Billy Caldwell, the "Sau-ga-nash," or Englishman, was son of Colonel Caldwell, a British officer stationed at Detroit, his mother being a beautiful Pottowatomie girl. He was educated by his father, though serving his mother's race as a chief of the Pottowatomies. (There were always many "chiefs.") He fought under Tecumseh against the whites under Wayne—"Mad Anthony," as he was often called, "Old Tempest," as Caldwell himself calls him[J]—also at the Battle of the Thames, in 1813, when Harrison fought and defeated the combined forces of British and Indians, and the famous chief, Tecumseh, was killed. He took part in the treaty of Greenville, in 1796, and that of Chicago, in 1833; a long space of historic time, covering a racial struggle of many thrilling incidents, not a thousandth part of which can ever see the light. They are buried in blood, smoke, flame and darkness. At this time, it will be observed, Caldwell was an ally of the English.
[J] See [Appendix H].
Billy Caldwell, for it was he, entered the parlor with a calm step, and without a trace of agitation in his manner. He deliberately took off his accoutrements and planed them, with his rifle, behind the door, and then saluted the hostile savages.
"How now, my friends? A good day to you! I was told there were enemies here, but I am glad to find only friends. Why have you blackened your faces? Is it that you are mourning for those friends you have lost in battle?" (purposely misunderstanding this token of evil designs) "or is it that you are fasting? If so, ask our friend here, and he will give you to eat. He is the Indians' friend, and never yet refused them what they had need of."
Thus taken by surprise, the savages were ashamed to acknowledge their bloody purpose. They therefore said modestly that they came to beg of their friends some white cotton in which to wrap their dead before interring them. This was given to them, with some other presents, and they took their departure peaceably from the premises.
The remainder of both the Wau-Bun and Heald narratives is devoted to the flight from Chicago and the later fate of the fugitives. Before closing this part of my story, I will give the following bit coming from another source.
Near the (present) north end of State Street bridge stood a log house known to history and tradition as "Cobweb Castle;" a name probably given to it after the rebuilding of the fort in 1816, and after it had become superannuated and superseded. Mrs. Callis, daughter of Mr. Jouett, who came here with him about 1817, says of it: "The house in which my father lived, was built before the massacre of 1812; I know this from the fact that 'White Elk,' an Indian chief, the tallest Indian I ever saw, was frequently pointed out to me as the savage who had dashed out the brains of the children of Sukey Corbin (a camp-follower and washerwoman) against the side of this very house. Mrs. Jouett told her daughter of a frantic mother (perhaps the same Mrs. Corbin), a former acquaintance of hers, who, on that occasion fought the monster all the while the butchery was going on, and who, in her turn, fell a victim herself."
This would indicate that some of the citizens (beside the Kinzies, Healds and Helms) got back to the settlement after the collision at the sand-hills, and that they found at their old homes no sanctuary, no rest, no mercy, no hope.
It is to be observed that, as the Jouetts were not on the spot at the time of the massacre, this part of the story has not the degree of authenticity attaching to the reports of the Healds and Helms. The treaty of 1817 gives, among the Pottowatomie signers, the Indian name of "the White Elk" as "Wa-bin-she-way."