BOUQUET FORCES THE DELAWARES AND SHAWANOES TO SUE FOR PEACE.
The work of ravage had begun afresh upon the borders. The Indians had taken the precaution to remove all their settlements to the western side of the River Muskingum, trusting that the impervious forests, with their unnumbered streams, would prove a sufficient barrier against invasion. Having thus, as they thought, placed their women and children in safety, they had flung themselves upon the settlements with all the rage and ferocity of the previous season. So fierce and active were the war-parties on the borders, that the English governor of Pennsylvania had recourse to a measure which the frontier inhabitants had long demanded, and issued a proclamation, offering a high bounty for Indian scalps, whether of men or women; a barbarous expedient, fruitful of butcheries and murders, but incapable of producing any decisive result.[422]
419
A Map of the Country on the Ohio & Muskingum Rivers Shewing the Situation of the Indian Towns with respect to the Army under the Command of Colonel Bouquet By Tho.s Hutchins Afs. Engineer.
Larger.
Early in the season, a soldier named David Owens, who, several years before, had deserted and joined the Indians, came to one of the outposts, accompanied by a young provincial recently taken prisoner on the Delaware, and bringing five scalps. While living among the Indians, Owens had formed a connection with one of their women, who had borne him several children. Growing tired, at length, of the forest life, he had become anxious to return to the settlements, but feared to do so without first having made some atonement for his former desertion. One night, he had been encamped on the Susquehanna, with four Shawanoe warriors, a boy of the same tribe, his own wife and two children, and another Indian woman. The young provincial, who came with him to the settlements, was also of the party. In the middle of the night, Owens arose, and looking about him saw, by the dull glow of the camp-fire, that all were buried in deep sleep. Cautiously awakening the young provincial, he told him to leave the place, and lie quiet at a little distance, until he should call him. He next stealthily removed the weapons from beside the sleeping savages, and concealed them in the woods, reserving to himself two loaded rifles. Returning to the camp, he knelt on the ground between two of the yet unconscious warriors, and, pointing a rifle at the head of each, touched the triggers, and shot both dead at once. Startled by the reports, the survivors sprang to their feet in bewildered terror. The two remaining warriors bounded into the woods; but the women and children, benumbed with fright, had no power to escape, and one and all died shrieking under the hatchet of the miscreant. His devilish work complete, the wretch sat watching until daylight among the dead bodies of his children and comrades, undaunted by the awful422 gloom and solitude of the darkened forest. In the morning, he scalped his victims, with the exception of the two children, and, followed by the young white man, directed his steps towards the settlements, with the bloody trophies of his atrocity. His desertion was pardoned; he was employed as an interpreter, and ordered to accompany the troops on the intended expedition. His example is one of many in which the worst acts of Indian ferocity have been thrown into shade by the enormities of white barbarians.[423]
Bouquet was now urging on his preparations for his march into the valley of the Ohio. We have seen how, in the preceding summer, he had been embarrassed by what he calls “the unnatural obstinacy of the government of Pennsylvania.” “It disables us,” he had written to the equally indignant Amherst, “from crushing the savages on this side of the lakes, and may draw us into a lingering war, which might have been terminated by another blow.... I see that the whole burden of this war will rest upon us; and while the few regular troops you have left can keep the enemy at a distance, the Provinces will let them fight it out without interfering.”[424]
Amherst, after vainly hoping that the Assembly of Pennsylvania would “exert themselves like men,”[425] had, equally in423 vain, sent Colonel James Robertson as a special messenger to the provincial commissioners. “I found all my pleading vain,” the disappointed envoy had written, “and believe Cicero’s would have been so. I never saw any men so determined in the right as these people are in this absurdly wrong resolve.”[426] The resolve in question related to the seven hundred men whom the Assembly had voted to raise for protecting the gathering of the harvest, and whom the commissioners stiffly refused to place at the disposition of the military authorities.
It is apparent in all this that, at an early period of the war, a change had come over the spirit of the commander-in-chief, whose prejudices and pride had revolted, at the outset, against the asking of provincial aid to “chastise the savages,” but who had soon been brought to reason by his own helplessness and the exigencies of the situation. In like manner, a change, though at the eleventh hour, had now come over the spirit of the Pennsylvania Assembly. The invasion of the Paxton borderers, during the past winter, had scared the Quaker faction into their senses. Their old quarrel with the governor and the proprietaries, their scruples about war, and their affection for Indians, were all postponed to the necessity of the hour. The Assembly voted to raise three hundred men to guard the frontiers, and a thousand to join Bouquet. Their commissioners went farther; for they promised to send to England for fifty couples of bloodhounds, to hunt Indian scalping-parties.[427]
In the preceding summer, half as many men would have sufficed; for, after the battle of Bushy Run, Bouquet wrote to Amherst from Fort Pitt, that, with a reinforcement of three hundred provincial rangers, he could destroy all the Delaware424 towns, “and clear the country of that vermin between this fort and Lake Erie;”[428] but he added, with some bitterness, that the provinces would not even furnish escorts to convoys, so that his hands were completely tied.[429]
It was past midsummer before the thousand Pennsylvanians were ready to move; so that the season for navigating the Ohio and its branches was lost. As for Virginia and Maryland, they would do absolutely nothing. On the fifth of August, Bouquet was at Carlisle, with his new levies and such regulars as he had, chiefly the veterans of Bushy Run. Before the tenth, two hundred of the Pennsylvanians had deserted, sheltered, as usual, by the country people. His force, even with full ranks, was too small; and he now took the responsibility of writing to Colonel Lewis, of the Virginia militia, to send him two hundred volunteers, to take the place of the deserters.[430] A body of Virginians accordingly joined him at Fort Pitt, to his great satisfaction, for he set a high value on these backwoods riflemen; but the responsibility he had assumed proved afterwards a source of extreme annoyance to him.
