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Chapter 1
Early Inhabitants and Indian WarsTHE MOUND BUILDERS – INDIAN TRIBES AND CUSTOMS- PIONEER SETTLERS- INDIAN
DEPREDATIONS- MASSEY HARRISON’S STORY CAPTAIN BRADY’S FIGHT- MINISTERIAL
DEFENDERSThe history of this county may be divided into three great periods: The
aboriginal, or period of Mound Builders; the savage, or Indian period; and the
civilized, or Caucasian occupation.No history, written or graven, can be discovered that will tell us of the
Mound Builders, although the remains of there activities are to be seen all
over the continent. Particularly are their earthen records to be found in
Armstrong county, but none has ever been found that gives a ray of light upon
their origin and object.Many the mounds, embankments and other earthworks that our forefathers
ploughed over and destroyed in the past, thinking that they were simply Indian
fortifications or graves, so we have little but tradition or memory to depend
upon in attempting to unravel the maze of finespun theories regarding the
races that peopled our country previous to the Indian tribes. We simply know
that the Indians were not in the habit of erecting earthworks or mounds, and
from the few relics to be gathered in these mounds it is judged that their
builders were of far greater capacity and cunning in working stone and copper
than their red successors.The Indians gave the name of “Allegewi” to these races that they
drove out of this country, and thence arose the name Allegheny. They were said
to have been a large and athletic race of men, but the overwhelming numbers of
the Indians soon drove them father south.The Mound Builders erected several kinds of earthworks, but only one of
these, the circular or elliptical fort, is to be found in this county. Many of
them are invisible at this date, but tradition has given us the location. One
of the most noted and largest was the circular embankment between Kittanning
and Ford City, near the run that was named “Fort” by the early
settlers. It was about an acre in extent, with a wall five feet high and a
moat of the same depth around it. This was used as a protection from the
Indians by the settlers of that section, so it served its purpose as a fort
for a least two widely differing races.At the point in Boggs township was an earthwork that undoubtedly was used
as a fort, as it was situated in a location favorable for defense. Other
remains were found in South Buffalo, on the banks of the Allegheny, and some
interesting relics were discovered in digging in to them. Other relics were
excavated in Washington township in 1843.THE INDIANS
The different tribes of Indians who later inhabited this valley were said
by Heckewelder to have been Lenni-Lenape, or Delaware Mohawks, Oneidas,
Cayugas, Onondagas and Senecas. Of these the Delawares were the more permanent
residents of the portion of country now included in the boundaries of
Armstrong County, although many of the others were frequently seen on hunting
trips through the county, traveling by way of their well-worn paths were.
These paths were well known to the early settlers and were, in fact, their
only routes for many years after the settlement of the country. One of these
paths crossed the Allegheny at Nicholson�s run in South Buffalo, another
extended from the region near Putneyville to the Indiana line by way of
Dayton, while a third crossed the Kiskiminetas not far from Apollo. By this
latter trail came post, the missionary, in 1758, who made several expeditions
to deliver conciliatory messages to the different tribes in the days before
settlement was made.Blockhouses were generally built by the settlers as soon as they arrived in
this country, for protection and shelter until their permanent were
constructed. Of these one of the first was the Claypoole blockhouse on the
Allegheny, near Fort run, now within the limits of Ford City, built in 1790.
About the same time another on the same river, at the mouth Nicholson�s run
in South Buffalo. Another was located in 1785 at the point now called
“Idaho” in South Bend township.The Indians had several villages in this section when the settlers came,
even occupying them some years afterward. Besides the famous one at
Kittanning, there was another at “Old Town” in Red Bank Township
known to have been a large settlement in 1770. Another was said to have been
situated at the mouth of the Mahoning, one at Brady�s Bend and another at
Bull Lick, on Pine creek.ARROWHEADS
The costumes and customs of the Indians are familiar to most of the readers
of history, so an extended description is unnecessary. Before the advent of
the whites the arms of the Indians were the tomahawk and bow and arrow. Most
of the arrowheads were obtained from tribes north and west of this county, as
flint rock is not found in the section of Pennsylvania of which we are
writing. However, there was in early times an arrowhead factory in the
northern part of Red Blank township, on Mudlick creek where fragments of rock
and finished implements and arrowheads were found. There is a rich reward for
those who will systematically seek for Indian relics along the streams of the
county, even after the years that have elapsed since the red man departed. For
the benefit of those who have read this sketch of the savages we will give a
few rules to observe in seeking for relics.Many a person has paced across a point of land, where he had been told that
an Indian camp had existed, until he was dizzy, without finding anything to
reward his search. But arrowheads, like evil deeds, sink in. To find the
arrowheads look along the caving edges of the embankments and bluffs until a
black spot is seen in the gravel and sand. This is the remains of the camp
fire, where generation of Indians had stopped to eat clams or prepare a meal.
