Colonel Calloway, the intimate friend of Boone, had joined him in the course of the spring, at the fort, which had received, by the consent of all, the name of Boonesborough. He had two daughters. Captain Boone had a daughter also, and the three were companions; and, if we may take the portraits of the rustic time, patterns of youthful bloom and loveliness. It cannot be doubted that they were inexpressibly dear to their parents. These girls, at the close of a beautiful summer day, the 14th of July, were tempted imprudently to wander into the woods at no great distance from their habitations, to gather flowers with which to adorn their rustic fire-places. They were suddenly surrounded by half a dozen Indians. Their shrieks and efforts to flee were alike unavailing. They were dragged rapidly beyond the power of making themselves heard. As soon as they were deemed to be beyond the danger of rescue, they were treated with the utmost indulgence and decorum.
This forbearance, of a race that we are accustomed to call savages, was by no means accidental, or peculiar to this case. While in battle, they are unsparing and unrelenting as tigers–while, after the fury of its excitement is past, they will exult with frantic and demoniac joy in the cries of their victims expiring at a slow fire–while they dash the tomahawk with merciless indifference into the cloven skulls of mothers and infants, they are universally seen to treat captive women with a decorous forbearance. This strange trait, so little in keeping with other parts of their character, has been attributed by some to their want of the sensibilities and passions of our race. The true solution is, the force of their habits. Honor, as they estimate it, is, with them, the most sacred and inviolable of all laws. The decorum of forbearance towards women in their power has been incorporated with their code as the peculiar honor of a warrior. It is usually kept sacred and inviolate. Instances are not wanting where they have shown themselves the most ardent lovers of their captives, and, we may add, most successful in gaining their voluntary affection in return. Enough such examples are recorded, were other proofs wanting, to redeem their forbearance from the negative character resulting from the want of passions.
The captors of these young ladies, having reached the main body of their people, about a dozen in number, made all the provision in their power for the comfort of their fair captives. They served them with their best provisions, and by signs and looks that could not be mistaken, attempted to soothe their agonies, and quiet their apprehensions and fears. The parents at the garrison, having waited in vain for the return of their gay and beloved daughters to prepare their supper, and in torments of suspense that may easily be imagined, until the evening, became aware that they were either lost or made captives. They sallied forth in search of them, and scoured the woods in every direction, without discovering a trace of them. They were then but too well convinced that they had been taken by the Indians. Captain Boone and Colonel Calloway, the agonizing parents of the lost ones, appealed to the company to obtain volunteers to pursue the Indians, under an oath, if they found the captors, either to retake their daughters, or die in the attempt. The oath of Boone on this occasion is recorded: “By the Eternal Power that made me a father, if my daughter lives, and is found, I will either bring her back, or spill my life blood.” The oath was no sooner uttered than every individual of the males crowded round Boone to repeat it. But he reminded them that a part of their number must remain to defend the station. Seven select persons only were admitted to the oath, along with the fathers of the captives. The only difficulty was in making the selection. Supplying themselves with knapsacks, rifles, ammunition, and provisions, the party set forth on the pursuit.
Hitherto they had been unable to find the trail of the captors. Happily they fell upon it by accident. But the Indians, according to their custom, had taken so much precaution to hide their trail, that they found themselves exceedingly perplexed to keep it, and they were obliged to put forth all the acquirement and instinct of woodsmen not to find themselves every moment at fault in regard to their course. The rear Indians of the file had covered their foot prints with leaves. They often turned off at right angles; and whenever they came to a branch, walked in the water for some distance. At a place of this sort, the pursuers were for some time wholly unable to find at what point the Indians had left the branch, and began to despair of regaining their trail. In this extreme perplexity, one of the company was attracted by an indication of their course, which proved that the daughters shared the sylvan sagacity of their parents. “God bless my dear child,” exclaimed Colonel Calloway; “she has proved that she had strength of mind in her deplorable condition to retain self possession.” At the same instant he picked up a little piece of ribbon, which he instantly recognized as his daughter’s. She had evidently committed it unobserved to the air, to indicate the course of her captors. The trail was soon regained, and the company resumed their march with renewed alacrity.
They were afterwards often at a loss to keep the trail, from the extreme care of the Indians to cover and destroy it. But still, in their perplexity, the sagacious expedient of the fair young captives put them right. A shred of their handkerchief, or of some part of their dress, which they had intrusted to the wind unobserved, indicated their course, and that the captives were thus far not only alive, but that their reasoning powers, unsubdued by fatigue, were active and buoyant. Next day, in passing places covered with mud, deposited by the dry branches on the way, the foot prints of the captives were distinctly traced, until the pursuers had learned to discriminate not only the number, but the peculiar form of each foot print.
Late in the evening of the fifteenth day’s pursuit, from a little eminence, they discovered in the distance before them, through the woods, a smoke and the light of a fire. The palpitation of their parental hearts may be easily imagined. They could not doubt that it was the camp of the captors of their children. The plan of recapture was intrusted entirely to Boone. He led his company as near the enemy as he deemed might be done with safety, and selecting a position under the shelter of a hill, ordered them to halt, with a view to passing the night in that place. They then silently took food as the agitation of their minds would allow. All but Calloway, another selected person of their number, and himself, were permitted to lie down, and get that sleep of which they had been so long deprived. The three impatiently waited for midnight, when the sleep of the Indians would be most likely to be profound. They stationed the third person selected, on the top of the eminence, behind which they were encamped, as a sentinel to await a given signal from the fathers, which should be his indication to fly to the camp and arouse the sleepers, and bring them to their aid. Then falling prostrate, they crept cautiously, and as it were by inches, towards the Indian camp.
Having reached a covert of bushes, close by the Indian camp, and examined as well as they could by the distant light of the camp-fires, the order of their rifles, they began to push aside the bushes, and survey the camp through the opening. Seventeen Indians were stretched, apparently in sound sleep, on the ground. But they looked in vain among them for the dear objects of their pursuit. They were not long in discovering another camp a little remote from that of the Indians. They crawled cautiously round to take a survey of it. Here, to their inexpressible joy, were their daughters in each others arms. Directly in front of their camp were two Indians, with their tomahawks and other weapons within their grasp. The one appeared to be in a sound sleep, and the other keeping the most circumspective vigils.
The grand object now was to get possession of the prisoners without arousing their captors, the consequence of which it was obvious, would be the immediate destruction of the captives. Boone made a signal to Calloway to take a sure aim at the sleeping Indian, so as to be able to despatch him in a moment, if the emergency rendered that expedient necessary. Boone, the while, crawled round, so as to reach the waking Indian from behind; intending to spring upon him and strangle him, so as to prevent his making a noise to awaken the sleeper. But, unfortunately, this Indian instead of being asleep was wide awake, and on a careful look out. The shadow of Boone coming on them from behind, aroused him. He sprang erect, and uttered a yell that made the ancient woods ring, leaving no doubt that the other camp would be instantly alarmed. The captives, terrified by the war yell of their sentinels, added their screams of apprehension, and every thing was in a moment in confusion. The first movement of Boone was to fire. But the forbearance of Calloway, and his own more prudent second thought, restrained him. It was hard to forego such a chance for vengeance, but their own lives and their children’s would probably pay the forfeit, and they fired not. On the contrary, they surrendered themselves to the Indians, who rushed furiously in a mass around them. By significant gestures, and a few Indian words, which they had learned, they implored the lives of their captive children, and opportunity for a parley. Seeing them in their power, and comprehending the language of defenceless suppliants, their fury was at length with some difficulty restrained and appeased. They seemed evidently under the influence of a feeling of compassion towards the daughters, to which unquestionably the adventurous fathers were indebted, that their lives were not instantly sacrificed. Binding them firmly with cords, and surrounding them with sentinels, the Indians retired to their camp, not to resume their sleep, but to hold a council to settle the fate of their new prisoners.
What were the thoughts of the captive children, or of the disinterested and brave parents, as they found themselves bound, and once more in the power of their enemies–what was the bitter disappointment of the one, and the agonizing filial apprehension of the other–may be much more readily imagined than described. But the light of the dawn enabled the daughters to see, in the countenances of their fathers, as they lay bound and surrounded by fierce savages, unextinguishable firmness, and undaunted resolution, and a consciousness of noble motives; and they imbibed from the view something of the magnanimity of their parents, and assumed that demeanor of composure and resolute endurance which is always the readiest expedient to gain all the respect and forbearance that an Indian can grant.
It would be difficult to fancy a state of more torturing suspense than that endured by the companions of Boone and Calloway, who had been left behind the hill. Though they had slept little since the commencement of the expedition, and had been encouraged by the two fathers, their leaders to sleep that night, the emergency was too exciting to admit of sleep.
Often, during the night, had they aroused themselves, in expectation of the return of the fathers, or of a signal for action. But the night wore away, and the morning dawned, without bringing either the one or the other. But notwithstanding this distressing state of suspense, they had a confidence too undoubting in the firmness and prudence of their leader, to think of approaching the Indian camp until they should receive the appointed signal.
It would naturally be supposed that the deliberation of the Indian council, which had been held to settle the fate of Boone and Calloway, would end in sentencing them to run the gauntlet, and then amidst the brutal laughter and derision of their captors, to be burnt to death at a slow fire. Had the prisoners betrayed the least signs of fear, the least indications of a subdued mind, such would in all probability have been the issue of the Indian consultation. Such, however, was not the result of the council. It was decreed that they should be killed with as little noise as possible; their scalps taken as trophies, and that their daughters should remain captives as before. The lenity of this sentence may be traced to two causes. The daring hardihood, the fearless intrepidity of the adventure, inspired them with unqualified admiration for their captives. Innumerable instances have since been recorded, where the most inveterate enemies have boldly ventured into the camp of their enemy, have put themselves in their power, defied them to their face and have created an admiration of their fearless daring, which has caused that they have been spared and dismissed unmolested. This sort of feeling had its influence on the present occasion in favor of the prisoners. Another extenuating influence was, that hostilities between the white and red men in the west had as yet been uncommon; and the mutual fury had not been exasperated by murder and retaliation.
As soon as it was clear morning light, the Indian camp was in motion. As a business preliminary to their march, Boone and Calloway were led out and bound to a tree, and the warriors were selected who were to despatch them with their tomahawks. The place of their execution was selected at such a distance from their camp, as that the daughters might not be able to witness it. The two prisoners were already at the spot, awaiting the fatal blow, when a discharge of rifles, cutting down two of the savages at the first shot, arrested their proceedings. Another and another discharge followed. The Indians were as yet partially supplied with fire arms, and had not lost any of their original dread of the effects of this artificial thunder, and the invisible death of the balls. They were ignorant, moreover, of the number of their assailants, and naturally apprehended it to be greater than it was. They raised a yell of confusion, and dispersed in every direction, leaving their dead behind, and the captives to their deliverers. The next moment the children were in the arms of their parents; and the whole party, in the unutterable joy of conquest and deliverance, were on their way homewards.
[Illustration]
It need hardly be added that the brave associates of the expedition who had been left in camp, having waited the signal for the return of Boone and Calloway, until their patience and forbearance was exhausted, aware that something serious must have prevented their return, reconnoitered the movement of the Indians as they moved from their camp to despatch their two prisoners, and fired upon them at the moment they were about to put their sentence into execution.
About this time a new element began to exasperate and extend the ravages of Indian warfare, along the whole line of the frontier settlements. The war of Independence had already begun to rage. The influence and resources of Great Britain extended along the immense chain of our frontier, from the north-eastern part of Vermont and New York, all the way to the Mississippi. Nor did this nation, to her everlasting infamy, hesitate to engage these infuriate allies of the wilderness, whose known rule of warfare was indiscriminate vengeance; without reference to the age or sex of the foe, as auxiliaries in the war.
