2024 Mary Harris Prizes Essays Winners
Dana M. Kittner: John Heckewelder - A Friend Closer Than a Brother: A Historical Look at his Famous Ride (1ST PLACE WINNER)
In the year, 1778, the indigenous Delaware nation of Coshocton found themselves in peril. The American Revolution was in full force and continued to spread into the wilderness region of the Ohio Valley. John Heckewelder, a devout Moravian who had moved to the region, promoted and maintained the personal conviction opposing war. In addition, he used his influence on the local tribe and encouraged them to stay neutral during the war. The following essay presents a historical background which led up to the peak moments in which Delaware were willing to join other tribes and turn away from the Patriots and from peace. In the end, Reverand Heckewelder raced against time, circumventing allegiances of war. His courageous act likely prevented not only the Americans from losing the war but ensured peace on the frontier after the war.
Experiencing religious persecution throughout Europe, the Moravians ventured to the New World not to escape it but rather to fulfill their mission – to establish missions among the most neglected people. Their missions ranged from the West Indies to Greenland - and America. Several attempts to establish missions to African slaves in Georgia and Native Americans in New York roused whites to interfere with the missions’ success. Having secured land in Pennsylvania, the Moravians established their home mission in what became known as Bethlehem, a remote location significantly distant from the white settlers, many who did not understand their practices. 1, 2 These missionaries saw themselves
"as messengers of the God of Peace, who himself had pronounced a blessing on the peacemakers; . . . The Christian Indians under their care," he continues, "obedient to the commandment of God: 'thou shalt not kill'-. . . strove to live in peace with all mankind... " 3Heckewelder, Narrative, vi.
John Heckewelder was one among those called to be a missionary. While a student in Bedford, England, he attended a Moravian school and it is here he heard Bishop Watteville’s moving speech challenging the boys to answer the call to serve in the mission field, to which he did in his heart,4 The mission equipped each person with skills for service. Having lost his parents on the mission field, orphaned Heckewelder apprenticed out as a cooper. 5 Yet, it was not his cooper skills but his aptitude with the native languages that caught the mission’s attention. Soon, he was assigned to accompany Rev. Post to Newcomerstown, a potential site for a mission to the Delawares. Although this endeavor failed, causing him to return to Bethlehem, he remained committed to missions. When fellow missionary, David Zeisenberger asked for Heckewelder to accompany him west, he went eagerly, establishing missions first in western Pennsylvania, then in eastern Ohio, choosing to live among the Indians as resident missionaries among the Delawares. 6
Before any migrating could occur, the Delawares had to ask permission from The League of Five Nations, primarily due to an arrangement made in 1736 with the leadership of Pennsylvania and the Iroquois. Being heavily involved with the fur trade among the natives, Pennsylvania “granted the Iroquois hegemony over all other tribes in the colony because of their military power and such successful brokerage as middlemen in the fur trade between the western tribes and the English and Dutch. 7 Migrating first from the New Jersey region into Pennsylvania, they settled along the Susquehanna; then they moved westward onto the Big Beaver River. 8 Pennsylvania realized they could use “the Iroquois to control other tribes in the colony in order to forge a military force that would deter French expansion in the Ohio country; a relationship designed to benefit Pennsylvania’s interests most - to regulate the fur trade”. 9 The Iroquois did just that; kept the French at bay by pressuring their counterparts to fall in line and trade with Britain alone.10
The Delawares, considered a “peaceful people”, submitted to the Iroquois to represent themselves “on all diplomatic matters with whites and prohibited them from making war or peace with either whites or Indians without their permission”. 11 Seen as “the woman” in the confederacy, functioning in the role of peace and abstaining from war, caused the Delawares resentment. By 1740, the Iroquois had sold most of the Delawares’ land in Pennsylvania, causing a greater western migration into the Ohio Country and ill feelings against the Iroquois. 12 By 1750, the tribe told the now Six Nations, (the Tuscarawas had joined); “We are men and are determined not to be ruled any longer by you as Women and as determined to cut off all the English, except those that may make their Escape from us n Ships” 13. Securing rights to live north of the Ohio River, south of the southern border of Lake Erie from the Wyandots, the Delaware's soon began establishing major settlements along the Tuscarawas.14 These settlements were so common, that by 1765 the “British depleted the ability of the Delawares to defend themselves from an attack by Indians or whites”; even the physical distance from the Iroquois made supervision by the Six Nations almost impossible. 15 The French observed the increased numbers and challenged themselves to find a way to utilize these numbers for their gain. “The Marquis de Beuharnois, governor of New France, reported: “It would promote in considerable degree the prosperity and security of the Colony, could these Indians settle between Lake Erie and the Ohio River.”16
It is into this landscape that the Moravian missionaries ventured, taking with them their converts from the Beaver River. Their western migration of relocating Delawares missions occurred out of necessity and safety for their converts:
“Continued pressure by white settlers, especially their retaliations during Pontiac's War, caused the Moravians to move their converts first to the Susquehanna valley, then to western Pennsylvania, and finally, in 1772, to the banks of the present Tuscarawas River in Ohio, where they built four towns and flourished for nearly ten years.”17
By 1776, the “Black Coats” and their converts had increased in number to warrant the establishment of another settlement; Zeisenberger with the aid of Netawatwes selected a location south of their other settlements but still on the Muskingum, calling it Lichtenau, “Meadow of Light”.18 Lichtenau was situated south of the newly established Delaware capital in present day Coshocton. Delaware head chief, Netawatwes (Newcomer) abandoned Gekelemuk (Newcomerstown) when a “breach took place among the Delawares, and with those of his tribe who remained true to him, he proceeded to the forks of the Tuscarawas and Walhonding, and built a new capital called, according to Heckewelder, “Goshochking,” and according to De Schweinetz, “Goschachgunk”. Chief Netawatwes and his family “were among the first converts…having selected the spot for Lichtenau” to be built.19 Heckewelder shares “The chief Netawatwes, together with the chiefs, White Eyes, Gelelemend (alias Killbuck) , Machingwi Puschiis (alias the Big Cat), and others, did everything in their power to preserve peace among the nations, by sending embassies, and exhorting them not to take up the hatchet, or to join either side”. 20Not only did the chiefs work together on matters related to the tribe, they also worked together with the missionaries on issues related to the Christian Delawares; Heckewelder explains the process as follows:
The chiefs and council of Goshocking, as the protectors of the Christian Indians, would frequently consult the missionaries on matters necessary for the preservation of peace. They had repeatedly declared that nothing should withdraw their confidence from their American brethren; who, together with them, had sprung up from the same soil. –that their brethren had told them, at the treaty of Pittsburgh not to join either side with a hostile intention – not to go to war against the English, no more than against them, and which language their American brethren still held before them, while on the other hand the English, who called themselves fathers, were continually teasing them to take up the hatchet, and kill the Americans, their brethren. 21
As the Revolutionary War took hold, the colonists clearly wanted the support of the Ohio Indians; if they couldn’t get their support, they wanted them to stay neutral and fight no one. To ensure the vast expanse of the Delaware's, “two treaties were made in Pittsburg in successive years—1775 and 1776—binding to neutrality the Delawares, and some of the immediately adjacent nations.” 22 Advantages of having the Indians support the colonists included protection for Fort Pitt and assistance with the supply chain. In addition, Fort Pitt was challenged due to lack of funds; the surge of new migration over the mountains and the lack of compensation made to locals who would or could sell their wares. Interestingly, the boundary controversy between Virginia and Pennsylvania caused colonists to consider favoring “the British in Pittsburgh and the near-by settlements.”23 The British, however, needed the Indians to fight and to help secure supplies to Detroit. They were outnumbered and had no easy way to get their supplies from Canada.24
By 1777 the hatchet sent form Detroit (the British headquarters) was accepted by the Shawnees, Wyandots, and Mingos.”25 Some Delaware were ready to join the British, but with a general council held on March 9, 1777, the hatchet was offered three times and declined each time; much credit given to Captain White Eye’s speeches.26 The Delawares, “fearing a British attack in retaliation for their friendly attitude toward the Americans, appealed in vain for military assistance.”27
Indian attacks continued throughout the region of Fort Pitt, in part as retaliation for killing of Indians and in part for land encroachment. 28 Heckewelder shares that by “early spring in 1778, the Wyandot, the Mingos (Iroquois), began to commit hostilities against the American people, attacking, plundering and murdering them on their plantations’.29 These Indians would sometimes purposely return via way of the Delawares, to “pass with their prisoners and their scalps, through the peaceable Delaware Indian settlement in order to disturb the inhabitants or if possible draw in the enemy, while in on them, taking such to be the aggressors.30
Seizing this opportunity to sway boarder colonists, Lieutenant Governor Hamilton sent “proclamations from Detroit, promising the frontier inhabitants large bounties in land if only they would come over to the British”. 31 In addition to these tactics, Hamilton also hired Alexander McKee, Simon Girty, and Matthew Elliot as secret agents of Britain.32 Simon Girty, having served in the American militia at Fort Pitt, asked for a captain’s commission in 1778 but was denied. Deserting on March 28, 1778, along with twenty other soldiers, they joined up with the British. He, McKee, Elliot and the twenty other soldiers headed “for British headquarters through the Indian country”, carrying “with them an intimate knowledge of American plans and strength, and their wide acquaintance among the Indians promised to be of great value to the enemy.” 33 They traveled to the Delawares’ capital, Goshocking and began to share the most shocking lies regarding the patriots and their leaders: “that the American army had been cut to pieces by the Redcoats, and Washington was dead,” that he army dispersed and lastly, that the Americans were on the warpath promising to kill all Native Americans- all to stir Col. Pipe and the Delawares into siding with the British.34 “Captain Pipe called the Delawares to the council house…urging them to take up the hatchet against the colonies.”35 Heckewelder writes: “Captain White Eyes and other chiefs would not give credit to reports of this kind, especially coming from such characters; yet …(White Eyes) knew well that his conduct in this affair would be closely watched by his rival, Captain Pipe . 35
White Eyes made a proposition to wait ten days for any word from Fort Pitt that would collaborate what was being said as true. Colonel Pipe saw this opportunity to usurp Captain White Eye’s leadership, stating “to declare every man an enemy to the nation, that should throw an obstacle in the way, that might tend to prevent the taking up of arms immediately against the American people” (p. 170). White Eyes realized the words were directed toward him but would not allow the ignorance of quick decision making and emotions destroy the peaceful status his tribe had accomplished in his tenure. He gave permission for the men to choose to follow the “vagabond fugitives”, but if so, he himself would not let his tribe go into battle without him. He said he would be going out first, to lead the battle in front and be the first to fall. All chose to wait ten days.36
During this time, Heckewelder had been stationed at Lichtenau however, had taken leave for a few months to go to Bethlehem to respond to concerns by the mission – they had heard nothing from their missions on the Muskingum. Fellow missionary, John Shabosh, accompanied him, however, were delayed in returning to Ohio as they waited for various passports of passage through various areas, which had to come directly from the President of Congress, Henry Laurens and Horatio Gates, the Secretary of War. Upon receiving them, they were on their way; as they approached Fort Pitt, evidence of Girty, McKee and Elliot’s influences were obvious as they witnessed abandoned and burned homesteads with words chalked or burned into siding “Good people avoid this road for the Indians are murdering us.” 37 At Fort Pitt where they heard reports “that had come up form the valley”, causing General Hand to issue letters of peace to the Delaware, “assuring them that all the stories were false.” 38 Colonel Gibson and General Hand were not successful finding anyone to “run” the messages to the Delaware – so they would know the truth and not enter the war. After a night of sleep, both men believed it their duty to God “to preserve the mission and save the Delaware nation and maintain peace; any other outcome would be the ruin of all.”39
They encountered war parties, swollen rivers to swim and another required building a pole raft to cross. They experienced hunger and fatigue and cold as no fire was built to avoid attention from the smoke. The men rode three days and nights, stopping only to feed their horses, reaching Gnadenhutten at eleven at night. Heckewelder requested a fresh horse before continuing to Goshochking, another thirty miles. After a few hours of sleep and securing a riding companion to join him, (John Martin), they set off. 40 Upon arriving:
The Delaware's were painted and ready for the warpath. His old friends, and even White Eyes, refused to shake hands with him. Seeing the crisis, he stood up in his saddle, …waving eh peace letters over his head, telling the Indians that all the stories were lies; that instead of Washington being killed, the American army had captured Burgoyne’s British army, and that instead of coming west to kill the Indians, the Americans were their true friends, and wanted them not to take any part in the war.41
When Heckewelder inquired why no one would yet shake his hand; it was Captain White Eyes who explained how the deceivers words had caused the Delaware to be leery of all Americans; that they just pretend to be friends to lure them in and take them by surprise. Heckewelder counters by challenging them about he being their friend, one who rode on to get them the letters from Fort Pitt. Captain White Eyes then begins to ask about all the statements that McKee and company proclaimed as truth: “are the American armies cut to pieces? Was General Washington killed? Was there still a congress? Did the British kill some and take some back to England for hanging? Are there only a few thousand American peoples left on the other side of the mountains who are determined to kill every Indian, man, woman and child? Now don’t deceive us, tell us the truth, is this the truth what I have shared?”42 Heckewelder declared all the statements as untrue and reached out again with the speeches sent from General Hand and Gibson; but were refused. Thinking quickly, he called on the drummer to beat the drum to call an assembly with White Eyes taking the lead addressing the assembly, “Shall we my friends and relatives listen once more to those who call us brethren?”43
The members affirmed loudly, gathering into the council house where all the speeches were read, where White Eyes spoke regarding how the American people had never asked them to join the war against the English but instead instructed them to remain quiet and not take up the hatchet as war is destructive, 44. White Eyes then held up the newspaper article of Burguyne’s army’s defeat so all could see it, saying:
“See my friends and relatives, this document contains the great events, not of a songbird but of truth. Then stepping up to me, he gave me his hand saying, “You are welcome with us Brother”, when everyone present, followed his example.45
Committed to his cause, Heckewelder’s tenacious drive from Fort Pitt to Coshocton allowed the Patriots to maintain a strong hold in the west. The frontier, the last frontier, proved to be a battleground in which a battle was never fought, but was the biggest battle which helped win the revolution. The English eventually withdrew from the Detroit region and the fur trade with the native American’s. Heckewelder’s faith in the cause of the patriots as well as his conviction to preserve the Delaware people by keeping them from war elevates him to a hero. His selfish acts of love and courage were perceived by his beloved Delaware as a true friendship. John, in his book at 15:14 reads “Greater love hath no man than this, that a man lay down his life for his friends”. Patriots died for their cause of freedom, Heckewelder would have died for his friends.
Bibliography
Downes, Randolph C. Evolution of Ohio County Boundaries. Columbus, OH: The Ohio Historical Society, 1970.
De Schweinitz, p. 310-316.
Heckewelder, John. Manners, and Customs of the Indian Nations who once Inhabited Pennsylvania and the Neighboring States: Pittsburgh, PA; The Historical Society of Pennsylvania, 1881
Heckewelder, John. A Narrative of the Mission of the United Brethren Among the Delaware and Mohegan Indians, from its Commencement, in the Year 1740, to the Close of the Year 1808. Philadelphia, PA: McCarty and Davis, 1820.
Heer, Fred J. Ohio Archeological and Historical Publications. Vol. 19. Columbus, OH; The Ohio State Archeological and Historical Society, 1910.
Hill, N. N. Jr. History of Coshocton County, Ohio: Its Past and Present, 1740-1881. Newark, OH: A.A. Graham & Company, 1881.
Hurt, William E. Historical Collections of Coshocton County Ohio. A Complete Panorama of the Earliest Known Occupants of the Territory unto the Present Time 1764-1876. Cincinnati, OH; Robert Clarke & Co. 1876.
Lohram, H. P. and Ralph H. Roming. Valley of the Tuscarawas. Dover, OH: The Ohio Hills Publishers, 1972.
Miller, James M. The Genesis of Western Culture the Upper Ohio Valley 1800-1825. Columbus, OH: The Ohio State Archaeological and Historical Society, 1938.
Mitchener, C. H. Ohio Annals: Historic Events in the Tuscarawas and Muskingum Valleys, and in Other Portions of the State of Ohio. Columbus, OH: Maxwell Publications, 1876.
Rondthale, Edward, Life of John Heckewelder. Philadelphia, PA: T Ward, 1847.
Schneider, Norris F. The Muskingum River A History and Guide. Columbus, OH: The Ohio Historical Society, 1968.
Smith, Thomas H. An Ohio Reader 1750 to the Civil War. Grand Rapids, MI: Williams B. Eerdmans Publishing Company, 1975.
Wallace, Paul A. The Travels of John Heckewelder in Frontier America. Pittsburgh, PA: University of Pittsburgh Press, 2013.
Wilcox, Frank N. Ohio Indian Trails. Cleveland, OH: The Gates Press, 1933.
Wittke, Carl, The History of the State of Ohio. Vol. 1. Columbus, OH: Ohio State Archeological and Historical Society, 1941.
Notes
1. Paul Wallace, The Travels of John Heckewelder in Frontier America (Pittsburgh: University of Pittsburgh Press, 2013), 26-28.
2. N.N. Hunt, Jr., History of Coshocton County, Ohio: Its Past and Present, 1740-1881 (Newark: A.A. Graham & Company, 1881), 58.
3. John Heckewelder, A Narrative of the Missions of the United Brethren Among the Delaware and Mohegan Indians, from its Commencement, in the Year 1740, to the Close of the year 1808 (Philadelphia: McCarty and Davis, 1820), vi.
4. Paul Wallace, The Travels of John Heckewelder in Frontier America (Pittsburgh: University of Pittsburgh Press, 2013), 57.
5. Edward Rondthaler, Life of John Heckewelder (Philadelphia: T Ward, 1847), 45.
6. Paul Wallace, The Travels of John Heckewelder in Frontier America (Pittsburgh: University of Pittsburgh Press, 2013), 34-35
7. Fred J., Heer. Ohio Archeological and Historical Publications, Vol. 19. (Columbus, OH: The Ohio State Archeological and Historical Society, 1910), 108-111.
8. Douglas R. Hunt. The Ohio Frontier Crucible of the Old Northwest, 1720-1830. (Indiana: Indiana University Press, 1996), 10.
9. Ibid, 10.
10. Ibid, 11.
11. Ibid, 16.
12. Ibid, 17.
13. Ibid, 17.
14. Ibid, 17.
15. Ibid, 17.
16. Ibid, 11.
17. Douglas R. Hurt. The Ohio Frontier Crucible of the Old Northwest, 1720-1830. (Indiana: Indiana University Press, 1996), 19.
18. De Schweinitz, pp. 310-316.
19. C. H. Mitchener. Ohio Annuals: Historic Events in the Tuscarawas and Muskingum Valleys, and in Other Portions of the State of Ohio. (Columbus: Maxwell Publications, 1976)114-115.
20. John Heckewelder. A Narrative of the Mission of the United Brethren Among the Delaware and Mohegan Indians, from its Commencement, in the Year 1740, to the Close of the Year 1808. (Philadelphia: McCarty and Davis, 1820), 145.
21. Ibid, 168.
22. William E. Hunt. Historical Collections of Coshocton County Ohio. A Complete Panorama of the Earliest Known Occupants of the Territory unto the Present Time 1764-1876. (Cincinnati: Robert Clarke & Co., 1876) 11.
23. Carl Wittke. The History of the State of Ohio, Vol. 1. (Columbus: Ohio State Archeological and Historical Society, 1941), 211-217.
24. Ibid, 201.
25. William E. Hunt. Historical Collections of Coshocton County Ohio. A Complete Panorama of the Earliest Known Occupants of the Territory unto the Present Time 1764-1876.(Cincinnati: Robert Clarke & Co., 1876),11.
26. Ibid, 11-12.
27. Carl Wittke. The History of the State of Ohio, Vol. 1. (Columbus: Ohio State Archeological and Historical Society, 1941), 210.
28. Ibid, 210.
29. John Heckewelder. A Narrative of the Mission of the United Brethren Among the Delaware and Mohegan Indians, from its Commencement, in the Year 1740, to the Close of the Year 1808. (Philadelphia: McCarty and Davis, 1820), 166-167.
30. Ibid.
31. Carl Wittke. The History of the State of Ohio, Vol. 1. (Columbus: Ohio State Archeological and Historical Society, 1941), 210.
32. Ibid, 211.
33. Douglas R. Hurt. The Ohio Frontier Crucible of the Old Northwest, 1720-1830. (Indiana: Indiana University Press, 1996), 114-115; 146; 204-205..
34. C. H. Mitchener. Ohio Annuals: Historic Events in the Tuscarawas and Muskingum Valleys, and in Other Portions of the State of Ohio. (Columbus: Maxwell Publications, 1976), 146.
35. John Heckewelder. A Narrative of the Mission of the United Brethren Among the Delaware and Mohegan Indians, from its Commencement, in the Year 1740, to the Close of the Year 1808. (Philadelphia: McCarty and Davis, 1820),170.
36. Ibid, 170-171.
37. Ibid, 172.
38. C. H. Mitchener. Ohio Annuals: Historic Events in the Tuscarawas and Muskingum Valleys, and in Other Portions of the State of Ohio. (Columbus: Maxwell Publications, 1976), 146.
39. John Heckewelder. A Narrative of the Mission of the United Brethren Among the Delaware and Mohegan Indians, from its Commencement, in the Year 1740, to the Close of the Year 1808. (Philadelphia: McCarty and Davis, 1820),176.
40. C. H. Mitchener. Ohio Annuals: Historic Events in the Tuscarawas and Muskingum Valleys, and in Other Portions of the State of Ohio. (Columbus: Maxwell Publications, 1976), 146.
41. Ibid, 147.
42. John Heckewelder. A Narrative of the Mission of the United Brethren Among the Delaware and Mohegan Indians, from its Commencement, in the Year 1740, to the Close of the Year 1808. (Philadelphia: McCarty and Davis, 1820),176.
43. Ibid, 181.
44. Ibid.
45. Ibid
Experiencing religious persecution throughout Europe, the Moravians ventured to the New World not to escape it but rather to fulfill their mission – to establish missions among the most neglected people. Their missions ranged from the West Indies to Greenland - and America. Several attempts to establish missions to African slaves in Georgia and Native Americans in New York roused whites to interfere with the missions’ success. Having secured land in Pennsylvania, the Moravians established their home mission in what became known as Bethlehem, a remote location significantly distant from the white settlers, many who did not understand their practices. 1, 2 These missionaries saw themselves
"as messengers of the God of Peace, who himself had pronounced a blessing on the peacemakers; . . . The Christian Indians under their care," he continues, "obedient to the commandment of God: 'thou shalt not kill'-. . . strove to live in peace with all mankind... " 3Heckewelder, Narrative, vi.
