Fort Wayne

“ A person might have remained in the woods within five or six miles of Fort Wayne for a year without being discovered by any government agent. It was the custom of the traders to bring whiskey in kegs and hide it in the woods about half a mile from the fort, a short time previous to the paying of the annuity, and when the Indians came to the fort, to give information to such of the Indians who could be confided in that there was whiskey to be had at those places. As soon as the Indians received their money they would go off to the appointed places. ”

“ Consequently, Fort Wayne was destined to remain until the end of that war primarily a government outpost of diplomacy, defense, and trade, represented by the Indian agency, the military garrison, and the government factory. There were a few farms of value, such as those of Wells and the officers, but while the land was fertile, the market was too distant for the crops to bring any considerable return. The civilians living in the neighborhood were, for the most part, French families who still found the fur trade profitable, along with a few American traders and sutlers. ”

“ The fort is now only a small stockade; no troops are stationed here, and less than thirty dwelling houses occupied by French and American families form the whole settlement. [6]
Riley added that the departure of the soldiers had left this little band of residents extremely lonely, but he predicted that as soon as the lands were opened for sale the settlers would flock to this region. The people living at Fort Wayne at this time had no right to the land and were considered as “squatters” by the government officials. ”

“ While the traders, large and small alike, were thus successfully evading any effective control over their operations, Fort Wayne was developing from a frontier army post and portage center into a very prosperous community. Its strategic location, the opening of a land office in 1822 and its selection as the county seat of Allen county brought many new settlers to the area. ”

“ From the beginning of Colonel Hunt’s administration in 1798 to the end of Captain Heald’s in 1810, the frontier was comparatively peaceful, especially until 1807. In that year signs of the forthcoming Indian difficulties began to appear, although the actual conflict did not break out until 1811, with the battle of Tippecanoe. In August 1796, Winthrop Sargent, the Secretary of the Northwest Territory, proclaimed the organization of Wayne county, with Fort Wayne on its southern boundary. ”

“ Meanwhile unaware that the siege of Fort Wayne had been lifted, the British commander at Detroit, Colonel Proctor, dispatched two hundred British regulars under Major Muir together with a thousand Indians under Captain Elliot to assist in taking Fort Wayne. Having brought their baggage and artillery up the Maumee as far as Fort Defiance, the British discovered the approach of Winchester’s stronger army. ”

“ He intends to return to Europe next year to explore still another aspect of history suggested by Fort Wayne’s story, the lives of French military officers who fought in the American Revolution. After that, he might consider a history of Fort Wayne in the railroad era, from 1855 (where Dr. Poinsatte’s work on the canal era ended) to the Progressive Era. Whatever the course of Professor Poinsatte’s future studies, Fort Wayne’s citizens will look forward to reading the results. He has already enriched our understanding of ourselves beyond measure. ”

“ Its strategic importance was recognized in all the plans for military campaigns in the area between the Great Lakes and the Ohio river for almost a century. Here was located at a later date an important government Indian agency, and to the town on certain days of the year flocked hundreds of Indian traders. Fort Wayne was also situated in the heart of the rich Maumee-Wabash fur producing region. ”

“ At this late date, however, Fort Wayne, looking at it in the cold, practical light of a middle-aged automobile tourist, offered but few titillations, either reminiscent or otherwise. Here it was, to me, sacred ground, and here had these various things occurred, yet as I viewed it now it seemed a rather dull, middle West town, with scarcely anything save a brisk commerce to commend it. Abroad one finds many cities of the same size of great interest, historically and architecturally—but here! ”

“ The government officials apparently accepted Harrison’s advice since the proposal to sell the Fort Wayne lands was laid aside. It is fortunate that this land was not sold, for it is unlikely that any farmers would have been attracted to this remote spot in northern Indiana during the forthcoming years of Indian difficulties on the frontier. If any settlers had come, it is doubtful that they could have survived the War of 1812. ”