As this biographical sketch of the life of Boone is inseparably interwoven with this border scene of massacres, plunderings, burnings, and captivities, which swept the incipient northern and western settlements with desolation, it may not be amiss to take a brief retrospect of the state of these settlements at this conjuncture in the life of Boone.
CHAPTER VII.
Settlement of Harrodsburgh–Indian mode of besieging and warfare–Fortitude and privation of the Pioneers–The Indians attack Harrodsburgh and Boonesborough–Description of a Station–Attack of Bryant’s Station.
A road sufficient for the passage of pack horses in single file, had been opened from the settlements already commenced on Holston river to Boonesborough in Kentucky. It was an avenue which soon brought other adventurers, with their families to the settlement. On the northern frontier of the country, the broad and unbroken bosom of the Ohio opened an easy liquid highway of access to the country. The first spots selected as landing places and points of ingress into the country, were Limestone–now Maysville–at the mouth of Limestone creek, and Beargrass creek, where Louisville now stands. Boonesborough and Harrodsburgh were the only stations in Kentucky sufficiently strong to be safe from the incursions of the Indians; and even these places afforded no security a foot beyond the palisades. These two places were the central points towards which emigrants directed their course from Limestone and Louisville. The routes from these two places were often ambushed by the Indians. But notwithstanding the danger of approach to the new country, and the incessant exposure during the residence there, immigrants continued to arrive at the stations.
The first female white settlers of Harrodsburgh, were Mrs. Denton, McGary, and Hogan, who came with their husbands and families. A number of other families soon followed, among whom, in 1776, came Benjamin Logan, with his wife and family. These were all families of respectability and standing, and noted in the subsequent history of the country.
Hordes of savages were soon afterwards ascertained to have crossed the Ohio, with the purpose to extirpate these germs of social establishments in Kentucky. According to their usual mode of warfare, they separated into numerous detachments, and dispersed in all directions through the forests. This gave them the aspect of numbers and strength beyond reality. It tended to increase the apprehensions of the recent immigrants, inspiring the natural impressions, that the woods in all directions were full of Indians. It enabled them to fight in detail,–to assail different settlements at the same time, and to fill the whole country with consternation.
Their mode of besieging these places, though not at all conformable to the notions of a siege derived from the tactics of a civilized people, was dictated by the most profound practical observation, operating upon existing circumstances. Without cannon or scaling ladders, their hope of carrying a station, or fortified place, was founded upon starving the inmates, cutting off their supplies of water, killing them, as they exposed themselves, in detail, or getting possession of the station by some of the arts of dissimulation. Caution in their tactics is still more strongly inculcated than bravery. Their first object is to secure themselves; their next, to kill their enemy. This is the universal Indian maxim from Nova Zembla to Cape Horn. In besieging a place, they are seldom seen in force upon any particular quarter. Acting in small parties, they disperse themselves, and lie concealed among bushes or weeds, behind trees or stumps. They ambush the paths to the barn, spring, or field. They discharge their rifle or let fly their arrow, and glide away without being seen, content that their revenge should issue from an invisible source. They kill the cattle, watch the watering places, and cut off all supplies. During the night, they creep, with the inaudible and stealthy step dictated by the animal instinct, to a concealed position near one of the gates, and patiently pass many sleepless nights, so that they may finally cut off some ill-fated person, who incautiously comes forth in the morning. During the day, if there be near the station grass, weeds, bushes, or any distinct elevation of the soil, however small, they crawl, as prone as reptiles, to the place of concealment, and whoever exposes the smallest part of his body through any part or chasm, receives their shot, behind the smoke of which they instantly cower back to their retreat. When they find their foe abroad, they boldly rush upon him, and make him prisoner, or take his scalp. At times they approach the walls or palisades with the most audacious daring, and attempt to fire them, or beat down the gate. They practice, with the utmost adroitness, the stratagem of a false alarm on one side when the real assault is intended for the other. With untiring perseverance, when their stock of provisions is exhausted, they set forth to hunt, as on common occasions, resuming their station near the besieged place as soon as they are supplied.
It must he confessed, that they had many motives to this persevering and deadly hostility, apart from their natural propensity to war. They saw this new and hated race of pale faces gradually getting possession of their hunting grounds, and cutting down their forests. They reasoned forcibly and justly, that the time, when to oppose these new intruders with success, was to do it before they had become numerous and strong in diffused population and resources. Had they possessed the skill of corporate union, combining individual effort with a general concert of attack, and directed their united force against each settlement in succession, there is little doubt, that at this time they might have extirpated the new inhabitants from Kentucky, and have restored it to the empire of the wild beasts and the red men. But in the order of events it was otherwise arranged. They massacred, they burnt, and plundered, and destroyed. They killed cattle, and carried off the horses;–inflicting terror, poverty, and every species of distress; but were not able to make themselves absolute masters of a single station.
It has been found by experiment, that the settlers in such predicaments of danger and apprehension, act under a most spirit-stirring excitement, which, notwithstanding its alarms, is not without its pleasures. They acquired fortitude, dexterity, and that kind of courage which results from becoming familiar with exposure.
The settlements becoming extended, the Indians, in their turn, were obliged to put themselves on the defensive. They cowered in the distant woods for concealment, or resorted to them for hunting. In these intervals, the settlers, who had acquired a kind of instinctive intuition to know when their foe was near them, or had retired to remoter forests, went forth to plough their corn, gather in their harvests, collect their cattle, and pursue their agricultural operations. These were their holyday seasons for hunting, during which they often exchanged shots with their foe. The night, as being most secure from Indian attack, was the common season selected for journeying from garrison to garrison.
We, who live in the midst of scenes of abundance and tranquillity can hardly imagine how a country could fill with inhabitants, under so many circumstances of terror, in addition to all the hardships incident to the commencement of new establishments in the wilderness; such as want of society, want of all the regular modes of supply, in regard to the articles most indispensable in every stage of the civilized condition. There were no mills, no stores, no regular supplies of clothing, salt, sugar, and the luxuries of tea and coffee. But all these dangers and difficulties notwithstanding, under the influence of an inexplicable propensity, families in the old settlements used to comfort and abundance, were constantly arriving to encounter all these dangers and privations. They began to spread over the extensive and fertile country in every direction–presenting such numerous and dispersed marks to Indian hostility, red men became perplexed, amidst so many conflicting temptations to vengeance, which to select.
The year 1776 was memorable in the annals of Kentucky, as that in which General George Rogers Clark first visited it, unconscious, it may be, of the imperishable honors which the western country would one day reserve for him. This same year Captain Wagin arrived in the country, and _fixed_ in a solitary cabin on Hinkston’s Fork of the Licking.
In the autumn of this year, most of the recent immigrants to Kentucky returned to the old settlements, principally in Virginia. They carried with them strong representations, touching the fertility and advantages of their new residence; and communicated the impulse of their hopes and fears extensively among their fellow-citizens by sympathy.
The importance of the new settlement was already deemed to be such, that on the meeting of the legislature of Virginia, the governor recommended that the south-western part of the county of Fincastle–so this vast tract of country west of the Alleghanies had hitherto been considered–should be erected into a separate county by the name of Kentucky.
This must be considered an important era in the history of the country. The new county became entitled to two representatives in the legislature of Virginia, to a court and judge; in a word, to all the customary civil, military, and judicial officers of a new county. In the year 1777, the county was duly organized, according to the act of the Virginia legislature. Among the names of the first officers in the new county, we recognize those of Floyd, Bowman, Logan, and Todd.
Harrodsburgh, the strongest and most populous station in the country, had not hitherto been assailed by the Indians. Early in the spring of 1777, they attacked a small body of improvers marching to Harrodsburgh, about four miles from that place. Mr. Kay, afterwards General Kay, and his brother were of the party. The latter was killed, and another man made prisoner. The fortunate escape of James Kay, then fifteen years old, was the probable cause of the saving of Harrodsburgh from destruction. Flying from the scene of attack and the death of his brother, he reached the station and gave the inhabitants information, that a large body of Indians was marching to attack the place. The Indians themselves, aware that the inhabitants had been premonished of their approach, seem to have been disheartened; for they did not reach the station till the next day. Of course, it had been put in the best possible state of defence, and prepared for their reception.
The town was now invested by the savage force, and something like a regular siege commenced. A brisk firing ensued. In the course of the day the Indians left one of their dead to fall into the hands of the besieged–a rare occurrence, as it is one of their most invariable customs to remove their wounded and dead from the possession of the enemy. The besieged had four men wounded and one of them mortally. The Indians, unacquainted with the mode of conducting a siege, and little accustomed to open and fair fight, and dispirited by the vigorous reception given them by the station, soon decamped, and dispersed in the forests to supply themselves with provisions by hunting.
On the 15th of April, 1777, a body of one hundred savages invested Boonesborough, the residence of Daniel Boone. The greater number of the Indians had fire arms, though some of them were still armed with bows and arrows. This station, having its defence conducted by such a gallant leader, gave them such a warm reception that they were glad to draw off; though not till they had killed one and wounded four of the inhabitants. Their loss could not be ascertained, as they carefully removed their dead and wounded.
In July following, the residence of Boone was again besieged by a body of Indians, whose number was increased to two hundred. With their numbers, their hardihood and audacity were increased in proportion. To prevent the neighboring stations from sending assistance, detachments from their body assailed most of the adjacent settlements at the same time. The gallant inmates of the station made them repent their temerity, though, as formerly, with some loss; one of their number having been killed and two wounded. Seven of the Indians were distinctly counted from the fort among the slain; though, according to custom, the bodies were removed. After a close siege, and almost constant firing during two days, the Indians raised a yell of disappointment, and disappeared in the forests.
In order to present distinct views of the sort of enemy, with whom Boone had to do, and to present pictures of the aspect of Indian warfare in those times, we might give sketches of the repeated sieges of Harrodsburgh and Boonesborough, against which–as deemed the strong holds of the _Long-knife,_ as they called the Americans–their most formidable and repeated efforts were directed. There is such a sad and dreary uniformity in these narratives, that the history of one may almost stand for that of all. They always present more or less killed and wounded on the part of the stations, and a still greater number on that of the Indians. Their attacks of stations having been uniformly unsuccessful, they returned to their original modes of warfare, dispersing themselves in small bodies over all the country, and attacking individual settlers in insulated cabins, and destroying women and children. But as most of these annals belong to the general history of Kentucky, and do not particularly tend to develop the character of the subject of this biography, we shall pretermit them, with a single exception. At the expense of an anachronism, and as a fair sample of the rest, we shall present that, as one of the most prominent Indian sieges recorded in these early annals. It will not be considered an episode, if it tend to convey distinct ideas of the structure and form of a _station_, and the modes of attack and defence in those times. It was in such scenes that the fearless daring, united with the cool, prudent, and yet efficient counsels of Daniel Boone, were peculiarly conspicuous. With this view we offer a somewhat detailed account of the attack of Bryant’s station.
As we know of no place, nearer than the sources of the Mississippi, or the Rocky Mountains, where the refuge of a _station_ is now requisite for security from the Indians; as the remains of those that were formerly built are fast mouldering to decay; and as in a few years history will be the only depository of what the term _station_ imports, we deem it right, in this place, to present as graphic a view as we may, of a station, as we have seen them in their ruins in various points of the west.
