17. William 517.
Judge George 562. Robert J. 564.

Slaves. African 265, 384, Pawnee Aborigine
384.

Slawson. James 512. 517. 584.

Sleight, Joseph ( 1S22) 552.

Slocum. Frances captive with Delawares and
.Mianiis 235. 418 note.

Slocum. Giles Hrj'an letter from Toledo
11832) 570-1.

Slocum. Charles E. private library and

IND'EX.

SLOCUM — Concluded.

museum of at Defiance 629, 633, 634*
635* 636.
Smallpox wished among Miami Aborigines
by the French 99, to Pontiac's warriors
by British 111 ; vaccination of Aborigines
against by United States 416.
Smith, H. T. 521, Timothy S. 527-30, 580,
Isaac S. 539, Dr. Samuel 546, Daniel C.
553, Achilles 555, Andrew J. and Ezra J.
55S, Marmaduke 564, W. H. H. 6^25.
Sneath, Mrs. Laura S. 1904, 628.
Snook, Capt. William March commanded

Fort Defiance in 1794, 201 note.
Snook, William and Wilson N. 527.
Soldiers, in Gen. Harmar's expedition to
the Maumee (1790) 161-7; with Gen. St.
Clair (1791) 171-4; with Gen. Wayne
(1794) 182, 184-5, 189-90, 193-4, 197-8,
201, 205-6, 209-10; in War of 1812, 269,
271-5, 277, 282, 284, 280-90, 292, 294-7,
299, 301, 303-4, 306, 308-9, 311, 313-15,
317-29, 332-3, 335-7, 340-3, 345-7, 349,
352, 357-60, 363. See also under Cap-
tives, Military movements, and Scouts.
Sorcerers and superstition among Abor-
igines 73-4* 257* 393-5, 427, 438.
Spafford, Maj. Amos 512, 567, 579, 583,

Aurora 518-19, 521, Samuel 520.
Spanish close Mississippi River to Amer-
icans 155 ; plot to separate Americans
west of the Alleghenies from the United
States 183, 245 : in communication with
the British 185 ; did not surrender forts
according to treaty 245, 249.
Spaulding, Oliver (1832) 572.
Sperger, Frederick W. 1822, 527.
Spink, J. C. lawyer 1830, 536.
Spotswood, Gov. Alexander opens road to

Ohio (1716) 88.
Sprague, Rev. William 531. Sidney S. 5S7.
Stacey, Oliver Van Wert (1837) 557.
Stearns, Rufus W. 1834, 556.
Steuben, Baron de sent by Washington to
demand surrender o f British forts in
United States territory 151.
Stevens, Frederick F. 561, Oliver 572.
Stewart, Dr. .J. B. 517, Samuel 559.
Stickney, Benjamin F. at Ft. Wayne (1812)
267-8, 380, 546 ; describes siege of Ft.
Wayne 279-82 ; reports condition of Abor-
igines (1817) 367; at lower Maumee 381;
in Ohio-Michigan boundary controvei-sy
565, 567-70, 572. 574, 577 ; favors canals
597.
Stoddard, Stacey (1815) 517.
Storts, Andrew (1837) 553.
Stout, John and Christian 554.
Strong, Hazel (1832) 554.
Sugar-making by Aborigines 390. 533-4.
Sullivan, Daniel (1825) 561.
Sunderland, Daniel and William 501.
Superstition, see under Sorcei-ers.
Sutphen, Dr. J. V. D. 1827, 570, 572.

TREATIES.

Sutton, Joseph (1825) 561.

Swan Creek, see under Rivers, Maumee,

Taber, Cyrus Ft. Wayne (1835) 547.
Tarhe (Crane) Wyandot chief 231; an ine-
briate 385 ; a beggar 386.
Taxes, paid with bounty on wolf-scalps 534 ;
beginnings of 554-5 ; Aborigines exempt
from 374, 430.
Taylor, Pierce at Defiance 528, Israel 550,

William 552-3.
Tecumseh, Shawnee warrior conspires with
British against Americans 256-68 ; visits
Gov. Harrison with hostile Aborigines
262 ; gathers force 282, 319 ; at sieges of
Ft. Meigs 329* 330, 343 ; killed in Uattle
of the Thames 356.
Telegraph and telephone 582.
Territory Northwest of the Ohio River, see

under Northwestern Territory.
Terry, Robert ( 1834) 060.
Thorp, — Findlay 1814, 552.
Thomas, James B. 552, Rev. Nathaniel Ladd

