History of the Early Settlement of the Juniata Valley Part 7

"I appeal," says Logan, "to any white man to say if he ever entered Logan's cabin hungry, and he gave him not meat; if he came naked and cold, and I clothed him not. During the last long and b.l.o.o.d.y war, Logan remained idle in his cabin, an advocate of peace. Such was my love for the whites that my countrymen, as they pa.s.sed, said, 'Logan is the friend of the whites.' I had thought of living among you, but for the injuries of one man. Captain Cressap, last spring, in cold blood, and unprovoked, murdered all the relations of Logan, not sparing even my women and children. There runs not one drop of my blood in any living creature. This called on me for revenge. I have sought it; I have killed many; I have fully glutted my vengeance. For my country, I rejoice in the beams of peace. But do not harbor the thought that mine is the joy of fear. Logan never felt fear. He will not turn on his heel to save his life. Who is there to mourn for Logan? Not one!"

The authors.h.i.+p of this speech was attributed to Thomas Jefferson, but he most emphatically denied it, as did others who were present at the treaty.

With respect to Captain Cressap, Logan was doubtless misinformed. It is true Captain Cressap was a daring frontier-man, who considered it an obligation imposed upon him by the Creator to slay Indians, but he was altogether innocent of the charge made against him by Logan. The ma.s.sacre in question, when the facts were known after Dunmore's treaty, was deeply deplored, and the wanton butchery of Cressap execrated.

Cressap's friends, however, would not suffer the stigma of an inhuman act, of which he was not guilty, to be fixed upon him; so they procured all the evidence to be had in the case, and fixed the disreputable deed upon Daniel Greathouse and his followers. A number of affidavits to that effect were made by men who accompanied Greathouse, and published a year or two after the treaty; others in 1799, when the subject was revived and freely discussed.

Seeing the great disadvantages the Indians labored under in trying to cope with well-armed and disciplined troops, and believing that his revenge was far from being satiated, it is quite likely that Logan became partially insane, as Heckwelder avers; but it is quite certain that he became a misanthrope, and for a long time refused to mingle with human beings. At length he plunged into deep excesses, and all he could earn, by the most skilful use of the rifle, went to gratify his inordinate thirst for strong drink. The once proud and n.o.ble Mingo chief gradually descended the scale of dignified manhood, outlived his greatness, and was killed in a drunken brawl. Sorry are we to say this, in the face of the _romance_ of history; nevertheless it is true.

We had the statement from an old Ohio pioneer, nearly twenty years ago.

CHAPTER X.

COL. JOHN ARMSTRONG'S EXPEDITION AGAINST KITTANING--LIST OF THE KILLED AND WOUNDED--DELAWARE CHIEFS, CAPTAIN JACOBS AND s.h.i.+NGAS.

The following account of the famous expedition against the Indian town of Kittaning we deem worthy of being recorded, not only because the companies of Captains Potter and Steel belonged to the Juniata Valley, but on account of its being an interesting detail of an important event in the early settlement of the country.

The expedition was planned and carried out with great secresy, for the sole purpose of punis.h.i.+ng the Indians engaged in the Juniata Valley ma.s.sacres, and who it was known had their head-quarters at Kittaning, where the chief instigators of all the mischief, s.h.i.+ngas and Captain Jacobs, lived. The command was intrusted to Colonel John Armstrong, a brave and prudent officer, and the forces consisted of seven companies.

He left Fort s.h.i.+rley (Aughwick, Huntingdon county) on the 30th of August, 1756, and on the 3d of September came up with the advanced party at "Beaver Dams, a few miles from Frankstown, on the north branch of the Juniata." This junction of the forces occurred on the flat where Gaysport now stands, where the little army struck the celebrated trail known as the Kittaning Path. In his official account of the expedition, dated at Fort Littleton, September 14, 1756, Colonel Armstrong says:--

