WATERSHED MIGRATIONS
A few descriptions of the local roadways of the mound-building Indians
have been cited; reasons for believing that they used the watersheds, to
a greater or less degree, as highways for passage from one part of the
country to another, have been described. Let us look at the matter of
their migrations.
That these people did migrate there is no doubt among archæologists. The
many kinds of archælogical remains now found indicate that they were
divided into many different tribes, and the great distances between
works of similar character show that the various tribes labored at
divers times in divers places. "The longest stretch where those
apparently the works of one people are found on one bank [of the
Mississippi river] is from Dubuque, Iowa, to the mouth of Des Moines
river. As we move up and down [the Mississippi] we find repeated
changes from one type to another."[88]
The direction from which these mound-builders entered the regions where
their works are found, and their migrations within this region, must be
decided by a careful study of the varying character of the mounds and a
classification of them.
This work has not been done, save in the most general way possible,
though one highly important conclusion has been definitely reached. It
is that the generally received opinion heretofore held by archæologists
that the lines of migration were along the principal water-courses is
not found to be correct, and that these lines of migration were _across_
the larger water-courses, such as the Mississippi, rather than _up and
down_ them.[89]
"One somewhat singular feature is found in the lines of former occupancy
indicated by the archæological remains. The chief one is that reaching
from New York through Ohio along the Ohio river and onward in the same
direction to the northeastern corner of Texas; another follows the
Mississippi river; another extends from the region of the Wabash to the
headwaters of the Savannah river, and another across southern Michigan
and southern Wisconsin. The inference, however, which might be drawn
from this fact--that these lines indicate routes of migration--is not to
be taken for granted. It is shown by the explorations of the Bureau, and
a careful study of the different types of mounds and other works, that
the generally received opinion that the lines of migration of the
authors of these works were always along the principal water-courses,
cannot be accepted as entirely correct. Although the banks of the
Mississippi are lined with prehistoric monuments from Lake Pepin to the
mouth of Red river, showing that this was a favorite section for the
ancient inhabitants, the study of these remains does not give support to
the theory that this great water highway was a line of migration during
the mound-building period, except for short distances. It was, no doubt,
a highway for traffic and war parties, but the movements of tribes were
across it rather than up and down it. This is not asserted as a mere
theory or simple deduction, but as a fact proved by the mounds
themselves, whatever may be the theory in regard to their origin or
uses."[90]
It is for future scholarship to point out to us the origin, movements,
and destiny of this earliest race after a careful comparative study of
the remains which contain all we know of them. But may we not believe
that the great watersheds were to them what they have been for every
other race which has occupied this land? We submit: the greater
watersheds should be carefully considered in connection with the study
and classification of the various kinds of prehistoric remains with a
view to solving the question of the movements of the mound-building
Indians in America. The purpose of the first part of this monograph has
been accomplished by pointing out some reasons for the belief that these
early people opened the first landward passage-ways of the continent on
these watersheds. These may be summed up as follows:
(1). The mound-building Indians, like the later Indians, were partial to
interior locations; some of their greatest forts and most remarkable
mounds are found beside our smaller streams.
(2). These works are scattered widely over such regions; if there was
any communication it must have been on the watersheds, land travel here
always having been most expeditious and practicable through all historic
times.
(3). They were acquainted with some of our most famous mountain passes,
showing that they were not ignorant of the law of least resistance; and,
to a marked degree, their works are found beside, and in general
alignment with, our modern roads--which to a great degree followed the
ancient routes of the Indians which so invariably obeyed this law.
(4). The comparative study of the mound-building Indians' works proves
that the migrations of that race did not follow even the larger streams
by which they labored most extensively.
PART II
Paths of the Great Game Animals
("BUFFALO ROADS")
CHAPTER I
INTRODUCTORY
When the first Europeans visited the Central West two sorts of land
thoroughfares were found by which the forests could be threaded: paths
of the aborigines and paths of the great game animals such as the
buffalo. These paths were familiarly known for half a century as Indian
Roads and Buffalo Roads. That these two kinds of thoroughfares were
easily distinguishable one from the other and that both were ways of
common passage through the land will be made plain later.
Many varying theories regarding the coming of the buffalo into the
central and eastern portions of this continent have been devised, but of
one thing we are sure, namely that, among all the relics exhumed from
the mounds of the pre-Columbian mound-building Indians, very few bones
of the buffalo have been found. Bones of other animals are frequently,
even commonly, brought to light, but the remarkable fact remains that
almost no buffalo bones are discovered. Considering that the buffalo was
the most useful animal possible to aboriginal tribes like those in
prehistoric America, there is but one conclusion to be reached, and that
is that the mound-building Indians had but little acquaintance with the
buffalo.
For this reason it has seemed altogether best to treat the routes of the
mound-building Indians first, and the routes of the great game animals,
which were known as Buffalo Roads, second--on the theory that the
buffalo came into the Central West sometime between the mound-building
era and the arrival of the first European explorers.[91]
CHAPTER II
RANGE AND HABITS OF THE BUFFALO
The range of the buffalo or bison in the United States formerly extended
from Great Slave Lake on the north to the northeastern provinces of
Mexico on the south--from 62° latitude to 25°. Its westward range
extended beyond the Rocky mountains and embraced quite a large area,
remains having recently been discovered as far west as the Blue
mountains in Oregon; farther south, herds roamed over the region
occupied by the Great Salt Lake basin and grazed westward as far as the
Sierra Nevada mountains. East of the Rocky mountains the feeding-grounds
embraced all the area drained by the Ohio river and its tributaries,
extending southward beyond the Rio Grande and northward to the Great
Lakes as far as the eastern extremity of Lake Erie. The southeastern
range probably did not extend beyond the Tennessee river, and only in
the upper portions of North and South Carolina did it extend beyond the
Alleghanies.