557-8.
Thurston, D. J. 1817, 51a.
Till, see under Glacial Till.
Tilor, Josephus (1820) 521.
Timber 540* 541* 542-3 ; manufactures

from 541* 542-4.
Tipton. John Ft. Wayne 1824, 381.
Tittle, Jacob, Peter and George 537.
Todd. Gen. 209, Ensign Charles S, 301, 305,

Judge George 521, 535.
Toledo, M'Carthy Village in east 375 ; be-
ginnings of 565-72 ; named in 1833, 572 ;
Harbor, extent and importance of 482, as
winter port 483* shipbuilding at 483-4*
naval militia and U. S. Training Ship
Essex 485 : petroleum refineries 572*
views of in 1902, 576* 577* ; postofflce
582; libraries 624-5*- 637-8 ; War 572-7.
Tomahawks of Aborigines, stone 58* 206*
metal supplied by Europeans 125* with
pipe 125* 442*
Tompkins, Daniel D. 1834, 560.
Towns, abandoned 515-16, 518, 557, 580-1,

618-19.
Townships, first Hamtramck (1798) 246;
Waynesfleld (1816) 520; Auglaise (1820)
520, 528, 553, 557; Perrysburg (1823)
520; Defiance (1824) 529; Damascus
(1823) 530, 553; Port Lawi-ence (1827)
570 ; Land and Civil 589-90* 591.
Tracey, David (1834) 560.
Trading Posts, United States for Aborigines
258 (1809) 259 (1811) 263-4; abolish-
ment of 381.
Travis, William. Porman E. and William G.

525-6.
Treaties, with .\borigines :

Albany. New York (1084) 82.
Lancaster, Pa. 1744 1748, 90, 94.
Detroit, Michigan (1761) 104.

INDEX.

TREATIES — Concluded.

Niagara (1764-5) 114, 120.

Fort Stanwix, N. Y. 1784, 152.

Port M'Intosh, Ohio (1785) 153.

Fort Finney, Ohio (1786) 154.

Fort Harniar, Ohio (1789) 158.

Vincennes. Ind. 1792, 177.

Philadelphia (1792) 177-8.

Greenville (1795) 225-35 (1814) 364.

Fort Wayne (1803) 252 (1809) 259.

Wabash (1804) 253 (1826) 411-12.

Fort Industry, Ohio ( 1805) 253.

Detroit (1807) 254-5.

Brownstown. Mich. 1808, 256.

Mississippi tribes (1815) 366.

Si.ring Wells, Mich. 1815, 366.

Fort Harrison, Ind. 1816, 366.

Lower Maumee (1817) 369; for removal
(1833) 416-17.

St. Marys, Ohio (1818) 376-8.

Edwardsville, III. 1818, 377.

With scattered bands (1821-7) 380.

For removal (1829-42) 411-15, 417-18.

See also under tribal names 425-42.
Treaties, witb France for the British suc-
cession (1760) 103.

With Great Britain, closing Revolutionary
War (1782-3) 148-9; Jay 1794, 238,
244; closing War of 1812, 362.

With Spain (17951 236.

With France (1800) 249.
Trees, large 195-6. 202; at Fort Wayne 97»

544; at Defiance 191* 544» 545.
Tremain. Calvin 569. 581.
Tremainville 569-70, 581, 586.
Trent, Capt. William (1752) 100.
Trenton Limestone, lowest exposed and ex-
plored in Ohio 7 ; gas and petroleum in

9, 10 ; water in highly mineralized 14 ;

depth from surface 15.
Trevitt. Doctor (1816) 546.
Troutner, .Joseph (1824) 550.
Truman, Maj. Alexander peace messenger

murdered by Aborigines 178.
Tucker, William H. library 637.
Tupper, Gen. Edward W. in War of 1812.

273, 288, 291-4, 299-301, 313.
Turkeytoot Rock 308.
Tui-ner, Dr. William U. S. Agent Ft. Wayne

.ISO, 407-8. 546.
Tuttle. John (Defiance 1849) 588.