The little army soon reached Fort Loudon, then in a decayed and ruinous condition, like all the wooden forts built during the French war. Here Bouquet received the strange communication from Bradstreet, informing him that he might return home with his troops, as a treaty had been concluded with the Delawares and Shawanoes. Bouquet’s disgust found vent in a letter to the commander-in-chief: “I received this moment advice from Colonel Bradstreet.... The terms he gives them (the Indians) are such as fill me with astonishment.... Had Colonel Bradstreet been as well informed as425 I am of the horrid perfidies of the Delawares and Shawanese, whose parties as late as the 22d instant killed six men ... he never could have compromised the honor of the nation by such disgraceful conditions, and that at a time when two armies, after long struggles, are in full motion to penetrate into the heart of the enemy’s country. Permit me likewise humbly to represent to your Excellency that I have not deserved the affront laid upon me by this treaty of peace, concluded by a younger officer, in the department where you have done me the honor to appoint me to command, without referring the deputies of the savages to me at Fort Pitt, but telling them that he shall send and prevent my proceeding against them. I can therefore take no notice of his peace, but (shall) proceed forthwith to the Ohio, where I shall wait till I receive your orders.”[431]
After waiting for more than a week for his wrath to cool, he wrote to Bradstreet in terms which, though restrained and temperate, plainly showed his indignation.[432] He had now reached Fort Bedford, where more Pennsylvanians ran off, with their arms and horses, and where he vainly waited the arrival of a large reinforcement of friendly Indians, who had been promised by Sir William Johnson, but who never arrived. On reaching Fort Ligonier, he had the satisfaction of forwarding two letters, which the commander-in-chief had significantly sent through his hands, to Bradstreet, containing a peremptory disavowal of the treaty.[433] Continuing to advance, he passed in safety the scene of his desperate fight of426 the last summer, and on the seventeenth of September arrived at Fort Pitt, with no other loss than that of a few men picked off from the flanks and rear by lurking Indian marksmen.[434]
The day before his arrival, ten Delaware chiefs and warriors appeared on the farther bank of the river, pretending to be deputies sent by their nation to confer with the English commander. Three of them, after much hesitation, came over to the fort, where, being closely questioned, and found unable to give any good account of their mission, they were detained as spies; while their companions, greatly disconcerted, fled back to their villages. Bouquet, on his arrival, released one of the three captives, and sent him home with the following message to his people:—
“I have received an account, from Colonel Bradstreet, that your nations had begged for peace, which he had consented to grant, upon assurance that you had recalled all your warriors from our frontiers; and, in consequence of this, I would not have proceeded against your towns, if I had not heard that, in open violation of your engagements, you have since murdered several of our people.
“I was therefore determined to have attacked you, as a427 people whose promises can no more be relied on. But I will put it once more in your power to save yourselves and your families from total destruction, by giving us satisfaction for the hostilities committed against us. And, first, you are to leave the path open for my expresses from hence to Detroit; and as I am now to send two men with despatches to Colonel Bradstreet, who commands on the lakes, I desire to know whether you will send two of your people to bring them safe back with an answer. And if they receive any injury either in going or coming, or if the letters are taken from them, I will immediately put the Indians now in my power to death, and will show no mercy, for the future, to any of your nations that shall fall into my hands. I allow you ten days to have my letters delivered at Detroit, and ten days to bring me back an answer.”[435]
The liberated spy faithfully discharged his mission; and the firm, decisive tone of the message had a profound effect upon the hostile warriors; clearly indicating, as it did, with what manner of man they had to deal. Many, who were before clamorous for battle, were now ready to sue for peace, as the only means to avert their ruin.
Before the army was ready to march, two Iroquois warriors came to the fort, pretending friendship, but anxious, in reality, to retard the expedition until the approaching winter should make it impossible to proceed. They represented the numbers of the enemy, and the extreme difficulty of penetrating so rough a country; and affirmed that, if the troops remained quiet, the hostile tribes, who were already collecting their prisoners, would soon arrive to make their submission. Bouquet turned a deaf ear to their advice, and sent them to inform the Delawares and Shawanoes that he was on his way to chastise them for their perfidy and cruelty, unless they should save themselves by an ample and speedy atonement.
Early in October, the troops left Fort Pitt, and began their westward march into a wilderness which no army had ever before sought to penetrate. Encumbered with their camp equipage, with droves of cattle and sheep for subsistence, and a long train of pack-horses laden with provisions, their progress428 was tedious and difficult, and seven or eight miles were the ordinary measure of a day’s march. The woodsmen of Virginia, veteran hunters and Indian-fighters, were thrown far out in front and on either flank, scouring the forest to detect any sign of a lurking ambuscade. The pioneers toiled in the van, hewing their way through woods and thickets; while the army dragged its weary length behind them through the forest, like a serpent creeping through tall grass. The surrounding country, whenever a casual opening in the matted foliage gave a glimpse of its features, disclosed scenery of wild, primeval beauty. Sometimes the army defiled along the margin of the Ohio, by its broad eddying current and the bright landscape of its shores. Sometimes they descended into the thickest gloom of the woods, damp, still, and cool as the recesses of a cavern, where the black soil oozed beneath the tread, where the rough columns of the forest seemed to exude a clammy sweat, and the slimy mosses were trickling with moisture; while the carcasses of prostrate trees, green with the decay of a century, sank into pulp at the lightest pressure of the foot. More frequently, the forest was of a fresher growth; and the restless leaves of young maples and basswood shook down spots of sunlight on the marching columns. Sometimes they waded the clear current of a stream, with its vistas of arching foliage and sparkling water. There were intervals, but these were rare, when, escaping for a moment from the labyrinth of woods, they emerged into the light of an open meadow, rich with herbage, and girdled by a zone of forest; gladdened by the notes of birds, and enlivened, it may be, by grazing herds of deer. These spots, welcome to the forest traveller as an oasis to a wanderer in the desert, form the precursors of the prairies; which, growing wider and more frequent as one advances westward, expand at last into the boundless plains beyond the Mississippi.