The habitat of the buffalo included feeding-grounds, stamping-grounds,
wallows and licks. Their feeding-grounds embraced the meadow valleys
where the choicest grazing was to be found.[92] The habit of keeping
together in immense herds while feeding soon exhausted the food in any
single locality and rendered a slow, constant movement necessary. A herd
so immense that it remained in the sight of a traveler for days required
a vast area of feeding-ground to sustain it during a season.
When a herd rested to ruminate the buffaloes arranged themselves in a
peculiar, characteristic manner--the young always in the center with the
mothers, the males forming a compact circle around them. By such a
conformation were the "stamping-grounds" made--each animal crowding and
pushing from the outside of the herd, where flies and insects were more
troublesome, toward the center.
A peculiar custom of the buffalo was "wallowing." In the pools of water
the old fathers of the herd lowered themselves on one knee, and with the
aid of their horns, soon had an excavation into which the water
trickled, forming a cool, muddy bath. From his ablutions each arose,
coated with mud, allowing the patient successor to take his turn. Each
entered the "wallow," threw himself flat upon his back, and, by means of
his feet and horns, violently forced himself around until he was
completely immersed. After many buffaloes had thus immersed themselves
and, by adhesion, had carried away each his share of the sticky mass, a
hole two feet deep and often twenty feet in diameter was left, and, even
to this day, marks the spot of a buffalo wallow. The "delectable laver
of mud" soon dried upon the buffalo and left him encased in an
impenetrable armor secure from the attacks of insects.
While the actions of a herd of buffaloes were very similar to those of a
herd of cattle, yet very dissimilar to the habit of domestic cattle was
their propensity to roll upon the ground. Though a bulky, ungraceful
animal in appearance, the buffalo rolled himself completely over,
apparently with more ease than a horse. A buffalo, by rolling over in
this manner, often dusted himself in what was known as a "dry wallow."
The buffaloes' licks, which afforded salt, that mineral so necessary to
their health, were the foci of all their roads, the favorite spots about
which the herds gyrated and between which they were continually passing.
So important were these considered when white men first entered the West
that every lick was carefully included in all the maps of the first
geographers. Filson's map of Kentucky, for instance, made during the
Revolutionary period, contains a large number of circles with dots about
them which were the signs of "Salt Springs & Licks," all of them being
connected, by trails, "some cleared, others not."
The saline materials of these licks are derived from imprisoned
sea-water which has been stored away in the strata below the action of
surface waters. When these rocks lie nearer the surface than the line of
drainage, the saline materials are leached away. The saline materials
increase with the depth until the level is reached where we find the
water saturated with the ingredients of old sea-water. The displacement
of these imprisoned waters is induced by the sinking of surface water
through the vertical interstices of soil and rock, and the natural
tendency of the water to restore the hydrostatic balance. This action is
much more likely to occur when the rocks above the drainage are
limestone or shale with an underlying bed of rock composed of sandstone
or other rock through which water may permeate. That such a pressure
exists and that some such process is at work is shown by the waters
rising ten feet or more above the surface when enclosed in a pipe.
The endurance and speed of the buffalo far exceeded that possessed by
domesticated cattle. With a good start a swift horse could only with
difficulty overtake a herd of buffaloes. Their gait was an awkward,
lumbering gallop, and the speed which they attained was much greater
than it appeared to be. When running at full speed, rough ground and an
occasional tumble were taken in a matter-of-fact way and seemed
scarcely to retard the progress of the herd. If a ravine intersected its
trail, the herd dashed down the vertical, rocky sides and on up the
opposite slope, resuming its onward rush as if no obstacle had appeared.
The extensive courses of the buffaloes necessitated the crossing of
large streams. This often caused a loss of many of the old and young
members of the herds, especially if the stream was swift or swollen.
Often, after having successfully battled their way entirely across the
stream, a bluff or a miry landing-place beyond proved disastrous.
Buffalo herds boldly crossed rivers on the ice. Large numbers have been
known to be drowned, when crowding too closely together, by the breaking
of the ice beneath their weight. Herds have even been known to cross
upon floating ice, when they fell an easy prey to the Indians, and many
were drowned.
The following incident is related by Colonel Dodge: "Late in the summer
of 1867 a herd of probably four thousand buffaloes attempted to cross
the South Platte near Plum Creek. The river was rapidly subsiding,
being nowhere over a foot or two in depth, and the channels in the bed
were filled or filling with loose quicksand. The buffaloes in front were
hopelessly stuck. Those immediately behind, urged on by the horns and
pressure of those yet further in the rear, trampled over their
struggling companions to be themselves engulfed in the devouring sand.
This was continued until the bed of the river, nearly half a mile broad,
was covered with dead or dying buffaloes. Only a comparative few
actually crossed the river, and these were soon driven back by hunters.
It was estimated that considerably more than half the herd, or over two
thousand buffaloes, paid for this attempt with their lives."[93]
CHAPTER III
EARLY USE OF BUFFALO ROADS
The first explorers that entered the interior of the American continent
were dependent upon the buffalo and Indian for ways of getting about.
Few of the early white men who came westward journeyed on the rivers, as
the journals of Gist and Walker attest, and to the trails of the buffalo
and Indian they owed their success in bringing to the seaboard the first
accounts of the interior of the continent.
From Gist, Walker, and Boone the world learned the most it knew of the
trans-Alleghany country prior to the Revolution. Gist pierced central
Ohio and came around homeward through eastern Kentucky which Dr. Walker
had explored, and Boone hunted from the Holston to the Kentucky river.
