34 DESTRUCTION OF SCHENECTADY. [BOOK I At 4 o'clock in the morning, the beginning of February, they arrived within two leagues of Schenectady. Here they halted, and the Great Agnier, chief of the Iroquois of the Falls of St. Louis, made a speech to them. He exhorted every one to forget the hardships they had endured, in the hope of avenging the wrongs they had for a long time suffered from the perfidious English, who were the authors of them; and in the close added, that they could not doubt of the assistance of Heaven against the enemies of God, in a cause so just. Hardly had they taken up their line of march, when they met 40 Indian women, who gave them all the necessary information for approaching the place in safety. A Canadian, named Giguiere, was detached immediately with nine Indians upon discovery, who acquitted himself to the entire satisfaction of his officers. He reconnoitred Schenectady at his leisure, and then rejoined his comrades. It had been determined by the party to put off the attack one day longer; but on the arrival of the scout under Giguiere, it was resolved to proceed without delay. Schenectady was then in form like that of a long square, and entered by two gates, one at each end. One opened towards Albany, the other upon the great road leading into the back country, and which was now possessed by the French and Indians. Mantet and St. Helene charged at the second gate, which the Indian women before mentioned had assured them was always open, and they found it so. D'Iberville and Repentigni passed to the left, in order to enter by the other gate, but, after losing some time in vainly endeavoring to find it, were obliged to return and enter with their comrades. The gate was not only open but unguarded, and the whole party entered without being discovered. Dividing themselves into several parties, they waylaid every portal, and then the war-whoop was raised. Mantet formed and attacked a garrison, where the only resistance of any account was made. The gate of it was soon forced, and all of the English fell by the sword, and the garrison was burned. Montigni was wounded, in forcing a house, in his arm and body by two blows of a halberd, which put him hors du combat; but St. Helene being come to his assistance, the house was taken, and the wounds of Montigni revenged by the death of all who had shut themselves up in it. Nothing was now to be seen but massacre and pillage in every place. At the end of about two hours, the chiefs, believing it due to their safety, posted bodies of guards at all the avenues, to prevent surprise, and the rest of the night was spent in refreshing themselves. Mantet had given orders that the minister of the place should be spared, whom he had intended for his own prisoner; but he was found among the promiscuous dead, and no one knew when he was killed, and all his papers were burned. After the place was destroyed, the chiefs ordered all the casks of intoxicating liquors to be staved, to prevent their men from getting drunk. They next set all the houses on fire, excepting that of a widow, into which Montigni had been carried, and another belonging to Major Coudre: they were in number about 40, all well built and furnished; no booty but that which could be easily transported was saved. The lives of about 60 persons were spared; chiefly women, children, and old men, who had escaped the fury of the onset, and 30 Indians who happened to be then in the place. The lives of the Indians were spared that they might carry the news of what had happened to their countrymen, whom they were requested to inform, that it was not against them that they intended any harm, but to the English only, whom they had now despoiled of property to the amount of four hundred thousand pounds. They were too near Albany to remain long among the ruins, and they decamped about noon. The plunder-Montigni, whom it was necessary to carry-the prisoners, who were to the number of 40-and the want of provisions, with which they had in their hurry neglected to provide themselves-retarded much their retreat. Many would have even died of famine, had they not had 50 horses, of which there remained but six when they CHAP. III.] MURDER OF MISS M'CREA. 35 arrived at Montreal, upon the 27 March following.* Their want of provisions obliged them to separate, and in an attack which was made upon one party, three Indians and six Frenchmen were killed or taken; an attack, which, for want of proper caution, cost the army more lives than the capture of Schenectady; in which they lost but two men, a Frenchman and an Indian. Murder of Miss Jane McCrea.-This young lady "was the second daughter of James McCrea, minister of Lamington, New Jersey, who died before the revolution. After his death, she resided with her brother, Colonel John McCrea of Albany, who removed in 1773 to the neighborhood of Fort Edward. His house was in what is now Northumberland, on the west side of the Hudson, three miles north of Fort Miller Falls. In July or August, 1777, being on a visit to the family of Mrs. McNeil, near Fort Edward, at the close of the week, she was asked to remain until Monday. On Sunday morning, when the Indians came to the house, she concealed herself in the cellar; but they dragged her out by the hair, and, placing her on a horse, proceeded on the road towards Sandy Hill. They soon met another party of Indians, returning from Argyle, where they had killed the family of Mr. Bains; these Indians disapproved the purpose of taking the captive to the British camp, and one of them struck her with a tomahawk and tore off her scalp. This is the account given by her nephew. The account of Mrs. McNeil is, that her lover, anxious for her safety, employed two Indians, with the promise of a barrel of rum, to bring her to him; and that, in consequence of their dispute for the right of conducting her, one of them murdered her. Gen. Gates, in his letter to Gen. Burgoyne of 2 September, says, 'she was dressed to receive her promised husband.' "Her brother, on hearing of her fate, sent his family the next day to Albany, and, repairing to the American camp, buried his sister, with one Lieutenant Van Vechten, three miles south of Fort Edward. She was 23 years old, of an amiable and virtuous character, and highly esteemed by all her acquaintance. It is said, and was believed, that she was engaged in marriage to Captain David Jones, of the British army, a loyalist, who survived her only a few years, and died, as was supposed, of grief for her loss. Her nephew, Colonel James McCrea, lived at Saratoga, in 1823."+ Under the name of Lucinda, Barlow has dwelt upon this murder in a strain that may be imitated, but not surpassed. We select from him as follows: "One deed shall tell what fame great Albion draws The poet then makes Lucinda, during a battle, wander from her home to watch her lover, whom he calls Heartly. She distinguishes him in the conflict, and, when his squadron is routed by the Americans, she proceeds to the contested ground, fancying she had seen him fall at a certain point. But "He hurries to his tent ;-oh, rage! despair! Had raved and wandered, till officious morn ⚫ There is no doubt but that they were obliged to subsist chiefly upon their horses. 36 HEROISM OF MRS. MERRIL.-WHITE INDIANS. With calculating pause and demon grin They seize her hands, and, through her face divine, With all the speed his wearied limbs could yield, He sunk, delirious, on her lifeless clay, And passed, in starts of sense, the dreadful day." [Book I. In a note to the above passages, Mr. Barlow says this tragical story of Miss McCrea is detailed almost literally. "Extraordinary instance of female heroism, extracted from a letter written by Col. James Perry to the Rev. Jordan Dodge, dated Nelson Co., Ky., 20 April, 1788."-"On the first of April inst., a number of Indians surrounded the house of one John Merril, which was discovered by the barking of a dog. Merril stepped to the door to see what he could discover, and received three musket-balls, which caused him to fall back into the house with a broken leg and arm. The Indians rushed on to the door; but it being instantly fastened by his wife, who, with a girl of about 15 years of age, stood against it, the savages could not immediately enter. They broke one part of the door, and one of them crowded partly through. The heroic mother, in the midst of her screaming children and groaning husband, seized an axe, and gave a fatal blow to the savage; and he falling headlong into the house, the others, supposing they had gained their end, rushed after him, until four of them fell in like manner before they discovered their mistake. The rest retreated, which gave opportunity again to secure the door. The conquerors rejoiced in their victory, hoping they had killed the whole company; but their expectations were soon dashed, by finding the door again attacked, which the bold mother endeavored once more to secure, with the assistance of the young woman. Their fears now came on them like a flood; and they soon heard a noise on the top of the house, and then found the Indians were coming down the chimney. All hopes of deliverance seemed now at an end; but the wounded man ordered his little child to tumble a couch, that was filled with hair and feathers, on the fire, which made such a smoke that two stout Indians came tumbling down into it. The wounded man, at this critical moment, seized a billet of wood, wounded as he was, and with it succeeded in despatching the half-smothered Indians. At the same moment, the door was attempted by another; but the heroine's arm had become too enfeebled by her over-exertions to deal a deadly blow. She however caused him to retreat wounded. They then again set to work to make their house more secure, not knowing but another attack would be made; but they were not further disturbed. This affair happened in the evening, and the victors carefully watched with their new family until morning. A prisoner, that escaped immediately after, said the Indian last mentioned was the only one that escaped. He, on returning to his friends, was asked, 'What news?" said, 'Plaguy bad news, for the squaws fight worse than the long-knives.' This affair happened at Newbardstown, about 15 miles from Sandy Creek, and may be depended upon, as I had the pleasure to assist in tumbling them into a hole, after they were stripped of their head-dresses, and about 20 dollars' worth of silver furniture." WELSH OR WHITE INDIANS. "Narrative of Capt. Isaac Stuart, of the Provincial Cavalry of South Carolina, taken from his own mouth, by I. C., Esq., March, 1782. "I was taken prisoner, about 50 miles to the westward of Fort Pitt, about 18 years ago, by the Indians, and carried to the Wabash, with other white men. They were executed, with circumstances of horrid barbarity; but it was my good fortune to call forth the sympathy of a good woman of the village, who was permitted to redeem me from those who held me prisoner, by giving them a horse as a ransom. After remaining two years in bondage, a Spaniard came to the nation, having been sent from Mexico on discoveries. CHAP. III.] WHITE INDIANS. 37 He made application to the chiefs of the Indians for hiring me, and another white man who was in the like situation, a native of Wales, and named John Davey, which was complied with. We took our departure and travelled to the westward, crossing the Mississippi near Red River, up which we travelled upwards of 700 miles. Here we came to a nation of Indians remarkably white, and whose hair was of a reddish color, at least, mostly so. They lived on a small river which emptied itself into Red River, which they called the River Post; and in the morning, the day after our arrival, the Welshman informed me that he was determined to remain with the nation of Indians, giving as a reason that he understood their language, it being very little different from the Welsh. My curiosity was excited very much by this information, and I went with my companion to the chief men of the town, who informed him, in a language that I had no knowledge of, and which had no affinity with that of any other Indian tongue that I ever heard, that the forefathers of this nation came from a foreign country, and landed on the east side of the Mississippi (describing particularly the country now called West Florida); and that, on the Spaniards taking possession of the country, they fled to their then abode; and, as a proof of what they advanced, they brought out rolls of parchment wrote with blue ink, at least it had a bluish cast. The characters I did not understand, and the Welshman being unacquainted with letters of any language, I was not able to know what the meaning of the writing was. They were a bold, hardy, intrepid people, very warlike, and their women were beautiful, compared with other Indians." Thus we have given so much of Captain Stuart's narrative as relates to the WHITE INDIANS. The remainder of it is taken up in details of several excur sions, of many hundred miles, in the interior of the continent, without any extraordinary occurrence, except the finding of a gold mine. He returned by way of the Mississippi, and was considered a man of veracity by the late Lieutenant-colonel Cruger, of South Carolina, who recommended him to the gentleman who communicated his narrative. I had determined formerly to devote a chapter to the examination of the subject of the White Indians; but, on reference to all the sources of information in my possession, I found that the whole rested upon no other authority than such as we have given above, and therefore concluded to give the most interesting parts of the accounts without comment, and let the reader draw his own conclusions. There seem to have been a good many accounts concerning the White Indians in circulation about the same period, and the next we shall notice is found in Mr. Charles Beatty's journal, the substance of which is as follows: At the foot of the Alleghany Mountains, in Pennsylvania, Mr. Beatty stopped at the house of a Mr. John Miller, where he "met with one Benjamin Sutton, who had been taken captive by the Indians, and had been in different nations, and lived many years among them. When he was with the Choctaws, at the Mississippi River, he went to an Indian town, a very considerable distance from New Orleans, whose inhabitants were of different complexions, not so tawny as those of the other Indians, and who spoke Welsh. He saw a book among them, which he supposed was a Welsh Bible, which they carefully kept wrapped up in a skin, but they could not read it; and he heard some of those Indians afterwards, in the lower Shawanee town, speak Welsh with one Lewis, a Welshman, captive there. This Welsh tribe now live on the west side of the Mississippi, a great way above New Orleans." At Tuscarora valley he met with another man, named Levi Hicks, who had been a captive from his youth with the Indians. He said he was once attending an embassy at an Indian town, on the west side of the Mississippi, where the inhabitants spoke Welsh, "as he was told, for he did not understand them" himself. An