A chieftain as renowned as Shinghiss, and more frequently mentioned in the histories of the olden time, was Guyasuta, or Kiashuta, a Seneca, who first appears on the scene as one of the three Indians who accompanied Washington to Fort Le Boeuf. He was a conspicuous figure in all the Indian wars and treaties which followed that event, and was present at the treaty Col. Bouquet held with the Shawnees, Delawares and Senecas on the Muskingum. We hear of him again in Lord Dunmore's war. He was frequently at or in the neighborhood of Fort Pitt, and had unbounded influence with his people, an influence he generally exerted for good and in the interest of the colonies, though finally won over to the British during the Revolution. His speeches at the various councils he attended were eloquent, and his language that of an autocrat who had unquestioning confidence in the power of his people and in his own might. He was deeply concerned in the conspiracy of Pontiac, and is believed to have inspired the attack on Hannahstown. Guyasuta found his last resting place near the banks of the Allegheny on Gen. O'Hara's farm, which is still called by his name.
The stray visitor who from time to time threads his devious way through the alleys and courts which surround the Block House may find himself perhaps in Fort Street, on historic ground once trodden by Washington, Forbes, Bouquet and the Indian kings of whom we have just been speaking. The echoes of the English drums, Scottish bagpipes and clash of arms have long since died away from the scarred sides of Mt. Washington and Duquesne Heights, and in their stead we hear the steam whistle and hollow reverberations from neighboring boiler shops. Hibernians and Italians inhabit the fields and the river banks where Killbuck, White Eyes, Shinghiss and Cornstalk once lit their camp-fires and held eloquent councils with Jumonville, De Ligneris and Bouquet. Squalid tenements crowd the narrow promontory where Robert de la Salle stood at the headwaters of the Ohio, in all probability the discoverer of the three rivers. The fort that Pontiac besieged has disappeared. The painted post to which the Indian tied his victim, the wigwam, the wampum belts, have vanished; the tomahawk is buried forever, though the readiness once observed among the residents of the "Point" to draw knives on each other on occasions of superhilarity may be but the survival of the good old customs which prevailed in that neighborhood more than one hundred years ago.
Inspired by the suggestion of hereditary, the imaginative mind turns to the past for other instances. On any pleasant Monday morning during the spring or summer months the thrifty housekeepers in Fort Street or Point Alley, and in the shadow of the Block House itself, may be seen doing their week's washing in front of their houses. But little are they thinking of those Monday mornings in the middle of the eighteenth century when the women of the fort were escorted by bands of soldiers to the banks of the Allegheny, where laundry work was carried on under rather embarrassing circumstances. For Indians were dodging about behind trees and bushes, and dancing in full view on the opposite shore, with threatening cries, and only kept at a distance by the presence of a guard. The custom seems still to prevail on this classic ground, but do the conveniences of soap and hydrant water make up for the spice and variety that characterized the lives of colonial laundresses?
Pittsburgh has always been preeminently a hospitable city, and it is possible that in no other town of its size is there as much entertaining. At weddings, too, the display of presents is an object of surprise to the out-of-town guests, unused to such lavishness. Tracing our Provincial characteristics back to their remote origins, we discover that Pittsburgh at the end of the nineteenth century, in the grip of hereditary, imitates the traders and early settlers in this region, who were in the habit of entertaining whole tribes of Indians, and of making them frequent gifts. Gay blankets, red paint, strings of wampum and barrels of whiskey are not now exchanged at Christmas and on New Year's Day, or shown at wedding feasts, as we have improved somewhat upon the primitive customs of our forefathers, but the instinct is unchanged.
Noted for the beauty and brilliancy of our balls, and the excellence of our dinners, it may be interesting to know something of our first attempts in the art of social entertaining. In a letter from Capt. Ecuyer, commandant at Fort Pitt, dated January 8th, 1763, written to Col. Bouquet, he informs the latter that they have a ball every Saturday evening, graced by the presence of the most beautiful ladies of the garrison. No mention is made of any solid refreshment, but we are informed that "the punch was abundant," and it is also intimated that if the fair sex did not find it strong enough for their taste, they knew where the whiskey was kept and how to remedy the fault. Gay indeed must have been the dancing and the merriment inspired by the frontier punch and the shrieks of the Indians outside the stockade, for at that very time hostile savages surrounded and threatened the lonely fort. No wonder the revellers needed strong drinks to keep up their spirits! It is indeed very doubtful if the very strongest ever brewed would give nerve enough to Pittsburgh belles of today to enable them to dance a cotillon to the tune of Indian whoops and yells.
As to more intellectual pursuits, it would at first seem impossible to discover what our frontier ancestors did in the way of reading. News from the outside world was not to be depended upon, and books a rare article, one would presume; but information often comes from unexpected sources, and in an edition of Robertson's "Charles Fifth," "printed for the subscribers in America in 1770," is "a list of subscribers whose names posterity may respect, because of their seasonable encouragement the American edition hath been accomplished at a price so moderate that the man of the woods, as well as the man of the court, may solace himself with sentimental delight." In this list we find the name of "Ensign Francis Howard, of the Royal Irish at Fort Pitt," the only subscriber west of the mountains.
We can imagine the young soldier, far from home and friends, reading of those far-off times of war and peril, the winter wind howling up and down the river and beating against the Block House, carrying with it the echo, perhaps, of an Indian death halloo! Doubtless he wondered what the stern Spanish campaigner would have done if brought to the western wilderness to fight the red man, and, if he lived to return to his English home with his scalp intact, it is more than probable that Ensign Francis Howard's tales of America warfare and adventure were the delight of many a hunting dinner or evening fireside.
Few indeed are the tangible relics of the most romantic period of our local history. The writer owns a copy of the edition of "Charles Fifth," and in all probability it is the one that the English ensign read at Fort Pitt. A few old letters, maps and account books, some cannon balls, rusty swords and bayonets, the handsome carved stone sun dial which the Chapter has placed for safe keeping in Carnegie Museum until its own home is built, are about all we can show of the works and possessions of the men who made our early history.
Here was the scene of a mighty struggle for empire, a struggle of which the only vestiges left are the Block House and the names of our streets, too many of which have been changed in recent years to suit the vulgar needs of convenience and at the cost of our historical identity.
Julia Morgan Harding.