Legends and Tales of the American West

by Richard Erdoes

  Soon after, panther and deer met and took a liking to each other. Daniel, clad in a blackened rawhide shirt, his long hair “clubbed,” went sparking to win the pretty, strapping Rebecca, who was fifteen years old, just the right age to get married. She met him in a cherry orchard, showing off her white cambric apron, the very height of frontier elegance. Daniel, shy and awkward, more used to the company of bears than of a young lady, tried to hide his embarrassment by playing idly with his hunting knife, tearing a hole in her priceless cambric—“a good way to try her temper,” as he said later. She forgave him.

  It was the custom for a young swain to bring a deer to his true-love’s cabin and dress the venison while she watched. Rebecca and her sisters and girlfriends made somewhat ironic comments on his sloppiness as he spattered a great deal of grease and blood all over his hunting shirt. Daniel pretended to have heard nothing, but as they sat down to eat in her father’s long house, he picked up his bowl of milk, admonishing it, “You, like my hunting shirt, have missed many a good washing.”

  They married notwithstanding. The wedding was the occasion for a frontier feast of bear paws, squirrel pie, and corn pone. A gallon jug of potent Monongahela rye went round and round. There was the usual earthy, good-natured banter about the young couple’s duty to forthwith increase and multiply. As the feast neared its end, Rebecca’s girlfriends, one by one, climbed the ladder leading up to the loft and there, with many giggles and jests about lost maidenheads, put the bride to bed.

  A little later Daniel’s male friends went up and put him under the bearskin, next to Rebecca. An hour or so later, a “heartening cup” of hard cider and a platter of venison were sent up to the pair “to maintain their strength.” There were rumors, true or false, that the panther had not been the first to share the deer’s bed. If so, nobody minded very much. It turned out to be a very happy, long-lasting marriage, Daniel and Rebecca setting up housekeeping in a “half-face” lean-to, meaning a three-sided primitive shelter the front of which was entirely open. They had many children, and so many grandchildren that they themselves could no longer keep track of them, this in spite of Daniel having itchy feet that often kept him for many months away from home.

  Boone had the habit of carving little notes about events, which to him seemed worth recording, into the trunks of beech trees, as for instance: D. BOONE KILLA BAR ON THIS TREE 1773. He killed a great many “bars.” One time he heard a loud noise as from a thumping, traipsing giant and concluded, correctly, that it was caused by a bear, a “she-bear” in fact. He fired and, for once, merely wounded the huge beast, rather than killing it. The enraged animal charged—so fast that Boone had no time to reload. The formidable creature reared up on her hind legs as if wanting to engage in a wrestling match. Boone whipped out his large hunting knife, holding it with outstretched arm in order to keep the growling beast as far away from him as he could. The obliging she-bear was so intent upon hugging Boone to her bosom in a loving embrace that she slowly impaled herself on the keen blade, pointed at her heart, until the whole knife was swallowed up in her body. She never caught on until she was dead. Possibly not even then. That night the Boone family supped on roast bear and rejoiced at having a new covering for Rebecca’s tick bed.

  Boone was the hero of innumerable fights with Indians. Once, traveling with his wife, he noticed a Shawnee lurking behind a tree. He quickly fired and scored a hit. “Dearest,” Rebecca remarked, “methinks you killed an Injun.”

  “Pshaw,” he answered, “what’s one Injun?”

  Sometimes he ended up second best. He was badly wounded on a number of occasions, lost brothers and children, and, more than once, fell into captivity. Like most frontiersmen, he always carried a few gunsmith’s tools on a long hunting trip in case of emergencies. Therefore, rather than burning him at the stake, his Shawnee captors employed him as their gun repairer. He used the opportunity to purloin some of their powder and bullets. Also, from discarded bits and pieces he secretly fashioned for himself a crude firearm. When he was ready, he appeared among his captors, saying, “Well, my friends, it is time for me to leave you,” walking some forty paces away from their campfire. The chief called after him: “If Wide Mouth tries to escape, we will shoot him dead!”