“ Living within the fort were the wives and children of those married officers and men who chose to bring their families to the wilderness with them. In many respects these women shared the army life of their husbands. They were governed by the same military regulations, even receiving the same daily whiskey ration as did the men. The officers and their families generally came from an older and more formal society and carried into the rude barracks the manners and customs of the East. One of the commanders, Col. Hunt, brought his family directly to Fort Wayne from their Boston home. ”

“ Among these early settlers who found their way to Fort Wayne in 1819, was Samuel Hanna, pioneer trader, judge, legislator, canal builder, railroad enterpriser, and banker. In many respects, Samuel Hanna was to become Fort Wayne’s most active citizen as the small community grew from a mere village to a city during his lifetime. Born in Scott county, Kentucky, in October, 1797, and later moving to Dayton, Ohio, with his parents, he came to Fort Wayne from St. Mary’s Ohio, where he had been engaged in supplying goods for the government during the Indian treaties of 1818. ”

“ The fort was well provided for a siege, having in it one hundred men, plenty of provisions, ammunition, four small pieces of cannon, and a good well of water.
Fort Wayne is one of the most elegant situations I ever saw, and must be an important [17] place to the United States. Three weeks ago the neighborhood around the fort would have exhibited a pleasing prospect to those who had seen nothing for several days but a dreary wilderness of one hundred miles. A number of well-cultivated farms, with neat houses, in view of the fort, would have excited emotions of pleasure. ”

“ Glide along with all ease in the sweet dreamy breeze,
Like balloons in soft heavens of blue? [Pg 90]
Mother: Not there, my child, not there.
Fort Wayne is a hustling city, my dear,
On the banks of the old Maumee,
Where most of the folks are too busy to care
The beauties of nature to see.
'Tis a place where they all pay a tax, my dear,
For repairing the street, you know,
That they all may enjoy their bicycles, dear,
As "bumpety bump" they go. ”

“ Fort Wayne has street railroads, electric lights, sewerage system, improved waterworks, several National banks, and numerous daily, weekly, and monthly periodicals. Among the industries are extensive railroad, machine and repair shops which occupy many acres, flour mills, knitting mills, oil-tank works, and packing houses. ”

“ Wayne cut the Indian forces in two by feinting toward Miamitown, then moving between it and the English Fort Miami at the mouth of the Maumee. Before the various tribes could reorganize fully, the “Legion” turned on the Indian forces to the east. At Fallen Timbers, a short distance from Toledo, on August 20, 1794, Wayne’s army met and defeated the red men. The Indian power in the Northwest was for the time being shattered and Wayne moved down the Maumee to complete his task, the construction, near the site of the old Kiskakon, of a new American stronghold in the Northwest—Fort Wayne. ”

“ With the selection of Fort Wayne as the county seat and the improvement and sale of the public lands, new settlers began to arrive in 1824. One of these was Hugh Hanna, the brother of Samuel Hanna, who established the first cabinet and carpenter shop. The villagers were becoming prosperous enough to build more permanent homes and furnish them with better furniture. Chief Richardville and Samuel Hanna, following the best tradition in the East, imported most of their household furnishings from France. ”

“ With this eastern culture was added a certain punctilio, a natural consequence of military life. The officers’ families, together with those of government officials and more prominent 33 settlers, formed the elite of the American society at Fort Wayne. In 1807 Lieutenant Philip Ostrander, an officer at Fort Wayne, wrote to his friend, George Hoffman, collector for the government at Michilimackinac:
On my arrival at this post I was received with the utmost politeness by Captain Heald [the commandant] who continues to show me every flattering attention. ”

“ Curtis in his account of the siege of Fort Wayne states that many attempts were made to send messages through to Detroit, but that they all failed. [4] Earlier in the same day that Metea informed Bondie of the coming attack on Fort Wayne, Captain Rhea expressed the rather naive belief that the Potawatomies gathering about the fort intended to proceed to Piqua for a conference with the U. S. commissioners, and requested Governor Meigs of Ohio to send him instructions concerning the matter. ”