To these men three routes of travel were feasible--Indian thoroughfares,
buffalo roads, and the beds of dry streams. It seems that of the two
former routes those of the Indian were easily distinguished from those
of the buffalo. In Dr. Walker's _Journal_ (1750) this is made clear from
the frequent mention of the several kinds of roads he found. Of the
Indian thoroughfares he writes as follows:
"April 14th. We kept down the Creek 5 miles Chiefly along the Indian
Road.
"15th. Easter Sunday. Being in bad grounds for our Horses we moved 7
miles along the Indian Road, to Clover Creek.
"18th. Still cloudy. We kept down the Creek to the River along the
Indian Road to where it crosses."[94]
On the other hand such specific mention of buffalo roads as the
following may be noted:
"Our horse being recover'd, we travelled to the Rocky Ridge [Clinch
Mountain]. I went up to the top, to look for a Pass, but found it so
Rocky that I concluded not to Attempt it there. This Ridge may be known
by Sight, at a distance. To the Eastward are many small Mountains, and
a Buffaloe Road between them and the Ridge."[95]
"We kept down the Creek 2 miles further, where it meets with a large
Branch coming from the South West, and thence runs through the East
Ridge making a very good Pass; and a large Buffaloe Road goes from that
Fork to the Creek over the West Ridge, which we took and found the
Ascent and Descent tollerably easie."[96]
"In the Fork of Licking Creek is a Lick much used by Buffaloes and many
large Roads lead to it."[97]
"We went up Naked Creek to the head and had a plain Buffaloe Road most
of the way."[98]
"I blazed several trees four ways on the outside of the low Grounds by a
Buffaloe Road, and marked my Name on Several Beech Trees."[99]
Boone, while relating the opening of his great road westward by way of
"Warrior's Path" through Cumberland Gap, distinctly states in his
autobiography that as he left the Gap in the distance he came to a point
where the Warrior's Path and the buffalo road diverged. The former ran
westward through what is now Danville and Louisville, while the latter
went northward. Boone followed the buffalo road to the mouth of Otter
creek where Boonesborough was founded.[100] Colonel Logan afterward
opened a road westward toward Danville and Louisville on the general
course of the Indian trail.
Thus it is plain that in the earliest days there was a marked
distinction between the roads of the buffalo and the Indian, though each
undoubtedly used, at times, the other's track, and in some places, such
as Cumberland Gap, the buffalo and Indian tracks were identical. Dr.
Walker in the quotation given above, "We went up Naked Creek to the head
and had a plain Buffaloe Road most of the way," was speaking probably of
the "Warrior's Path" leading directly to Cumberland Gap though not
aware that the road he traveled was more than a buffalo path.[101]
That buffaloes were accustomed to traveling Indian routes is clearly
proved by a number of incidents. It is said that when the Catawbas came
up to Ohio in search of the hated Iroquois they cut off buffalo hoofs,
tied them to their own feet, pursued the Indian trail and ambushed
themselves. The Iroquois, following the fresh buffalo tracks, soon found
themselves the victims of their own credulity.
Two instances of travelers meeting buffaloes on Indian thoroughfares and
the quarrel for the right of way are to the point:
Joseph Buell, in a journey from Vincennes to the Ohio, relates this
incident in his journal under date of October 4th: "In our march today,
came across five buffaloes. They tried to force a passage through our
column. The general ordered the men to fire on them. Three were killed
and the others wounded."[102]
Dr. Walker writes the following under the date of June 19th, 1750: "We
got to Laurel Creek early this morning, and met so impudent a Bull
Buffaloe that we were obliged to shoot him, or he would have been
amongst us."[103]
Buffalo roads should be divided into two classes-local and
transcontinental. The former were the short roads which converged from
the feeding and stamping-grounds, brakes and meadows, to the licks where
the animal's natural craving for salt was satisfied. The
transcontinental routes were those used in migrating from one portion of
the country to another, like the great route through Cumberland Gap.
Such regions as Kentucky, where there were numerous salt licks and great
areas of meadow-land near by, became favorite haunts for herds of
buffalo, and here their local roads are of such a nature as to be
reckoned among "the national curiosities of the state." Broad, hard, and
often deep, these great roads were adopted immediately by Indians and
white men alike as highways of travel. They are thus described by some
early writers:
"The roads opened by these animals may be reckoned among the national
curiosities of the state [Kentucky], being generally wide enough for a
carriage or waggon way, in which trees, shrubs, etc., are all trampled
down, and destroyed by the irresistible impetus of the mighty
phalanx."[104]
Croghan wrote in his _Journal_ (1765): "We came to a large road which
the buffaloes have beaten spacious enough for a wagon to go abreast, and
leading straight into the Lick."[105]
In the MS. autobiography of General James Taylor of Newport, Kentucky,
is found this statement "Big Bone Lick ... has been a great resort of
the buffalo, and the roads ... were larger than any common ones now
[1794] in the State, and in many places were worn five or six feet
deep."[106]
"A foot-path, zigzagging through the freshly made stumps of trees and
past some saplings of dogwood and pawpaw, led down from the station
[Bryant's] to this spring, while a much broader track sloped from the
main gate on the southeastern side of the stockade to a road a little
distance away and nearly fronting the fort, that was a priceless boon to
the pioneers. It seemed an ancient product of human skill, but was, in
fact, a 'trace,' hard and firm, made by the buffaloes alone which had
thundered over it for a thousand years in their journeys to the Salt
Licks."[107]
From the time Boone led the van of the pioneer hosts into the southern
portion of the Ohio basin until the present day, the buffalo routes have
perceptibly influenced the course of travel. Writes a Kentucky
historian:
"Exploring the country from the headwaters of Cumberland river to the
Ohio, they discovered its main streams, and its variety of soil and
surface. By following its trodden roads, or 'traces' as the pioneers
called them, which the buffaloes made from their grazing fields and
brakes, they [Boone and his brother] found a number of the great 'licks'
to which wild animals in countless multitudes commonly resorted in hunt
of salt. These buffalo traces are plainly marked out to the present
day."[108]
One or two references will show how common it was to refer to buffalo
"traces" as the main thoroughfares of Kentucky: "Hardly had the plaudits
of the pioneers for the women of Bryant's Station died on the stillness
of the sultry August air ere summer breezes carried the story of the
awful carnage and destruction at the Battle of the Blue Licks, from the
valley of the Licking, by the buffalo traces, to the settlements on the
Kentucky River."[109] "... It was the 16th of August when Caldwell and
McKee, piloted by Simon Girty, assailed the place [Bryant's Station].