The first immigrants to Tennessee and Kentucky, as we have seen, came in pairs and small bodies. These pioneers on their return to the old settlements, brought back companies and societies.–Friends and connections, old and young, mothers and daughters, flocks, herds, domestic animals, and the family dogs, all set forth on the patriarchal emigration for the land of promise together. No disruption of the tender natal and moral ties; no annihilation of the reciprocity of domestic kindness, friendship, and love, took place. The cement and panoply of affection, and good will bound them together at once in the social tie, and the union for defence. Like the gregarious tenants of the air in their annual migrations, they brought their true home, that is to say their charities with them. In their state of extreme isolation from the world they had left, the kindly social propensities were found to grow more strong in the wilderness. The current of human affections in fact naturally flows in a deeper and more vigorous tide, in proportion as it is diverted into fewer channels.
These immigrants to the Bloody Ground, coming to survey new aspects of nature, new forests and climates, and to encounter new privations, difficulties and dangers, were bound together by a new sacrament of friendship, new and unsworn oaths, to stand by each other for life and for death. How often have we heard the remains of this primitive race of Kentucky deplore the measured distance and jealousy, the heathen rivalry and selfishness of the present generation, in comparison with the unity of heart, dangers and fortunes of these primeval times–reminding one of the simple kindness, the community of property, and the union of heart among the first Christians!
Another circumstance of this picture ought to be redeemed from oblivion. We suspect that the general impressions of the readers of this day is, that the first hunters and settlers of Kentucky and Tennessee were a sort of demi-savages. Imagination depicts them with long beard, and a costume of skins, rude, fierce, and repulsive. Nothing can be wider from the fact. These progenitors of the west were generally men of noble, square, erect forms, broad chests, clear, bright, truth-telling eyes, and of vigorous intellects.
All this is not only matter of historical record, but in the natural order of things. The first settlers of America were originally a noble stock. These, their descendants, had been reared under circumstances every way calculated to give them manly beauty and noble forms. They had breathed a free and a salubrious air. The field and forest exercise yielded them salutary viands, and appetite and digestion corresponding. Life brought them the sensations of high health, herculean vigor, and redundant joy.
When a social band of this description had planted their feet on the virgin soil, the first object was to fix on a spot, central to the most fertile tract of land that could be found, combining the advantages usually sought by the first settlers. Among these was, that the station should be on the summit of a gentle swell, where pawpaw, cane, and wild clover, marked exuberant fertility; and where the trees were so sparse, and the soil beneath them so free from underbrush, that the hunter could ride at half speed. The virgin soil, as yet friable, untrodden, and not cursed with the blight of politics, party, and feud, yielded, with little other cultivation than planting, from eighty to a hundred bushels of maize to the acre, and all other edibles suited to the soil and climate, in proportion.
The next thing, after finding this central nucleus of a settlement, was to convert it into a _station_, an erection which now remains to be described. It was a desirable requisite, that a station should in close or command a flush limestone spring, for water for the settlement. The contiguity of a salt lick and a sugar orchard, though not indispensable, was a very desirable circumstance. The next preliminary step was to clear a considerable area, so as to leave nothing within a considerable distance of the station that could shelter an enemy from observation and a shot. If a spring were not inclosed, or a well dug within, as an Indian siege seldom lasted beyond a few days, it was customary, in periods of alarm to have a reservoir of some sort within the station, that should be filled with water enough to supply the garrison, during the probable continuance of a siege. It was deemed a most important consideration, that the station should overlook and command as much of the surrounding country as possible.
The form was a perfect parallelogram, including from a half to a whole acre. A trench was then dug four or five feet deep, and large and contiguous pickets planted in this trench, so as to form a compact wall from ten to twelve feet high above the soil. The pickets were of hard and durable timber, about a foot in diameter. The soil about them was rammed hard. They formed a rampart beyond the power of man to leap, climb, or by unaided physical strength to overthrow. At the angles were small projecting squares, of still stronger material and planting, technically called _flankers_, with oblique port-holes, so as that the sentinel within could rake the external front of the station, without being exposed to shot from without. Two folding gates in the front and rear, swinging on prodigious wooden hinges, gave egress and ingress to men and teams in times of security.
In periods of alarm a trusty sentinel on the roof of the building was so stationed, as to be able to descry every suspicious object while yet in the distance. The gates were always firmly barred by night; and sentinels took their alternate watch, and relieved each other until morning. Nothing in the line of fortification can be imagined more easy of construction, or a more effectual protection against a savage enemy, than this simple erection. Though the balls of the smallest dimensions of cannon would have swept them away with ease, they were proof against the Indian rifle, patience, and skill. The only expedient of the red men was to dig under them and undermine them, or destroy them by fire; and even this could not be done without exposing them to the rifles of the flankers. Of course, there are few recorded instances of their having been taken, when defended by a garrison, guided by such men as Daniel Boone.
Their regular form, and their show of security, rendered these walled cities in the central wilderness delightful spectacles in the eye of immigrants who had come two hundred leagues without seeing a human habitation. Around the interior of these walls the habitations of the immigrants arose, and the remainder of the surface was a clean-turfed area for wrestling and dancing, and the vigorous and athletic amusements of the olden time. It is questionable if heartier dinners and profounder sleep and more exhilarating balls and parties fall to the lot of their descendants, who ride in coaches and dwell in mansions. Venison and wild turkeys, sweet potatoes and pies, smoked on their table; and persimmon and maple beer, stood them well instead of the poisonous whisky of their children.
The community, of course, passed their social evenings together; and while the fire blazed bright within the secure square, the far howl of wolves, or even the distant war-whoop of the savages, sounded in the ear of the tranquil in-dwellers like the driving storm pouring on the sheltering roof above the head of the traveller safely reposing in his bed; that is, brought the contrast of comfort and security with more home-felt influence to their bosom.
Such a station was Bryant’s, no longer ago than 1782. It was the nucleus of the settlements of that rich and delightful country, of which at present Lexington is the centre. There were but two others of any importance, at this time north of Kentucky river. It was more open to attack than any other in the country. The Miami on the north, and the Licking on the south of the Ohio, were long canals, which floated the Indian canoes from the northern hive of the savages, between the lakes and the Ohio, directly to its vicinity.
In the summer of this year a grand Indian assemblage took place at Chillicothe, a famous central Indian town on the Little Miami. The Cherokees, Wyandots, Tawas, Pottawattomies, and most of the tribes bordering on the lakes, were represented in it. Besides their chiefs and some Canadians, they were aided by the counsels of the two Girtys, and McKee, renegado whites. We have made diligent enquiry touching the biography of these men, particularly Simon Girty, a wretch of most infamous notoriety in those times, as a more successful instigator of Indian assault and massacre, than any name on record. Scarcely a tortured captive escaped from the northern Indians, who could not tell the share which this villain had in his sufferings–no burning or murder of prisoners, at which he had not assisted by his presence or his counsels. These refugees from our white settlements, added the calculation and power of combining of the whites to the instinctive cunning and ferocity of the savages. They possessed their thirst for blood without their active or passive courage–blending the bad points of character in the whites and Indians, without the good of either. The cruelty of the Indians had some show of palliating circumstances, in the steady encroachments of the whites upon them. Theirs was gratuitous, coldblooded, and without visible motive, except that they appeared to hate the race more inveterately for having fled from it. Yet Simon Girty, like the Indians among whom he lived, sometimes took the freak of kindness, nobody could divine why, and he once or twice saved an unhappy captive from being roasted alive.
This vile renegado, consulted by the Indians as an oracle, lived in plenty, smoked his pipe, and drank off his whisky in his log palace. He was seen abroad clad in a ruffled shirt, a red and blue uniform, with pantaloons and gaiters to match. He was belted with dirks and pistols, and wore a watch with enormous length of chain, and most glaring ornaments, all probably the spoils of murder. So habited, he strutted, in the enormity of his cruelty in view of the ill-fated captives of the Indians, like the peacock spreading his morning plumage. There is little doubt that his capricious acts of saving the few that were spared through his intercession, were modified results of vanity; and that they were spared to make a display of his power, and the extent of his influence among the Indians.
The assemblage of Indians bound to the assault of Bryant’s station, gathered round the shrine of Simon Girty, to hear the response of this oracle touching the intended expedition. He is said to have painted to them, in a set speech, the abundance and delight of the fair valleys of Kan-tuck-ee, for which so much blood of red men had been shed–the land of clover, deer, and buffaloes. He described the gradual encroachment of the whites, and the certainty that they would soon occupy the whole land. He proved the necessity of a vigorous, united, and persevering effort against them, now while they were feeble, and had scarcely gained foot-hold on the soil, if they ever intended to regain possession of their ancient, rich, and rightful domain; assuring them, that as things now went on, they would soon have no hunting grounds worth retaining, no blankets with which to clothe their naked backs, or whisky to warm and cheer their desolate hearts. They were advised to descend the Miami, cross the Ohio, ascend the Licking, paddling their canoes to the immediate vicinity of Bryant’s station, which he counselled them to attack.
Forthwith, the mass of biped wolves raised their murderous yell, as they started for their canoes on the Miami. Girty, in his ruffled shirt and soldier coat, stalked at their head, silently feeding upon his prowess and grandeur.
The station against which they were destined, inclosed forty cabins. They arrived before it on the fifteenth of August, in the night. The inhabitants were advertised of their arrival in the morning, by being fired upon as they opened the gates. The time of their arrival was apparently providential. In two hours most of the efficient male inmates of the station were to have marched to the aid of two other stations, which were reported to have been attacked. This place would thus have been left completely defenceless. As soon as the garrison saw themselves besieged, they found means to despatch one of their number to Lexington, to announce the assault and crave aid. Sixteen mounted men, and thirty-one on foot, were immediately despatched to their assistance.
The number of the assailants amounted to at least six hundred. In conformity with the common modes of their warfare, they attempted to gain the place by stratagem. The great body concealed themselves among high weeds, on the opposite side of the station, within pistol shot of the spring which supplied it with water. A detachment of a hundred commenced a false attack on the south-east angle, with a view to draw the whole attention of the garrison to that point. They hoped that while the chief force of the station crowded there, the opposite point would be left defenceless. In this instance they reckoned without their host. The people penetrated their deception, and instead of returning their fire, commenced what had been imprudently neglected, the repairing their palisades, and putting the station in a better condition of defence. The tall and luxuriant strammony weeds instructed these wary backwoodsmen to suspect that a host of their tawny foe lay hid beneath their sheltering foliage, lurking for a chance to fire upon them, as they should come forth for water.
Let modern wives, who refuse to follow their husbands abroad, alleging the danger of the voyage or journey, or the unhealthiness of the proposed residence, or because the removal will separate them from the pleasures of fashion and society, contemplate the example of the wives of the defenders of this station. These noble mothers, wives, and daughters, assuring the men that there was no probability that the Indians would fire upon them, offered to go out and draw water for the supply of the garrison, and that even if they did shoot down a few of them, it would not reduce the resources of the garrison as would the killing of the men. The illustrious heroines took up their buckets, and marched out to the spring, espying here and there a painted face, or an Indian body crouched under the covert of the weeds. Whether their courage or their beauty fascinated the Indians to suspend their fire, does not appear. But it was so, that these generous women came and went until the reservoir was amply supplied with crater. Who will doubt that the husbands of such wives must have been alike gallant and affectionate.
After this example, it was not difficult to procure some young volunteers to tempt the Indians in the same way. As was expected, they had scarcely advanced beyond their station, before a hundred Indians fired a shower of balls upon them, happily too remote to do more than inflict slight wounds with spent balls. They retreated within the palisades, and the whole Indian force, seeing no results from stratagem, rose from their covert and rushed towards the palisade. The exasperation of their rage may be imagined, when they found every thing prepared for their reception. A well aimed fire drove them to a more cautious distance. Some of the more audacious of their number, however, ventured so near a less exposed point, as to be able to discharge burning arrows upon the roofs of the houses. Some of them were fired and burnt. But an easterly wind providentially arose at the moment, and secured the mass of the habitations from the further spread of the flames. These they could no longer reach with their burning arrows.
