The fight continued all night long, until the approach of dawn, and the

danger of the forest fire cutting them off made the Indians decamp. They

did not stop until in the big beaver meadow at Wildcat Valley, they

paused long enough to take stock of prisoners, and to count wounded and

missing. They had captured an even dozen prisoners, and as the light

grew stronger they noticed that they had one male captive, his face

almost unrecognizable with soot, and mostly stripped of clothing, who

proved to be none other than the zealous Hugh Gibson himself.

It was a strange company that moved in single file towards the

Alleghenies, eleven women and one man, all tied together with leather

thongs, like a party of Alpinists, one after another, not descending a

monarch of mountains, but descending into captivity, into the valley of

the shadow. The Indians were jubilant over the personnel of their

captives. In addition to Hugh Gibson, late captain of the guard, they

had taken Elsbeth Henry, daughter of the most influential of the

settlers, a girl of rare beauty and charm, who had enjoyed some

educational advantages among the Moravians at Nazareth, the pioneers of

women’s education in America.

Gibson had for a year past, ever since he first appeared in the vicinity

of Fort Robinson, admired the uncommonly attractive girl, and being

ambitions in many ways, aspired to her hand. She had never treated him

with much consideration, except to be polite to him, but she was that to

everyone, and could not be otherwise, being a happy blend of Huguenot

and Bohemian ancestry.

The minute that Gibson saw that Elsbeth was his fellow prisoner he

forgot the chagrin at being the sole male captive, and congratulated

himself in secret on the good fortune that would make him, for a year or

more, the daily companion of the object of his admiration. He would

redeem the humiliation of this capture by staging a sensational double

escape, and then, after freeing the maiden, she could not fail to love

him and agree to become his wife. He was, therefore, the most cheerful

of prisoners, and whistled and sang Irish songs as he marched along at

the tail end of the long line of captives.

It seemed as if they were being taken on a long journey, and he surmised

that the destination was Fort Duquesne, to be delivered over to the

French, where rewards would be paid for each as hostages. He could see

by the deference paid to Elsbeth Henry that the redmen recognized that

they had a prisoner of quality, and as she walked along, away ahead of

him, whenever there was a turn in the path, he would note her youthful

beauty and charm.

She was not very tall, but was gracefully and firmly built. Her most

noticeable features were the intense blackness of her soft wavy hair,

and the whiteness of her skin, with minute blue veins showing, gave her

complexion a blue whiteness, the color of mother of pearl almost, and

Gibson, being a somewhat poetical Ulster Scot, compared her to an

evening sky, with her red lips, like a streak of flame, across the

mother of pearl firmament, her downcast eyes, like twin stars just

appearing!

The further on the party marched the harder it was going to be to

successfully bring her back in safety to the Juniata country, through a

hostile Indian territory, for he had not the slightest doubt that he

would outwit the clumsy-witted redmen and escape with her. It might be

best to strike north or northwest, out of the seat of hostilities, and

make a home for his bride-to-be in the wilderness along Lake Erie, and

never take her back to her parents. But then there was his mother; how

could he desert her? He must go back with Elsbeth, run all risks, once

he had escaped and freed her from her inconsiderate captors.

After a few days he learned that the permanent camp was to be on the

Pucketa, in what is now Westmoreland County. Cooties was located there,

and since his unparalleled success in massacring whole families of

whites, he was apparently again in favor with the Indian tribal

Chieftains. He was to take charge of the prisoners, and when ready,

would lead them to Fort Duquesne, or possibly to some point further up

La Belle Riviere, to turn them over to the French, who would hold them

as hostages.

It was in the late afternoon when the party filed into Cooties’

encampment, at the Blue Spring, near the headwaters of the beautiful

Pucketa. Cooties had been apprised of their coming, and had painted his

face for the occasion, but meanwhile had consumed a lot of rum, and was

beastly drunk, so much so that in his efforts to drive the punkis off

his face, which seemed to have a predilection for the grease paint, he

smeared the moons and stars into an unrecognizable smudge all over his

saturnine countenance.

