Arrowmaker (Pennsylvania Frontier Series)

by Roy F. Chandler

  Rob Shatto would have none of it. While his neighbors wore their liberty caps and cursed George the Third as a fool and a knave, Rob worked long hours at his forge repairing the rifles and muskets they would carry to their battles. But, Rob said little about his own intent, and when his neighbors’ war fevers mounted high, the scar across his forehead seemed to give his expression an even more quizzical look.

  The valley fumed at his apparent unconcern. Rob gave his reasoning, and although they did not like it much, there was no way to sensibly answer.

  Rob would say, “Back when the Shawnee were scalping and murdering here in the valley, we all fought for our places. Our women fought, and even our children loaded if they were big enough. The people along the coast would not help a lick. They would not even send us powder and shot. Well, maybe that was all right, the fighting did not affect them any. But now that the battles are in their towns and their fields, it is their turn to halloo for our help. And, maybe that’s all right, too, but until I hear about all of them pitching into this war, I’m not going!

  “Now, I’ve looked into this maybe a little closer than some others. Right now, there’s over two million people in these thirteen colonies. Know how many men are fighting with General George? Well, it’s about ten thousand, this year. Why there’s more than that many able-bodied men right in Philadelphia alone, still earning a living, and not doin’ much of anything to help out.

  “I’m told the Bay Colony has more’n three hundred thousand people in it. An’ Virginia, Lord! There’s more than a half million people living there. Why, if the common folks of Philadelphia, New York, Boston, and Baltimore, plus a lot of other known places like Charleston, Providence, Camden, or Dorchester went slam-bang into those lobster backs, old General Howe, Clinton, or anybody else would be in their boats and gone back to England.

  “But, that ain’t the way it is. For the most part, they’re lettin’ the British in among ‘em and lettin’ the war bother them as little as they can while they’re asking others to come in and do their bleeding for them.

  “So, until all those men wearin’ boiled shirts and living comfortably start shooting back their own selves and quit depending on a few to do it for them, I ain’t going!”

  Andrew Shatto went. He went as a private in Will Bratton’s company of riflemen and served through the entire war before he came home to the Little Buffalo. Rob saw him off, proud of his tall son, but fearful for his safety. And, he welcomed his return in 1782 much as a prodigal son.

  In 1778 James Cummens came for Rob’s help, and as Blue Moccasin, he and Quehana traveled within the Iroquois nations speaking for peace and warning of the confederacy’s certain destruction if the Iroquois rose against those who lived around them.

  Belated word of Sattelihu’s death reached them, but only Rob felt the loss. Montour had died of a common illness they said. Croghan had withdrawn from the frontier and was squatting on a farm in New York.

  Rob had barely digested Montour’s death when Flat came wailing to the house, and William Sweet Miller, who had died peacefully in his sleep, took his place on the burial knoll. Flat moved back into the big house, and George moved his family to the cabin. The place seemed empty without Will at hand. He had been a good companion, and Rob missed his easy ways and certain support.

  It seemed to Rob that everybody he had ever cared about was passing away. Rob Shatto was forty-five years old, and he could feel the years slipping away.

  Rob spent less time farming or working at the forge. He roamed widely through the hills hunting and dropping in unexpectedly at other places. He missed the hard old men. Croghan, Sattelihu, and Will—all gone. Often his thoughts turned to Shikee and the early times. He wondered if he was getting old.

  In July of seventy-eight, Indians and British rangers swept down the North Branch of the Susquehanna River and slaughtered hundreds of settlers in the Wyoming Valley. The Indians were Iroquois and Huron. uronHHThey claimed over two hundred scalps from the Wilkes-barre area. Sherman’s Valley again looked to its defenses, and men who had talked of going to the Continental Army turned their eyes toward the frontier.

  Late in the war, Simon Girty’s name appeared. Captives released or escaped from British Indians told and repeated tales of Girty’s renegade activities in torturing whites and raising tomahawks against the settlements. In their telling, Girty seemed to have gone bad, Rob wondered at some of the tales, but let them be. Girty’s range was far to the west of Sherman’s Valley.

