In June, John Owens, John Juggins and Owen Owens, were attacked by some Indians, as they were going to their cornfield on Booth’s creek; and the two former were killed and scalped. Owen Owens being some distance behind them, made his escape to the fort. John Owens the younger, who had been to the pasture field for the plough horses, heard the guns, but not suspecting any danger to be near, rode forward towards the cornfield. As he was proceeding along the path by a fence side, riding one and leading another horse, he was fired at by several Indians, some of whom afterwards rushed forward and caught at the bridle reins; yet he escaped unhurt from them all.
The savages likewise visited Cheat river, during the spring, and coming to the house of John Sims, were discovered by a negro woman, who ran immediately to the door and alarmed the family.––Bernard Sims (just recovering from the small pox) taking down his gun, and going to the door, was shot. The Indians, perceiving that he was affected with a disease, of all others the most terrifying to them, not only did not perform the accustomed operation of scalping, but retreated with as much rapidity, as if they had been pursued by an overwhelming force of armed men,––exclaiming as they ran “small pox, small pox.”
After the attack on Donnelly’s fort in May 1778, the Indians made no attempt to effect farther mischiefs in the Greenbrier country, until this year. The fort at Point Pleasant guarded the principal pass to the settlements on the Kenhawa, in the Levels, and on Greenbrier river, and the reception with which they had met at Col. Donnelly’s, convinced them that not much was to be gained by incursions into that section of the frontiers. But as they were now making great preparations for effectual operations against the whole border country, a party of them was despatched to this portion of it, at once for the purpose of rapine and murder, and to ascertain the state of the country and its capacity to resist invasion.
The party then sent into Greenbrier consisted of twenty-two [211] warriors, and committed their first act of atrocity near the house of Lawrence Drinnan, a few miles above the Little Levels. Henry Baker and Richard Hill, who were then staying there, going early in the morning to the river to wash, were shot at by them: Baker was killed, but Hill escaped back to the house. When the Indians fired at Baker, he was near a fence between the river and Drinnan’s and within gunshot of the latter place. Fearing to cross the fence for the purpose of scalping him, they prized it up, and with a pole fastening a noose around his neck, drew him down the river bank & scalped and left him there.
Apprehensive of an attack on the house, Mr. Drinnan made such preparations as were in his power to repel 292 them, and despatched a servant to the Little Levels, with the intelligence and to procure assistance. He presently returned with twenty men, who remained there during the night, but in the morning, seeing nothing to contradict the belief that the Indians had departed, they buried Baker, and set out on their return to the Levels, taking with them all who were at Drinnan’s and the most of his property. Arrived at the fork of the road, a question arose whether they should take the main route, leading through a gap which was deemed a favorable situation for an ambuscade, or continue on the farther but more open and secure way. A majority preferred the latter; but two young men, by the name of Bridger, separated from the others, and travelling on the nearer path, were both killed at the place, where it was feared danger might be lurking.
The Indians next proceeded to the house of Hugh McIver, where they succeeded in killing its owner, and in making prisoner his wife; and in going from thence, met with John Prior, who with his wife and infant were on their way to the country on the south side of the Big Kenawha. Prior was shot through the breast, but anxious for the fate of his wife and child, stood still, ’till one of the Indians came up and laid hold on him. Notwithstanding the severe wound which he had received, Prior proved too strong for his opponent, and the other Indians not interfering, forced him at length to disengage himself from the struggle. Prior, then seeing that no violence was offered to Mrs. Prior or the infant, walked off without any attempt being made to stop, or otherwise molest him: the Indians no doubt suffering him to depart under the expectation that he would obtain assistance and endeavor to regain his wife and child, and that an opportunity of waylaying any party coming with this view, would be [212] then afforded them. Prior returned to the settlement, related the above incidents and died that night. His wife and child were never after heard of, and it is highly probable they were murdered on their way, as being unable to travel as expeditiously as the Indians wished.
They next went to a house, occupied by Thomas 293 Drinnon and a Mr. Smith with their families, where they made prisoners of Mrs. Smith, Mrs. Drinnon and a child; and going then towards their towns, killed, on their way, an old gentleman by the name of Monday and his wife. This was the last outrage committed by the Indians in the Greenbrier settlements. And although the war was carried on by them against the frontier settlements, with energy for years after, yet did they not again attempt an incursion into it. Its earlier days had been days of tribulation and wo, and those who were foremost in occupying and forming settlements in it, had to endure all that savage fury could inflict. Their term of probation, was indeed of comparatively short duration, but their sufferings for a time, were many and great. The scenes of murder and blood, exhibited on Muddy creek and the Big Levels in 1776, will not soon be effaced from the memory; and the lively interest excited in the bosoms of many, for the fate of those who there treacherously perished, unabated by time, still gleams in the countenance, when tradition recounts the tale of their unhappy lot.
[213] CHAPTER XIII.