130 General Lewis marches down Kenhawa. 1774. commandant of Fort Dunmore, was such as to excite universal detestation, and at last to draw down upon his patron the reproof of Lord Dartmouth.* He seized property, and imprisoned white men without warrant or propriety; and we may be assured, in many cases beside that just mentioned, treated the natives with an utter disregard of justice. It is not then surprising that Indian attacks occurred along the frontiers from June to September; nor, on the other hand, need we wonder that the Virginians (against whóm, in distinction from the people of Pennsylvania, the war was carried on,) became more and more excited, and eager to repay the injuries received. To put a stop to these devastations, two large bodies of troops were gathering in Virginia; the one from the southern and western part of the State, under General Andrew Lewis, met at Camp Union, now Lewisburg, Greenbriar county, near the far-famed White Sulphur Springs; - the other from the northern and eastern counties was to be under the command of Dunmore himself, and descending the Ohio from Fort Pitt, was to meet Lewis' army at the mouth of the Great Kenhawa. The force under Lewis, amounting to eleven hundred men, commenced its march upon the 6th and 12th of September, and upon the 6th of October reached the spot agreed upon. As Lord Dunmore was not there, and as other troops were to follow down the Kenhawa under Colonel Christian, General Lewis despatched runners toward Pittsburgh to inform the Commander-in-chief of his arrival, and proceeded to encamp at the point where the two rivers meet. Here he remained until the 9th of October, when despatches from the Governor reached him informing him that the plan of the campaign was altered, that he (Dunmore) meant to proceed directly against the Shawanese towns. of the Scioto, and Lewis was ordered at once to cross the Ohio and meet the other army before those towns. But on the very day when this movement should have been executed, (October 10th,) the Indians in force, headed by the able and brave Chief of the Shawanese, Cornstalk, appeared before the army of Virginians, determined then and there to avenge past wrongs and cripple vitally the power of the invaders. Delawares, Iroquois, Wyandots, and Shawanese, under their most noted Chiefs, among whom was Logan, formed the army opposed to that of Lewis, and with both the struggle of that day was one of life or death. Soon after sunrise the presence of the savages was discovered; General * Am. Archives, 4th Series, i. 774. 1774. Battle of Point Pleasant. 131 Lewis ordered out his brother Colonel Charles Lewis and Colonel Fleming to reconnoitre the ground where they had been seen; this at once brought on the engagement. In a short time Colonel Lewis was killed, and Colonel Fleming disabled; the troops, thus left without Commanders, wavered, but Colonel Field with his regiment coming to the rescue, they again stood firm; - about noon Colonel Field was killed, and Captain Evan Shelby, (father of Isaac Shelby Governor of Kentucky in after time and who was then Lieutenant in his father's company,) took the command;and the battle still continued. It was now drawing toward evening and yet the contest raged without decided success for either party, when General Lewis ordered a body of men to gain the flank of the enemy by means of Crooked Creek, a small stream which runs into the Kenhawa about four hundred yards above its mouth. This was successfully done, and the result was the retreat of the Indians across the Ohio.* Lord Dunmore meanwhile, had descended the river from Fort Pitt, and was, at the time he sent word to Lewis of his change of plans, at the mouth of the Hocking, where he built a block-house, called Fort Gower, and remained until after the battle at the Point. Thence he marched on towards the Scioto, while Lewis and the remains of the army under his command strengthened by the troops under Colonel Christian, pressed forward in the same direction, elated by the hope of annihilating the Indian towns, and punishing the inhabitants for all they had done. But before reaching the enemy's country Dunmore was visited by Chiefs asking for peace; ‡ he listened to their request, and appointing a place where a treaty should be held, sent orders to Lewis to stop his march against the Shawanese towns; which orders, however, that officer did not obey, nor was it till the Governor visited his camp on Congo Creek near Westfall, that he would agree to give up an attempt upon the village of Old Chillicothe, which stood where Westfall now is. After this visit by Dunmore General Lewis felt himself bound, though unwillingly, to prepare for a bloodless retreat. The Commander-in-chief, however, remained for a time at Fort Border Warfare, 125. Doddridge, 230.-American Pioneer, i. 381. Letters in American Archives, fourth series, i. 808, 18, &c. &c. Thatcher's lives of Indians, ii. 168. + Border Warfare, 133. With them was one Elliott, probably Matthew Elliott, so noted in 1790 to 1795.American Pioneer, i. 18. | Whittlesey's Discourse, 1840-p. 24. 132 Affidavit of John Gibson, Esquire. 1775. Charlotte, upon Sippo Creek, about eight miles from the town of Westfall on the Scioto. There he met Cornstalk who, being satisfied of the futility of any further struggle, was determined to make peace, and arranged with the Governor the preliminaries of a treaty; and from this point Crawford was sent against a town of the Mingoes, who still continued hostile, and took several prisoners who were carried to Virginia, and were still in confinement in February, 1775. It was at this time though not at Camp Charlotte, for he would not go there, that Logan delivered his celebrated speech. In relation to this speech or message, the genuineness of which has been questioned, it may be worth while to record here the evidence of John Gibson,|| to whom it was given by Logan, and whose statement being undisputed seems to place the matter beyond cavil. Alleghany county, SS. Before me, the subscriber, a justice of the peace in and for said county, personally appeared John Gibson, Esquire, an Associate Judge of the same county, who being duly sworn, deposeth and saith, that in the year 1774, he accompanied Lord Dunmore on the expedition against the Shawanese and other Indians on the Sciota; that on their arrival within fifteen miles of the towns, they were met by a flag, and a white man by the name of Elliott, who informed Lord Dunmore that the Chiefs of the Shawanese had sent to request his Lordship to halt his army and send in some person, who understood their language; that this deponent, at the request of Lord Dunmore and the whole of the officers with him, went in; that on his arrival at the towns, Logan, the Indian, came to where this deponent was sitting with the Cornstalk, and the other Chiefs of the Shawanese, and asked him to walk out with him; that they went into a copse of wood, where they sat down, when Logan, after shedding abundance of tears, delivered to him the speech, nearly as related by Mr. Jefferson in his Notes on the State of Virginia; that he the deponent told him then that it was not Colonel Cresap who had murdered his relations, and that although his son Captain Michael Cresap was with the party who killed a Shawanese Chief and other * American Pioneer, i. 331. + American Archives, fourth series, i. 1222. Border Warfare, 137.