As he sat there on a huge dark buffalo robe, a rifle lying before him, a

skull filled with smoking tobacco on one side, and a leather jug of rum

on the other, smoking a long pipe, his head bobbing unsteadily on its

short neck, he made a picture never to be forgotten. The slayer of the

Sheridan family was at best an ugly specimen of the Indian race. He was

short, squat–Gibson described him as “sawed off”; his complexion was

very dark, his lips small and thin, his nose was broad and flat, his

eyes full and blood-shot, and his shaven head was covered with a red

cap, almost like a Turk’s fez.

He was too intoxicated to indicate his pleasure, if he felt any, at the

arrival of the prisoners. In front of where he sat were the embers of a

campfire, as the weather–it was early in March–was still very cold. He

had the prisoners lined up in front of him beyond the coals, while he

squatted on his rug, eyeing them as carefully as his bleared, inebriated

vision would permit. Calling to several of his henchmen, he had them

fetch fresh wood and pile it beside the embers, as if a big bonfire was

to be started later.

Just as they were in the midst of bringing the wood, a group of six

stalwart Indians rushed on the scene, literally dragging a rather

good-looking, dark-haired white woman of about thirty years, whose face

showed every sign of intense terror. From words that he could

understand, and the gestures, Gibson made out that this woman had

belonged to another batch of prisoners, but before she could be

delivered at Shannopin’s Town had somehow made her escape.

To deliver a body of prisoners short one of the quota had brought some

criticism on Cooties, and he was in an ugly frame of mind when she was

brought before him. There was an ash pole near the wood pile, to which

prisoners were tied while being interrogated, and Cooties ordered that

the unfortunate woman should be strapped to it. The Indian warriors,

needless to say, made a thorough job and bound her to it securely, hand

and foot.

Though she saw twelve or more white persons, the bound woman never said

a word, and the captives from Fort Robinson and other places were too

terror-stricken to address a word to her. They stared at her with that

look of dumb helplessness that a flock of sheep assume when peering

through the bars of their fold at a farmer in the act of butchering one

of their number. Sympathy they may have felt, but to express it in words

would have availed nothing.

Once tied to the tree, Cooties ordered that the wood be piled about her

feet. It was ranked until it came almost to her waist. Then the cruel

warrior turned to his victim, saying to her in German, “It’s going to be

a cold night; I think you can warm me up very nicely.”

Then he grinned and looked at each of his other prisoners menacingly.

Silas Wright in his excellent “History of Perry County” thus quotes Hugh

Gibson in describing the scene then enacted: “All the prisoners in the

neighborhood were collected to be spectators of the death by torture of

a poor, unhappy woman, a fellow-prisoner who had escaped, and been

recaptured. They stripped her naked, tied her to a post and pierced her

with red hot irons, the flesh sticking to the irons at every touch. She

screamed in the most pitiful manner, and cried for mercy, but the

ruthless barbarians were deaf to her agonizing shrieks and prayers, and

continued their horrid cruelty until death came to her relief.”

After this fiendish episode, the Fort Robinson prisoners were sick at

heart and in body for days, and most of them would have dropped in their

tracks if they had been compelled to resume the long, tedious western

journey.

It appeared that in the foray on Fort Robinson one young Indian had been

slain; rumor among the Indians had it that he had been shot by mistake

by a member of his own party. At any rate his parents, who lived near

Cooties’ camp-ground, took his end very hard, and the squaw, who was

Cooties’ sister, demanded the adoption of Hugh Gibson to take the place

of her lost warrior son. This was a good point for Gibson, although the

warrior’s father, Busqueetam, acted very coldly towards him, and he

feared he might some day, in a fit of revenge and hate, take his life.

However, the young white man, by making every effort to help his Indian

foster parents, who were very feeble and unable to work, won their

confidence, and also that of Cooties, who requisitioned him to do all

sorts of errands and work about the encampment.

One day Busqueetam was in a terrible state of excitement. His spotted

pony, the only equine in the camp, and the one that he expected to give

to Cooties to ride with chiefly dignity through the portals of the Fort

had strayed off in the night.