United States, conspiracies against 130, 133,
142. 156, 244-6. 249, 256 ; efforts of for
peace with Aborigines 149, 152-3, 157-
61, 170, 176-81, 208, 224-35 ; receives
cession of State claims to this Basin, New
York (1781) 145. Virginia (1784) 152.
Massachusetts (1785. 1800) 153, Connec-
ticut (1786) 155 (1805) 253; reser-
vations of within .\borlgine grants 153-4,
158. 227-9 ; Trading Posts for Aborigines
(1S09) 259 (1811) 203-4. ungratefully
burned at Ft. Wayne 282, abolished 381 ;

WARREN, Thomas

policy toward Aborigines 369, liberal to
395 passim, builds dwellings for 413, fos-
ters religious missions and education
among 374, 399, 402, 409, 413, pays debts
of 395, 415, 417, guards health of 416,
could not wholly protect from use of In-
toxicants 429, 441, see also under Abor-
igines, Agents, Animals, Mills ; custom
houses 512, 582 ; surveyors of lands
546-7, 556.
Upper Sandusky, Fort Feree at 291 ; agency
for Wyandots 381 ; religious Mission for
Aborigines 401.

Van Ansdall, Lucas 555, William 559.

Vance, Samuel (1817) 516, 519, 534, 553,
Wilson (1817) 516, 551.

Van Home, Thomas B. 1833, 564.

Van Wert platted 1835, 557, library 630.

Van Wert County organized 4, 557.

Vincennes, Capt. de establishes French mili-
tary post by Maumee 87.

Vincennes, Indiana, 135, 138, 154. 159.

Vistula Village platted (1S32) 570-1.

Vose, Capt. Josiah H. commanded Fort
Wayne 1817-19 ; religious character of
205 note.

Voyageurs, early 81 (1747) 92.

Wadsworth, Gen. James Samuel 538.

Waile, Morrison R. 534, 1124, Israel, Reuben,
Silas and William 554.

Walbridge. liiram {Toledo 1S45) 624.

Walcott, James (1825) 556.

Wales, Philander (1832) 572.

Walker, Rev. G. Methodist 1827, 519.

Walking Purchase paraphrased 375.

Wallace. Ellas (1825) 561.

Walton. Joseph (1S26) 559.

Walwortu. Eleanor and Sarah Toledo 1825,
569, John 570.

Wampler. Joseph (1816) 517.

Wampum, war belts of 86, 90-2, 99, 106-7,
117, 130, 137 ; peace belts and strings
96, 122, 234-5» uses of 237 ; 3S5»

Wapakoneta, Shawnee chief 436, 564.

Wapakoneta Village 370; council house 371,
564 ; 562* 563* 582.

Wars, British-French (1613-84) 82 (1689)
84, Queen Anne's (1702) 87-8, King
George 11. (1744) 88-90, last (1754-60)
94; British-Aborigine (Pontiac's 1763)
106-113; Revolutionary (1775-83) 130-
148; United States-Aborigine (1790-4)
161-215; War of 1812, 256-362. See
also under Military movements.

War-parties of Aborigines, sent by French
against British 92, by British against
French 93 : sent by British against Amer-
icans 130-148.

Ward. James Defiance (1841) 532, Joseph
559. Gen .Tohn 560-1.

\. arren, Thomas 527, 532, Isaac 527.

INDEX.

WASHBURN, Samuel

Washburn. Samuel 561, Daniel 572.

Wason, Robert A. Toledo 1867, 625.

Wasson, Parraenas and Robert 527, 533.

Water, potable from the rocks 14-6 ; shal-
low wells 45 : river 443.

Water Gages, in Maumee River 448-9 note,
in the Ottawa of the Auglaise 498 note,
in the Auglaise 504, in the TilHn 508.

Waterhouse. C. C. 1833, 528.

Waterloo, Indiana, postofflce 582.

Waterman, Neh. Toledo 1867, 625.

Waterville, Ohio, postofiice 582.

Watkins, Joshua (1837) 557.

Watt, Hudson 560,, William 561.

Wattles, Augustus principal the Emlen In-
stitute for negroes 594.

Wauseon, Ottawa chief 416, 578,

Wauseon Village 578. library 632.

Way, George B. and James S. 578,

Way, Willard V. 587, library 627.

Wayne, Gen. Anthony chosen comuiander
Northwestern Army and issues proclama-
tion (17921 177; Aborigines attack his
convoys 182 ; builds Forts Greenville and
Recovery (1793) 182: Aborigines attack
Ft. Recovery and are repulsed 184 ; dar-
ing acts of his scouts 186-7 note: portrait
of 188* diary of his Maumee campaign
189-206 : builds Ft. Adams 189* 190* is
injured by a falling tree 190 ; builds Ft.
Defiance 192, 199* 200* wins success in
Battle of Fallen Timber 193-4, 208-9 ;
plan of daily encampment 197* names
applied to by Aborigines 197, 223 ; builds
Ft. Wayne 203-4* returns to Ft. Green-
ville 206: reports of 207-24: wins Abor-
igines to Treaty at Greenville 219-35 ;
farewell address at Greenville 234 ; visits
Secretary of War 237, Detroit 241 : starts
on return to Philadelphia and dies at
Erie, Pa. 241 : high character of 182, 241.

