J. Seymour Currey

“ When at length the Indian tribes became assured that war between the English and the Americans was about to follow, it was readily seen that they would act for their own interests, and that they would be found opposed to the Americans. The sympathies of the tribes were plainly with the English by reason of the fact that the latter were more liberal in making presents to them than the Americans were. Every year the Indians gathered at Maiden, opposite Detroit, to receive presents both useful and ornamental. ”

“ On the fourteenth, the day before that decided upon for the evacuation, the general despondency was relieved by the arrival of « 117 » Captain William Wells from Fort Wayne at the head of a band of about thirty friendly Indians of the Miami tribe mounted on ponies. Captain Wells will always be classed among the heroic figures of the time. He was then in the prime of life, a man about forty years of age, and known throughout the frontier as a "perfect master of everything pertaining to Indian life both in peace and war, and withal a stranger to personal fear." ”

“ Black Partridge replied, "Then make all speed to the house; your friend is in danger, and you alone can save him."
Sauganash, also known as Billy Caldwell, was a half-breed and was a chief of the Potawatami tribe, and a man of great influence among the Indians. He was not present at the evacuation and massacre of the day before, but had come in time to save the lives of many of the prisoners. With him had come the chief Shabbona, who also used his influence in moderating the brutality of the younger members of the tribes. ”

“ Boat navigation was the main reliance for transporting men and goods, though as yet there was not a sufficiently large number of boats of any description on Lake Michigan to have moved so large a body of men and women at one time as composed the procession leaving the fort. And even if there had been enough of such as were used by the traders, it is not likely that the people would have been permitted by the hostile Indians even to embark in them. ”

“ But so far as the portage at Chicago was concerned this change of sovereignty made little difference. What with the constant strife among the savage tribes whose normal condition was that of warfare, and the dangers to the whites caused by the neglect of military protection, the region was left a solitude; and the few references to its existence during a hundred years indicate confused relations between the tribes and the few whites who ventured to visit the region. The sovereignty of the western country again changed in 1783, this time from the British to the American Government. ”

“ Possessing a perfect knowledge of the character and disposition of the Indians, derived from his long residence among them, Wells foresaw that the savages would take quick advantage of the whites should they leave the shelter of the fort walls and expose themselves in the open on their long slow march of a hundred and fifty miles to Fort Wayne. ”

“ One of them, the Frenchman Debou, remarked to Liberty White: "I do not like the appearance of the Indians; they are none of our folks. I know by their dress and paint that they are not Potawatamis." Another one of the white men, the discharged soldier, then said to the boy Lee: "If that is the case we had better get away from them if we can. Say nothing, but do as you see me do."
As the afternoon was then far advanced, the discharged soldier passed out of the house and walked in a deliberate manner down the path toward the canoes tied up at the river bank, accompanied by the boy Lee. ”

“ The boat containing the Kinzie family and the servants accompanying them at first kept near the mouth of the river, the occupants watching the troops and the wagon train passing along the beach toward the south. They heard the discharge of the guns when the Indians attacked, and the boat's course was directed so as to approach as nearly as possible to the scene of the fighting. They saw a woman on horseback led by an Indian not far from the edge of the water.
"That is Mrs. Heald," cried Mrs. Kinzie. "That Indian will kill her. ”

“ It was not until February, 1809, that Illinois Territory was organized, with Ninian Edwards as the first Governor. No civil government was in existence at Chicago; the first authority, as at all frontier posts, was military. The only people here during the period of which we are writing, besides the few traders we have mentioned and their helpers, were the officers and soldiers of Fort Dearborn, and they were of course under military authority and discipline. ”

“ The few inhabitants of the place living outside the fort, consisting of discharged soldiers and half-breeds, now took measures to defend themselves against a possible attack from the Indians, which they fully expected to follow. They planked up the long piazzas of the Agency House, which stood a short distance west of the fort on the bank of the river, and cut loopholes through the planks for use of musketry. Greater watchfulness was exercised by the garrison, and every preparation was made to resist attack. ”

“ In that war the Indians were generally found fighting on the side of their English friends.
Another cause of the hostility shown by the Indians toward the Americans was the constant irritation created in their minds after treaties had been concluded. These treaties, though formally agreed to by the chiefs representing their tribes, were often regarded by the Indians as without validity for one reason or another. Indeed, the Indians were not without grievances against the Americans, some real and others conjured up and distorted by wrong-headed leaders among them. ”

“ After the destruction of Fort Dearborn, Chicago ceased for a time to be a fit dwelling-place for white men and their families. It continued in this condition with but little change for the following four years, and then the troops came back. Meanwhile peace had been concluded between the two warring nations, treaties of peace and friendship had been made with various tribes of Indians, and a new era began.
During the winter succeeding the battle and massacre the only two residents of Chicago who were householders were Ouilmette and Du Pin. ”

“ The War of 1812, between the United States and Great Britain, was actually begun some time before the date of the declaration of war issued by the United States, on June 12, 1812; and it was continued some time after the treaty of peace had been signed, December 24, 1814. Of this war, the Fort Dearborn massacre on August 15, 1812, was one of the disastrous events.
"The lives of thirty thousand Americans," says Larned, "were sacrificed during this war of two and a half years, and the national debt was increased one hundred millions of dollars." ”