On the tenth day after leaving Fort Pitt, the army reached the River Muskingum, and approached the objects of their march, the haunts of the barbarian warriors, who had turned whole districts into desolation. Their progress had met no interruption. A few skulking Indians had hovered about them, but, alarmed by their numbers, feared to venture an attack. The Indian cabins which they passed on their way were deserted429 by their tenants, who had joined their western brethren. When the troops crossed the Muskingum, they saw, a little below the fording-place, the abandoned wigwams of the village of Tuscaroras, recently the abode of more than a hundred families, who had fled in terror at the approach of the invaders.
Bouquet was in the heart of the enemy’s country. Their villages, except some remoter settlements of the Shawanoes, all lay within a few days’ march; and no other choice was left them than to sue for peace, or risk the desperate chances of battle against a commander who, a year before, with a third of his present force, had routed them at the fight of Bushy Run. The vigorous and active among them might, it is true, escape by flight; but, in doing so, they must abandon to the victors their dwellings, and their secret hordes of corn. They were confounded at the multitude of the invaders, exaggerated, doubtless, in the reports which reached their villages, and amazed that an army should force its way so deep into the forest fastnesses, which they had thought impregnable. They knew, on the other hand, that Colonel Bradstreet was still at Sandusky, in a position to assail them in the rear. Thus pressed on both sides, they saw that they must submit, and bend their stubborn pride to beg for peace; not alone with words, which cost nothing, and would have been worth nothing, but by the delivery of prisoners, and the surrender of chiefs and warriors as pledges of good faith. Bouquet had sent two soldiers from Fort Pitt with letters to Colonel Bradstreet; but these men had been detained, under specious pretexts, by the Delawares. They now appeared at his camp, sent back by their captors, with a message to the effect that, within a few days, the chiefs would arrive and hold a conference with him.
Bouquet continued his march down the valley of the Muskingum, until he reached a spot where the broad meadows, which bordered the river, would supply abundant grazing for the cattle and horses; while the terraces above, shaded by forest-trees, offered a convenient site for an encampment. Here he began to erect a small palisade work, as a depot for stores and baggage. Before the task was complete, a deputation of chiefs arrived, bringing word that their warriors were430 encamped, in great numbers, about eight miles from the spot, and desiring Bouquet to appoint the time and place for a council. He ordered them to meet him, on the next day, at a point near the margin of the river, a little below the camp; and thither a party of men was at once despatched, to erect a sort of rustic arbor of saplings and the boughs of trees, large enough to shelter the English officers and the Indian chiefs. With a host of warriors in the neighborhood, who would gladly break in upon them, could they hope that the attack would succeed, it behooved the English to use every precaution. A double guard was placed, and a stringent discipline enforced.
In the morning, the little army moved in battle order to the place of council. Here the principal officers assumed their seats under the canopy of branches, while the glittering array of the troops was drawn out on the meadow in front, in such a manner as to produce the most imposing effect on the minds of the Indians, in whose eyes the sight of fifteen hundred men under arms was a spectacle equally new and astounding. The perfect order and silence of the far-extended lines; the ridges of bayonets flashing in the sun; the fluttering tartans of the Highland regulars; the bright red uniform of the Royal Americans; the darker garb and duller trappings of the Pennsylvania troops, and the bands of Virginia backwoodsmen, who, in fringed hunting-frocks and Indian moccasons, stood leaning carelessly on their rifles,—all these combined to form a scene of military pomp and power not soon to be forgotten.
At the appointed hour, the deputation appeared. The most prominent among them were Kiashuta, chief of the band of Senecas who had deserted their ancient homes to form a colony on the Ohio; Custaloga, chief of the Delawares; and the head chief of the Shawanoes, whose name sets orthography at defiance. As they approached, painted and plumed in all their savage pomp, they looked neither to the right hand nor to the left, not deigning, under the eyes of their enemy, to cast even a glance at the military display around them. They seated themselves, with stern, impassive looks, and an air of sullen dignity; while their sombre brows betrayed the hatred still rankling in their hearts. After a few minutes had been431 consumed in the indispensable ceremony of smoking, Turtle Heart, a chief of the Delawares, and orator of the deputation, rose, bearing in his hand a bag containing the belts of wampum. Addressing himself to the English commander, he spoke as follows, delivering a belt for every clause of his speech:—
“Brother, I speak in behalf of the three nations whose chiefs are here present. With this belt I open your ears and your hearts, that you may listen to my words.
“Brother, this war was neither your fault nor ours. It was the work of the nations who live to the westward, and of our wild young men, who would have killed us if we had resisted them. We now put away all evil from our hearts; and we hope that your mind and ours will once more be united together.
“Brother, it is the will of the Great Spirit that there should be peace between us. We, on our side, now take fast hold of the chain of friendship; but, as we cannot hold it alone, we desire that you will take hold also, and we must look up to the Great Spirit, that he may make us strong, and not permit this chain to fall from our hands.