We were there [at the Beaver Dams] informed that some of our men, having been out upon a scout, had discovered the tracks of two Indians about three miles this side of the Alleghany Mountain and but a few miles from the camp. From the freshness of the tracks, their killing of a cub bear, and the marks of their fires, it seemed evident they were not twenty-four hours before us, which might be looked upon as a particular providence in our favor that we were not discovered. Next morning we decamped, and in two days came within fifty miles of the Kittaning. It was then adjudged necessary to send some persons to reconnoitre the town, and to get the best intelligence they could concerning the situation and position of the enemy; whereupon an officer, with one of the pilots and two soldiers, were sent off for that purpose. The day following we met them on their return, and they informed us that the roads were entirely clear of the enemy, and that they had the greatest reason to believe they were not discovered; but from the rest of the intelligence they gave it appeared they had not been nigh enough the town, either to perceive the true situation of it, the number of the enemy, or in what way it might most advantageously be attacked. We continued our march, in order to get as near the town as possible that night, so as to be able to attack it next morning about daylight; but, to our great dissatisfaction, about nine or ten o'clock at night one of our guides came and told us that he perceived a fire by the road-side, at which he saw two or three Indians, a few perches distant from our front; whereupon, with all possible silence, I ordered the rear to retreat about one hundred perches, in order to make way for the front, that we might consult how we could best proceed without being discovered by the enemy.

Soon after, the pilot returned a second time, and a.s.sured us, from the best observations he could make, there were not above three or four Indians at the fire, on which it was proposed that we should immediately surround and cut them off; but this was thought too hazardous, for, if but one of the enemy had escaped, it would have been the means of discovering the whole design; and the light of the moon, on which depended our advantageously posting our men and attacking the town, would not admit of our staying until the Indians fell asleep; on which it was agreed to leave Lieutenant Hogg, with twelve men and the person who first discovered the fire, with orders to watch the enemy, but not to attack them, till break of day, and then, if possible, to cut them off. It was also agreed (we believing ourselves to be but about six miles from the town) to leave the horses, many of them being tired, with what blankets and other baggage we then had, and to take a circuit off the road, which was very rough and incommodious on account of the stones and fallen timber, in order to prevent our being heard by the enemy at the fire place. This interruption much r.e.t.a.r.ded our march, but a still greater loss arose from the ignorance of our pilot, who neither knew the true situation of the town nor the best paths that led thereto; by which means, after crossing a number of hills and valleys, our front reached the river Ohio [Alleghany] about one hundred perches below the main body of the town, a little before the setting of the moon, to which place, rather than by the pilot, we were guided by the beating of the drum and the whooping of the warriors at their dance. It then became us to make the best use of the remaining moonlight; but, ere we were aware, an Indian whistled in a very singular manner, about thirty perches from our front, in the foot of a corn-field; upon which we immediately sat down, and, after pa.s.sing silence to the rear, I asked one Baker, a soldier, who was our best a.s.sistant, whether that was not a signal to the warriors of our approach. He answered "No," and said it was the manner of a young fellow's calling a squaw after he had done his dance, who accordingly kindled afire, cleaned his gun, and shot it off before he went to sleep. All this time we were obliged to lie quiet and lurk, till the moon was fairly set. Immediately after, a number of fires appeared in different places in the corn-field, by which Baker said the Indians lay, the night being warm, and that these fires would immediately be out, as they were only designed to disperse the gnats. By this time it was break of day, and the men, having marched thirty miles, were mostly asleep. The time being long, the three companies of the rear were not yet brought over the last precipice. For these some proper hands were immediately despatched; and the weary soldiers being roused to their feet, a proper number, under sundry officers, were ordered to take the end of the hill at which we then lay, and march along the top of the said hill at least one hundred perches, and so much farther (it then being daylight) as would carry them opposite the upper part, or at least the body, of the town. For the lower part thereof and the corn-field, presuming the warriors were there, I kept rather the larger number of men, promising to postpone the attack in that part for eighteen or twenty minutes, until the detachment along the hill should have time to advance to the place a.s.signed them--in doing of which they were a little unfortunate. The time being elapsed, the attack was begun in the corn-field, and the men, with all expedition possible, despatched through the several parts thereof, a party being also despatched to the houses, which were then discovered by the light of the day. Captain Jacobs immediately then gave the war-whoop, and, with sundry other Indians, as the English prisoners afterward told, cried the white men were at last come, they would then have scalps enough; but, at the same time, ordered their squaws and children to flee to the woods. Our men, with great eagerness, pa.s.sed through and fired in the corn-field, where they had several returns from the enemy, as they also had from the opposite side of the river. Presently after, a brisk fire began among the houses, which from the house of Captain Jacobs was returned with a great deal of resolution, to which place I immediately repaired, and found that from the advantage of the house and portholes sundry of our people were wounded and some killed; and, finding that returning the fire upon the house was ineffectual, I ordered the contiguous houses to be set on fire, which was performed by sundry of the officers and soldiers with a great deal of activity, the Indians always firing whenever an object presented itself, and seldom missing of wounding or killing some of our people--from which house, in moving about to give the necessary orders and directions, I received a wound with a large musket-ball in the shoulders. Sundry persons, during the action, were ordered to tell the Indians to surrender themselves prisoners, but one of the Indians in particular answered and said he was a man, and would not be a prisoner; upon which he was told, in Indian, he would be burnt. To this he answered he did not care, for he would kill four or five before he died; and, had we not desisted from exposing ourselves, they would have killed a great many more, they having a number of loaded guns by them. As the fire began to approach and the smoke grew thick, one of the Indian fellows, to show his manhood, began to sing. A squaw in the same house, and at the same time, was heard to cry and make a noise, but for so doing was severely rebuked by the man; but by-and-by, the fire being too hot for them, two Indian fellows and a squaw sprang out and made for the corn-field, who were immediately shot down by our people then surrounding the houses. It was thought Captain Jacobs tumbled himself out at a garret or c.o.c.kloft window at which he was shot--our prisoners offering to be qualified to the powder-horn and pouch there taken off him, which they say he had lately got from a French officer in exchange for Lieutenant Armstrong's boots, which he carried from Fort Granville, where the lieutenant was killed.

