“Endowed by nature with a frame of the greatest strength, which had not been enervated by parental indulgence or a puny education, with a strength and depth of mind to which to find a parallel we may search the records of the world in vain, he seemed from infancy destined to command. The inflexibility of his virtues astonished his enemies; his coolness and self-possession in the hour of danger pointed to him as the master spirit of the Revolution, peculiarly fitted ‘to ride the whirlwind and direct the storm.’ His valor had been tested in the French war, and long will the banks of the Monongahela bear witness to his youthful prudence and courage in saving the remnant of Braddock’s defeated army.
“On accepting the chief command, his modesty and diffidence betrayed the greatness of his soul. After showing his countrymen the way to conquest and victory he concluded the American war with honor to himself and his compatriots in arms. He resigned his commission into the hands which gave it and retired to his farm to enjoy the sweets of domestic life, and this, too, at a time when an exasperated and injured people were ready to confer upon him absolute power. But, preferring the happiness of his country and the approving smiles of his own countrymen to the glittering diadem, he once more endeared himself to the land of his nativity, gaining the paternal appellation of the Father of his Country.
“When it became necessary to secure the Federal compact by adopting a proper constitution, fitted to the growing wants of the young and rising republic, he presided in that august assembly that framed it. He was the first to administer the government under its regulations, and for eight successive years, beset with perils and dangers, guided by wisdom, he steered the bark of state into the port of safety.
“For all these services and self-denials, what did he ask as a recompense? The crown had been refused when within his grasp. Did he lay his hands upon the national treasury? No; he refused pay for the seven years he had spent in arduous service. Did he ask for peculiar privileges for himself and his family? No; none of these. He retired sublimely to the shades of Mount Vernon, there to enjoy the happiness rural life affords, content with the honor of having assisted his countrymen to achieve their independence and establish their liberty upon a permanent basis. History furnishes no parallel to this. Compared with Washington, Alexander becomes a selfish destroyer of the human race, Caesar the ambitious votary of power, and Bonaparte the disappointed candidate for universal empire.”
To the Border Wars of the Revolution, which were still fresh in the memory of many of his auditors, the speaker referred as follows:
“The sufferings of many peaceful inhabitants were little inferior to those of actual combatants. Their fields were laid waste and devastated; their homes burned over their heads; their sons murdered upon the paternal hearth; their wives and daughters outraged by a licentious soldiery, and to cap the climax of British butchery, the merciless savages were let loose on our defenseless frontier settlements and a bounty was given for American scalps. How often were the scattered inhabitants led captive into the howling wilderness; how often was the murderous tomahawk plunged into the defenseless bosom; how often was the smiling babe torn from its mother’s arms and its brains beat out against the wall!
“Alas! the records of those days furnish too many incidents of tragic scenes. How could that nation, which we have been told was the bulwark for that religion taught by the Prince of Peace, authorize such barbarity? How could that nation, which still wishes to lord itself over our minds and style itself the pattern of refinement, assist in those acts so revolting to human feelings? But such was the fact. If any in this assembly have a doubt of the truth of this assertion, I appeal for confirmation to those whitehaired patriots before me whose eyes I see moisten at the recollection of the tragic scenes. Certainly the curse of an offended God must fall upon that people so lost to the feelings of honor and humanity.”
Of England’s direct complicity in the barbarities committed during the Border Wars there no longer exists any doubt. Joseph Brant, during his visit to London, in 1775-6, entered into an understanding with Lord George Germaine, the member of Lord North’s cabinet, who had direct charge of the conduct of the war in America, while the correspondence between at least one other member of the Cabinet and the commander of the English army in this country settles beyond all question the complicity of the home government in the employment of Indians during the war.
A large mass of testimony also exists to show that the Indians were not only urged to take part in the war, but were promised immediate pecuniary rewards, were lavishly supplied with presents, and were assured that, however the war might terminate, their material condition should be made as good as before. It was not the Indians who were responsible for the most barbarous scenes on the frontier, but the English themselves—Tories who had gone to Canada and come back, of whom the master fiend was Walter N. Butler and a leader scarcely less culpable, his father, John Butler. Brant himself declared, on more than one occasion, and notably at Cherry Valley, that the Tories were “more savage than the savages themselves.”
How high ran party spirit in 1826 further passages from this oration by my grandfather will show: