Pioneers of the Old Southwest [33]
that Croghan and Lord Dunmore, the Governor of Virginia, were instigating the war appears to have arisen out of the conduct of Dr. John Connolly, Dunmore's agent and Croghan's nephew. Croghan had induced the Shawanoes to bring under escort to Fort Pitt certain English traders resident in the Indian towns. The escort was fired on by militiamen under command of Connolly, who also issued a proclamation declaring a state of war to exist. Connolly, however, probably acted on his own initiative. He was interested in land on his own behalf and was by no means the only man at that time who was ready to commit outrages on Indians in order to obtain it. As Croghan lamented, there was "too great a spirit in the frontier people for killing Indians."
Two hundred thousand acres in the West--Kentucky and West Virginia--had been promised to the colonial officers and soldiers who fought in the Seven Years' War. But after making the Proclamation the British Government had delayed issuing the patents. Washington interested himself in trying to secure them; and Lord Dunmore, who also had caught the "land-fever,"* prodded the British authorities but won only rebuke for his inconvenient activities. Insistent, however, Dunmore sent out parties of surveyors to fix the bounds of the soldiers' claims. James Harrod, Captain Thomas Bullitt, Hancock Taylor, and three McAfee brothers entered Kentucky, by the Ohio, under Dunmore's orders. John Floyd went in by the Kanawha as Washington's agent. A bird's-eye view of that period would disclose to us very few indeed of His Majesty's loving subjects who were paying any attention to his proclamation. Early in 1774, Harrod began the building of cabins and a fort, and planted corn on the site of Harrodsburg. Thus to him and not to Boone fell the honor of founding the first permanent white settlement in Kentucky
* See Alvord, "The Mississippi Valley in British Politics," vol. II, pp. 191-94.
When summer came, its thick verdure proffering ambuscade, the air hung tense along the border. Traders had sent in word that Shawanoes, Delawares, Mingos, Wyandots, and Cherokees were refusing all other exchange than rifles, ammunition, knives, and hatchets. White men were shot down in their fields from ambush. Dead Indians lay among their own young corn, their scalp locks taken. There were men of both races who wanted war and meant to have it--and with it the land.
Lord Dunmore, the Governor, resolved that, if war were inevitable, it should be fought out in the Indian country. With this intent, he wrote to Colonel Andrew Lewis of Botetourt County, Commander of the Southwest Militia, instructing him to raise a respectable body of troops and "join me either at the mouth of the Great Kanawha or Wheeling, or such other part of the Ohio as may be most convenient for you to meet me." The Governor himself with a force of twelve hundred proceeded to Fort Pitt, where Croghan, as we have seen, was extending his hospitality to eleven hundred warriors from the disaffected tribes.
On receipt of the Governor's letter, Andrew Lewis sent out expresses to his brother Colonel Charles Lewis, County Lieutenant of Augusta, and to Colonel William Preston, County Lieutenant of Fincastle, to raise men and bring them with all speed to the rendezvous at Camp Union (Lewisburg) on the Big Levels of the Greenbrier (West Virginia). Andrew Lewis summoned these officers to an expedition for "reducing our inveterate enemies to reason." Preston called for volunteers to take advantage of "the opportunity we have so long wished for...this useless People may now at last be oblidged to abandon their country." These men were among not only the bravest but the best of their time; but this was their view of the Indian and his alleged rights. To eliminate this "useless people," inveterate enemies of the white race, was, as they saw it, a political necessity and a religious duty. And we today who profit by their deeds dare not condemn them.
Fervor less solemn was aroused in other quarters by Dunmore's call to arms. At Wheeling, some eighty or
Two hundred thousand acres in the West--Kentucky and West Virginia--had been promised to the colonial officers and soldiers who fought in the Seven Years' War. But after making the Proclamation the British Government had delayed issuing the patents. Washington interested himself in trying to secure them; and Lord Dunmore, who also had caught the "land-fever,"* prodded the British authorities but won only rebuke for his inconvenient activities. Insistent, however, Dunmore sent out parties of surveyors to fix the bounds of the soldiers' claims. James Harrod, Captain Thomas Bullitt, Hancock Taylor, and three McAfee brothers entered Kentucky, by the Ohio, under Dunmore's orders. John Floyd went in by the Kanawha as Washington's agent. A bird's-eye view of that period would disclose to us very few indeed of His Majesty's loving subjects who were paying any attention to his proclamation. Early in 1774, Harrod began the building of cabins and a fort, and planted corn on the site of Harrodsburg. Thus to him and not to Boone fell the honor of founding the first permanent white settlement in Kentucky
* See Alvord, "The Mississippi Valley in British Politics," vol. II, pp. 191-94.
When summer came, its thick verdure proffering ambuscade, the air hung tense along the border. Traders had sent in word that Shawanoes, Delawares, Mingos, Wyandots, and Cherokees were refusing all other exchange than rifles, ammunition, knives, and hatchets. White men were shot down in their fields from ambush. Dead Indians lay among their own young corn, their scalp locks taken. There were men of both races who wanted war and meant to have it--and with it the land.
Lord Dunmore, the Governor, resolved that, if war were inevitable, it should be fought out in the Indian country. With this intent, he wrote to Colonel Andrew Lewis of Botetourt County, Commander of the Southwest Militia, instructing him to raise a respectable body of troops and "join me either at the mouth of the Great Kanawha or Wheeling, or such other part of the Ohio as may be most convenient for you to meet me." The Governor himself with a force of twelve hundred proceeded to Fort Pitt, where Croghan, as we have seen, was extending his hospitality to eleven hundred warriors from the disaffected tribes.
On receipt of the Governor's letter, Andrew Lewis sent out expresses to his brother Colonel Charles Lewis, County Lieutenant of Augusta, and to Colonel William Preston, County Lieutenant of Fincastle, to raise men and bring them with all speed to the rendezvous at Camp Union (Lewisburg) on the Big Levels of the Greenbrier (West Virginia). Andrew Lewis summoned these officers to an expedition for "reducing our inveterate enemies to reason." Preston called for volunteers to take advantage of "the opportunity we have so long wished for...this useless People may now at last be oblidged to abandon their country." These men were among not only the bravest but the best of their time; but this was their view of the Indian and his alleged rights. To eliminate this "useless people," inveterate enemies of the white race, was, as they saw it, a political necessity and a religious duty. And we today who profit by their deeds dare not condemn them.
Fervor less solemn was aroused in other quarters by Dunmore's call to arms. At Wheeling, some eighty or