“Brother, these words come from our hearts, and not from our lips. You desire that we should deliver up your flesh and blood now captive among us; and, to show you that we are sincere, we now return you as many of them as we have at present been able to bring. [Here he delivered eighteen white prisoners, who had been brought by the deputation to the council.] You shall receive the rest as soon as we have time to collect them.”[436]
In such figurative terms, not devoid of dignity, did the Indian orator sue for peace to his detested enemies. When he had concluded, the chiefs of every tribe rose in succession, to express concurrence in what he had said, each delivering a432 belt of wampum and a bundle of small sticks; the latter designed to indicate the number of English prisoners whom his followers retained, and whom he pledged himself to surrender. In an Indian council, when one of the speakers has advanced a matter of weight and urgency, the other party defers his reply to the following day, that due time may be allowed for deliberation. Accordingly, in the present instance, the council adjourned to the next morning, each party retiring to its respective camp. But, when day dawned, the weather had changed. The valley of the Muskingum was filled with driving mist and rain, and the meeting was in consequence postponed. On the third day, the landscape brightened afresh, the troops marched once more to the place of council, and the Indian chiefs convened to hear the reply of their triumphant foe. It was not of a kind to please them. The opening words gave an earnest of what was to come; for Bouquet discarded the usual address of an Indian harangue: fathers, brothers, or children,—terms which imply a relation of friendship, or a desire to conciliate,—and adopted a sterner and more distant form.
“Sachems, war-chiefs, and warriors,[437] the excuses you have offered are frivolous and unavailing, and your conduct is without defence or apology. You could not have acted as you pretend to have done through fear of the western nations; for, had you stood faithful to us, you knew that we would have protected you against their anger; and as for your young men, it was your duty to punish them, if they did amiss. You have drawn down our just resentment by your violence and perfidy. Last summer, in cold blood, and in a time of profound peace, you robbed and murdered the traders, who had come among you at your own express desire. You attacked Fort Pitt, which was built by your consent; and you destroyed433 our outposts and garrisons, whenever treachery could place them in your power. You assailed our troops—the same who now stand before you—in the woods at Bushy Run; and, when we had routed and driven you off, you sent your scalping-parties to the frontier, and murdered many hundreds of our people. Last July, when the other nations came to ask for peace, at Niagara, you not only refused to attend, but sent an insolent message instead, in which you expressed a pretended contempt for the English; and, at the same time, told the surrounding nations that you would never lay down the hatchet. Afterwards, when Colonel Bradstreet came up Lake Erie, you sent a deputation of your chiefs, and concluded a treaty with him; but your engagements were no sooner made than broken; and, from that day to this, you have scalped and butchered us without ceasing. Nay, I am informed that, when you heard that this army was penetrating the woods, you mustered your warriors to attack us, and were only deterred from doing so when you found how greatly we outnumbered you. This is not the only instance of your bad faith; for, since the beginning of the last war, you have made repeated treaties with us, and promised to give up your prisoners; but you have never kept these engagements, nor any others. We shall endure this no longer; and I am now come among you to force you to make atonement for the injuries you have done us. I have brought with me the relatives of those you have murdered. They are eager for vengeance, and nothing restrains them from taking it but my assurance that this army shall not leave your country until you have given them an ample satisfaction.
“Your allies, the Ottawas, Ojibwas, and Wyandots, have begged for peace; the Six Nations have leagued themselves with us; the great lakes and rivers around you are all in our possession, and your friends the French are in subjection to us, and can do no more to aid you. You are all in our power, and, if we choose, we can exterminate you from the earth; but the English are a merciful and generous people, averse to shed the blood even of their greatest enemies; and if it were possible that you could convince us that you sincerely repent of your past perfidy, and that we could depend on your good behavior for the future, you might yet hope for mercy and434 peace. If I find that you faithfully execute the conditions which I shall prescribe, I will not treat you with the severity you deserve.
“I give you twelve days from this date to deliver into my hands all the prisoners in your possession, without exception: Englishmen, Frenchmen, women, and children; whether adopted into your tribes, married, or living among you under any denomination or pretence whatsoever. And you are to furnish these prisoners with clothing, provisions, and horses, to carry them to Fort Pitt. When you have fully complied with these conditions, you shall then know on what terms you may obtain the peace you sue for.”
This speech, with the stern voice and countenance of the speaker, told with chilling effect upon the awe-stricken hearers. It quelled their native haughtiness, and sunk them to the depths of humiliation. Their speeches in reply were dull and insipid, void of that savage eloquence, which, springing from a wild spirit of independence, has so often distinguished the forest orators. Judging the temper of their enemies by their own insatiable thirst for vengeance, they hastened, with all the alacrity of terror, to fulfil the prescribed conditions, and avert the threatened ruin. They dispersed to their different villages, to collect and bring in the prisoners; while Bouquet, on his part, knowing that his best security for their good faith was to keep up the alarm which his decisive measures had created, determined to march yet nearer to their settlements. Still following the course of the Muskingum, he descended to a spot near its confluence with its main branch, which might be regarded as a central point with respect to the surrounding Indian villages. Here, with the exception of the distant Shawanoe settlements, they were all within reach of his hand, and he could readily chastise the first attempt at deceit or evasion. The principal chiefs of each tribe had been forced to accompany him as hostages.[438]
435
For the space of a day, hundreds of axes were busy at their work. The trees were felled, the ground cleared, and, with marvellous rapidity, a town sprang up in the heart of the wilderness, martial in aspect and rigorous in discipline; with storehouses, hospitals, and works of defence, rude sylvan cabins mingled with white tents, and the forest rearing its sombre rampart around the whole. On one side of this singular encampment was a range of buildings, designed to receive the expected prisoners; and matrons, brought for this purpose with the army, were appointed to take charge of the women and children among them. At the opposite side, a canopy of branches, sustained on the upright trunks of young trees, formed a rude council-hall, in keeping with the savage assembly for whose reception it was designed.