Many of these clam shells will be found in this spot, generally partially
burned.Bring a sifter with you and spade, and dig all around these ancient camping
grounds, and you will be richly rewarded for your labor. Here around the camp
fire the arrowmaker may have been located, but there are always arrow points
to be found and especially bits of the crude clay pottery marked with rough
geometrical designs.By taking out a couple of spadesful of earth at a time and putting it
though the sifter, and carefully examining all the things that remain, the
searcher will be rewarded by a number of pieces. Sometimes exceedingly rare
points of obsidian, milky quartz, jasper and jet will be found, along with the
rougher points of gray flint, feldspar and such minerals.If the searcher is really interested in such a collection he should not
toss aside anything he is not sure about, but secure a handbook on the subject
and study the illustrations. The skin scrapers, the hammers and many other
objects appear to the untrained eyes to be merely natural stones.The same opportunity is offered on the banks of the large inland rivers.
Look in the ploughed furrows on points of land extending into a river or lake,
for the Indians always camped on such places, as they offered a a vantage
point for them, enabling them to note the approach of an enemy on all sides.One of the enthusiastic collectors of Indian relics for the past twenty
years is Capt. James M. Hudson, of Kittanning, who owns one of the most
complete cabinets in the State.Some of the settlers used to claim that the Indians had found deposits of
lead ore in this section, They probably bartered for the ore, with other
tribes, and afterwards removed it from their hiding places when wanted to
trade for power or whiskey.BUILDING OPERATIONS
Their summer homes were the skin tepee, but their winter habitations were
more elaborate. An early writer says he was a cabin erected when he was
captive among the Indians along Lake Erie. “They cut logs,” says he,
“about fifteen feet long, and laid them upon each other, and drove posts
in the ground at each end to keep them together; they tied the posts together
at the top with bark, and by means raised a wall fifteen feet long and four
feet high, and in the same manner they raised another wall opposite to this,
at about twelve feet distance; then they drove forks in the ground in the
ground in the center of each end, and laid a strong pole from end to end on
these forks; and from these walls to the poles they set up poles instead of
rafters, and on them tied small poles instead of laths; and cover was made of
lynn( linden) bark which will run water even in the winter season. At the end
of these walls they set up split timber all round except a space at each end
of the door. At the top, in place of a chimney, they left an open space, for
bedding they laid down that kind of bark, on which they spread bearskins.
