The Winning of the West, Volume Four | Page 8

Indian warriors more
numerous than had ever yet appeared on any single field.
The United States Government Driven to War.
The newly created Government of the United States was very reluctant
to make formal war on the northwestern Indians. Not only were
President Washington and the National Congress honorably desirous of
peace, but they were hampered for funds, and dreaded any extra
expense. Nevertheless they were forced into war. Throughout the years
1789 and 1790 an increasing volume of appeals for help came from the
frontier countries. The governor of the Northwestern Territory, the
brigadier-general of the troops on the Ohio, the members of the
Kentucky Convention, and all the county lieutenants of Kentucky, the
lieutenants of the frontier counties of Virginia proper, the
representatives from the counties, the field officers of the different
districts, the General Assembly of Virginia, all sent bitter complaints
and long catalogues of injuries to the President, the Secretary of War,
and the two Houses of Congress; complaints which were redoubled
after Harmar's failure. With heavy hearts the national authorities
prepared for war. [Footnote: American State Papers, IV., pp. 83, 94,
109, and III.]
Raid on the Marietta Settlements.
Their decision was justified by the redoubled fury of the Indian raids
during the early part of 1791. Among others the settlements near
Marietta were attacked, a day or two after the new year began, in bitter
winter weather. A dozen persons, including a woman and two children,
were killed, and five men were taken prisoners. The New England

settlers, though brave and hardy, were unused to Indian warfare. They
were taken completely by surprise, and made no effective resistance;
the only Indian hurt was wounded with a hatchet by the wife of a
frontier hunter in the employ of the company. [Footnote: "The
American Pioneer," II., 110. American State Papers, IV., 122.] There
were some twenty-five Indians in the attacking party; they were
Wyandots and Delawares, who had been mixing on friendly terms with
the settlers throughout the preceding summer, and so knew how best to
deliver the assault. The settlers had not only treated these Indians with
much kindness, but had never wronged any of the red race; and had
been lulled into a foolish feeling of security by the apparent good-will
of the treacherous foes. The assault was made in the twilight, on the
2nd of January, the Indians crossing the frozen Muskingum and
stealthily approaching a block-house and two or three cabins. The
inmates were frying meat for supper, and did not suspect harm, offering
food to the Indians; but the latter, once they were within doors, dropped
the garb of friendliness, and shot or tomahawked all save a couple of
men who escaped and the five who were made prisoners. The captives
were all taken to the Miami, or Detroit, and as usual were treated with
much kindness and humanity by the British officers and traders with
whom they came in contact. McKee, the British Indian agent, who was
always ready to incite the savages to war against the Americans as a
nation, but who was quite as ready to treat them kindly as individuals,
ransomed one prisoner; the latter went to his Massachusetts home to
raise the amount of his ransom, and returned to Detroit to refund it to
his generous rescuer. Another prisoner was ransomed by a Detroit
trader, and worked out his ransom in Detroit itself. Yet another was
redeemed from captivity by the famous Iroquois chief Brant, who was
ever a terrible and implacable foe, but a great-hearted and kindly victor.
The fourth prisoner died; while the Indians took so great a liking to the
fifth that they would not let him go, but adopted him into the tribe,
made him dress as they did, and, in a spirit of pure friendliness, pierced
his ears and nose. After Wayne's treaty he was released, and returned to
Marietta to work at his trade as a stone mason, his bored nose and slit
ears serving as mementos of his captivity.
Cincinnati Also Suffers.
The squalid little town of Cincinnati also suffered from the Indian war

parties in the spring of this year, [Footnote: "American Pioneer," II.,
149.] several of the townsmen being killed by the savages, who grew so
bold that they lurked through the streets at nights, and lay in ambush in
the gardens where the garrison of Fort Washington raised their
vegetables. One of the Indian attacks, made upon a little palisaded
"station" which had been founded by a man named Dunlop, some
seventeen miles from Cincinnati, was noteworthy because of an act of
not uncommon cruelty by the Indians. In the station there were some
regulars. Aided by the settlers they beat back their foes; whereupon the
enraged savages brought one of their prisoners within ear-shot of the