OF
FROM
Logstown to Pickawillany
A.
D. 1752.
NOW PUBLISHED FOR THE FIRST TIME FROM A COPY IN THE ARCHIVES OF
THE WESTERN RESERVE HISTORICAL SOCIETY, CLEVELAND, OHIO,
TOGETHER WITH LETTERS OF
GOVERNOR ROBERT DINWIDDIE
AN
HISTORICAL NOTICE OF THE MIAMI CONFEDERACY OF
INDIANS. A SKETCH OF THE ENGLISH POST
AT PICKAWILLANY
WITH
A Short Biography of Captain Trent
AND OTHER PAPERS NEVER BEFORE PRINTED
______________________
EDITED
BY
ALFRED T. GOODMAN
Secretary W. R. Historical Society
______________________
C I
N C I N N A T I
PRINTED BY ROBERT CLARKE & CO., FOR WILLIAM DODGE
1871.
Goodman, Alfred T., ed.
Journal of Captain William Trent
pp. 84-93.
84 |
Captain Trent to Governor Dinwiddie. |
Colonel James Patten,* your Honor's commissioners, appointed to deliver His Majesty's present to the Indians at Logstown, to proceed with a present to the Twightwees. An account of that whole affair I beg leave to lay before you, which will appear in the following sheets.
|
"I am your Honor's
|
______
A
JOURNAL OF CAPTAIN WILLIAM TRENT TO THE
TWIGHTWEE [MIAMI] INDIANS, 1752.
June the 21st, 1752. We left the Logstown.
25th. We met a white man who had been thirteen days from the Pick town; he informed us that the French Indians had been there, and that twenty-five families of the Picks or Twightwees had gone back with them to the French.
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esteemed an active, useful, and energetic officer. He commanded a regiment of Virginia volunteers in the French and English war, 1755-1763.
* James Patten resided in Augusta County, Virginia. He was a man of prominence among the frontier settlers, and frequently held positions of trust and profit. As early as 1742, he was employed by Virginia in negotiating with the Indians.
Pickawillany, on Evans' map, 17 55, located on west bank of Loramies creek, at its mouth. By map, the distance from Logstown to Pickawillany was 326 miles; from Wills creek, 456 miles.
Goodman, Alfred T., ed.
Journal of Captain William Trent
pp. 84-93.
|
Captain Trent to Governor Dinwiddie. |
85 |
27th. We met a Mingoe* man called Powell, who had been then just twenty days from Fort D'Troit,Ý and ten days before he left the fort three hundred French and Indians had set off, either to persuade the Twightwees back to the French, else to cut them off.
29th. We got to Muskingum,ý 150 miles from the Logstown, where we met some white men from Hockhocken,§ who told us the town was taken and all the white men killed, the young Shawanees king having made his escape and brought the news.
July the 2d. We reached Hockhocken where we met with William Ives, who passed by the Twightwee town in the night. He informed us that the white men's houses were all on fire, and that he heard no noise in the fort, only one gun fired, and two or three hollows.
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* The Mingoes were a branch of the Senecas. They came from Western Pennsylvania and located in Northeast and Eastern Ohio. Their principal town was called Mingo Bottom, on the site of Steubenville, Ohio. They were called the " Iroquois of Ohio."
Ý Detroit. Sieur De l'Hut erected a fort there in 1685, which was rebuilt in 1701 by M. de Cadillac and called Fort Ponchartrain.
ý Mingo town on the north bank of the Tuscarawas, five miles east of the mouth of White Woman's creek, in what is now Coshocton county. In 1751 it contained about one hundred families. Boquet was there in 1764, and Colonel Brodhead led an expedition against it in 1780. The distance from Logstown to Muskingum by the Indian trail was 122 miles.
§ The name Hock-hock-ing signifies a bottle. The town was a small place, containing a few Delaware families. The French at one time had a trading post there, called "Margaret's Fort."
Goodman, Alfred T., ed.
Journal of Captain William Trent
pp. 84-93.
86 |
Captain Trent to Governor Dinwiddie. |
3d. We got to the Meguck,* where we heard much the same news, which made us conclude to go to the lower Shawanees townÝ with the goods, that we might know the certainty.
6th. We arrived at the lower Shawanees town, where the Indians received us very kindly, with the firing of guns, and whooping and hollowing, according to their custom, and conducted us to the long house (the council house), where, after they had given us victuals, they inquired the news; we told them the next day we would let them know everything. Then Thomas Burney and Andrew McBryer,ý the only two men that escaped, when the town was attacked, came to us and told us that 240 French and Indians, on the 21st of June, about nine o'clock in the morning, surprised the Indians in the cornfields,§ and that they came so suddenly
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* A Delaware town of ten families, fifteen miles southwest of Hockhocken.
Ý There were two towns of this name, both on the Scioto. One was at the mouth of the river, the other somewhere in the neighbor hood of Columbus. Trails from both led to Pickawillany. In 1751 the town at the mouth of the Scioto contained 300 warriors, and 100 houses, besides a state house or council room 90 feet long. It was to this town that Captain Trent proceeded after leaving Meguck.