There were fires along the middle from one end to the other of the hut, which
the squaws made of dry spit wood, and stopped up whatever open place there
were in the walls with moss which they collected from the old logs; they hung
a bearskin at the door. Notwithstanding our winter her are hard, our lodging
was much better then I expected. Perhaps the Indian houses in Kittanning,
especially that of the chief, Captain Jacobs, were somewhat better and
differently built.From these rude dwellings our forefathers developed their log cabins,
improving in many points upon the crude construction of their savage
instructors. In many ways the settles patterned after the Indians; in their
mode of dress, methods of hunting, travel and the cultivation of the products
of the soil native to this country, and in most cases with profit to
themselves. The Indians had developed settled upon the most satisfactory way
of living in the wilderness, so that settlers did well to emulate them until
they could by experience improve upon their methods.OUTRAGES
It would occupy too much space to detail all the harrowing experiences of
the settlers in their wars with the indians, so we will only touch upon the
most famous of these incidents. Many of the settlers were captured and
tortured, but occasionally, through superstition or whim, their lives would be
spared and they remained captives for years. In one instance, a son of David
Shields, of Red Bank Township, was recaptured by his father, but the lure of
the forest life seemed to draw him away and he soon returned to his savage
friends. Fergus Moorhead owed his life to the savages� reluctance to shoot
over three times at a person, they believing that the Great Spirit wished his
life spared. Joshua Spencer, who lived on Crooked Creek, was captured and made
to run the gauntlet, and escaping the ordeal unscathed, was adopted into the
tribe. One of the pecular customs of the indians was to spare those with black
hair, and to this Ezekiel Lewis, of Captain Orr�s command, owed his life in
battle with them.CORNPLANTER
Not all of the Indians were bad, of the strong friends of the whites was
Cornplanter, who on several occasions hastened to warn the settlers of
uprisings of other tribes and prospective attacks. This distinguished Indian
chief was born at Conewagus, on the Genesee river; his father, a white man was
said to be a resident of Albany, N.Y. After the war of the Revolution he was
an unswerving friend of the whites and performed some valuable service for
them , for which he received grants of land in various localities. The fact
that he and some of his people once resided at and near the mouth of
Cornplanter�s run in South Buffalo township, where they raised corn, has
come down from early explorers of and settlers in this region. It is related
by Charles Sipe, Sr.; who fished and hunted along these streams in and after
1796, that he and his sons could see the rows of corn hills on a parcel of
about three acres opposite the mouth of Cornplanter�s Run and on another
parcel on the west side of the creek about half a mile up. It does not seen
improbable that John O�Bail, as Cornplanter was also called derived his
Indian name Ki-en-twa-ka, from those cornfields. Cornplanter had two sons,
Charles and Henry, who survived him. He and one or the others of his people
occasionally passed down and up the Allegheny, stopping sometimes at
Kittanning, whom Philip Mechling and some others of the oldest citizens living
in 1875 remembered having seen. He died at his home on his long-loved
Allegheny, in Warren county, March 7,1836, in or about the one hundred and
fifth year of his age.FORTS AND FIGHTS
The settlement of this county was delayed by the rival claims of the French
and English to the land. The Indians soon took sides in this division of their
property, and their alliance was courted by both of the opposing forces, The
French built a line of forts down the Allegheny to control the county, and in
many instances winked at the ravages of their red allies.England sent Braddock to capture the Ohio valley in 1755, but his
ignominious defeat is a matter of familiar history. The next year occurred
Armstrong�s famous raid on Kittanning, an account of which will be found in
the sketch of that borough.The capture of Fort Duquesne (Pittsburgh) in 1758 by Gen. John Forbes
completed the conquest of this country from the French. Then came the
Revolutionary war, in which many of the settlers of Armstrong county took
part. After the termination of that conflict the first of the expeditions of
the colonists against the Senecas and Munsees by Col. Daniel Brodhead, in
1779, up the Allegheny, resulted in a temporary tranquility to the settlers.An expedition was made in 1781 against the Indians of Ohio by Col.
Archibald Lochry and Capt. Robert Orr, but resulted in complete failure by
their defeat at the mouth of the Muskingum river. Captain Orr was afterwards a
settler of Sugar creek township, and the ancestor of many of the prominent
citizens of this county in later days. One of them was the capture of Massey
Harbison in 1792, of which much has been written and told. From the many
conflicting stories of different writers, as well as the woman herself, we
gather the following facts.MASSY HARBISON�S STORY
John Harbison was a soldier in St. Clar�s army. Having been wounded he
was given the lighter employment f spy upon the movements of the savages. In
the spring of 1792 his family resided in a log house near what is now
Kiskiminetas Junction on the Pennsylvania railroad, at that time the site of
the reed blockhouse.While Harbison and William Hill, grandfather of Robert B.McKee, now editor
of the Freeport Journal, were absent on a scouting expedition, the Indians
entered his house in sight of the blockhouse garrison and carried off Mrs.
Harbison and her three children. Two Spies, Davis and Sutton, had lodged that
night at Harbison�s house, and when the horn at the blockhouse was blown to
notify them of an Indian attack they hurriedly left the house at daylight,
leaving the door open. Several Indians who had been skulking around the house,
soon afterward entered and drew Mrs. Massey (corrupted from Mera) Harbison and
her eldest two children by their feet from there beds, the third or youngest
one, about a year old, being in bed with her. While they were rummageing the
house and scrambling to secure whatever each one could of her clothing and
other articles, she went outdoors and hallooed to the men in the blockhouse.