And now, issuing from the forest, came warriors, conducting troops of prisoners, or leading captive children,—wild young barbarians, born perhaps among themselves, and scarcely to be distinguished from their own. Yet, seeing the sullen reluctance which the Indians soon betrayed in this ungrateful task, Bouquet thought it expedient to stimulate their efforts by sending detachments of soldiers to each of the villages, still retaining the chiefs in pledge for their safety. About this time, a Canadian officer, named Hertel, with a party of Caughnawaga Indians, arrived with a letter from Colonel Bradstreet, dated at Sandusky. The writer declared that he was unable to remain longer in the Indian country, and was on the point of retiring down Lake Erie with his army; a movement which, at the least, was of doubtful necessity, and which might have involved the most disastrous consequences. Had the tidings been received but a few days sooner, the whole effect of Bouquet’s measures would probably have436 been destroyed, the Indians encouraged to resistance, and the war brought to the arbitration of a battle, which must needs have been a fierce and bloody one. But, happily for both parties, Bouquet now had his enemies firmly in his grasp, and the boldest warrior dared not violate the truce.
The messengers who brought the letter of Bradstreet brought also the tidings that peace was made with the northern Indians; but stated, at the same time, that these tribes had murdered many of their captives, and given up but few of the remainder, so that no small number were still within their power. The conduct of Bradstreet in this matter was the more disgraceful, since he had been encamped for weeks almost within gunshot of the Wyandot villages at Sandusky, where most of the prisoners were detained. Bouquet, on his part, though separated from this place by a journey of many days, resolved to take upon himself the duty which his brother officer had strangely neglected. He sent an embassy to Sandusky, demanding that the prisoners should be surrendered. This measure was in a great degree successful. He despatched messengers soon after to the principal Shawanoe village, on the Scioto, distant about eighty miles from his camp, to rouse the inhabitants to a greater activity than they seemed inclined to display. This was a fortunate step; for the Shawanoes of the Scioto, who had been guilty of atrocious cruelties during the war, had conceived the idea that they were excluded from the general amnesty, and marked out for destruction. This notion had been propagated, and perhaps suggested, by the French traders in their villages; and so thorough was the conviction of the Shawanoes, that they came to the desperate purpose of murdering their prisoners, and marching, with all the warriors they could muster, to attack the English. This plan was no sooner formed than the French traders opened their stores of bullets and gunpowder, and dealt them out freely to the Indians. Bouquet’s messengers came in time to prevent the catastrophe, and relieve the terrors of the Shawanoes, by the assurance that peace would be granted to them on the same conditions as to the rest. Thus encouraged, they abandoned their design, and set out with lighter hearts for the English camp, bringing with them a portion of their prisoners. When about half-way on their437 journey, they were met by an Indian runner, who told them that a soldier had been killed in the woods, and their tribe charged with the crime. On hearing this, their fear revived, and with it their former purpose. Having collected their prisoners in a meadow, they surrounded the miserable wretches, armed with guns, war-clubs, and bows and arrows, and prepared to put them to death. But another runner arrived before the butchery began, and, assuring them that what they had heard was false, prevailed on them once more to proceed. They pursued their journey without farther interruption, and, coming in safety to the camp, delivered the prisoners whom they had brought.
These by no means included all of their captives, for nearly a hundred were left behind, because they belonged to warriors who had gone to the Illinois to procure arms and ammunition from the French; and there is no authority in an Indian community powerful enough to deprive the meanest warrior of his property, even in circumstances of the greatest public exigency. This was clearly understood by the English commander, and he therefore received the submission of the Shawanoes, at the same time compelling them to deliver hostages for the future surrender of the remaining prisoners.
Band after band of captives had been daily arriving, until upwards of two hundred were now collected in the camp; including, as far as could be ascertained, all who had been in the hands of the Indians, excepting those belonging to the absent warriors of the Shawanoes. Up to this time, Bouquet had maintained a stern and rigorous demeanor; repressing his natural clemency and humanity, refusing all friendly intercourse with the Indians, and telling them that he should treat them as enemies until they had fully complied with all the required conditions. In this, he displayed his knowledge of their character; for, like all warlike savages, they are extremely prone to interpret lenity and moderation into timidity and indecision; and he who, from good-nature or mistaken philanthropy, is betrayed into yielding a point which he has before insisted on, may have deep cause to rue it. As their own dealings with their enemies are not leavened with such humanizing ingredients, they can seldom comprehend them; and to win over an Indian foe by kindness should only be438 attempted by one who has already proved clearly that he is able and ready to subdue him by force.
But now, when every condition was satisfied, such inexorable rigor was no longer demanded; and, having convoked the chiefs in the sylvan council-house, Bouquet signified his willingness to receive their offers of peace.
“Brother,” began the Indian orator, “with this belt of wampum I dispel the black cloud that has hung so long over our heads, that the sunshine of peace may once more descend to warm and gladden us. I wipe the tears from your eyes, and condole with you on the loss of your brethren who have perished in this war. I gather their bones together, and cover them deep in the earth, that the sight of them may no longer bring sorrow to your hearts; and I scatter dry leaves over the spot, that it may depart for ever from memory.