ý Traders.
§ The Miamis cultivated extensive fields of maize. Their houses were always well supplied with this valuable article of food.
Goodman, Alfred T., ed.
Journal of Captain William Trent
pp. 84-93.
|
Captain Trent to Governor Dinwiddie. |
87 |
on them that the white men, who were in their houses, had the utmost difficulty to reach the fort. Three not being able to get to the fort shut themselves up in one of the houses. At this time there were but twenty men and boys in the fort, including the white men. The French and Indians having taken possession of the white men's houses, some of which were within ten yards of the fort, they kept a smart fire on the fort till the afternoon, and had taken the three white men who had shut themselves up in one of the houses. Though they had plenty of arms and ammunition in the house, they could not be prevailed upon by the white men and Indians in the fort to fire a gun, though they encouraged them as much as possible, but as soon as they were taken told how many white men were in the fort. The French and Indians in the afternoon let the Twightwees know that if they would deliver up the white men that were in the fort, they would break up the siege and go home. After a consultation it was agreed by the Indians and whites that as there were so few men, and no water in the fort, it was better to deliver up the white men, with beaver and wampum, to the Indians not to hurt them, than for the fort to be taken, and all to be at their mercy. The white men were delivered up accordingly, except Burney and Andrew, whom the Indians hid. One of the white men that was wounded in the belly, as soon as they got him they stabbed and scalped, and took out his heart
Goodman, Alfred T., ed.
Journal of Captain William Trent
pp. 84-93.
88 |
Captain Trent to Governor Dinwiddie. |
and eat it. Upon receiving the white men they delivered up all the Indian women they had prisoners, and set off with the plunder they got out of the white men's houses, amounting to about three thousand pounds. They killed one Englishman and took six prisoners, one Mingoe and one Shawanees killed, and three Twightwees; one of them, the old Pianguisha* king, called by the English Old Britain,Ý who, for his attachment to the English, they boiled, and eat him all up.ý
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* A tribe of the Miamis who dwelt upon the Wabash. The name has been variously spelled- Peanguichas, Peanguishas, Pianguishaws, Piankashaws, Piankeshaws, Piankeshas, etc.
Ý He was the principal man, or commander in chief of the Miamis. His terrible fate was in revenge for the conduct of the Piankeshaws during the winter of 1751-2, when they killed and scalped eight French soldiers near Fort Miami, and took four negro slaves prisoner in the Illinois country. The bitter enmity of the French was doubtless increased from the fact that the governor of Virginia had recently offered a high price for "Canadian scalps."
ý When the French first visited the Iroquois, one of the customs of that confederacy was to "roast and eat'' prisoners taken in battle. This barbarous treatment was common in the Northern tribes, and continued until a comparatively late day, vide the following extracts from a letter dated at Detroit, published in the Newport (R. I.) Mercury, July 9, 1763:
"Was it not very agreeable every day to know of the cutting, and carving, and boiling, and eating of our companions? They boiled and eat Sir Robert Davers, and we are informed by Mr. Pauley, who escaped the other day, that he had seen an Indian with the skin of Captain Robertson's arm for a tobacco pouch!'
Goodman, Alfred T., ed.
Journal of Captain William Trent
pp. 84-93.
|
Captain Trent to Governor Dinwiddie. |
89 |
7th. Scaruneate, with some more of the Six Nations,* came to us in the morning and asked us if we would go with them, in order to bring the remaining Twightwees this way; we told them that we would; then we went to the long house and showed them our belts, and speeches with each belt. Then the ShawaneesÝ that had been at the Twightwees produced the wampum they brought, on a large black belt, with a scalp tied to the end of it,ý with this speech:
" BROTHERS: We have struck the French, and we expect that all nations in alliance with us will do the same."
The next was a string of black wampum from the captains and warriors of the Twightwees to the captains and warriors of all nations in alliance with them,
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* This powerful confederacy was formed in 1539, by a union of the Mohawks, Onondagas, Oneidas, Senecas, and Cayugas. In 1712 they were reinforced by the Tuscaroras, and from that time were known as the Six Nations.
Ý The Shawanees originally belonged south of the Ohio. Having suffered severely from the Cherokees and Chickasaws, they were invited by the Miamis to their country along the Scioto, but were dispersed by the Iroquois in 1672. They then separated, a portion moving to Carolina and others to Pennsylvania. A few remained in Ohio. About the year 1728, they returned to the Scioto. During the French and English war, 1755-1763, they were active allies of the French. In the Revolutionary was they sided with the British, and were bitterly hostile in the Indian wars which followed.
ý This signifies the nation was at war and had suffered loss.
Goodman, Alfred T., ed.
Journal of Captain William Trent
pp. 84-93.
90 |
Captain Trent to Governor Dinwiddie. |
letting them know that they put their women and children under their care; that inasmuch as they expect that they would all assist them, and that they had not forgot the league betwixt them.