  34

  1780 - Simon Girty

  Rob was squirrel hunting when a wren twittered in the brush. The tone was not right, and silent as a lynx Rob faded behind a beech—rifle poised and his eyes searching. A voice called, “Mister Shatto, can we talk?”

  Rob answered, “Say your name.”

  “It’s me, Simon Girty.”

  “Heard Simon was near Detroit.”

  “Nope, it’s me alright, Mister Shatto. ‘Member our talk in the cave at the half-falls when I was only a younker?”

  “I remember, but show yourself careful now.”

  Girty emerged from the thicket and laid his rifle aside. He stepped away from the gun and squatted, drawing pipe and tobacco from his pouch.

  Rob studied him carefully. Girty’s reputation was that of an enemy. Rob saw a dark haired man of medium build. His buckskins were travel-stained and, Rob judged, Huron-made. His hair hung straight to his shoulders, and a stubble of beard covered his face. He moved with the same easy grace and economy of motion he had as a boy. Rob was sure the man was Girty.

  Simon Girty was said to have been present at the torture of whites. Some said he participated himself. None denied his close British ties, and most branded Girty a murderer.

  Decoration on Girty’s Huron clothing was Seneca, and as Rob recalled it, that tribe of warriors had kept Girty for two years after his capture at Fort Granville in 1756. Simon Girty was more than familiar with the tribes.

  Rob moved into the open and squatted beside Girty but made no move to lay aside his own rifle, merely propping it against a nearby tree.

  Simon examined him keenly as though experiencing again a fond but distant memory. He rocked back on his heels the better to see Rob’s pistol holstered at his back and chuckled in recognition of Rob’s persistence in wearing the gun. They shared Girty’s pipe, and Rob enjoyed the tangy bite of Kinnikinnick. He had long been without the herb flavored leaf and thought he might just mix himself a batch.

  Rob broke their silence. “You’re lookin’ well, Simon. The years have treated you kindly.”

  “An’ you, Mister Shatto. Ya look no different than last I saw ya. How long now … more’n twenty years, ain’t it?”

  “Yep, it’s been a while. Now tell me what brings you east. It should be important; many would shoot Simon Girty dead, given the chance.”

  Girty seemed to brood a moment, as though weighing Rob’s words.

  “Hard to believe I growed up jest over that ridge a-piece. Been livin’ with the tribes so long I don’t ‘spect I’ll ever get to settle an’ farm my own ground. An’ if’n I do, it’ll have to be up north o’Detroit where I’m knowed. ‘Course, you’re right; folks in these parts ‘d slit my throat fer me in a minute.

  “Fact is, that’s why I’m here callin’ on you, that is.”

  “What do you want of me, Simon?”

  “Well, Mister Shatto, I’ll have to go back a spell ta explain it all.

  “When old Fort Granville fell in fifty-six, we’uns got all split up. Jim went to the Shawnee, George got lucky an’ was sent to the Delaware, an’ I lived with the Seneca people. Maw got let go an’ come east. Me an’ Jim ain’t seen her since.

  “Well, I always figured on comin’ back an’ visitin’ her, but one thing an’ another, I never made it. Well, word got sent by people I can trust that I’d better get back if I’m goin’a. Guess she ain’t too good, gettin’ old an’ all.”

  Rob could imagine word being sent to Girty, even to the furthe
st frontier. Many colonials were still loyal to the crown. With little choice, they hid their feelings and proclaimed the King’s cause only within their own loyalist circles.

  Rob looked inquiringly at Girty, still not knowing the man’s wishes.

  “Well,” Girty continued, “Ain’t been no trouble gettin’ ta here. But on east is another matter. Fact is, Mister Shatto, I need a place to leave my skins. I need common clothes an’ ta have my hair trimmed an’ get the Injun smell off a’ me. I need a horse, so’s I can move across the country like I belonged, ‘stead o’slippin’ through the woods an’ all.”

  Rob whistled softly through his teeth. “You ask a great deal, Simon.”

  “Shore, I know I do. It ain’t that I’m short o’coin, I’ve got gold ta pay for everythin’, but I daren’t be seen till I’m fixed so no one would recognize me as Simon Girty.”