  “Go ahead and try,” answered Boone, smiling.

  During the night, while the Indians slept, he had drawn all the balls from their barrels, leaving only the powder. A dozen Shawnees fired their guns at him. Guffawing and capering, Boone made a great show of snatching their nonexistent bullets out of the air, pretending to gather them up in his hunting shirt. He then emptied out from it his small heap of stolen lead balls, letting them fall to the ground.

  “Wide Mouth has heap big bullet medicine,” the chief exclaimed.

  “Goodbye, my friends,” said Boone, and walked off without the Shawnees trying to stop him.

  Daniel was superstitious and believed in dreams. Often his dead father appeared to him in visions. If the specter looked angry, then whatever Boone tried to do would turn out badly. If, on the other hand, his father’s ghost smiled, all would turn out well. This he firmly believed.

  Once he was confronted by a party of Indian braves. Their leader told him: “Sheltowee must not come here. This is our hunting ground. If you trespass upon it, we will be like wasps and sting you to death!” Shortly afterward, Boone dreamed that he was stung by a whole nest of yellow jackets. On his next hunting trip he was badly wounded by an arrow. He called the place where this happened Dreaming Creek.

  Boone grew tobacco that he swapped with the Indians for pelts. He had built himself a two-story, grass-thatched drying shed, the tobacco leaves hanging from slender sticks in three tiers, one above the other. He was just about to take the completely dried stalks down, beginning with the topmost tier, when he was surprised by a Shawnee war party. He found himself precariously perched some eighteen feet off the ground, unarmed, at some distance from his cabin. The leader of the band approached him with a big grin on his face.

  “How, Sheltowee. This time Shawnees got you. This time no escape. This time no tricks.”

  “Why would I try to escape from old friends like you,” said Boone. “I shall be glad to go with friends to their village, but I must first finish my work here. Then my Shawnee friends will go home with plenty of kinnikinnick.” He kept up his chatter, lulling them into a false sense of security, and then, with a mighty heave, brought all three tiers of dried tobacco down upon their heads, filling the air with a dense cloud of pungent tobacco dust. The Shawnees sneezed, coughed, and spat, frantically rubbing their eyes, trying to fight their way out of the swirling, suffocating, air-filling powder. When the dust finally settled, Boone had vanished.

  When Daniel felt that his end might not be far off, he settled his debts, which gave him a great sense of accomplishment. He also paid his taxes—in deerskins.

  Daniel and Rebecca lived to be eighty-six years old—a veritable miracle considering the dangers and hardships they had been exposed to. An even greater miracle was that the long hunter and Indian fighter died peacefully in his bed. This would not do for the legend makers who composed their own version of Boone’s demise. They had him die as he had lived, sitting on a rock near a deer lick, hidden by shrubs and branches, his trusty Tick-licker resting on a log, primed and cocked, his finger on the trigger, his left eye closed, his right sighting along the barrel, waiting for the game to approach. Thus death overcame him as, in a last spasm, his finger pulled the trigger and the already dead hunter bagged yet one more deer.

  His death went almost unnoticed. His old home, Kentucky, had never had much use for its greatest hero. Twenty-five years later they remembered him. His bones were exhumed for a fitting reburial. There was much pomp and circumstance, the rolling of muffled drums, the firing of salutes, many fine speeches. But before they put Old Daniel under for the second time, they made a cast of his skull. If you should by any chance know what became of it, please let the writer know.

  Swallowing a Sca
lping Knife

  Daniel Boone was once resting in the woods with a small number of his followers when a large party of Indians came suddenly upon them and halted—neither party having discovered the other until they came in contact. The whites were eating, and the savages, with the ready tact for which they are famous, sat down with perfect composure, and also commenced eating. It was obvious they wished to lull the suspicions of the white men and seize a favorable opportunity for rushing upon them. Boone affected a careless inattention, but, in an undertone, quietly admonished his men to keep their hands upon their rifles. He then strutted towards the reddies unarmed and leisurely picking the meat from a bone. The Indian leader, who was somewhat similarly employed, arose to meet him.