They had surrounded it during the previous night. They came like the
pestilence that walks in darkness, unexpected and unseen. They had
marched along the buffalo traces or stolen through the forests without
having given to any one any notice of their intention."[110]
The course of one of these famous "traces" is thus described:
"From Big Bone Lick buffalo roads led to Blue Licks, and also southwest
to Drennon's Lick, in Henry County, thence to the crossing of the
Kentucky just below Frankfort. From the valley of the river they then
passed to the high ground east of Frankfort by a deeply worn road yet
visible, known as the Buffalo Trace, to the Stamping Ground, in Scott
County, a town named from the fact that the animals in vast herds would
tread or stamp the earth while crowded together and moving around in the
effort of those on the outside to get inside and thus secure protection
from the flies. Thence they passed by the Great Crossings, so called
from its being the place where they crossed Elkhorn, two miles west of
Georgetown, and thence eastward to Blue Lick, May's Lick, and across the
river into Ohio. Their roads formed in the comparatively level country
the routes of the immigrants through the dense forests, impenetrable
from the heavy cane, peavines, and other undergrowth. They also
determined in many portions of the State not only the lines of travel
and transportation, but also of settlement, as particularly shown
between Maysville and Frankfort, a distance of about eighty miles, where
the settlements were first made along the Buffalo road, and later the
turnpike and railroad followed in close proximity to the route surveyed
by this sagacious animal, which Mr. Benton said blazed the way for the
railroad to the Pacific. The same idea is embodied in the vernacular of
the unlettered Kentuckian who said that the then great roadmakers were
'the buffler, the Ingin, and the Ingineer.'"[111]
"May 31st, 1765. Early in the morning we went to the great Lick, where
those bones are only found, about four miles from the river, on the
south-east side. In our way we passed through a fine timbered clear
wood; we came into a large road which the buffaloes have beaten,
spacious enough for two wagons to go abreast, and leading straight into
the Lick. It appears that there are vast quantities of these bones lying
five or six feet under ground, which we discovered in the bank, at the
edge of the Lick. We found here two tusks above six feet long; we
carried one, with some other bones, to our boats, and set off."[112]
"Monday, Oct. 17th, 1785. Here Mr. Zane found the drove of Buffaloes
which he pursued; they took up this creek to the licks. Here are large
roads to the licks. Below this creek is a large bottom of fine timber.
Three miles down Mr. Zane killed a fine buffalo, which induced me to
encamp."[113]
Another historian, after describing the bold attack of the British and
Indian horde on Bryant's Station, speaks of the route of the retreating
army and its pursuers:
"It was not difficult to find the road on which the departing enemy had
marched. They had taken what was known as the middle buffalo trace,
leading along near where Paris and Millersburg now stand, to the salt
springs at Blue Licks. It was easy to follow these roads which the
buffalo, the pioneer engineers of the great West, had laid down as best
for travel. Once having ascertained the route which the Indians pursued,
the marching was rapid.... The enemy in front of them had showed no
haste in their journey to their own land. Leaving on the morning of the
17th, they had camped some twenty miles away. During the day of the 18th
they had marched about eighteen miles more, and now, on the morning of
the 19th, they were only three miles in advance of their pursuers, on
the east side of the Licking, at the point where the Maysville and
Lexington road now crosses that stream over a suspension bridge....