Most of the Fort Robinson and other prisoners who had been brought in

from various directions since their arrival, to make a great caravan of

captives to impress the commanders at Shannopin’s Town, like a Roman

triumph, were allowed their liberty during the daytime. At night they

were all tied together as they lay about the campfire, not far from the

charred stump of the ash pole where the poor white woman had been burned

to death, and where the small Indian dogs were constantly sniffing.

There were about twenty-five prisoners, all told, and with these were

tied about half a dozen guards, and all lay down in a circle about the

fire, guards and prisoners sleeping at the same time. It was a different

system from that of the whites, for if a prisoner got uneasy or tried to

get up, he or she would naturally pull on the leather thongs, and rouse

the guardians and other prisoners. The thongs were around both wrists,

so a prisoner was tied to the person on either side.

Hugh Gibson managed to have a few words with Elsbeth, when he heard of

the horse’s disappearance. Much as he would like to have talked to her,

few words passed between them during the captivity. Elsbeth was

naturally reserved, and had never known Hugh well before, and he was

playing for big stakes, and saw how the Indians resented any hobnobbing

among their prisoners. He managed to whisper to her that he would

volunteer to hunt for Busqueetam’s missing pony, but would return at

night and wait for her in the Panther Glade, a dense Rhododendron

thicket through which they had passed on their way to the campground;

that she should gnaw herself free with her teeth, and that done, with

her natural agility and moccasined feet, could nimbly spring away into

the darkness and escape to him. He thought he knew where the pony was

hiding, and she could ride on the animal to civilization. And now let

Gibson tell the adventure in his own words:

“At last a favorable opportunity to gain my liberty. Busqueetam lost a

horse and sent me to hunt him. After hunting some time, I came home and

told him I had discovered his tracks at some considerable distance, and

that I thought I would find him; that I would take my gun and provisions

and would hunt him for three or four days, and if I could kill a deer or

a bear, I would pack home the meat on the horse.”

Hugh Gibson, the privileged captive, strolled out of camp with a

business-like expression on his lean face, and carrying Cooties’

favorite rifle. He took a long circle about through the deep forest, and

at dark was ensconced in the Panther Glade, to wait the fateful moment

when Elsbeth, his beloved, would come to him, and as his promised wife,

he would lead her to liberty.

It was a cold night, and his teeth chattered as he squatted among the

rhododendrons waiting and listening. The wolves were howling, and he

wondered if the girl would feel afraid!

At the usual time the various prisoners and their guards were lashed

together, and lay down for their rest around the embers of the campfire.

Most of them were short of coverings, so they huddled close together.

Not so Elsbeth, for Cooties looked after her and provided her with four

buffalo robes, which she would have loved dearly to share with her less

favored fellow prisoners, but they would not allow it. The Indians made

the captives work hard during the day cutting wood, dressing furs and

pounding corn. They did not feed them any too well, as game was scarce

and ammunition scarcer, so all were tired when they lay down by the

campfire’s soothing glow.

One by one they fell asleep, all but Elsbeth, who, covering her head

with the buffalo robes, began to gnaw on the leather thongs as if they

were that much caramel, first this side, then the other. She felt like a

rodent before she was half through, and her pretty pearl-colored teeth

grew shorter and blunter before she was done. It was a gigantic task,

but she stuck to it bravely, and some time during the “wee, sma’” hours

had the delicious sensation of knowing she was free, even though she

felt horridly toothless and sore-gummed in her moment of victory.

Like a wild cat she slipped out from under the buffalo robes, wiggled

along among the wet leaves and moss, then crawled to her feet and was

off like a deer towards the Panther Glade, regardless of the howling of

the wolves. Hugh Gibson’s quick sense of hearing told him she was

coming, and he walked out so that he stood on the path before her, and

clasped her white shapely arms in heartfelt congratulations.

“Now that we are free,” he said, “I will take you to the pony in three

hours’ travel. I want to arrange the one final detail to make this

reunion always memorable for us both. We have shared common hardships

and perils; we have plotted and planned for freedom together. Let us

guarantee that our lives shall always be together, for I love you, and

want you to be my wife.”

