Part 34
In the spring of 1779 conditions along the frontier became more serious than in any time past. The Indians were more active and destroyed growing crops and burned the homes and outbuildings of the settlers, whom they murdered or took away in captivity.
The condition was so alarming it was reported to the Supreme Executive Council. One such letter, dated “Fort Augusta 27th April, 1779” written by Colonel Samuel Hunter, was in part: “I am really sorry to inform you of our present Disturbances; not a day, but there is some of the Enemy makes their appearances on our Frontiers. On Sunday last, there was a party of Savages attact’d the inhabitants that lived near Fort Jenkins, and had taken two or three familys prisoners, but the Garrison being appris’d of it, about thirty men turned out of the Fort and Rescued the Prisoners; the Indians collecting Themselves in a body drove our men under Cover of the Fort, with the loss of three men kill’d & four Badly Wounded; they burned several houses near the Fort, kill’d cattle, & drove off a number of Horses.
“Yesterday there was another party of Indians, about thirty or forty, kill’d and took seven of our militia, that was stationed at a little Fort near Muncy Hill, call’d Fort Freeland; there was two or three of the inhabitants taken prisoners; among the latter is James McKnight, Esqr., one of our Assemblymen; the same day a party of thirteen of the inhabitants that went to hunt their Horses, about four or five miles from Fort Muncy was fired upon by a large party of Indians, and all taken or kill’d except one man. Captain Walker, of the Continental Troops, who commands at that post turned out with thirty-four men to the place he heard the firing, and found four men kill’d and scalped and supposes they Captured ye Remaind’r.
“This is the way our Frontiers is harrassed by a cruel Savage Enemy, so that they cannot get any Spring crops in to induce them to stay in the County. I am afraid in a very short time we shall have no inhabitants above this place unless when General Hand arrives here he may order some of the Troops at Wyoming down on our Frontiers, all Col. Hartley’s Regiment, our two month’s men, and what militia we can turn out, is very inadequate to guard our Country.
“I am certain everything is doing for our relief but afraid it will be too late for this County, as its impossible to prevail on the inhabitants to make a stand, upon account of their Women and Childer.
“Our case is Really deplorable and alarming, and our County on ye Eve of breaking up, as I am informed at the time I am writing this by two or three expresses that there is nothing to be seen but Desolation, fire & smoke, as the inhabitants is collected at particular places, the Enemy burns all their Houses that they have evacuated.” The bearer of this important letter was James Hepburn.
It is a matter of interest that the James McKnight captured at Fort Freeland had secured 300 acres of land, April 3, 1769, in what is now Union County, where he brought his family. In 1774 they purchased three tracts of land “contiguous to and bounded on each other,” on Limestone Run, in Turbut Township, Northumberland County.
In 1776 William McKnight was chosen a member of the Committee of Safety, and was a most zealous and active patriot.
Both he and his wife perished at the hands of the Indians, when they attempted to make a trip from Fort Freeland, where they had sought refuge from the savages. Their only son, James, carried their bodies from Fort Freeland to the graveyard now known as Chillisquaque, and there buried them himself.
James McKnight had three sisters. He married Elizabeth Gillen, and was regarded as a man of great courage and rectitude. In 1778 he was elected to the General Assembly, but did not long survive to enjoy the honor.
The McKnight family had frequent and terrible experiences with the Indians. In the autumn of 1778 Mrs. James McKnight and Mrs. Margaret Wilson Durham, each with an infant in her arms, started on horseback from Fort Freeland to go to Northumberland. Near the mouth of Warrior Run, about two miles from the fort, they were fired upon by a band of Indians, lying in ambush. Mrs. Durham’s child was killed in her arms, and she fell from her horse. An Indian rushed out of the bushes, scalped her and fled.