Wayne County organized (1796) 241: great
extent of 242* divided into four township*
246 : reduced in size 248* 249* ceased to
exist in Ohio at organization of State
(1802) 252.

Waynesfield Village (1816) 564-5.

Waynesfleld Township 520, 551.

Weather, severe winter 1779-80, 140.

Weaver, Sherrel (1856) 542.

Weidenhammer, Benjamin 537.

Weir, Rev. — Methodist (1825) 531.

Welch, John (1825) 561.

Wells, deep for natural gas, petroleum, and
water 9* to 16.

Wells, Capt. William U. S. Army scout
186-8 : interpreter 233. 389-91, and other
service to his country 258-67, 3S6-9 ; his
reservation at Ft. Wayne 97* massacred
and heart eaten by Aborigines (1812)
276-7 ; U. S. gives land to his children
379.

Weosecab or Wolf, Shawnee chief 394.

. YOUNG, Andrew

Whipple, Capt. commands Fort Wayne
(1804) 205, 388-9, J. P. 554.

Whistler, Capt. John commands Fort Wayne
205, 276, Fort Larnoult Detroit 267, Fort
Barbee 205.

Whitney, Frances Maria Toledo (1825)
569-70, Noah A. 569-70, 572, James M.
and Michael T. 572.

Wickham, John C. 1828, 553, 593.

Wilcox, Ashbell (1837) 553.

Wilds, Jonathan K. 1833, 564.

Wilkins, Maj. John army against PoQtiac's
warriors meets disaster 112.

Wilkinson, Gen. James suspicioned 156 ; ex-
pedition against hostiles 169-70 ; visits
field of St. Clair's defeat and buries re-
mains of soldiers 175 ; sends peace mes-
sengers to Maumee where they are mur-
dered 17S : in Gen. Wayne's campaign 209 ;
succeeds Gen. Wayne in command N. W.
.Army 2o7, 241 ; receives visit from secret
emissaries of France and Spain 245 ; takes
possession of Spanish forts 246.

Wilkinson. boat-Capt. Jacob 512, 519, boat-
Capt. David 516.

Williams County, organized 4, 528 ; in 1826,
533-6 ; first court house 534* Capitol
moved from Defiance to Bryan 536.

Williams, Jesse L. 1832, 602.

Willshire platted 556, postofflce 582.

Wilson, Ishmael Defiance (1837) 537. Bben-
ezer 553, William 570.

Winchester, Geu. James given command N.
W. Army (1812) 274: arrives at Ft.
Wayne 282-3 : letters to Gov. Meigs 285,
295 : order of march down Maumee 285-6 ;
loss of scouts 286 : meets advance line of
British 286 ; fords Maumee 287* arrives
at Defiance 2S8 : his five camps 191* 288,
290-1* 295-6* 297* receives Gen. Har-
rison 2S9 : appointed commander Left
Wing N. W. Army 290 ; builds Fort Win-
chester 290-3* mistakes of 292, 305-11 ;
marches down Maumee 305-6 : builds Fort
Deposit (No. 2) 30S-9* advances to River
Raisin 308-10: defeat of by British and
Aborigines 310 : again taken prisoner 311 :
at Mobile (1815) resignation and death of
311 note.

Winnemac, Winnemeg or Catfish, hostile
Pottawotami chief 232. 260, 281, 302, 436.

Wolves, extinction of 1 ; taxes paid with the
bounty on their scalps 534.

Wood. Col. Eleazer D. builds Fort Meigs by
lower Maumee (1813) 314-16.

Wood. Emilus 518, Christopher 559. 561,
John G. and Joseph 559.

Wood County organized 4, 519.

Woodcox. Benjamin B. 545.

Wyoming massacre, Maumee Aborigines par-
ticipate in 133.

Young, Andrew (1845) 518.

9690

Internet Archive Audio

Featured

Top

Images

Featured

Top

Software

Featured

Top

Books

Featured

Top

Video

Featured

Top

Mobile Apps

Browser Extensions

Archive-It Subscription

Save Page Now

Full text of "History of the Maumee River basin from the earliest account to its organization into counties"

See other formats