That Dark and Bloody River
Page 42
“Captain Brady,” Brodhead began, “I want to set up a well-organized body of men to be called Rangers—a force established to search out and attack raiding Indian parties. I want a group of good, experienced men to make regular patrols along the upper Ohio to watch for Indian sign and give warning to the settlements of any approaching danger. When a report is received of Indian attack occurring, especially when captives are taken, these Rangers are to go to the scene immediately, trail the Indian party at top speed and overtake them, the first priority being to get the prisoners back unhurt, the second to destroy the Indian raiders.
“The question, Captain,” Col. Brodhead added, “is this: Would you be willing to set up this body of Rangers to undertake this dangerous type of activity and act as its commander?”
“I would be in sole command?” Brady asked.
“You would. Responsible only to me, but I want you to take the initiative. Set up the kind of force you want, with the very best and most reliable men. Volunteers only. This is an assignment that will be extremely dangerous to all who engage in it and so they must be men who have great courage and ability, men who are willing to use the Indian style of fighting against the Indians themselves, who will use judgment and discretion, yet who will kill swiftly and without emotion when the situation warrants.”
“How many men?”
“I am not setting limits,” Brodhead replied, “but my feeling is that you would do much better with a small force of very highly trained Rangers than with a company of less well-trained men dashing about through the woods with their rifles. The most important thing is to get the quality of men you want, men who are willing to be trained by you to beat the Indians at their own game. Can you do this? Let me rephrase: Will you do it?”
“I can, Colonel, and I will.”
“Excellent. I thought you would. You can start right now.”
By the end of the day, Capt. Samuel Brady had selected seven men as a foundation for his Rangers. The first selected was Samuel Murphy, the brawny, 30-year-old little Irishman who had accompanied Brady on his mission up the Allegheny last September. Peter Parchment, 34, was next; he had proven himself well during that long difficult period at Fort Laurens. The Cuppy brothers were youngest of his choices—John was 18 and Abram not yet 17, but they were tough young men with great powers of endurance, excellent marksmen and accomplished woodsmen. Then he selected the brothers Vachel and Kinzie Dickerson, who were not much older, 21 and 19 respectively, but both had proven themselves time and again in fighting Indians and were tough, level-headed, powerful young men. Finally, he chose Tom Edgington, who had come to the Pittsburgh area from Redstone and settled a short distance up Chartier’s Creek. Edgington, at 35, was the eldest of this group, a serious, highly dependable man with a great deal of scouting and Indian fighting in his background. Though he was a man of about average size—five feet eight inches tall and weighing 160 pounds—he was a very swift runner and could lift objects much heavier than any of his neighbors could manage.
Brady knew these seven were ideal to form the nucleus of his elite force. Each, without reservation, was a man he would trust by his side in the wilderness. Each, when asked to volunteer, accepted instantly without question. Brady was sure that as time went on, he would be selecting others to join them, but these were enough for the present. Brady’s Rangers was now an active force of eight men.
Brady first inaugurated a rigorous training program, drilling his men at all hours of day and night on how they should act in this team he had assembled. He was absolute leader, and his commands must be obeyed instantly, as lives would undoubtedly depend upon it. No one, except in case of emergency, was to fire his weapon unless Brady gave the word. They practiced different forms of ambush, different methods of approaching an enemy camp and different means of subterfuge, and Brady also devised a whole set of hand signals, so conversation would be unnecessary. A finger pointed at a man meant he was to take first shot. An outstretched hand moved back and forth, palm down, meant no one was to fire. A finger held up and twirled in a circle meant to scatter and reassemble about 100 yards behind them; two fingers so used meant 200 yards behind, and so on. An arm held straight up from the elbow, hand stiff and straight, meant to tree—that is, to instantly hide behind the nearest big tree or other available cover and fire from that position. A fist held out, wrist to the sky and the bunched fingers suddenly spread out to their widest, meant not only to scatter, but every man for himself in getting back home. There were many other such signals, all devised to give them easy and silent communication under any circumstance. Their mode of dress was not formalized, but remembering Delaware John Thompson’s admonition that they would be safer clad as Indians, they wore clothing that blended well with the underbrush: buckskin leggins and blouses, their feet clad in moccasins, their hair, if long, clubbed or tied into a tail at the nape. Most elected not to wear hats or, if they wanted a head covering, wore what Brady himself always wore, virtually as his trademark—a black kerchief covering the head and tied in back.
After many hours and days of such training, they at last headed out on a scout. Sam Murphy was away, so there were only seven in their party. They headed generally eastward from Fort McIntosh, following the north bank of the Ohio toward Fort Pitt, watching for any sign of Indians prowling about the scattered settlements north of the Ohio or having crossed over to strike the settlements on the south side of the river.
It was a mile or so downstream from the mouth of Big Sewickley Creek that they encountered the trail of a large party of Indians—Brady estimated their number at about 25. The Rangers followed the trail, expecting the Indians to cross the Ohio soon, but they hadn’t. Instead, at the mouth of Big Sewickley, 15 miles below Fort Pitt, the trail led them upstream along the tributary. There were several families of German settlers along that stream, and Brady feared the worst.