The enemy cowered back, and crouched to their covert in the weeds; where, panther-like, they waited for less dangerous game. They had divided, on being informed, that aid was expected from Lexington; and they arranged an ambuscade to intercept it, on its approach to the garrison. When the reinforcement, consisting of forty-six persons, came in sight, the firing had wholly ceased, and the invisible enemy were profoundly still. The auxiliaries hurried on in reckless confidence, under the impression that they had come on a false alarm. A lane opened an avenue to the station, through a thick cornfield. This lane was way-laid on either side, by Indians, for six hundred yards. Fortunately, it was mid-summer, and dry; and the horsemen raised so thick a cloud of dust, that the Indians could fire only at random amidst the palpable cloud, and happily killed not a single man. The footmen were less fortunate. Being behind the horse, as soon as they heard the firing, they dispersed into the thick corn, in hopes to reach the garrison unobserved. They were intercepted by masses of the savages, who threw themselves between them and the station. Hard fighting ensued, in which two of the footmen were killed and four wounded. Soon after the detachment had joined their friends, and the Indians were again crouching close in their covert, the numerous flocks and herds of the station came in from the woods as usual, quietly ruminating, as they made their way towards their night-pens. Upon these harmless animals the Indians wreaked unmolested revenge, and completely destroyed them.
A little after sunset the famous Simon, in all his official splendor, covertly approached the garrison, mounted a stump, whence he could be heard by the people of the station, and holding a flag of truce, demanded a parley and the surrender of the place. He managed his proposals with no small degree of art, assigning, in imitation of the commanders of what are called civilized armies, that his proposals were dictated by humanity and a wish to spare the effusion of blood. He affirmed, that in case of a prompt surrender, he could answer for the safety of the prisoners; but that in the event of taking the garrison by storm, he could not; that cannon and a reinforcement were approaching, in which case they must be aware that their palisades could no longer interpose any resistance to their attack, or secure them from the vengeance of an exasperated foe. He calculated that his imposing language would have the more effect in producing belief and consternation, inasmuch as the garrison must know, that the same foe had used cannon in the attack of Ruddle’s and Martin’s stations. Two of their number had been already slain, and there were four wounded in the garrison; and some faces were seen to blanch as Girty continued his harangue of menace, and insidious play upon their fears. Some of the more considerate of the garrison, apprised by the result, of the folly of allowing such a negotiation to intimidate the garrison in that way, called out to shoot the rascal, adding the customary Kentucky epithet. Girty insisted upon the universal protection every where accorded to a flag of truce, while this parley lasted; and demanded with great assumed dignity, if they did not know who it was that thus addressed them?
A spirited young man, named Reynolds, of whom the most honorable mention is made in the subsequent annals of the contests with the Indians, was selected by the garrison to reply to the renegado Indian negotiator. His object seems to have been to remove the depression occasioned by Girty’s speech, by treating it with derision; and perhaps to establish a reputation for successful waggery, as he had already for hard fighting.
“You ask,” answered he, “if we do not know you? Know you! Yes. We know you too well. Know Simon Girty! Yes. He is the renegado, cowardly villain, who loves to murder women and children, especially those of his own people. Know Simon Girty! Yes. His father was a panther and his dam a wolf. I have a worthless dog, that kills lambs. Instead of shooting him, I have named him Simon Girty. You expect reinforcements and cannon, do you? Cowardly wretches, like you, that make war upon women and children, would not dare to touch them off, if you had them. We expect reinforcements, too, and in numbers to give a short account of the murdering cowards that follow you. Even if you could batter down our pickets, I, for one, hold your people in too much contempt to discharge rifles at them. Should you see cause to enter our fort, I have been roasting a great number of hickory switches, with which we mean to whip your naked cut-throats out of the country.”
Simon, apparently little edified or flattered by this speech, wished him some of his hardest curses; and affecting to deplore the obstinacy and infatuation of the garrison, the ambassador of ruffled shirt and soldier coat withdrew. The besieged gave a good account of every one, who came near enough to take a fair shot. But before morning they decamped, marching direct to the Blue Licks, where they obtained very different success, and a most signal and bloody triumph. We shall there again meet Daniel Boone, in his accustomed traits of heroism and magnanimity.
[Illustration]
CHAPTER VIII.
Boone being attacked by two Indians near the Blue Licks, kills them both–Is afterwards taken prisoner and marched to Old Chillicothe–Is adopted by the Indians–Indian ceremonies.
We return to the subject of our memoir, from which the reader may imagine we have wandered too long. He had already conducted the defence of Boonesborough, during two Indian sieges. The general estimate of his activity, vigilance, courage, and enterprise, was constantly rising. By the Indians he was regarded as the most formidable and intelligent captain of the Long-knife; and by the settlers and immigrants as a disinterested and heroic patriarch of the infant settlements. He often supplied destitute families gratuitously with game. He performed the duties of surveyor and spy, generally as a volunteer, and without compensation. When immigrant families were approaching the country, he often went out to meet them and conduct them to the settlements. Such, in general, were the paternal feelings of the pioneers of this young colony.
The country was easily and amply supplied with meat from the chase, and with vegetables from the fertility of the soil. The hardy settlers could train themselves without difficulty to dispense with many things which habit and long use in the old settlements had led them to consider as necessaries. But to every form of civilized communities salt is an indispensable article. The settlement of Boonesborough had been fixed near a lick, with a view to the supply of that article. But the amount was found to be very inadequate to the growing demand. The settlement deemed it necessary to send out a company to select a place where the whole country could be supplied with that article at a reasonable rate.
Captain Boone was deputed by the settlers to this service. He selected thirty associates, and set out on the first of January, 1779, for the Blue Licks, on Licking river, a well known stream emptying into the Ohio, opposite where Cincinnati now stands. They arrived at the place, and successfully commenced their operations. Boone, instead of taking a part in the diurnal and uninterrupted labor, of evaporating the water, performed the more congenial duty of hunting to keep the company in provisions, while they labored. In this pursuit he had one day wandered some distance from the bank of the river. Two Indians, armed with muskets,–for they had now generally added these efficient weapons to their tomahawks–came upon him. His first thought was to retreat. But he discovered from their nimbleness, that this was impossible. His second thought was resistance, and he slipped behind a tree to await their coming within rifle shot. He then exposed himself so as to attract their aim. The foremost levelled his musket. Boone, who could dodge the flash, at the pulling of the trigger, dropped behind his tree unhurt. His next object W&B to cause the fire of the Second musket to be thrown away in the same manner. He again exposed a part of his person. The eager Indian instantly fired, and Boone evaded the shot as before. Both the Indians, having thrown away their fire, were eagerly striving, but with trembling hands, to reload. Trepidation and too much haste retarded their object. Boone drew his rifle and one of them fell dead. The two antagonists, now on equal grounds, the one unsheathing his knife, and the other poising his tomahawk, rushed toward the dead body of the fallen Indian. Boone, placing his foot on the dead body, dexterously received the well aimed tomahawk of his powerful enemy on the barrel of his rifle, thus preventing his skull from being cloven by it. In the very attitude of firing the Indian had exposed his body to the knife of Boone, who plunged it in his body to the hilt. This is the achievement commemorated in sculpture over the southern door of the Rotunda in the Capitol at Washington.
This adventure did not deter him from exposing himself in a similar way again. He was once more hunting for the salt makers, when, on the seventh day of February following, he came in view of a body of one hundred and two Indians, evidently on their march to the assault of Boonesborough–that being a particular mark for Indian revenge. They were in want of a prisoner, from whom to obtain intelligence, and Boone was the person of all others whom they desired. He fled; but among so many warriors, it proved, that some were swifter of foot than himself, and these overtook him and made him prisoner.
By a tedious and circuitous march they brought him back to the Blue Licks, and took their measures with so much caution, as to make twenty-seven of the thirty salt makers prisoners. Boone obtained for them a capitulation, which stipulated, that their lives should be spared, and that they should be kindly treated. The fortunate three, that escaped, had just been sent home with the salt that had been made during their ill-fated expedition.
The Indians were faithful to the stipulations of the capitulation; and treated their prisoners with as much kindness both on their way, and after their arrival at Chillicothe, as their habits and means would admit. The march was rapid and fatiguing, occupying three days of weather unusually cold and inclement.
The captivity of twenty-eight of the select and bravest of the Kentucky settlers, without the hope of liberation or exchange, was a severe blow to the infant settlement. Had the Indians, after this achievement, immediately marched against Boonesborough, so materially diminished in its means of defence, they might either have taken the place by surprise, or, availing themselves of the influence which the possession of these prisoners gave them over the fears and affections of the inmates, might have procured a capitulation of the fort. Following up this plan in progression, the weaker station would have followed the example of Boonesborough; since it is hardly supposable, that the united influence of fear, example, and the menace of the massacre of so many prisoners would not have procured the surrender of all the rest. But, though on various occasions they manifested the keenest observation, and the acutest quickness of instinctive cunning–though their plans were generally predicated on the soundest reason, they showed in this, and in all cases, a want of the combination of thought, and the abstract and extended views of the whites on such occasions. For a single effort, nothing could be imagined wiser than their views. For a combination made up of a number of elements of calculation, they had no reasoning powers at all.
Owing to this want of capacity for combined operations of thought, and their, habitual intoxication of excitement, on the issue of carrying some important enterprise without loss, they hurried home with their prisoners, leaving the voice of lamentation and the sentiment of extreme dejection among the bereaved inmates of Boonesborough.
Throwing all the recorded incidents and circumstances of the life of Boone, during his captivity among them, together, we shall reserve them for another place, and proceed here to record what befell him among the whites.
He resided as a captive among the Indians until the following March. At that time, he, and ten of the persons who were taken with him at the Blue Licks, were conducted by forty Indians to Detroit, where the party arrived on the thirteenth of the month. The ten men were put into the hands of Governor Hamilton, who, to his infinite credit, treated them with kindness. For each of these they received a moderate ransom. Such was their respect, and even affection for the hunter of Kentucky, and such, perhaps, their estimate of his capability of annoying them, that although Governor Hamilton offered them the large sum of a hundred pounds sterling for his ransom, they utterly refused to part with him. It may easily be imagined, in what a vexatious predicament this circumstance placed him; a circumstance so much the more embarrassing, as he could not express his solicitude for deliverance, without alarming the jealousy and ill feeling of the Indians. Struck with his appearance and development of character, several English gentlemen, generously impressed with a sense of his painful position, offered him a sum of money adequate to the supply of his necessities. Unwilling to accept such favors from the enemies of his country, he refused their kindness, alleging a motive at once conciliating and magnanimous, that it would probably never be in his power to repay them. It will be necessary to contemplate his desolate and forlorn condition, haggard, and without any adequate clothing in that inclement climate, destitute of money or means, and at the same time to realize that these men, who so generously offered him money, were in league with those that were waging war against the United States, fully to appreciate the patriotism and magnanimity of this refusal. It is very probable, too, that these men acted from the interested motive of wishing to bind the hands of this stern border warrior from any further annoyance to them and their red allies, by motives of gratitude and a sense of obligation.
It must have been mortifying to his spirit to leave his captive associates in comfortable habitations and among a civilized people at Detroit, while he, the single white man of the company, was obliged to accompany his red masters through the forest in a long and painful journey of fifteen days, at the close of which he found himself again at Old Chillicothe, as the town was called.