“ The area Dr. Poinsatte decided to study was Fort Wayne and not Detroit or Chicago or Cincinnati. Here what Nathaniel Hawthorne called “a sort of home-feeling with the past” worked its magic. Born in Fort Wayne in 1925, Charles Poinsatte was stirred by the names he heard as a boy, Little Turtle, Anthony Wayne, and George Rogers Clarke. Some family property was part of the old Richardville estate, and in his youth he explored an old Indian burial ground there. He has never gotten over his fascination with those men, and now he examines them with his academic tools. ”

“ On one occasion the traders combined against him to prevent the issuance of a presidential order curtailing the amount of whiskey brought to Fort Wayne.
Hays also urged the appointment of a sub-agent to assist him in controlling the situation, and the reestablishment of a military force at Fort Wayne. “It is neither [at] Chicago, Green Bay, Prairie du Chien, Falls of St. Anthony, Rock River, or any part of the Mississippi or even Michilimakanac ... that in my opinion a Military force would be more necessary.” [18] he wrote to John Calhoun. ”

“ It was fortunate that Wayne left a capable man in charge of Fort Wayne, as Hamtramck’s difficulties proved to be many. There still remained a great deal of work to be done in strengthening the fort, which was not completed until the following spring. The garrison was plagued by an epidemic of malaria fever during the first summer. This condition was made worse by the lack of quinine or any medical supplies. [8] During the winter, the men often went about in rags and tatters. Hamtramck was forced to permit them to cut up their blankets and turn them into over-coats. ”

“ Among others, I became a considerable purchaser of considerable public lands, for which I paid an extravagant price. One tract, near and adjoining the reservation for the agency, I paid $26 per acre for.... If a removal should take place, the Indians, as well as the inhabitants at Wayne, who have expended their all there, will be greatly disobliged. [5]
Judging from an earlier letter of McCorkle to Tipton, the former believed that the agent had misled him at the time the Fort Wayne lands were sold by the government. ”

“ I thought you were going to Fort Wayne."
She made no reply, but watched the four riders as they turned a little away from the lake and went south-west over the prairie. A pack horse, Black Partridge, and four other Indians were following them.
"What made you think I was going to Fort Wayne?" she asked.
"Nothing, only you had such a good start. Besides, you live there, don't you?"
"No," she said slowly, "I live here. I fought at Fort Wayne."
"Indeed!" remarked Ronald, with polite interest. "Indians or soldiers?" ”

“ Alice Williams Brotherton, the author of two volumes of verse, and a contributor to the periodicals, lived as a young woman at Cambridge, in the same county. Fort Wayne has always stood a little apart from the capital and the other towns lying nearer the Ohio. This has been due to its geographical position and direct railway connection with Chicago and the seaboard cities. Socially and commercially it has not been so intimately related to the capital as most of the other Indiana towns ”

“ The name of Allen county was suggested by John Tipton, who was an ardent admirer of Colonel John Allen, the gallant Kentuckian who, after aiding in the relief of Fort Wayne in 1812, lost his life at the battle of the River Raisin in Michigan.
Barr and McCorkle awaited the organization of the county government, after which they proceeded with the work of securing returns on their investments. At this time there were no streets beyond beaten paths and driveways which had, by chance, come into accepted use whenever one man chose to walk or drive over a route taken by another before him. ”

“ The little Wabash rises in an elevated swamp prairie six miles south of Fort Wayne, and joins the Wabash eighteen miles hence. Thus in high stages of water, a portage of only six miles carries merchandise from the level of the Maumee into the navigable waters of the Wabash (and vice versa) .” [5]
These observations by Riley on the possibility of a canal were supplemented in the same letter by his early impression of Fort Wayne as a future center of population. He stated to Mr. Sanford:
The country around Fort Wayne is very fertile. ”