Forming in line and riding in the narrow trace, which rarely exceeded
seven or eight feet in width, two or three abreast, the pioneers soon
struck a little branch, along which the trace wound its way to the
bottom of the Licking River. About a mile from the ford the trace left
the hillside and turned north-westwardly into this branch and followed
it down to the mother stream. At this point some consultation was held
among the officers, and it was here that Boone, whose great experience
and whose thorough knowledge of the country gave his opinion much
weight, suggested that, instead of following this trace and going down
the river, they should follow the ridge and strike the Licking two miles
above, cross at Abnee's or Bedinger's mills, and thus come down to the
banks of the Licking some two and a half miles above Blue Licks, and
cross the Licking into a wide valley from which, a mile eastwardly, they
would gain the ridge along which the trace pursued its way into Fleming
and Mason counties.... The command 'Forward!' rang through the woods
and echoed along the hillsides, and down the fateful trace to the Blue
Licks ford the cavalcade pursued its march. At the point where the trace
strikes the Licking the valley is a quarter of a mile wide. It is two
hundred feet on the western side, where the Kentucky pioneers emerged
from the forest, and some eight hundred feet wide on the east side,
where the foe for hours had been waiting the advance of the pursuers,
whose presence by this time was thoroughly known to them.... Across the
Licking the trace followed up the hillside of the ridge, which was rocky
and barren of all trees and vegetation. For ages the buffaloes had come
to these licks to find salt. Instinct had taught them the necessity of
periodical visitations to these saline springs, where nature had
provided this essential for animal life, and for hundreds of years,
along these narrow paths, cut out of the woods by the ceaseless
trampings of these mighty herds of buffalo, had come millions of these
animals to find health and life in the waters which gushed from the
Licking bottom. When they had satisfied nature's call for salt, these
herds would climb the adjacent hills to lie down and rest through the
day and sleep through the night. On these eminences thousands of them
would stand and watch the incoming buffaloes as they emerged from the
trace on the western side, and, plunging into the waters of the Licking,
swim across the stream and slake nature's demand for this necessary
product, which here the Great Provider for all animal life had laid up
in unlimited quantity.... The backbone of the ridge along which the
fight was to occur was about four hundred and fifty feet in width. Trigg
was ordered to the right, and his route was close to the edge of the
ravine which comes up from the bank of the Licking and reaches the top
of the hill close to the point where the Sardis turnpike leaves the
Lexington and Maysville road."[114]
The favorite paths of the settlers were these "traces" made hard as
modern roads by the herds which had traversed them. Even the first main
street of Lexington was almost impassable in bad weather, and was
deserted for the road of the buffalo near by.[115] With the passing of
the buffalo, their old routes became clogged in time with wind-strewn
brush and fallen trees; but, so good was the course and so solid the
footing, that the pioneers cleared these routes in preference to opening
roads of their own. A specific illustration of this is noted by a
Lexington historian:
"A buffalo 'trace' fortunately ran from this station [Bryant's] close to
Lexington, and the settlers of both places joined forces in clearing it
of logs, undergrowth, and other obstructions; a wise measure as
subsequent events proved, for, owing to it, the troops from Lexington
that went to the assistance of the besieged station, in 1782, were
enabled to reach it much sooner than they could otherwise have
done."[116]
"... The main road from Louisville to Lexington [Kentucky] passed
through it [Leestown] about a mile below Frankfort. This road had been
originally made by the buffaloes, and crossed the Kentucky River at one
of the few places along its extended course where it was practicable to
make the passage."[117]
"The roads [in Kentucky] first made by the buffaloes and adopted by the
pioneers, are laid down with such accuracy that the position of those
old historic places may be ascertained at this distant day by
measurement from known objects whose positions have not changed."[118]
The important part played by buffalo roads in the development of
Kentucky is noted by Mr. James Lane Allen in _The Blue-Grass Region of
Kentucky_;[119] two notices of early road-making in that region are
found in General Butler's _Journal_:
"Sunday, Oct. 30th. This morning several of the inhabitants came to
visit us. Capt. Johnston, a sensible man, proposes he will apply to the
general Court for an order to mark a road from Lexington to this place
[mouth of the Miami river], which Gen. Clark and myself recommend
warmly."[120]
"Sunday, Nov. 20th. We were this day informed by people from the station
that the inhabitants of the Lexington and other settlements had blazed a
road to the Big Bone Lick, agreeable to the proposition of Capt.
Johnston of October 30th, approved and recommended by Gen. C. and
myself."[121]
CHAPTER IV
CONTINENTAL THOROUGHFARES
Turning from a particular region, where, because of the close proximity
of licks and feeding-grounds, the buffalo made local roads, it becomes
of interest to look at the country at large and note the great
continental routes.
For an animal credited with but little instinct, the buffalo found the
paths of least resistance with remarkable accuracy.[122]
Undoubtedly the migrations of the buffalo caused the opening of the
great overland trails upon which the first white men came into the
West. The nomadic trait which induced migratory movements was acquired
through necessity. The animals moved in herds. The Central West, for
instance, was, when white men first saw it, covered largely with
forests; between the forests were open spots covered with rank grasses.
These "opens" were of various sizes from little patches surrounded by
forests to great treeless expanses miles in length and breadth.
However large these open prairies, the herds of buffalo would in a short
time exhaust the supply of grass and then troop on to fresher fields.
Fires, grasshoppers, and drouth also tended to destroy the buffaloes'
feeding-ground and to send them on long pilgrimages. Thus it is probable
that in the day when the eastern portion of the United States was
included in the habitat of the buffaloes, these animals were
continuously trooping along over their great roadways throughout the
summer, one herd after another, in search of fresh licks and springs.
The buffaloes migrated annually from the north to the south, and
throughout their habitat in the United States, their great trails were
north and south trails. The rivers flowing mainly east or west into the
Mississippi are crossed usually at right angles by the more important
trails of the buffalo. The annual movement was caused not so much by the
change of temperature (though buffaloes which remain sometimes in cold
climates seek the warmer, secluded spots) as by the frozen condition of
the ground and the depths of snow which buried the grasses upon which
they fed. When, from various causes, the annual north and south
migrations of the buffalo herds of the Far West were discontinued, an
east and west migration took place--the herds moving westward to more
protected portions of the country. As late as 1872, hunting parties made
their headquarters during the summer at Hay's City, and in winter moved
their quarters a hundred or a hundred and fifty miles westward of their
fall camps; near Hay's City the grass was buried under ice and encrusted
snow, while near Ellis the ground was bare. Thus unnaturally the
migrations were turned east and west rather than north and south, and
the trails which marked the former lines of migration were cut by
deep-worn trails crossing them at right angles.[123]
During the reign of the buffaloes in the Ohio basin their greater
thoroughfares were undoubtedly made by their annual migrations, even
though the extent of this movement did not exceed a few hundred miles.
In this day the winters are appreciably milder along the Ohio river than
even in the northern portions of the states of which it forms the
southern boundary. And here, as in the Far West, the routes of the
buffalo are north and south with here and there a great cross trail.