This town was inhabited by the Shawnese, and Boone was placed in a most severe school, in which to learn Indian modes and ceremonies, by being himself the subject of them. On the return of the party that led him to their home, he learned that some superstitious scruple induced them to halt at mid-day when near their village, in order to solemnize their return by entering their town in the evening. A runner was despatched from their halting place to instruct the chief and the village touching the material incidents of their expedition.
Before the expedition made the triumphal entry into their village, they clad their white prisoner in a new dress, of material and fashion like theirs. They proceeded to shave his head and skewer his hair after their own fashion, and then rouged him with a plentiful smearing of vermilion and put into his hand a white staff, gorgeously tasselated with the tails of deer. The war-captain or leader of the expedition gave as many yells as they had taken prisoners and scalps. This operated as effectually as ringing a tocsin, to assemble the whole village round the camp. As soon as the warriors from the village appeared, four young warriors from the camp, the two first carrying each a calumet, approached the prisoner, chanting a song as they went, and taking him by the arm, led him in triumph to the cabin, where he was to remain until the announcement of his doom. The resident in this cabin, by their immemorial usage, had the power of determining his fate, whether to be tortured and burnt at the stake, or adopted into the tribe.
The present occupant of the cabin happened to be a woman, who had lost a son during the war. It is very probable that she was favorably impressed towards him by noting his fine person, and his firm and cheerful visage–circumstances which impress the women of the red people still more strongly than the men. She contemplated him stedfastly for some time, and sympathy and humanity triumphed, and she declared that she adopted him in place of the son she had lost. The two young men, who bore the calumet, instantly unpinioned his hands, treating him with kindness and respect. Food was brought him, and he was informed that he was considered as a son, and she, who had adopted him, as his mother. He was soon made aware, by demonstrations that could not be dissembled or mistaken, that he was actually loved, and trusted, as if he really were, what his adoption purported to make him. In a few days he suffered no other penalty of captivity than inability to return to his family. He was sufficiently instructed in Indian customs to know well, that any discovered purpose or attempt to escape would be punished with instant death.
Strange caprice of inscrutable instincts and results of habit! A circumstance, apparently fortuitous and accidental, placed him in the midst of an Indian family, the female owner of which loved him with the most disinterested tenderness, and lavished upon him all the affectionate sentiments of a mother towards a son. Had the die of his lot been cast otherwise, all the inhabitants of the village would have raised the death song, and each individual would have been as fiercely unfeeling to torment him, as they were now covetous to show him kindness. It is astonishing to see, in their habits of this sort, no interval between friendship and kindness, and the most ingenious and unrelenting barbarity. Placed between two posts, and his arms and feet extended between them, nearly in the form of a person suffering crucifixion, he would have been burnt to death at a slow fire, while men, women, and children would have danced about him, occasionally applying torches and burning splinters to die most exquisitely sensible parts of the frame, prolonging his torture, and exulting in it with the demoniac exhilaration of gratified revenge.
This was the most common fate of prisoners of war at that time. Sometimes they fastened the victim to a single stake, built a fire of green wood about him, and then raising their yell of exultation, marched off into the desert, leaving him to expire unheeded and alone. At other times they killed their prisoners by amputating their limbs joint by joint. Others they destroyed by pouring on them, from time to time, streams of scalding water. At other times they have been seen to hang their victim to a sapling tree by the hands, bending it down until the wretched sufferer has seen himself swinging up and down at the play of the breeze, his feet often, within a foot of the ground. In a word, they seem to have exhausted the invention and ingenuity of all time and all countries in the horrid art of inflicting torture.
The mention of a circumstance equally extraordinary in the Indian character, may be recorded here. If the sufferer in these afflictions be an Indian, during the whole of his agony a strange rivalry passes between them which shall outdo each other, they inflicting, and he in enduring these tortures. Not a groan, not a sigh, not a distortion of countenance is allowed to escape him. He smokes, and looks even cheerful. He occasionally chants a strain of his war song. He vaunts his exploits performed in afflicting death and desolation in their villages. He enumerates the names of their relatives and friends that he has slain. He menaces them with the terrible revenge that his friends will inflict by way of retaliation. He even derides their ignorance in the art of tormenting; assures them that he had afflicted much more ingenious torture upon their people; and indicates more excruciating modes of inflicting pain, and more sensitive parts of the frame to which to apply them.
They are exceedingly dexterous in the horrid surgical operation of taking off the scalp–that is, a considerable surface of the hairy integument of the crown of the cranium. Terrible as the operation is, there are not wanting great numbers of cases of persons who have survived, and recovered from it. The scalps of enemies thus taken, even when not paid for, as has been too often the infamous custom of their white auxiliaries, claiming to be civilized, are valued as badges of family honor, and trophies of the bravery of the warrior. On certain days and occasions, young warriors take a new name, constituting a new claim to honor, according to the number of scalps they have taken, or the bravery and exploits of those from whom they were taken. This name they deem a sufficient compensation for every fatigue and danger. Another ludicrous superstition tends to inspire them with the most heroic sentiments. They believe that all the fame, intelligence, and bravery that appertained to the enemy they have slain is transferred to them, and thenceforward becomes their intellectual property. Hence, they are excited with the most earnest appetite to kill warriors of distinguished fame. This article of Indian faith affords an apt illustration of the ordinary influence of envy, which seems to inspire the person whom it torments with the persuasion, that all the merit it can contract from the envied becomes its own, and that the laurels shorn from another’s brow will sprout on its own.
He witnessed also their modes of hardening their children to that prodigious power of unshrinking endurance, of which such astonishing effects have just been recorded. This may be fitly termed the Indian system of gymnastics. The bodies of the children of both sexes are inured to hardships by compelling them to endure prolonged fastings, and to bathe in the coldest water. A child of eight years, fasts half a day; and one of twelve, a whole day without food or drink. The face is blacked during the fast, and is washed immediately before eating. The male face is entirely blacked; that of the female only on the cheeks. The course is discontinued in the case of the male at eighteen, and of the female at fourteen. At eighteen, the boy is instructed by his parents that his education is completed, and that he is old enough to be a man. His face is then blacked for the last time, and he is removed at the distance of some miles from the village, and placed in a temporary cabin. He is there addressed by his parent or guardian to this purport: “My son, it has pleased the Great Spirit that you should live to see this day. We all have noted your conduct since I first blacked your face. They well understand whether you have strictly followed the advice I have given you, and they will conduct themselves towards you according to their knowledge. You must remain here until I, or some of your friends, come for you.”
The party then returns, resumes his gun, and seeming to forget the sufferer, goes to his hunting as usual, and the son or ward is left to endure hunger as long as it can be endured, and the party survive. The hunter, meanwhile, has procured the materials for a feast, of which the friends are invited to partake They accompany the father or guardian to the unfortunate starving subject. He then accompanies them home, and is bathed in cold water, and his head shaved after the Indian fashion–all but a small space on the centre of the crown. He is then allowed to take food, which, however, as a consecrated thing, is presented him in a vessel distinct from that used by the rest. After he has eaten, he is presented with a looking-glass, and a bag of vermilion. He is then complimented for the firmness with which he has sustained his fasting, and is told that he is henceforward a man, and to be considered as such. The instance is not known of a boy eating or drinking while under this interdict of the blacked face. They are deterred, not only by the strong sentiments of Indian honor, but by a persuasion that the _Great Spirit_ would severely punish such disobedience of parental authority.
The most honorable mode of marriage, and that generally pursued by the more distinguished warriors, is to assemble the friends and relatives, and consult with them in regard to the person whom it is expedient to marry. The choice being made, the relations of the young man collect such presents as they deem proper for the occasion, go to the parents of the woman selected, make known the wishes of their friend, deposit their presents, and return without waiting for an answer. The relations of the girl assemble and consult on the subject. If they confirm the choice, they also collect presents, dress her in her best clothes, and take her to the friends of the bridegroom who made the application for the match, when it is understood that the marriage is completed. She herself has still a negative; and if she disapprove the match, the presents from the friends of the young man are returned, and this is considered as a refusal. Many of the more northern nations, as the Dacotas, for example, have a custom, that, when the husband deceases, his widow immediately manifests the deepest mourning, by putting off all her finery, and dresses herself in the coarsest Indian attire, the sackcloth of Indian lamentation. Meanwhile she makes up a respectable sized bundle of her clothes into the form of a kind of doll-man, which represents her husband. With this she sleeps. To this she converses and relates the sorrows of her desolate heart. It would be indecorous for any warrior, while she is in this predicament, to show her any attentions of gallantry. She never puts on any habiliments but those of sadness and disfigurement. The only comfort she is permitted in this desolate state is, that her budgetted husband is permitted, when drams are passing, to be considered as a living one, and she is allowed to cheer her depressed spirits with a double dram, that of her budget-husband and her own. After a full year of this penance with the budget-husband, she is allowed to exchange it for a living one, if she can find him.
When an Indian party forms for private revenge the object is accomplished in the following manner. The Indian who seeks revenge, proposes his project to obtain it to some of his more intimate associates, and requests them to accompany him. When the requisite number is obtained, and the plan arranged it is kept a profound secret from all others, and the proposer of the plan is considered the leader. The party leaves the village secretly, and in the night. When they halt for the night, the eldest encamp in front, and the younger in the rear. The foremen hunt for the party, and perform the duty of spies. The latter cook, make the fires, mend the moccasins, and perform the other drudgery of the expedition.
Every war party has a small budget, called the _war budget_, which contains something belonging to each one of the party, generally representing some animal; for example, the skin of a snake, the tail of a buffalo, the skin of a martin, or the feathers of some extraordinary bird. This budget is considered a sacred deposit, and is carried by some person selected for the purpose, who marches in front, and leads the party against the enemy. When the party halts, the budget is deposited in front, and no person passes it without authority. No one, while such an exhibition is pending, is allowed to lay his pack on a log, converse about women or his home. When they encamp, the heart of whatever beast they have killed on the preceding day is cut into small pieces and burnt. No person is allowed, while it is burning, to step across the fire, but must go round it, and always in the direction of the sun.
When an attack is to be made, the war budget is opened, and each man takes out his budget, or _totem_, and attaches it to that part of his body which has been indicated by tradition from his ancestors. When the attack is commenced, the body of the fighter is painted, generally black, and is almost naked. After the action, each party returns his _totem_ to the commander of the party, who carefully wraps them all up, and delivers them to the man who has taken the first prisoner or scalp; and he is entitled to the honor of leading the party home in triumph. The war budget is then hung in front of the door of the person who carried it on the march against the enemy, where it remains suspended thirty or forty days, and some one of the party often sings and dances round it.
One mode of Indian burial seems to have prevailed, not only among the Indians of the lakes and of the Ohio valley, but over all the western country. Some lay the dead body on the surface of the ground, make a crib or pen over it, and cover it with bark. Others lay the body in a grave, covering it first with bark, and then with earth. Others make a coffin out of the cloven section of trees, in the form of plank, and suspend it from the top of a tree. Nothing can be more affecting than to see a young mother hanging the coffin that contains the remains of her beloved child to the pendent branches of the flowering maple, and singing her lament over her love and hope, as it waves in the breeze.
CHAPTER IX.
Boone becomes a favorite among the Indians–Anecdotes relating to his captivity–Their mode of tormenting and burning prisoners–Their fortitude under the infliction of torture–Concerted attack on Boonesborough–Boone escapes.
