They found the pony by morning, but it took some maneuvering to capture the wily beast, and packed him across the Kittanning Path, where, at Burgoon’s Run, they came upon a party of traders headed by George McCord, who had lately come from the Juniata.
McCord told them the details of the conflict at Fort Robinson, of the shocking killing of Widow Gibson, Robert Miller’s daughter, James Wilson’s wife, John Summerson, and others, on that bloody night of gas, forest fires, smoke and surprises.
It was the turning point in Hugh Gibson’s life; his mother gone, and not a sign of weakening in Elsbeth Henry’s mother-of-pearl countenance; in fact, the indistinct line of her mouth was more like a streak of crimson flame than ever. A new light had dawned for him out of these shocking misfortunes; his purpose would be to redeem his inactivity at Fort Robinson, his overconfidence, his over self-esteem, by going at once to Carlisle to secure a commission in the Royal American Regiment of Riflemen. He left Elsbeth in charge of the McCord party who would see her back to her distracted parents, while he tramped over the mountains towards Reastown and Fort Littleton, by the shortest route to the Cumberland Valley.
BILL BREWER, “HICK” PREACHER
XII
Girty’s Notch
The career of Simon Girty, otherwise spelled Girtee and Gerdes, has become of sufficient interest to cause the only authoritative biography to sell at a prohibitive figure, and outlaw or renegade as he is called, there are postoffices[postoffices], hotels, streams, caves and rocks which perpetuate his name throughout Pennsylvania.
Simon Gerdes was born in the Cumberland Valley on Yellow Breeches Creek, the son of a Swiss-German father and an Irish mother. This origin guaranteed him no high social position, for in the old days, in the Cumberland Valley, in particular, persons of those racial beginnings were never accepted at par by the proud descendants of Quakers, Virginia Cavaliers, and above all, by the Ulster Scots. After the world war similar beginnings have correspondingly lowered in the markets of prestige, and a century or more of gradual family aggrandizement has gone for nil, the social stratification of pre-Revolutionary days having completely re-established itself.
Unfortunately[Unfortunately] for Simon Gerdes, or Girty, as he was generally called, he was possessed of lofty ambitions, he aimed to be a military hero and a man of quality, like the dignified and exclusive gentry who rode about the valley on their long-tailed white horses and carried swords, and were accompanied by retainers with long rifles. There must have been decent blood in him somewhere to have brought forth such aspirations, but personally he was never fitted to attain them. He had no chance for an education off there in the rude foothills of the Kittochtinnies; he was undersized, swarthy and bushy headed; his hands were hairy, and his face almost impossible to keep free of black beard. Analyzed his features were not unpleasant; he had deepset, piercing black eyes, a prominent aquiline nose, a firm mouth and jaw, and his manner was quick, alert and decisive.