Alexander Guffy and two companions named Peter and Ellis Williams rushed to the scene of the shooting and when they approached Mrs. Durham, whom they supposed dead, they were greatly surprised to see her rise up and piteously call for water. With the loss of her scalp she presented a horrible appearance. Guffy ran to the river and brought water in his hat. They then bound up her head, as best they could, and placed her in a canoe and hastily paddled down stream fifteen miles to Sunbury, where Colonel William Plunket, also a distinguished physician, dressed her wounded head, and she recovered. She died in 1829, aged seventy-four years.
Mrs. McKnight escaped unhurt from the surprise attack. The shots frightened the horse she was riding, it turned and ran back to the fort. Mrs. McKnight came near losing her child, when the horse wheeled and the child fell from her arms, but she caught it by the foot and held to it until the fort was reached.
Two sons of Mrs. McKnight, who were accompanying the party on foot, attempted to escape by hiding under the bank of the river, but were taken by the Indians.
James Durham, husband of Margaret, was taken at the same time. The three prisoners survived their captivity in Canada, and returned to their homes at the close of the Revolution in 1783.
On the eventful day that the little stockade was next attacked, April 26, 1779, Hon. James McKnight, was captured by the Indians.
William McKnight and his wife and James and his wife are interred in the old Chillisquaque burying ground.
----------
Steam Boat Susquehanna, in Effort to Navigate River, Starts Fatal Trip, April 27, 1826
Even before the advent of canals or railroads the enterprising merchants of Baltimore sensed the importance of facilitating the commerce along the great Susquehanna River.
They believed it would materially enhance their volume of business, especially in lumber, iron, grain, and whiskey, if the river would be freed of such obstructions as impeded or hindered navigation.
Large sums of money were expended in removing rocky channels in the river below Columbia, so as to admit the passage of arks and rafts down stream, on their way to tide water. A canal had been constructed from Port Deposit, northward, in order that the returning craft might avoid the shoals and dangerous reefs along the first ten miles above tide water.
Yet in spite of all these improvements no satisfactory way had been found which would return to the producers of the Susquehanna Valley such articles of commerce and merchandise as they would naturally require in return for the raw products of the forest, field and mine.
The authorities of Pennsylvania were also awake to the situation, as were the citizens. Several attempts had been made to have complete surveys of the river and estimates of the cost of the work required to make the great river navigable.
To Baltimore, more than to Pennsylvania, belongs the credit of an actual attempt to establish steamboat navigation.
In 1825 a small steamboat, named the Susquehanna, was built in Baltimore and, when launched, was towed up to Port Deposit.
The Harrisburg Chronicle said:
“The Susquehanna was expected at Columbia on Sunday night, Tuesday’s reports were, that she had not got to Columbia. Eye-witnesses to her progress put the matter to rest on Wednesday; they had seen her a short distance above the head of the Maryland Canal, with a posse of men tugging at the ropes, and when they had tugged nine miles gave up the job. So ended all the romance about the Susquehanna. She drew too much water (22 inches) for the purpose and started at the wrong point. Watermen say that the crookedness of the channel, with the rapidity of the current, makes it utterly impossible for a steamboat to ascend the falls between the head of the canal and Columbia.”
The Chronicle article says further: “We have a report that Mr. Winchester, of Baltimore, has contracted for the building of a steamboat at York Haven. We also learn that the York Company are making great progress with the sheet-iron steamboat, and that she will be launched about the 4th of July.”
This sheetiron boat was called the Codorus, and early in April of the next year ascended the river as far as Binghamton, after which she returned to York Haven. Her captain, a Mr. Elger, reported that navigation of the Susquehanna by steam was impracticable.
Either the original Susquehanna renamed or another steamboat built by the Baltimore promoters, and named Susquehanna and Baltimore was put on the river and operation above Conewago Falls by Captain Cornwell, an experienced river pilot.
She was accompanied on her trial trip on this portion of the river by a board of Commissioners of the State of Maryland, Messrs. Patterson, Ellicott and Morris, three distinguished citizens of Baltimore. Capt. Cornwell had already in March made several successful trips as far up as Northumberland and Danville on the North Branch and to Milton on the West Branch, returning to York Haven without accident.