John Heckewelder was one among those called to be a missionary. While a student in Bedford, England, he attended a Moravian school and it is here he heard Bishop Watteville’s moving speech challenging the boys to answer the call to serve in the mission field, to which he did in his heart,4 The mission equipped each person with skills for service. Having lost his parents on the mission field, orphaned Heckewelder apprenticed out as a cooper. 5 Yet, it was not his cooper skills but his aptitude with the native languages that caught the mission’s attention. Soon, he was assigned to accompany Rev. Post to Newcomerstown, a potential site for a mission to the Delawares. Although this endeavor failed, causing him to return to Bethlehem, he remained committed to missions. When fellow missionary, David Zeisenberger asked for Heckewelder to accompany him west, he went eagerly, establishing missions first in western Pennsylvania, then in eastern Ohio, choosing to live among the Indians as resident missionaries among the Delawares. 6
Before any migrating could occur, the Delawares had to ask permission from The League of Five Nations, primarily due to an arrangement made in 1736 with the leadership of Pennsylvania and the Iroquois. Being heavily involved with the fur trade among the natives, Pennsylvania “granted the Iroquois hegemony over all other tribes in the colony because of their military power and such successful brokerage as middlemen in the fur trade between the western tribes and the English and Dutch. 7 Migrating first from the New Jersey region into Pennsylvania, they settled along the Susquehanna; then they moved westward onto the Big Beaver River. 8 Pennsylvania realized they could use “the Iroquois to control other tribes in the colony in order to forge a military force that would deter French expansion in the Ohio country; a relationship designed to benefit Pennsylvania’s interests most - to regulate the fur trade”. 9 The Iroquois did just that; kept the French at bay by pressuring their counterparts to fall in line and trade with Britain alone.10
The Delawares, considered a “peaceful people”, submitted to the Iroquois to represent themselves “on all diplomatic matters with whites and prohibited them from making war or peace with either whites or Indians without their permission”. 11 Seen as “the woman” in the confederacy, functioning in the role of peace and abstaining from war, caused the Delawares resentment. By 1740, the Iroquois had sold most of the Delawares’ land in Pennsylvania, causing a greater western migration into the Ohio Country and ill feelings against the Iroquois. 12 By 1750, the tribe told the now Six Nations, (the Tuscarawas had joined); “We are men and are determined not to be ruled any longer by you as Women and as determined to cut off all the English, except those that may make their Escape from us n Ships” 13. Securing rights to live north of the Ohio River, south of the southern border of Lake Erie from the Wyandots, the Delaware's soon began establishing major settlements along the Tuscarawas.14 These settlements were so common, that by 1765 the “British depleted the ability of the Delawares to defend themselves from an attack by Indians or whites”; even the physical distance from the Iroquois made supervision by the Six Nations almost impossible. 15 The French observed the increased numbers and challenged themselves to find a way to utilize these numbers for their gain. “The Marquis de Beuharnois, governor of New France, reported: “It would promote in considerable degree the prosperity and security of the Colony, could these Indians settle between Lake Erie and the Ohio River.”16
It is into this landscape that the Moravian missionaries ventured, taking with them their converts from the Beaver River. Their western migration of relocating Delawares missions occurred out of necessity and safety for their converts:
“Continued pressure by white settlers, especially their retaliations during Pontiac's War, caused the Moravians to move their converts first to the Susquehanna valley, then to western Pennsylvania, and finally, in 1772, to the banks of the present Tuscarawas River in Ohio, where they built four towns and flourished for nearly ten years.”17
By 1776, the “Black Coats” and their converts had increased in number to warrant the establishment of another settlement; Zeisenberger with the aid of Netawatwes selected a location south of their other settlements but still on the Muskingum, calling it Lichtenau, “Meadow of Light”.18 Lichtenau was situated south of the newly established Delaware capital in present day Coshocton. Delaware head chief, Netawatwes (Newcomer) abandoned Gekelemuk (Newcomerstown) when a “breach took place among the Delawares, and with those of his tribe who remained true to him, he proceeded to the forks of the Tuscarawas and Walhonding, and built a new capital called, according to Heckewelder, “Goshochking,” and according to De Schweinetz, “Goschachgunk”. Chief Netawatwes and his family “were among the first converts…having selected the spot for Lichtenau” to be built.19 Heckewelder shares “The chief Netawatwes, together with the chiefs, White Eyes, Gelelemend (alias Killbuck) , Machingwi Puschiis (alias the Big Cat), and others, did everything in their power to preserve peace among the nations, by sending embassies, and exhorting them not to take up the hatchet, or to join either side”. 20Not only did the chiefs work together on matters related to the tribe, they also worked together with the missionaries on issues related to the Christian Delawares; Heckewelder explains the process as follows:
The chiefs and council of Goshocking, as the protectors of the Christian Indians, would frequently consult the missionaries on matters necessary for the preservation of peace. They had repeatedly declared that nothing should withdraw their confidence from their American brethren; who, together with them, had sprung up from the same soil. –that their brethren had told them, at the treaty of Pittsburgh not to join either side with a hostile intention – not to go to war against the English, no more than against them, and which language their American brethren still held before them, while on the other hand the English, who called themselves fathers, were continually teasing them to take up the hatchet, and kill the Americans, their brethren. 21
As the Revolutionary War took hold, the colonists clearly wanted the support of the Ohio Indians; if they couldn’t get their support, they wanted them to stay neutral and fight no one. To ensure the vast expanse of the Delaware's, “two treaties were made in Pittsburg in successive years—1775 and 1776—binding to neutrality the Delawares, and some of the immediately adjacent nations.” 22 Advantages of having the Indians support the colonists included protection for Fort Pitt and assistance with the supply chain. In addition, Fort Pitt was challenged due to lack of funds; the surge of new migration over the mountains and the lack of compensation made to locals who would or could sell their wares. Interestingly, the boundary controversy between Virginia and Pennsylvania caused colonists to consider favoring “the British in Pittsburgh and the near-by settlements.”23 The British, however, needed the Indians to fight and to help secure supplies to Detroit. They were outnumbered and had no easy way to get their supplies from Canada.24
By 1777 the hatchet sent form Detroit (the British headquarters) was accepted by the Shawnees, Wyandots, and Mingos.”25 Some Delaware were ready to join the British, but with a general council held on March 9, 1777, the hatchet was offered three times and declined each time; much credit given to Captain White Eye’s speeches.26 The Delawares, “fearing a British attack in retaliation for their friendly attitude toward the Americans, appealed in vain for military assistance.”27
Indian attacks continued throughout the region of Fort Pitt, in part as retaliation for killing of Indians and in part for land encroachment. 28 Heckewelder shares that by “early spring in 1778, the Wyandot, the Mingos (Iroquois), began to commit hostilities against the American people, attacking, plundering and murdering them on their plantations’.29 These Indians would sometimes purposely return via way of the Delawares, to “pass with their prisoners and their scalps, through the peaceable Delaware Indian settlement in order to disturb the inhabitants or if possible draw in the enemy, while in on them, taking such to be the aggressors.30
Seizing this opportunity to sway boarder colonists, Lieutenant Governor Hamilton sent “proclamations from Detroit, promising the frontier inhabitants large bounties in land if only they would come over to the British”. 31 In addition to these tactics, Hamilton also hired Alexander McKee, Simon Girty, and Matthew Elliot as secret agents of Britain.32 Simon Girty, having served in the American militia at Fort Pitt, asked for a captain’s commission in 1778 but was denied. Deserting on March 28, 1778, along with twenty other soldiers, they joined up with the British. He, McKee, Elliot and the twenty other soldiers headed “for British headquarters through the Indian country”, carrying “with them an intimate knowledge of American plans and strength, and their wide acquaintance among the Indians promised to be of great value to the enemy.” 33 They traveled to the Delawares’ capital, Goshocking and began to share the most shocking lies regarding the patriots and their leaders: “that the American army had been cut to pieces by the Redcoats, and Washington was dead,” that he army dispersed and lastly, that the Americans were on the warpath promising to kill all Native Americans- all to stir Col. Pipe and the Delawares into siding with the British.34 “Captain Pipe called the Delawares to the council house…urging them to take up the hatchet against the colonies.”35 Heckewelder writes: “Captain White Eyes and other chiefs would not give credit to reports of this kind, especially coming from such characters; yet …(White Eyes) knew well that his conduct in this affair would be closely watched by his rival, Captain Pipe . 35
White Eyes made a proposition to wait ten days for any word from Fort Pitt that would collaborate what was being said as true. Colonel Pipe saw this opportunity to usurp Captain White Eye’s leadership, stating “to declare every man an enemy to the nation, that should throw an obstacle in the way, that might tend to prevent the taking up of arms immediately against the American people” (p. 170). White Eyes realized the words were directed toward him but would not allow the ignorance of quick decision making and emotions destroy the peaceful status his tribe had accomplished in his tenure. He gave permission for the men to choose to follow the “vagabond fugitives”, but if so, he himself would not let his tribe go into battle without him. He said he would be going out first, to lead the battle in front and be the first to fall. All chose to wait ten days.36
During this time, Heckewelder had been stationed at Lichtenau however, had taken leave for a few months to go to Bethlehem to respond to concerns by the mission – they had heard nothing from their missions on the Muskingum. Fellow missionary, John Shabosh, accompanied him, however, were delayed in returning to Ohio as they waited for various passports of passage through various areas, which had to come directly from the President of Congress, Henry Laurens and Horatio Gates, the Secretary of War. Upon receiving them, they were on their way; as they approached Fort Pitt, evidence of Girty, McKee and Elliot’s influences were obvious as they witnessed abandoned and burned homesteads with words chalked or burned into siding “Good people avoid this road for the Indians are murdering us.” 37 At Fort Pitt where they heard reports “that had come up form the valley”, causing General Hand to issue letters of peace to the Delaware, “assuring them that all the stories were false.” 38 Colonel Gibson and General Hand were not successful finding anyone to “run” the messages to the Delaware – so they would know the truth and not enter the war. After a night of sleep, both men believed it their duty to God “to preserve the mission and save the Delaware nation and maintain peace; any other outcome would be the ruin of all.”39
They encountered war parties, swollen rivers to swim and another required building a pole raft to cross. They experienced hunger and fatigue and cold as no fire was built to avoid attention from the smoke. The men rode three days and nights, stopping only to feed their horses, reaching Gnadenhutten at eleven at night. Heckewelder requested a fresh horse before continuing to Goshochking, another thirty miles. After a few hours of sleep and securing a riding companion to join him, (John Martin), they set off. 40 Upon arriving:
The Delaware's were painted and ready for the warpath. His old friends, and even White Eyes, refused to shake hands with him. Seeing the crisis, he stood up in his saddle, …waving eh peace letters over his head, telling the Indians that all the stories were lies; that instead of Washington being killed, the American army had captured Burgoyne’s British army, and that instead of coming west to kill the Indians, the Americans were their true friends, and wanted them not to take any part in the war.41
When Heckewelder inquired why no one would yet shake his hand; it was Captain White Eyes who explained how the deceivers words had caused the Delaware to be leery of all Americans; that they just pretend to be friends to lure them in and take them by surprise. Heckewelder counters by challenging them about he being their friend, one who rode on to get them the letters from Fort Pitt. Captain White Eyes then begins to ask about all the statements that McKee and company proclaimed as truth: “are the American armies cut to pieces? Was General Washington killed? Was there still a congress? Did the British kill some and take some back to England for hanging? Are there only a few thousand American peoples left on the other side of the mountains who are determined to kill every Indian, man, woman and child? Now don’t deceive us, tell us the truth, is this the truth what I have shared?”42 Heckewelder declared all the statements as untrue and reached out again with the speeches sent from General Hand and Gibson; but were refused. Thinking quickly, he called on the drummer to beat the drum to call an assembly with White Eyes taking the lead addressing the assembly, “Shall we my friends and relatives listen once more to those who call us brethren?”43
The members affirmed loudly, gathering into the council house where all the speeches were read, where White Eyes spoke regarding how the American people had never asked them to join the war against the English but instead instructed them to remain quiet and not take up the hatchet as war is destructive, 44. White Eyes then held up the newspaper article of Burguyne’s army’s defeat so all could see it, saying:
“See my friends and relatives, this document contains the great events, not of a songbird but of truth. Then stepping up to me, he gave me his hand saying, “You are welcome with us Brother”, when everyone present, followed his example.45
Committed to his cause, Heckewelder’s tenacious drive from Fort Pitt to Coshocton allowed the Patriots to maintain a strong hold in the west. The frontier, the last frontier, proved to be a battleground in which a battle was never fought, but was the biggest battle which helped win the revolution. The English eventually withdrew from the Detroit region and the fur trade with the native American’s. Heckewelder’s faith in the cause of the patriots as well as his conviction to preserve the Delaware people by keeping them from war elevates him to a hero. His selfish acts of love and courage were perceived by his beloved Delaware as a true friendship. John, in his book at 15:14 reads “Greater love hath no man than this, that a man lay down his life for his friends”. Patriots died for their cause of freedom, Heckewelder would have died for his friends.
Bibliography
Downes, Randolph C. Evolution of Ohio County Boundaries. Columbus, OH: The Ohio Historical Society, 1970.
De Schweinitz, p. 310-316.
Heckewelder, John. Manners, and Customs of the Indian Nations who once Inhabited Pennsylvania and the Neighboring States: Pittsburgh, PA; The Historical Society of Pennsylvania, 1881
Heckewelder, John. A Narrative of the Mission of the United Brethren Among the Delaware and Mohegan Indians, from its Commencement, in the Year 1740, to the Close of the Year 1808. Philadelphia, PA: McCarty and Davis, 1820.
Heer, Fred J. Ohio Archeological and Historical Publications. Vol. 19. Columbus, OH; The Ohio State Archeological and Historical Society, 1910.
Hill, N. N. Jr. History of Coshocton County, Ohio: Its Past and Present, 1740-1881. Newark, OH: A.A. Graham & Company, 1881.
Hurt, William E. Historical Collections of Coshocton County Ohio. A Complete Panorama of the Earliest Known Occupants of the Territory unto the Present Time 1764-1876. Cincinnati, OH; Robert Clarke & Co. 1876.
Lohram, H. P. and Ralph H. Roming. Valley of the Tuscarawas. Dover, OH: The Ohio Hills Publishers, 1972.
Miller, James M. The Genesis of Western Culture the Upper Ohio Valley 1800-1825. Columbus, OH: The Ohio State Archaeological and Historical Society, 1938.
Mitchener, C. H. Ohio Annals: Historic Events in the Tuscarawas and Muskingum Valleys, and in Other Portions of the State of Ohio. Columbus, OH: Maxwell Publications, 1876.
Rondthale, Edward, Life of John Heckewelder. Philadelphia, PA: T Ward, 1847.
Schneider, Norris F. The Muskingum River A History and Guide. Columbus, OH: The Ohio Historical Society, 1968.
Smith, Thomas H. An Ohio Reader 1750 to the Civil War. Grand Rapids, MI: Williams B. Eerdmans Publishing Company, 1975.
Wallace, Paul A. The Travels of John Heckewelder in Frontier America. Pittsburgh, PA: University of Pittsburgh Press, 2013.
Wilcox, Frank N. Ohio Indian Trails. Cleveland, OH: The Gates Press, 1933.
Wittke, Carl, The History of the State of Ohio. Vol. 1. Columbus, OH: Ohio State Archeological and Historical Society, 1941.
Notes
1. Paul Wallace, The Travels of John Heckewelder in Frontier America (Pittsburgh: University of Pittsburgh Press, 2013), 26-28.
2. N.N. Hunt, Jr., History of Coshocton County, Ohio: Its Past and Present, 1740-1881 (Newark: A.A. Graham & Company, 1881), 58.
3. John Heckewelder, A Narrative of the Missions of the United Brethren Among the Delaware and Mohegan Indians, from its Commencement, in the Year 1740, to the Close of the year 1808 (Philadelphia: McCarty and Davis, 1820), vi.
4. Paul Wallace, The Travels of John Heckewelder in Frontier America (Pittsburgh: University of Pittsburgh Press, 2013), 57.
5. Edward Rondthaler, Life of John Heckewelder (Philadelphia: T Ward, 1847), 45.
6. Paul Wallace, The Travels of John Heckewelder in Frontier America (Pittsburgh: University of Pittsburgh Press, 2013), 34-35
7. Fred J., Heer. Ohio Archeological and Historical Publications, Vol. 19. (Columbus, OH: The Ohio State Archeological and Historical Society, 1910), 108-111.
8. Douglas R. Hunt. The Ohio Frontier Crucible of the Old Northwest, 1720-1830. (Indiana: Indiana University Press, 1996), 10.
9. Ibid, 10.
10. Ibid, 11.
11. Ibid, 16.
12. Ibid, 17.
13. Ibid, 17.
14. Ibid, 17.
15. Ibid, 17.
16. Ibid, 11.
17. Douglas R. Hurt. The Ohio Frontier Crucible of the Old Northwest, 1720-1830. (Indiana: Indiana University Press, 1996), 19.
18. De Schweinitz, pp. 310-316.
19. C. H. Mitchener. Ohio Annuals: Historic Events in the Tuscarawas and Muskingum Valleys, and in Other Portions of the State of Ohio. (Columbus: Maxwell Publications, 1976)114-115.
20. John Heckewelder. A Narrative of the Mission of the United Brethren Among the Delaware and Mohegan Indians, from its Commencement, in the Year 1740, to the Close of the Year 1808. (Philadelphia: McCarty and Davis, 1820), 145.
21. Ibid, 168.
22. William E. Hunt. Historical Collections of Coshocton County Ohio. A Complete Panorama of the Earliest Known Occupants of the Territory unto the Present Time 1764-1876. (Cincinnati: Robert Clarke & Co., 1876) 11.
23. Carl Wittke. The History of the State of Ohio, Vol. 1. (Columbus: Ohio State Archeological and Historical Society, 1941), 211-217.
24. Ibid, 201.
25. William E. Hunt. Historical Collections of Coshocton County Ohio. A Complete Panorama of the Earliest Known Occupants of the Territory unto the Present Time 1764-1876.(Cincinnati: Robert Clarke & Co., 1876),11.
26. Ibid, 11-12.
27. Carl Wittke. The History of the State of Ohio, Vol. 1. (Columbus: Ohio State Archeological and Historical Society, 1941), 210.
28. Ibid, 210.
29. John Heckewelder. A Narrative of the Mission of the United Brethren Among the Delaware and Mohegan Indians, from its Commencement, in the Year 1740, to the Close of the Year 1808. (Philadelphia: McCarty and Davis, 1820), 166-167.
30. Ibid.
31. Carl Wittke. The History of the State of Ohio, Vol. 1. (Columbus: Ohio State Archeological and Historical Society, 1941), 210.
32. Ibid, 211.
33. Douglas R. Hurt. The Ohio Frontier Crucible of the Old Northwest, 1720-1830. (Indiana: Indiana University Press, 1996), 114-115; 146; 204-205..
34. C. H. Mitchener. Ohio Annuals: Historic Events in the Tuscarawas and Muskingum Valleys, and in Other Portions of the State of Ohio. (Columbus: Maxwell Publications, 1976), 146.
35. John Heckewelder. A Narrative of the Mission of the United Brethren Among the Delaware and Mohegan Indians, from its Commencement, in the Year 1740, to the Close of the Year 1808. (Philadelphia: McCarty and Davis, 1820),170.
36. Ibid, 170-171.
37. Ibid, 172.
38. C. H. Mitchener. Ohio Annuals: Historic Events in the Tuscarawas and Muskingum Valleys, and in Other Portions of the State of Ohio. (Columbus: Maxwell Publications, 1976), 146.
39. John Heckewelder. A Narrative of the Mission of the United Brethren Among the Delaware and Mohegan Indians, from its Commencement, in the Year 1740, to the Close of the Year 1808. (Philadelphia: McCarty and Davis, 1820),176.
40. C. H. Mitchener. Ohio Annuals: Historic Events in the Tuscarawas and Muskingum Valleys, and in Other Portions of the State of Ohio. (Columbus: Maxwell Publications, 1976), 146.
41. Ibid, 147.
42. John Heckewelder. A Narrative of the Mission of the United Brethren Among the Delaware and Mohegan Indians, from its Commencement, in the Year 1740, to the Close of the Year 1808. (Philadelphia: McCarty and Davis, 1820),176.
43. Ibid, 181.
44. Ibid.
45. Ibid
Mark Kittel: Coshocton, Capital of Ohio? (1st Place Winner)
Most Coshocton residents well know that the town’s name comes from the Lenape Indians, as it was the Lenape who established a town here and called it Goschachgunk, “union of waters.” (Coshocton County Government, “About Coshocton.”) But likely few Coshoctonians know that the Coshocton Lenape were the first Native American nation to make a treaty with the United States.
This treaty could have made Coshocton the capital of this state. And had this treaty been honored fully, America’s sad and destructive history with Native Americans might have turned out entirely differently.
By 1775, as the colonies’ revolt against Britain turned to open war, the Lenape had been pushed out of their ancestral homelands on the Atlantic, and most had settled west of the Appalachian Mountains. They had established towns throughout what is now western Pennsylvania and eastern Ohio, and Coshocton was one of the largest of these settlements. (Delaware Tribe of Indians, “Removal History of the Delaware Tribe.”) Some of these settlements, like Schoenbrunn and Gnadenhutten, were established through Moravian missionaries seeking to Christianize the Lenape, Shawnee, and Wyandots. (Toyias 2013, 44.) British treaties with these Native American nations set boundaries to contain colonists and prevent them from pushing westward against British will, but numerous Americans, particularly the Virginians, regularly ignored these boundaries and continually encroached on Indian territory. (Ibid, 36.) The Shawnee and Cherokee nations, as well as some Wyandot and Delaware clans, felt that the best way to protect their territory and population was to ally with the British in their war to keep the colonies in line. (Dowd 1992, 47-49.)
The fledgling states were desperate for Native American allies in the face of British invasion and native nations uniting against the colonies. (Dowd 1992, 72.) It was thus probably a welcome surprise when White Eyes, a chief of the Coshocton Lenape, addressed the Continental Congress in April, 1776, and proposed a treaty with the Americans against the British. In exchange for their friendship and aid, the Lenape would be granted statehood and Congressional representation in the new United States. The Congress said yes, and a formal treaty between the Lenape and the United States was signed at Fort Pitt two years later.
White Eyes’ vision of how the Delaware could preserve their land and their independence was unique among Native American leaders. Most leaders of his time held to the belief that they could contain the growing colonies through warfare and keep themselves separated from the Americans. For these leaders, allying with the British was a political calculation. They well understood that the British were not their peaceful friends, but at least could be better trusted than the Americans to respect and enforce boundaries. Aligning with the British in their war gave them express permission to attack white colonists and take back land they had occupied. These leaders believed and hoped that a British victory would mean preservation of these nations’ identities, lands, traditions and religious beliefs. (Dowd 1992, 64, 74-75.)
White Eyes saw the Native American world changing and advocated instead for the Lenape to accommodate and adapt to the colonists. This view had clearly come to him years before his 1776 address to the Continental Congress. When White Eyes rose to leadership with the Lenape is not well known, but at least as early as 1767 he, along with a few other Lenape chiefs, advocated against violent conflict with white settlers. (Ibid, 45.) At a time when other chiefs resisted and attacked Christian missions, White Eyes befriended the Moravian missions in this region and did not discourage Lenape from converting to Christianity. While White Eyes himself never converted, he found harmony between his beliefs and certain Christian sects, particularly those of the Quakers, even going so far as to declare that the Lenape and Quakers were “spiritual brothers.” (Ibid, 69.) White Eyes was so committed to peaceful conflict resolution that he left Newcomer’s Town to found his own town of White Eyes (near West Lafayette) to avoid fighting with other leaders over how to deal with the colonists. (Ibid, 45.) But following severe losses fighting Virginia in Dunmore’s War in 1774, several other regional leaders, particularly chiefs Killbuck and Netawatwes, adopted White Eyes’ accommodationist views. Netawatwes went so far as to openly advocate for his people to convert to Christianity. (Ibid, 69.)
David Zeisberger, one of the most prominent of these Moravian missionary leaders, was not blind to White Eyes’ motivations. While he likely appreciated the relative peace that White Eyes espoused, as well as the converts, Zeisberger was convinced that White Eyes’ was only interested in the political and material benefits of accommodation, not any spiritual benefits of conversion. He was likely correct in his assessment. By encouraging cooperation with the missions, White Eyes and his fellow leaders would retain their position of leadership over those Lenape that had chosen conversion, as well as prevent cultural separation of the converts from those that remained unconverted. Converts would not find their allegiances divided. Through cooperation White Eyes promoted trade through the missions, giving the Lenape access to European tools and technologies and building the economic strength of the Coshocton people. (Dowd 1992, 69-73.) Zeisberger’s account shows us that White Eyes, unlike his contemporaries in rival clans and native nations, recognized that peace and prosperity for the Coshocton Lenape would not be achieved through warfare and isolation. Instead, this visionary leader saw that his people would have to accept and adapt to the presence and systems of the colonists in order to preserve their own strength and independence. (Toyias 2013, 44-46.) He recognized that the Lenape, as well as his neighboring Native American nations, could not hope to defeat the American colonists nor survive through armed resistance.