These greater trails lay largely on the watersheds which the buffalo
found with great certainty. He was an agile climber despite his great
size and weight. Writes Mr. Allen, "They will often leap down vertical
banks where it would be impossible to urge a horse, and will even
descend precipitous rocky bluffs by paths where a man could only climb
down with difficulty, and where it would seem almost impossible for a
beast of their size and structure to pass except at the cost of broken
limbs or a broken neck. On the bluffs of the Musselshell river I found
places where they had leaped down bare ledges three or four feet in
height with nothing but ledges of rocks for a landing-place; sometimes,
too, through passages between high rocks but little wider than the
thickness of their own bodies, with also a continuous precipitous
descent for many feet below. Nothing in their history ever surprised me
more than this revelation of their expertness and fearlessness in
climbing."[124]
Ordinarily the buffalo laid out his road with commendable sagacity,
"usually choosing the easiest grades and the most direct courses, so
that a buffalo trail can be depended upon as affording the most feasible
road possible through the region it traverses."[125] This was because
their weight demanded the most stable courses and they were thus very
sure of avoiding low grounds, preferring even difficult climbs to
passage-ways through soft ground; we have made one quotation, from Dr.
Walker's _Journal_, which notes that one "Buffaloe Road" which he
followed afforded an "Ascent and Descent tollerably easie."[126]
The three great overland routes from the Atlantic seaboard into the
Central West were undoubtedly first opened by the buffalo; one was the
course through central New York followed afterward by the Erie canal and
the New York Central railway; the second from the Potomac through
southwestern Pennsylvania to the headwaters of the Ohio; the third the
famous route through Cumberland Gap into Kentucky.
These three routes led to the northern, the central, and the southern
portions of the great Ohio basin. It is certain that the two latter
routes were great buffalo migration routes and there is little doubt
that the route through New York was a buffalo thoroughfare. There were
lesser thoroughfares which, though latterly known as Indian trails, were
undoubtedly paths of the buffalo. One of these was the famous Kittaning
Path from the headwaters of the Juniata to the Allegheny, the route of
the Pennsylvania railway across the Alleghanies; another was the old
trail through Carlisle and Bedford, Pennsylvania, later known as
Forbes's route to Pittsburg. Still another was the well-worn path over
the Alleghany divide by way of Hot Springs, the present route of the
Chesapeake and Ohio railway.[127]
In the Central West the greater migratory routes were, in Kentucky the
route from Cumberland Gap to the Ohio by way of the great licks; in West
Virginia the course from the head of New River down the valley of the
Great Kanawha, also on the watershed from the Monongahela to the Ohio by
way of Middle Island creek and Dry Ridge; in Ohio the great trail from
the "Forks of the Ohio" (Pittsburg) across the watershed which divides
the streams (in Ohio, Indiana, and Illinois) which flow into the Ohio
from those which flow into the lakes; the trails up the Muskingum and
Scioto and Miami to the lakes, in Pennsylvania the great trail running
north and south on the western spurs of the Alleghanies, Chestnut Ridge
and its prolongation, Laurel Hill; in Tennessee the great Warrior's Path
through Cumberland Gap to the country of the Cherokees and Catawbas.
The great routes of the buffaloes were north and south routes. The Ohio
was the only river which greatly facilitated westward migration in the
pioneer period. Most of the smaller streams in the Central West run
approximately north and south--in general alignment with the known
thoroughfares of the bison. For the Indians the north and south trails
were exceedingly convenient, since, throughout the period of intertribal
Indian wars with which we are acquainted, the major portion were between
foes who needed north and south roads upon which to reach each other
quickly; the great war trails of Indian history in the Central West led
north and south, and were usually on the general alignment of, if not
over, buffalo routes. In the earliest of historic days we find the
Iroquois fighting the confederacies of the South--and that warfare kept
up until Europeans allied the various Indian nations with them in their
wars. When the Shawanese were driven from the South they came northward
to the Cumberland, doubtless on the routes made by buffalo migrations,
for these would have brought them just where they were first found by
geographers.
The subsequent migrations of the Shawanese into the Alleghanies were
also undoubtedly made over buffalo routes across the Great Kanawha and
Monongahela valleys. At least, from the beginning to the end of the
strange wanderings of these "Bedouins of American Indians" they remained
within the habitat of the buffalo and the lesson of history clearly
states that within that habitat man has found the routes of the buffalo
the most practicable. Of the Wyandots, who according to their legends
came into the Central West by the Great Lakes, buffalo routes cannot be
said to have determined their distribution, but the Delawares, fleeing
from the valley whose name they bore, no doubt came westward to the
Muskingum on prehistoric routes used by the buffalo.
Thus buffalo traces must have influenced, to some extent, at least, the
distribution of the Indian nations who were found occupying the Ohio
basin when, about the middle of the eighteenth century, white men came
to know it. A significant proof of this is found in the fact that no
Indian nation permanently occupied the region now embraced in the state
of Kentucky, to which, because of the unusual quantity of licks and
meadow lands, the buffaloes were manifestly partial and where their
roads are best known. Thither came all the Indian nations and here all
contended in the immemorial conflict for possession of this land which
they, as well as the buffalo, loved.
