CHAPTER XII.
Scarcity of salt at Boonesborough—Boone goes to Blue Licks to make salt, and is captured by the Indians—Taken to Chilicothe—Affects contentment, and deceives the Indians—Taken to Detroit—Kindness of the British officers to him—Returns to Chilicothe—Adopted into an Indian family—Ceremonies of adoption—Boone sees a large force of Indians destined to attack Boonesborough—Escapes, and gives the alarm, and strengthens the fortifications at Boonesborough—News of delay by the Indians on account of Boone's escape—Boone goes on an expedition to the Scioto—Has a fight with a party of Indians—Returns to Boonesborough, which is immediately besieged by Captain Duquesne with five hundred Indians—Summons to surrender—Time gained—Attack commenced—Brave defense—Mines and countermines—Siege raised—Boone brings his family once more back to Boonesborough, and resumes farming.
While George Rogers Clark was engaged in his campaign against the British posts in the northwest, Daniel Boone was a prisoner among the Indians. The people at Boonesborough were suffering for want of salt. It could not be obtained conveniently from the Atlantic Colonies, but it could be manufactured at a place called the Blue Licks, from salt water, which abounded there.
In January, 1778, accompanied by thirty men, Boone went to the Blue Licks to make salt for the different Stations; and on the 7th of February following, while out hunting, he fell in with one hundred and two Indian warriors, on their march to attack Boonesborough. He instantly fled, but being upward of fifty years old, he was unable to outstrip the fleet young men who pursued him, and was a second time taken prisoner. As usual, he was treated with kindness until his final fate should be determined, and was led back to the Licks, where his party were still encamped. Here Boone surrendered his whole party, to the number of twenty-seven, upon a promise on the part of the Indians of life and good treatment, both of which conditions were faithfully observed. This step was apparently unnecessary; but the result showed that it was a master-stroke of policy on Boone's part. He knew the nature of the Indians, and foresaw that they would forthwith return home with their prisoners, and thus save Boonesborough from attack.
Had the Indians gone on to that place, by showing their prisoners and threatening to put them to the torture, they might have obtained important results. But they did nothing of the kind. As Boone had calculated, they went home with their prisoners and booty.
Captain Boone has been censured for the surrender of his men, which he made at his own capture, and at a subsequent period was tried by court-martial and acquitted. This was a just decision. The surrender caused the Indians to return home with their prisoners instead of attacking Boonesborough, which would almost certainly have been taken and destroyed if this surrender had not been made.
Elated with their unexpected success, the Indians now returned at once to old Chilicothe, the principal town of the Shawnees, on the Little Miami, treating their prisoners, during a march of three days in very cold and inclement weather, as well as they fared themselves, as regarded fire and provisions. Boone and his companions were kept in captivity by the Indians, and closely watched for several weeks, when the old pioneer and ten of his men were conducted to Detroit, then a British garrison, and all but Boone presented to the commandant, by whom they were all well treated. For the old pioneer himself, the Indians had conceived a particular liking; and they stubbornly refused to give him up, though several gentlemen of Detroit were very anxious they should leave him, and the commandant offered to ransom him by a liberal sum. He was therefore compelled to accompany them back to Chillicothe, their town on the Little Miami, which they reached after a march of fifteen days.
Boone was now formally adopted as a son in one of the Indian families. "The forms of the ceremony of adoption," says Mr. Peck,[[36]] "were often severe and ludicrous. The hair of the head is plucked out by a painful and tedious operation, leaving a tuft, some three or four inches in diameter, on the crown, for the scalp-lock, which is cut and dressed up with ribbons and feathers. The candidate is then taken into the river in a state of nudity, and there thoroughly washed and rubbed, 'to take all his white blood out.' This ablution is usually performed by females. He is then taken to the council-house, where the chief makes a speech, in which he expatiates upon the distinguished honors conferred on him. His head and face are painted in the most approved and fashionable style, and the ceremony is concluded with a grand feast and smoking."