The same prisoners say they are perfectly a.s.sured of his scalp, as no other Indians there wore their hair in the same manner. They also say they know his squaw's scalp by a particular _bob_, and also know the scalp of a young Indian called the King's Son.

Before this time, Captain Hugh Mercer, who, early in the action, was wounded in the arm, had been taken to the top of a hill above the town,--to whom a number of the men and some of the officers were gathered, from whence they had discovered some Indians pa.s.s the river and take the hill, with an intention, as they thought, to surround us and cut off our retreat, from whom I had sundry pressing messages to leave the houses and retreat to the hills, or we should all be cut off. But to this I would by no means consent until all the houses were set on fire. Though our spreading upon the hills appeared very necessary, yet did it prevent our researches of the corn-field and river-side, by which means sundry scalps were left behind, and doubtless some squaws, children, and English prisoners, that otherwise might have been got. During the burning of the houses, which were near thirty in number, we were agreeably entertained with a quick succession of charged guns gradually firing off as reached by the fire, but much more so with the vast explosion of sundry bags and large kegs of gunpowder, wherewith almost every house abounded; the prisoners afterward informing us that the Indians had frequently said they had a sufficient stock of ammunition for ten years' war with the English.

With the roof of Captain Jacobs's house, when the powder blew up, was thrown the leg and thigh of an Indian, with a child of three or four years old, to such a height that they appeared as nothing, and fell in an adjoining corn-field. There was also a great quant.i.ty of goods burnt, which the Indians had received in a present but ten days before from the French. By this time I had proceeded to the hill, to have my wound tied up and the blood stopped, where the prisoners which in the morning had come to our people informed me that that very day two bateaux of Frenchmen, with a large party of Delaware and French Indians, were to join Captain Jacobs at the Kittaning, and to set out early the next morning to take Fort s.h.i.+rley, or, as they called it, George Crogan's Fort; and that twenty-four warriors, who had lately come to the town, were set out the evening before, for what purpose they did not know,--whether to prepare meat, to spy the fort, or to make an attack on some of our back inhabitants. Soon after, upon a little reflection, we were convinced these warriors were all at the fire we had discovered but the night before, and began to doubt the fate of Lieutenant Hogg and his party. From this intelligence of the prisoners,--our provisions being scaffolded some thirty miles back, except what were in the men's haversacks, which were left, with the horses and blankets, with Lieutenant Hogg and his party,--and having a number of wounded people then on hand, by the advice of the officers it was thought imprudent then to wait for the cutting down the corn-field, (which was before designed,) but immediately to collect our wounded and force our march back in the best manner we could; which we did, by collecting a few Indian horses to carry off our wounded. From the apprehension of being waylaid and surrounded, (especially by some of the woodsmen,) it was difficult to keep the men together, our march, for sundry miles, not exceeding two miles an hour; which apprehensions were heightened by the attempt of a few Indians, who, for some time after the march, fired upon each wing and immediately ran off; from whom we received no other damage but one of our men being wounded through both legs. Captain Mercer--being wounded, was induced, as we have every reason to believe, by some of his men, to leave the main body, with his ensign, John Scott, and ten or twelve men, they being heard to tell him that we were in great danger, and that they could take him into the road a nigh way--is probably lost, there being yet no account of him, and the most of the men come in. A detachment was sent back to bring him, but could not find him; and upon the return of the detachment it was generally reported he was seen, with the above number of men, to take a different road. Upon our return to the place where the Indian fire had been discovered the night before, we met with a sergeant of Captain Mercer's company, and two or three other of his men, who had deserted us that