The buffalo, because of his sagacious selection of the most sure and
most direct courses, has influenced the routes of trade and travel of
the white race as much, possibly, as he influenced the course of the
red-men in earlier days. There is great truth in Thomas Benton's figure
when he said that the buffalo blazed the way for the railways to the
Pacific. That sagacious animal undoubtedly "blazed"--with his hoofs on
the surface of the earth--the course of many of our roads, canals, and
railways. That he found the points of least resistance across our great
mountain ranges there can be little doubt. It is certain that he
discovered Cumberland Gap and his route through that pass in the
mountains has been accepted as one of the most important on the
continent. It is also obvious that the buffalo found the course from
Atlantic waters to the head of the Great Kanawha, and that he opened a
way from the Potomac to the Ohio. How important these strategic points
are now considered is evident from the fact that a railway crosses the
mountains at each of them; the New York Central, the Baltimore and Ohio,
the Pennsylvania, and the Chesapeake and Ohio cross the first great
divide in the eastern portion of our country on routes selected
centuries ago by the plunging buffalo. One of the most interesting of
specific examples of a railway following an ancient highway of buffalo
and Indian is to be found on the Baltimore and Ohio Southwestern railway
line between Grafton and Parkersburg. While searching for the old
highway from the Monongahela to the Ohio, an explorer asked an old
resident to describe its course. "From Parkersburg," said the informant,
"it goes on to Ewing's Station, Turtle Run, and Kanawha Station; it goes
over Eaton's Tunnel, follows Dry Ridge into Dodridge county and passes
through Martin's Woods, just north of Greenwood, to Center Station where
it turns east, crossing Gorham's Tunnel, and goes down Middle Island
Creek."
"The Indians must have patronized the railroad well," observed the
student, "since their trail passes by all the stations and tunnels."
"Law, no," broke out the disappointed old man, "they wa'n't no railroad
them days, but when they come to build it they follered the trail the
hull way." It is nothing less than wonderful that the old highway
selected by the instinct of the bison should be found in two instances,
in a space of twenty miles, immediately above the railway tunnel.
Other strategic lines of travel perhaps first opened by the buffalo were
the portage paths between the heads of streams, especially those of the
Ohio basin and the lake streams on the north and the Atlantic streams
on the south. Undoubtedly in his migrations north and south the buffalo
deeply wore the river trails, for here he was close to water and the
river meadows which constantly offered all the nourishment he needed. At
least, when white men first came into the West they found great paths
over the portages which were more of the nature of buffalo roads than
Indian trails. Certain of these portages have been noted; others were
between the French Creek and Lake Erie--a portage undoubtedly well known
to the buffalo--which the French named Rivière aux Boeufs in honor of
these monarchs of the forests; others again between the Cuyahoga and the
Muskingum, the Scioto and Sandusky, the Wabash and Maumee, St. Joseph
and Kankakee, Fox and Illinois, etc. The prehistoric use of portages has
elsewhere been noticed in connection with the mound-building Indians.
They were perhaps the earliest of traveled ways of the continent.
FOOTNOTES:
[1] _Twelfth Annual Report of the Bureau of Ethnology_, p. 601.
[2] _Id._, p. 17, art. 7.
[3] _Id._, p. 645.
[4] _Report of the Geological Survey of Ohio_, vol. vii., part ii., p.
37.
[5] _Bulletin_, 1891.
[6] _Twelfth Annual Report of the Bureau of Ethnology_, p. 525.
[7] _Life and Times of Ephraim Cutler_, p. 23.
[8] General Butler's _Journal_, "The Olden Time," vol. ii., pp. 455-456.
[9] Cf. Gist's, Dr. Walker's, Boone's, Washington's, Post's,
Zeisberger's, Croghan's, Heckewelder's, journeys into the West as
related in their _Journals_ or letters; note the routes of such armies
as those led by Bouquet and McIntosh which went from Fort Pitt to the
interior of Ohio, or by Lewis which marched from Virginia to the mouth
of the Great Kanawha, or by Harmar, St. Clair, and Wayne, which went
northward from the Ohio river toward the Great Lakes. Troops were
shipped frequently from Pittsburg and Detroit westward by water, but is
there one instance where they were transported into the interior on the
smaller rivers? Cf. Pentland's _Journal_, "History of Western
Pennsylvania," appendix, pp. 389-391.
[10] _Life and Times of Ephraim Cutler_, p. 21.
[11] Hildreth's _Pioneer History_, p. 159.
[12] Gen. Moses Cleaveland, on coming to the site of the city which
bears his name, found he could not ascend the Cuyahoga because of the
vast quantity of deadwood which filled it.
[13] MacLean's _Mound Builders_, p. 145.
[14] _Twelfth Annual Report of the Bureau of Ethnology_, p. 52.
[15] _Id._, pp. 54-55.
[16] _Id._, p. 54.
[17] _Id._, p. 56.
[18] _Id._, p. 58.
[19] _Id._, p. 58.
[20] _Id._, p. 59.
[21] _Id._, p. 60.
[22] _Id._, p. 62.
[23] _Id._, p. 184.
[24] _Id._, p. 192.
[25] _Id._, pp. 198-215.
[26] _Id._, p. 449.
[27] _Id._, p. 451.
[28] _Id._, p. 452.
[29] _Id._, p. 458.
[30] _Id._, p. 458.
[31] _Catalogue of Prehistoric Works East of the Rocky Mountains_,
p. 22.
[32] _Id._, p. 26.
[33] _Id._, p. 48.
[34] _Id._, p. 50.
[35] _Id._, p. 51.
[36] _Id._, p. 57.
[37] _Id._, p. 63.
[38] _Id._, p. 69.
[39] _Id._, p. 74.
[40] _Id._, p. 75.
[41] _Id._, p. 91.
[42] _Id._, p. 94.
[43] _Id._, p. 128.
[44] _Id._, p. 144.
[45] _Id._, p. 146.
[46] _Id._, pp. 152-153.
[47] _Id._, p. 157.
[48] _Id._, pp. 169, 177.
[49] _Id._, p. 52.
[50] _Id._, pp. 53, 54.
[51] _Id._, p. 68.
[52] _Id._, p. 90.
[53] _Id._, p. 153.
[54] _Id._, p. 152.
[55] _Id._, p. 156.
[56] _Id._, p. 158.
[57] _Id._, p. 200.
[58] _Id._, p. 209.
[59] _Id._, p. 218.