Boone, being now a son in a principal Shawnee family, presents himself in a new light to our observation. We would be glad to be able give a diurnal record of his modes of deportment, and getting along. Unhappily, the records are few and meagre. It will be obvious, that the necessity for a more profound dissimulation of contentment, cheerfulness, and a feeling of loving his home, was stronger than ever. It was a semblance that must be daily and hourly sustained. He would never have acquitted himself successfully, but for a wonderful versatility, which enabled him to enter into the spirit of whatever parts he was called upon to sustain; and a real love for the hunting and pursuits of the Indians, which rendered what was at first assumed, with a little practice, and the influence of habit, easy and natural. He soon became in semblance so thoroughly one of them, and was able in all those points of practice which give them reputation, to conduct himself with so much skill and adroitness, that he gained the entire confidence of the family into which he was adopted, and become as dear to his mother of adoption as her own son.
Trials of Indian strength and skill are among their most common amusements. Boone was soon challenged to competition in these trials. In these rencounters of loud laughter and boisterous merriment, where all that was done seemed to pass into oblivion as fast as it transpired, Boone had too much tact and keen observation not to perceive that jealousy, envy, and the origin of hatred often lay hid under the apparent recklessness of indifference. He was not sorry that some of the Indians could really beat him in the race, though extremely light of foot; and that in the game of ball, at which they had been practised all their lives, he was decidedly inferior. But there was another sport–that of shooting at a mark–a new custom to the Indians but recently habituated to the use of fire arms; a practice which they had learned from the whites, and they were excessively jealous of reputation of great skill in this exercise, so important in hunting and war. Boone was challenged to shoot with them at a mark. It placed him in a most perplexing dilemma. If he shot his best, he could easily and far excel their most practised marksmen. But he was aware, that to display his superiority would never be forgiven him. On the other hand, to fall far short of them in an exercise which had been hitherto peculiar to the whites, would forfeit their respect. In this predicament, he judiciously allowed himself sometimes to be beaten; and when it became prudent to put forth all his skill, a well dissembled humility and carelessness subdued the mortification and envy of the defeated competitor.
He was often permitted to accompany them in their hunting parties; and here their habits and his circumstances alike invoked him to do his best. They applauded his skill and success as a hunter, with no mixture of envy or ill will. He was particularly fortunate in conciliating the good will of the Shawnee chief. To attain this result, Boone not only often presented him with a share of his game, but adopted the more winning deportment of always affecting to treat his opinions and counsels with deference. The chief, on his part, often took occasion to speak of Boone as a most consummate proficient in hunting, and a warrior of great bravery. Not long after his residence among them, he had occasion to witness their manner of celebrating their victories, by being an eye witness to one which commemorated the successful return of a war party with some scalps.
Within a day’s march of the village, the party dispatched a runner with the joyful intelligence of their success, achieved without loss. Every cabin in the village was immediately ordered to be swept perfectly clean, with the religious intention to banish every source of pollution that might mar the ceremony. The women, exceedingly fearful of contributing in any way to this pollution, commenced an inveterate sweeping, gathering up the collected dirt, and carefully placing it in a heap behind the door. There it remained until the medicine man, or priest, who presides over the powow, ordered them to remove it, and at the same time every savage implement and utensil upon which the women had laid their hands during the absence of the expedition.
Next day the party came in sight of the village, painted in alternate compartments of red and black, their heads enveloped in swan’s down, and the centre of their crown, surmounted with long white feathers. They advanced, singing their war song, and bearing the scalps on a verdant branch of evergreen.
Arrived at the village, the chief who had led the party advanced before his warriors to his winter cabin, encircling it in an order of march contrary to the course of the sun, singing the war song after a particular mode, sometimes on the ten or and sometimes on the bass key, sometimes in high and shrill, and sometimes in deep and guttural notes. The _waiter_, or servant of the leader, called _Etissu_, placed a couple of blocks of wood near the war-pole, opposite the door of a circular cabin, called the _hot-house_, in the centre of which was the council fire. On these blocks he rested a kind of ark, deemed among their most sacred things. While this was transacting the party were profoundly silent. The chief bade all set down, and then inquired whether his cabin was prepared and every thing unpolluted, according to the custom of their fathers? After the answer, they rose up in concert and began the war-whoop, walking slowly round the war-pole as they sung. All the consecrated things were then carried, with no small show of solemnity, into the hot-house. Here they remained three whole days and nights, in separation from the rest of the people, applying warm ablutions to their bodies, and sprinkling themselves with a decoction of snake root. During a part of the time, the female relations of each of the consecrated company, after having bathed, anointed, and drest themselves in their finest apparel, stood, in two lines opposite the door, and facing each other. This observance they kept up through the night, uttering a peculiar, monotonous song, in a shrill voice for a minute; then intermitting it about ten minutes, and resuming it again. When not singing their silence was profound.
The chief, meanwhile, at intervals of about three hours, came out at the head of his company, raised the war-whoop, and marched round the red war-pole, holding in his right hand the pine or cedar boughs, on which the scalps were attached, waving them backward and forward, and then returned again. To these ceremonies they conformed without the slightest interruption, during the whole three days’ purification. To proceed with the whole details of the ceremony to its close, would be tedious. We close it, only adding, that a small twig of the evergreen was fixed upon the roof of each one of their cabins, with a fragment of the scalps attached to it, and this, as it appeared, to appease the ghosts of their dead. When Boone asked them the meaning of all these long and tedious ceremonies, they answered him by a word which literally imports “holy.” The leader and his waiter kept apart and continued the purification three days longer, and the ceremony closed.
He observed, that when their war-parties returned from an expedition, and had arrived near their village, they followed their file leader, in what is called _Indian file_, one by one, each a few yards behind the other, to give the procession an appearance of greater length and dignity. If the expedition had been unsuccessful, and they had lost any of their warriors, they returned without ceremony and in noiseless sadness. But if they had been successful, they fired their guns in platoons, yelling, whooping, and insulting their prisoners, if they had made any. Near their town was a large square area, with a war-pole in the centre, expressly prepared for such purposes. To this they fasten their prisoners. They then advance to the house of their leader, remaining without, and standing round his red war-pole, until they determine concerning the fate of their prisoner. If any prisoner should be fortunate enough to break from his pinions, and escape into the house of the chief medicine man, or conductor of the powow, it is an inviolable asylum, and by immemorial usage, the refugee is saved from the fire.
Captives far advanced in life, or such as had been known to have shed the blood of their tribe, were sure to atone for their decrepitude, or past activity in shedding blood, by being burnt to death. They readily know those Indians who have killed many, by the blue marks on their breasts and arms, which indicate the number they have slain. These hieroglyphics are to them as significant as our alphabetical characters. The ink with which these characters are impressed, is a sort of lampblack, prepared from the soot of burning pine, which they catch by causing it to pass through a sort of greased funnel. Having prepared this lampblack, they tattoo it into the skin, by punctures made with thorns or the teeth of fish. The young prisoners, if they seem capable of activity and service, and if they preserve an intrepid and unmoved countenance, are generally spared, unless condemned to death by the party, while undergoing the purification specified above. As soon as their case is so decided, they are tied to the stake, one at a time. A pair of bear-skin moccasins, with the hair outwards, are put on their feet. They are stripped naked to the loins, and are pinioned firmly to the stake.
Their subsequent punishment, in addition to the suffering of slow fire, is left to the women. Such are the influences of their training, that although the female nature, in all races of men, is generally found to be more susceptible of pity than the male, in this case they appear to surpass the men in the fury of their merciless rage, and the industrious ingenuity of their torments. Each is prepared with a bundle of long, dry, reed cane, or other poles, to which are attached splinters of burning pine. As the victim is led to the stake, the women and children begin their sufferings by beating them with switches and clubs; and as they reel and recoil from the blows, these fiendish imps show their gratification by unremitting peals of laughter; too happy, if their tortures ended here, or if the merciful tomahawk brought them to an immediate close.
The signal for a more terrible infliction being given–the arms of the victim are pinioned, and he is disengaged from the pole, and a grapevine passed round his neck, allowing him a circle of about fifteen yards in circumference, in which he can he made to march round his pole. They knead tough clay on his head to secure the cranium from the effects of the blaze, that it may not inflict immediate death. Under the excitement of ineffable and horrid joy, they whip him round the circle, that he may expose each part of his body to the flame, while the other part is fanned by the cool air, that he may thus undergo the literal operation of slow roasting. During this abhorrent process, the children fill the circle in convulsions of laughter; and the women begin to thrust their burning torches into his body, lacerating the quick of the flesh, that the flame may inflict more exquisite anguish. The warrior, in these cases; goaded to fury, sweeps round the extent of his circle, kicking, biting, and stamping with inconceivable fury. The throng of women and children laugh, and fly from the circle, and fresh tormentors fill it again. At other times the humor takes him to show them, that he can bear all this, without a grimace, a spasm, or indication of suffering. In this case, as we have seen, he smokes, derides, menaces, sings, and shows his contempt, by calling them by the most reproachful of all epithets–_old women_. When he falls insensible, they scalp and dismember him, and the remainder of his body is consumed.
We have omitted many of these revolting details, many of the atrocious features of this spectacle, as witnessed by Boone. While we read with indignation and horror, let us not forget that savages have not alone inflicted these detestable cruelties. Let us not forget that the professed followers of Jesus Christ have given examples of a barbarity equally unrelenting and horrible, in the form of religious persecution, and avowedly to glorify God.
During Boone’s captivity among the Shawnese, they took prisoner a noted warrior of a western tribe, with which they were then at war. He was condemned to the stake with the usual solemnities. Having endured the preliminary tortures with the most fearless unconcern, he told them, when preparing to commence a new series, with a countenance of scorn, he could teach them how to make an enemy eat fire to some purpose; and begged that they would give him an opportunity, together with a pipe and tobacco. In respectful astonishment, at an unwonted demonstration of invincible endurance, they granted his request. He lighted his pipe, began to smoke, and sat down, all naked as he was, upon the burning torches, which were blazing within his circle. Every muscle of his countenance retained its composure. On viewing this, a noted warrior sprang up, exclaiming, that this was a true warrior; that though his nation was treacherous, and he had caused them many deaths, yet such was their respect for true courage, that if the fire had not already spoiled him, he should be spared. That being now impossible, he promised him the merciful release of the tomahawk. He then held the terrible instrument suspended some moments over his head, during all which time he was seen neither to change his posture, move a muscle, or his countenance to blench. The tomahawk fell, and the impassable warrior ceased to suffer.
[Illustration]
We shall close these details of the Shawnese customs, at the time when Boone was prisoner among them, by giving his account of their ceremonies at making peace. The chief warriors, who arrange the conditions of the peace and subsequent friendship, first mutually eat and smoke together. They then pledge each other in the sacred drink called _Cussena_. The Shawnese then wave large fans of eagles’ tails, and conclude with a dance. The stranger warriors, who have come to receive the peace, select half a dozen of their most active young men, surmounting their crowns with swan’s feathers, and painting their bodies with white clay. They then place their file leader on the consecrated seat of what imports in their language, the “beloved cabin.” Afterwards they commence singing the peace song, with an air of great solemnity. They begin to dance, first in a prone or bowing posture. They then raise themselves erect, look upwards, and wave their eagles’ tails towards the sky, first with a slow, and then with a quick and jerky motion. At the same time, they strike their breast with a calabash fastened to a stick about a foot in length, which they hold in their left hand, while they wave the eagles’ feathers with the right, and keep time by rattling pebbles in a gourd. These ceremonies of peace-making they consider among their most solemn duties; and to be perfectly accomplished in all the notes and gestures is an indispensable acquirement to a thorough trained warrior.
Boone has related, at different times, many oral details of his private and domestic life, and his modes of getting along in the family, of which he was considered a member. He was perfectly trained to their ways, could prepare their food, and perform any of their common domestic operations with the best of them. He often accompanied them in their hunting excursions, wandering with them over the extent of forest between Chillicothe and lake Erie. These conversations presented curious and most vivid pictures of their interior modes; their tasks of diurnal labor and supply; their long and severe fasts; their gluttonous indulgence, when they had food; and their reckless generosity and hospitality, when they had any thing to bestow to travelling visitants.