April 17, 1826, the boat started from York Haven, having in tow a large keel boat capable of carrying a thousand bushels of wheat, and proceeded on her fatal trip, arriving at the Nescopeck Falls at 4 o’clock on May 3. At these falls there was an outer and an artificial inner channel of shallow water for the accommodation of rafts and arks. Capt. Cornwell decided after consulting with other river men on board, to try first the main, or deep water channel, and the captain argued that if the boat would not stem it, that he could then drop back and try the other one. The boat made a halt in a small eddy below the falls on the east side of the river and some of the passengers went ashore; this was the case with the Maryland Commissioners.
The boat was directed into the main channel, and had proceeded perhaps two-thirds of the distance through the falls, when she ceased to make further progress, the engine was stopped and she was permitted to drift back to the foot of the rapid, where she struck upon a wall dividing the artificial from the main channel, and at that instant one of her boilers exploded.
The scene was as awful as the imagination can picture. Two of the passengers on board, named John Turk and Heber Whitmarsh, raftmen from Chenango, N.Y., were instantly killed; William Camp, a merchant from Owego, was fatally scalded by escaping steam. Dave Rose, of Chenango, N. Y., was fatally injured. Quincy Maynard, the engineer, as stated in the account published in the Danville Watchman, one week after the occurrence, was not expected to recover. Christian Brobst, of Catawissa and Jeremiah Miller, of Juniata, were seriously injured. Messrs. Woodside, Colt and Underwood, of Danville, were more or less injured, as were Messrs. Barton, Hurley, Foster and Colonel Paxton, of Catawissa, and Benjamin Edwards, of Braintrim, Luzerne County.
It was said by somebody on board that at the time of the explosion, a passenger was holding down the lever of the safety valve, but why this should be done after the boat had ceased her efforts to pull through is difficult to conjecture. Thus ended the second attempt to navigate the Susquehanna by steam power.
----------
Shawnee Indians Murder Conestoga Tribesmen April 28, 1728
Two Shawnee Indians cruelly murdered a man and a woman of the Conestoga tribe, April 28, 1728. John Wright, of Hempfield, wrote from Lancaster, May 2, advising James Logan of this murder, and that the Conestoga have demanded of the Shawnee the surrender of the murderers. He further wrote that some Shawnee had brought the Shawnee murderers as far as Peter Chartier’s house, but there the party engaged in a drinking bout and through the connivance of Chartier the two murderers escaped.
Chartier was an Indian trader among the Shawnee and was himself a half-blood Shawnee. He had traded for a time on the Pequea Creek and at Paxtang. Later he settled at the Shawnee town on the west side of the Susquehanna, at the mouth of the Yellow Breeches Creek, the present site of New Cumberland. He later removed on the Conemaugh, then to the Allegheny, about 1734.
The action upon the part of Chartier incensed the Conestoga so much that they threatened to wipe out the whole section of the Shawnee.
John Wright further states in his letter, “Yesterday there came seventeen or eighteen of the young men, commanded by Tilehausey, all Conestoga Indians, painted for war, all armed. We inquired which way they were going. They would not tell us, but said they or some of them were going to war, and that there were some Canoy to go along with them. But we hearing the above report, are apt to think that they are going against the Shawnee.”
Almost contemporary with this murder, the whites along the Schuylkill had their safety threatened from another quarter. Kakowwatchy, head of the Shawnee at Pechoquealon, claimed to have heard that the Flatheads, or Catawba from Carolina, had entered Pennsylvania to strike the Indians along the Susquehanna. He sent eleven warriors to ascertain the truth of this incursion of the Southern Indians, and as they approached the neighborhood of the Durham Iron Works, at Manatawny, their provisions failing, forced the inhabitants to give them victuals and drink.
The people did not know these Indians and believing the chief of the band to be a Spanish Indian, caused great alarm.
