When the Indians retired from before Boonesboro, one hundred and twenty-five pounds weight of bullets were picked up by the garrison, besides many that stuck in the logs of the fort. A conclusive proof that the Indians were not idle, during the continuance of the siege.
John Bowman, of Harrodsburgh, was lieutenant of Kentucky County, and colonel of its militia. During the spring of 1779, there was a general desire to raid the unsuspecting Shawnees, in retaliation for their invasions of Kentucky, and Bowman decided to command in person this “first regular enterprise to attack, in force, the Indians beyond the Ohio, ever planned in Kentucky.” The company of volunteers of the interior rendezvoused in May at Harrodsburgh, and under Capts. Benjamin Logan and Silas Harlan marched to Lexington, where they met the Boonesborough company under Capt. John Holder, and another party under Capt. Levi Todd. At the mouth of the Licking (site of Covington, Ky.), the general rendezvous agreed on, they found a company from the Falls of the Ohio (site of Louisville), under Capt. William Harrod. Also in the little army, which finally mustered 297 men, including officers, were frontiersmen from Redstone Old Fort, and other settlements in the valleys of the Ohio and Monongahela. The Redstone men were on their way home, when they heard of the expedition, and joined it at the Licking; they had been on a visit to Big Bone Lick, and had a canoe-load of relics therefrom, which they were transporting up river. The force crossed the Ohio, May 28, just below the mouth of the Licking; 32 men remained behind in charge of the boats, leaving 265 to set out for the Shawnee town of Little Chillicothe, on the Little Miami, distant about sixty-five miles northeast. George Clark and William Whitley were pilots, and George M. Bedinger adjutant and quartermaster.––R. G. T.
Without having seen an Indian, the expedition arrived in sight of Little Chillicothe, at dusk of May 29––Withers places the date two months ahead of the actual time. Capt. Logan had charge of the left wing, Harrod of the right, and Holder of the center. The white force now numbered 263––two men having returned to the boats, disabled; the Indians numbered about 100 warriors and 200 squaws and children. Black Fish was the principal village chief, and subordinate to him were Black Hoof and Black Beard.––R. G. T.
This was the council house, which was so stoutly defended that the white assailants were glad to take refuge in a neighboring hut, from which they escaped with difficulty.––R. G. T.
The chief cause of alarm, and the consequent disorder, was a false report started among the whites, that Simon Girty and a hundred Shawnees from the Indian village of Piqua, twelve miles distant, were marching to the relief of Black Fish. Order was soon restored, and when, fourteen miles out upon the homeward trail, Indians were discovered upon their rear, the enemy were met with vigor, and thereafter the retreat was unhampered. The force reached the Ohio, just above the mouth of the Little Miami, early on June 1. The “pack-horses” alluded to by Withers, were 163 Indian ponies captured in the Chillicothe woods; the other plunder was considerable, being chiefly silver ornaments and clothing. After crossing the Ohio in boats––the horses swimming––there was an auction of the booty, which was appraised at £32,000, continental money, each man getting goods or horses to the value of about £110. The Indian loss was five killed at the town, and many wounded; the whites had seven men killed. Little Chillicothe had been for the most part destroyed by fire, and its crops destroyed. The newspapers of the day regarded the expedition as an undoubted success.––R. G. T.