Elsbeth drew herself back out of his grasp, and a shudder went through

her supple little frame. “Why I have never heard the like of what you

say, much as I have appreciated all you have done; ours was only a

common misfortune. I could not care for you that way, even though

recognizing your bravery, your foresight and your kindliness.”

For a moment Hugh Gibson was so angry that he felt like leading her back

to Cooties, where she would probably have been received with open arms,

and be burned at the stake, but he finally “possessed his soul” and

accepted the inevitable.

They found the pony by morning, but it took some maneuvering to capture

the wily beast, and packed him across the Kittanning Path, where, at

Burgoon’s Run, they came upon a party of traders headed by George

McCord, who had lately come from the Juniata.

McCord told them the details of the conflict at Fort Robinson, of the

shocking killing of Widow Gibson, Robert Miller’s daughter, James

Wilson’s wife, John Summerson, and others, on that bloody night of gas,

forest fires, smoke and surprises.

It was the turning point in Hugh Gibson’s life; his mother gone, and not

a sign of weakening in Elsbeth Henry’s mother-of-pearl countenance; in

fact, the indistinct line of her mouth was more like a streak of crimson

flame than ever. A new light had dawned for him out of these shocking

misfortunes; his purpose would be to redeem his inactivity at Fort

Robinson, his overconfidence, his over self-esteem, by going at once to

Carlisle to secure a commission in the Royal American Regiment of

Riflemen. He left Elsbeth in charge of the McCord party who would see

her back to her distracted parents, while he tramped over the mountains

towards Reastown and Fort Littleton, by the shortest route to the

Cumberland Valley.

[Illustration]

[Illustration: BILL BREWER, “HICK” PREACHER]

XII

_Girty’s Notch_

The career of Simon Girty, otherwise spelled Girtee and Gerdes, has

become of sufficient interest to cause the only authoritative biography

to sell at a prohibitive figure, and outlaw or renegade as he is called,

there are postoffices, hotels, streams, caves and rocks which perpetuate

his name throughout Pennsylvania.

Simon Gerdes was born in the Cumberland Valley on Yellow Breeches Creek,

the son of a Swiss-German father and an Irish mother. This origin

guaranteed him no high social position, for in the old days, in the

Cumberland Valley, in particular, persons of those racial beginnings

were never accepted at par by the proud descendants of Quakers, Virginia

Cavaliers, and above all, by the Ulster Scots. After the world war

similar beginnings have correspondingly lowered in the markets of

prestige, and a century or more of gradual family aggrandizement has

gone for nil, the social stratification of pre-Revolutionary days having

completely re-established itself.

Unfortunately for Simon Gerdes, or Girty, as he was generally called, he

was possessed of lofty ambitions, he aimed to be a military hero and a

man of quality, like the dignified and exclusive gentry who rode about

the valley on their long-tailed white horses and carried swords, and

were accompanied by retainers with long rifles. There must have been

decent blood in him somewhere to have brought forth such aspirations,

but personally he was never fitted to attain them. He had no chance for

an education off there in the rude foothills of the Kittochtinnies; he

was undersized, swarthy and bushy headed; his hands were hairy, and his

face almost impossible to keep free of black beard. Analyzed his

features were not unpleasant; he had deepset, piercing black eyes, a

prominent aquiline nose, a firm mouth and jaw, and his manner was quick,

alert and decisive.

Such was Simon Girty when his martial dreams caused him to leave home

and proceed to Virginia to enlist in the Rifle Regiment. A half century

of Quaker rule in Pennsylvania had failed to disturb the tranquility of

the relations between whites and Indians, but in the Old Dominion, there

was a constant bickering with the redskins along the western frontier.

As Girty was a sure shot, he was eagerly accepted, and in a short time

was raised to the grade of Corporal. Accompanied by a young

Captain-lieutenant named Claypoole, he was sent to the Greenbrier River

country to convey a supply train, but owing to the indifference of the

officer, the train became strung out, and the vanguard was cut off by

Indians, and captured, and the rearguard completely routed.

As Girty happened to be the vidette, the Captain-lieutenant, who was in

the rear and should have come up and seen that his train traveled more

compactly, had a splendid opportunity to shift the blame. An

investigation was held at Spottsylvania, presided over by a board of

officers recently arrived from England, who knew nothing of border

warfare, and were sticklers for caste above everything else.