“The path of peace, which once ran between your dwellings and mine, has of late been choked with thorns and briers, so that no one could pass that way; and we have both almost forgotten that such a path had ever been. I now clear away all such obstructions, and make a broad, smooth road, so that you and I may freely visit each other, as our fathers used to do. I kindle a great council-fire, whose smoke shall rise to heaven, in view of all the nations; while you and I sit together and smoke the peace-pipe at its blaze.”[439]
439
In this strain, the orator of each tribe, in turn, expressed the purpose of his people to lay down their arms, and live for the future in friendship with the English. Every deputation received a separate audience, and the successive conferences were thus extended through several days. To each and all, Bouquet made a similar reply, in words to the following effect:—
“By your full compliance with the conditions which I imposed, you have satisfied me of your sincerity, and I now receive you once more as brethren. The King, my master, has commissioned me, not to make treaties for him, but to fight his battles; and though I now offer you peace, it is not in my power to settle its precise terms and conditions. For this, I refer you to Sir William Johnson, his Majesty’s agent and superintendent for Indian affairs, who will settle with you the articles of peace, and determine every thing in relation to trade. Two things, however, I shall insist on. And, first, you are to give hostages, as security that you will preserve good faith, and send, without delay, a deputation of your chiefs to Sir William Johnson. In the next place, these chiefs are to be fully empowered to treat in behalf of your nation; and you will bind yourselves to adhere strictly to every thing they shall agree upon in your behalf.”
440
These demands were readily complied with. Hostages were given, and chiefs appointed for the embassy; and now, for the first time, Bouquet, to the great relief of the Indians,—for they doubted his intentions,—extended to them the hand of friendship, which he had so long withheld. A prominent chief of the Delawares, too proud to sue for peace, had refused to attend the council; on which Bouquet ordered him to be deposed, and a successor, of a less obdurate spirit, installed in his place. The Shawanoes were the last of the tribes admitted to a hearing; and the demeanor of their orator clearly evinced the haughty reluctance with which he stooped to ask peace of his mortal enemies.
“When you came among us,” such were his concluding words, “you came with a hatchet raised to strike us. We now take it from your hand, and throw it up to the Great Spirit, that he may do with it what shall seem good in his sight. We hope that you, who are warriors, will take hold of the chain of friendship which we now extend to you. We, who are also warriors, will take hold as you do; and we will think no more of war, in pity for our women, children, and old men.”[440]
On this occasion, the Shawanoe chiefs, expressing a hope for a renewal of the friendship which in former years had subsisted between their people and the English, displayed the dilapidated parchments of several treaties made between their ancestors and the descendants of William Penn,—documents, some of which had been preserved among them for more441 than half a century, with the scrupulous respect they are prone to exhibit for such ancestral records. They were told that, since they had not delivered all their prisoners, they could scarcely expect to meet the same indulgence which had been extended to their brethren; but that, nevertheless, in full belief of their sincerity, the English would grant them peace, on condition of their promising to surrender the remaining captives early in the following spring, and giving up six of their chiefs as hostages. These conditions were agreed to; and it may be added that, at the appointed time, all the prisoners who had been left in their hands, to the number of a hundred, were brought in to Fort Pitt, and delivered up to the commanding officer.[441]
From the hard formalities and rigid self-control of an Indian council-house, where the struggles of fear, rage, and hatred were deep buried beneath a surface of iron immobility, we turn to scenes of a widely different nature; an exhibition of mingled and contrasted passions, more worthy the pen of the dramatist than that of the historian; who, restricted to the meagre outline of recorded authority, can reflect but a feeble image of the truth. In the ranks of the Pennsylvania troops, and among the Virginia riflemen, were the fathers, brothers, and husbands of those whose rescue from captivity was a chief object of the march. Ignorant what had befallen them, and doubtful whether they were yet among the living, these men had joined the army, in the feverish hope of winning them back to home and civilization. Perhaps those whom they sought had perished by the slow torments of the stake;442 perhaps by the more merciful hatchet; or perhaps they still dragged out a wretched life in the midst of a savage horde. There were instances in which whole families had been carried off at once. The old, the sick, or the despairing, had been tomahawked, as useless encumbrances; while the rest, pitilessly forced asunder, were scattered through every quarter of the wilderness. It was a strange and moving sight, when troop after troop of prisoners arrived in succession—the meeting of husbands with wives, and fathers with children, the reunion of broken families, long separated in a disastrous captivity; and, on the other hand, the agonies of those who learned tidings of death and horror, or groaned under the torture of protracted suspense. Women, frantic between hope and fear, were rushing hither and thither, in search of those whose tender limbs had, perhaps, long since fattened the cubs of the she-wolf; or were pausing, in an agony of doubt, before some sunburnt young savage, who, startled at the haggard apparition, shrank from his forgotten parent, and clung to the tawny breast of his adopted mother. Others were divided between delight and anguish: on the one hand, the joy of an unexpected recognition; and, on the other, the misery of realized fears, or the more intolerable pangs of doubts not yet resolved. Of all the spectators of this tragic drama, few were obdurate enough to stand unmoved. The roughest soldiers felt the contagious sympathy, and softened into unwonted tenderness.
Among the children brought in for surrender, there were some, who, captured several years before, as early, perhaps, as the French war, had lost every recollection of friends and home. Terrified by the novel sights around them, the flash and glitter of arms, and the strange complexion of the pale-faced warriors, they screamed and struggled lustily when consigned to the hands of their relatives. There were young women, too, who had become the partners of Indian husbands; and who now, with all their hybrid offspring, were led reluctantly into the presence of fathers or brothers whose images were almost blotted from their memory. They stood agitated and bewildered; the revival of old affections, and the rush of dormant memories, painfully contending with more recent attachments, and the shame of their real or fancied disgrace; while443 their Indian lords looked on, scarcely less moved than they, yet hardening themselves with savage stoicism, and standing in the midst of their enemies, imperturbable as statues of bronze. These women were compelled to return with their children to the settlements; yet they all did so with reluctance, and several afterwards made their escape, eagerly hastening back to their warrior husbands, and the toils and vicissitudes of an Indian wigwam.[442]
Day after day brought renewals of these scenes, deepening in interest as they drew towards their close. A few individual incidents have been recorded. A young Virginian, robbed of his wife but a few months before, had volunteered in the expedition with the faint hope of recovering her; and, after long suspense, had recognized her among a troop of prisoners, bearing in her arms a child born during her captivity. But the joy of the meeting was bitterly alloyed by the loss of a former child, not two years old, captured with the mother, but soon taken from her, and carried, she could not tell whither. Days passed on; they could learn no tidings of its fate, and the mother, harrowed with terrible imaginations, was almost driven to despair; when, at length, she discovered her child in the arms of an Indian warrior, and snatched it with an irrepressible cry of transport.