  The man’s dilemma was plain. Who else along the frontier could Simon even know? If Rob refused help, Girty would no doubt attempt to work his way through the woods, and Rob did not doubt his ability to succeed with woe unto anyone attempting to interfere.

  Although he could sympathize with Girty’s wish to see his aging mother, Rob was not certain of his own desire to involve himself with the man.

  “I see your problems, Simon, but there are stories that you kill and torture white captives and encourage Indians to massacre and war. Some say you are the worst renegade on the border, Simon. I would like to hear of these matters as you see them.”

  Again Girty pondered a moment. His lips turned rueful, and he said, “Fact is, Mister Shatto, I am a British agent, same as Croghan was or like ol’ Sattelihu, ‘fore he died.

  “Fact is, I live most o’the time with the tribes. ‘Course, I try to keep ‘em on the British side. I bring ‘em gifts, an’ powder, an’ guns. Mostly, I talk with ‘em-tellin’ ‘em the way things is. Cripes, that ‘ar is what a agent is fer!”

  “Bein’ out in the lodges, I often been ‘round when a prisoner was brung in. T’ain’t purty or nice, o’course. You know how Injuns is well as I do. When their blood’s up, there ain’t no talkin’ with ‘em.

  “Yep, I been there many a time when whites was tortured or killed. Mostly I can’t help ‘em. Them warriors’d turn on me in a instant if I was to interfere. ‘Casionally, I do get a prisoner off. Got a few sent ta Detroit for exchange. Fact is, them’s probably the ones who bad-mouth me worst. Most o’the others is daid!”

  Girty’s story ran true. Aroused Indians were not to be reasoned with by any white man, no matter how close he stood in the council.

  Girty continued, “I don’t hold with torturin’, but Injuns do, an’ I cain’t do nothin’ about that. One time I got chose for the honor of finishin’ off a nearly dead white who’d been worked on for some days. I figure I did the poor devil a favor by sinkin’ a tomahawk in his skull an’ endin’ his misery. ‘Side from that, I’ve just been lookin’ on. An’ that’s the truth of it, as shore as I’m Simon Girty that ya’ve knowed all these years.”

  William Miller’s old suit fit Girty well. In Miller’s boots and clothes, his hair trimmed and parted in the middle, the clean-shaven Girty looked anything but a woods-running renegade.

  Except for the long knife common to most travelers, Girty went unarmed and rode Rob’s horse on a leather saddle. He rode south with their good wishes, for his mission was peaceful, and he planned no harm.

  Rebecca had been first intrigued by the presence of the renegade Simon Girty in her home. Her confidence in Rob was such that she had no worry that a man about whom terrible tales were told might slay them in their beds. If Rob spoke for Girty, then the man was welcome.

  During the two days it required to change the border ruffian into a common villager, Becky found him kindly with his own innate courtesy. An unlettered man, Simon’s language was atrocious. They warned him to avoid mixing his half-dozen Indian tongues in his speech, and he tried with some success.

  While Girty was gone, Flat undertook to clean and repair his buckskins. She tittered over the unattractive Seneca decorations and added tasteful Delaware paint and quills where she could. Rob worked over Girty’s rifle. He replaced the frizzen, installed a new trigger, and freshed the bore. He replaced Simon’s bullet mold with one that dropped a proper ball for the new rifling, and filled his shot pouch and both powder horns. The Shattos then set Girty’s things aside for his return—if he made his journey in safety.

  Traveling under a false name, Girty completed his trip in four weeks. He returned to the Little Buffalo content. Even the horse looked better for its regular exercise.

  Girty spoke with amazement of the growth of the country. Villages had sprung up at every road crossing. He had studied on the war and English hopes as he had traveled, and he admitted both to himself and to the Shattos that British victory was improbable—in the long run. The colonies were growing too large, the distances were too great, and British attention was too often diverted elsewhere. Girty thought he would remain in the west and come no more to the settled colonies.

  Aware that his presence, if detected, could require lengthy explanations and ill-feeling among Rob’s neighbors, Girty did not linger. He dressed in his refurbished skins and gripped his rebuilt rifle. His handclasp with Rob was Indian and was held long after whites would have become embarrassed and withdrawn. Their feelings flowed through their hands, and each understood the other.