Someone had to be disciplined, and if a fellow could be punished and a

gentleman exculpated, why then of course, punish the fellow. This was

speedily done, and Girty was taken out before the regiment, stripped of

his chevrons, denounced by the Colonel, forced to run the gauntlet,

Indian style, and drummed out of camp.

Girty, though humiliated and shamed, felt glad that he was not shot; he

would have been had he been actually guilty of neglect; he was punished

as badly as an innocent man dare be punished to shield a guilty

superior. After receiving his dishonorable discharge, Girty sorrowfully

wended his way back to the parental home on the Yellow Breeches, his

visions of glory shattered. He did not tell his parents what had

happened, but they knew that something had gone wrong, and pitied him,

as only poor, lowly people can pity another.

Henry Fielding, a gentleman born and bred, has said: “Why is it that the

only really kindly people are the poor,” and again, “Why is it that

persons in high places are always so hard?”

About this time Simon Girty found work breaking colts on the estate of

an eccentric character named Gaspar, known in the Cumberland Valley as

“French Louis,” who resided near the mouth of Dublin Gap, on the same

side of the trail, but nearer the valley than the present Sulphur

Springs Hotel. All that remains of his ambitious chateau is the chimney,

which was recently photographed by Professor J. S. Illick, head of the

research bureau of the State Department of Forestry.

“French Louis” Gaspar was a Huguenot, a Gascon, and prided himself on a

resemblance to Henry of Navarre, and wore the same kind of fan-shaped,

carefully brushed beard. His wife was also of French origin, a member of

the well-known Le Tort family, and a woman of some education and

character. They had several daughters, all of whom married well, and at

the time of Girty’s taking employment, but one was at home–the

youngest–Eulalie.

She was a slim, dark girl, with hair and eyes as black as Girty’s, a

perfect mate in type and disposition. It is a curious thing while

unravelling these stories of old time Pennsylvania, that in seeking

descriptions of the personal appearance (which is always the most

interesting part) of the persons figuring in them at an early day,

scarcely any blondes are recorded; the black, swarthy Indian-like

visages so noticeable to strangers traveling through Pennsylvania today,

were also prevalent, commonly met with types of our Colonial period.

Eulalie Gaspar could see that there was something on Girty’s mind, and

tried to be kind to him and encourage him, but she asked no questions,

and he volunteered no information. If he had not received such a

complete social setback at Spottsylvania, the youth might have aspired

to the girl’s hand, but he now was keenly aware of the planes of caste,

realizing that he stood very low on the ladder of quality.

He seemed to be improving in spirits under the warm sun of encouragement

at Chateau Gaspar, as “French Louis” liked to call his huge house of

logs and stone, for the Huguenot adventurer was much of a Don Quixote,

and lived largely in a world of his own creation. Eulalie, hot-blooded

and impulsive, often praised his prowess as a horseman, and otherwise

smiled on him.

There was a great sale of Virginia bred horses being held in the market

place at Carlisle, and, of course, “French Louis” mounted on a superbly

caparisoned, ambling horse, and wearing a hat with a plume, and attended

by Simon Girty, were among those present.

The animals ranged from packers and palfreys to fancy saddlers of the

high school type, and although Gaspar had every stall full at home, and

some wandering, hobbled about the old fields, he bought six more at

fancy prices, and it would be an extensive task to return them safely to

the stables at the “Chateau”.

It was near the close of the sale when a young Virginian named Conrad

Gist or Geist, one of the sellers of horses, who had been a sergeant in

Girty’s regiment, and witnessed his degradation at Spottsylvania, came

up, and in the presence of the crowd, taunted young Simon on being

court-martialed and kicked out of camp.

Girty, though the humiliating words were said among divers of his

friends, bit his lips and said nothing at the time. Later in the tap

room, when “French Louis” was having a final jorum before starting

homeward, the Virginian repeated his taunts, and Girty, though half his

size, slapped his face. Gist quickly drew a horse pistol from one of the

deep pockets of his long riding coat, and tried to shoot the affronted

youth. Girty was too quick for him, and in wresting the pistol from his

hand, it went off, and shot the Virginian through the stomach. He fell

to the sanded floor, and was soon dead.