One Indian then ran up and stopped her mount, another rushed toward her with a
tomahawk, which a third one seized calling her his squaw and claiming her as
his own. Fifteen Indians then advanced toward and fired upon both the
blockhouse and the storehouse, killing one and wounding another of the
soldiers, one of whom, by the name of wolf, was returning from the spring and
the other either coming or looking out of the storehouse. When Mrs. Harbison
told the Indians who remained with her that there were forty men in the
blockhouse, each having a gun, those who were firing were brought back. Then
they began to drive her and her children away. Because one of her boys, three
years old was unwilling to leave and was crying, they seized him by his feet,
dashing his brains out against the threshold of the door, and then stabbed and
scalped him. Her heart rent with agony, almost bereft of sight and all her
other senses, still keeping her infant in her arms, she gave a terrific
scream, and for that one of her savage captors dealt a heavy blow on her head
and face, which restored her to consciousness. She and her two surviving
children were then taken to the top of a hill, where they all stopped and
while the Indians were tying up their booty she counted them their number
being thirty- two, among whom were two white men, painted like Indians.Several of the Indians could speak English. Mrs. Harbison know three or
four of them very well; two Seneacas and two were Munsees whose guns her
husband had repaired almost two years before. Two Indians were detailed to
guard her, and the rest then went toward Puckety. When she, her children and
their guards had advanced about two hundred yards, the latter caught two of
her uncle John Currie�s horses, and then placing her and the youngest child
on one and one of the guards and the remaining child on the other, proceeded
toward the Kiskiminetas to a point opposite the upper end of Todd�s island,
where in descending the steep river hill the Indians horse fell and rolled
more then once. The boy fell over the horse back receiving a slight injury,
and was taken up by one of the Indians. On reaching the shore the horses could
not be made to swim, so the Indians took the captives across to the head of
that island in bark canoes. After landing the elder boy, five years old
complaining of the injuries he had received from his fall and still lamenting
the death of his brother, one of the guards tommy hawked and then scalped him,
the other guards having first ordered the mother to move on ahead of them.
Actuated, perhaps by a slight assertion of humanity to save her the pain of
witnessing the murder of another of her children. When she beheld that second
massacre of her offspring she feel senseless to the ground with her infant in
her arms beneath her with its little hands above her head.She knew not how long she remained in that insensible condition. The first
thing she remembered on recovering her consciousness was raising her head from
the ground and being overcome by an extreme, uncontrollable drowsiness, and
beholding as she looked around the bloody scalp of her boy in the hand of one
of theses savages. She then involuntarily sank again to the earth upon her
infant. The first thing which she remembered after that was the severe
castigation that her cruel guards were inflicting upon her, after which they
aided her in raising and supported her when on her feet. Why they did not
massacre her she attributed to the interposition of Divine Providence in her
behalf. There must have still been a little streak humanity lingering in there
ferocious breasts, for they concealed the scalp of her boy from her sight.Having restored her dormant senses by leading her knee-deep into the river,
all proceeded to a shoal near the head of the island, between it and the main
land or “Indian side of the country” where her guards forced her
before them into and through the water breast deep, she holding her child
above her surface, and by their assistance she with her child safely reached
the opposite shore. They all moved thence as fast as they could across the
forks to the big buffalo, which being a very rapid stream, her guards were
obliged to aid her in crossing. Thence they took a straight course towards the
Connoquennessing creek, the very place where butler now stands. Thence they
advanced along the Indian trail to the Little Buffalo, which they crossed at
the very place where B. Sarver�s mill afterward stood and there ascended the
hill.Having become weary of life she fully determined to make these savages kill
her, to end her fatigue and the prospective miseries and cruelties which she
conceived awaited her. They were then moving in single file, one guard before
and the other behind her. She stopped, withdraw from her shoulder a large
powder horn which besides her child, they compelled her to carry, and threw it
to the ground, closing her eyes and momentarily expecting to feel their deadly
tomahawks. But, contrary to her expectations, they replaced it on her
shoulder. She threw it off a second time, expecting death. But they, looking