Families left their plantations, and the women and children were in great danger from exposure, as the weather was cold. About twenty white men took arms, approached the band, and soon a battle was in progress. The whites said that the Indians refused a parley and fired first, wounding several of the inhabitants. The red men made off into the woods and were not seen again. Their leader was wounded, but escaped.
The identity of this band was not known until ten days later, May 20, when the Lieutenant Governor Patrick Gordon was waited upon by John Smith and Nicholas Schonhoven, two Indian traders from Pechoquealon, who delivered to him a verbal message from Kakowwatchy, which was an explanation of the unfortunate affair, and for which the chief sent his regrets, and asked the Governor for a return of the gun which the wounded leader had lost.
The Lieutenant Governor, accompanied by many other citizens of Philadelphia went to the troubled district, and personally pleaded with those who had fled from their plantations to return. So excited were the whites that they seemed ready to kill any red man or woman.
On May 20, an Indian man, two women and two girls, appeared at John Roberts, at Cucussea, then in Chester County. Their neighbors fearing danger, rallied to their defense, and shot the man and one of the women, beat out the brains of the other woman, and wounded the girls. Their excuse was that the Indian had put an arrow into his bow.
The Provincial authorities were fearful that revenge upon the people might be attempted, so the two neighbors who committed the atrocity were arrested and sent to Chester for trial, and notice of the affair was sent to Sassoonan, Opekasset, and Manawhyhickon, with a request that they bring their people to a treaty, arranged to be held at Conestoga with Chief Civility and the Indians there.
The Pennsylvania Government did not leave all to diplomacy. John Pawling, Marcus Hulings and Mordecai Lincoln (a relative of President Abraham Lincoln) were commissioned to gather the inhabitants and to put them in a posture to defend themselves.
Having forwarded to Kakowwatchy the watchcoats, belts and tomahawks dropped by the eleven warriors, and having sent a present, together with a request that he warn his Indians to be more cautious in the future, Governor Gordon expressed a wish to see Kakowwatchy at Durham, then went to Conestoga, and met Civility, Tawenne and other Conestoga, some Delaware and three Shawnee chiefs.
Gordon began by reminding the Indians of the links in the chain of friendship and that neither the Indians nor Christians would believe ill reports of each other without investigation of the facts. The Governor then made them presents of watchcoats, duffels, blankets, shirts, gunpowder, lead, flints and knives.
The Governor then told them of the recent murders, and of the intention to punish those who killed the Indians, if found guilty. The chiefs, in turn, declared that they had no cause of complaint.
Sassoonan, or Allummapees, the head of the Delaware, and his nephew, Opekasset, and some other chiefs, including the great Shikellamy, vicegerent of the Six Nations, met with Governor Gordon at Molatton, and from there went to Philadelphia, where a great council was held June 4, 1728, which was concluded most satisfactorily for all concerned.
----------
Christian Post, Moravian Missionary and Messenger, Died April 29, 1785
Christian Frederic Post, who has been denominated “the great Moravian peace-maker,” was a simple uneducated missionary of the Moravian Church. He was born in Polish Prussia, in 1710, and at an early age came under the influence of the Moravians. He emigrated to this country as a member of the “Sea Congregation,” which arrived on the Catherine, at New London, Conn., May 30, 1742. Post, with the other members, joined the congregation at Bethlehem, Pa., three weeks later.
From that time until his death, at Germantown, April 29, 1785, he performed many hazardous missions for his church and the Provincial Government of Pennsylvania, and many times was in imminent peril. The first several years of his residence in Pennsylvania he was employed as a Moravian missionary, but afterwards was almost constantly performing important services for the Province in its Indian dealings.
Some of the journals of Post, which appear in the Archives of Pennsylvania, and have been republished elsewhere, are valuable for the intimate history of the peoples and the country through which he traveled. One of the editors who republished his journals, wrote as follows concerning the missionary and mediator: “Antiquarians and historians have alike admired the sublime courage of the man and the heroic patriotism which made him capable of advancing into the heart of a hostile territory, into the very hands of a cruel and treacherous foe. But aside from Post’s supreme religious faith, he had a shrewd knowledge of Indian customs, and knew that in the character of an ambassador requested by the Western tribes his mission would be a source of protection. Therefore, even under the very walls of Fort Dusquesne, he trusted not in vain to Indian good faith.”