When the army, on its homeward march, reached the town of Carlisle, those who had been unable to follow the expedition came thither in numbers, to inquire for the friends they had lost. Among the rest was an old woman, whose daughter had been carried off nine years before. In the crowd of female captives, she discovered one in whose wild and swarthy features she discerned the altered lineaments of her child; but the444 girl, who had almost forgotten her native tongue, returned no sign of recognition to her eager words, and the old woman bitterly complained that the daughter, whom she had so often sung to sleep on her knee, had forgotten her in her old age. Bouquet suggested an expedient which proves him a man of feeling and perception. “Sing the song that you used to sing to her when a child.” The old woman obeyed; and a sudden start, a look of bewilderment, and a passionate flood of tears, removed every doubt, and restored the long-lost daughter to her mother’s arms.[443]
The tender affections by no means form a salient feature in the Indian character. They hold them in contempt, and scorn every manifestation of them; yet, on this occasion, they would not be repressed, and the human heart betrayed itself, though throbbing under a breastplate of ice. None of the ordinary signs of emotion, neither tears, words, nor looks, declared how greatly they were moved. It was by their kindness and solicitude, by their attention to the wants of the captives, by their offers of furs, garments, the choicest articles of food, and every thing which in their eyes seemed luxury, that they displayed their sorrow at parting from their adopted relatives and friends.[444] Some among them went much farther, and asked permission to follow the army on its homeward march, that they might hunt for the captives, and supply them with better food than the military stores could furnish. A young Seneca warrior had become deeply enamoured of a Virginian girl. At great risk of his life, he accompanied the troops far within the limits of the settlements; and, at every night’s encampment, approaching the quarters of the captives as closely as the sentinels would permit, he sat watching, with patient vigilance, to catch a glimpse of his lost mistress.
The Indian women, whom no idea of honor compels to wear an iron mask, were far from emulating the frigid demeanor of their lords. All day they ran wailing through the445 camp; and, when night came, the hills and woods resounded with their dreary lamentations.[445]
The word prisoner, as applied to captives taken by the Indians, is a misnomer, and conveys a wholly false impression of their situation and treatment. When the vengeance of the conquerors is sated; when they have shot, stabbed, burned, or beaten to death, enough to satisfy the shades of their departed relatives, they usually treat those who survive their wrath with moderation and humanity; often adopting them to supply the place of lost brothers, husbands, or children, whose names are given to the successors thus substituted in their place. By a formal ceremony, the white blood is washed from their veins; and they are regarded thenceforth as members of the tribe, faring equally with the rest in prosperity or adversity, in famine or abundance. When children are adopted in this manner by Indian women, they nurture them with the same tenderness and indulgence which they extend, in a remarkable degree, to their own offspring; and such young women as will not marry an Indian husband are treated with a singular forbearance, in which superstition, natural temperament, and a sense of right and justice may all claim a share.[446] The captive, unless he excites suspicion by his conduct, or exhibits peculiar contumacy, is left with no other restraint than his own free will. The warrior who captured him, or to whom he was assigned in the division of the spoil, sometimes claims, it is true, a certain right of property in him, to the exclusion of others; but this claim is soon446 forgotten, and is seldom exercised to the inconvenience of the captive, who has no other prison than the earth, the air, and the forest.[447] Five hundred miles of wilderness, beset with difficulty and danger, are the sole bars to his escape, should he desire to effect it; but, strange as it may appear, this wish is apt to expire in his heart, and he often remains to the end of his life a contented denizen of the woods.
Among the captives brought in for delivery were some bound fast to prevent their escape; and many others, who, amid the general tumult of joy and sorrow, sat sullen and scowling, angry that they were forced to abandon the wild license of the forest for the irksome restraints of society.[448] Thus to look back with a fond longing to inhospitable deserts, where men, beasts, and Nature herself, seem arrayed in arms, and where ease, security, and all that civilization reckons among the goods of life, are alike cut off, may appear to argue some strange perversity or moral malformation. Yet such has been the experience of many a sound and healthful mind. To him who has once tasted the reckless independence, the haughty self-reliance, the sense of irresponsible freedom, which the forest life engenders, civilization thenceforth seems flat and stale. Its pleasures are insipid, its pursuits wearisome, its conventionalities, duties, and mutual dependence alike tedious and disgusting. The entrapped wanderer grows fierce and restless, and pants for breathing-room. His path, it is true, was choked with difficulties, but his body and soul were hardened to meet them; it was beset with dangers, but these were the very spice of his life, gladdening his heart with exulting self-confidence, and sending the blood through his veins with a livelier current. The wilderness, rough, harsh, and inexorable, has charms more potent in their seductive influence than all the lures of luxury and sloth. And often he on whom it has cast its magic finds no heart to dissolve the spell, and447 remains a wanderer and an Ishmaelite to the hour of his death.[449]
There is a chord, in the breasts of most men, prompt to answer loudly or faintly, as the case may be, to such rude appeals. But there is influence of another sort, strongest with minds of the finest texture, yet sometimes holding a controlling power over those who neither acknowledge nor suspect its workings. There are few so imbruted by vice, so perverted by art and luxury, as to dwell in the closest presence of Nature, deaf to her voice of melody and power, untouched by the ennobling influences which mould and penetrate the heart that has not hardened itself against them. Into the spirit of such an one the mountain wind breathes its own freshness, and the midsummer tempest, as it rends the forest, pours its own fierce energy. His thoughts flow with the placid stream of the broad, deep river, or dance in light with the sparkling current of the mountain brook. No passing mood or fancy of448 his mind but has its image and its echo in the wild world around him. There is softness in the mellow air, the warm sunshine, and the budding leaves of spring; and in the forest flower, which, more delicate than the pampered offspring of gardens, lifts its tender head through the refuse and decay of the wilderness. But it is the grand and heroic in the hearts of men which finds its worthiest symbol and noblest inspiration amid these desert realms,—in the mountain, rearing its savage head through clouds and sleet, or basking its majestic strength in the radiance of the sinking sun; in the interminable forest, the thunder booming over its lonely waste, the whirlwind tearing through its inmost depths, or the sun at length setting in gorgeous majesty beyond its waves of verdure. To the sick, the wearied, or the sated spirit, nature opens a theatre of boundless life, and holds forth a cup brimming with redundant pleasure. In the other joys of existence, fear is balanced against hope, and satiety against delight; but here one may fearlessly drink, gaining, with every draught, new vigor and a heightened zest, and finding no dregs of bitterness at the bottom.
