LOGAN, JOHN (c. 1725-1780), also known as Tahgahjuté, American Indian chief, a Cayuga by birth, was the son of Shikellamy, a white man who had been captured when a child by the Indians, had been reared among them, and had become chief of the Indians living on the Shamokin Creek in what is now Northumberland county, Pennsylvania. The name Logan was given to the son in honour of James Logan (1674-1751), secretary of William Penn and a steadfast friend of the Indians. John Logan lived for some time near Reedsville, Penn., and removed to the banks of the Ohio river about 1770. He was not technically a chief, but acquired great influence among the Shawnees, into which tribe he married. He was on good terms with the whites until April 1774, when, friction having arisen between the Indians and the whites, a band of marauders, led by one Greathouse, attacked and murdered several Indians, including, it appears, Logan’s sister and possibly one or more other relatives. Believing that Captain Michael Cresap was responsible for this murder, Logan sent him a declaration of hostilities, the result of which was the bloody conflict known as Lord Dunmore’s war. Logan refused to join the Shawnee chief, Cornstalk, in meeting Governor Dunmore in a peace council after the battle of Point Pleasant, but sent him a message which has become famous as an example of Indian eloquence. The message seems to have been given by Logan to Colonel John Gibson, by whom it was delivered to Lord Dunmore. Thomas Jefferson first called general attention to it in his Notes on Virginia (1787), where he quoted it and added: “I may challenge the whole orations of Demosthenes and Cicero, and of any more eminent orator, if Europe has furnished more eminent, to produce a single passage superior to it.” Logan became a victim of drink, and in 1780 was killed near Lake Erie by his nephew whom he had attacked. There is a monument to him in Fair Hill Cemetery, near Auburn, New York.
Brantz Mayer’s Tahgahjuté, or Logan the Indian and Captain Michael Cresap (Baltimore, 1851, 2nd ed., Albany, 1867) defends Captain Cresap against Jefferson’s charges, and also questions the authenticity of Logan’s message, about which there has been considerable controversy, though its actual wording seems to be that of Gibson rather than of Logan.
LOGAN, JOHN (1748-1788), Scottish poet, was born at Soutra, Midlothian, in 1748. His father, George Logan, was a farmer and a member of the Burgher sect of the Secession church. John Logan was sent to Musselburgh grammar school, and in 1762 to the university of Edinburgh. In 1768-1769 he was tutor to John, afterwards Sir John, Sinclair, at Ulbster, Caithness, and in 1770, having left the Secession church, he was licensed as a preacher by the presbytery of Haddington. In 1771 he was presented to the charge of South Leith, but was not ordained till two years later. On the death of Michael Bruce (q.v.) he obtained that poet’s MSS. with a view to publication. In 1770 he published Poems on Several Occasions, by Michael Bruce with a preface, in which, after eulogizing Bruce, who had been a fellow student of his, he remarked that “to make up a miscellany some poems wrote by different authors are inserted, all of them originals, and none of them destitute of merit. The reader of taste will easily distinguish them from those of Mr Bruce, without their being particularized by any mark.” Logan was an active member of the committee of the General Assembly of the Church of Scotland which worked from 1775 to 1781 at revising the “Translations and Paraphrases” for public worship, in which many of his hymns are printed. In 1779-1781 he delivered a course of lectures on the philosophy of history at St Mary’s Chapel, Edinburgh. An analysis of these lectures, Elements of the Philosophy of History (1781), bears striking resemblance to A View of Ancient History (1787), printed as the work of Dr W. Rutherford, but thought by Logan’s friends to be his. In 1781 he published his own Poems, including the “Ode to the Cuckoo” and some other poems which had appeared in his volume of Michael Bruce’s poems, and also his own contributions to the Paraphrases. His other publications were An Essay on the Manners and Governments of Asia (1782), Runnamede, a tragedy (1783), and A Review of the Principal Charges against Warren Hastings (1788). His connexion with the theatre gave offence to his congregation at South Leith; he was intemperate in his habits, and there was some local scandal attached to his name. He resigned his charge in 1786, retaining part of his stipend, and proceeded to London, where he became a writer for the English Review. He died on the 28th of December 1788. Two posthumous volumes of sermons appeared in 1790 and 1791. They were very popular, and were reprinted in 1810. His Poetical Works were printed in Dr Robert Anderson’s British Poets (vol. xi., 1795), with a life of the author. They were reprinted in similar collections, and separately in 1805.