To become, during this tedious captivity, perfectly acquainted with their most interior domestic and diurnal manners, was not without interest for a mind constituted like his. To make himself master of their language, and to become familiarly acquainted with their customs, he considered acquisitions of the highest utility in the future operations, in which, notwithstanding his present duress, he hoped yet to be beneficial to his beloved settlement of Kentucky.
Although the indulgence with which he was treated in the family, in which he was adopted, and these acquisitions, uniting interest with utility, tended to beguile the time of his captivity, it cannot be doubted, that his sleeping and waking thoughts were incessantly occupied with the chances of making his escape. An expedition was in contemplation, by the tribe, to the salt licks on the Scioto, to make salt. Boone dissembled indifference whether they took him with them, or left him behind, with so much success, that, to his extreme joy, they determined that he should accompany them. The expedition started on the first day of June, 1778, and was occupied ten days in making salt.
During this expedition, he was frequently sent out to hunt, to furnish provisions for the party; but always under such circumstances, that, much as he had hoped to escape on this expedition, no opportunity occurred, which he thought it prudent to embrace. He returned with the party to Chillicothe, having derived only one advantage from the journey, that of furnishing, by his making no attempt to escape, and by his apparently cheerful return, new motives to convince the Indians, that he was thoroughly domesticated among them, and had voluntarily renounced his own race; a persuasion, which, by taking as much apparent interest as any of them, in all their diurnal movements and plans, he constantly labored to establish.
Soon after his return he attended a warrior-council, at which, in virtue of being a member of one of the principal families, he had a right of usage and prescription, to be present. It was composed of a hundred and fifty of their bravest men, all painted and armed for an expedition, which he found was intended against Boonesborough. It instantly occurred to him, as a most fortunate circumstance, that he had not escaped on the expedition to Scioto. Higher and more imperious motives, than merely personal considerations, now determined him at every risk to make the effort to escape, and prepare, if he might reach it, the station for a vigorous defence, by forewarning it of what was in preparation among the Indians.
The religious ceremonies of the council and preparation for the expedition were as follow. One of the principal war chiefs announced the intention of a party to commence an expedition against Boonesborough. This he did by beating their drum, and marching with their war standard three times round the council-house. On this the council dissolved, and a sufficient number of warriors supplied themselves with arms, and a quantity of parched corn flour, as a supply of food for the expedition. All who had volunteered to join in it, then adjourned to their “winter house,” and drank the war-drink, a decoction of bitter herbs and roots, for three days–preserving in other respects an almost unbroken fast. This is considered to be an act tending to propitiate the Great Spirit to prosper their expedition. During this period of purifying themselves, they were not allowed to sit down, or even lean upon a tree, however fatigued, until after sun-set. If a bear or deer even passed in sight, custom forbade them from killing it for refreshment. The more rigidly punctual they are in the observance of these rights, the more confidently they expect success.
While the young warriors were under this probation, the aged ones, experienced in the usages of their ancestors, watched them most narrowly to see that, from irreligion, or hunger, or recklessness, they did not violate any of the transmitted religious rites, and thus bring the wrath of the Great Spirit upon the expedition. Boone himself, as a person naturally under suspicion of having a swerving of inclination towards the station to be assailed, was obliged to observe the fast with the most rigorous exactness. During the three days’ process of purification, he was not once allowed to go out of the medicine or sanctified ground, without a trusty guard, lest hunger or indifference to their laws should tempt him to violate them.
When the fast and purification was complete, they were compelled to set forth, prepared or unprepared, be the weather fair or foul. Accordingly, when the time arrived, they fired their guns, whooped, and danced, and sung–and continued firing their guns before them on the commencement of their route. The leading war-chief marched first, carrying their medicine bag, or budget of holy things. The rest followed in Indian file, at intervals of three or four paces behind each other, now and then chiming the war-whoop in concert.
They advanced in this order until they were out of sight and hearing of the village. As soon as they reached the deep woods, all became as silent as death. This silence they inculcate, that their ears may be quick to catch the least portent of danger.
Every one acquainted with the race, has remarked their intense keenness of vision. Their eyes, for acuteness, and capability of discerning distant objects, resemble those of the eagle or the lynx; and their cat-like tread among the grass and leaves, seems so light as scarcely to shake off the dew drops. Thus they advance on their expedition rapidly and in profound silence, unless some one of the party should relate that he has had an unpropitious dream When this happens, an immediate arrest is put upon the expedition, and the whole party face about, and return without any sense of shame or mortification. A whole party is thus often arrested by a single person; and their return is applauded by the tribe, as a respectful docility to the divine impulse, as they deem it, from the Great Spirit. These dreams are universally reverenced, as the warnings of the guardian spirits of the tribe. There is in that country a sparrow, of an uncommon species, and not often seen. This bird is called in the Shawnese dialect by a name importing “kind messenger,” which they deem always a true omen, whenever it appears, of bad news. They are exceedingly intimidated whenever this bird sings near them; and were it to perch and sing over their war-camp, the whole party would instantly disperse in consternation and dismay.
Every chief has his warrior, Etissu, or waiter, to attend on him and his party. This confidential personage has charge of every thing that is eaten or drank during the expedition. He parcels it out by rules of rigid abstemiousness. Though each warrior carries on his back all his travelling conveniences, and his food among the rest, yet, however keen the appetite sharpened by hunger, however burning the thirst, no one dares relieve his hunger or thirst, until his rations are dispensed to him by the Etissu.
Boone had occasion to have all these rites most painfully impressed on his memory; for he was obliged to conform to them with the rest. One single thought occupied his mind–to seize the right occasion to escape.
It was sometime before it offered. At length a deer came in sight. He had a portion of his unfinished breakfast in his hand. He expressed a desire to pursue the deer. The party consented. As soon as he was out of sight, he instantly turned his course towards Boonesborough. Aware that he should be pursued by enemies as keen on the scent as bloodhounds, he put forth his whole amount of backwoods skill, in doubling in his track, walking in the water, and availing himself of every imaginable expedient to throw them off his trail. His unfinished fragment of his breakfast was his only food, except roots and berries, during this escape for his life, through unknown forests and pathless swamps, and across numerous rivers, spreading in an extent of more than two hundred miles. Every forest sound must have struck his ear, as a harbinger of the approaching Indians.
No spirit but such an one as his, could have sustained the apprehension and fatigue. No mind but one guided by the intuition of instinctive sagacity, could have so enabled him to conceal his trail, and find his way. But he evaded their pursuit. He discovered his way. He found in roots, in barks, and berries, together with what a single shot of his rifle afforded, wherewith to sustain the cravings of nature. Travelling night and day, in an incredible short space of time he was in the arms of his friends at Boonesborough, experiencing a reception, after such a long and hopeless absence, as words would in vain attempt to portray.
CHAPTER X.
Six hundred Indians attack Boonesborough–Boone and Captain Smith go out to treat with the enemy under a flag of truce, and are extricated from a treacherous attempt to detain them as prisoners–Defence of the fort–The Indians defeated–Boone goes to North Carolina to bring bark his family.
It will naturally be supposed that foes less wary and intelligent, than those from whom Boone had escaped, after they had abandoned the hope of recapturing him, would calculate to find Boonesborough in readiness for their reception.
Boonesborough, though the most populous and important station in Kentucky, had been left by the abstraction of so many of the select inhabitants in the captivity of the Blue Licks, by the absence of Colonel Clarke in Illinois, and by the actual decay of the pickets, almost defenceless. Not long before the return of Boone, this important post had been put under the care of Major Smith, an active and intelligent officer. He repaired thither, and put the station, with great labor and fatigue, in a competent state of defence. Learning from the return of some of the prisoners, captured at the Blue Licks, the great blow which the Shawnese meditated against this station, he deemed it advisable to anticipate their movements, and to fit out an expedition to meet them on their own ground.–Leaving twenty young men to defend the place, he marched with thirty chosen men towards the Shawnese towns.
At the Blue Licks, a place of evil omen to Kentucky, eleven of the men, anxious for the safety of the families they had left behind and deeming their force too small for the object contemplated, abandoned the enterprise and retreated to the fort. The remaining nineteen, not discouraged by the desertion of their companions, heroically persevered. They crossed the Ohio to the present site of Cincinnati, on rafts. They then painted their faces, and in other respects assumed the guise and garb of savages, and marched upon the Indian towns.
When arrived within twenty miles of these towns they met the force with which Boone had set out. Discouraged by his escape, the original party had returned, had been rejoined by a considerable reinforcement, the whole amounting to two hundred and fifty men on horse-back, and were again on their march against Boonesborough. Fortunately, Major Smith and his small party discovered this formidable body before they were themselves observed. But instead of endeavoring to make good their retreat from an enemy so superior in numbers, and mounted upon horses, they fired upon them and killed two of their number. An assault so unexpected alarmed the Indians; and without any effort to ascertain the number of their assailants, they commenced a precipitate retreat. If these rash adventurers had stopped here, they might have escaped unmolested. But, flushed with this partial success, they rushed upon the retreating foe, and repeated their fire. The savages, restored to self-possession, halted in their turn, deliberated a moment, and turned upon the assailants. Major Smith, perceiving the imprudence of having thus put the enemy at bay, and the certainty of the destruction of his little force, if the Indians should perceive its weakness, ordered a retreat in time; and being considerably in advance of the foe, succeeded in effecting it without loss. By a rapid march during the night, in the course of the next morning they reached Boonesborough in safety.
Scarcely an hour after the last of their number had entered the fort, a body of six hundred Indians, in three divisions of two hundred each, appeared with standards and much show of warlike array, and took their station opposite the fort. The whole was commanded by a Frenchman named Duquesne. They immediately sent a flag requesting the surrender of the place, in the name of the king of Great Britain. A council was held, and contrary to the opinion of Major Smith, it was decided to pay no attention to the proposal. They repeated their flag of truce, stating that they had letters from the commander at Detroit to Colonel Boone. On this, it was resolved that Colonel Boone and Major Smith should venture out, and hear what they had to propose.
Fifty yards from the fort three chiefs met them with great parade, and conducted them to the spot designated for their reception, and spread a panther’s skin for their seat, while two other Indians held branches over their heads to protect them from the fervor of the sun. The chiefs then commenced an address five minutes in length, abounding in friendly assurances, and the avowal of kind sentiments. A part of the advanced warriors grounded their arms, and came forward to shake hands with them.
The letter from Governor Hamilton of Detroit was then produced, and read. It proposed the most favorable terms of surrender, provided the garrison would repair to Detroit. Major Smith assured them that the proposition seemed a kind one; but that it was impossible, in their circumstances, to remove their women and children to Detroit. The reply was that this difficulty should be removed, for that they had brought forty horses with them, expressly prepared for such a contingency.
In a long and apparently amicable interview, during which the Indians smoked with them, and vaunted their abstinence in not having killed the swine and cattle of the settlement, Boone and Smith arose to return to the fort, and make known these proposals, and to deliberate upon their decision. Twenty Indians accompanied their return as far as the limits stipulated between the parties allowed. The negotiators having returned, and satisfied the garrison that the Indians had no cannon, advised to listen to no terms, but to defend the fort to the last extremity. The inmates of the station resolved to follow this counsel.