White Eyes’ vision for Lenape statehood grew out of his efforts to promote harmony with Christian missionaries and white settlers. In 1774, he was selected to be the principal chief of the Lenape nation, not long after tensions between Virginian colonists and the Shawnee nation boiled over into open warfare. (Toyias 2013, 44.) He advocated for Lenape neutrality in Dunmore’s war and attempted, unsuccessfully, to prevent war altogether. He nevertheless acted as an intermediary between the Shawnee and Governor Dunmore of Virginia during the war, helping to broker a peace settlement to end hostilities. (Hill 1881, 198; Dowd 1992, 68-69.) As part of the bargain for his labor, White Eyes won from Dunmore an agreement that the governor would obtain a grant from the king on behalf of the Lenape. The grant would secure the Lenape claim to lands in Ohio, both against any claims by colonists and against any claims by other Native American nations. Along with this grant, White Eyes laid the groundwork with Dunmore to gain Congressional representation and protection for the Lenape. (Dowd 1992, 71; Toyias 2013, 44-45.) This goal was sound if it could be achieved; Congressional recognition of the Coshocton Lenape lands would obligate the American government to protect the Lenape against both unwelcome colonists and against hostile native nations.
Unfortunately for the Coshocton Lenape, the colonial revolt came quickly on the heels of the conclusion of this short war. Dunmore, a thorough British loyalist, was forced in 1775 to flee Virginia as Virginians revolted against British rule. His departure virtually erased the gains that White Eyes had made, and the Lenape had to start over. (Dowd 1992, 71; Toyias 2013, 44-45.) However, the alignment of so many Native American nations with the British against the colonies gave White Eyes and the Lenape their best chance for the future. Thus, when White Eyes laid out his proposal to Congress in the Spring of 1776, he aimed to put the Lenape on the same footing as the thirteen states of the new United States.
The 1778 Treaty of Fort Pitt virtually solidified the plan for a new Native American state to be created. The terms of the treaty called for mutual forgiveness of past disputes and grievances, established that the Lenape would assist American troops and guide them through Lenape territory when required, spelled out terms for trade between the two parties, called for a defensive fort to be built near Lenape territory, and mandated peaceful negotiations for future disputes. The last article of the treaty recognized the sovereignty of the Lenape people, guaranteed their protection, and promised to seek Congressional approval in the future for granting statehood to the Lenape Confederation, which would encompass the Lenape and any other Native American people who joined with them. (Williams 1976, 381-383; Zotigh, “A Brief Balance of Power.”) The Lenape, designated as the leaders of this confederation, would govern the new state upon creation. On September 17, 1778, White Eyes, along with chiefs Killbuck and Pipe, signed on behalf of the three Lenape clans from the Coshocton region. (Zotigh, “A Brief Balance of Power.”)
The Treaty of Fort Pitt was the first treaty signed between the new United States and a Native American nation, and by its very terms promised a revolutionary change in two centuries of hostile relations between European Americans and Native Americans. How that might have fully played out under different circumstances can only be the subject of speculation, but had the treaty held and been honored by the parties, some outcomes are fairly clear in retrospect.
Granting statehood to one Native American nation would have provided a path for numerous other Native nations to join the United States. Rather than engage in a long-running series of debilitating wars fought to stem the flow of white settlers, Native nations could have followed the Lenape model and petitioned Congress to form a state, giving them formal recognition as equal parts and partners in the union. Like the original thirteen states, they would have organized state and local governments that would control how those state lands could be developed and used, and granted seats in Congress.
Conflicts between settlers moving westward and established Native Americans would likely have been resolved more often through negotiation and intervention by the national government when needed. The aggressive westward expansion of the United States would likely still have occurred as populations of eastern states and cities grew, but with the precedent established for Native Americans to define their own states, these native nations could have made themselves legally recognized sovereign states at the same time that eastern migrants moved west and began establishing new territories that would also become states. This path for formal statehood could thus have prevented much of the relentless displacement and resettlement of Native peoples during the nineteenth century, as well as the violent deaths of countless white and native people throughout these decades of expansion.
Also, there is a real likelihood that this Lenape state, whether named Ohio or given a different name, would have had Coshocton as its first capital. In White Eyes’ time, Coshocton was probably the largest single town of Lenape people north of the Ohio River with an estimated population of about 2,000. (Dowd 1992, 79.) Present day Coshocton has a well-known history as a prominent canal town in the early nineteenth century, situated as it is at the confluence of the Tuscawaras and Muskingum rivers; in all likelihood the Lenape would have taken advantage of the rivers as well to facilitate trade and shipping between the Great Lakes and the Ohio River, leading to economic and popular growth for the town.
But the Fort Pitt treaty was short lived. White Eyes died on November 10, 1778, and with him died
the main force that had made the treaty possible.
Per the promises of the treaty, in early November White Eyes joined a division of the Continental Army led by General Lachlan McIntosh. He was given the rank of lieutenant colonel and tasked with guiding McIntosh’s troops through the Ohio wilderness. The expedition intended to scout the Ohio River and its tributaries for suitable defensive posts. (Zotigh, “A Brief Balance of Power”; Schilling, “Yellow Creek Stories.”) The expedition set out from Fort McIntosh on November 5, 1778, with White Eyes leading the troops along trails well known to him. White Eyes was reported by General McIntosh to have died five days later of smallpox. (Schilling, “Yellow Creek Stories.”) But a contemporary and friend of White Eyes, George Morgan, claimed years later that White Eyes had been assassinated by one of McIntosh’s militia men. (Dowd 1992, 77-78.) No motive for the killing was ever provided, but given how much the Lenape revered their leader and the almost certain loss of the states’ only Native American allies if the truth were revealed, McIntosh had every reason to cover up the killing with a story of smallpox. (Dowd 1992, 77-78; Schilling, “Yellow Creek Stories.”) In retrospect and with the benefit of modern medical knowledge, the chances that White Eyes actually died of smallpox are very low. People who have died of smallpox usually died within ten days to two weeks after the first symptoms appeared. (Ochmann et al., “Smallpox.”) At best, White Eyes would have been in the middle of the worst and most debilitating symptoms of smallpox, including the well-known and recognizable full body rash, when the army began its travels on November 5. The idea that he guided troops for five full days in that condition is fairly unbelievable.
While the murder by militia men is now the more widely accepted explanation of White Eyes’ death, there are also reports that he was assassinated by Chief Pipe from a rival Lenape clan. Unlike White Eyes and in like mind with many Shawnee and Wyandot leaders, Pipe was an advocate for full resistance to the encroachment of white settlers and was hostile to missionaries’ attempts to convert the Lenape to Christianity. Pipe’s advocacy, however, had nearly led the Lenape into a disastrous war against the Continental army in Pennsylvania in 1776; it was White Eyes’ firm resolve to maintain the peaceful neutrality of the Lenape that prevented hostilities. Pipe apparently suffered a loss of reputation with the Lenape over this incident, and he reportedly was one to nurse grudges. (Schilling, “Yellow Creek Stories.”) Whether driven by revenge or by his desire to separate the Lenape from the grip of Christian conversion, Pipe would have had sufficient motive to kill off a rival leader and put an end to White Eyes’ agenda of accommodation with the European Americans.
White Eyes’ death was keenly felt throughout the Ohio Lenape. Chief Killbuck took up White Eyes’ mantle to preserve relations with the Americans, but quickly found in the months after White Eyes death that maintaining neutrality was nearly impossible (Dowd 1992, 80). White Eyes was not the only prominent Lenape killed under suspicious circumstances, and further suspicious killings began changing Lenape minds on neutrality. Despite the promises of the treaty, American settlers continued to push into Lenape territory and come into armed conflict with the natives. At the same time, Native forces friendly to the British harassed and raided in Lenape territory. Eventually, Killbuck had no choice but to choose sides, and he elected to commit warriors to fight alongside the Americans and preserve the alliance. (Dowd 1992, 78-80.)
The collapse of Fort Laurens, near present day Bolivar, completely undid the Fort Pitt treaty. This fort was completed in late 1778 by General McIntosh, fulfilling one of the treaty’s main provisions. But the fort was never properly manned and was always poorly supplied. The Americans withdrew most of the troops in the early winter of 1779, leaving it and the Lenape open to attack. The Americans promised the Lenape they would reinforce the fort, but no reinforcements ever came. This opened the fort to a deadly siege by British forces and numerous Native American allies in February. Several of these allies were Lenape clans who had become disillusioned with the Americans and removed Killbuck from leadership. Commander Brodhead, having taken over from General McIntosh, considered the Lenape to have broken the Treaty of Fort Pitt and began raiding Coshocton. (Dowd 1992, 81-83.) The worst retaliation for the fall of Fort Laurens came with a raid on the Moravian village of Gnadenhutten, where American soldiers killed nearly a hundred unarmed Lenape. Even the leadership of the Continental Army recognized the depravity of this deplorable massacre, but the damage to relations with the Lenape was now irreparable. (Toyias 2013, 47; Dowd 1992, 86). The alliance was over, and the remaining Lenape continued fighting the Americans until their losses forced them into surrender.
If Chief Pipe did assassinate White Eyes, there is harsh irony in the fallout from that killing. After the war ended in 1783, the colonists wasted little time in expanding westward and gave little thought to attacking the Native Americans that had allied with the British. Without aid from the British military, Native Americans found it impossible to do more than enjoy temporary victories before crushing defeats. (Dowd 1992, 90-115; Hill 1881, 197-198.) By 1795, Chief Pipe, along with leaders from several other Ohio nations, was forced to sign a treaty that recognized ownership by the United States of the Ohio territory. (Dowd 1992, 112-114.) The Lenape abandoned what was left of Coshocton. They initially resettled in Indiana, and eventually were forced into new settlements in Oklahoma and Ontario. (Delaware Tribe of Indians, “Removal History of the Delaware Tribe.”)
It remains an open question whether the Continental Congress of 1776 truly intended to follow through with their agreement to grant statehood to the Lenape. Desperate as they were for help, they probably would have made any promise that would win them support from Native Americans. But after the collapse of the Treaty of Fort Pitt, the United States never again offered a sovereign state to any native nation, and no Native Americans sought such an agreement. We are left now only with the memory of White Eyes’ keen vision and the question of what might have sprung from that vision.
References Cited:
“About Coshocton.” Coshocton County Government. Accessed October 31, 2024.
https://www.coshoctoncounty.net/about-coshocton/.
Dowd, Gregory Evans. A Spirited Resistance: The North American Indian Struggle for Unity, 1745- 1815, 68–89. Baltimore, Md: Johns Hopkins University Press, 1992.
Hill, Norman Newell. History of Coshocton County, Ohio: Its Past and Present, 1740-1881, 197–99. Newark, OH: A. A. Graham & Co., 1881.
Ochmann, Sophie, Saloni Dattani, and Max Roser. “Smallpox.” Our World in Data, February 29, 2024. https://ourworldindata.org/smallpox.
“Removal History of the Delaware Tribe.” Delaware Tribe of Indians. Accessed October 31, 2024. https://delawaretribe.org/services-and-programs/historic-preservation/removal-history-of-the- delaware-tribe/. Reprinted from “Removal and the Cherokee-Delaware Agreement,” in Delaware Tribe in a Cherokee Nation, by Brice Obermeyer. University of Nebraska Press, 2009. Pp. 37-48, 52- 58.
Schilling, Robert W. “Yellow Creek Stories.” Yellow Creek Stories: Chapter IX, “White Eyes.” Accessed October 31, 2024. https://www.garlock-elliott.org/archive/YllwCrkSt/CHAPTER09.htm.
Toyias, Danice. “NativeAmericans_andRev,” April 7, 2013, 36-39, 44-45. http://biographiesofthenation.pbworks.com/w/file/fetch/36105468/NativeAmericans_andRev.pdf
Williams, Edward G. “Fort Pitt and the Revolution on the Western Frontier.” The Journal of American History 59, no. 4 (October 1976): 379–444. https://doi.org/10.2307/1900909.
Zotigh, Dennis. “A Brief Balance of Power—The 1778 Treaty with the Delaware Nation.” Smithsonian Magazine, May 21, 2018. https://www.smithsonianmag.com/blogs/national-museum-american- indian/2018/05/22/1778-delaware-treaty/
This treaty could have made Coshocton the capital of this state. And had this treaty been honored fully, America’s sad and destructive history with Native Americans might have turned out entirely differently.
By 1775, as the colonies’ revolt against Britain turned to open war, the Lenape had been pushed out of their ancestral homelands on the Atlantic, and most had settled west of the Appalachian Mountains. They had established towns throughout what is now western Pennsylvania and eastern Ohio, and Coshocton was one of the largest of these settlements. (Delaware Tribe of Indians, “Removal History of the Delaware Tribe.”) Some of these settlements, like Schoenbrunn and Gnadenhutten, were established through Moravian missionaries seeking to Christianize the Lenape, Shawnee, and Wyandots. (Toyias 2013, 44.) British treaties with these Native American nations set boundaries to contain colonists and prevent them from pushing westward against British will, but numerous Americans, particularly the Virginians, regularly ignored these boundaries and continually encroached on Indian territory. (Ibid, 36.) The Shawnee and Cherokee nations, as well as some Wyandot and Delaware clans, felt that the best way to protect their territory and population was to ally with the British in their war to keep the colonies in line. (Dowd 1992, 47-49.)
The fledgling states were desperate for Native American allies in the face of British invasion and native nations uniting against the colonies. (Dowd 1992, 72.) It was thus probably a welcome surprise when White Eyes, a chief of the Coshocton Lenape, addressed the Continental Congress in April, 1776, and proposed a treaty with the Americans against the British. In exchange for their friendship and aid, the Lenape would be granted statehood and Congressional representation in the new United States. The Congress said yes, and a formal treaty between the Lenape and the United States was signed at Fort Pitt two years later.
White Eyes’ vision of how the Delaware could preserve their land and their independence was unique among Native American leaders. Most leaders of his time held to the belief that they could contain the growing colonies through warfare and keep themselves separated from the Americans. For these leaders, allying with the British was a political calculation. They well understood that the British were not their peaceful friends, but at least could be better trusted than the Americans to respect and enforce boundaries. Aligning with the British in their war gave them express permission to attack white colonists and take back land they had occupied. These leaders believed and hoped that a British victory would mean preservation of these nations’ identities, lands, traditions and religious beliefs. (Dowd 1992, 64, 74-75.)
White Eyes saw the Native American world changing and advocated instead for the Lenape to accommodate and adapt to the colonists. This view had clearly come to him years before his 1776 address to the Continental Congress. When White Eyes rose to leadership with the Lenape is not well known, but at least as early as 1767 he, along with a few other Lenape chiefs, advocated against violent conflict with white settlers. (Ibid, 45.) At a time when other chiefs resisted and attacked Christian missions, White Eyes befriended the Moravian missions in this region and did not discourage Lenape from converting to Christianity. While White Eyes himself never converted, he found harmony between his beliefs and certain Christian sects, particularly those of the Quakers, even going so far as to declare that the Lenape and Quakers were “spiritual brothers.” (Ibid, 69.) White Eyes was so committed to peaceful conflict resolution that he left Newcomer’s Town to found his own town of White Eyes (near West Lafayette) to avoid fighting with other leaders over how to deal with the colonists. (Ibid, 45.) But following severe losses fighting Virginia in Dunmore’s War in 1774, several other regional leaders, particularly chiefs Killbuck and Netawatwes, adopted White Eyes’ accommodationist views. Netawatwes went so far as to openly advocate for his people to convert to Christianity. (Ibid, 69.)
David Zeisberger, one of the most prominent of these Moravian missionary leaders, was not blind to White Eyes’ motivations. While he likely appreciated the relative peace that White Eyes espoused, as well as the converts, Zeisberger was convinced that White Eyes’ was only interested in the political and material benefits of accommodation, not any spiritual benefits of conversion. He was likely correct in his assessment. By encouraging cooperation with the missions, White Eyes and his fellow leaders would retain their position of leadership over those Lenape that had chosen conversion, as well as prevent cultural separation of the converts from those that remained unconverted. Converts would not find their allegiances divided. Through cooperation White Eyes promoted trade through the missions, giving the Lenape access to European tools and technologies and building the economic strength of the Coshocton people. (Dowd 1992, 69-73.) Zeisberger’s account shows us that White Eyes, unlike his contemporaries in rival clans and native nations, recognized that peace and prosperity for the Coshocton Lenape would not be achieved through warfare and isolation. Instead, this visionary leader saw that his people would have to accept and adapt to the presence and systems of the colonists in order to preserve their own strength and independence. (Toyias 2013, 44-46.) He recognized that the Lenape, as well as his neighboring Native American nations, could not hope to defeat the American colonists nor survive through armed resistance.
White Eyes’ vision for Lenape statehood grew out of his efforts to promote harmony with Christian missionaries and white settlers. In 1774, he was selected to be the principal chief of the Lenape nation, not long after tensions between Virginian colonists and the Shawnee nation boiled over into open warfare. (Toyias 2013, 44.) He advocated for Lenape neutrality in Dunmore’s war and attempted, unsuccessfully, to prevent war altogether. He nevertheless acted as an intermediary between the Shawnee and Governor Dunmore of Virginia during the war, helping to broker a peace settlement to end hostilities. (Hill 1881, 198; Dowd 1992, 68-69.) As part of the bargain for his labor, White Eyes won from Dunmore an agreement that the governor would obtain a grant from the king on behalf of the Lenape. The grant would secure the Lenape claim to lands in Ohio, both against any claims by colonists and against any claims by other Native American nations. Along with this grant, White Eyes laid the groundwork with Dunmore to gain Congressional representation and protection for the Lenape. (Dowd 1992, 71; Toyias 2013, 44-45.) This goal was sound if it could be achieved; Congressional recognition of the Coshocton Lenape lands would obligate the American government to protect the Lenape against both unwelcome colonists and against hostile native nations.
Unfortunately for the Coshocton Lenape, the colonial revolt came quickly on the heels of the conclusion of this short war. Dunmore, a thorough British loyalist, was forced in 1775 to flee Virginia as Virginians revolted against British rule. His departure virtually erased the gains that White Eyes had made, and the Lenape had to start over. (Dowd 1992, 71; Toyias 2013, 44-45.) However, the alignment of so many Native American nations with the British against the colonies gave White Eyes and the Lenape their best chance for the future. Thus, when White Eyes laid out his proposal to Congress in the Spring of 1776, he aimed to put the Lenape on the same footing as the thirteen states of the new United States.
The 1778 Treaty of Fort Pitt virtually solidified the plan for a new Native American state to be created. The terms of the treaty called for mutual forgiveness of past disputes and grievances, established that the Lenape would assist American troops and guide them through Lenape territory when required, spelled out terms for trade between the two parties, called for a defensive fort to be built near Lenape territory, and mandated peaceful negotiations for future disputes. The last article of the treaty recognized the sovereignty of the Lenape people, guaranteed their protection, and promised to seek Congressional approval in the future for granting statehood to the Lenape Confederation, which would encompass the Lenape and any other Native American people who joined with them. (Williams 1976, 381-383; Zotigh, “A Brief Balance of Power.”) The Lenape, designated as the leaders of this confederation, would govern the new state upon creation. On September 17, 1778, White Eyes, along with chiefs Killbuck and Pipe, signed on behalf of the three Lenape clans from the Coshocton region. (Zotigh, “A Brief Balance of Power.”)
The Treaty of Fort Pitt was the first treaty signed between the new United States and a Native American nation, and by its very terms promised a revolutionary change in two centuries of hostile relations between European Americans and Native Americans. How that might have fully played out under different circumstances can only be the subject of speculation, but had the treaty held and been honored by the parties, some outcomes are fairly clear in retrospect.
Granting statehood to one Native American nation would have provided a path for numerous other Native nations to join the United States. Rather than engage in a long-running series of debilitating wars fought to stem the flow of white settlers, Native nations could have followed the Lenape model and petitioned Congress to form a state, giving them formal recognition as equal parts and partners in the union. Like the original thirteen states, they would have organized state and local governments that would control how those state lands could be developed and used, and granted seats in Congress.
Conflicts between settlers moving westward and established Native Americans would likely have been resolved more often through negotiation and intervention by the national government when needed. The aggressive westward expansion of the United States would likely still have occurred as populations of eastern states and cities grew, but with the precedent established for Native Americans to define their own states, these native nations could have made themselves legally recognized sovereign states at the same time that eastern migrants moved west and began establishing new territories that would also become states. This path for formal statehood could thus have prevented much of the relentless displacement and resettlement of Native peoples during the nineteenth century, as well as the violent deaths of countless white and native people throughout these decades of expansion.
Also, there is a real likelihood that this Lenape state, whether named Ohio or given a different name, would have had Coshocton as its first capital. In White Eyes’ time, Coshocton was probably the largest single town of Lenape people north of the Ohio River with an estimated population of about 2,000. (Dowd 1992, 79.) Present day Coshocton has a well-known history as a prominent canal town in the early nineteenth century, situated as it is at the confluence of the Tuscawaras and Muskingum rivers; in all likelihood the Lenape would have taken advantage of the rivers as well to facilitate trade and shipping between the Great Lakes and the Ohio River, leading to economic and popular growth for the town.
But the Fort Pitt treaty was short lived. White Eyes died on November 10, 1778, and with him died
the main force that had made the treaty possible.
Per the promises of the treaty, in early November White Eyes joined a division of the Continental Army led by General Lachlan McIntosh. He was given the rank of lieutenant colonel and tasked with guiding McIntosh’s troops through the Ohio wilderness. The expedition intended to scout the Ohio River and its tributaries for suitable defensive posts. (Zotigh, “A Brief Balance of Power”; Schilling, “Yellow Creek Stories.”) The expedition set out from Fort McIntosh on November 5, 1778, with White Eyes leading the troops along trails well known to him. White Eyes was reported by General McIntosh to have died five days later of smallpox. (Schilling, “Yellow Creek Stories.”) But a contemporary and friend of White Eyes, George Morgan, claimed years later that White Eyes had been assassinated by one of McIntosh’s militia men. (Dowd 1992, 77-78.) No motive for the killing was ever provided, but given how much the Lenape revered their leader and the almost certain loss of the states’ only Native American allies if the truth were revealed, McIntosh had every reason to cover up the killing with a story of smallpox. (Dowd 1992, 77-78; Schilling, “Yellow Creek Stories.”) In retrospect and with the benefit of modern medical knowledge, the chances that White Eyes actually died of smallpox are very low. People who have died of smallpox usually died within ten days to two weeks after the first symptoms appeared. (Ochmann et al., “Smallpox.”) At best, White Eyes would have been in the middle of the worst and most debilitating symptoms of smallpox, including the well-known and recognizable full body rash, when the army began its travels on November 5. The idea that he guided troops for five full days in that condition is fairly unbelievable.
While the murder by militia men is now the more widely accepted explanation of White Eyes’ death, there are also reports that he was assassinated by Chief Pipe from a rival Lenape clan. Unlike White Eyes and in like mind with many Shawnee and Wyandot leaders, Pipe was an advocate for full resistance to the encroachment of white settlers and was hostile to missionaries’ attempts to convert the Lenape to Christianity. Pipe’s advocacy, however, had nearly led the Lenape into a disastrous war against the Continental army in Pennsylvania in 1776; it was White Eyes’ firm resolve to maintain the peaceful neutrality of the Lenape that prevented hostilities. Pipe apparently suffered a loss of reputation with the Lenape over this incident, and he reportedly was one to nurse grudges. (Schilling, “Yellow Creek Stories.”) Whether driven by revenge or by his desire to separate the Lenape from the grip of Christian conversion, Pipe would have had sufficient motive to kill off a rival leader and put an end to White Eyes’ agenda of accommodation with the European Americans.
