That Dark and Bloody River
Page 44
At that point, Col. Brodhead decided the campaign should end and started the army back toward Pittsburgh. Only one other incident of note occurred on the trip back, when one of his officers, young Ens. Jack Ward, while fording a small creek, slipped on a slick rock, fell and broke his leg. Even in his pain, Ward was able to grin and say that that gave him the right to name the creek. “From now on, boys,” he said, “this is Slippery Rock Creek.” And so it was.
Now, after an absence of 25 days, they had returned to the Forks of the Ohio, having killed 22 Indians, including four chiefs. Another 17 were known to have been wounded, and probably more than that. For the Americans there had been only one death—the private killed by the accidental firing of his own gun—and four wounded, only one of whom was seriously hurt, Jonathan Zane. And one officer had been hurt, Ens. Jack Ward, with an accidentally broken leg.
So now, in his headquarters office in Fort Pitt, smoking his pipe and sipping a good brandy, Col. Daniel Brodhead was delighted to write in his report to Gen. Washington that the Allegheny Campaign had been a complete success.379
[September 29, 1779—Wednesday]
As a result of the significant successes of Brady’s Rangers on their Ohio River patrols, rescues of captives and Indian fighting, the group had already gained considerable renown. One result of this was that Sam Brady no longer had to make concerted searches to find good men to join him. He was constantly approached these days by adventurous young men for whom the elite force carried a glamour and romance that was very appealing. Only a small percentage of those who applied to become Rangers were accepted, however.
The selection was based strictly upon Sam Brady’s assessment of the abilities and potential of the applicant. Age was not really much of a consideration, except that the applicant had to be able to handle himself well in almost any kind of emergency situation; his youngest Ranger at this time was 17, the eldest was 42. Formal education was not a prerequisite; to Brady it was more important that the applicant have a good knowledge of woods lore and that elusive but all-important survival instinct. He was looking for men who could load and shoot a rifle rapidly and accurately, who could throw a tomahawk and knife with reasonable skill, who were quick-witted, level-headed and in top physical condition with plenty of stamina. All his men also needed to have committed to memory the important and extensive series of hand signals that Brady had devised, by which explicit orders could be communicated between the Rangers without speech. They had to be willing to undergo regular periods of drilling, where martial arts suitable to Indian fighting were practiced exhaustively. While not required—since some simply could not master the technique involved—Brady recommended that all the Rangers try to develop the life-saving skill of reloading while running.
Sam Brady had absolutely no patience with—or a place among his Rangers for—anyone who exhibited jealousy of his companions or who was a complainer, a shirker, a braggart, squeamish, out to make a name for himself or, most important, prone to making mistakes. Errors often cost lives, and every one of his Rangers had to be fully dependable to the others and, equally, to place his own full trust in the others.
Jonathan Zane, just before the Allegheny Campaign, had been one of the applicants, and Brady had been inclined to accept him because of his woodsmanship and past experience in Indian fighting. For this reason Brady was pleased when Col. Brodhead had suggested he take Zane along on the advance party, as it would give him an opportunity to observe his behavior in dangerous situations. But then Zane had made the grave error of exposing himself to the Indians they were attempting to ambush—an act that had put Thomas Nicholson in dire jeopardy, from which he had fortunately escaped with only a slight wound, and that had resulted in Zane himself being seriously wounded. Because of that error, Brady no longer considered Zane a suitable individual for inclusion in the Rangers. Errors were not tolerated, and no one in Brady’s Rangers got a second chance.
Today, on a strictly probational basis, a new applicant named Robert Bacon was being permitted to accompany the Rangers on a regular patrol. He was a big, athletic young man, 23 years old, who hailed from the Dunkard Creek settlements and had a certain amount of experience with Indian encounters. Ten other Rangers, including Brady, were making today’s patrol. Sometimes the patrols were on land, following the trails along the waterways, sometimes in canoes, skimming along close to shore. Today’s outing, originating at Fort McIntosh, was designed to take them down along the left bank 25 miles to Baker’s Bottom. There they would cross the river to the mouth of Yellow Creek and paddle back up the Ohio along the more dangerous right bank.
In their two canoes they had crossed the Ohio from Fort McIntosh at the mouth of Beaver River to the left bank and now, as their route carried them along the left bank of the Ohio, they were very watchful and paddled in utmost silence. Whether in canoes or moving along on shore, unnecessary conversation was strictly forbidden; more than one party of inexperienced woodsmen had been ambushed because the sound of their voices had preceded them. The Rangers’ training demanded that their eyes constantly study their surroundings for tracks or traces of anything different or unusual—the broken twig on a bush, the sliver of bark newly bumped from a tree trunk, the roil of mud along the rim of a stream—anything that might indicate the passage or presence of a foe. Equally, their ears had to become attuned to the ambient sounds, so that when something inexplicable was heard—or there was a sudden cessation of normal bird songs or animal sounds—they could be on their guard for whatever was causing it. All of these practices and more very quickly became second nature to the Rangers.
