In the Central West the greater migratory routes were, in Kentucky the route from Cumberland Gap to the Ohio by way of the great licks; in West Virginia the course from the head of New River down the valley of the Great Kanawha, also on the watershed from the Monongahela to the Ohio by way of Middle Island creek and Dry Ridge; in Ohio the great trail from the “Forks of the Ohio” (Pittsburg) across the watershed which divides the streams (in Ohio, Indiana, and Illinois) which flow into the Ohio from those which flow into the lakes; the trails up the Muskingum and Scioto and Miami to the lakes, in Pennsylvania the great trail running north and south on the western spurs of the Alleghanies, Chestnut Ridge and its prolongation, Laurel Hill; in Tennessee the great Warrior’s Path through Cumberland Gap to the country of the Cherokees and Catawbas.
The great routes of the buffaloes were north and south routes. The Ohio was the only river which greatly facilitated westward migration in the pioneer period. Most of the smaller streams in the Central West run approximately north and south—in general alignment with the known thoroughfares of the bison. For the Indians the north and south trails were exceedingly convenient, since, throughout the period of intertribal Indian wars with which we are acquainted, the major portion were between foes who needed north and south roads upon which to reach each other quickly; the great war trails of Indian history in the Central West led north and south, and were usually on the general alignment of, if not over, buffalo routes. In the earliest of historic days we find the Iroquois fighting the confederacies of the South—and that warfare kept up until Europeans allied the various Indian nations with them in their wars. When the Shawanese were driven from the South they came northward to the Cumberland, doubtless on the routes made by buffalo migrations, for these would have brought them just where they were first found by geographers.
The subsequent migrations of the Shawanese into the Alleghanies were also undoubtedly made over buffalo routes across the Great Kanawha and Monongahela valleys. At least, from the beginning to the end of the strange wanderings of these “Bedouins of American Indians” they remained within the habitat of the buffalo and the lesson of history clearly states that within that habitat man has found the routes of the buffalo the most practicable. Of the Wyandots, who according to their legends came into the Central West by the Great Lakes, buffalo routes cannot be said to have determined their distribution, but the Delawares, fleeing from the valley whose name they bore, no doubt came westward to the Muskingum on prehistoric routes used by the buffalo.
Thus buffalo traces must have influenced, to some extent, at least, the distribution of the Indian nations who were found occupying the Ohio basin when, about the middle of the eighteenth century, white men came to know it. A significant proof of this is found in the fact that no Indian nation permanently occupied the region now embraced in the state of Kentucky, to which, because of the unusual quantity of licks and meadow lands, the buffaloes were manifestly partial and where their roads are best known. Thither came all the Indian nations and here all contended in the immemorial conflict for possession of this land which they, as well as the buffalo, loved.
The buffalo, because of his sagacious selection of the most sure and most direct courses, has influenced the routes of trade and travel of the white race as much, possibly, as he influenced the course of the red-men in earlier days. There is great truth in Thomas Benton’s figure when he said that the buffalo blazed the way for the railways to the Pacific. That sagacious animal undoubtedly “blazed”—with his hoofs on the surface of the earth—the course of many of our roads, canals, and railways. That he found the points of least resistance across our great mountain ranges there can be little doubt. It is certain that he discovered Cumberland Gap and his route through that pass in the mountains has been accepted as one of the most important on the continent. It is also obvious that the buffalo found the course from Atlantic waters to the head of the Great Kanawha, and that he opened a way from the Potomac to the Ohio. How important these strategic points are now considered is evident from the fact that a railway crosses the mountains at each of them; the New York Central, the Baltimore and Ohio, the Pennsylvania, and the Chesapeake and Ohio cross the first great divide in the eastern portion of our country on routes selected centuries ago by the plunging buffalo. One of the most interesting of specific examples of a railway following an ancient highway of buffalo and Indian is to be found on the Baltimore and Ohio Southwestern railway line between Grafton and Parkersburg. While searching for the old highway from the Monongahela to the Ohio, an explorer asked an old resident to describe its course. “From Parkersburg,” said the informant, “it goes on to Ewing’s Station, Turtle Run, and Kanawha Station; it goes over Eaton’s Tunnel, follows Dry Ridge into Dodridge county and passes through Martin’s Woods, just north of Greenwood, to Center Station where it turns east, crossing Gorham’s Tunnel, and goes down Middle Island Creek.”
“The Indians must have patronized the railroad well,” observed the student, “since their trail passes by all the stations and tunnels.”
“Law, no,” broke out the disappointed old man, “they wa’n’t no railroad them days, but when they come to build it they follered the trail the hull way.” It is nothing less than wonderful that the old highway selected by the instinct of the bison should be found in two instances, in a space of twenty miles, immediately above the railway tunnel.
Other strategic lines of travel perhaps first opened by the buffalo were the portage paths between the heads of streams, especially those of the Ohio basin and the lake streams on the north and the Atlantic streams on the south. Undoubtedly in his migrations north and south the buffalo deeply wore the river trails, for here he was close to water and the river meadows which constantly offered all the nourishment he needed. At least, when white men first came into the West they found great paths over the portages which were more of the nature of buffalo roads than Indian trails. Certain of these portages have been noted; others were between the French Creek and Lake Erie—a portage undoubtedly well known to the buffalo—which the French named Rivière aux Bœufs in honor of these monarchs of the forests; others again between the Cuyahoga and the Muskingum, the Scioto and Sandusky, the Wabash and Maumee, St. Joseph and Kankakee, Fox and Illinois, etc. The prehistoric use of portages has elsewhere been noticed in connection with the mound-building Indians. They were perhaps the earliest of traveled ways of the continent.