“ After the council he had an interview with Captain Heald and earnestly tried to convince him of the utter worthlessness of the promises made by the Indians. He reminded him of the many instances of hostility shown by them during the past year, especially by the Wabash Indians, with whom the Potawatamis were closely associated; and that it had become the settled policy of the Americans to withhold from the savages whatever would aid them in carrying on warfare against the scattered white inhabitants of the frontier ”

“ Indians now held, thus having reversed the positions which the opposing forces occupied at the beginning of the battle.
There was nothing now to prevent the savages from attacking the wagons containing the women and children. The troops were isolated on the prairie and could not even defend themselves, much less could they do anything to protect the helpless people in the wagons.
Meantime Captain Wells was fighting, Indian fashion, and doing more execution than any other man on the field. Mounted on horseback, he freely exposed himself wherever the combat was most furious. ”

“ This tragic affair was witnessed by the people at the fort, and by a half-breed woman who was a servant in the Kinzie family from the door of the Kinzie house. As Lalime had many friends at the fort who at first thought that Mr. Kinzie had attacked him without provocation there was a movement to take Kinzie into custody; and fearing that a squad would be sent for this purpose, he concealed himself in the woods near his house, and soon after embarked in a boat with an Indian guide for Milwaukee, where one of his trading posts was located. ”

“ The Potawatami escort had in fact become the attacking party, choosing to murder the whites rather than join in looting the fort.
The Indians could now be seen in great numbers coming into view from behind the mounds of sand, their heads bobbing up and down "like turtles out of the water." The troops were promptly formed and they had no sooner taken position than the Indians began firing upon them with deadly effect, the first victim being a veteran of seventy years of age. ”

“ Helm's lifelong experience with the Indians, though she was much younger than himself, he said to her: "Do you think they will take our lives? I am badly wounded, but I think not mortally. Perhaps we might purchase our lives by promising them a large reward. ”

“ After delivering up their arms, the survivors were taken back to the encampment of the Indians near the fort, and distributed among the different tribes. The number of their warriors, Heald said, was between four hundred and five hundred, mostly of the Potawatami nation, and the loss on their side was about fifteen. There were about sixty of the whites killed in the battle and the massacre which followed, but when the troops surrendered and the Indians promised that the lives of the survivors should be spared, it was found that the savages regarded the wounded as exempted from this condition. ”

“ M. du Pin, being a man of discernment, "entertained some fears," continues the Wau-Bun account, "that the chief's honorable resolution might not hold out, to leave it to the lady herself whether to accept his addresses or not, so he entered at once into a negotiation for her ransom, and so effectually wrought upon the good feelings of Black Partridge that he consented to bring his fair prisoner at once to Chicago, that she might be restored to her friends." ”

“ The Potawatamis were the principal tribe of Indians met with by the whites in the vicinity of Fort Dearborn in 1803, and they continued here until their final removal to their new reservations in 1835. Other tribes were represented by occasional parties camping in their wigwams on the banks of the river near the fort. Among such visitors were Winnebagoes, Miamis, Ottawas, and Chippewas.
When the early explorers passed over the Chicago Portage more than a century before, they found the Illinois Indians in possession of most of the territory of what is now the northern portion of Illinois ”

“ Forays and attacks, sporadic expeditions of the savages for purposes of plunder or the taking of the scalps of settlers, were continually reported throughout the years 1811 and 1812. One of the causes of war recited by President Madison in his message to Congress just previous to the declaration of war against England was the attacks of the savages upon the frontier settlements incited by British traders, "a warfare," said the President, "which is known to spare neither age nor sex, and distinguished by features peculiarly shocking to humanity." ”

“ Joseph trading post or travel to Detroit.
All this had been foreseen by the older and wiser men among them, but the hot-blooded young men of the tribes were intent on plunder and the ghastly trophies represented by the scalps of their victims, and they could not be restrained. There was now little inducement to visit the post at Chicago; consequently the great numbers that formerly assembled in the neighborhood scattered to remote places and eked out a precarious existence by fishing and hunting. ”

“ It was afterward learned through traders out in the Indian country that the perpetrators of this bloody deed were a band of Winnebago Indians who came into this neighborhood to "take some white scalps." Their plan had been to massacre all the men at the farm and then proceed down the river and kill every white man who could be found outside the walls of the fort. ”

“ It should not be forgotten that De Soto, a Spanish explorer, had discovered the Mississippi at a point not far from the present city of Memphis, in the year 1541, a hundred and thirty-two years before the voyage of Joliet and Marquette; but the knowledge of that discovery had faded from men's minds. They actually passed over the spot where De Soto had crossed the river in the previous century, though apparently they were not aware of that fact, for no mention is made in Marquette's journal of De Soto or his discovery. ”

“ But notwithstanding the astonishment of the Indians, it was probably not the first time that sailing vessels had visited the shores of the future site of Chicago. William Burnett, the trader at St. Joseph before referred to, in writing to a merchant in Mackinac in 1786, makes a request that a vessel be sent to St. Joseph to take on board a quantity of grain, and further says regarding the expected vessel, "If she is to come to Chicago you can very likely get her to stop at the mouth of the « 25 » river"—that is, the St. Joseph River. ”