  Boone saluted him, and then requested to look at the knife with which the Indian cut his meat. The chief handed it to him without hesitation, and our pioneer, who, with his other traits, possessed considerable expertness at sleight of hand, deliberately opened his mouth and affected to swallow the long knife, which, at the same instant, he slipped adroitly into his sleeve. The Indians were awed. Boone gasped, rubbed his throat, stroked his body, and then, with apparent satisfaction, pronounced the horrid mouthful very good.

  Having enjoyed the surprise of the spectators for a few moments, he made another contortion, and drawing forth the knife, as they supposed, from his body, coolly handed it to the chief. The latter took the point cautiously between thumb and finger, as if fearful of being contaminated by touching the weapon, and threw it from him into the bushes, The pioneer sauntered back to his party, and the Indians, instantly dispatching their meal, marched off, desiring no further intercourse with a man who could swallow a scalping knife.

  That’s John’s Gun!

  At the disastrous battle of Blue Licks there were a few reported slain who had been captured, and, after running the gauntlet, had been allowed to live. Among them was a certain husband, who, with eleven other captives, had been painted black, the sign of death. The twelve of them were stripped and placed on a log, the husband being at one extremity. The cruel savages now slaughtered eleven, one by one, but when they came to this one, though they drew their knives and tomahawks over him ready to strike, they paused and had an animated powwow, ending in sparing his life—why, he never could find out.

  For over a year his wife awaited his return, hopeful against all arguments to the contrary. She almost gave up at last, but, wooed by another, she postponed the day from time to time, declaring she could not shake off the belief that her husband would yet come back. Her friends reasoned on her folly; she reluctantly yielded, and the nuptial day was set, when just before dawn the crack of a familiar rifle was heard near the lonely cabin. At the welcome sound she leaped out like a liberated fawn, ejaculating as she sprang, “That’s John’s gun! That’s John’s gun!” It was John’s gun, sure enough, and in an instant she was in her beloved husband’s arms. Nine years later, however, that same husband did really fall at St. Clair’s defeat, and the same persevering lover renewed his suit and at last won the widow.

  A Clever Runner

  A settler named Morgan was skinning a wolf that he had taken from his trap. He was out in the forest at a considerable distance from his home. He saw a rider coming toward him and recognized his neighbor’s horse; however, the man on the horse was not his neighbor but a Shawnee Indian who was followed by three more braves who were on foot. Morgan took shelter behind a rock and fired at the rider, toppling him from his mount. Instantly grabbing his powder horn to reload, he found to his dismay that it was empty. While skinning the wolf the stopper had come loose and the powder had been spilled. Flight held out the only hope for survival. Morgan ran for dear life, the Indians at his heel. Morgan was a good runner and two of his pursuers quickly fell behind, but the third was fast gaining on him. Morgan’s empty rifle had become an impediment and he discarded it, hoping that the Indian would pick it up and be thereby delayed, but the Shawnee ignored it. Morgan next threw away his three-cornered hat, but the Indian wasted no time on it either. Morgan flung away his blue coat with its shining brass buttons, sure that this, at least, would cause his tomahawk-waving pursuer to stop. It did not. Barely reaching the top of a little knoll ahead of his adversary, the desperate settler had recourse to another stratagem. He waved his arms and shouted, as if calling upon some friends for help: “Come on, boys, shoot the son of a bitch before he gets away!” This fooled the Shawnee warrior, who stopped in his tracks, convinced that he had fallen into a deadly ambush of armed pioneers. The Indian turned on his heels and fled back into the forest. Morgan hastened home, happy to have lost only his hat, coat, and gun, rather than his hair.