morning, immediately after the action at the Kittaning. These men, on running away, had met with Lieutenant Hogg, who lay wounded in two different parts of his body by the road-side. He there told them of the fatal mistake of the pilot, who had a.s.sured us there were but three Indians, at the most, at the fire place; but when he came to attack them that morning, according to orders, he found a number considerably superior to his, and believes they killed or mortally wounded three of them the first fire, after which a warm engagement began, and continued for above an hour, when three of his best men were killed and himself twice wounded. The residue fleeing off, he was obliged to squat in a thicket, where he might have lain securely until the main body had come up, if this cowardly sergeant and others that fled with him had not taken him away.

They had marched but a short s.p.a.ce when four Indians appeared, on which these deserters began to flee. The lieutenant then, notwithstanding his wounds, as a brave soldier, urged and commanded them to stand and fight, which they all refused. The Indians pursued, killing one man and wounding the lieutenant a third time, through the belly, of which he died in a few hours, but, having some time before been put on horseback, rode some miles from the place of action. This last attack of the Indians upon Lieutenant Hogg and the deserters was by the before-mentioned sergeant represented to us quite in a different light, he telling us that there was a far larger number of the Indians there than appeared to them, and that he and the men with him had fought five rounds; that he had there seen the lieutenant and sundry others killed and scalped, and had also discovered a number of Indians throwing themselves before us, and insinuated a great deal of such stuff as threw us into much confusion; so that the officers had a great deal to do to keep the men together, but could not prevail upon them to collect what horses and other baggage the Indians had left after the conquest of Lieutenant Hogg and the party under his command in the morning, except a few of the horses, which some of the bravest of the men were prevailed on to collect; so that from the mistake of the pilot who spied the Indians at the fire, and the cowardice of the said sergeant and other deserters, we here sustained a considerable loss of our horses and baggage. It is impossible to ascertain the exact number of the enemy killed in the action, as some were destroyed by fire, and others in different parts of the corn-field; but, upon a moderate computation, it is generally believed there cannot be less than thirty or forty killed and mortally wounded, as much blood was found in sundry parts of the corn-field, and Indians seen in several places crawl into the woods on hands and feet,--whom the soldiers in pursuit of others then overlooked, expecting to find and scalp them afterward,--and also several killed and wounded in crossing the river. On beginning our march back, we had about a dozen of scalps and eleven English prisoners; but now we find that four or five of the scalps are missing, part of which were lost on the road, and part in possession of those men who, with Captain Mercer, separated from the main body, with whom went also four of the prisoners, the other seven being now at this place, where we arrived on Sunday night, not being separated or attacked through our whole march by the enemy, though we expected it every day. Upon the whole, had our pilots understood the true situation of the town and the paths leading to it, so as to have posted us at a convenient place where the disposition of the men and the duty a.s.signed to them could have been performed with greater advantage, we had, by divine a.s.sistance, destroyed a much greater number of the enemy, recovered more prisoners, and sustained less damage, than what we at present have. But though the advantage gained over this our common enemy is far from being satisfactory to us, yet we must not despise the smallest degrees of success that G.o.d is pleased to give, especially at a time of such general calamity, when the attempts of our enemies have been so prevalent and successful. I am sure there was the greatest inclination to do more, had it been in our power, as the officers and most of the soldiers, throughout the whole action, exerted themselves with as much activity and resolution as could be expected. Our prisoners inform us the Indians have for some time past talked of fortifying at the Kittaning and other towns.