indignant and frightful, again replaced it. She threw it down a third time as
far as she could over the rocks. While the one that had been engaged in that
little contest was recovering it, the other one who had claimed her as his
squaw, and who had witnessed the affair, approached and said: “Well done,
you did right and are a good squaw, and he is lazy; he may carry it
himself.”The guards having changed their positions, the latter taking the rear
probably to prevent the other from injuring her, they proceeded until they
reached, shortly before dark, without refreshment during the day, the Salt
Lick on the Connoquennessing, nearly two miles above the present site of
Butler, where there was an Indian camp made of stakes driven into the ground
sloping, covered with chestnut bark, long enough for fifty men, which appeared
to have been occupied for some time was very much weather beaten paths
extended in different directions.Mrs.Harbison was taken that night from that camp into a large dark bottom,
about three hundred rods up a run, where they cut away the brush in a thicket,
placed a blanket on the ground and permitted her to sit down with her child,
which it was difficult for her to manage, as they had pinioned her arms so
that she had but slight freedom of their use. There without refreshment, thus
pinioned, with those two savages who had that day massacred in her presence
two of her boys, one of, one of those guards on each side of her, she passed
the first night of her captivity.The next morning one of the guards left to watch the trail they had
traveled, and ascertain whether any of the white people were in pursuit.
During his absence the other, being the one, who claimed her as his squaw, and
who had that day killed her second boy, remained with her and took from his
bosom the scalp which he had so humanely concealed from her sight on the
island and stretched it upon a hoop. She then meditated revenge attempting to
take the tomahawk which hung by his side, and deal a fatal blow was alas!
Detected. Her dusky captor turned, cursed her, and called her a
“Yankee” thus intimating that he understood her intention, and to
prevent a repetition of her attempt, faced her. The feigned reason that she
gave for handling his tomahawk was, that her child wanted to play with its
handle.The guard that had been out returned from his lookout about noon, and
reported that he had not discovered any pursuers, and remained on guard while
the other went out for the same purpose. The one then guarding her, after
questioning her respecting the whites the strength of their armies, and
boasting of the achievement of the Indians in St. Clair�s defeat, examined
the plunder which he had brought from her house, among which he found her
pocketbook, containing $10 in silver and a half-guinea in gold. All the food
that she received from her guards on that on that Sunday and Monday was a
piece of dried venison, about the size of an egg, each day, for herself and
her child, but by reason of the blows which they had inflicted upon her jaws
she could not eat any of it, and broke it up and give it to her child. The
guard who had been lookout in the afternoon returned about dark. Having been
removed to another station in the valley of that run, that evening, she was
again pinioned, guarded, and kept without either fire or refreshment, the
second night of her captivity, just as she had been during the first one. She
however, fell sleep occasionally. Her ears were regaled the next morning by
the singing of a flock of mocking-birds and robins that hovered over her
irksome camp. To her imgination they seemed to sing,”Get up and go
off!” One of the guards having left at daybreak to watch the trail, the
remaining one appeared to be sleeping, on observing which she began to snore
and feigned to be asleep. When she was satisfied that he had really fallen
asleep, she concluded it was her time to escape. She would then have slain or
disabled him, but for the crying of her child when out of her arms, which
would of course awaken him and jeopardize her life own life. She,therefore
,was contented to take a short gown, handkerchief, and child�s frock from
the pillow case containing the articles which the Indians had brought from her
house, and escape, about half an hour after sunrise. Guided by those birds,
and wisely taking a direction from istead of toward her home, in order to
mislead her captors, she passed over the hill, reached the Connoquennessing,
about two miles from the point at which she and they had crossed it, and
descended it through thorns and briers, and over rocks and percipices, with
bare feet and legs. Having discovered by the sun and course of the stream that
she was advancing too far in her course from her home, she changed it ascended
the hill, sat down till sunset, determined her direction for the morrow by the
evening star, gathered leaves for her bed, without food, her feet painful from
the thorns that were in them, reclned and slept.About daybreak the next morning she was awakened by that flock of birds
which seemed to her to be attending and guiding her through the wilderness.