In a short time the Indians sent in another flag, with a view, as they stated, to ascertain the result of the deliberations of the fort. Word was sent them, that if they wished to settle a treaty, a place of conference must be assigned intermediate between their camp and the fort. The Indians consented to this stipulation, and deputed thirty chiefs to arrange the articles, though such appeared to be their distrust, that they could not be induced to come nearer than eighty yards from the fort. Smith and Boone with four others were deputed to confer with them. After a close conference of two days, an arrangement was agreed upon, which contained a stipulation, that neither party should cross the Ohio, until after the terms had been decided upon by the respective authorities on either side. The wary heads of this negotiation considered these terms of the Indians as mere lures to beguile confidence.
When the treaty was at last ready for signature, an aged chief, who had seemed to regulate all the proceedings, remarked that he must first go to his people, and that he would immediately return, and sign the instrument. He was observed to step aside in conference with some young warriors. On his return the negotiators from the garrison asked the chief why he had brought young men in place of those who had just been assisting at the council? His answer was prompt and ingenious. It was, that he wished to gratify his young warriors, who desired to become acquainted with the ways of the whites. It was then proposed, according to the custom of both races, that the parties should shake hands. As the two chief negotiators, Smith and Boone, arose to depart, they were both seized from behind.
Suspicious of treachery, they had posted twenty-five men in a bastion, with orders to fire upon the council, as soon as they should see any marks of treachery or violence. The instant the negotiators were seized, the whole besieging force fired upon them, and the fire was as promptly returned by the men in the bastion. The powerful savages who had grasped Boone and Smith, attempted to drag them off as prisoners. The one who held Smith was compelled to release his grasp by being shot dead. Colonel Boone was slightly wounded. A second tomahawk, by which his skull would have been cleft asunder, he evaded, and it partially fell on Major Smith; but being in a measure spent, it did not inflict a dangerous wound. The negotiators escaped to the fort without receiving any other injury. The almost providential escape of Boone and Smith can only be accounted for by the confusion into which the Indians were thrown, as soon as these men were seized, and by the prompt fire of the men concealed in the bastion. Added to this, the two Indians who seized them were both shot dead, by marksmen who knew how to kill the Indians, and at the same time spare the whites, in whose grasp they were held.
The firing on both sides now commenced in earnest, and was kept up without intermission from morning dawn until dark. The garrison, at once exasperated and cheered by the meditated treachery of the negotiation and its result, derided the furious Indians, and thanked them for the stratagem of the negotiation, which had given them time to prepare the fort for their reception. Goaded to desperation by these taunts, and by Duquesne, who harangued them to the onset, they often rushed up to the fort, as if they purposed to storm it. Dropping dead under the cool and deliberate aim of the besieged, the remainder of the forlorn hope, raising a yell of fury and despair, fell back. Other infuriated bands took their place; and these scenes were often repeated, invariably with the same success, until both parties were incapable of taking aim on account of the darkness.
They then procured a quantity of combustible matter, set fire to it, and approached under covert of the darkness, so near the palisades as to throw the burning materials into the fort. But the inmates had availed themselves of the two days’ consultation, granted them by the treacherous foe, to procure an ample supply of water; and they had the means of extinguishing the burning faggots as they fell.
Finding their efforts to fire the fort ineffectual, they returned again to their arms, and continued to fire upon the station for some days. Taught a lesson of prudence, however, by what had already befallen them, they kept at such a cautious distance, as that their fire took little effect. A project to gain the place, more wisely conceived, and promising better success, was happily discovered by Colonel Boone. The walls of the fort were distant sixty yards from the Kentucky river. The bosom of the current was easily discernible by the people within. Boone discovered in the morning that the stream near the shore was extremely turbid. He immediately divined the cause.
The Indians had commenced a trench at the water level of the river bank, mining upwards towards the station, and intending to reach the interior by a passage under the wall. He took measures to render their project ineffectual, by ordering a trench to be cut inside the fort, across the line of their subterraneous passage. They were probably apprised of the countermine that was digging within, by the quantity of earth thrown over the wall. But, stimulated by the encouragement of their French engineer, they continued to advance their mine towards the wall, until, from the friability of the soil through which it passed, it fell in, and all their labor was lost. With a perseverance that in a good cause would have done them honor, in no wise discouraged by this failure to intermit their exertions, they returned again to their fire arms, and kept up a furious and incessant firing for some days, but producing no more impression upon the station than before.
During the siege, which lasted eight days, they proposed frequent parleys, requesting the surrender of the place, and professing to treat the garrison with the utmost kindness. They were answered, that they must deem the garrison to be still more brutally fools than themselves, to expect that they would place any confidence in the proposals of wretches who had already manifested such base and stupid treachery. They were bidden to fire on, for that their waste of powder and lead gave the garrison little uneasiness, and were assured that they could not hope the surrender of the place, while there was a man left within it. On the morning of the ninth day from the commencement of the siege, after having, as usual, wreaked their disappointed fury upon the cattle and swine, they decamped, and commenced a retreat.
No Indian expedition against the whites had been known to have had such a disastrous issue for them. During the siege, their loss was estimated by the garrison at two hundred killed, beside a great number wounded. The garrison, on the contrary, protected by the palisades, behind which they could fire in safety, and deliberately prostrate every foe that exposed himself near enough to become a mark, lost but two killed, and had six wounded.
After the siege, the people of the fort, to whom lead was a great object, began to collect the balls that the Indians had fired upon them. They gathered in the logs of the fort, beside those that had fallen to the ground, a hundred and twenty-five pounds. The failure of this desperate attempt, with such a powerful force, seems to have discouraged the Indians and their Canadian allies from making any further effort against Boonesborough. In the autumn of this season, Colonel Boone returned to North Carolina to visit his wife and family.
When he was taken at the Blue Licks, with his associates, who had returned, while he was left behind in a long captivity, during which no more news of him transpired than as if he were actually among the dead, the people of the garrison naturally concluded that he had been killed. His wife and family numbered him as among the dead; and often had they shuddered on the bare recurrence of some one to the probability of the tortures he had undergone. Deeply attached to him, and inconsolable, they could no longer endure a residence which so painfully reminded them of their loss. As soon as they had settled their minds to the conviction that their head would return to them no more, they resolved to leave these forests that had been so fatal to them, and return to the banks of the Yadkin, where were all their surviving connections. A family so respectable and dear to the settlement would not be likely to leave without having to overcome many tender and pressing solicitations to remain, and many promises that if they would, their temporal wants should be provided for.
To all this Mrs. Boone could only object, that Kentucky had indeed been to her, as its name imported, a dark and _Bloody Ground_. She had lost her eldest son by the savage fire before they had reached the country. Her daughter had been made a captive, and had experienced a forbearance from the Indians to her inexplicable. She would have been carried away to the savage towns, and there would have been forcibly married to some warrior, but for the perilous attempt, and improbable success of her father in recapturing her. Now the father himself, her affectionate husband, and the heroic defender of the family, had fallen a sacrifice, probably in the endurance of tortures on which the imagination dared not to dwell. Under the influence of griefs like these, next to the unfailing resource of religion, the heart naturally turns to the sympathy and society of those bound to it by the ties of nature and affinity. They returned to their friends in North Carolina.
It was nearly five years since this now desolate family had started in company with the first emigrating party of families, in high hopes and spirits, for Kentucky. We have narrated their disastrous rencounter with the Indians in Powell’s valley, and their desponding return to Clinch river. We have seen their subsequent return to Boonesborough, on Kentucky river. Tidings of the party thus far had reached the relatives of Mrs. Boone’s family in North Carolina; but no news from the country west of the Alleghanies had subsequently reached them. All was uncertain conjecture, whether they still lived, or had perished by famine, wild beasts, or the Indians.
At the close of the summer of 1778, the settlement on the Yadkin saw a company on pack horses approaching in the direction from the western wilderness. They had often seen parties of emigrants departing in that direction, but it was a novel spectacle to see one return from that quarter. At the head of that company was a blooming youth, scarcely yet arrived at the age of manhood. It was the eldest surviving son of Daniel Boone. Next behind him was a matronly woman, in weeds, and with a countenance of deep dejection. It was Mrs. Boone. Still behind was the daughter who had been a captive with the Indians. The remaining children were too young to feel deeply. The whole group was respectable in appearance, though clad in skins, and the primitive habiliments of the wilderness. It might almost have been mistaken for a funeral procession. It stopped at the house of Mr. Bryan, the father of Mrs. Boone.
The people of the settlement were not long in collecting to hear news from the west, and learn the fate of their former favorite, Boone, and his family. As Mrs. Boone, in simple and backwood’s phrase, related the thrilling story of their adventures, which needed no trick of venal eloquence to convey it to the heart, an abundant tribute of tears from the hearers convinced the bereaved narrator that true sympathy is natural to the human heart. As they shuddered at the dark character of many of the incidents related, it was an hour of triumph, notwithstanding their pity, for those wiser ones, who took care, in an under tone, to whisper that it might be remembered that they had predicted all that had happened.
CHAPTER XI.
A sketch of the character and adventures of several other pioneers–Harrod, Kenton, Logan, Ray, McAffee, and others.
Colonel Boone having seen the formidable invasion of Boonesborough successfully repelled, and with such a loss as would not be likely to tempt the Indians to repeat such assaults–and having thus disengaged his mind from public duties, resigned it to the influence of domestic sympathies. The affectionate husband and father, concealing the tenderest heart under a sun-burnt and care-worn visage, was soon seen crossing the Alleghanies in pursuit of his wife and children. The bright star of his morning promise had been long under eclipse; for this journey was one of continued difficulties, vexations, and dangers–so like many of his sufferings already recounted, that we pass them by, fearing the effect of incidents of so much monotony upon the reader’s patience. The frame and spirit of the western adventurer were of iron. He surmounted all, and was once more in the bosom of his family on the Yadkin, who, in the language of the Bible, hailed him as one _who had been dead and was alive again; who had been lost and was found_.
Many incidents of moment and interest in the early annals of Kentucky occurred during this reunion of Boone with his family. As his name is forever identified with these annals, we hope it will not be deemed altogether an episode if we introduce here a brief chronicle of those incidents–though not directly associated with the subject of our memoir. In presenting those incidents, we shall be naturally led to speak of some of the other patriarchs of Kentucky–all Boones in their way–all strangely endowed with that peculiar character which fitted them for the time, place, and achievements. We thus discover the foresight of Providence in the arrangement of means to ends. This is no where seen more conspicuously than in the characters of the founders of states and institutions.
During the absence of Colonel Boone, there was a general disposition in Kentucky to retaliate upon the Shawnese some of the injuries and losses which they had so often inflicted upon the infant settlement. Colonel Bowman, with a force of a hundred and sixty men, was selected to command the expedition; and it was destined against Old Chillicothe–the den where the red northern savages had so long concentrated their expeditions against the settlements south of the Ohio.
The force marched in the month of July, 1779, and reached its destination undiscovered by the Indians. A contest commenced with the Indians at early dawn, which lasted until ten in the morning. But, although Colonel Bowman’s force sustained itself with great gallantry, the numbers and concealment of the enemy precluded the chance of a victory. He retreated, with an inconsiderable loss, a distance of thirty miles. The Indians, collecting all their forces, pursued and overtook him. Another engagement of two hours ensued, more to the disadvantage of the Kentuckians than the former. Colonel Harrod proposed to mount a number of horse, and make a charge upon the Indians, who continued the fight with great fury. This apparently desperate measure was followed by the happiest results. The Indian front was broken, and their force thrown into irreparable confusion. Colonel Bowman, having sustained a loss of nine killed and one wounded, afterwards continued an unmolested retreat.
In June of the next year, 1780, six hundred Indians and Canadians, commanded by Colonel Bird, a British officer, attacked Riddle’s and Martin’s stations, at the forks of the Licking, with six pieces of cannon. They conducted this expedition with so much secrecy, that the