  Simon Girty faded into the trees as he had come. Rob heard the wren call, this time clear and perfect. He answered with his own, and Girty was gone. Rob pondered the circumstances that had brought their paths together over the long years. Most would condemn his help to Girty, but Rob Shatto thought the untutored woodsman much more of a man than many who cursed him.

  35

  1805 - The New Gun

  1805 was a special year. It did not rain at all until the fall. Fortunately, it was a cool spring and summer or the forest might have died.

  As it was, few crops grew, and the fields blew their good soil away. Terrible fires scarred distant mountains, and the air often filled with ash and smoke. Rumors of Indians firing the forests traveled among newer farmers, but most thought heat lightning started the blazes.

  Throughout Sherman’s Valley, farmers complained of their springs and wells drying up. The Juniata River was mostly a series of puddles, and an enormous fish kill drew thousands of buzzards and coyotes. Wolves returned in some numbers, but the fish rotted, and the animals again disappeared. The north fork of the Little Buffalo was bone dry, but although his stream ran low, the springs feeding Rob’s branch never faltered.

  By mid-summer, the fish had been dead long enough to ease the smell along the river, and Rob thought it a good time to make a few visits beyond his valley.

  He really had little to do, anyway. George ran both mills more efficiently than Rob could have, and there were more than enough grown-up grandchildren to tend both fields and stock.

  Of course, he enjoyed sitting with Becky and looking over the valley. In the evening, lights from their children’s cabins rimmed the valley as though guarding his borders against intruders. He liked visiting and seeing their progress in clearing and building. He encouraged them to buy land, preferably bordering his own, and he loaned them needed money but insisted on repayment as a matter of principle.

  Except for a pair of late arrivals, their grandchildren were mostly grown and great grandchildren were appearing with astonishing frequency. There seemed to be Shattos everywhere he turned. They were calling the new village at the foot of Kittatinny Shermansdale, but at the rate his people were moving over there and hatching new broods, he thought they might better have named it Shattoville.

  After the revolution, Andrew had settled himself off in the hills back of Mount Pisgah. They didn’t see Andy or his family often. Rob felt a little sad about that. Andrew had been the first to break away, and Rob admired the spirit that took him off to the fighting and made him insist on going his own way. He would have to make
more of an effort to get over there to visit.

  Right now, though, he hankered for a new rifle. He looked at the old gun-making tools, all mixed in with the blacksmithing outfit, and considered putting a new rifle together himself. But, times had changed, and riflesmiths were turning out long guns a little different than he had made.

  Tim Murphy had planted himself up near the half falls on the Susquehanna, and he had been shooting a rifle made by a man named Shuler who had set up shop a-ways downstream from the Murphy place. Nobody shot better than Tim Murphy, and Rob figured if Murphy found a Shuler rifle to be right, maybe he had better take a look, and hunting up a new rifle would give him an excuse for moving around a little.

  He had heard that people were making quite a settlement over there on the Susquehanna. Some said more than seventy folks lived in the town. He guessed the trade up the river was picking up right smart. Towns always followed the water, and Liverpool seemed a natural place to rest the night going or coming. Shuler might do well there, although Rob was himself partial to the Juniata.

  He took a good lunch in his hunting pouch and slung his blanket over his shoulder figuring to stay the night in Girty’s old cave. On the way over, he would take a minute or two where the Tipped up old stump still rotted near the spot he had fought a man-monster to the death. That memory always turned his blood cold because if his friend Ironhawk had not leaped in to help, the monster would have broken Rob’s back.

  What a battle that had been! Shot through twice, with an arrow in his kidney, the man-animal had still just about licked him. Well, that was a story for around-the-fire yarning. He would just take a minute to look at the ground and think back over it. Maybe he would tell the tale to this Shuler. If he wanted, the man could go down to Philadelphia and see the skeleton with a skull twice the size of a normal man’s in the museum where James Cummens had placed it.

  Rob let George caterwaul awhile about him going off alone, gave Becky a peck on the cheek, raised a hand to Flat, and ignored the others.