  Some ten years passed. A treaty of eternal peace and friendship between the Shawnees and the palefaces was about to be signed. The Great White Father had sent some bigwigs in gold-laced uniforms to preside over the event. Shawnee chiefs arrived to “touch the pen.” Morgan also came, together with his wife and half-grown offspring to witness the proceedings. The commissioners and the Indians sat in a circle. Gifts were spread. The smoking calumet went from hand to hand. Among the Shawnee elders putting their thumbprints on the treaty documents was a solemn fellow in a faded and frayed blue coat with brass buttons, cradling a Germantown rifle in the crook of his arm. Both coat and gun seemed familiar to Morgan. The Indian looked at him, nodded, and grinned. Morgan smiled back.

  After the ceremony the chief walked over to Morgan to shake hands. They reminisced about the day when they had almost killed each other. “Me a warrior then,” said the Shawnee, “now big chief. We never finish race.”

  “Well then,” said Morgan, “why not finish it now?”

  The news that there was going to be a running contest spread swiftly. A crowd gathered. One of the self-important bigwigs with a cocked hat arrived at the scene to take over the management of the affair. He pointed to a large distant tree: “You fellows run to that tree and touch it, then race back here to the mark.”

  The chief stripped to his breechcloth, Morgan to his drawers. The man with the cocked hat gave the signal and they were off. Both rivals touched the tree almost simultaneously, but when arriving back at the mark, Morgan was about twenty steps ahead. Panting, the loser sat down on a tree stump, rubbing one knee and ankle: “Stiff, stiff, too old to run.”

  “Well, you got the better of me last time,” said Morgan, “and thereby got my gun. Now I got the better of you and should have it back.” With that he smilingly took the rifle and walked off, leaving the Shawnee somewhat surprised.

  A Damn Good Jump

  This is the story of Sam Brady’s famous leap, which gets longer and longer with every telling. Colonel Brady (every self-respecting frontiersman of his time laid claim to the title of colonel, or at least captain) was born in 1756 in western Pennsylvania, into a family of grim and enthusiastic fighters with a propensity for getting themselves killed. His father, John, was a surveyor by profession, a soldier by inclination, an officer of the Continental Army, and chief of rangers, who greatly distinguished himself at the Battle of Brandywine. John Brady once was so rash as to prevent an already booze-blind, scar-faced Indian from demolishing an additional keg of fine brandy. Temporarily disabled by too much firewater, the Indian vowed, “Sometime, for this, I heap kill you.” Years later, as Captain John was riding home with a friend, a shot rang out and the old soldier dropped dead from his horse. His friend later reported that the assassin had been a scar-faced redskin.

  The victim’s son, “Leaping Sam” Brady, soon became famous as a daring long hunter and Indian fighter. Many were the tales, some of them true, of his many gallant exploits. Among the first was the story of his fight at the disastrous Battle of Paoli, during the Revolutionary War. Escaping from a crowd of lobsterbacks, Brady was jumping a fence when a British bayonet pierced his coat, pinning him to a fence post. Leaping Sam tore himself loose, shot dead a dragoon who was galloping after him, and clubbed a grenadier insensible with the butt of his rifle. He then made good his esca
pe, hiding in a swamp.

  Years later we find the doughty frontiersman in Ohio, engaged in fighting all sorts of Indians ornery enough not to take kindly to losing their ancient hunting grounds to land-hungry pioneers. On one occasion Brady fell into an ambush and was captured by his savage foes. There was jubilation among his captors at having landed so big a fish. There was to be no quick death for the killer of so many of their fellows. A slow barbecue was to be his fate. Brady was bound to the stake and a low fire kindled around him. Stoically, he endured his ordeal until he felt that flames, licking at his bonds, had weakened the rawhide rope with which he was bound. An Indian squaw, with a child in one arm and a huge war club in the other, dealt Brady a terrific blow just as he was ripping apart his bonds. Quick as lightning, he snatched the woman’s infant and threw it into the fire, making his escape in the ensuing confusion. The fastest long-distance runner on the frontier, Brady managed, for a full twelve hours, to keep ahead of the human wolfpack snapping at his heels. As one after the other of his pursuers fell behind, panting and exhausted, Brady ran on and on to seek safety in the nearest settlement.