The Indians could not brook the intrusion of the whites on the hunting grounds and navigable waters which they had been in habits of considering as their own property from time immemorial, and partly through revenge for the usurpation of their rights, partly to intimidate others, but chiefly from the hopes of booty, all the nations in the neighbourhood of the Ohio, the Cumberland, the Tennessee, and the Mississippi, and even those more remote, used to send detachments of warriours and hunters to lie in wait in the narrow passes, and do their utmost to cut off all travellers, in which they often succeeded through {244} their expertness with the rifle; and it is not improbable but some white desperadoes, under the appearance of Indians, were guilty of atrocities of the same nature against their countrymen, without the shadow of any of the excuses afforded to the aborigines.
FOOTNOTES:
[174] The original village of Ste. Genevieve was about three miles south of the present Missouri town of that name. The exact date of its founding is not known, but it was upon a mining grant given to Regnault. A relic of a chimney found in 1881 bears the date 1732—possibly the first year of the settlement. The cession of the Illinois to the English (1763) brought an accession of French inhabitants; and in 1766, the Spanish ordered to Ste. Genevieve a commandant and garrison. The earliest American inhabitants were John and Israel Dodge, the latter being father of Governor Henry Dodge of Wisconsin. The encroachment of the river (about 1784-85) caused the old to be abandoned for the modern site.—Ed.
[175] Henderson County was formed in 1798, being named in honor of Colonel Richard Henderson of Transylvania fame. The great ornithologist, John James Audubon, came to Henderson in 1812; but it was not until many years later that his work made him known to the scientific world.—Ed.
[176] The tales of the robberies and atrocities of the Harpe and Mason banditti are numerous, differing largely in details. Cuming’s account seems to be fairly accurate. See Claiborne, Mississippi (Jackson, 1880), pp. 225-228.—Ed.
CHAPTER XLI
Highland creek and good settlements—Carthage—Wabash island—Wabash river—Shawanee town—Saline river and salt works—Remarkable cavern—The Rocking cave.
Seven miles below Diamond island, we came to Straight island, and nine miles further, to Slim island, which is three miles and a half long, with a settlement on its upper end.
Highland creek, the mouth blocked up with drift, is three miles below Slim island on the left, and opposite on the Indiana shore are three families of Robinsons, the first settlements in that distance. There is a fine landing just below Highland creek, and two beautiful settlements owned by Messrs. Cooper and Austin, and a framed house rented by a Mr. Gilchrist, a temporary settler.[177] We observed several boats laid up here, which had lately brought families down the river, which are all settled in the neighbourhood, and a mile lower down, we passed the scite of an intended town called Carthage, but where there is yet but one house.
Two miles and a half below, we entered the Indiana sound of Wabash island, in a west direction, leaving the Kentucky sound (forming a beautiful coup d’œil with a small island and clump of trees directly in the centre) running S. W. on the left.