Indian, named Joseph Peepy, Mr. Beatty's interpreter, said he once saw some Indians, whom he supposed to be of the same tribe, who talked Welsh. He was sure they talked Welsh, for he had been acquainted with Welsh people, and knew some words they used. To the above Mr. Beatty adds: "I have been informed, that many years ago, a clergyman went from Britain to Virginia, and having lived some time there, went from thence to S. Carolina; but after some time, for some reason, 38 WHITE; INDIANS. [BOOK I. he resolved to return to Virginia, and accordingly set out by land, accompanied with some other persons. In travelling through the back parts of the country, which was then very thinly inhabited, he fell in with a party of Indian warriors, going to attack the inhabitants of Virginia. Upon examining the clergyman, and finding he was going to Virginia, they looked upon him and his companions as belonging to that province, and took them all prisoners, and told then they must die. The clergyman, in preparation for another world, went to prayer, and, being a Welshman, prayed in the Welsh language. One or more of the Indians was much surprised to hear him pray in their own language. Upon this they spoke to him, and finding he could understand them, got the sentence of death reversed, and his life was saved. They took him with them into their country, where he found a tribe whose native language was Welsh, though the dialect was a little different from his own, which he soon came to understand. They showed him a book, which he found to be the Bible, but which they could not read; and on his reading and explaining it, their regard for him was much heightened." After some time, the minister proposed to these people to return to his own country, and promised to return again to them with others of his friends, who would instruct them in Christianity; but not long after his return to England, he died, which put an end to his design. It is very natural to inquire how these Indians, though descended from the Welsh, came by books; for it is well known that the period at which the Welsh must have come to America, was long before printing was discovered, or that any writings assumed the form of books as we now have them. It should be here noted that Mr. Beatty travelled in the autumn of 1766. Major Rogers, in his "Concise Account of North America," published in 1765, notices the White Indians; but the geography of their country he leaves any where on the west of the Mississippi; probably never having visited them himself, although he tells us he had travelled very extensively in the interior. "This fruitful country," he says, "is at present inhabited by a nation of Indians, called by the others, the White Indians, on account of their complexion; they being much the fairest Indians on the continent. They have, however, Indian eyes, and a certain guilty Jewish cast with them. This nation is very numerous, being able to raise between 20 and 30,000 fighting men. They have no weapons but bows and arrows, tomahawks, and a kind of wooden pikes, for which reason they often suffer greatly from the eastern Indians, who have the use of fire-arms, and frequently visit the white Indians on the banks of the easterly branch, [of Muddy River?] and kill or captivate them in great numbers. Such as fall alive into their hands, they generally sell for slaves. These Indians live in large towns, and have commodious houses; they raise corn, tame the wild cows, and use both their milk and flesh; they keep great numbers of dogs, and are very dextrous in hunting; they have little or no commerce with any nation that we at present are acquainted with." In the account of Kentucky, written in 1784, by an excellent writer, Mr. John Filson, we find as follows:-After noticing the voyage of Madoc, who with his ten ships with emigrants sailed west about 1170, and who were, according to the Welsh historians, never heard of after, he proceeds ::-"This account has at several times drawn the attention of the world; but as no vestiges of them had then been found, it was concluded, perhaps too rashly, to be a fable, or at least that no remains of the colony existed. Of late years, however, the western settlers have received frequent accounts of a nation, inhabiting at a great distance up the Missouri, in manners and appearance resembling the other Indians, but speaking Welsh, and retaining some ceremonies of the Christian worship; and at length this is universally believed there to be a fact. Capt. Abraham Chaplain, of Kentucky, a gentleman whose veracity may be entirely depended upon, assured the author that in the late war [revolution] being with his company in garrison, at Kaskaskia, some Indians came there, and, speaking the Welsh dialect, were perfectly understood and conversed with by two Welshmen in his company, and that they informed them of the situation of their nation as mentioned above." Henry Ker, who travelled among 13 tribes of Indians in 1810, &c., names one near a great mountain which he calls Mnacedeus. He said Dr. Sibley |