Brady, in the lead canoe, abruptly raised a hand and, with fingers pointing downward, twisted it rapidly back and forth. Both boats slowed at once: This was the sign that they were approaching a tributary stream of the Ohio. Such areas were among the most dangerous because these were usually the places where war parties, crossing the big river, came ashore to take advantage of the cover afforded at the mouths of streams. With such cover they could not only screen themselves but equally hide their canoes, either by dragging them or carrying them well up from the water and camouflaging them with brush or by putting rocks into them and sinking them for recovery and use later on when returning from their raiding.
The stream they were approaching now was Raccoon Creek, its mouth 29 miles below Fort Pitt and four miles below Fort McIntosh. Because of its proximity to the latter fort, it was not generally considered a high-risk area, but Brady was not one to take things for granted or be careless. They moved up cautiously, listening carefully, watching closely, and those Rangers who were not paddling held their rifles at ready.
Brady eased his canoe into the mouth of the stream, prepared to ascend for a quarter-mile, as they always did with the larger tributaries, but then, after only 100 yards or so, his body suddenly tensed, and the Rangers behind knew he had spotted something. Brady pointed forward and to his right, and then they saw it, too—on the left bank there were fairly fresh scrape marks in the mud, where canoes had obviously put to shore. Studying the water as they moved in closer, Brady could see neither sunken canoes nor fresh roils of muddiness at the shoreline, meaning the marks had been made sometime before. With hand signals he directed the canoes to the same shore about ten yards below the marks, so their own roils would not be spotted by the raiding party returning to its canoes from inland—assuming, of course, that they had in fact hidden their canoes on shore here.
They had. Brady, allowing no more than the tip of the bow of his canoe to touch the shoreline, stepped out onto the harder ground and left the canoes to hold in place with gentle paddling while he made a quick inspection. Avoiding bare ground where he might leave a track, he stepped on leaf litter back to the canoe marks and saw at once where they had been lifted from the water and carried up the bank. He followed the trace for 20 yards and then discovered two canoes screened by a fallen tree and covered over with forest debris. Within five minutes he was back stepping into his canoe again.
“Two canoes,” he said. “Ten, twelve, maybe fourteen of ’em. Expect they’ve gone up to hit Beeler’s.” Beeler’s Fort was a small blockhouse in the fairly new settlement established by big John and Sam Beeler some 18 miles up Raccoon Creek.380 “I figure they came across here during the night. Probably so as to hit Beeler’s about dawn. It’s after noon now, so that gives us maybe two-three hours before they might show up back there. If they do, they won’t stay on that side, and they won’t chance going down the Ohio in broad daylight. They’ll come right across and probably hole up till dark a little way up Four Mile Run. We’ll hit ’em there.” Four Mile Run, a much smaller tributary, emptied into the Ohio from the north about 1,000 feet below the mouth of Raccoon Creek.
When they completed their crossing and came to the mouth of Four Mile Run, they found little cover available for them. Brady directed the canoes upstream a dozen yards or more to where cover was available, and they pulled the canoes out at this point and carried them up the bank to where they could be effectively hidden. Then he had them cut bushes—mainly scrub willows—and carry them closer to the mouth of the run and impale them in the ground so as to look natural and provide blinds for them to hide behind. The moist soil this close to the river’s edge would prevent the foliage from wilting for a long while and allow them to retain the natural appearance.
Then they settled down to wait—and this was the most difficult part. It might be an hour or two, perhaps five or six. For that matter, the Indians might not even return to their canoes until night or even tomorrow. There was no way of knowing. Contingency plans had to be made for any eventuality.
“If they don’t come by nightfall, we’ll clear out of here and head downstream. We’ll have to chance they came out of Yellow Creek, so we’ll lay a new ambush for ’em there. If they’re not there by morning, we’ll come back up here and start all over. They’ll show up eventually.”
Each man had a few hard biscuits and some jerky and parched corn in his pouch, so they wouldn’t go hungry, at least not for a while, depending on how long it was before the Indians appeared. Even though all of them were watching closely, two of the Rangers were appointed special lookouts who could not vary their attention from the mouth of the Raccoon across the Ohio. Every hour they would be relieved of the responsibility by two others.
The first hour passed without incident, and the lookout was changed. The second hour a few of the Rangers dozed, and a few others did so during the third. It was toward the end of the fourth hour and late in the afternoon when the tedium was finally broken.
“There they are!” Jake Fouts’s whisper was harsh and urgent and dispelled any sleepiness among the others. The men rolled into prone positions behind their blinds and peered through the leaves. The Indian canoes were just moving out of the mouth of Raccoon Creek and heading directly this way, paddling strongly and rapidly, obviously anxious to get across as quickly as possible since it was daylight and they could be seen for a long distance upstream and down.
As usual, no one was to fire until Capt. Brady did so, and then all the others were to fire as well, and swiftly reload to fire more, if necessary. By the time the canoes reached the midpoint of the Ohio, Brady could see there were 15 people in them, and in a few minutes more, it became obvious that three were captives, their arms tied behind them and a rawhide tug linking them together throat to throat.
Brady did not plan to shoot until they were actually entering the mouth of Four Mile Run because at the closer range there would be less likelihood of the prisoners being accidentally hit or being tomahawked by the Indians once the fight broke out. That plan went awry. They were still a good 40 yards from the mouth of the stream when one of the Indians in the lead canoe stood up and stared intently, then pointed in their direction and shouted a warning.