The following is a list of the killed and wounded, returned in Colonel Armstrong's official report of the expedition:--

LIEUTENANT-COLONEL JOHN ARMSTRONG'S COMPANY.--_Killed_--Thomas Power, John M'Cormick. _Wounded_--Lieutenant-Colonel Armstrong, James Caruthers, James Strickland, Thomas Foster.

CAPTAIN HAMILTON'S COMPANY.--_Killed_--John Kelly.

CAPTAIN MERCER'S COMPANY.--_Killed_--John Baker, John McCartney, Patrick Mullen, Cornelius McGinnis, Theophilus Thompson, Dennis Kilpatrick, Bryan Carrigan. _Wounded_--Richard Fitzgibbons.

_Missing_--Captain Hugh Mercer, Ensign John Scott, Emanuel Minskey, John Taylor, John Francis Phillips, Robert Morrow, Thomas Burk, Philip Pendergra.s.s.

CAPTAIN ARMSTRONG'S COMPANY.--_Killed_--Lieutenant James Hogg, James Anderson, Holdcraft Stringer, Edward Obrians, James Higgins, John La.s.son. _Wounded_--William Findley, Robert Robinson, John Ferrol, Thomas Camplin, Charles O'Neal. _Missing_--John Lewis, William Hunter, William Barker, George Appleby, Anthony Grissy, Thomas Swan.

CAPTAIN WARD'S COMPANY.--_Killed_--William Welch. _Wounded_--Ephraim Bratton. _Missing_--Patrick Myers, Lawrence Donnahow, Samuel Chambers.

CAPTAIN POTTER'S COMPANY.--_Wounded_--Ensign James Potter, Andrew Dougla.s.s.

CAPTAIN STEEL'S COMPANY.--_Missing_--Terence Cannaherry.

Total killed, 17; wounded, 13; missing, 19. All the missing, with one or two exceptions, reached their homes, and nearly all of the wounded recovered.

The loss on the part of the colonists was severe, when we consider that they had three hundred and fifty men engaged in the action, while the Indian force did not consist of over one hundred warriors. The ignorance of the pilot, and the great error of some of the officers in persisting in trying to dislodge the enemy from the houses by discharge of fire-arms, was no doubt the direct cause of the death of many of the brave men; for all must admit that the expedition was well planned, and admirably carried out, as far as circ.u.mstances would permit.

In speaking of the horrible Indian ma.s.sacres which followed the defeat of Braddock, Drake, in his Indian history, says:--

s.h.i.+ngas and Captain Jacobs were supposed to have been the princ.i.p.al instigators of them, and a reward of seven hundred dollars was offered for their heads. It was at this period that the dead bodies of some of the murdered and mangled were sent from the frontiers to Philadelphia, and hauled about the streets, to inflame the people against the Indians, and also against the Quakers, to whose mild forbearance was attributed a laxity in sending out troops. The mob surrounded the House of a.s.sembly, having placed the dead bodies at its entrance, and demanded immediate succor. At this time, the above reward was offered.