White Eyes’ death was keenly felt throughout the Ohio Lenape. Chief Killbuck took up White Eyes’ mantle to preserve relations with the Americans, but quickly found in the months after White Eyes death that maintaining neutrality was nearly impossible (Dowd 1992, 80). White Eyes was not the only prominent Lenape killed under suspicious circumstances, and further suspicious killings began changing Lenape minds on neutrality. Despite the promises of the treaty, American settlers continued to push into Lenape territory and come into armed conflict with the natives. At the same time, Native forces friendly to the British harassed and raided in Lenape territory. Eventually, Killbuck had no choice but to choose sides, and he elected to commit warriors to fight alongside the Americans and preserve the alliance. (Dowd 1992, 78-80.)
The collapse of Fort Laurens, near present day Bolivar, completely undid the Fort Pitt treaty. This fort was completed in late 1778 by General McIntosh, fulfilling one of the treaty’s main provisions. But the fort was never properly manned and was always poorly supplied. The Americans withdrew most of the troops in the early winter of 1779, leaving it and the Lenape open to attack. The Americans promised the Lenape they would reinforce the fort, but no reinforcements ever came. This opened the fort to a deadly siege by British forces and numerous Native American allies in February. Several of these allies were Lenape clans who had become disillusioned with the Americans and removed Killbuck from leadership. Commander Brodhead, having taken over from General McIntosh, considered the Lenape to have broken the Treaty of Fort Pitt and began raiding Coshocton. (Dowd 1992, 81-83.) The worst retaliation for the fall of Fort Laurens came with a raid on the Moravian village of Gnadenhutten, where American soldiers killed nearly a hundred unarmed Lenape. Even the leadership of the Continental Army recognized the depravity of this deplorable massacre, but the damage to relations with the Lenape was now irreparable. (Toyias 2013, 47; Dowd 1992, 86). The alliance was over, and the remaining Lenape continued fighting the Americans until their losses forced them into surrender.
If Chief Pipe did assassinate White Eyes, there is harsh irony in the fallout from that killing. After the war ended in 1783, the colonists wasted little time in expanding westward and gave little thought to attacking the Native Americans that had allied with the British. Without aid from the British military, Native Americans found it impossible to do more than enjoy temporary victories before crushing defeats. (Dowd 1992, 90-115; Hill 1881, 197-198.) By 1795, Chief Pipe, along with leaders from several other Ohio nations, was forced to sign a treaty that recognized ownership by the United States of the Ohio territory. (Dowd 1992, 112-114.) The Lenape abandoned what was left of Coshocton. They initially resettled in Indiana, and eventually were forced into new settlements in Oklahoma and Ontario. (Delaware Tribe of Indians, “Removal History of the Delaware Tribe.”)
It remains an open question whether the Continental Congress of 1776 truly intended to follow through with their agreement to grant statehood to the Lenape. Desperate as they were for help, they probably would have made any promise that would win them support from Native Americans. But after the collapse of the Treaty of Fort Pitt, the United States never again offered a sovereign state to any native nation, and no Native Americans sought such an agreement. We are left now only with the memory of White Eyes’ keen vision and the question of what might have sprung from that vision.
References Cited:
“About Coshocton.” Coshocton County Government. Accessed October 31, 2024.
https://www.coshoctoncounty.net/about-coshocton/.
Dowd, Gregory Evans. A Spirited Resistance: The North American Indian Struggle for Unity, 1745- 1815, 68–89. Baltimore, Md: Johns Hopkins University Press, 1992.
Hill, Norman Newell. History of Coshocton County, Ohio: Its Past and Present, 1740-1881, 197–99. Newark, OH: A. A. Graham & Co., 1881.
Ochmann, Sophie, Saloni Dattani, and Max Roser. “Smallpox.” Our World in Data, February 29, 2024. https://ourworldindata.org/smallpox.
“Removal History of the Delaware Tribe.” Delaware Tribe of Indians. Accessed October 31, 2024. https://delawaretribe.org/services-and-programs/historic-preservation/removal-history-of-the- delaware-tribe/. Reprinted from “Removal and the Cherokee-Delaware Agreement,” in Delaware Tribe in a Cherokee Nation, by Brice Obermeyer. University of Nebraska Press, 2009. Pp. 37-48, 52- 58.
Schilling, Robert W. “Yellow Creek Stories.” Yellow Creek Stories: Chapter IX, “White Eyes.” Accessed October 31, 2024. https://www.garlock-elliott.org/archive/YllwCrkSt/CHAPTER09.htm.
Toyias, Danice. “NativeAmericans_andRev,” April 7, 2013, 36-39, 44-45. http://biographiesofthenation.pbworks.com/w/file/fetch/36105468/NativeAmericans_andRev.pdf
Williams, Edward G. “Fort Pitt and the Revolution on the Western Frontier.” The Journal of American History 59, no. 4 (October 1976): 379–444. https://doi.org/10.2307/1900909.
Zotigh, Dennis. “A Brief Balance of Power—The 1778 Treaty with the Delaware Nation.” Smithsonian Magazine, May 21, 2018. https://www.smithsonianmag.com/blogs/national-museum-american- indian/2018/05/22/1778-delaware-treaty/
Tom Edwards: Help Wanted (Women Need Not Apply) (2nd Place Winner)
I recently read a news article about Hillary Clinton, the same Hillary Clinton who was almost elected President. She since has turned her efforts to “uncover buried treasures” in the production of a New York Broadway Play “Suffs”, a musical about suffragists efforts to pass the 19th Amendment giving women the right to vote. Theater critics compared it to the historical musical “Hamilton”. Among the original song scores: “The young are at the gates” tells of the cold morning the Suffs tried to get past the White House gates and talk to President Woodrow Wilson about women’s right to vote. Lyrics of the song “Wait My Turn” are about the struggle, “wait my turn, when will you white women ever learn”.
Hillary seems correct in her assumption that most of us never studied the Suffrage movement. I asked myself, what role models did frontier women in Coshocton have in women’s civil rights and voting rights? As I researched the question, I learned Coshocton has a rich history of “buried treasures” regarding Women.
Hillary seems correct in her assumption that most of us never studied the Suffrage movement. I asked myself, what role models did frontier women in Coshocton have in women’s civil rights and voting rights? As I researched the question, I learned Coshocton has a rich history of “buried treasures” regarding Women.
Starting with Mary Harris who lived in Coshocton around 1745 and for whom “Whitewoman” Street in Roscoe Village is named, Mary was taken captive at about age 9 by the Mohawk Indians in the famous French and Indian raids in Deerfield, Massachusetts. Taken to live at a Jesuit mission in Canada, she later married a Mohawk brave and was well treated in that community. Mary moved with the tribe and was interviewed by the explorer Christopher Gist in a village in what is present day Coshocton County, an Ohio territory in late 1751. She is acknowledged to be the first white woman to have resided in Ohio. Christopher made notes in his diary which was published in London and in the US. Christopher wrote that Mohawk women filled very important roles, more so than in 18th century American culture.
David Zeisberger and the other Moravian Missionaries were shocked with the casualness of Indian divorce and the ease in which they accepted new partners; that Indian woman controlled what braves went to war over and how they exerted controlled over the normal activities of the tribe. The Moravian Missionaries established Schoenbrunn Village in 1772 in the adjacent county to Coshocton and attempted to civilize the Indian Savages. A debate lives on about who participated in the killing of 96 converted Delaware, Lenape and Mohican Indians. A small museum in Gnadenhutten, OH tells of the jealousy of other Indian tribes and of local white men farming nearby, but which group lead the massacre? The longest running outdoor drama in New Philadelphia, OH” Trumpet in the Land” continues to tell the story to this day.
David Zeisberger and the other Moravian Missionaries were shocked with the casualness of Indian divorce and the ease in which they accepted new partners; that Indian woman controlled what braves went to war over and how they exerted controlled over the normal activities of the tribe. The Moravian Missionaries established Schoenbrunn Village in 1772 in the adjacent county to Coshocton and attempted to civilize the Indian Savages. A debate lives on about who participated in the killing of 96 converted Delaware, Lenape and Mohican Indians. A small museum in Gnadenhutten, OH tells of the jealousy of other Indian tribes and of local white men farming nearby, but which group lead the massacre? The longest running outdoor drama in New Philadelphia, OH” Trumpet in the Land” continues to tell the story to this day.
Christopher Gist, the explorer who traveled with then Colonel George Washington into the Ohio Company in 1750, made notes about how Indian women chose their husbands and voted on tribal matters.
The Gold Rush (49ers) saw many east coast women travel to California. A few had to masquerade as men and dressed in men’s clothes to win a good paying job. Charlotte Parkhurst was such a woman, after she fled an orphanage in Massachusetts, she (AKA Charley) became a Wells Fargo Stage Coach Whip. She voted for Ulysses S. Grant for President in 1868 disguised as a man. Her voting is one of the buried suffragists treasures Hilary Clinton spoke of.
Some women served as soldiers and spies in the War between the States (Civil War). Although the Union Army had doctors who gave recruits physical exams, to meet quotas, doctors looked only for a good trigger finger and health teeth (to tear open gun powder cartridges). Historians tell of one such woman, Emma Edmondson of Detroit (AKA Frank Thompson) who passed the hurried physical. Dr. Mary Walker wearing men’s pants, received the Congressional Medal of Honor in 1865. However, it was rescinded in 1916, then restored by President Carter in 1977. Clara Barton, a nurse during the Civil War was instrumental in organizing the American Red Cross. She also worked with Susan B. Anthony and the women’s suffrage movement.
In the 1800’s women could not enlist in the Navy, but many women posed as male sailors on merchants’ ships. It was not until 1916 the Navy authorized female Yeoman.
One of the 1st national meetings held in Senaca Falls N.Y., “The 1848 Women’s Convention”, hosted attendees whose goals included voting rights, abolishing slavery, social, civil, and equal access to employment. One attendee, Lucretia Mott, spent time as part of the Iroquois Indian Confederacy. She noted that Indian women had power and rights that American women had not yet been granted. Another attendee, Elizabeth Cady Stanton traveled throughout Ohio giving lectures about the women’s rights’ movement. She spoke at Miami of Ohio University in Oxford, OH (home of the Miami Indian Tribe), one of the largest gatherings she had to date. Her Brother-in-Law was President of the University and he had educators and teachers from around Ohio in attendance. Horace Greeley’s New York Tribune Newspaper covered the Women’s Convention and he argued that Women should obtain equal rights. He wrote that Cornelius Vanderbilt had allowed women to take over certain jobs on his railroads when their husband died. Sophia Keenan of the Pittsburg Press was making a name for women in Horace’s vocation as a newspaper editor. The Zanesville Daily Signal had a column “Where Women Vote” calling attention to readers that women in Great Britian, France, Norway, Russia, Croatia, New Zealand, Canada already had the right to vote.
Some government officials worked behind the scenes to gather support for women’s rights even after the ratification of the 19th Amendment. A Coshocton native and President of the AFL (American Federation of Labor), William Green, championed job equality for women in industries, like mining and organized labor work places. Green included women in the Ohio 1911 Workers Compensation Laws when he was a Democratic member of the Ohio Senate and worked with Columbus industrialist Republican Samuel Prescott Bush (paternal relative to the two Bush Presidents, George Herbert Bush and George Walker Bush) to pass one of the first such laws in the nation. The tallest building in Columbus today is named the William Green Workers Compensation Building.
Frontier men were reluctant to changing woman’s roles in society. Some men took Mark Twain’s comments seriously “There is one inseparable obstacle in the way of women suffrage, a woman would never vote because she would have to tell her age at the voting poll”. Twain went on to say “if women get elected, they would make drinking whiskey a hanging offense and abolish smoking cigars and pipes”.
Cleveland, OH in 1874 was the birth place of Woman’s Christian Temperance Union. Westerville, OH was the birth place of Anti-Saloon League. Both organizations along with the Women’s Suffrage Movements Championed prohibition because Women were tired of drunken, abusive relationships. Dr. Thomas De Witt Talmage gave a sermon in Zanesville in March 1900 about the changing American society. Women should not grow up with the belief that they had to get someone to care for them. Faith and trust in God would help women find work and provide for themselves. In 1910 there were three Woman’s Christian Temperance Union organizations in Coshocton County and they championed women’s right to vote.
1850 the Ohio Women’s Rights Convention met in Salem Ohio to start the process for the revision of the Ohio Constitution. “Equal suffrage for adults without regard to sex, color or condition”. Abolitionist help gather signatures for the ballot initiative, but it stalled at the state house. In 1861 Ohio did pass a married women’s property right law. Susan B. Anthony is quoted in the New York Tribune that the Ohio Convention “started a National Effect”.
President William Howard Taft, from Ohio (1909-1913) like many politicians of that era, paid lip service to the suffragist movement, feeling women were too emotional to vote. “On the whole, it is fair to say that the immediate enfranchisement of women will increase the proportion of the hysterical element of the electorate”. Many Rotary Clubs in Ohio took the position that women should be allowed to vote and would make good Republicans and Democrats. However, in the case of the Coshocton Rotary Club, it would be 1986 before women were members. In 1912 Columbus, OH held a Centennial parade with the help of the staff of The Ohio State University. Ohio suffragist had a float with a woman dressed in a full suit of armor depicting Joan of Arc (Joan of Arc was a role model for women’s rights in France and here in America). Joan of Arc, of the French – British 100-year War of the 1400’s, is recognized as the first noted woman’s role model. She was captured by the British and put on trial for wearing men’s clothing and leading the French Troops. The British verdict was to burn her at the stake. The second Sunday in May is still a national festival in France in her honor. New Orleans, Louisiana has an annual parade on January 6th to honor Joan of Arc, and to kick off Mardi Gras week.
In 1914, Ohio suffragist tried to present to Charles Graves, the Secretary of State a petition for women to vote by changing the Ohio Constitution. Graves solution was to lock himself in his office, refusing to let them in. The women kept their wits and travelled 2 miles up High St. to see William Thompson, the President of The Ohio State University. Thompson got the petition to the state house the next day. However, court challenges ruled the petitions were filled with “defects”.
In Zanesville, Oh January 16, 1914 a regional suffragist meeting was held reporting what other states had legislated concerning women and children’s rights. The discussion revolved around if the federal Constitutional Amendment were passed and ratified by all the states, would it incorporate many of the state statues. Such as the state of Washington had instituted the “Lazy Husband Law” by which deserting husbands are forced to work in a county stockade and the $1.50 a day earned would be paid to their families. This was one of the first child support laws in the country.
The 19th Amendment may have made it illegal to deny voting based on one’s sex, but some states still did not apply that to American Indians. Passage of the Native Indian Freedom Citizenship Suffrage Act of 1924 was to give Indians citizenship rights to include voting, but obstacles still remained. Even the famous Indian Code Talkers that helped end WWII in the Pacific could not vote when they came home. It took dozens of law suits to gain access to elections in some states (74 cases filled in 15 states).
As Ohio was turning a new century (1900), Land Grant Colleges and Normal Schools began certifying women to be school teachers leading to women challenging teenage marriage, avoiding years of child bearing and back breaking chores.
Masonic Lodges throughout Ohio did not admit women; but the suffragists did give praise to the Masons and their appendant body, The Order of Eastern Star for Women.
July 5, 1851 John T. Bown a General Store Merchant in New Moscow, Ohio Coshocton County was appointed Postmaster, but by September 1861, he enlisted in Company D, 51st Ohio Volunteer Infantry. In his absence his wife Rachel continued to run the Post Office. John died in December 1862 at Camp Rosecrans, TN during the Civil War. In February 28, 1863 his wife Rachel received her formal appointment as Postmistress of New Moscow.
President U. S. Grant, from Ohio supported the suffrage movement in words but succumbed to political pressure to not appropriate any legislation. To his credit, President Grant did appoint over 5,000 women Postmistresses (a highly coveted job). In Grants home town of Georgetown, OH he appointed Mrs. Lucinda B. Power Postmistress on 11/05/1875. However, she was paid 35% less than her male counterpart. Women where not hired as postal letter carriers until 1917 and then only because of a shortage of men who were off to WWI in France.
Building Safety, Fire Alarms and women’s working conditions came to the Nation’s attention in March 25th, 1911 with the New York City Triangle Shirt Waist Factory Fire. Domestic servants and Seamstress were about the only jobs open to women at the turn of the century. These women worked under horrible conditions for low wages, long hours and abusive foreman. The Triangle fire was a watershed moment in sweat shop manufacturing. Locked doors in the third floor, locked to hinder employee theft resulted in 143 women dying in the fire.
The Gold Rush (49ers) saw many east coast women travel to California. A few had to masquerade as men and dressed in men’s clothes to win a good paying job. Charlotte Parkhurst was such a woman, after she fled an orphanage in Massachusetts, she (AKA Charley) became a Wells Fargo Stage Coach Whip. She voted for Ulysses S. Grant for President in 1868 disguised as a man. Her voting is one of the buried suffragists treasures Hilary Clinton spoke of.
Some women served as soldiers and spies in the War between the States (Civil War). Although the Union Army had doctors who gave recruits physical exams, to meet quotas, doctors looked only for a good trigger finger and health teeth (to tear open gun powder cartridges). Historians tell of one such woman, Emma Edmondson of Detroit (AKA Frank Thompson) who passed the hurried physical. Dr. Mary Walker wearing men’s pants, received the Congressional Medal of Honor in 1865. However, it was rescinded in 1916, then restored by President Carter in 1977. Clara Barton, a nurse during the Civil War was instrumental in organizing the American Red Cross. She also worked with Susan B. Anthony and the women’s suffrage movement.
In the 1800’s women could not enlist in the Navy, but many women posed as male sailors on merchants’ ships. It was not until 1916 the Navy authorized female Yeoman.
One of the 1st national meetings held in Senaca Falls N.Y., “The 1848 Women’s Convention”, hosted attendees whose goals included voting rights, abolishing slavery, social, civil, and equal access to employment. One attendee, Lucretia Mott, spent time as part of the Iroquois Indian Confederacy. She noted that Indian women had power and rights that American women had not yet been granted. Another attendee, Elizabeth Cady Stanton traveled throughout Ohio giving lectures about the women’s rights’ movement. She spoke at Miami of Ohio University in Oxford, OH (home of the Miami Indian Tribe), one of the largest gatherings she had to date. Her Brother-in-Law was President of the University and he had educators and teachers from around Ohio in attendance. Horace Greeley’s New York Tribune Newspaper covered the Women’s Convention and he argued that Women should obtain equal rights. He wrote that Cornelius Vanderbilt had allowed women to take over certain jobs on his railroads when their husband died. Sophia Keenan of the Pittsburg Press was making a name for women in Horace’s vocation as a newspaper editor. The Zanesville Daily Signal had a column “Where Women Vote” calling attention to readers that women in Great Britian, France, Norway, Russia, Croatia, New Zealand, Canada already had the right to vote.
Some government officials worked behind the scenes to gather support for women’s rights even after the ratification of the 19th Amendment. A Coshocton native and President of the AFL (American Federation of Labor), William Green, championed job equality for women in industries, like mining and organized labor work places. Green included women in the Ohio 1911 Workers Compensation Laws when he was a Democratic member of the Ohio Senate and worked with Columbus industrialist Republican Samuel Prescott Bush (paternal relative to the two Bush Presidents, George Herbert Bush and George Walker Bush) to pass one of the first such laws in the nation. The tallest building in Columbus today is named the William Green Workers Compensation Building.
Frontier men were reluctant to changing woman’s roles in society. Some men took Mark Twain’s comments seriously “There is one inseparable obstacle in the way of women suffrage, a woman would never vote because she would have to tell her age at the voting poll”. Twain went on to say “if women get elected, they would make drinking whiskey a hanging offense and abolish smoking cigars and pipes”.
Cleveland, OH in 1874 was the birth place of Woman’s Christian Temperance Union. Westerville, OH was the birth place of Anti-Saloon League. Both organizations along with the Women’s Suffrage Movements Championed prohibition because Women were tired of drunken, abusive relationships. Dr. Thomas De Witt Talmage gave a sermon in Zanesville in March 1900 about the changing American society. Women should not grow up with the belief that they had to get someone to care for them. Faith and trust in God would help women find work and provide for themselves. In 1910 there were three Woman’s Christian Temperance Union organizations in Coshocton County and they championed women’s right to vote.
1850 the Ohio Women’s Rights Convention met in Salem Ohio to start the process for the revision of the Ohio Constitution. “Equal suffrage for adults without regard to sex, color or condition”. Abolitionist help gather signatures for the ballot initiative, but it stalled at the state house. In 1861 Ohio did pass a married women’s property right law. Susan B. Anthony is quoted in the New York Tribune that the Ohio Convention “started a National Effect”.
President William Howard Taft, from Ohio (1909-1913) like many politicians of that era, paid lip service to the suffragist movement, feeling women were too emotional to vote. “On the whole, it is fair to say that the immediate enfranchisement of women will increase the proportion of the hysterical element of the electorate”. Many Rotary Clubs in Ohio took the position that women should be allowed to vote and would make good Republicans and Democrats. However, in the case of the Coshocton Rotary Club, it would be 1986 before women were members. In 1912 Columbus, OH held a Centennial parade with the help of the staff of The Ohio State University. Ohio suffragist had a float with a woman dressed in a full suit of armor depicting Joan of Arc (Joan of Arc was a role model for women’s rights in France and here in America). Joan of Arc, of the French – British 100-year War of the 1400’s, is recognized as the first noted woman’s role model. She was captured by the British and put on trial for wearing men’s clothing and leading the French Troops. The British verdict was to burn her at the stake. The second Sunday in May is still a national festival in France in her honor. New Orleans, Louisiana has an annual parade on January 6th to honor Joan of Arc, and to kick off Mardi Gras week.
In 1914, Ohio suffragist tried to present to Charles Graves, the Secretary of State a petition for women to vote by changing the Ohio Constitution. Graves solution was to lock himself in his office, refusing to let them in. The women kept their wits and travelled 2 miles up High St. to see William Thompson, the President of The Ohio State University. Thompson got the petition to the state house the next day. However, court challenges ruled the petitions were filled with “defects”.
In Zanesville, Oh January 16, 1914 a regional suffragist meeting was held reporting what other states had legislated concerning women and children’s rights. The discussion revolved around if the federal Constitutional Amendment were passed and ratified by all the states, would it incorporate many of the state statues. Such as the state of Washington had instituted the “Lazy Husband Law” by which deserting husbands are forced to work in a county stockade and the $1.50 a day earned would be paid to their families. This was one of the first child support laws in the country.
The 19th Amendment may have made it illegal to deny voting based on one’s sex, but some states still did not apply that to American Indians. Passage of the Native Indian Freedom Citizenship Suffrage Act of 1924 was to give Indians citizenship rights to include voting, but obstacles still remained. Even the famous Indian Code Talkers that helped end WWII in the Pacific could not vote when they came home. It took dozens of law suits to gain access to elections in some states (74 cases filled in 15 states).
As Ohio was turning a new century (1900), Land Grant Colleges and Normal Schools began certifying women to be school teachers leading to women challenging teenage marriage, avoiding years of child bearing and back breaking chores.
Masonic Lodges throughout Ohio did not admit women; but the suffragists did give praise to the Masons and their appendant body, The Order of Eastern Star for Women.
July 5, 1851 John T. Bown a General Store Merchant in New Moscow, Ohio Coshocton County was appointed Postmaster, but by September 1861, he enlisted in Company D, 51st Ohio Volunteer Infantry. In his absence his wife Rachel continued to run the Post Office. John died in December 1862 at Camp Rosecrans, TN during the Civil War. In February 28, 1863 his wife Rachel received her formal appointment as Postmistress of New Moscow.