When Conrad Weiser visited Shikellamy at Shamokin, May, 1743, he wrote: “As I saw their old men seated on rude benches and on the ground listening with decorous gravity and rapt attention to Post, I fancied I saw before me a congregation of primitive Christians.”
In 1743 Post was married to a converted Indian woman, and endeared himself to all the Indians. But all was not smooth, for the Brethren were persecuted and humbled before their converts. Post, who had been on a journey to the Iroquois country, in March, 1745, was arrested at Canajoharie and sent to New York, where he was imprisoned for weeks, on a trumped-up charge of abetting Indian raids. He was released April 10.
In 1758 it became a matter of importance with Governor Denny and Sir William Johnson, that a treaty of peace be secured with the Western Indians. Post was selected to convey to them the white belt of peace and reconciliation. Tedyuskung, the Delaware king, protested against his going, declaring he would never return alive, but the bold and confident Christian said it was a mission of peace, that God would protect him, and that he must go.
On July 15, 1758, Post departed from Philadelphia with five Indian guides. He carried with him copies of the treaties made with Tedyuskung, belts of wampum and messages from the Governor. He made his trip by way of Bethlehem, Shamokin, Great Island, Chinclamoose, etc.
It was a perilous journey. Twice he got lost in the woods, and one of his guides strayed away and could not be found. Without food and drenched with rain, night after night he slept on the cold, wet ground. He was frequently very near the French. Finally he arrived at King Beaver’s, who ruled over the Delaware in the West. These Indians remembered him when he preached the gospel at Wyoming, and were glad to see him. They gave him a public dinner, to which they invited the surrounding tribes.
The French sent spies to watch him and to induce him to go to Fort Duquesne. Post refused to be trapped, but instead succeeded in making arrangements for kindling a great council-fire at Easton in October following.
Post now set out on his return and had not proceeded far when he heard the thunder of nineteen cannon discharged at the fort. Under the very mouths of these guns he had, singly and alone, with the full knowledge of the French, laid a plan which rent asunder the alliance between them and their Indian allies.
Post succeeded in his mission, and the French at the fort, finding themselves abandoned by their allies, fired it and fled, as the invalid general, John Forbes, and his army made their appearance.
Frank Cowan, poet of Southwestern Pennsylvania, tells the story in one of his songs, of which the following is a verse:
“The Head of Iron from his couch, Gave courage and command, Which Washington, Bouquet and Grant Repeated to the band; Till Hark! the Highlanders began With their chieftain’s word to swell, ‘Tonight, I shall sup and drain my cup In Fort Du Quense—or Hell!’ But the Man of Prayer, and not of boast, Had spoken first, in Frederic Post.”
Again, in 1761, he proceeded to the Muskingum and built the first white man’s house within the present State of Ohio. He had made previous trips into this country, and always succeeded in persuading the Shawnee and Delaware to “bury the hatchet” and desert the French. He did this with a heavy reward upon his scalp, and while his every footstep was surrounded with danger.
In 1762 the Reverend John G. B. Heckewelder, the Moravian missionary and writer, especially among the Delaware, was an assistant to Post.
Toward the close of his eventful life Post retired from the Moravian sect and entered the Protestant Episcopal Church. He died at Germantown on April 29, 1785, and on May 1 his remains were interred in the “Lower graveyard of that place, the Reverend William White, then rector of Christ Church,” conducting the funeral service.
----------
Veterans of French and Indian Wars Organize April 30, 1765
As early as 1764 officers of the First and Second Battalions of Pennsylvania who had served under Colonel Henry Bouquet during the French and Indian War tarried at Bedford on their way home and formed an association. The purpose of this organization was that they be awarded the land to which they were entitled for service rendered.