December, 1774; but he never returned to the valley of the In the course of the years 1775 and 1776, by means of the operations of land companies,* and the perseverance of individual adventurers, several hundred settlers were added to the white population of the country lying between the Allegheny mountains and the river Ohio. In the mean time, the English colonies in North America, acting wisely and justly in this instance, renounced their allegiance to Great Britain, and declared that they were, "and of right ought to be, free and independent States." By the authority of the Continenal Congress, commissioners were appointed to reside at Fort Pitt for the purpose of making treaties with the Indians in that region, and messengers were sent with pacific overtures from the new government to the southern and the northwestern tribes. To defeat the object of this policy, the British commandants and the loyal British traders in the country northwest of the Ohio, encouraged and supported by a considerable number of French auxiliaries, incited the Indians to assail the frontiers of the confederated States. From the speeches of two distinguished Delaware chiefs, Buckongahelas and White Eyes, an inference may be drawn concerning the nature of the appeals which, about this time, were made to the Indians. Buckongahelas, who was the friend of the king of Great Britain, spoke to the Indians thus: "Friends! listen to what I say to you! You see *On the 17th of March, 1775, Colonel Richard Henderson and Company, at a public council held on a branch of the river Holston, obtained from three distinguished Cherokee chiefs a deed for the territory bounded as follows: "Beginning on the Ohio river at the mouth of Kentucky, Chenoca, or what, by the English, is called Louisa river; from thence, running up the said river and the most northwardly branch of the same, to the head-spring thereof; thence, a southeast course to the top ridge of Powel's mountain; thence westwardly along the ridge of the said mountain unto a point from which a northwest course will hit or strike the head-spring of the most southwardly branch of Cumberland river; thence down the said river, ineluding all its waters to the Ohio river; thence up the said river as it meanders to the beginning," etc. For this territory it appears that the Cherokee Indians received from Henderson and Company "the sum of ten thousand pounds of lawful money of Great Britain," or "ten thousand pounds sterling in merchandise."-Vide BUTLER'S HIS. KY., 2d ed. 14, 503. LIBRARY a great and powerful nation divided! You see the father fighting against the son, and the son against the father! The father has called on his Indian children to assist him in punishing his children, the Americans, who have become refractory. I took time to consider what I should do-whether or not I should receive the hatchet of my father to assist him. At first I looked upon it as a family quarrel, in which I was not interested. However, at length, it appeared to me that the father was in the right, and his children deserved to be punished a little. That this must be the case, I concluded from the many cruel acts his offspring had committed, from time to time, on his Indian children, in encroaching on their land, stealing their property, shooting at and murdering, without cause, men, women, and children. Yes! even murdering those who, at all times, had been friendly to them, and were placed for protection under the roof of their father's house-the father himself standing sentry at the door at the time.* Friends! often has the father been obliged to settle and make amends for the wrongs and mischiefs done to us by his refractory children, yet these do not grow better. No! they remain the same, and will continue to be so as long as we have any land left us. Look back at the murders committed by the Longknives on many of our relations, who lived peaceable neighbors to them on the Ohio. Did they not kill them without the least provocation? Are they, do you think, better now than they were then?" + At this period a Delaware chief, whose Indian name was Koguethagechton, but who was called, by the Americans, Captain White Eyes, lived in the valley of the river Muskingum. In the course of his efforts to explain the causes which produced the Revolutionary war, and to establish relations of friendship between his tribe and the United States, he sometimes addressed the Delawares, in substance, as follows: "Suppose a father had a little son whom he loved and indulged while young, but, growing up to be a youth, began to think of having some help from him, and, making up a small pack, bade him carry it for him. The boy cheerfully takes the pack, *Alluding to the murder of the Conestoga Indians.-See GORDON'S HISTORY OF PENNSYLVANIA, 405. + Heckewelder. following his father with it. The father, finding the boy willing and obedient, continues in his way; and, as the boy grows stronger, so the father makes the pack in proportion larger— yet as long as the boy is able to carry the pack, he does so without grumbling. At length, however, the boy, having arrived at manhood, while the father is making up the pack for him, in comes a person of an evil disposition, and, learning who was the carrier of the pack, advises the father to make it heavier, for surely the son is able to carry a large pack. The father, listening rather to the bad adviser than consulting his own judgment and the feelings of tenderness, follows the advice of the hard-hearted adviser, and makes up a heavy load for his son to carry. The son, now grown up, examining the weight of the load he is to carry, addresses the parent in these words: Dear father, this pack is too heavy for me to carry— do, pray, lighten it. I am willing to do what I can, but I am unable to carry this load.' The father's heart having, by this time, become hardened, and the bad adviser calling to him, 'whip him, if he disobeys and refuses to carry the pack,' now in a peremptory tone orders his son to take up the pack and carry it off, or he will whip him, and already takes up a stick to beat him. 