President U. S. Grant, from Ohio supported the suffrage movement in words but succumbed to political pressure to not appropriate any legislation. To his credit, President Grant did appoint over 5,000 women Postmistresses (a highly coveted job). In Grants home town of Georgetown, OH he appointed Mrs. Lucinda B. Power Postmistress on 11/05/1875. However, she was paid 35% less than her male counterpart. Women where not hired as postal letter carriers until 1917 and then only because of a shortage of men who were off to WWI in France.
Building Safety, Fire Alarms and women’s working conditions came to the Nation’s attention in March 25th, 1911 with the New York City Triangle Shirt Waist Factory Fire. Domestic servants and Seamstress were about the only jobs open to women at the turn of the century. These women worked under horrible conditions for low wages, long hours and abusive foreman. The Triangle fire was a watershed moment in sweat shop manufacturing. Locked doors in the third floor, locked to hinder employee theft resulted in 143 women dying in the fire.
The League of Women’s Voters was formed in 1920 after passage of the 19th Amendment to the Constitution by the merger of several women’s suffrage associations. Their aim was to help newly enfranchised women to exercise their right to vote. Repeal of Prohibition was foremost on their agenda. The 18th Amendment Prohibition had unintended consequences and it took the 19th Amendment and women voting to correct this wrong.
Prohibition caused a rise in organized crime and corruption. Women saw the unregulated speakeasy lure their young boys and girls to drinking. Women were encouraged to use their newly earned right to vote to elect congressional representatives who would overturn prohibition. They also supported the formation of the League of Nations (United Nations) with the hopes it would prevent future wars. The League of Women Voters started the sponsorship of candidate debates on radio then on TV. To this day, the League continues to promote issues to make the home and family a better place. “Mothers Against Drunk Drivers”, sexual harassment, maternity leave, equal pay, reproduction rights….
1886 saw a “Gold Rush” of sorts in Coshocton. Advertising Art was born with an Ad for a shoe store printed on Burlap School Book Bag. Calendars, metal serving trays, metal signs soon followed. By the turn of the Century Coshocton’s Colony of Artist and Illustrators in residence was on par with New York City. However, most Jobs were only for men. Novelty Advertising printed calendars and employed a few women, but manufacturing plants were dealing with hot steel and employing large hydraulic stamping machines creating noise and dirt were just not a place for a woman.
Coshocton was home to a woman that made headlines in Ohio Newspaper by working as a man in Coshocton’s booming Advertising Art trade.
“Miss Mary Fry was the 18-year-old adopted daughter of a coal miner from Barnhill, Ohio. She was forced to work in the fields of the Fry farm and was often beaten after long hours of hard labor. Determined to improve the conditions of her life, Mary ran away from the Fry home, believing that opportunity was lacking for females so she cut off her hair, dressed herself as a man and went seeking adventures. By October 21, 1899, she showed up at the office of the Tuscarora (American Art Works) plant in Coshocton seeking employment as a man. The plant was noted for making millions of metal Coca Cola trays. Having impressed her interviewer, she was given work in the pressroom.
She soon became an excellent press feeder, winning the respect of her fellow employees. Assuming the name of her biological father, Mary was listed on the payroll as Fred L. Johnson, AKA Freddy. She worked at the plant for a few months before she was discovered. It seems that a woman visiting from Barnhill recognized that the young boy at the Coshocton church service looked very much like the missing Mary Fry. She mentioned her suspicion to a church member, Mr. Shaw who was in the coal business and knew Mary’s adopted family from his coal dealings in Barnhill. Mr. Shaw went to the factory the next day; as soon as Freddy (Mary) saw him, she knew her carefully guarded secret was over. She was identified and left the factory escorted by Marshall Doney to appear before Mayor Cassingham in Coshocton’s Mayor’s Court. The mayor put her in the Farmers Hotel for the night, bought her some woman’s clothing and the next day saw that Mary was returned to Barnhill dressed as a woman.
Mary did however return to Coshocton; as reported in the Coshocton Age newspaper on February 9, 1900. She was hired by Mr. Murray Hissong as a domestic in his home.
It is noteworthy that women in many all-male cultures were trying to improve their lives. A similar tale of a young Polish girl in 1904, Yentl was told in a film directed by and starring Barbra Streisand that debuted in 1983. The movie incorporates music to tell the story of an Askenazi Jewish girl who cuts off her hair, dresses as a man to enter Yeshiva, an all-male Jewish religious school.
Even today, author Kerry Segrave has written books and essays about “Women Masquerading in Male Attire” in third world countries to get away from abuse and arranged marriage. Jenny Nordberg reports about girls in Afghanistan under the Taliban rule, working as boys to earn money for their family to send their brothers to school.
Warren Buffett, one of the wealthiest business men in America, was born in 1930 and reported “he had two sisters that have every bit the intelligence that I have, every bit the drive, but they didn’t have the same opportunities”. Warren attributes much of his success today by “inclusion in all business matters with half the population in mind, women”.
In retrospect, from Mary Harris to Mary Frye with many women in between, Coshocton women played a proud role in Women’s Rights and Voting Rights
1. Library of Congress Report of Women’s Rights Convention, Seneca Falls N.Y. July 20, 1848
2. Frontier History of Coshocton by Scott E. Butler PHD
3. Abolitionist and Activist @ History of Women’s Fight for their Rights by Mikki Kendall
4. Mark Twain: Collected Tales, Sketches, Speeches, and Essays – Library of America
5. New Women in the Old West by Winifred Gallagher
6. Age Discrimination by Kerry Segrave
7. The Underground Girls of Kabul by Jenny Nordberg
8. Call me Bill Armstrong by Lynette Richards
9. Masquerading in Male Attire by Kerry Segrave
10. Liar Temptress, Solider Spy, The Women Undercover in the Civil War by Karen Abbott
11. Fiddler on the Roof by Sholen Alechichein
12. The American Indians, the Woman’s Way Time Life Books
13. American Women and the Repeal of Prohibition, Kenneth Rose
14. National Geographic by Katie Thornton 11-2-2020
15. Zanesville Daley Signal July 26, 1894
16. Zanesville Daily Signal Nov 7, 1895
17. The Fifth Star Ohio’s Fight for Woman’s Right to Vote Jamie C. Capuzza
18. The Salem, Ohio 1850 Women’s Rights Convention Proceedings, Robert W. Audretsch
19. Coshocton Agne Newspaper February 9, 1900
20. Native American Rights Fund: June 4, 2024
Legal Review Vol. #49 No. 1
21.Ryan P. Semmes, Ph.D, Professor/Director of Research, The Ulysses S. Grant Presidential Library
22.Postal History of Coshocton County 1805-1961 Miriam C. Hunter, Coshocton Public Library
Prohibition caused a rise in organized crime and corruption. Women saw the unregulated speakeasy lure their young boys and girls to drinking. Women were encouraged to use their newly earned right to vote to elect congressional representatives who would overturn prohibition. They also supported the formation of the League of Nations (United Nations) with the hopes it would prevent future wars. The League of Women Voters started the sponsorship of candidate debates on radio then on TV. To this day, the League continues to promote issues to make the home and family a better place. “Mothers Against Drunk Drivers”, sexual harassment, maternity leave, equal pay, reproduction rights….
1886 saw a “Gold Rush” of sorts in Coshocton. Advertising Art was born with an Ad for a shoe store printed on Burlap School Book Bag. Calendars, metal serving trays, metal signs soon followed. By the turn of the Century Coshocton’s Colony of Artist and Illustrators in residence was on par with New York City. However, most Jobs were only for men. Novelty Advertising printed calendars and employed a few women, but manufacturing plants were dealing with hot steel and employing large hydraulic stamping machines creating noise and dirt were just not a place for a woman.
Coshocton was home to a woman that made headlines in Ohio Newspaper by working as a man in Coshocton’s booming Advertising Art trade.
“Miss Mary Fry was the 18-year-old adopted daughter of a coal miner from Barnhill, Ohio. She was forced to work in the fields of the Fry farm and was often beaten after long hours of hard labor. Determined to improve the conditions of her life, Mary ran away from the Fry home, believing that opportunity was lacking for females so she cut off her hair, dressed herself as a man and went seeking adventures. By October 21, 1899, she showed up at the office of the Tuscarora (American Art Works) plant in Coshocton seeking employment as a man. The plant was noted for making millions of metal Coca Cola trays. Having impressed her interviewer, she was given work in the pressroom.
She soon became an excellent press feeder, winning the respect of her fellow employees. Assuming the name of her biological father, Mary was listed on the payroll as Fred L. Johnson, AKA Freddy. She worked at the plant for a few months before she was discovered. It seems that a woman visiting from Barnhill recognized that the young boy at the Coshocton church service looked very much like the missing Mary Fry. She mentioned her suspicion to a church member, Mr. Shaw who was in the coal business and knew Mary’s adopted family from his coal dealings in Barnhill. Mr. Shaw went to the factory the next day; as soon as Freddy (Mary) saw him, she knew her carefully guarded secret was over. She was identified and left the factory escorted by Marshall Doney to appear before Mayor Cassingham in Coshocton’s Mayor’s Court. The mayor put her in the Farmers Hotel for the night, bought her some woman’s clothing and the next day saw that Mary was returned to Barnhill dressed as a woman.
Mary did however return to Coshocton; as reported in the Coshocton Age newspaper on February 9, 1900. She was hired by Mr. Murray Hissong as a domestic in his home.
It is noteworthy that women in many all-male cultures were trying to improve their lives. A similar tale of a young Polish girl in 1904, Yentl was told in a film directed by and starring Barbra Streisand that debuted in 1983. The movie incorporates music to tell the story of an Askenazi Jewish girl who cuts off her hair, dresses as a man to enter Yeshiva, an all-male Jewish religious school.
Even today, author Kerry Segrave has written books and essays about “Women Masquerading in Male Attire” in third world countries to get away from abuse and arranged marriage. Jenny Nordberg reports about girls in Afghanistan under the Taliban rule, working as boys to earn money for their family to send their brothers to school.
Warren Buffett, one of the wealthiest business men in America, was born in 1930 and reported “he had two sisters that have every bit the intelligence that I have, every bit the drive, but they didn’t have the same opportunities”. Warren attributes much of his success today by “inclusion in all business matters with half the population in mind, women”.
In retrospect, from Mary Harris to Mary Frye with many women in between, Coshocton women played a proud role in Women’s Rights and Voting Rights
1. Library of Congress Report of Women’s Rights Convention, Seneca Falls N.Y. July 20, 1848
2. Frontier History of Coshocton by Scott E. Butler PHD
3. Abolitionist and Activist @ History of Women’s Fight for their Rights by Mikki Kendall
4. Mark Twain: Collected Tales, Sketches, Speeches, and Essays – Library of America
5. New Women in the Old West by Winifred Gallagher
6. Age Discrimination by Kerry Segrave
7. The Underground Girls of Kabul by Jenny Nordberg
8. Call me Bill Armstrong by Lynette Richards
9. Masquerading in Male Attire by Kerry Segrave
10. Liar Temptress, Solider Spy, The Women Undercover in the Civil War by Karen Abbott
11. Fiddler on the Roof by Sholen Alechichein
12. The American Indians, the Woman’s Way Time Life Books
13. American Women and the Repeal of Prohibition, Kenneth Rose
14. National Geographic by Katie Thornton 11-2-2020
15. Zanesville Daley Signal July 26, 1894
16. Zanesville Daily Signal Nov 7, 1895
17. The Fifth Star Ohio’s Fight for Woman’s Right to Vote Jamie C. Capuzza
18. The Salem, Ohio 1850 Women’s Rights Convention Proceedings, Robert W. Audretsch
19. Coshocton Agne Newspaper February 9, 1900
20. Native American Rights Fund: June 4, 2024
Legal Review Vol. #49 No. 1
21.Ryan P. Semmes, Ph.D, Professor/Director of Research, The Ulysses S. Grant Presidential Library
22.Postal History of Coshocton County 1805-1961 Miriam C. Hunter, Coshocton Public Library
Martha Richardson: Germ Warfare on the Frontier (3rd Place Winner)
Having been born and raised in Coshocton, Ohio, I can remember in my elementary school years studying about White Woman's Rock, Bouquet's Camp, Mary Harris, the Native American language which gave our town's its name, and a host of other details about early life in Coshocton. Admittedly, I didn't pay much attention to any of it, probably due to my age and assorted other interests. But of the little information I obtained during that time, I do remember that Colonel Henry Bouquet was conveyed at the very least, to be a positive figure in Ohio history, if not a hero. I don't remember any mention of blemishes on his record, even as I expanded my knowledge of this time period during junior and senior high school.
The history of any modern or primitive society will undoubtedly detail disagreements about political ideals, territorial ownership, financial disputes, and a list of almost any other topic that results in aggression between one faction and any number of others. These may be between one individual and another, one village and another, or one or more nations against others. Literature detailing these events will include any number of facts and figures and almost always will report what instruments are used by each group to obtain superiority against the other(s). These could be anything as simple as a well-written treatise or as devastating as the use of nuclear weapons, as well as a host of other available choices.
In recent years, with endless numbers of these conflicts in play, the term "instruments of mass destruction" may be part of the conversation. One might think that this term is only relevant to those recently developed weapons defined as "a class of weaponry with the ability to produce, in a single moment, an enormous destructive effect with the capability to kill millions of civilians, jeopardize the natural environment, and fundamentally alter the lives of future generations through their catastrophic effects". These are generally accepted as atomic weapons, radioactive weapons, lethal biological and chemical weapons, or any others which have the potential to cause results similar to those witnessed with the deployment of the atomic bomb. It does, therefore, seem somewhat incompatible that a discussion about circumstances which occurred during the late eighteenth and early nineteenth century on the Ohio frontier would have any similarity to the highly technical components detailed in even a cursory insight into the weapons of mass destruction discussion. But an investigation into the relationships between major factions in early Ohio history may suggest that the idea may not be as far fetched as one might think, and, in fact, probably did occur.
It has historically been suggested that man's very nature motivates him to acquire possessions that are of value and give him an advantage or status, perceived or real, within his community. This could be an item such as gold or silver, multiple spouses, or any other object that the community has identified as having value. A recurring theme through the ages presents the acquisition of land as a prime motivator. Whether a king was amassing land to expand his kingdom, a rancher wanted to expand his grazing pastures or a developer needed a few more blocks to build a strip mall, the basic want was the same - - more land. If their expansions could be achieved in a peaceful, acceptable manner, the story moves forward with no obstacles. But if the acquisition is disputed, anything from tedious negotiations to outright warfare might ensue. As a result, whomever is credited with the final outcome is heralded as either a hero or failure depending on one's perspective. With that in mind let us look at events that occurred during the acquisition and development of the Ohio frontier, specifically noting how tactics used at the time not only secured territory for the British but helped to eliminate their biggest foe, the Native Americans in those areas and beyond.
Henry Bouquet was a Swiss mercenary who rose to prominence during the French and Indian War. He also played a strategic role in the development and protection of an area of territory adjacent to the confluence of the Tuscarawas and Walhonding Rivers and the area we know now as Coshocton.
In 1754, the initial stages of the French and Indian War ( 1754-1763) marked the conflict between Great Britain and France over ownership of territories in North America, primarily in and around what is now Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. As the name implies, the French had spent considerable time and resources in developing and nurturing a profitable relationship between themselves and whatever indigenous populations were already living in the disputed territory. For years the British had claimed these lands and had built a series of forts to protect both the land and those who lived there and had been trying for years to reclaim territory at the forks of the Ohio River from the French. This was the point where the Allegheny and the Monongahela Rivers joined to form the Ohio River. This location was commonly referred to as "the Point". In 1753, under orders from the governor of Virginia, an army of British soldiers, led by a young emissary, George Washington, was sent to inform the French that they were to stop construction of any more forts and to leave the territory immediately. The French refused, but this did not curtail action from the governor of Virginia.
Captain William Trent was directed to take a small group of men to "the Point" and build a small fortification there. It was to be called Fort Prince George but more commonly became known as Trent's Fort. Unfortunately, Trent was unable to complete his assignment because the French traveled down the Allegheny and Trent and his men were forced to surrender. The French now had control of the area and decided to fortify it by building Fort Duquesne. The British troops made two attempts to regain the Point. The first unsuccessful attempt was led by George Washington, who retreated to Virginia, and the second was led by General George Braddock, whose troops were quickly overtaken by the French and their Native American allies. After Braddock's defeat the British decided to reinforce their holdings in America and Bouquet was selected to assist General John Forbes as one of the officers to help accomplish this objective. In 1758 the British were in a position to once again attempt to take over Fort Duquesne. The British Secretary of State devised a plan to utilize a three-prong attack. The attack was led by General John Forbes, but due to his failing health, Bouquet initiated the third part of the attack and marched toward the Point with the purpose of capturing the French and regaining this strategic location for the British. Unfortunately, the French had learned of the plan, realized they were vastly outnumbered and burned the fort to the ground and fled the area only a few day s before the British arrived. Although this technically was a defeat of the British, they then built one of the largest and most fortified forts at the Point. The huge complex, with its unique pentagon shape and architectural features designed to withstand any type of attack, became the model for all future fortifications and Bouquet remained in the area to assure military control of the area.
Following the end of the war, the Native Americans in the territories began to feel increasing unrest. The various tribes in the area had no wish to join together as one unified community, but they almost universally were starting to realize that the reciprocal agreement they had enjoy ed while supporting the French was in no way the situation they now had under British direction. In the initial negotiations between the French and the Native Americans, the French began the practice of giving gifts to them. These might include iron tools, blankets, beads, alcohol, and other supplies, which essentially given to them as bribes to buy the Native Americans' support for their expansion into lands currently held by them. But when the British rose to power in these territories, they ceased the practice of gift giving. The British also were making tremendous efforts to force the Native Americans to be "subjects of Great Britain" and as such would be relinquishing much of their power. These actions were considered insults to the Native Americans, as gift exchanging was a fundamental expression offriendship and culturally important to the Native Americans. They were a binding support and concrete evidence to the Native American nations of the continuing relationship between themselves and the British. But Pontiac, an Odawa war chief, rallied the Native Americans and encouraged them to regain their lands and cease associations with the British, citing recent changes in dealings with them. At the same time, Neolin, a Delaware prophet, revealed a vision he had experienced where it was revealed to him that the Native Americans should break away from the British, cease using the tools and weapons they had learned from them and regain the lands they had lost. He also advised the end of drinking alcohol and abandoning the religious aspects they had been taught by the missionaries. Sparked by Pontiac and Neolin, the indigenous groups in the Ohio Valley went on the offensive and seized most of the forts in the western lands until only a handful remained. These actions and their continuing raids came to be known as Pontiac's War".
It was during this time, in 1763, that Henry Bouquet again enters our picture. Captain Simeon Ecuyer was overseeing the running of Fort Pitt. Colonel Henry Bouquet was technically in charge of the facility, but he managed from afar, remaining in Philadelphia. Ecuyer wrote to Bouquet when he became concerned about happenings at the fort. Pontiac's War had the Native Americans attempting to drive out the settlers and take over the fort. As a result, those individuals living outside the fort and natives, friendly to the British, sought refuge inside. Ecuyer, well aware of the spread of smallpox throughout the area, wrote to Bouquet voicing his concern that the increasing numbers within the fort would greatly increase the chance that smallpox would be spread throughout the fort, devastating those within. Ecuyer suggested that representatives from the natives who were coming to speak with Ecuyer and others at the fort, encouraging them to leave the fort and return the land, possessions, and any indigenous hostages, be intentionally exposed to the smallpox. If successful, the results would affect not only the representatives, but upon their return to their home, would spread to the Native Americans there, as well as the French who were still friendly with the natives, but remained enemies of the British.
During the time that Ecuyer was communicating with Bouquet, William Trent, a trader in the area who lived within Fort Pitt, recorded in his journal that "Out of our regard for them (the representatives) we gave them two blankets and a handkerchief out of the smallpox hospital. I hope it will have the desired effect". This exchange was recorded on June 24, 1763 several weeks before Ecuyer had any response from Bouquet. No one knows whose idea it was to send the infected items with the representatives. Sir Jeffery Amherst, the commander of all the British forces in North America at the time, probably did not know about the Trent incident at the time. But there was so much pressure from Great Britain to put an end to the continuing problems with the Native Americans, Amherst wrote on July 7, 1763, "Could it not be contrived to send the smallpox among those disaffected tribes of Indians? We must, on this occasion, use every stratagem in our power to reduce them". On July 13, upon receiving this message, Bouquet was traveling to Fort Pitt with reinforcements and replied to Amherst that he would try to spread the disease to the Native Americans using contaminated blankets, but he would be "taking care not to get the disease myself". Amherst wrote back, "You will do well to try to inoculate the Indians by means of blankets as well as to try every other method that will serve to extirpate this race".
It is not known which of these two attempts, Trent's or Bouquet's had the desired effect, but after the Fort Pitt incident a smallpox epidemic exploded in the Ohio Valley with the Native Americans suffering catastrophic casualties. That Fort Pitt incident is one of the first and best documented episodes of an intentional attempt to spread smallpox. Although historians disagree about which account resulted in the desired outcome, there is a receipt which Trent submitted to the British military for payment for two blankets and one handkerchief to "replace in kind those which were taken from people in the hospital to convey smallpox to the Indians". The fact that both Ecuyer and Amherst suggested this action within days of each other suggests that it was not unusual and was fairly acceptable to the British and no argument was given by anyone that the attempts should not be taken.
In 1764, Bouquet left Fort Pitt with a group of 1500 men and marched to the forks of the Muskingum River, the area now known as Coshocton, arriving on October 25, 1764. They stayed there until November 18th. During that time Bouquet was able to negotiate the release of 206 white men, women, and children from the Naive Americans and returned to their families. He obtained a promise of peace from the Delawares, Senecas and Shawnee. He was able to accomplish this without any shots being fired. It is this series of events which earned Colonel Bouquet a place in Ohio History. This location is marked by an Ohio Historical Marker which is erected on Ohio State Route 83, north of Coshocton, near the Lake Park complex. Nearly every school child in Coshocton has taken a school field trip to this spot and learned of Colonel Bouquet and his place in Ohio history. As time continues to pass I am certain that countless other children and visitors to Coshocton will travel to this marker, and will leave believing in the remarkable accomplishments it conveys, never knowing that this same man may have instigated the first documented case of germ warfare using smallpox infected items.
In conclusion, does it really matter which set of facts we remember about Colonel Bouquet? That he was a shrewd military man who helped to end a war and return hostages to their families or the same shrewd military man who gave an order and engaged in the destruction of Countless Native Americans? Or do they balance each other out? You will need to decide that for yourself.
References
Bergman, Abraham B. "A Political History of the Indian Health Services". The Milbank Quarterly 77. No. 4 (1999).p.571-604. Retrieved September 12, 2024.
Calloway, Colin G. The Scratch of a Pen:1763 and the Transformation of North America. Oxford, Oxford University Press, 2006. p. 79.
Gross, W.H. "Colonel Henry Bouquet Frees the Indian Captives". NRA Family.org. (June 16, 2022). Retrieved October 14, 2024.
Henderson, Donald A. "Smallpox as a Biological Weapon". Journal of the American Medical Association. Vol. 281, No. 22. (June 9, 1999).
Jennings, Francis. Empire of Fortune: Crowns, Colonies, and Tribes in the Seven Years War in America. New York, Norton, 1988. p. 112-126.
Middleton, Richard. Pontiac's War:Its Causes, Concerns, and Consequences. New York: Routledge, 2007. p. 133-34.
The Papers of Henry Bouquet. Pennsylvania Historical and Museum Commission. https ://catalog. hathitrust. org/Record/001262955
Peckham, Howard H. Pontiac and the Indian Uprising. Detroit, Wayne State University Press, 1994. p. 7 7 -81.