Brady’s Rangers moved swiftly but with care. Near the headwaters of the stream, they came to the claim of Jacob Frantz, where they found the burned cabin still smoldering. Close to the ruins they found the bodies of Frantz and his 18-year-old daughter, Sophie. Jacob had been shot, and both were tomahawked and scalped. Brady’s men scouted about in an ever widening circle and, where a cornfield was being planted, found another man, mortally wounded and scalped but still alive. Before he died, he was able to give them details of what had occurred.
His name, he told them, was Elmer Kribs, and he and another man, named John Sipes, had been appointed to stand sentry while others planted the corn under direction of a man named Cheny, who boarded with the Henrys. The first he knew anything was amiss was when he was struck in the stomach by a bullet and fell. He didn’t completely lose consciousness, but he couldn’t move and, from where he lay, he saw the other sentry and those in the field run toward the cabin. The Indians cut them off and took them prisoner. The door of the cabin had opened, and Jacob Frantz came running out, rifle in hand, only to be shot dead. Then the Indians ran into the cabin and came out with Frantz’s daughters, Sophie and 16-year-old Aimy. Sophie was lame in one leg and could not walk well, so they tomahawked her and then scalped both her and her father. They plundered the cabin and set it afire and started to march the others away as captives, when one of the warriors, evidently the one who had shot Kribs, remembered him and ran back to where he lay. Kribs said he saw him coming and tried to drag himself into the underbrush but could not. The last he remembered was the warrior racing up on him with tomahawk upraised. Now Kribs tried to say more, but he failed and fell unconscious. In a few moments more his breathing stopped.
“We’ve got to try to get those prisoners back,” Brady said. “Let’s go.”
They followed the trail and could see that they were gaining on the Indian party, their progress evidently slowed because of the captives. It was not long until they came to the ruins of another cabin, still ablaze but the Indians gone. John Cuppy recognized the place as the cabin of John Henry, a Dutchman, who had settled there with his wife and two
children, Peter and Alma. Cuppy reckoned the two were now probably about eight and ten years old respectively. Since there were no bodies in evidence, they and their parents had evidently been taken prisoner.
The trail of the Indians headed northeast, and they continued to follow it. Within a few miles it split, the larger portion of the party angling away to the north, while the smaller party—the footprints indicating eight or ten adults and at least a couple of children—continued to the northeast on a course that would soon take them to the Allegheny. Brady decided they would follow the smaller party, not only because they would have a greater chance of success in attacking it but because the tracks made it most likely the Henry children were with them and perhaps some of the other captives as well.
The Brady party made cold camps at night, and on the third day of following the trail, the tracks became so fresh that mud still swirled in the little runs they had waded across. Brady gave orders for complete silence, and they continued with increased caution. It was just as dusk was deepening that Brady ordered his men to rest while he and Parchment scaled a nearby high hill to its summit. From this vantage they could see an extreme bend of the Allegheny River—at this point some 60 miles upstream from Fort Pitt—and, close to its edge, smoke ascending from what had to be the camp of the Indians. It was full dark by the time they returned to the other Rangers, and Brady said they would continue moving in on them, advancing warily and in single file with Brady himself in the lead.
Moving slowly and quietly, sliding their feet gently along the ground so as not to step on twigs that might snap and reveal their approach, it took them nearly two hours to get to within sight of the fire. The Indians had stopped just above the mouth of a creek entering the Allegheny from the northwest.354 Their camp was in a clearing a dozen yards or so from a large fallen tree and about 100 yards from the west bank of the Allegheny, where the stream makes a sharp, extensive horseshoe curve to the west.355 Brady and his men studied the situation from a distance and estimated, as the Indians moved in and out of the light of the campfire, that there were about a dozen warriors, plus a couple of youngsters who were evidently the Henry children. An Indian guard was sitting near the fire mending a moccasin. Brady and his men held a whispered council and made their plans. He directed his six men to move out and space themselves appropriately in a semicircle, while Brady himself would creep in and take a position behind the log. Because some of the Indians were far enough from the fire that they could not be seen in the darkness, the Rangers would hold off attacking until dawn. The firing of Brady’s gun would be the signal for all to shoot.
The Indian guard was edgy, and several times as Brady and his men moved into position, he stopped working on his moccasin and cocked his head to listen, at which the whites, as prearranged, froze in place until he resumed his work. Brady had just reached the log when the guard rose and walked in his direction.
Brady flattened himself behind the log, lying on his back with tomahawk in hand and ready to strike if he should be discovered. The Indian stepped up onto the log directly over Brady, and though he glanced downward for a moment, the depth of the night shadows hid Brady well, and he was not discovered. But then a stream of liquid began striking Brady’s chest, and he realized the warrior was urinating into the darkness from his stance atop the log. Brady continued to lie still, and after a few moments the guard stepped off the log and moved back to the fire, where he resumed his moccasin repair.