Logan was accused of having appropriated in his Poems (1781) verses written by Michael Bruce. The statements of John Birrell and David Pearson on behalf of Bruce were included in Dr Anderson’s Life of Logan. The charge of plagiarism has been revived from time to time, notably by Dr W. Mackelvie (1837) and Mr James Mackenzie (1905). The whole controversy has been marked by strong partisanship. The chief points against Logan are the suppression of the major portion of Bruce’s MSS. and some proved cases of plagiarism in his sermons and hymns. Even in the beautiful “Braes of Yarrow” one of the verses is borrowed direct from an old border ballad. The traditional evidence in favour of Bruce’s authorship of the “Ode to the Cuckoo” can hardly be set aside, but Dr Robertson of Dalmeny, who was Logan’s literary executor, stated that he had gone over the MSS. procured at Kinnesswood with Logan.
Logan’s authorship of the poems in dispute is defended by David Laing, Ode to the Cuckoo with remarks on its authorship, in a letter to J. C. Shairp, LL.D. (1873); by John Small in the British and Foreign Evangelical Review (July, 1877, April and October, 1879); and by R. Small in two papers (ibid., 1878). See also [Bruce, Michael].
LOGAN, JOHN ALEXANDER (1826-1886), American soldier and political leader, was born in what is now Murphysborough, Jackson county, Illinois, on the 9th of February 1826. He had no schooling until he was fourteen; he then studied for three years in Shiloh College, served in the Mexican war as a lieutenant of volunteers, studied law in the office of an uncle, graduated from the Law Department of Louisville University in 1851, and practised law with success. He entered politics as a Douglas Democrat, was elected county clerk in 1849, served in the State House of Representatives in 1853-1854 and in 1857, and for a time, during the interval, was prosecuting attorney of the Third Judicial District of Illinois. In 1858 and 1860 he was elected as a Democrat to the National House of Representatives. Though unattached and unenlisted, he fought at Bull Run, and then returned to Washington, resigned his seat, and entered the Union army as colonel of the 31st Illinois Volunteers, which he organized. He was regarded as one of the ablest officers who entered the army from civil life. In Grant’s campaigns terminating in the capture of Vicksburg, which city Logan’s division was the first to enter and of which he was military governor, he rose to the rank of major-general of volunteers; in November 1863 he succeeded Sherman in command of the XV. Army Corps; and after the death of McPherson he was in command of the Army of the Tennessee at the battle of Atlanta. When the war closed, Logan resumed his political career as a Republican, and was a member of the National House of Representatives from 1867 to 1871, and of the United States Senate from 1871 until 1877 and again from 1879 until his death, which took place at Washington, D.C., on the 26th of December 1886. He was always a violent partisan, and was identified with the radical wing of the Republican party. In 1868 he was one of the managers in the impeachment of President Johnson. His war record and his great personal following, especially in the Grand Army of the Republic, contributed to his nomination for Vice-President in 1884 on the ticket with James G. Blaine, but he was not elected. His impetuous oratory, popular on the platform, was less adapted to the halls of legislation. He was commander-in-chief of the Grand Army of the Republic from 1868 to 1871, and in this position successfully urged the observance of Memorial or Decoration Day, an idea which probably originated with him. He was the author of The Great Conspiracy: Its Origin and History (1886), a partisan account of the Civil war, and of The Volunteer Soldier of America (1887). There is a fine statue of him by St Gaudens in Chicago.
The best biography is that by George F. Dawson, The Life and Services of Gen. John A. Logan, as Soldier and Statesman (Chicago and New York, 1887).