The next was a large white belt* that the Six Nations had sent them upon their first being friends, which was to let them know the situation they were in was bad, and that they should move from the fort with their own people, or the Six Nations, whoever should come first, that they might be in a place of safety; but back with the French they never would go. They also let them know that in the time of the battle the French and Indians called to them, and told them they were dead, whether they killed them or no, for the English and Six Nations would put them all to death; upon which they made them this answer: "You are liars! You have killed of us all, and we'll be revenged."Ý
July 12th. We left the lower Shawanees town with twenty-two men and boys, whites, and Indians, instead of above a hundred, which we expected, occasioned by a quantity of liquorý coming to town. The chief we had belonged to the Six Nations.
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* An emblem of peace and friendship.
Ý The Indian were good swearers. That branch of the English tongue they learned to perfection from the traders.
ý All Indians, male and female, are exceedingly fond of rum, and will get drunk whenever they can secure it.
Goodman, Alfred T., ed.
Journal of Captain William Trent
pp. 84-93.
|
Captain Trent to Governor Dinwiddie. |
91 |
19th. We lay about twenty miles this side the Pick town. Before we took up we heard three guns. We sent some young men out to discover who they were, but they returned without finding anybody. About midnight some of our people that were awake heard a hollow and two whistles; they waked us, and we lay awake the rest of the night, with our guns in our hands.
20th. We sent two men off in the morning to view the town; they met us about five miles on this side of the town and told us that it was deserted, and that there were two French flags flying. We went to the town, unloaded our horses and turned them into the cornfields, and hoisted the English colors; we sent out people to track which way they were gone; they found where two men, the day before, had been sitting in the cornfields, which we suppose to be some of the enemy watching the fort. They found the people's s tracks down the creek, one part of which had taken through the woods, for the lower Shawanees town, and the rest had gone towards their own people. We got water in the fort, and secured two of the fort gates; the other we left open for our people to go in and out at. A little after dark we heard three guns fired along the French road, upon which we sent four young men out to scout about the edge of the woods, to see what they could discover, and the rest of us kept awake all night, at the fort gate, with our guns in our hands.
Goodman, Alfred T., ed.
Journal of Captain William Trent
pp. 84-93.
92 |
Captain Trent to Governor Dinwiddie. |
21st. In the morning we tied up part of the skins that were left in the fort, and lent the man whom the skins belonged to our riding horses to bring them off. We sent some people out along the French road,* but they returned without discovering any of the enemy. They found a blue jacket and a shirt stabbed in six or seven places, all bloody, which we suppose belonged to some of the Indians that were killed. About noon we set off upon the people's track down the creek. We went about seven miles, and then took up in order to kill meat, having no provisions but what we killed.
29th. We reached the Shawanees town after a very tiresome and tedious journey, having then carried the goods between six and seven hundred miles, the weather the hottest that ever was known in these parts, many of the Indian dogs dropping dead as they were hunting; the runs and creeks were so dry, that we were almost perished for want of water, having traveled one day two and twenty miles without a drop. After we had refreshed ourselves we went to see the Twightwees, and found that the young Pianguisha king, Musheguanockque, or the Turtle,Ý, two more men, Old Britain's wife
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*Trail leading to Fort Miami, at the junction of the Maumee and St. Joseph rivers, near where Fort Wayne (Ind.) now stands.
Ý A Miami chief of this name led the Indians at Hardin's and Wyllys' defeats in Harmar's campaign, 1790, and also at St. Clair's defeat the following year.
Goodman, Alfred T., ed.
Journal of Captain William Trent
pp. 84-93.
|
Captain Trent to Governor Dinwiddie. |
93 |
and son,* with about a dozen women and their children, were come this way.
August 4th. When the six CherokeesÝ were coming into town, the Shawanees sent for us to the place they had made to receive them. After we had been there some time they hoisted a suit of French colors, which the French had given to Nucheconner.ý I got up and told them that I looked upon the hoisting them colors as an affront to his Majesty, the King of Great Britain, and as I was doing the King's business, I could hear no councils under them, upon which Mr. Montour and myself got up and went away. As soon as an Indian, called the Blue Shadow,§ understood it, he struck them, and throwed them away as far as he could throw them.
"Brothers, the Twightwees: We present you with this string of wampum to wash away the blood, and to take
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* Called Ellonagoa Pyangeacha. At the council at Carlisle, October 3, 1753, the wife of Old Britain" thus referred to her son: "Remember, brethren, that my husband took a fast hold of the chain of friendship subsisting between your nations. Therefore, I now deliver up his child into your care and protection, and desire you would take care of him, and remember the alliance his father was in with you, and not forget his friendship, but continue kind to his child."
Ý The Cherokees resided south of the Ohio, to the west of the Carolinas, and, in 1752, numbered about 2,500 warriors.
ý King of the Shawanees.
§ A Cherokee chief.
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