The history of any modern or primitive society will undoubtedly detail disagreements about political ideals, territorial ownership, financial disputes, and a list of almost any other topic that results in aggression between one faction and any number of others. These may be between one individual and another, one village and another, or one or more nations against others. Literature detailing these events will include any number of facts and figures and almost always will report what instruments are used by each group to obtain superiority against the other(s). These could be anything as simple as a well-written treatise or as devastating as the use of nuclear weapons, as well as a host of other available choices.
In recent years, with endless numbers of these conflicts in play, the term "instruments of mass destruction" may be part of the conversation. One might think that this term is only relevant to those recently developed weapons defined as "a class of weaponry with the ability to produce, in a single moment, an enormous destructive effect with the capability to kill millions of civilians, jeopardize the natural environment, and fundamentally alter the lives of future generations through their catastrophic effects". These are generally accepted as atomic weapons, radioactive weapons, lethal biological and chemical weapons, or any others which have the potential to cause results similar to those witnessed with the deployment of the atomic bomb. It does, therefore, seem somewhat incompatible that a discussion about circumstances which occurred during the late eighteenth and early nineteenth century on the Ohio frontier would have any similarity to the highly technical components detailed in even a cursory insight into the weapons of mass destruction discussion. But an investigation into the relationships between major factions in early Ohio history may suggest that the idea may not be as far fetched as one might think, and, in fact, probably did occur.
It has historically been suggested that man's very nature motivates him to acquire possessions that are of value and give him an advantage or status, perceived or real, within his community. This could be an item such as gold or silver, multiple spouses, or any other object that the community has identified as having value. A recurring theme through the ages presents the acquisition of land as a prime motivator. Whether a king was amassing land to expand his kingdom, a rancher wanted to expand his grazing pastures or a developer needed a few more blocks to build a strip mall, the basic want was the same - - more land. If their expansions could be achieved in a peaceful, acceptable manner, the story moves forward with no obstacles. But if the acquisition is disputed, anything from tedious negotiations to outright warfare might ensue. As a result, whomever is credited with the final outcome is heralded as either a hero or failure depending on one's perspective. With that in mind let us look at events that occurred during the acquisition and development of the Ohio frontier, specifically noting how tactics used at the time not only secured territory for the British but helped to eliminate their biggest foe, the Native Americans in those areas and beyond.
Henry Bouquet was a Swiss mercenary who rose to prominence during the French and Indian War. He also played a strategic role in the development and protection of an area of territory adjacent to the confluence of the Tuscarawas and Walhonding Rivers and the area we know now as Coshocton.
In 1754, the initial stages of the French and Indian War ( 1754-1763) marked the conflict between Great Britain and France over ownership of territories in North America, primarily in and around what is now Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. As the name implies, the French had spent considerable time and resources in developing and nurturing a profitable relationship between themselves and whatever indigenous populations were already living in the disputed territory. For years the British had claimed these lands and had built a series of forts to protect both the land and those who lived there and had been trying for years to reclaim territory at the forks of the Ohio River from the French. This was the point where the Allegheny and the Monongahela Rivers joined to form the Ohio River. This location was commonly referred to as "the Point". In 1753, under orders from the governor of Virginia, an army of British soldiers, led by a young emissary, George Washington, was sent to inform the French that they were to stop construction of any more forts and to leave the territory immediately. The French refused, but this did not curtail action from the governor of Virginia.
Captain William Trent was directed to take a small group of men to "the Point" and build a small fortification there. It was to be called Fort Prince George but more commonly became known as Trent's Fort. Unfortunately, Trent was unable to complete his assignment because the French traveled down the Allegheny and Trent and his men were forced to surrender. The French now had control of the area and decided to fortify it by building Fort Duquesne. The British troops made two attempts to regain the Point. The first unsuccessful attempt was led by George Washington, who retreated to Virginia, and the second was led by General George Braddock, whose troops were quickly overtaken by the French and their Native American allies. After Braddock's defeat the British decided to reinforce their holdings in America and Bouquet was selected to assist General John Forbes as one of the officers to help accomplish this objective. In 1758 the British were in a position to once again attempt to take over Fort Duquesne. The British Secretary of State devised a plan to utilize a three-prong attack. The attack was led by General John Forbes, but due to his failing health, Bouquet initiated the third part of the attack and marched toward the Point with the purpose of capturing the French and regaining this strategic location for the British. Unfortunately, the French had learned of the plan, realized they were vastly outnumbered and burned the fort to the ground and fled the area only a few day s before the British arrived. Although this technically was a defeat of the British, they then built one of the largest and most fortified forts at the Point. The huge complex, with its unique pentagon shape and architectural features designed to withstand any type of attack, became the model for all future fortifications and Bouquet remained in the area to assure military control of the area.
Following the end of the war, the Native Americans in the territories began to feel increasing unrest. The various tribes in the area had no wish to join together as one unified community, but they almost universally were starting to realize that the reciprocal agreement they had enjoy ed while supporting the French was in no way the situation they now had under British direction. In the initial negotiations between the French and the Native Americans, the French began the practice of giving gifts to them. These might include iron tools, blankets, beads, alcohol, and other supplies, which essentially given to them as bribes to buy the Native Americans' support for their expansion into lands currently held by them. But when the British rose to power in these territories, they ceased the practice of gift giving. The British also were making tremendous efforts to force the Native Americans to be "subjects of Great Britain" and as such would be relinquishing much of their power. These actions were considered insults to the Native Americans, as gift exchanging was a fundamental expression offriendship and culturally important to the Native Americans. They were a binding support and concrete evidence to the Native American nations of the continuing relationship between themselves and the British. But Pontiac, an Odawa war chief, rallied the Native Americans and encouraged them to regain their lands and cease associations with the British, citing recent changes in dealings with them. At the same time, Neolin, a Delaware prophet, revealed a vision he had experienced where it was revealed to him that the Native Americans should break away from the British, cease using the tools and weapons they had learned from them and regain the lands they had lost. He also advised the end of drinking alcohol and abandoning the religious aspects they had been taught by the missionaries. Sparked by Pontiac and Neolin, the indigenous groups in the Ohio Valley went on the offensive and seized most of the forts in the western lands until only a handful remained. These actions and their continuing raids came to be known as Pontiac's War".
It was during this time, in 1763, that Henry Bouquet again enters our picture. Captain Simeon Ecuyer was overseeing the running of Fort Pitt. Colonel Henry Bouquet was technically in charge of the facility, but he managed from afar, remaining in Philadelphia. Ecuyer wrote to Bouquet when he became concerned about happenings at the fort. Pontiac's War had the Native Americans attempting to drive out the settlers and take over the fort. As a result, those individuals living outside the fort and natives, friendly to the British, sought refuge inside. Ecuyer, well aware of the spread of smallpox throughout the area, wrote to Bouquet voicing his concern that the increasing numbers within the fort would greatly increase the chance that smallpox would be spread throughout the fort, devastating those within. Ecuyer suggested that representatives from the natives who were coming to speak with Ecuyer and others at the fort, encouraging them to leave the fort and return the land, possessions, and any indigenous hostages, be intentionally exposed to the smallpox. If successful, the results would affect not only the representatives, but upon their return to their home, would spread to the Native Americans there, as well as the French who were still friendly with the natives, but remained enemies of the British.
During the time that Ecuyer was communicating with Bouquet, William Trent, a trader in the area who lived within Fort Pitt, recorded in his journal that "Out of our regard for them (the representatives) we gave them two blankets and a handkerchief out of the smallpox hospital. I hope it will have the desired effect". This exchange was recorded on June 24, 1763 several weeks before Ecuyer had any response from Bouquet. No one knows whose idea it was to send the infected items with the representatives. Sir Jeffery Amherst, the commander of all the British forces in North America at the time, probably did not know about the Trent incident at the time. But there was so much pressure from Great Britain to put an end to the continuing problems with the Native Americans, Amherst wrote on July 7, 1763, "Could it not be contrived to send the smallpox among those disaffected tribes of Indians? We must, on this occasion, use every stratagem in our power to reduce them". On July 13, upon receiving this message, Bouquet was traveling to Fort Pitt with reinforcements and replied to Amherst that he would try to spread the disease to the Native Americans using contaminated blankets, but he would be "taking care not to get the disease myself". Amherst wrote back, "You will do well to try to inoculate the Indians by means of blankets as well as to try every other method that will serve to extirpate this race".
It is not known which of these two attempts, Trent's or Bouquet's had the desired effect, but after the Fort Pitt incident a smallpox epidemic exploded in the Ohio Valley with the Native Americans suffering catastrophic casualties. That Fort Pitt incident is one of the first and best documented episodes of an intentional attempt to spread smallpox. Although historians disagree about which account resulted in the desired outcome, there is a receipt which Trent submitted to the British military for payment for two blankets and one handkerchief to "replace in kind those which were taken from people in the hospital to convey smallpox to the Indians". The fact that both Ecuyer and Amherst suggested this action within days of each other suggests that it was not unusual and was fairly acceptable to the British and no argument was given by anyone that the attempts should not be taken.
In 1764, Bouquet left Fort Pitt with a group of 1500 men and marched to the forks of the Muskingum River, the area now known as Coshocton, arriving on October 25, 1764. They stayed there until November 18th. During that time Bouquet was able to negotiate the release of 206 white men, women, and children from the Naive Americans and returned to their families. He obtained a promise of peace from the Delawares, Senecas and Shawnee. He was able to accomplish this without any shots being fired. It is this series of events which earned Colonel Bouquet a place in Ohio History. This location is marked by an Ohio Historical Marker which is erected on Ohio State Route 83, north of Coshocton, near the Lake Park complex. Nearly every school child in Coshocton has taken a school field trip to this spot and learned of Colonel Bouquet and his place in Ohio history. As time continues to pass I am certain that countless other children and visitors to Coshocton will travel to this marker, and will leave believing in the remarkable accomplishments it conveys, never knowing that this same man may have instigated the first documented case of germ warfare using smallpox infected items.
In conclusion, does it really matter which set of facts we remember about Colonel Bouquet? That he was a shrewd military man who helped to end a war and return hostages to their families or the same shrewd military man who gave an order and engaged in the destruction of Countless Native Americans? Or do they balance each other out? You will need to decide that for yourself.
References
Bergman, Abraham B. "A Political History of the Indian Health Services". The Milbank Quarterly 77. No. 4 (1999).p.571-604. Retrieved September 12, 2024.
Calloway, Colin G. The Scratch of a Pen:1763 and the Transformation of North America. Oxford, Oxford University Press, 2006. p. 79.
Gross, W.H. "Colonel Henry Bouquet Frees the Indian Captives". NRA Family.org. (June 16, 2022). Retrieved October 14, 2024.
Henderson, Donald A. "Smallpox as a Biological Weapon". Journal of the American Medical Association. Vol. 281, No. 22. (June 9, 1999).
Jennings, Francis. Empire of Fortune: Crowns, Colonies, and Tribes in the Seven Years War in America. New York, Norton, 1988. p. 112-126.
Middleton, Richard. Pontiac's War:Its Causes, Concerns, and Consequences. New York: Routledge, 2007. p. 133-34.
The Papers of Henry Bouquet. Pennsylvania Historical and Museum Commission. https ://catalog. hathitrust. org/Record/001262955
Peckham, Howard H. Pontiac and the Indian Uprising. Detroit, Wayne State University Press, 1994. p. 7 7 -81.
Jennifer Wilkes: Indian Culture: Then and Now (3rd Place Winner)
Grey Owl
I watched the movie ‘Grey Owl’ last night. All I knew, was that it was a true story about an Indian named Grey Owl, and to my shock and horror who played this main character? None other than Pierce Brosnan of ‘James Bond’ fame. A man known for his upper crust English accent and European features, was cast as an American Indian! As the story unfolds you learn he lived in the 1880’s, was adopted by the Ojibwa tribe and was an avid trapper and student of Native American culture. It all became clear when it is revealed after his death, that his true name was Archie Belaney and that he came to America from Sussex, England at the age of 18 because of a fascination with American Indian culture through reading books and poems such as Hiawatha.
Grey Owl or Archie became truly famous through the books he wrote, becoming one of North American’s first Environmentalist; he warned of the extinction of the beaver, the burning of the forest and over hunting. He went on tour around the world preaching the importance of Nature Preserves and limited hunting. They would say, reading his books was like hearing a wild animal talk and indeed we will never learn more about the culture of Native Americans than through his firsthand accounts. As the first environmentalist, this moment in time was pivotal. Settlers and industry were expanding; these Native Cultures were disappearing and that is what fascinated me. How did the white culture affect the Native one? What was it like to live through this change in the American Indian’s population? Through this man’s eyes (and others) we feel the change in our hearts. We see what it once was, sitting on Archie’s shoulders, in his writings, like a squirrel with a pen. Join me as we take a peek at Native American life THEN:
“He who lands his canoe at a semi-permanent Indian village at any hour after daylight will find few men. Hunters are away, for more game can be taken in the two hours after the break of day than in all the rest of the twenty-four hours together. Returning at noon the visitor is apt to find the inhabitants half-sleeping and the camp basking silently in the sunlight; save perhaps some old woman who sits smoking… or the hum of insects. …..Quite often these people have done a half day’s work while the rest of the world was in bed. But when an Indian is not actually engaged in a strenuous occupation they relax utterly and completely. The woman do all the work which gives rise to the legend of Indian laziness….(but the woman would laugh if a man tried to help)” (Owl 1932)
What does this village look like? What do their structures look like?
“These villages are moveable, for this is a nomadic people…and rarely do they build cabins.... instead tents, wind breaks and bark shelters are scattered …….and in the background is the inevitable dark, towering wall of …forest. Hudson Bay blankets, ….green, blue, black red or white hang out on poles to air before each lodge, give a brilliant note of colour. Woman in voluminous plaid dresses and multicoloured head shawls, move from tent to tent, sewing, baking endless Bannocks, or working everlastly at half-tanned hides.” (Owl 1932)
So what’s cooking in this village? It was a land of plenty.
“In an open space near the centre of the village is a rack of poles, 10’ long and 6’ high festooned with n numerous strips of…meat, and split open from the back, hangs a giant sturgeon the length of a man. ….The cool smoke from the fire adds a savour and zest that no bottled condiment can impart.” (Owl 1932)
What did they look like? What did they do all day?
“Men, some with clipped heads, others bobbed, older men with long black braids, gather around this central place, whittling out muskrat stretchers with crooked knives, mending nets, sitting around smoking, or just sitting around. Half-naked children play in the dust with half-tame huskies; a crow, tied by the leg with a thong to a cross pole, squawks…while two tumbling bears run loose. As the sun climbs down toward the rim of hills the men bestir themselves…. and at intervals take their guns and light axes….and they steal away as the spirit moves them; when one turns to speak, they are not there; that is all. As the day falls, smudges are lit to the windward, a protection from the swarms of mosquitos...nets are set, everything eatable are hung up out of reach of the dogs...and the twinkling of fires spring up...like a gathering of fireflies. “ (Owl 1932)
What happens when the village decides to move? Let’s take a look!
“There is no unseemly haste in breaking up camp. Every individual has his or her allotted task; not a move is wasted. Quietly, smoothly without bustle or confusion (items) are loaded and in little more than an hour perhaps 10-12 families are on their way.” (Owl 1932)
“Every individual has his or her allotted task; not a move is wasted. Quietly, smoothly, without bustle or confusion and in a little more than an hour from the time of rising nothing remains of the village save the damp steam rising from the deluge of fires and racks of bare poles, piled clear of the ground for future use. The scene .....is a lively one. Colourful as a band of Gypsies, men, women and children.....decked with inordinate loads of every imaginable description. Men with a hundred pounds of flour and a tin stove,....women carry tents and huge rolls of blankets with apparent ease, their hands full of light but irksome utensils.” (Owl 1932)
Even the children carry their burden.
“Children carry their own miniature packs...taking their work as seriously as do their elders. Some women carry infants on their backs, laced onto a flat padded board fitted with an outring fitted in such a manner that the child is protected in case of a fall, from which dangles a wooden homemade doll or other simple toy. These mothers carry no other load but to them having their hands free is delegated .......the difficult task of herding...and hazing along the trail those of the multifarious pets that cannot be carried in bags or boxes, assisted by the children.” (Owl 1932)
And what a menagerie of animals!
“ I have seen cats perched contentedly on top of a roll of bedding,...crows carried on poles like banners, full grown beaver led on a chain, tiny bears running loose,...and once a young girl with an owl laced tightly into a baby’s cradle.” (Owl 1932)
He continues to describe the scene.
“To follow these people in their ceaseless wanderings, is to spend long weeks of terrific labour, alternating with lazy days of basking in the sun, and games and dancing. Periods of want are offset by days and nights of feasting.” (Owl 1932)
What an amazing scene of joy, peace and contentment.
Christopher Gist
Gist was another white man that was able to experience the life of Native Americans before the total encroachment of European settlers. He was given instructions by the Committee of the Ohio Company September 11, 1750 to:
“Search and discover the Lands upon the river Ohio. He was to observe what Nations of Indians inhabited the land, their strength, numbers and commodities they delt in.” (Summers, 1929)
Gist attended many meetings with the Natives with speeches being said pro and con toward either the English or the French. He recorded the environment that he found, Indian towns and trading posts.
Some of his journal entries record some interesting occurrences amongst the Natives:
“Dec 26 1750 A woman who had been long time a prisoner .......put to death in a grisly manner, ending with her being scalped, threw her scalp in the air.... and another cut off her head.”
“Jan 15 1751 Muskingum..... White Woman creek....this white woman was taken away from New England when she was not above Ten years old..... She is now upwards to fifty and has an Indian husband and several children---her name is Mary Harris......( She) wonders “how the white men can be so wicked as she has seen in these woods.” (Summers, 1929)
It appears that at this time, the white man’s influence is already being felt in the Ohio Territory.
Gist related the following report about one of the Indian traditions that he witnessed:
“An account of the Festival mentioned in My Journal: ....a proclamation that all the Indian’s marriages were dissolved, and a Public Feast was to be held for three succeeding Days after, in which Woman as their Custom was again to choose Husbands. The next Morning early the Indians breakfasted and after spent the Day in dancing till Evening when they retired to a splendid Feast prepared, after Feasting they spend the Night in dancing....the Men dancing by themselves and the woman in turns around the fires, and dancing in Their manner in the Figures 8 about 60 or 70 at a time. The Woman the whole time they danced sang a song in their Language the Chorus of which was:”
‘I am not afraid of my Husband -----I will choose what Man I please.’
“The third day in the Evening, ...the woman standing together as the Men danced by them; And as any woman likes a Man passing by she stepped in and joined the dance, taking hold of the Man’s hand whom she Chose, and then continued in the Dance till the rest of the Woman stepped in and made their choice in the same Manner; afterwards the Dance ended and they all retired to Consummate.“ (Summers, 1929)
It is interesting to note the freedom that the Native woman had compared to the White woman of this time. White women during this time, were basically owned by their husbands, could not own property or vote. In the Native society, a White woman could be a medicine woman, be respected for her skill and participate in a festival where women were celebrated in their ability to dissolve and then choose another man of their choice.
Jonathan Alder
Another white man, Jonathan, was captured by Indians as a boy in 1781 while living with his family in Virginia. From his first-hand account, we learn that he was taken to the Ohio Country where he lived after being adopted by an elderly couple who he called Mother and Father. He was scrubbed clean and dressed in the Indian style. He amused himself by playing ball, running races and was a favorite but still not exempt from the tricks and jokes of the other youth. The tribes’ people were always cheerful and good natured he says, but the food didn’t agree with him because most of their diet was meat. Occasionally they would have hominy and beans but bread was a rare thing with honey and sugar being plentiful.
His first work was to skin and stretch the pelts of the racoon. He enjoyed this work and after learning to speak 3 Indian languages began to feel at home with these Natives. Later he became a hunter and a trapper but the whites made it difficult to be an Indian because they would invade and burn all their crops of corn and beans and the Indians would have to flee.
After one retreat his tribe found themselves once again hungry:
“Our chief living there was coon with out salt, hominy or corn for we had lost everything we had in the way of food. Coon were plenty and fat, not bad eating for a hungry person. We generally threw them in the fire, we did not skin them for fear of losing some part of them that could be eaten. There was a wild potato that could be eaten but were not very placatable but sustained life.” (Alder, 2002)
You can see why Jonathan would join in the raiding parties across the Ohio river. He also writes about how white man’s ‘Fire water’ was to blame for murder amongst the tribes and cause them to quarrel and fight when drunk. He then explains about treaties that would be made while they were drunk to sell off their land for a small portion of land Out West and money to be paid yearly.
After their ‘Terror-stricken’ fight with Anthony Wayne and a peace treaty drawn up, Jon decided to settle with his squaw in Darby, near present day Columbus, in what he says is the ‘Best hunting of the Indian territory.’ In a short while, Whites moved in and he learned to speak English again. He raised cattle, horses and hogs. He was happy:
“I had my own white race for neighbors and the red man that I loved, all mingling together.” (Alder,2002)
He also had this to say about working on his farm:
“I pretty much hired all my work done and was forced to hire white men, for the Indians was like myself, they didn’t know how and couldn’t work. But even if they had known how, they wouldn’t, for it is not natural for an Indian to work.” (Alder, 2002)
In 1804, he dropped the Indian costume that he had worn for the last 23 years and bought a new suit and set off to visit his family in Virginia. They returned with him to his home in Ohio.
As you can see from Jonathan’s commentary, the Indian’s way of life was no longer idyllic. They were pushed West into what would become the state of ‘Indiana’ after thousands of Whites descended upon them from all over the globe. It is estimated that there were only 6,000 Indians in the whole of the Ohio territory during this period. (Hill, 1881) You can understand people’s attitude by reading what has been written in a Coshocton History book published in 1881:
“(The Natives) are a hunter race, wholly adverse to labor. Like most savage races, their habits are unchangeable, at least, the examples of white men, and their efforts during three centuries, have made little, if any, impression.” (Hill, 1881)
It is interesting to read how the Whites justified the taking of Indian land:
“The true basis of title to Indian Territory is the right of civilized men to the soil for purpose of cultivation. There was never any question who would be in control of Indian land. The right to hold the land rests with the power of the developing nation. There was never any doubt the fate of the Indians.” (Hill, 1881)
You can feel the apathy for them through this quote:
“Savage men, like savage beast, are engaged in continual migrations. Now, none are left. The white man occupies the home of the red man.”
This little poem is a nice touch:
‘The verdant hills
Are covered o’er with growing grain,
And white men till the soil,
Where once the red man used to reign.’ (Hill, 1881))
Grey Owl
At the end of his story, Grey Owl writes about the Indian’s belief in Mysticism and relates to us stories of sleight of hand, hypnotism, cursing and telepathy; but his most personal story is especially thought provoking.
It was in the Autumn, a time of relaxation but his mind kept coming back to his younger days, particularly to a certain lake where he had camped with his Indian friends. More and more frequently he thought of it, waking hours, dreaming of it and persistent before his mind was the image of his wise and ancient companion of former days - ‘Stands First’. He had to go there.
Arriving at the deserted camping-ground brought back a flood of memories:
“Here, under these very trees I had feasted, and gamed, and danced with those of whom many now rested in that silent grove.” (Owl 1932)
He goes on to explain how the leasing of the surrounding water to a fishing concern resulted in a shortage of food for the Indians and the proximity of the new Railroad brought in hordes of amateur trappers leaving in their wake a ravished area of poison and broken beaver dams that had driven them from their ancestorial home forever.
“A feeling of sadness pervaded me, and I began to wish I had not come” (Owl 1932)
But then a bark canoe drifted ashore and his friend of many days, ‘Stands First’ greeted him.