'So!' says the son, 'am I to be served thus for not doing what I am unable to do? Well, if entreaties avail nothing with you, father-and it is to be decided by blows whether or not I am able to carry a pack so heavy-then I have no other choice left me but that of resisting your unreasonable demand by my strength; and so, striking each other, we may see who is the strongest.' * Heckewelder.—[The speeches which were delivered by Buckongahelas and others, in favor of the king of Great Britain, were prepared by officers in the British Indian department; and the reported speech of Captain White Eyes, in favor of the American colonies, was prepared by a committee of the Continental Congress, adopted by that body on the 13th of July, 1775, and delivered to an assemblage of Indians at Pittsburg, in the fall of the same year.]-Vide AM. ARCHIVES, 4th series, ii, p. 1880. CHAPTER XI. INDIAN AFFAIRS. WESTERN LAND COMPANIES THE events which have been related in the preceding chapter show that, before the close of the year 1774, the government of Great Britain abandoned the project of confining the settlements of the English colonists in America to the regions lying on the eastern side of the Allegheny mountains. Indeed, the British ministry, soon after the year 1765, began to perceive that this project was impracticable. Although they rejected various propositions for erecting new colonies in the interior parts of North America, yet this policy did not materially check the growth of the English settlements in the west. In 1769, Lieutenant-Colonel John Wilkins, British commandant at Fort Chartres, in the Illinois country, granted several large tracts of land to English traders. This officer declared that these grants were made because "the cultivation of lands not then appropriated, was essentially necessary and useful toward the better peopling and settlement of the said country, as well as highly advantageous to his 'majesty's service in the raising, producing, and supplying provisions for his majesty's troops, then stationed, or thereafter to be stationed, in the said country of the Illinois."† On the 5th of July, 1773, at a public council held at the village of Kaskaskia, an association of English traders and merchants, who styled themselves "the Illinois Land Company," obtained from ten chiefs of the Kaskaskia, Cahokia, and Peoria tribes, a deed for two very large tracts of land on the east side of the river Mississippi. The first tract was bounded thus: "Beginning at the mouth of the Huron creek, called by the French the river of Mary, being about a league *This officer signed his name and title thus: "John Wilkins, Esquire, Lieutenant-Colonel of his Majesty's Eighteenth Royal Regiment of Ireland, Governor and Commandant throughout the Illinois country." Laws of the U. S. i, 509. below the mouth of the Kaskaskia river; thence a northward of east course, in a direct line back to the Hilly Plains, eight leagues, or thereabouts, be the same more or less; thence, the same course, in a direct line to the Crabtree Plains, seventeen leagues, or thereabouts, be the same more or less; thence, the same course, in a direct line to a remarkable place, known by the name of the Big Buffalo Hoofs, seventeen leagues, or thereabouts, be the same more or less; thence, the same course, in a direct line to the Salt Lick creek, about seven leagues, be the same more or less; thence, crossing the said creek, about one league below the ancient Shawanees town, in an easterly or a little to the north of east course, in a direct line to the river Ohio, about four leagues, be the same more or less; then down the Ohio, by the several courses thereof, until it empties itself into the Mississippi, about thirty-five leagues, be the same more or less; and then up the Mississippi, by the several courses thereof to the place of beginning, thirty-three leagues, or thereabouts, be the same more or less." The second tract was bounded as follows: "Beginning at a place or point in a direct line opposite to the mouth of the Missouri river; thence up the Mississippi, by the several courses thereof, to the mouth of the Illinois river, about six leagues, be the same more or less; and then up the Illinois river, by the several courses thereof, to Chicagou or Garlick creek, about ninety leagues or thereabouts, be the same 'more or less; then nearly a northerly course, in a direct line, to a certain place remarkable, being the ground on which an engagement or battle was fought, about forty or fifty years ago, between the Pewaria and Renard Indians, about fifty leagues, be the same more or less; thence, by the same course, in a direct line, to two remarkable hills close together, in the middle of a large prairie or plain, about fourteen leagues, be the same more or less; thence, a north of east course, in a direct line, to a remarkable spring, known by the Indians by the name of Foggy spring, about fourteen leagues, be the same more or less; thence, the same course, in a direct line, to a great mountain to the northward of the White Buffalo Plain, about fifteen leagues, be the same more or less; thence, nearly a southwest course, in a direct line, to the place of beginning, about forty leagues, be the same more or less." |