[60] _Twelfth Annual Report of the Bureau of Ethnology_, PP. 46, 47.
[61] _Id._, p. 52.
[62] _Id._, p. 56.
[63] _Id._, p. 55.
[64] _Id._, pp. 54, 55, 56, 59.
[65] _Id._, p. 78.
[66] _Id._, p. 85.
[67] _Id._, p. 160.
[68] _Id._, plate viii.
[69] _Id._, p. 175.
[70] _Id._, p. 243, plate opp. p. 244.
[71] Squier and Davis's _Ancient Monuments of the Mississippi Valley_,
plate iv.
[72] _Id._, plate vii.
[73] _Id._, plate x.
[74] _Id._, plate xii., No. 4.
[75] _Id._, plate xiv., No. 4.
[76] _Id._, plate xx.
[77] _Id._, plate xxxi., No. 1.
[78] _American Antiquarian_, vol. viii., pp. 369, 370.
[79] _Smithsonian Report_, 1879, p. 443.
[80] White's _Historical Collections of Georgia_, p. 541.
[81] _Smithsonian Report_, 1882, pp. 737-749.
[82] _Id._, pp. 730-749.
[83] _Id._, pp. 728-749.
[84] Squier and Davis's _Ancient Monuments of the Mississippi Valley_,
pp. 115, 116, plate xxxix.
[85] _Smithsonian Report_, 1881, p. 682.
[86] _Catalogue of Prehistoric Works East of the Rocky Mountains_, p.
177.
[87] Atwater, _Transactions of the American Antiquarian Society_, vol.
i. (1820), pp. 193, 194; Howe's _Historical Collections of Ohio_ (1847),
p. 413; Squier and Davis's _Ancient Monuments of the Mississippi
Valley_, pp. 88-90, fig. 20 and plate xxxi., No. 1, and p. 171, fig. 57,
No. 3; MacLean's _Mound Builders_, pp. 37-38, fig. 4; Shepherd's
_Antiquities of the State of Ohio_, p. 61.
[88] _Twelfth Annual Report of the Bureau of Ethnology_, p. 526.
[89] _Id._, p. 526.
[90] _Id._, pp. 525-526.
[91] A most ingenious theory regarding the advent of the buffalo into
the Central West will be found in Prof. Shaler's _Man and Nature in
America_.
[92] _Memoirs of the Geological Survey of Kentucky_, vol. i., part ii.
[93] Chicago _Inter Ocean_, August 5, 1875.
[94] _First Explorations of Kentucky_ (Filson Club Pub. No. 13), p. 50.
[95] _Id._, pp. 44-45.
[96] _Id._, p. 47.
[97] _Id._, p. 51.
[98] _Id._, p. 61.
[99] _Id._, p. 66.
[100] Boone's _Autobiography_.
[101] _First Explorations of Kentucky_ (Filson Club Pub. No. 13), p. 61,
note.
[102] Buell's _Journal_, Hildreth's "Pioneer History," p. 157.
[103] _First Explorations of Kentucky_ (Filson Club Pub. No. 13), p. 70.
[104] M'Murtrie's _Sketches of Louisville_, p. 58.
[105] _First Explorations of Kentucky_ (Filson Club Pub. No. 13), p.
169.
[106] _Id._, p. 170.
[107] _Bryant's Station_ (Filson Club Pub. No. 12), pp. 74-75.
[108] Smith's _History of Kentucky_, p. 7.
[109] _Bryant's Station_ (Filson Club Pub. No. 12), p. 131.
[110] _Bryant's Station_ (Filson Club Pub. No. 12), p. 135.
[111] _First Explorations of Kentucky_ (Filson Club Pub. No. 13), pp.
184-185.
[112] Croghan's _Journal_, "The Olden Time," vol. i., pp. 407-408.
[113] Gen. Butler's _Journal_, "The Olden Time," vol. ii. p. 450.
[114] _Bryant's Station_ (Filson Club Pub. No. 12), pp. 159-172.
[115] Ranck's _History of Lexington, Kentucky_, p. 105.
[116] Ranck's _History of Lexington, Kentucky_, p. 29.
[117] _John Filson_ (Filson Club Pub. No. 1), p. 18.
[118] _John Filson_ (Filson Club Pub. No. 1), pp. 18-19.
[119] _The Blue-Grass Region of Kentucky_, pp. 245, 261-262, 267, 283.
[120] Gen. Butler's _Journal_, "The Olden Time," vol. ii., p. 458.
[121] _Id._, p. 484.
[122] "The stupidity of the buffalo, as well as its sagacity, has been
by some writers overstated. A herd of buffaloes certainly possesses ...
the sheep-like propensity of blindly following its leaders.... A little
reflection, however, will show that in such instances as the rushing of
a herd over a precipice or into a pond ... is not wholly an act of
stupidity, but comparable to that of a panic-stricken crowd of human
beings."--"History of the American Bison," _Ninth Annual Report,
Department of the Interior_, p. 472.
[123] _Ninth Annual Report, Department of the Interior_, p. 466.
[124] _Ninth Annual Report, Department of the Interior_, p. 467. On this
point see further Dr. Coues's communication given in Part II.
[125] _Id._, p. 467.
[126] _First Explorations of Kentucky_ (Filson Club Pub. No. 13), p. 47.
[127] Walker's _Journal_ (Filson Club Pub. No. 13), p. 73, note.
* * * * *
Transcriber's Notes:
1. Passages in italics are surrounded by _underscores_.
2. Obvious errors in spelling and punctuation have been corrected.
3. Footnotes have been moved to the end of the main text body.
4. Images have been moved from the middle of a paragraph to the closest
paragraph break.
5. Certain words use an oe ligature in the original.