“An aged man from my earliest recollection of him, he now seemed of another day and age, changed beyond belief. He was dressed in old and faded overalls and shirt and wore beaded moccasins and had a decorated medicine pouch. His hair, now white, framed a face the colour of mahogany, almost fleshless; eyes with a thousand wrinkles.” He said, “Grey Owl, I see you do not forget. I called and, of them all, you came.” (Owl 1932)
Grey Owl wonders if this is why he had the urge to visit the lake? Or could this be just a coincidence?
Stands First spoke: “.....My son, I have seen many snows come and go....I was a warrior once, and fought the blue-coated soldiers on a day when a river ran red with blood.” (Owl 1932)
It was evident that Grey Owl was soon to be the last of his clan.
“Since then I have seen many changes; I see the winged canoe of the white man flies with the wild geese amongst the clouds. I hear a sound,.....it is the spirit of an Indian, looking for a place to rest, and there is none! The sky is red at night with the fire of burning forest. The beaver are gone, and there are no more singing birds...the setting sun throws a red path across the water; there lies the trail to the to the hand of Spirits; along it I soon must follow my people.”
“In the glow of the sunset the Indian got up and walked to the edge of the lake. This time, the worn figure in his tattered clothing became a thing of beauty. He raised his right hand, palm out, and bowed his head....saluting to the western sky with that greeting with which the Indian met the first White man, the ancient and almost forgotten PEACE sign.” (Owl 1932)
Grey Owl buried him the next day ...with his muzzle-loader, old fashioned axe and his beaded pouch of relics by his side and there he will always be.
Conclusion
Yes, there are still Native Americans in North America in these modern times but the immigration of thousands of Europeans, as well as people from all over the world, have changed their way of life forever.
To illustrate this let’s look at ‘Wild Bill Hickok statement as he explains to Crazy Horse this fact in the dramatic book, The White Buffalo:
“Today it is the White’s turn. Those you have seen on this plain are like a handful of beads. For every white you kill, there are a thousand that take their place. They are like the sands of the great sea. They outnumber the spring blades of grama grass. There are more than the Buffalo in the days when they smothered the earth with its great herds. There is no way to stand against the Whites; their seed is strong and their weapons terrible. They have the power! They will sweep across….. the Shining Mountains with their steam wagons until the streams and the plains and mountains are white-land from Huntka’s sunrise to the western ocean. You will bend to the Long Knives or be broken. You will live as they say, or you will die on their bayonets.”
Natives attempt to keep their culture alive through language, museums, and traditions such as the pow wow and sweat lodges. But how do the reservations and casinos fit into this culture? As an aboriginal people, they may never come to grips with the massive change brought on to their civilization by the flood of this other population.
I would imagine that the future holds more and more assimilation and intermarriage and like every other culture it will come down to group participations in activities, songs, clothing, food and traditions. At this time in Ohio, we have one group of natives from all different tribes keeping these traditions alive. It’s called NAICCO or ‘Native American Indian Center of Central Ohio’. They have regular meetings and have a food truck that they are using to earn and save money to buy their own space, their own land. Their mission:
The Native American Indian Center of Central Ohio (NAICCO) is devoted to preserving and restoring balance in the lives of Native Americans through traditional, cultural, educational, family, community, and wellness driven values and initiatives.
The American native spirit lives on in organizations like this: They have survived.
Bibliography:
Grey Owl, The Men of the Last Frontier, 1932, Buffalo, NY, Firefly Books
Grey Owl, Pilgrims of the Wild, 1935, Buffalo, NY, Firefly Books
Grey Own, Sato and the Beaver People, 1936, Buffalo, NY, Firefly Books
Kenneth Browser, Grey Owl, January 1990, The Atlantic Magazine, Volume 265, No. 1, P. 74-78
N. N. Hill jr., History of Coshocton County Ohio, 1881, Newark, Ohio, A. A. Graham and Company Publishing
Lewis P. Summers, Christopher Grist’s Journal: Annals of Southwest Virginia 1769-1800, 1929, Abingdon, Virginia, Penelope.uchigago.edu
Henry Clay Alder, A History of Jonathan, 2002, Akron, Ohio, The University of Akron
Richard Attenbough, Movie: Grey Owl, 1999, Ontario, Canda, Largo Entertainment
https://www.naicco.com/ Native Americans Indians of Central Ohio
Sale, Richard, The White Buffalo, 1973, New York, NY, Bantam Books
I watched the movie ‘Grey Owl’ last night. All I knew, was that it was a true story about an Indian named Grey Owl, and to my shock and horror who played this main character? None other than Pierce Brosnan of ‘James Bond’ fame. A man known for his upper crust English accent and European features, was cast as an American Indian! As the story unfolds you learn he lived in the 1880’s, was adopted by the Ojibwa tribe and was an avid trapper and student of Native American culture. It all became clear when it is revealed after his death, that his true name was Archie Belaney and that he came to America from Sussex, England at the age of 18 because of a fascination with American Indian culture through reading books and poems such as Hiawatha.
Grey Owl or Archie became truly famous through the books he wrote, becoming one of North American’s first Environmentalist; he warned of the extinction of the beaver, the burning of the forest and over hunting. He went on tour around the world preaching the importance of Nature Preserves and limited hunting. They would say, reading his books was like hearing a wild animal talk and indeed we will never learn more about the culture of Native Americans than through his firsthand accounts. As the first environmentalist, this moment in time was pivotal. Settlers and industry were expanding; these Native Cultures were disappearing and that is what fascinated me. How did the white culture affect the Native one? What was it like to live through this change in the American Indian’s population? Through this man’s eyes (and others) we feel the change in our hearts. We see what it once was, sitting on Archie’s shoulders, in his writings, like a squirrel with a pen. Join me as we take a peek at Native American life THEN:
“He who lands his canoe at a semi-permanent Indian village at any hour after daylight will find few men. Hunters are away, for more game can be taken in the two hours after the break of day than in all the rest of the twenty-four hours together. Returning at noon the visitor is apt to find the inhabitants half-sleeping and the camp basking silently in the sunlight; save perhaps some old woman who sits smoking… or the hum of insects. …..Quite often these people have done a half day’s work while the rest of the world was in bed. But when an Indian is not actually engaged in a strenuous occupation they relax utterly and completely. The woman do all the work which gives rise to the legend of Indian laziness….(but the woman would laugh if a man tried to help)” (Owl 1932)
What does this village look like? What do their structures look like?
“These villages are moveable, for this is a nomadic people…and rarely do they build cabins.... instead tents, wind breaks and bark shelters are scattered …….and in the background is the inevitable dark, towering wall of …forest. Hudson Bay blankets, ….green, blue, black red or white hang out on poles to air before each lodge, give a brilliant note of colour. Woman in voluminous plaid dresses and multicoloured head shawls, move from tent to tent, sewing, baking endless Bannocks, or working everlastly at half-tanned hides.” (Owl 1932)
So what’s cooking in this village? It was a land of plenty.
“In an open space near the centre of the village is a rack of poles, 10’ long and 6’ high festooned with n numerous strips of…meat, and split open from the back, hangs a giant sturgeon the length of a man. ….The cool smoke from the fire adds a savour and zest that no bottled condiment can impart.” (Owl 1932)
What did they look like? What did they do all day?
“Men, some with clipped heads, others bobbed, older men with long black braids, gather around this central place, whittling out muskrat stretchers with crooked knives, mending nets, sitting around smoking, or just sitting around. Half-naked children play in the dust with half-tame huskies; a crow, tied by the leg with a thong to a cross pole, squawks…while two tumbling bears run loose. As the sun climbs down toward the rim of hills the men bestir themselves…. and at intervals take their guns and light axes….and they steal away as the spirit moves them; when one turns to speak, they are not there; that is all. As the day falls, smudges are lit to the windward, a protection from the swarms of mosquitos...nets are set, everything eatable are hung up out of reach of the dogs...and the twinkling of fires spring up...like a gathering of fireflies. “ (Owl 1932)
What happens when the village decides to move? Let’s take a look!
“There is no unseemly haste in breaking up camp. Every individual has his or her allotted task; not a move is wasted. Quietly, smoothly without bustle or confusion (items) are loaded and in little more than an hour perhaps 10-12 families are on their way.” (Owl 1932)
“Every individual has his or her allotted task; not a move is wasted. Quietly, smoothly, without bustle or confusion and in a little more than an hour from the time of rising nothing remains of the village save the damp steam rising from the deluge of fires and racks of bare poles, piled clear of the ground for future use. The scene .....is a lively one. Colourful as a band of Gypsies, men, women and children.....decked with inordinate loads of every imaginable description. Men with a hundred pounds of flour and a tin stove,....women carry tents and huge rolls of blankets with apparent ease, their hands full of light but irksome utensils.” (Owl 1932)
Even the children carry their burden.
“Children carry their own miniature packs...taking their work as seriously as do their elders. Some women carry infants on their backs, laced onto a flat padded board fitted with an outring fitted in such a manner that the child is protected in case of a fall, from which dangles a wooden homemade doll or other simple toy. These mothers carry no other load but to them having their hands free is delegated .......the difficult task of herding...and hazing along the trail those of the multifarious pets that cannot be carried in bags or boxes, assisted by the children.” (Owl 1932)
And what a menagerie of animals!
“ I have seen cats perched contentedly on top of a roll of bedding,...crows carried on poles like banners, full grown beaver led on a chain, tiny bears running loose,...and once a young girl with an owl laced tightly into a baby’s cradle.” (Owl 1932)
He continues to describe the scene.
“To follow these people in their ceaseless wanderings, is to spend long weeks of terrific labour, alternating with lazy days of basking in the sun, and games and dancing. Periods of want are offset by days and nights of feasting.” (Owl 1932)
What an amazing scene of joy, peace and contentment.
Christopher Gist
Gist was another white man that was able to experience the life of Native Americans before the total encroachment of European settlers. He was given instructions by the Committee of the Ohio Company September 11, 1750 to:
“Search and discover the Lands upon the river Ohio. He was to observe what Nations of Indians inhabited the land, their strength, numbers and commodities they delt in.” (Summers, 1929)
Gist attended many meetings with the Natives with speeches being said pro and con toward either the English or the French. He recorded the environment that he found, Indian towns and trading posts.
Some of his journal entries record some interesting occurrences amongst the Natives:
“Dec 26 1750 A woman who had been long time a prisoner .......put to death in a grisly manner, ending with her being scalped, threw her scalp in the air.... and another cut off her head.”
“Jan 15 1751 Muskingum..... White Woman creek....this white woman was taken away from New England when she was not above Ten years old..... She is now upwards to fifty and has an Indian husband and several children---her name is Mary Harris......( She) wonders “how the white men can be so wicked as she has seen in these woods.” (Summers, 1929)
It appears that at this time, the white man’s influence is already being felt in the Ohio Territory.
Gist related the following report about one of the Indian traditions that he witnessed:
“An account of the Festival mentioned in My Journal: ....a proclamation that all the Indian’s marriages were dissolved, and a Public Feast was to be held for three succeeding Days after, in which Woman as their Custom was again to choose Husbands. The next Morning early the Indians breakfasted and after spent the Day in dancing till Evening when they retired to a splendid Feast prepared, after Feasting they spend the Night in dancing....the Men dancing by themselves and the woman in turns around the fires, and dancing in Their manner in the Figures 8 about 60 or 70 at a time. The Woman the whole time they danced sang a song in their Language the Chorus of which was:”
‘I am not afraid of my Husband -----I will choose what Man I please.’
“The third day in the Evening, ...the woman standing together as the Men danced by them; And as any woman likes a Man passing by she stepped in and joined the dance, taking hold of the Man’s hand whom she Chose, and then continued in the Dance till the rest of the Woman stepped in and made their choice in the same Manner; afterwards the Dance ended and they all retired to Consummate.“ (Summers, 1929)
It is interesting to note the freedom that the Native woman had compared to the White woman of this time. White women during this time, were basically owned by their husbands, could not own property or vote. In the Native society, a White woman could be a medicine woman, be respected for her skill and participate in a festival where women were celebrated in their ability to dissolve and then choose another man of their choice.
Jonathan Alder
Another white man, Jonathan, was captured by Indians as a boy in 1781 while living with his family in Virginia. From his first-hand account, we learn that he was taken to the Ohio Country where he lived after being adopted by an elderly couple who he called Mother and Father. He was scrubbed clean and dressed in the Indian style. He amused himself by playing ball, running races and was a favorite but still not exempt from the tricks and jokes of the other youth. The tribes’ people were always cheerful and good natured he says, but the food didn’t agree with him because most of their diet was meat. Occasionally they would have hominy and beans but bread was a rare thing with honey and sugar being plentiful.
His first work was to skin and stretch the pelts of the racoon. He enjoyed this work and after learning to speak 3 Indian languages began to feel at home with these Natives. Later he became a hunter and a trapper but the whites made it difficult to be an Indian because they would invade and burn all their crops of corn and beans and the Indians would have to flee.
After one retreat his tribe found themselves once again hungry:
“Our chief living there was coon with out salt, hominy or corn for we had lost everything we had in the way of food. Coon were plenty and fat, not bad eating for a hungry person. We generally threw them in the fire, we did not skin them for fear of losing some part of them that could be eaten. There was a wild potato that could be eaten but were not very placatable but sustained life.” (Alder, 2002)
You can see why Jonathan would join in the raiding parties across the Ohio river. He also writes about how white man’s ‘Fire water’ was to blame for murder amongst the tribes and cause them to quarrel and fight when drunk. He then explains about treaties that would be made while they were drunk to sell off their land for a small portion of land Out West and money to be paid yearly.
After their ‘Terror-stricken’ fight with Anthony Wayne and a peace treaty drawn up, Jon decided to settle with his squaw in Darby, near present day Columbus, in what he says is the ‘Best hunting of the Indian territory.’ In a short while, Whites moved in and he learned to speak English again. He raised cattle, horses and hogs. He was happy:
“I had my own white race for neighbors and the red man that I loved, all mingling together.” (Alder,2002)
He also had this to say about working on his farm:
“I pretty much hired all my work done and was forced to hire white men, for the Indians was like myself, they didn’t know how and couldn’t work. But even if they had known how, they wouldn’t, for it is not natural for an Indian to work.” (Alder, 2002)
In 1804, he dropped the Indian costume that he had worn for the last 23 years and bought a new suit and set off to visit his family in Virginia. They returned with him to his home in Ohio.
As you can see from Jonathan’s commentary, the Indian’s way of life was no longer idyllic. They were pushed West into what would become the state of ‘Indiana’ after thousands of Whites descended upon them from all over the globe. It is estimated that there were only 6,000 Indians in the whole of the Ohio territory during this period. (Hill, 1881) You can understand people’s attitude by reading what has been written in a Coshocton History book published in 1881:
“(The Natives) are a hunter race, wholly adverse to labor. Like most savage races, their habits are unchangeable, at least, the examples of white men, and their efforts during three centuries, have made little, if any, impression.” (Hill, 1881)
It is interesting to read how the Whites justified the taking of Indian land:
“The true basis of title to Indian Territory is the right of civilized men to the soil for purpose of cultivation. There was never any question who would be in control of Indian land. The right to hold the land rests with the power of the developing nation. There was never any doubt the fate of the Indians.” (Hill, 1881)
You can feel the apathy for them through this quote:
“Savage men, like savage beast, are engaged in continual migrations. Now, none are left. The white man occupies the home of the red man.”
This little poem is a nice touch:
‘The verdant hills
Are covered o’er with growing grain,
And white men till the soil,
Where once the red man used to reign.’ (Hill, 1881))
Grey Owl
At the end of his story, Grey Owl writes about the Indian’s belief in Mysticism and relates to us stories of sleight of hand, hypnotism, cursing and telepathy; but his most personal story is especially thought provoking.
It was in the Autumn, a time of relaxation but his mind kept coming back to his younger days, particularly to a certain lake where he had camped with his Indian friends. More and more frequently he thought of it, waking hours, dreaming of it and persistent before his mind was the image of his wise and ancient companion of former days - ‘Stands First’. He had to go there.
Arriving at the deserted camping-ground brought back a flood of memories:
“Here, under these very trees I had feasted, and gamed, and danced with those of whom many now rested in that silent grove.” (Owl 1932)
He goes on to explain how the leasing of the surrounding water to a fishing concern resulted in a shortage of food for the Indians and the proximity of the new Railroad brought in hordes of amateur trappers leaving in their wake a ravished area of poison and broken beaver dams that had driven them from their ancestorial home forever.
“A feeling of sadness pervaded me, and I began to wish I had not come” (Owl 1932)
But then a bark canoe drifted ashore and his friend of many days, ‘Stands First’ greeted him.
“An aged man from my earliest recollection of him, he now seemed of another day and age, changed beyond belief. He was dressed in old and faded overalls and shirt and wore beaded moccasins and had a decorated medicine pouch. His hair, now white, framed a face the colour of mahogany, almost fleshless; eyes with a thousand wrinkles.” He said, “Grey Owl, I see you do not forget. I called and, of them all, you came.” (Owl 1932)
Grey Owl wonders if this is why he had the urge to visit the lake? Or could this be just a coincidence?
Stands First spoke: “.....My son, I have seen many snows come and go....I was a warrior once, and fought the blue-coated soldiers on a day when a river ran red with blood.” (Owl 1932)
It was evident that Grey Owl was soon to be the last of his clan.
“Since then I have seen many changes; I see the winged canoe of the white man flies with the wild geese amongst the clouds. I hear a sound,.....it is the spirit of an Indian, looking for a place to rest, and there is none! The sky is red at night with the fire of burning forest. The beaver are gone, and there are no more singing birds...the setting sun throws a red path across the water; there lies the trail to the to the hand of Spirits; along it I soon must follow my people.”
“In the glow of the sunset the Indian got up and walked to the edge of the lake. This time, the worn figure in his tattered clothing became a thing of beauty. He raised his right hand, palm out, and bowed his head....saluting to the western sky with that greeting with which the Indian met the first White man, the ancient and almost forgotten PEACE sign.” (Owl 1932)
Grey Owl buried him the next day ...with his muzzle-loader, old fashioned axe and his beaded pouch of relics by his side and there he will always be.
Conclusion
Yes, there are still Native Americans in North America in these modern times but the immigration of thousands of Europeans, as well as people from all over the world, have changed their way of life forever.
To illustrate this let’s look at ‘Wild Bill Hickok statement as he explains to Crazy Horse this fact in the dramatic book, The White Buffalo:
“Today it is the White’s turn. Those you have seen on this plain are like a handful of beads. For every white you kill, there are a thousand that take their place. They are like the sands of the great sea. They outnumber the spring blades of grama grass. There are more than the Buffalo in the days when they smothered the earth with its great herds. There is no way to stand against the Whites; their seed is strong and their weapons terrible. They have the power! They will sweep across….. the Shining Mountains with their steam wagons until the streams and the plains and mountains are white-land from Huntka’s sunrise to the western ocean. You will bend to the Long Knives or be broken. You will live as they say, or you will die on their bayonets.”
Natives attempt to keep their culture alive through language, museums, and traditions such as the pow wow and sweat lodges. But how do the reservations and casinos fit into this culture? As an aboriginal people, they may never come to grips with the massive change brought on to their civilization by the flood of this other population.
I would imagine that the future holds more and more assimilation and intermarriage and like every other culture it will come down to group participations in activities, songs, clothing, food and traditions. At this time in Ohio, we have one group of natives from all different tribes keeping these traditions alive. It’s called NAICCO or ‘Native American Indian Center of Central Ohio’. They have regular meetings and have a food truck that they are using to earn and save money to buy their own space, their own land. Their mission:
The Native American Indian Center of Central Ohio (NAICCO) is devoted to preserving and restoring balance in the lives of Native Americans through traditional, cultural, educational, family, community, and wellness driven values and initiatives.
The American native spirit lives on in organizations like this: They have survived.
Bibliography:
Grey Owl, The Men of the Last Frontier, 1932, Buffalo, NY, Firefly Books
Grey Owl, Pilgrims of the Wild, 1935, Buffalo, NY, Firefly Books
Grey Own, Sato and the Beaver People, 1936, Buffalo, NY, Firefly Books
Kenneth Browser, Grey Owl, January 1990, The Atlantic Magazine, Volume 265, No. 1, P. 74-78
N. N. Hill jr., History of Coshocton County Ohio, 1881, Newark, Ohio, A. A. Graham and Company Publishing
Lewis P. Summers, Christopher Grist’s Journal: Annals of Southwest Virginia 1769-1800, 1929, Abingdon, Virginia, Penelope.uchigago.edu
Henry Clay Alder, A History of Jonathan, 2002, Akron, Ohio, The University of Akron
Richard Attenbough, Movie: Grey Owl, 1999, Ontario, Canda, Largo Entertainment
https://www.naicco.com/ Native Americans Indians of Central Ohio
Sale, Richard, The White Buffalo, 1973, New York, NY, Bantam Books
Bianca Robinson: Colonel Charles Williams (Honorable Mention Winner)
1764
Colonel Charles Williams was born in Washington County, Maryland. During the Revolutionary War, his parents decided to relocate to Washington County, Pennsylvania, before moving again to Wellsburg, Virginia.
During this same year, Colonel Henry Bouquet first established Coshocton. Bouquet became well known for his role in the French and Indian War, marking him as a significant figure in 18th-century American military history. Due to his efforts in negotiating peace with Native American tribes, he was sent, along with 1,500 men, to the unestablished area of Coshocton during the Bouquet Expedition, which aimed to secure British control over the Ohio Country in an attempt to improve relations with local tribes. The Treaty of Fort Pitt came from this expedition, establishing a fragile regional peace. Military tactics were influenced by Bouquet's actions, leading to the outcomes of future interactions between European settlers and the Native Americans in what became Ohio.
1783
Williams relocated with his father to the Cross Creek area, where he honed his hunting skills, primarily pursuing bear and deer. While living in this area, he began to forge his own path, stepping out from underneath his father and independently beginning his own life.
1785
Around the age of 20 or 21, Williams traveled to Ohio, settling in what is today Jefferson County. While living there, he met and became engaged to Susannah Carpenter. Her family was one of the most prominent in the surrounding area; the settlement was named "Carpenter's Fort." Carpenter's Fort had been established in 1781 by John Carpenter. Carpenter built a house above Short Creek, on the Ohio side of the river in what is today's Jefferson County. Due to Susannah's father's unapproval of her relationship with Williams, the two eloped in Virginia, where they could find a justice of the peace.
1787
Williams returned to Ohio with his wife, settling at Carpenter's Station. During their time there, he immersed himself in the ranging business, making a living by hunting and tracking local Indigenous tribes.
c. 1790
In a journal by Charles Williams about his travels, he wrote, "Then after some years, I thought I would quit this kind of life and go to work. I went down the river to Manchester in this State (Adams County) and thought I would work for my living. I began to raise a crop but had not been there long until a party of men came along who were going after some prisoners who had been taken on Flat River, Kentucky about thirty women and children" (p. 419). He agreed to join them and, on their first day, fell into an altercation with Indians, resulting in the deaths of three Indians and the loss of one of their own men. From there, the decision to return home was made. At a later date, Williams went out with surveyors who were going to survey the Virginia Military Land. On this trip, another encounter with Indians occurred, only this time, Colonel Nathaniel Massie initially would not allow the men to attack. "We went about two miles when we found the trail of about eight Indians…At sundown we came to the place where the Indians were encamped for the night. We soon caught their horses and waited patiently until dark; then myself and four others, who were to attack the camp, creeped up to within a few feet and fired upon them. Two were killed; the rest escaped. We went fast for home through fear of those we had passed that day." (p.419)
After this quick venture, Williams returned home only to set off again. He took a position with Anthony Wayne, tending to cattle for military use. After doing this work for some time, his wife fell sick, and he returned to her side. That spring, Williams purchased land in conjunction with a family named Hoglin on Brush Creek in Adams County. Following Hoglin's death, Williams moved his family back to Carpenter's Station, seeking a safer environment and a more peaceful coexistence with the local Indigenous tribes.