Throughout the remainder of the night Brady’s men crouched in place. Finally dawn began breaking, and visibility improved. As the guard came to his feet and stretched, the crack of Brady’s gun shattered the stillness. The Indian fell and then tried to rise. Shots from Brady’s men broke out, and the guard warrior slumped over and remained motionless. The other Indians leaped to their feet at the same time and instantly scattered into dimly lighted woods. Two acted as if they may have been hit, but no one else fell.356
Closer to the fire the boy and girl, bound to each other at wrist and ankle, scrambled to their feet, and eight-year-old Peter Henry yelled, “Don’t shoot! Don’t shoot! I’m a white man!”
Parchment ran up to them and cut away their bonds, and the boy hugged him around the waist and tearfully thanked him for saving their lives.357 Then he ran over to the dead Indian, pulled the warrior’s tomahawk out of his waistband and struck the dead man several blows to head and body.
The Indians had left behind their rifles but, leaving nothing to chance, Thomas Edgington and three other Rangers spread out and checked to make sure they were really gone. They returned a quarter-hour later to report that the warriors had fled without pause and several of them had been seen swimming across the great bend of the Allegheny out of range of their rifles. One of them, they reported, climbed out of the water on the opposite side and yelled at them, “Damn Yankees!”358 Thomas Edgington, grinning, then told Sam Brady, “We figured a bend in the river like this one needs to have a name, so we’ve named it.”
“What name?” Brady asked.
“From now on,” Edgington replied, “it’s Brady’s Bend.”359
Brady chuckled and shook his head. “Never figured on becoming a landmark. All right, these youngsters are so tuckered out they can’t walk much farther. Let’s get a couple of bark canoes built and get ’em down to Pittsburgh.”360 Two large canoes were built in a few hours, and Brady and his men took the Henry children to Pittsburgh, where they were put in the care of a relative.361 The rifles and plunder taken by the Indians from several strikes—blankets, kettles and other goods—were sold there at auction, and the proceeds went to the children.
Word spread rapidly throughout the upper Ohio region of the feat accomplished by Brady’s Rangers, and there was much jubilation and approbation. And at Fort McIntosh Col. Daniel Brodhead was extremely pleased with their success and felt certain they would be at least equally successful in future forays.
[July 30, 1779—Friday]
The whites in the middle and lower Ohio River Valley were faring somewhat better than those on the upper Ohio, but there were strong fears that this was about to change. What had happened recently in the campaign led by Col. John Bowman from Kentucky into the Ohio country against the Shawnees was considered by many as an affront that would call for drastic retaliation by the Indians.
A great many whites had been killed in the continuing raids of the Shawnees against the Kentucky settlements, and a large amount of property had been destroyed, livestock killed and horses stolen. Bowman was very jealous of the fame that had come to George Rogers Clark for taking Kaskaskia and Cahokia, then capturing Gen. Henry Hamilton and his British force at Vincennes.362 So late this past spring Bowman announced a proposed campaign against the great Shawnee village of Chalahgawtha on the Little Miami River and called for volunteers. A total of 264 men had come forward with their own horses and weapons and the mounted operation was put into motion.
Luck was riding high on the shoulders of Bowman at this time because of two major occurrences about which he knew nothing. First, the split in the Shawnee nation last March, when more than half the tribe moved away to resettle west of the Mississippi, had greatly weakened those who remained. Second, at the precise time of his move against Chalahgawtha—the largest of all Shawnee villages, with a population of some 3,000, about a third of which were warriors—all but a small handful of males were gone from the village, attending a major council that had been called at the Shawnee capital village, Wapatomica, some 50 miles to the north. Had those warriors been at home, everyone agreed, Bowman’s small force would have been annihilated.
Only 35 defenders, mainly young boys and old men, were at Chalahgawtha when Bowman’s army approached, favoring the mounted force with almost eight to one odds over the Indians. They had approached the town by night but the crucial element of surprise was lost because of Bowman’s failure to observe silence. His strident voice carried far and reached Chalahgawtha well before his forces. By the time they came in sight of the town, vir
tually all the Shawnees there had taken advantage of the darkness to abandon their dwellings and gather for mutual defense in the msi-kah-mi-qui—the huge council house. Many of the women were already singing the death song because all fully believed they would be destroyed in a very short time. Yet even though the sporadic firing directed at the whites from the council house indicated there were very few defenders, Bowman was afraid to make a charge to overwhelm them. Instead, seeing that the greater part of the town was empty, Bowman ordered his men to burn the houses.
Moving from wegiwa to wegiwa and cabin to cabin, the attackers not only set each of the flimsy structures afire, they also wasted a lot of time and energy in looting them—of spears, fur robes, shields, woven mats, tanned deer skins, pottery, decorative garments, silver jewelry and other goods. Very quickly the whites became far more obsessed with taking plunder than with accomplishing the mission. Their greed made them careless, and as they came very close to the almost continuous shooting coming from the council house, ten of Bowman’s men were downed, while not a single Shawnee had yet been wounded.
Col. Bowman’s courage, what there was of it, drained away, and incredibly, with the foe in the very palm of his hand, he ordered a withdrawal. The corral in which some 12 dozen Shawnee horses were penned was discovered, and Bowman had most of them rounded up and driven back toward Kentucky. Burdened with loot and the task of driving such a large herd of horses, the army now suddenly became very vulnerable.