[FN] Doddridge.
The British authorities at Detroit were by no means friendly to these Moravian towns; early in the year 1781 they applied to the Great Council of the Six Nations, assembled at Niagara, to remove them out of the country. A message was accordingly sent by the Iroquois to the Ottawas and Chippewas to this effect: "We herewith make you a present of the Christian Indians to make soup of;" a figurative Indian expression equivalent to saying—"We deliver these people to you to be killed." But neither the Ottawas nor Chippewas would receive the message, which was returned with the laconic reply—"We have no cause for doing this." The same message was next sent to the Wyandots, but they at that time were equally indisposed to make war upon their inoffensive brethren. [FN] But in the Autumn of the same year, under the influence of McKee and Elliott, who had now become captains in the ranks of the crown connected with the Indian service at Detroit, and by reason of the more immediate persuasions of Simon Girty, the bloodthirsty refugee associate of McKee and Elliott, who was living among the Wyandots, over whom he had acquired great influence, the poor Moravians, with their pious and self-denying ministers, were forcibly removed, or rather compelled, by the hostile Indians, at the instigation of those men, to remove to Sandusky. The leaders of the Wyandots compelling this emigration, were Girty, Half King, and the celebrated Captain Pipe. The sachem-convert, Glickhickan, was also carried to Sandusky; and a young female relation of his, by her courage and generosity, had well-nigh cost him his life. Apprehending that evil would befall her friends, she stole a fine horse belonging to Captain Pipe, and rode to Pittsburgh, to give the alarm in regard to the captive missionaries and their congregations. In revenge for this courageous action, Glickhickan was seized by a party of the Wyandot, or Huron warriors, who raised the death-song, and would have put him to death but for the interference of the Half King in his favor. Glickhickan was subsequently examined by his captors, and his innocence of all participation in the mission of the heroic squaw fully made to appear.
[FN] Heckewelder.
It was at a great sacrifice of property and comfort that these Indians were torn thus from their homes. They had more than two hundred heads of black cattle, and upward of four hundred swine, of which they were deprived, together with large stores of corn, and three hundred acres more just ripening for the harvest. They arrived at Sandusky on the 11th of October—a distance of one hundred and twenty-five miles from their homes. They were treated with great harshness on their march, especially by Girty, who, in the course of the Winter subsequent to their removal, caused their missionaries to be arrested by order of the commandant at Detroit, to which place they were transferred. [FN]
[FN] These good men, after many trials and vexations, were ultimately released, and Half King charged all the blame upon Girty, whose iniquity in the premises the Indian prince indignantly exposed and denounced. The British Government also censured the conduct of its officers in regard to the proceedings, especially the harsh treatment of the missionaries.
While the meek and pious missionaries, amid the tears and other manifestations of grief of their people, were preparing for the journey to Detroit, intelligence of a most painful character was received. Being pressed by hunger at Sandusky, a considerable number of the Moravian Indians, with some of their families, had been allowed to return to their former habitations on the Muskingum, to secure their corn, and such other provisions as they could find, and forward the same from time to time to their suffering brethren. Unhappily, while this peaceable party were thus engaged at Salem and Gnadenhuetten, the weather being favorable for the operations of scalping parties, a few hostile Indians of Sandusky had made a descent upon the Pennsylvania frontier, and murdered the family of Mr. William Wallace, consisting of his wife and five or six children. A man named John Carpenter was taken prisoner at the same time.
Enraged at these outrages, a band of between one and two hundred men, from the settlements of the Monongahela, turned out in quest of the marauders, thirsting for vengeance, under the command of Colonel David Williamson. Each man provided himself with arms, ammunition, and provisions, and the greater number were mounted. They bent their course directly for the settlements of Salem and Gnadenhuetten, arriving within a mile of the latter place at the close of the second day's march. Colonel Gibson, commanding at Pittsburgh, having heard of Williamson's expedition, despatched messengers to apprise the Indians of the circumstance, but they arrived too late.