King s.h.i.+ngas, as he was called by the whites, (who is noticed in the preceding paragraph,) but whose proper name was _s.h.i.+ngask_, which is interpreted _Bog-meadow_, was the greatest Delaware warrior at that time. Heckwelder, who knew him personally, says, "Were his war exploits all on record, they would form an interesting doc.u.ment, though a shocking one." Conococheague, Big Cove, Sherman's Valley, and other settlements along the frontier, felt his strong arm sufficiently to attest that he was a "b.l.o.o.d.y warrior,"--cruel his treatment, relentless his fury. His person was small, but in point of courage, activity, and savage prowess, he was said to have never been exceeded by any one. In 1753, when Was.h.i.+ngton was on his expedition to fight the French on the Ohio, (Alleghany,) s.h.i.+ngas had his house at Kittaning.

King s.h.i.+ngas was at Fort Duquesne when Lieutenant Armstrong destroyed Kittaning; but there is no doubt whatever that Captain Jacobs fell in the engagement, notwithstanding Hans Hamilton, in a letter to the council, dated at Fort Lyttleton, April 4, 1756, said, "Indian Isaac hath brought in the scalp of Captain Jacobs." This Indian Isaac claimed, and we believe received, the reward offered for killing and scalping Captain Jacobs, and yet Captain Jacobs lived to do a great deal of mischief before his scalp fell into the hands of the English colonists.

Not only was Captain Jacobs a great warrior, but it would appear that all his family connections were Indians of note. In a letter from Colonel Stephen to Colonel Armstrong, it is stated, on the authority of a returned captive from Muskingum, that

A son of Captain Jacobs is killed, and a cousin of his, about seven foot high, called Young Jacob, at the destroying of Kittaning, and it is thought a noted warrior by the name of The Sunfish, as many of them were killed that we know nothing of.

There is no doubt that Armstrong's return did not embrace half the actual loss of the enemy, including women and children; but it was a mistake in Stephen or his informant to include the warrior Sunfish among the slain, for he was a hale old chief in 1781.

CHAPTER XI.

OLD INDIAN TOWN--INDIAN PATHS--AUGHWICK--MURDER OF JOHN ARMSTRONG AND PARTY--CAPTAIN JACK, THE WILD HUNTER OF THE JUNIATA--GEORGE CROGAN, ETC.

As we ascend the river, the nearer we approach the base of the Alleghany Mountains the fewer places we find even mentioned in quite early history. On the flat eight or nine miles west of Lewistown, near a large spring, stood an old Shawnee town. It is mentioned as early as 1731, in a report of the number of Indians accompanying the deposition of some traders. The town was called _Ohesson_, on the "Choniata," and supposed to be sixty miles distant from the Susquehanna. As this is Indian computation, some allowance must be made, for in the same connection we notice the Indian town of _a.s.sunnepachla_ set down as being distant one hundred miles from Ohesson by water and fifty miles by land. a.s.sunnepachla was the Indian name of Frankstown; and no person, by following the most sinuous windings of the river, can make the distance to Lewistown over eighty miles.

These places were probably never visited by any but Indian traders previous to Braddock's defeat, and the consequence is that we are without any record of Ohesson, which was evidently destroyed and abandoned at an early day. a.s.sunnepachla, however, stood for many years, but it lost its name before it became a place of importance to the whites.

Aughwick, it is said, had the honor of receiving the first white settlers, in 1749, that came within the present limits of Huntingdon county. Of course, they were in search of choice lands, and there is reason to believe they found them, too, notwithstanding the proprietors and their man Peters, in a year thereafter, ousted them by burning their cabins over their heads. Aughwick Valley is in the extreme southern part of Huntingdon county, and, if not a regular continuation of the Tuscarora Valley, is at least one of the chain of valleys through whose entire length ran the celebrated Indian path from Kittaning to Philadelphia,--the great western highway for footmen and pack-horses.