-American Archives, fourth series, ii. 1189. See, very lately, Brown's History of Illinois, p. 25; also, American Pioneer, i. vol. Index. This gentleman was (nominal) Secretary of Indiana Territory under General Harrison. See account by John Johnson, in Cist's Cincinnati Miscellany, ii. 305. 1775. Close of the war with the Indian tribes. 133 Indians, yet he was not present when his relations were killed at Baker's near the mouth of Yellow Creek on the Ohio; that this deponent on his return to camp delivered the speech to Lord Dunmore; and that the murders perpetrated as above, were considered as ultimately the cause of the war of 1774, commonly called Cresap's war. JOHN GIBSON. Sworn and subscribed the 4th of April, 1800, at Pittsburgh, before me, JER. BAKER.* Thus in November was the war of 1774, known as Dunmore's, Logan's, or Cresap's war, terminated; the Shawanese agreeing not to hunt south of the Ohio, nor molest travellers. It was very much to the dissatisfaction of the Virginians that it ended as it did, as no efficient blow had been struck, and as the conduct of the Governor could not well be explained by the frontier men except by supposing him to act with reference to the expected contest of England and her colonies, a motive which the colonists. naturally regarded as little less than treasonable. And here we wish to notice a statement given as a curious instance of historical puzzles by Mr. Whittlesey, in his address before the Ohio Historical Society, delivered in 1841, at page 28.|| In 1831, a steam boat was detained a few hours near the house of Mr. Curtis, on the Ohio, a short distance above the mouth of the Hockhocking, and General Clark§ came ashore. He inquired respecting the remains of a Fort or encampment at the mouth of the Hock hocking river, as it is now called. He was told that there was evidence of a clearing of several acres in extent, and that pieces of guns and muskets had been found on the spot; and also, that a collection of several hundred bullets had been discovered on the bank of the Hockhocking, about twenty-five miles up the river. General Clark then stated, that the ground had been occupied as a camp by Lord Dunmore, who came American Pioneer, p. 18. + American Archives, fourth series, i. 1170. When Lord Dunmore retired he left an hundred men at the mouth of the Great Kenhawa, a few at Fort Dunmore (Pittsburgh,) and some at Fort Fincastle (Wheeling.) These were dismissed as the prospect of renewed war ceased. Lord Dunmore was to have returned to Pittsburgh in the spring, to meet the Indians and form a definite peace, but the Revolutionary movements prevented. The Mingoes were not parties to the peace of Fort Charlotte.-(American Archives, ii. 1189.) The frontier men, or many of them, thought, as we have said, that Dunmore's conduct was outrageous, but that such was not the universal feeling in Virginia may be seen by reference to American Archives, fourth series, ii. 170, 301. &c. Expedition of Lord Dunmore, from p. 28, to 29. § An eminent citizen of Missouri, a brother of General George Rogers Clark, of Ky. 134 Battle of Lexington on the 19th of April. 1775. down the Kenhawa with 300 men in the spring of 1775, with the expectation of treating with the Indians here. The Chiefs not making their appearance, the march was continued up the river twenty-five or thirty miles, where an express from Virginia overtook the party. That evening a council was held and lasted very late at night. In the morn ing the troops were disbanded, and immediately requested to enlist in the British service for a stated period. The contents of the despatches had not transpired when this proposition was made. A major of militia by the name of McCarty, made au harrangue to the men against enlisting, which seems to have been done in an eloquent and effectual manner. He referred to the condition of the public mind in the colonies, and the probability of a revolution, which must soon arrive. He represented the suspicious circumstances of the express, which was still a secret to the troops, and that appearances justified the conclusion, that they were required to enlist in a service against their own countrymen, their own kindred, their own homes. The consequence was, that but few of the men re-enlisted, and the majority, choosing the orator as a leader, made the best of their way to Wheeling. The news brought out by the courier proved to be an account of the opening combat of the Revolution at Lexington, Massachusetts, April 20, 1775. General Clark stated that himself (or his brother,) was in the expedition. Lord Dunmore is said to have returned to Virginia by way of the Kenhawa river. There are very few historical details sustained by better authority than the above relation. Desirous of reconciling this statement with history, I addressed a letter to General Clark, requesting an explanation, but his death, which happened soon after, prevented a reply.* This we know cannot be true in the form in which it is stated. The battle of Lexington was on April 19th; on April 21st Lord Dunmore removed the powder from the public storehouse at Williamsburg on board a King's vessel, and was thenceforward at Williamsburg. June 5th he informs the Assembly that he had meant to go West and look after Indian matters, but had been too busy. It is one of many instances showing how sceptical we should be where a single person testifies, and especially from memory. Among those who had been engaged in Dunmore's war, as scouts or soldiers, were Daniel Boone, James Harrod, and others of the early explorers of Kentucky; after the peace these naturally turned their attention again to the rich valleys they had visited. * Lord Dunmore's Expedition, pp. 28, 29. + American Archives, fourth series, ii. 1189, &c. |