1799
After spending eight years trading with the surrounding Indians, Williams relocated his wife and their three children to the Muskingum Salt Springs. When the family reached Duncan Falls, the Indians had already been waiting. Williams had a barrel of whiskey for them and, throughout the nights, had to constantly move their bed and whiskey to prevent them from being robbed. On their way to Duncan Falls, Williams states that he "got the ague, and had it two months". While traveling from there, he fell sick and was left alone, unable to move forward, and his family and hands traveled. "Those were hard times. There was no person to work for me and I laid sick for about two months without bread or any other food except meat. It was a very hard winter. After some time I got able to go for some provisions and brought several horse loads. I had to fetch it about eighty miles through deep snow. There was no road but at last I got home and we had bread." (p. 420) During his time here, most of his neighbors were Indigenous people, but eventually, two white settlers, William McCulloch and Henry Crooks, moved to the area. Williams focused on salt production and providing for travelers to support himself, earning a living in the process. His efforts culminated in constructing a road leading to their home, which he ultimately sold before moving on.
1800
In his journal, Williams recounts his decision to move to the Whitewoman area, where the Indians soon robbed him. He handled the recovery and return of horses that had been stolen from others. During a trip to Sandusky, he encountered approximately 300 Indians and spoke with their chief. Williams made it clear that his task was to return the stolen horses and end the violence that had been occurring, a stance that temporarily curbed the thefts, at least until he documented the events in his journal.
After having the ague for roughly nine months, he and his family made the move to Coshocton, becoming the first to establish a permanent settlement in the area. He built a cabin on the river bank along the forks of the Muskingum. His two brothers-in-law joined the family the following year, raising corn four miles upstream from White Woman's Creek (p. 297).
1801-1840
Coshocton is where Colonel Charles Williams would spend the rest of his days and grow to become a very influential figure in the town. "He was a successful trapper, hunter, Indian scout, and trader, and held every office (being almost all the time in some) in the county possible for a man of his education, from road supervisor and tax-collector to member of the legislature" (p. 232). He first built a home beneath the present-day Tuscarawas bridge. From this first home, Williams went on to establish a tavern on the corners of Water and Chestnut Street. Beginning in 1811, court services were held here. The county compensated him with thirty dollars a year for the use of the second floor of the building. This arrangement continued until the county decided to switch to a building owned by Wilson McGowan, until 1824 when an actual courthouse was built.
After the news of a second war with Britain hit Coshocton County in 1812, Williams traveled to Detroit across the lake. Upon arrival, he joined General Harrison's vanguard and was commissioned as a colonel to take control of the Coshocton County troops. After a rumored Indian attack, Williams was stationed in Mansfield. This anticipated attack never occurred; the assumption was that this was because of Williams' previous standing reputation with the Indians (The Coshocton Tribune).
Following his time serving as a colonel, Williams returned to Coshocton. Maintaining the tavern, trading, and tending to cattle and hogs filled most of his days. "He was a successful trapper, hunter, Indian scout, and trader, and held every office, being almost all the time in some position in the county, from road supervisor and tax collector to member of the State legislature. He was famous as a tavern keeper, and in that and other capacities became very popular. Clever, genial, naturally shrewd, indomitable in purpose, not averse to the popular vices of his day, and even making a virtue of profanity, he was for forty years a controlling spirit of the county, and for twenty-five years the controlling spirit" (p. 413). Charles Williams remained in Coshocton until he died in 1840 at the age of 76, spending more than half of his lifetime residing in Coshocton County. Still today, he is regarded as one of the most influential individuals in the early stages of our county.
Works Cited
Graham, Albert Adams. History of Coshocton County, Ohio: Its Past and Present, 1740-1881: Containing a Comprehensive History of Ohio; a Complete History of Coshocton County ... a History of Its Soldiers in the Late War ... Biographies and Histories of Pioneer Families, Etc. United States, A. A. Graham, 1881. (Pages 419-20, Page 413)
History of the Upper Ohio Valley: With Family History and Biographical Sketches ; a Statement of Its Resources, Industrial Growth and Commercial Advantages. Brant & Fuller, 1890.
Howe, H. (1908). Coshocton County. In Historical collections of ohio: In Two volumes: An encyclopedia of the state: History both general and local, geography with descriptions of its counties, cities and villages, its agricultural, manufacturing, mining and business development, sketches of eminent and interesting characters, etc., with notes of a tour over it in 1886. essay, The State of Ohio.
Hunt, William E. Historical Collections of Coshocton County, Ohio. R. Clarke & Co., Printers, 1876. (Page 232)
Mitchener, Charles Hallowell. Ohio Annals. Historic Events in the Tuscarawas and Muskingum Valleys, and in Other Portions of the State of Ohio. T.W. Odell, 1876. (Page 297)
The Coshocton Tribune, 20 Aug. 1961. Colorful Charlie Williams Was First Settler Here.
Colonel Charles Williams was born in Washington County, Maryland. During the Revolutionary War, his parents decided to relocate to Washington County, Pennsylvania, before moving again to Wellsburg, Virginia.
During this same year, Colonel Henry Bouquet first established Coshocton. Bouquet became well known for his role in the French and Indian War, marking him as a significant figure in 18th-century American military history. Due to his efforts in negotiating peace with Native American tribes, he was sent, along with 1,500 men, to the unestablished area of Coshocton during the Bouquet Expedition, which aimed to secure British control over the Ohio Country in an attempt to improve relations with local tribes. The Treaty of Fort Pitt came from this expedition, establishing a fragile regional peace. Military tactics were influenced by Bouquet's actions, leading to the outcomes of future interactions between European settlers and the Native Americans in what became Ohio.
1783
Williams relocated with his father to the Cross Creek area, where he honed his hunting skills, primarily pursuing bear and deer. While living in this area, he began to forge his own path, stepping out from underneath his father and independently beginning his own life.
1785
Around the age of 20 or 21, Williams traveled to Ohio, settling in what is today Jefferson County. While living there, he met and became engaged to Susannah Carpenter. Her family was one of the most prominent in the surrounding area; the settlement was named "Carpenter's Fort." Carpenter's Fort had been established in 1781 by John Carpenter. Carpenter built a house above Short Creek, on the Ohio side of the river in what is today's Jefferson County. Due to Susannah's father's unapproval of her relationship with Williams, the two eloped in Virginia, where they could find a justice of the peace.
1787
Williams returned to Ohio with his wife, settling at Carpenter's Station. During their time there, he immersed himself in the ranging business, making a living by hunting and tracking local Indigenous tribes.
c. 1790
In a journal by Charles Williams about his travels, he wrote, "Then after some years, I thought I would quit this kind of life and go to work. I went down the river to Manchester in this State (Adams County) and thought I would work for my living. I began to raise a crop but had not been there long until a party of men came along who were going after some prisoners who had been taken on Flat River, Kentucky about thirty women and children" (p. 419). He agreed to join them and, on their first day, fell into an altercation with Indians, resulting in the deaths of three Indians and the loss of one of their own men. From there, the decision to return home was made. At a later date, Williams went out with surveyors who were going to survey the Virginia Military Land. On this trip, another encounter with Indians occurred, only this time, Colonel Nathaniel Massie initially would not allow the men to attack. "We went about two miles when we found the trail of about eight Indians…At sundown we came to the place where the Indians were encamped for the night. We soon caught their horses and waited patiently until dark; then myself and four others, who were to attack the camp, creeped up to within a few feet and fired upon them. Two were killed; the rest escaped. We went fast for home through fear of those we had passed that day." (p.419)
After this quick venture, Williams returned home only to set off again. He took a position with Anthony Wayne, tending to cattle for military use. After doing this work for some time, his wife fell sick, and he returned to her side. That spring, Williams purchased land in conjunction with a family named Hoglin on Brush Creek in Adams County. Following Hoglin's death, Williams moved his family back to Carpenter's Station, seeking a safer environment and a more peaceful coexistence with the local Indigenous tribes.
1799
After spending eight years trading with the surrounding Indians, Williams relocated his wife and their three children to the Muskingum Salt Springs. When the family reached Duncan Falls, the Indians had already been waiting. Williams had a barrel of whiskey for them and, throughout the nights, had to constantly move their bed and whiskey to prevent them from being robbed. On their way to Duncan Falls, Williams states that he "got the ague, and had it two months". While traveling from there, he fell sick and was left alone, unable to move forward, and his family and hands traveled. "Those were hard times. There was no person to work for me and I laid sick for about two months without bread or any other food except meat. It was a very hard winter. After some time I got able to go for some provisions and brought several horse loads. I had to fetch it about eighty miles through deep snow. There was no road but at last I got home and we had bread." (p. 420) During his time here, most of his neighbors were Indigenous people, but eventually, two white settlers, William McCulloch and Henry Crooks, moved to the area. Williams focused on salt production and providing for travelers to support himself, earning a living in the process. His efforts culminated in constructing a road leading to their home, which he ultimately sold before moving on.
1800
In his journal, Williams recounts his decision to move to the Whitewoman area, where the Indians soon robbed him. He handled the recovery and return of horses that had been stolen from others. During a trip to Sandusky, he encountered approximately 300 Indians and spoke with their chief. Williams made it clear that his task was to return the stolen horses and end the violence that had been occurring, a stance that temporarily curbed the thefts, at least until he documented the events in his journal.
After having the ague for roughly nine months, he and his family made the move to Coshocton, becoming the first to establish a permanent settlement in the area. He built a cabin on the river bank along the forks of the Muskingum. His two brothers-in-law joined the family the following year, raising corn four miles upstream from White Woman's Creek (p. 297).
1801-1840
Coshocton is where Colonel Charles Williams would spend the rest of his days and grow to become a very influential figure in the town. "He was a successful trapper, hunter, Indian scout, and trader, and held every office (being almost all the time in some) in the county possible for a man of his education, from road supervisor and tax-collector to member of the legislature" (p. 232). He first built a home beneath the present-day Tuscarawas bridge. From this first home, Williams went on to establish a tavern on the corners of Water and Chestnut Street. Beginning in 1811, court services were held here. The county compensated him with thirty dollars a year for the use of the second floor of the building. This arrangement continued until the county decided to switch to a building owned by Wilson McGowan, until 1824 when an actual courthouse was built.
After the news of a second war with Britain hit Coshocton County in 1812, Williams traveled to Detroit across the lake. Upon arrival, he joined General Harrison's vanguard and was commissioned as a colonel to take control of the Coshocton County troops. After a rumored Indian attack, Williams was stationed in Mansfield. This anticipated attack never occurred; the assumption was that this was because of Williams' previous standing reputation with the Indians (The Coshocton Tribune).
Following his time serving as a colonel, Williams returned to Coshocton. Maintaining the tavern, trading, and tending to cattle and hogs filled most of his days. "He was a successful trapper, hunter, Indian scout, and trader, and held every office, being almost all the time in some position in the county, from road supervisor and tax collector to member of the State legislature. He was famous as a tavern keeper, and in that and other capacities became very popular. Clever, genial, naturally shrewd, indomitable in purpose, not averse to the popular vices of his day, and even making a virtue of profanity, he was for forty years a controlling spirit of the county, and for twenty-five years the controlling spirit" (p. 413). Charles Williams remained in Coshocton until he died in 1840 at the age of 76, spending more than half of his lifetime residing in Coshocton County. Still today, he is regarded as one of the most influential individuals in the early stages of our county.
Works Cited
Graham, Albert Adams. History of Coshocton County, Ohio: Its Past and Present, 1740-1881: Containing a Comprehensive History of Ohio; a Complete History of Coshocton County ... a History of Its Soldiers in the Late War ... Biographies and Histories of Pioneer Families, Etc. United States, A. A. Graham, 1881. (Pages 419-20, Page 413)
History of the Upper Ohio Valley: With Family History and Biographical Sketches ; a Statement of Its Resources, Industrial Growth and Commercial Advantages. Brant & Fuller, 1890.
Howe, H. (1908). Coshocton County. In Historical collections of ohio: In Two volumes: An encyclopedia of the state: History both general and local, geography with descriptions of its counties, cities and villages, its agricultural, manufacturing, mining and business development, sketches of eminent and interesting characters, etc., with notes of a tour over it in 1886. essay, The State of Ohio.
Hunt, William E. Historical Collections of Coshocton County, Ohio. R. Clarke & Co., Printers, 1876. (Page 232)
Mitchener, Charles Hallowell. Ohio Annals. Historic Events in the Tuscarawas and Muskingum Valleys, and in Other Portions of the State of Ohio. T.W. Odell, 1876. (Page 297)
The Coshocton Tribune, 20 Aug. 1961. Colorful Charlie Williams Was First Settler Here.
Larry Stahl: Thomas Hutchins, Forgotten Hero of the Frontier (Honorable Mention Winner)
In history, as we look back at the famous individuals who left their mark and their achievements are well documented, and yet there are always those who have accomplished as much or more than the names we are familiar with. One of the most important men of the early history of our nation is scarcely remembered today. Finding references for Thomas Hutchens is not easy. Hopefully this little narrative will somewhat correct that. I will also show how Mr. Hutchin’s time in what later became Coshocton County helped develop the orderly surveying, settlement and sale of public land in the 29 public land states.
Thomas Hutchins was born in New Jersey in the year 1730. He led a very full life and to list all of his accomplishments prior to 1764 would be a story in itself and beyond the scope of this narrative. To briefly summarize his young life, he became a surveyor, a cartographer, and a geographer. Thomas also joined the British Army and served during the French and Indian war. Thomas stayed enrolled in the service and distinguished himself so that by 1764 he was sent to Fort Pitt to help defend the fort from hostile attacks by the Native Americans.
It was while he was at Fort Pitt that Colonel Henry Bouquet arrived, coming from Philadelphia to help defend the fort. Thomas Hutchins and Bouquet met at Fort Pitt and Hutchins served under Bouquet who realizing Hutchin’s abilities, charged Hutchins with developing plans for a new Fort Pitt and then engaged Hutchins to oversee the building of the new fort.
While Bouquet and Hutchins were at Fort Pitt, Bouquet received his orders to march into the Ohio country and quell the hostilities of the Indian Nations and to secure the release of all prisoners held by the Indians. This was a major undertaking and securing supplies and men took time to organize. By October Bouquet was ready and on October 3, 1764, the army marched from Fort Pitt into the wilderness of the Ohio country and into the heart of a hostile Indian Nation.
Thomas Hutchins was part of the detail and being a surveyor and cartographer, he kept detailed notes on their journey. Unfortunately, most of Thomas Hutchins original writings are lost. A few pages exist and Mr. Hutchins made the maps that were published in William Smith’s history of the Bouquet expedition that was published in 1765.
While establishing a route for the Army and surveying the route, Mr. Hutchins made note of the quality of the land that they were traveling through and of the vastness of the wilderness they were encountering. The Army of 1500 men, around 1000 horses, and what was left of 400 cattle and 400 sheep, arrived at what would be encampment number 16 on October 25, 1764. This encampment was noted as being about a mile from the forks of the Muskingum and the survey conducted by Hutchins and recorded by Samuel Finley who was also on the expedition, give positive proof that the encampment was on land that would later become a part of Coshocton County.
The Army stayed at this camp until November 18, 1764, a total of 24 days. Their mission was a complete success with the Indian Nations being subdued and the return of over 200 prisoners from the Indian Nations. Returning to Fort Pitt by the end of November, Bouquet became famous for heading one of the greatest military campaigns in history. Only one man died during the entire campaign and their mission was totally accomplished. Unfortunately, Henry Bouquet would catch a fever and die in 1765, ending a brilliant military career.
The man who would leave an even larger impact on the upcoming settlement of the new Nation, Thomas Hutchins is barely mentioned, if at all in retelling of the Bouquet expedition. Thomas Hutchins as previously stated was a surveyor, cartographer, and geographer. He understood the challenges of establishing a workable system to give accurate descriptions of land parcels. Up to now land has been surveyed in what is called the Metes and Bounds (Indiscriminate) surveys. What that means is that boundary lines were ran to existing geographical landmarks such as trees, rocks, buildings, designated points that could change or even disappear over time leading to future litigation of deeds.
Thomas Hutchins designed what was known as the Federal Rectangular Survey System.
After the Bouquet expedition Thomas was hired for many wilderness surveys including one of the lower parts of the Mississippi River. As his fame and reputation grew, he was named Geographer of the United States in 1781. To date, Thomas Hutchins is the only person to have been given this title. Using his experiences surveying wilderness territories, Thomas devised a system of rectangular surveys where land is surveyed into townships and townships are numbered from a base line and in ranges. This would give each parcel of land a unique description and one that would also make a parcel of land be located without question of the boundaries or location.
This system was adopted by Congress on May 20, 1785, and became the foundation of the American Land System which led to the orderly surveying, sale and settlement of public lands in the United States. This system of surveying is used in 29 states. Townships were surveyed from a base line, being numbered from South to North and in Ranges being numbered from East to West. The townships were to be surveyed six miles square and then into 36 one-mile square sections. These sections as surveyed would contain 640 acres which was then sold by the United States Government.
The first lands surveyed under this new system was in Ohio and was called the “Seven Ranges” because it was seven ranges of townships being surveyed from a point where the Pennsylvania State line met the Ohio River and then proceeding west for seven townships (42 miles) from that point. Thomas Hutchins himself started the survey on September 30, 1785.
What became Coshocton County lies wholly within the United States Military District, which was a large parcel of land that was set aside to be given to soldiers who fought in the Revolutionary War. The townships in this district were surveyed five miles square containing 16,000 acres and then each township into four quarters each containing 4000 acres each.
From there the land in each quarter was surveyed into the parcels that were entered both by Veterans who had land bounties and settlers who purchased parcels from the Government at the Government Land Office at Zanesville. Twenty- two and a half of these original surveying townships are located inside the boundaries of Coshocton County today.
Thomas Hutchins continued his surveying career and died while doing work in the Seven Ranges land district on April 18, 1789, and was taken to Pittsburg where he was inturred. His rectangular system of surveying is still used in descriptions of parcels of land in Coshocton County to this day.
Bibliography:.
Hill, Nathan N. “A History of Coshocton County, It’s past and Present. A.A. Graham &
Company,” Newark, Ohio 1881 Pages 205 – 213
Petro, Jim. “Ohio Lands.” Researched and written by Thomas A. Burke. Ohio Auditor of State
Columbus, Ohio Ninth Edition, September 1997 Pages 5, 14, 15
White, C. Albert. “ A History of the Rectangular Survey System” Government Printing Office,
Washington, D.C. 1982 Entire
Thomas Hutchins was born in New Jersey in the year 1730. He led a very full life and to list all of his accomplishments prior to 1764 would be a story in itself and beyond the scope of this narrative. To briefly summarize his young life, he became a surveyor, a cartographer, and a geographer. Thomas also joined the British Army and served during the French and Indian war. Thomas stayed enrolled in the service and distinguished himself so that by 1764 he was sent to Fort Pitt to help defend the fort from hostile attacks by the Native Americans.
It was while he was at Fort Pitt that Colonel Henry Bouquet arrived, coming from Philadelphia to help defend the fort. Thomas Hutchins and Bouquet met at Fort Pitt and Hutchins served under Bouquet who realizing Hutchin’s abilities, charged Hutchins with developing plans for a new Fort Pitt and then engaged Hutchins to oversee the building of the new fort.
While Bouquet and Hutchins were at Fort Pitt, Bouquet received his orders to march into the Ohio country and quell the hostilities of the Indian Nations and to secure the release of all prisoners held by the Indians. This was a major undertaking and securing supplies and men took time to organize. By October Bouquet was ready and on October 3, 1764, the army marched from Fort Pitt into the wilderness of the Ohio country and into the heart of a hostile Indian Nation.
Thomas Hutchins was part of the detail and being a surveyor and cartographer, he kept detailed notes on their journey. Unfortunately, most of Thomas Hutchins original writings are lost. A few pages exist and Mr. Hutchins made the maps that were published in William Smith’s history of the Bouquet expedition that was published in 1765.
While establishing a route for the Army and surveying the route, Mr. Hutchins made note of the quality of the land that they were traveling through and of the vastness of the wilderness they were encountering. The Army of 1500 men, around 1000 horses, and what was left of 400 cattle and 400 sheep, arrived at what would be encampment number 16 on October 25, 1764. This encampment was noted as being about a mile from the forks of the Muskingum and the survey conducted by Hutchins and recorded by Samuel Finley who was also on the expedition, give positive proof that the encampment was on land that would later become a part of Coshocton County.
The Army stayed at this camp until November 18, 1764, a total of 24 days. Their mission was a complete success with the Indian Nations being subdued and the return of over 200 prisoners from the Indian Nations. Returning to Fort Pitt by the end of November, Bouquet became famous for heading one of the greatest military campaigns in history. Only one man died during the entire campaign and their mission was totally accomplished. Unfortunately, Henry Bouquet would catch a fever and die in 1765, ending a brilliant military career.
The man who would leave an even larger impact on the upcoming settlement of the new Nation, Thomas Hutchins is barely mentioned, if at all in retelling of the Bouquet expedition. Thomas Hutchins as previously stated was a surveyor, cartographer, and geographer. He understood the challenges of establishing a workable system to give accurate descriptions of land parcels. Up to now land has been surveyed in what is called the Metes and Bounds (Indiscriminate) surveys. What that means is that boundary lines were ran to existing geographical landmarks such as trees, rocks, buildings, designated points that could change or even disappear over time leading to future litigation of deeds.
Thomas Hutchins designed what was known as the Federal Rectangular Survey System.
After the Bouquet expedition Thomas was hired for many wilderness surveys including one of the lower parts of the Mississippi River. As his fame and reputation grew, he was named Geographer of the United States in 1781. To date, Thomas Hutchins is the only person to have been given this title. Using his experiences surveying wilderness territories, Thomas devised a system of rectangular surveys where land is surveyed into townships and townships are numbered from a base line and in ranges. This would give each parcel of land a unique description and one that would also make a parcel of land be located without question of the boundaries or location.
This system was adopted by Congress on May 20, 1785, and became the foundation of the American Land System which led to the orderly surveying, sale and settlement of public lands in the United States. This system of surveying is used in 29 states. Townships were surveyed from a base line, being numbered from South to North and in Ranges being numbered from East to West. The townships were to be surveyed six miles square and then into 36 one-mile square sections. These sections as surveyed would contain 640 acres which was then sold by the United States Government.
The first lands surveyed under this new system was in Ohio and was called the “Seven Ranges” because it was seven ranges of townships being surveyed from a point where the Pennsylvania State line met the Ohio River and then proceeding west for seven townships (42 miles) from that point. Thomas Hutchins himself started the survey on September 30, 1785.
What became Coshocton County lies wholly within the United States Military District, which was a large parcel of land that was set aside to be given to soldiers who fought in the Revolutionary War. The townships in this district were surveyed five miles square containing 16,000 acres and then each township into four quarters each containing 4000 acres each.
From there the land in each quarter was surveyed into the parcels that were entered both by Veterans who had land bounties and settlers who purchased parcels from the Government at the Government Land Office at Zanesville. Twenty- two and a half of these original surveying townships are located inside the boundaries of Coshocton County today.
Thomas Hutchins continued his surveying career and died while doing work in the Seven Ranges land district on April 18, 1789, and was taken to Pittsburg where he was inturred. His rectangular system of surveying is still used in descriptions of parcels of land in Coshocton County to this day.
Bibliography:.
Hill, Nathan N. “A History of Coshocton County, It’s past and Present. A.A. Graham &
Company,” Newark, Ohio 1881 Pages 205 – 213
Petro, Jim. “Ohio Lands.” Researched and written by Thomas A. Burke. Ohio Auditor of State
Columbus, Ohio Ninth Edition, September 1997 Pages 5, 14, 15
White, C. Albert. “ A History of the Rectangular Survey System” Government Printing Office,
Washington, D.C. 1982 Entire