Having accomplished its work, the army left the Muskingum, and, retracing its former course, arrived at Fort Pitt on the twenty-eighth of November. The recovered captives were sent to their respective homes in Pennsylvania or Virginia; and the provincial troops disbanded, not without warm praises for the hardihood and steadiness with which they had met the difficulties of the campaign. The happy issue of the expedition spread joy throughout the country. At the next session of the Pennsylvania Assembly, one of its first acts was to pass a vote of thanks to Colonel Bouquet, expressing in earnest terms its sense of his services and personal merits, and conveying its acknowledgments for the regard which he had constantly shown to the civil rights of the inhabitants.[450] The Assembly of Virginia passed a similar vote; and both houses concurred in recommending Bouquet to the King for promotion.
Nevertheless, his position was far from being an easy or a pleasant one. It may be remembered that the desertion of his newly levied soldiers had forced him to ask Colonel Lewis to449 raise for him one or two companies of Virginian volunteers. Virginia, which had profited by the campaign, though contributing nothing to it, refused to pay these troops; and its agents tried to throw the burden upon Bouquet in person. The Assembly of Pennsylvania, with a justice and a generosity which went far to redeem the past, came to his relief and assumed the debt, though not till he had suffered the most serious annoyance. Certain recent military regulations contributed at the same time to increase his vexation and his difficulties. He had asked in vain, the year before, to be relieved from his command. He now asked again, and the request was granted; on which he wrote to Gage: “The disgust I have conceived from the ill-nature and ingratitude of those individuals (the Virginian officials) makes me accept with great satisfaction your obliging offer to discharge me of this department, in which I never desire to serve again, nor, indeed, to be commanding officer in any other, since the new regulations you were pleased to communicate to me; being sensible of my inability to carry on the service upon the terms prescribed.”[451]
He was preparing to return to Europe, when he received the announcement of his promotion to the rank of Brigadier General. He was taken completely by surprise; for he had supposed that the rigid prescriptions of the service had closed the path of advancement against him, as a foreigner. “I had, to-day,” he wrote to Gage, “the honor of your Excellency’s letter of the fifteenth instant. The unexpected honor, which his Majesty has condescended to confer upon me, fills my heart with the utmost gratitude. Permit me, sir, to express my sincere acknowledgments of my great obligation to you.... The flattering prospect of preferment, open to the other foreign officers by the removal of that dreadful barrier, gives me the highest satisfaction, being convinced that his Majesty has no subjects more devoted to his service.”[452]
Among the letters of congratulation which he received from officers serving under him is the following, from Captain George Etherington, of the first battalion of the Royal450 American regiment, who commanded at Michillimackinac when it was captured:—
“Lancaster, Pa., 19 April, 1765.
“Sir:
“Though I almost despair of this reaching you before you sail for Europe, yet I cannot deny myself the pleasure of giving you joy on your promotion, and can with truth tell you that it gives great joy to all the gentlemen of the battalion, for two reasons: first, on your account; and, secondly, on our own, as by that means we may hope for the pleasure of continuing under your command.
“You can hardly imagine how this place rings with the news of your promotion, for the townsmen and boors (i.e., German farmers) stop us in the streets to ask if it is true that the King has made Colonel Bouquet a general; and, when they are told it is true, they march off with great joy; so you see the old proverb wrong for once, which says, he that prospers is envied; for sure I am that all the people here are more pleased with the news of your promotion than they would be if the government would take off the stamp duty....
“Geo. Etherington.
“Brigadier General Henry Bouquet.”
“And,” concludes Dr. William Smith, the chronicler of the campaign, “as he is rendered as dear by his private virtues to those who have the honor of his more intimate acquaintance, as he is by his military services to the public, it is hoped he may long continue among us, where his experienced abilities will enable him, and his love of the English constitution entitle him, to fill any future trust to which his Majesty may be pleased to call him.” This hope was not destined to fulfilment. Bouquet was assigned to the command of the southern military department; and, within three years after his return from the Muskingum, he was attacked with a fever at Pensacola, which closed the career of a gallant soldier and a generous man.
The Delawares and Shawanoes, mindful of their engagement and of the hostages which they had given to keep it, sent their deputies, within the appointed time, to Sir William451 Johnson, who concluded a treaty with them; stipulating, among the other terms, that they should grant free passage through their country to English troops and travellers; that they should make full restitution for the goods taken from the traders at the breaking out of the war; and that they should aid their triumphant enemies in the difficult task which yet remained to be accomplished,—that of taking possession of the Illinois, and occupying its posts and settlements with British troops.