When light enough to find her way, she started on her fourth day’s trial of
hunger and fatigue, advancing, according to her knowledge of courses and
distances, toward the Allegheny river. Nothing unusual occurred during the
day. It having commenced raining moderately about sunset, she prepared to make
her bed of leaves, but was prevented by the crying of her child when she sat
him down. Listening she distinctly heard the footstep of a man following her.
Such was the condition of the soil that her footprints might be discerned.
Fearing that she was thus exposed to a second captivity, she looked for a
place of concealment and providentially discovered a large fallen tree, into
whose thick foliage she crept with her child in her arms, where, aided by the
darkness, she avoided detection by the Indian whose footsteps she had heard.
He having heard the child cry, came to the spot whence the sound proceeded,
halted, put down his gun, and was then so near to her that she that she
distinctly heard the wiping stick strike against his gun. Fortunately the
child pressed to her bosom,became warm and lay quiet during the continuance of
their imminent peril. That Indian in the meantime amidst that unbroken
stillness,stood for nearly two hours with listening ears to again catch the
sounds of the child’s cry, and so profound was that stillness that the beating
of her heart was all she heard, and which seemed to her to be so loud that she
feared her dusky pursuer would hear it. Finally answering the sound of a bell
and a cry like a night owl’s signals which his companions had given, and
giving a horrid, soul harrowing yell, he departed. Deemingit imprudent to
remain there until morning, lest her tracks might be discovered in daylight,
she removed her coat and wrapped it around the child, with one end between her
teeth and one arm. With the other she groped her way among the trees a mile or
two , and there sat in the damp, cold air till morning.At daylight the next morning, wet,hungry,exhausted, wretched, she advanced
across the headwaters of Pine Creek, not knowing whit they were, and became
alarmed by two freshly indented moccasin tracks of men traveling in the same
direction that she was. As they were ahead of her she concluded that she could
see them as soon as they could see her. So she proceeded about three miles to
a hunter’s camp at the confluence of another branch of the creek, in which
those who preceded her had kindled a fire breakfasted. She afterward learned
that they were spies, James Anderson and John Thompson.Having become still more alarmed, she left that path, ascended a hill,
struck another path, and while meditating there what to do, saw three deer
advancing toward her at full speed. They turned to look and she, too looked
intently at their pursuers, and saw the flash and heard the instantaneous
report of a gun. Seeing some dogs start after the deer, she crouched behind a
large log for shelter, but fortunately not close to it,for, as she as she
placed her hand on the ground to raise herself up, that she might’s see the
hunters, she saw a large mass of rattlesnakes, her face being very near the
top one, which lay coiled ready to strike its deadly fangs into her. With a
supreme effort she left that dangerous spot, bearing to the left, reached the
headwaters of Squaw run, which through rain, she followed the rest the of the
day day, her limbs so cold and shivering that she could not help giving an
occasional involuntary groan. Though her jaws had sufficiently recovered from
the pain caused by the blows inflicted upon her by the Indians, she suffered
from hunger, procuring grapevines whenever she could and chewing them for what
little sustenance they afforded. Having arrived at evening tide within a mile
of the Allegheny River, though she did not know it, at the root of a tree,
holding her child in her lap and her head against the tree to shelter him from
that night’s drenching rain, she lodged that fifth night since her capture.She was unable for a considerable time the next morning to raise herself
from the ground. Having, with a hard stuggle , gained her feet, with nature so
nearly exhausted and her spirits so completely depressed as they were, her
progress was very slow and discouraging. After proceeding a short distance,
she struck a path over which cattle had passed, following which for about a
mile, she reached an uninhabited cabin on the river bottom. Not knowing where
she was, and overcome with despair, she went to its threshold, having resolved
to enter it and then lie down and die. But the thought of the suffering to be
endured in that event nerved her to another desperate effort to live. Hearing
the sound of a cowbell, which awakened a gleam of hope in her extreme
despondency, she followed that sound until she reached a point opposite the
fort at Six mile Island, where ,with feelings which can be more readily
imagined than expressed, she beheld three men on the left bank of the river.
They appeared to be unwilling to come for her when she called on them, and
requested her to inform them who she was. When she told them that she was the
one who had been taken prisoner up the Allegheny on the morning of the 22d and
had escaped, they requested her to walk up the bank of the river for awhile
that they might see whether or not the Indians were making a decoy of her.
