and Creeks. The last Indian invasions of Kentucky occurred this year. General Wayne did not get ready for his grand expedition until the season was too far past for a campaign, and deferred it to the coming year. November 9, the first newspaper in Ohio was established at Cincinnati. It was called The Sentinel of the Northwestern Territory. Kentucky was actively organizing its State Government. Many new settlements were commenced, especially south of the Ohio. The Ohio settlers were in constant danger from the Indians.

1794.-Governor Simcoe, of Upper Canada, erected an English Fort at the rapids of the Maumee, in April of this year; agents of Spain stimulated the Indians to hostility to the United States, and French agents endeavored to organize an expedition among the Kentuckians to attack New Orleans. The growing importance of the United States in the Great Valley became more and more evident each year. The general government, through 1793, made every effort to procure a peaceable settlement with the Indians, which was one reason for the delay of General Wayne's attack; but the Indians insisted on the withdrawal of all settlers to the south of the Ohio, and effective negotiations failed.

July 26, 1600 Kentucky volunteers joined General Wayne's army, and, August 20, he defeated an Indian force of 2,000, after an hour's fight, and pursued them two miles, up to the guns of the British Fort. The battle ground was eleven miles southwest of Toledo. The Americans had thirty-three killed and 100 wounded.

For fourteen years the inhabitants of Middle Tennessee had been constantly exposed to the attacks of the Cherokees and Creeks. In numerous expeditions they had retaliated and preserved their settlements from total destruction. On the 13th of September, 1794, the inhabitants-who had been more than usually harassed, many families and individuals having been killed, and nearly all the horses in Middle Tennessee stolen-assembled to chastise them, invaded the Cherokee

FINAL CLOSE OF THE OLD INDIAN WARS.

237

towns, and fought a decisive battle, which procured a tolerable state of peace, lasting until the war of 1812. In this year a Territorial Assembly was first elected. It met at Knoxville, in February.

The General Government had much difficulty in restraining the tide of immigration on all the borders within the limits of purchases made from the Indians. The Georgians, especially, constantly pressed on the Creeks. Georgia claimed the whole territory lying west of it to the Mississippi River, and made treaties and sales of land in defiance of the Federal authorities, and to the intense disgust and rage of the Creeks. In this year Georgia sold large sections of Alabama and Mississippi to various land companies. The contracts were repealed by the next Legislature, but many hundreds of settlers had spread over portions of the lands. These held their ground, laying the permanent foundations of settlements in the territory, afterwards erected into those states; but, unhappily, the discontent of the Creeks, restrained for some years, and then inflamed by Tecumseh, produced the terrible retaliation of the Creek War of 1813 and 1814.

1795. The old Indian Wars were now brought to a close. August 3, all the tribes of the Upper Valley signed a treaty, at Greenville, Ohio, which continued in force until 1811, when Tecumseh united the tribes for another effort to preserve their hunting grounds.

With this year closed the perils from the Indians on the Ohio and its tributaries. Nearly the whole of the present state of Ohio was now open to peaceful settlement. Forts and settlements in Indiana on the Ohio, Wabash, and Maumee Rivers offered further security to Kentucky and Ohio, but the Indians were completely cowed, for the present, and heroism had henceforth only nature and the want of markets to struggle against.

It is remarkably characteristic of the native American that this deadly struggle had no depressing effect, but, on the con

trary, was a healthy stimulus to the new settlers. Every blow was returned with interest, all distress and trial was borne without murmuring, and the axe, the hoe, or the rifle were used in turn with equal cheerfulness and resolution. But it left a deep impression on the character of the people, which was intensified and developed by later circumstances and

events.

This period has been presented in the form of a condensed chronicle, to indicate the more important of the events that crowded it with excitement and showed the heroic daring of the first settlers. A detailed narrative would require too much space.

1

CHAPTER IX.

WHOLESALE SETTLEMENT UNDER DIFFICULTIES.

Kentucky became an independent State just before the close of the Indian War, and Tennessee just after. The early explorations had been made under imminent danger. Indeed, many of the first companions of Boone fell under the Indian gun or tomahawk before he took his family into the dangerous wilderness. Cabins were raised and cornfields cleared, planted and gathered while the exasperated Mingo chief, Logan, was taking a terrible vengeance for the brutal murder of his family, and the year following Kentucky received 500 settlers. These were the two Heroic States. The birth of their settlements occurred while the thunder of commencing war was rolling, peal after peal, from Lexington and Bunker Hill to Savannah, along the Atlantic coast. Their youth was passed under constant attacks from the Ohio Indians on the north and the Cherokees and Creeks on the south. In the meantime the new born states of the coast had their hands abundantly full in asserting independence of the strongest maritine power in the world, whose attacks were invited by a long line of unprotected

coast.

The heroes of the wilderness did not emigrate to fight the Indians, they would gladly have kept the peace, but their presence, and especially their agricultural clearings and comfortable log cabins, which indicated an intention to stay, were regarded by the tribes as a declaration of war. They could hope for no certain aid from the other side of the mountains. They might feel happy if they could obtain powder and ball to protect themselves. "But none of these things moved them." The fruitful soil, and sunny bottoms, and shady slopes drew them with an irresistible attraction. All that

was dear and valuable to them was in constant danger of sudden ruin from a foe that knew no pity and spared neither the harmless child, the helpless woman, nor the property he could not carry away. They were ever ready for a stout defense, to strike a quick, sharp blow and then to offer peace, that they might resume the axe and the hoe. They were neither fierce, revengeful nor melancholy. They bore up hardily against ill fortune, and cheerfully, even gaily, enjoyed all the good they could win and whatever sunshine fell to their lot. So the deeply tried pioneers held their ground, sent cheerful hails back across the mountains, and thousands, kindred to them in cheerful resolution and contempt of danger because they were strong in the hope soon to become prosperous farmers, constantly joined them.

Want of a standing body of soldiers to watch and ward off danger, want of means, and even of weapons and munitions of war, want of organization and authority to act when action was pressingly required, added unspeakably to their difficulties and calamities through the whole period. By the time these embarrassments were overcome through the state organizations, which permitted efficient action and prevision in their own behalf, the danger was over. They had borne patiently the fearful heat and burden of the day, and now they were at liberty to care for their individual, social and political interests without disturbance. The best lands had already been taken up, their healthy, bold and hardy children were thronging around them and immigration began to fill up all the corners and gaps between their settlements.

The new lands beyond the Ohio were now opened and the great and promising West began to attract New England. But the "Old Settlers," of ten or twelve years, who had cleared the way for two lusty young commonwealths, were still the heroes of toil, privation and labor. They hurried across the Ohio by thousands to commence anew on a still richer soil and under more favorable circumstances, and gave