This path, traces of which can yet be plainly seen in various places, and especially in the wilds of the mountains, must have been a famous road in its day. It commenced at Kittaning, on the Alleghany River, and crossed the Alleghany Mountains in a southeastern direction, the descent on the eastern slope being through a gorge, the mouth of which is five or six miles west of Hollidaysburg, at what is well known as Kittaning Point. From this it diverged in a southern direction until it led to the flat immediately back of Hollidaysburg, from thence east, wound round the gorge back of the Presbyterian graveyard, and led into Frank's old town. From thence it went through what is now called Scotch Valley, Canoe Valley, and struck the river at Water street. From thence it led to Alexandria, crossed the river, and went into Hartsog Valley; from thence to Woodc.o.c.k Valley; from Woodc.o.c.k Valley, across the Broadtop Mountain, into Aughwick; from thence into the Tuscarora Valley, and from thence into Sherman's Valley, by Sterritt's Gap.

At Kittaning Point, this path, although it is seldom that the foot of any one but an occasional hunter or fisher treads it, is still the same path it was when the last dusky warrior who visited the Juniata Valley turned his face to the west, and traversed it for the last time. True, it is filled up with weeds in summer-time, but the indentation made by the feet of thousands upon thousands of warriors and pack-horses which travelled it for an unknown number of years are still plainly visible.

We have gone up the Kittaning gorge two or three miles, repeatedly, and looked upon the ruins of old huts, and the road, which evidently never received the impression of a wagon-wheel, and were forcibly struck with the idea that it must once have been traversed, without knowing at the time that it was the famous Kittaning trail. In some places, where the ground was marshy, close to the run, the path is at least twelve inches deep, and the very stones along the road bear the marks of the iron-shod horses of the Indian traders. Two years ago, we picked up, at the edge of the run, a mile up the gorge, two gun-flints,--now rated as relics of a past age. At the time we supposed that some modern Nimrod lost them. Now, however, we incline to the belief that they fell from the pocket of some weary soldier in Armstrong's battalion, who lay down upon the bank of the brook to slake his thirst, nearly a hundred years ago. The path can be traced in various other places, but nowhere so plain as in the Kittaning gorge. This is owing to the fact that one or two other paths led into it, and no improvement has been made in the gorge east of "Hart's Sleeping Place," along the line of the path.

Aughwick was an Indian town, located probably near where s.h.i.+rleysburg now stands, and for a long time was an important frontier post. The name of the place figures extensively in the Colonial Records, first as a place where many conferences were held, and afterward as Fort s.h.i.+rley.

Previous to actual settlers coming into the Juniata Valley, every inch of it was known to the traders--or, at least, every Indian town in it; and how long they trafficked with the red men before actual settlers came is unknown. Thus, for instance, six or seven years before the settlement of Aughwick, a trader named John Armstrong, and his two servant-men, were murdered at what is now Jack's Narrows, in Huntingdon county. As there are several narrows along the Juniata, we should have been at a loss to locate the scene of the murder, had we not accidentally noticed in the Archives a calculation of distances by John Harris, wherein he says--"From Aughwick to Jack Armstrong's Narrows--so called from his being there murdered,--eight miles." At the time of the ma.s.sacre, the British colonists and the Indians were on the most friendly terms of intimacy, and Armstrong was a man of some standing and influence, so that the murder (the first one of so atrocious a nature in that region) created the most intense excitement. Along with Armstrong, his servant-men, James Smith and Woodward Arnold, were also murdered. The charge was laid to a Delaware Indian, named Musemeelin, and two companions. Seven white men and five Indians searched for the bodies, found and buried them. The Indian was arrested and taken to Lancaster, and from there removed to Philadelphia for trial, but whether convicted or not the record does not say. _Allumoppies_, King of the Delawares, s.h.i.+ckallemy, and a number of other Indians of standing and influence, were brought before the council in Philadelphia, when the friends of Armstrong produced the following affidavit of those who searched for the bodies:--