When she told them her feet so sore that she could not walk, James Closier
came over for her in a canoe, while the other two stood on the river bank with
cocked rifles, ready to fire in case she proved to be a decoy. When Closier
approached the shore and saw her haggard and dejected appearance he exclaimed:
“Who, in the name of God, are you?” So great was the change wrought
by her six day’s sufferings that he, one of her nearest neighbors, did not
recognize either her face or voice. When she arrived on the other side of the
river she was unable to move or to help herself in any way. The people at the
fort ran to see her. Some of them took her child and other took her from the
canoe to Mr. Carter’s house. Then, all danger being passed, she enjoyed for
the first time since her capture the relief which comes from a copious flow of
tears. Coming too suddenly to the fire and the smell of the victuals, she
fainted.Those hospitable people might have killed her with their exuberant
kindness, had not Major McCulley, who then commanded the line along the
Allegheny river, fortunately arrived. When he saw her situation and the
bountiful provisions those good people were making for her, he immediately
ordered her out of the house, away from the heat of the fire and the smell of
the victuals which were being cooked, and prohibited her from taking anything
but the whey of buttermilk, in very small quantities, which he himself
administered. By that judicious treatment she was gradually restored to health
and strength of mind and body.Sarah Carter and Mary Ann Crozier then began to extract the thorns from her
feet and legs to number of 150, as counted by Felix Negley, who watched the
operation, and who afterward resided at the mouth of Bull creek, Tarentum.
Many more were extracted the next evening. Some of the thorns went through and
came out on the top of her feet. The skin and flesh were excruciatingly
mangled and hung in shreds to her feet and legs. So much exposure of naked
body to rain by night and heat of the sun by day, and carrying her child so
long in her arms without relief caused much of her skin to come off so that
nearly her whole body was raw, and for two weeks her feet were not
sufficiently healed to enable her to put them to the ground to walk.The news of her escape spread rapidly in various directions, reaching
Pittsburgh the same evening of her arrival at the fort at Six Mile Island. Two
spies proceeded that evening to coe -now Tarentum and the next morning to
Reed’s station, bearing the intelligence to her husband. A young man employed
by the magistrates at Pittsburgh came for her to go thiher for the purpose of
making before one of them her affidavit of the facts connected with her
captivity and escape, as was customary in early times, for publication . Being
unable either to walk or ride on horse back, she was carried by some of the
men into a canoe. After arriving at Pittsburgh she was borne in their arms to
the office of John Wilkins, a justice of the peace and a son of the late Judge
Wilkins, of the United State court, before whom she made her affidavit, May
28, 1792. The facts which she thus stated, being circulated, cause a lively
sensation in and for twenty miles around Pittsburgh. Her husband arrived there
that evening,and the next morning she was conveyed to Coe’s station. That
evening she gave to those about her an account of the murder of her boy on
Todd’s Island, whither a scout went the next morning, found and buried the
corpes,which had lain there unburied nine days.From her affidavit and a subsequent and more elaborate narrative, prepared
from her statement by John Winter, the writer has condensed the foregoing
facts, credited by the early settles who were her neighbor, and which were
made during those six terrible days of her life.She resided during serveral subsequent years at Salt Lick, a mile and a
half north of Butler, on the Connoquennessing, at or near the site of the
Indian camp mentioned in her affidavit and narrative. The last years of her
life were passed in a cabin on the lot on the northeastern corner of Fourth
street and Mulberry alley, Freeport, opposite the Methodist Episcopal church,
where she died on Saturday, Dec. 9, 1837. By an act of the Legislature in 1828
she was granted a donation of $ 100 as full payment for relief as the window
of a solder of the Revolutionary war.Robert B. McKee of Freeport is a relative of Massy, his father’s sister
having married her son James. The site of the house from which she was
captured is part of the property of Andrew Carnegie directly across the river
from the mouth of Buffalo creek.
