"The outcome of the campaign," says B. J. Griswold, the Fort Wayne historian, "considered from the most favorable angle, gave naught to the American government to increase its hopes of the pacification of the west." On the other hand, the savages, their spirit of revenge aroused to the white heat of the fiercest hatred, assembled at the site of their ruined villages, and there, led to renewed defiance of the Americans through the fiery speech of Simon Girty, set about the work of preparation to meet the next American force which might be sent against them. In a body, these savages, led by Little Turtle, LeGris and Blue Jacket, proceeded to Detroit, where they "paraded the streets, uttering their demoniac scalp yelps while bearing long poles strung with the scalps of many American soldiers."
Governor St. Clair expressed regret that a post had not been established; it would be the surest means of obliging the Indians to be at peace with the United States. On December second, 1790, Major John Hamtramck, writing from Vincennes, gave it as his opinion that "nothing can establish peace with the Indians as long as the British keep possession of the upper posts, for they are daily sowing the seed of discord betwixt the measures of our government and the Indians." He further summed up the situation as follows: "The Indians never can be subdued by just going to their towns and burning their houses and corn, and returning the next day, for it is no hardship for the Indians to live without; they make themselves perfectly comfortable on meat alone; and as for houses, they can build with as much facility as a bird does his nest." Speaking of this campaign and of its effects on the Miamis, Roosevelt says that "the blow was only severe enough to anger and unite them, not to cripple or crush them. All the other western tribes made common cause with them. They banded together and warred openly; and their vengeful forays on the frontier increased in number, so that the suffering of the settlers was great. Along the Ohio people lived in dread of tomahawk and scalping knife; the attacks fell unceasingly on all the settlements from Marietta to Louisville."
The expedition of Hamtramck against the Kickapoo towns on the Vermilion river was a failure. He destroyed the Indian village at the site of the old Shelby farm, near Eugene, but the warriors being absent, he returned to Vincennes. Some local historian has written a bloodcurdling description of the merciless massacre of old men, women and children by Hamtramck's army, but this tale is an injustice both to the worthy Major and the soldiers under him. The only truthful part of this sketch is that "the adjoining terrace lands were filled with thousands of the greatest varieties of plum bushes and grape vines and it was known as the great plum patch." Since General Harrison's march to Tippecanoe the crossing at this river has been known as "the Army Ford."
CHAPTER XII
SCOTT AND WILKINSON
—The Kentucky raids on the Miami country along the Wabash in 1791.
The effects of Harmar's campaign were soon apparent. In the closing months of 1790, the citizens of Ohio, Monongahela, Harrison, Randolph, Kanawha, Green-Briar, Montgomery, and Russel counties, in western Virginia, sent an appeal for immediate aid to the governor of that state, stating that their frontier on a line of nearly four hundred miles along the Ohio, was continually exposed to Indian attack; that the efforts of the government had hitherto been ineffectual; that the federal garrisons along the Ohio could afford them no protection; that they had every reason to believe that the late defeat of the army at the hands of the Indians, would lead to an increase of the savage invasions; that it was better for the government to support them where they were, no matter what the expense might be, than to compel them to quit the country after the expenditure of so much blood and treasure, when all were aware that a frontier must be supported somewhere. On the second of January, 1791, between "sunset and daylight-in," the Indians surprised the new settlements on the Muskingum, called the Big Bottom, forty miles above Marietta, killing eleven men, one woman, and two children. General Rufus Putnam, writing to President Washington, on the eighth of the same month, said that the little garrison at Fort Harmar, consisting of a little over twenty men, could afford no protection to the settlements. That the whole number of effective men in the Muskingum country would not exceed two hundred and eighty-seven, and that many of them were badly armed, and that unless the government speedily sent a body of troops for their protection, they were "a ruined people." Virginia, Pennsylvania and Kentucky, were all being sorely pressed by savage incursions.
It was a fortunate circumstance for the future welfare of the great west, that George Washington was president of the United States. Great numbers of the people in the Atlantic states, according to Secretary of War Knox, were opposed to the further prosecution of the Indian war. They considered that the sacrifice of blood and treasure in such a conflict would far exceed any advantages that might possibly be reaped by it. The result of Harmar's campaign had been very disheartening, and the government was in straitened circumstances, both as to men and means. But by strenuous efforts, President Washington induced Congress to pass an act, on the second day of March, 1791, for raising and adding another regiment to the military establishment of the United States, "and for making further provision for the protection of the frontiers." Governor Arthur St. Clair was appointed as the new commander-in-chief of the army of the northwest, and Colonel Richard Butler, of Pennsylvania, was promoted and placed second in command. St. Clair was authorized to raise an army of three thousand men, but as there were only "two small regiments of regular infantry," the remainder of the force was to be raised by special levies of six months' men, and by requisitions of militia. In the meantime, the government, owing to the pressing demands of the western people, had authorized the establishment of a local Board of War for the district of Kentucky. This Board was composed of Brigadier-General Charles Scott, leader of the Kentucky militia, Harry Innes, John Brown, Benjamin Logan and Isaac Shelby, and they were vested with discretionary powers "to provide for the defense of the settlements and the prosecution of the war." The government had now fully determined on a definite plan of action. First, a messenger was to be dispatched to the Wabash Indians with an offer of peace. This messenger was to be accompanied by the Cornplanter, of the Seneca Nation, and such other Iroquois chiefs as might be friendly to the United States. Second, in case this mission of peace should fail, expeditions were to be organized to strike the Wea, the Eel river and the Kickapoo towns, in order to prevent them from giving aid to the main Miami and Shawnee villages at the head of the Maumee. Third, a grand expedition under the command of St. Clair himself, was to capture Kekionga, establish a military post there, and check the activities of both the Indians and British in the valleys of the Wabash and the Maumee. The instructions of the secretary of war to General St. Clair with reference to Kekionga were specific. "You will commence your march for the Miami village, in order to establish a strong and permanent military post at that place. In your advance, you will establish such posts of communication with Fort Washington, on the Ohio, as you may judge proper. The post at the Miami village is intended for the purpose of awing and curbing the Indians in that quarter, and as the only preventive of future hostilities. It ought, therefore, to be rendered secure against all attempts and insults by the Indians. The garrison which should be stationed there ought not only to be sufficient for the defense of the place, but always to afford a detachment of five or six hundred men, either to chastise any of the Wabash, or other hostile Indians, or to secure any convoy of provisions. The establishment of such a post is considered as an important object of the campaign, and is to take place in all events."