Brady shot at once and sent the warrior tumbling into the river, his canoe rocking dangerously. The guns of the other Rangers spoke in ragged bursts, and half a dozen other Indians were shot and fell into the water. Two or three leaped out of the canoes and began swimming off with the current, alternately diving and surfacing. The captives ducked low to avoid being shot. No return shots were fired, mainly because just endeavoring to keep from overturning and at the same time trying to paddle out of range was occupying the Indians’ attention. One warrior jerked out a tomahawk and raised it to strike the nearest captive, but Fouts’s second shot struck him before the blow descended and knocked him overboard. Another warrior, holding onto the gunwales, tried to stamp a hole in the bottom of the canoe with his heel so the canoe would sink and the bound captives drown, but he, too, was shot, slumped to one side and slid overboard.
Both canoes were now empty except for the captives and a couple of dead Indians. The heads of a few swimming Indians could be seen, quickly growing smaller with distance, but most of the Indians had disappeared beneath the Ohio’s surface.
Brady shouted an order to get the canoes launched, and the whole party raced to them, jerked away the covering brush and quickly dragged them to the water’s edge. In moments both were launched and being paddled furiously to emerge from the mouth of the run and then overtake the drifting canoes with their captives, who were now shouting for help.
The few swimming Indians had disappeared from sight by the time the drifting canoes were overtaken, but whether they had drowned or made it to shore, no one could tell. The captives were two men and a young boy, and one of the men and the boy were weeping with relief at being saved. The banks were so sheer here that there was no landing place, and so they towed the canoes back to the small bottom where the blinds were located. As this was being done, the captives told how Beeler’s Fort had been struck by surprise by the party of Wyandots just after dawn and how they had themselves been captured as they headed out to the cornfield with their hoes to work. Four people at the fort, they said, were killed before everyone got inside to safety and the doors were barred. The Indians had continued firing at the fort at random for the better part of two hours and then had withdrawn with their captives and marched them to where the canoes were hidden.
As soon as they came ashore at the mouth of Four Mile Run, the bonds were cut away from the prisoners and a period of handshaking ensued by the grateful rescued. A certain amount of plunder and some of the Indian rifles were recovered from the bottoms of the canoes. While this was occurring, Brady walked over to the blinds and studied them for a moment before calling Robert Bacon over. The other Rangers stood where they were and watched.
“I expect,” Brady asked the youth, “you saw how the Indians discovered us when they were still a good ways off?”
“Yep,” Bacon replied, then shook his head, “but I cain’t figger out how they knew.”
Brady pointed. “This is your blind, right?”
“Uh-huh.”
“I watched you when you made it, and you did just like the others, setting the bushes straight up. So how come they’re tilted back the way they are now?”
Bacon blushed and stammered. “Well, … Cap … Cap’n Brady. It … it got kinda … kinda hot in that sun, and I … well … I reckon I sort’a … you know,… sort’a pulled ’em back t’get some shade over me.”
“Come over here.” Brady strode off toward the river’s edge, and Bacon followed. The leader of the Rangers stopped about ten yards from the blinds and turned. “Take a look at the blinds from here, Mr. Bacon,” he said.
Bacon looked, and the color drained from his cheeks. The other blinds were upright and green and appeared to be naturally growing bushes. At Bacon’s blind, however, not only was the backward tilt of the bushes clearly apparent, but the angle had caused most of the leaves to fully or partially invert, showing
the much paler light green of their undersides. The difference was like a magnet drawing the eye to it. Bacon’s prominent Adam’s apple bobbed as he swallowed.
“I … I’m sorry, Cap’n. I … I didn’t think.… ”
“That’s right, Mr. Bacon,” Brady said grimly, “you didn’t think. And by not thinking, by considering your own comfort and committing an error like this, you jeopardized your fellow Rangers, the captives, this whole operation.” He shook his head and his tone softened, but his gaze remained hard. “What we do on these patrols is no game. One mistake like that could kill us all. I’m sorry to have to tell you this, but you won’t be going out with us anymore.”
There were no second chances in Brady’s Rangers.
[October 5, 1779—Tuesday]
William McMechen stared morosely at the blackened remains of some of the timbers of his burned-out settlement, still protruding above weeds that had taken root and almost hidden them. Twice he had built his settlement, and twice it had been burned by the Indians. The first time he had taken his family away for a year before returning and starting all over again. This time it had been 26 months since they had taken refuge at Wheeling, and the settlement had been burned again as soon as they had abandoned it. They had moved back to the Redstone Old Fort area and built a new home in adjacent Brownsville, and he had truly believed then that they would never return here again.
McMechen’s first son, David, had refused to come west with him from Wilmington, Delaware, and was now studying law in Baltimore.381 His second son, James, was seeking land of his own down the Ohio, five miles below Fish Creek.382 His third son, William, Jr., showed no interest in living on the frontier or acquiring land and instead, when still a boy, went to live with his eldest brother.383 And then, in ’77, while they were living at Brownsville, his fourth son had been born and was named Benjamin.