REPRISALS
Such outrages were not calculated to make the early settlers merciful in
their dealings with the Indians, and naturally their reprisals were as fierce
and bloody as their savage adversaries . An Example of this is shown in the
story of the expedition of Armstrong against the Indian village of Kittanning
, described elsewhere. Another case was the raid of Capt. Samuel Brady, of
which the following is a condensation . About the 10th of June
1779, three men, whom Colonel Brodhead has sent from Fort Pitt to reconnoiter
the Seneca country, returned having been closely pursued some distance below
Kittanning, and nearly captured, by several Indian warriors who were
descending the Allegheny in canoes. In a few days thereafter Capt. Samuel
Brady obtained with difficulty, on account of the envy excited in some of his
fellow officers by his previous brilliant successes, permission from the
commandant of that fort to proceed with twenty men and a young Delware chief
toward the Seneca country, to catch the Indians. While he and his command were
moving these Indians warriors advanced to the settlement. They killed a solder
between Fort Hand and Crawford, that is, between the mouths of the Loyal
Hannon and Poketas creeks, and at the Sewickley settlement they killed one
woman and her four children and took two other children prisoners, their
father being absent. Brady and his party they were all painted like Indians
crossed the Allegheny and advanced up its west side, carefully examining the
mouths of all its principal, especially its eastern, tributaries supposing
that the Indians would descend it in their canoes. On reaching a point
opposite the mouth of Mahoning, they discovered the Indian�s canoes moored
at the southwestern bank of the creek. Brady and his force then went some
distance down the river, halted until dark, made a raft, crossed over to the
east side advanced along it to the creek, found the canoes had been removed to
the opposite side of the creek, vainly attempted to wade it, then moved up
along its left bank and shore a considerable distance.BRADY�S FIGHT
After crossing the creek, a fire was made, their clothes dried, and arms
inspected. They then moved down toward the Indian camp, which was pitched on
what was then a second bank of the Allegheny, a short distance east of where
the Pennsylvania railroad track now is. Brady posted his men on the first
bank, which has since been worn away. He surrounded them as well as the
situation would admit and finding he was discovered by break of day, he
attacked them. The Indian captain a notorious warrior of the Muncy nation, was
killed on the spot, and serveral more mortally wounded, but the wood were
remarkably thick,and the party could not pursue the villains tracks after they
had stopped their wounds, which they always do as soon as possible after
receiving them. Captain Brady, however retook six horse, the two prisoners,
the scalps, all their plunder, and took all Indians guns, tomahawks, match
coat moccasins in fine, everything they had, except their breech clouts.Captain Brady and most of his men acted with great spirit and intrepidity ,
but it is stated that the young Delaware chief Nanowland , or George Wilson ,
distinguished himself in this enterprise.That camp-ground was in the northwestern corner of the tract subsequently
called �� Spring-field , �� several rods east of what was still more
recently the old steamboat wharf. The thicket into which the wounded escaped
was on the hill still higher up the creek than camp.The two prisoners that were here recaptured were Peter and Margaret Henry ,
children of Frederick Henry. They had been captives about two weeks before
they were recaptured. Peter settled in Butler county, Pa., and was a member of
Captain Brinker�s company in in the war of 1812 . He was a farmer, raised a
large family, and was highly respected . He died in his ninety-fourth year
1885. Peter Henry, Jr., of Brady�s Bend father-in-law of Andrew W. Bell was
one of his sons. Margaret married and lived in Westmoreland county, Pa. An
erroneous idea prevails among some of these captives� descendants that they
were recaptured at Brady�s Bend.MINISTERIAL DEFENDERS
During the French and Indian wars along the frontiers of Pennsylvania, the
services of everyone who could shoulder a musket were required. Clergymen of
various denominations entered the ranks and fought bravely to protect their
property and families. The Rev. Mr. Steele of Cumberland, Rev. Mr. Elder of
Lancaster, Rev. John Conrad Boucher of Harrisburg, Rev. Richard Peters of
Philadelphia, and Rev. Mr. Barton of York County, were all in active service
at the time of Colonel Armstrong�s campaign.Source: Page(s) 1-9, Armstrong County, Pa., Her People, Past and
Present, J. H. Beers & Co., 19114.
Transcribed July 1998 by Bonnie Schultz for the Armstrong County Smith
Project.
Contributed by Bonnie Schultz for use by the Armstrong County Genealogy
Project (http://www.pa-roots.com/armstrong/)Armstrong County Genealogy Project Notice:
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