_Paxton, April 19, 1744._

The deposition of the subscribers testifieth and saith, that the subscribers, having a suspicion that John Armstrong, trader, together with his men, James Smith and Woodward Arnold, were murdered by the Indians, they met at the house of Joseph Chambers, in Paxton, and there consulted to go to Shamokin, to consult with the Delaware king and s.h.i.+ckcalimy, and there council what they should do concerning the affair. Whereupon the king and council ordered eight of their men to go with the deponents to the house of James Berry, in order to go in quest of the murdered persons; but that night they came to the said Berry's house three of the eight Indians ran away; and the next morning these deponents, with the five Indians that remained, set out on their journey, peaceably, to the last supposed sleeping-place of the deceased; and upon their arrival, these deponents dispersed themselves, in order to find out the corpse of the deceased; and one of the deponents, named James Berry, a small distance from the aforesaid sleeping-place, came to a white-oak tree, which had three notches on it, and close by said tree he found a shoulder-bone, which the deponent does suppose to be John Armstrong's,--and that he himself was eaten by the Indians,--which he carried to the aforesaid sleeping-place, and showed it to his companions, one of whom handed it to the said five Indians to know what bone it was; and they, after pa.s.sing different sentiments upon it, handed it to a Delaware Indian, who was suspected by the deponents; and they testify and say that as soon as the Indian took the bone in his hand his nose gushed out with blood, and he directly handed it to another. From whence these deponents steered along a path, about three or four miles, to the Narrows of Juniata, where they suspected the murder to have been committed; and where the Alleghany Road crosses the creek these deponents sat down, in order to consult on what measures to take to proceed on a discovery. Whereupon most of the white men, these deponents, crossed the creek again, and went down the creek, and crossed into an island, where these deponents had intelligence the corpse had been thrown; and there they met the rest of the white men and Indians who were in company, and there consulted to go farther down the creek in quest of the corpse. And these deponents further say, they ordered the Indians to go down the creek on the other side; but they all followed these deponents at a small distance, except one Indian, who crossed the creek again; and soon after these deponents, seeing some bald eagles and other fowls, suspected the corpse to be thereabouts, and then lost sight of the Indians, and immediately found one of the corpses, which these deponents say was the corpse of James Smith, one of said Armstrong's men; and directly upon finding the corpse these deponents heard three shots of guns, which they had great reason to think were the Indians their companions, who had deserted from them; and in order to let them know that they had found the corpse these deponents fired three guns, but to no purpose, for they never saw the Indians any more. And about a quarter of a mile down the creek they saw more bald eagles, whereupon they made down toward the place, where they found another corpse (being the corpse of Woodworth Arnold, the other servant of said Armstrong) lying on a rock, and then went to the former sleeping-place, where they had appointed to meet the Indians; but saw no Indians, only that the Indians had been there, and cooked some victuals for themselves and had gone off.

And that night, the deponents further say, they had great reason to suspect that the Indians were then thereabouts, and intended to do them some damage; for a dog these deponents had with them barked that night, which was remarkable, for the said dog had not barked all the time they were out till that night, nor ever since, which occasioned these deponents to stand upon their guard behind the trees, with their guns c.o.c.ked, that night. Next morning these deponents went back to the corpses, which they found to be barbarously and inhumanly murdered by very gashed, deep cuts on their hands with a tomahawk, or such like weapon, which had sunk into their skulls and brains; and in one of the corpses there appeared a hole in his skull near the cut, which was supposed to be with a tomahawk, which hole these deponents do believe to be a bullet-hole. And these deponents, after taking as particular view of the corpses as their melancholy condition would admit, they buried them as decently as their circ.u.mstances would allow, and returned home to Paxton,--the Alleghany Road to John Harris's, thinking it dangerous to return the same way they went. And further these deponents say not.

These same deponents, being legally qualified before me, James Armstrong, one of his majesty's justices of the peace for the county of Lancaster, have hereunto set their hands in testimony thereof.

JAMES ARMSTRONG.