Other Virginians present raised an outcry, in which they were upheld by

those of similar social status in the fraternity of “gentlemen horse

dealers” residing at Carlisle. Threats were made to hang Girty to a tree

and fill him full of bullets. He felt that he was lucky to escape in the

melee, and make for the mountains. Public opinion was against him, and a

reward placed on his head. Armed posses searched for him for weeks,

eventually learning that he was being harbored by a band of escaped

redemptioners, slaves, and gaol breakers, who had a cabin or shack in

the wilds along Shireman’s Creek. It was vacated when the pursuers

reached it, but they burnt it to the ground, as well as every other roof

in the wilds that it could be proved he had ever slept under.

By 1750 he became known as the most notorious outlaw in the Juniata

country, and pursuit becoming too “hot”, he decided to migrate west,

which he did, allying himself with the Wyandot Indians. He lived with

them a foe to the whites, more cruel and relentless, the Colonial

Records state, than his adopted people.

Some of his marauding expeditions took him back to the Susquehanna

country, and he made several daring visits to his parents, on one of

which he learned to his horror and disgust, that Eulalie Gaspar, while

staying with one of her married sisters at Carlisle, had met and married

the now Captain Claypoole, the author of his degradation, who had come

there in connection with the mustering of Colonial troops.

During these visits Girty occupied at times a cave facing the

Susquehanna River, in the Half Fall Hills, directly opposite to Fort

Halifax, which he could watch from the top of the mountain. The narrow,

deep channel of the river, at the end of the Half Fall Hills, so long

the terror of the “up river” raftsmen, became known as Girty’s Notch.

The sinister reputation of the locality was borne out in later years in

a resort for rivermen called Girty’s Notch Hotel, now a pleasant,

homelike retreat for tired and thirsty autoists who draw birch beer

through straws, and gaze at the impressive scenery of river and mountain

from the cool, breezeswept verandas.

But the most imposing of all is the stone face on the mountain side,

looking down on the state road and the river, which shows clearly the

rugged outlines of the features of the notorious borderer. An excellent

photograph of “Girty’s Face” can be seen in the collection of

stereoscoptic views possessed by the genial “Charley Mitchell”

proprietor of the Owens House, formerly the old Susquehanna House, at

Liverpool.

It was after General Braddock’s defeat in 1755 that Captain, now Major

Claypoole, decided to settle on one of his parental estates on the

Redstone River, (now Fayette County) in Western Pennsylvania. Being

newly wedded and immensely wealthy for his day, he caused to be erected

a manor house of the showy native red stone, elaborately stuccoed, on a

bluff overlooking this picturesque winding river. He cleared much land,

being aided by Negro slaves, and a horde of German redemptioners.

When General Forbes’ campaign against Fort Duquesne was announced in

1757, he decided to again try for actual military laurels, though his

promotion in rank had been rapid for one of his desultory service; so he

journeyed to Carlisle, and was reassigned to the Virginia Riflemen, with

the rank of Lieutenant Colonel of Staff.

He was undecided what to do with his young wife in his absences, but as

she had become interested in improving “Red Clay Hall,” as the new

estate was called, he decided to leave her there, well guarded by his

armed Virginia overseers. The Indians had been cleared out of the valley

for several years, and were even looked upon as curiosities when they

passed through the country, consequently all seemed safe on that score.

However, while Lieutenant-Colonel Claypoole was at Carlisle, before the

Forbes-Bouquet Army had started westward, an Indian with face blackened

and painted, in the full regalia of a chief, appeared at the door of

“Red Clay Hall” and asked to see the lady of the manor, with whom he

said he was acquainted–that she would know him by the name of Suckaweek.

This was considered peculiar, and he was told to wait outside, until

“her ladyship” could be informed of his presence. Eulalie Gaspar

Claypoole, clad in a gown of rose brocade, was in her living room on the

second story of the mansion, an apartment with high ceilings and large

windows, which commanded a view of the Red Stone Valley, clear to its

point of confluence with the lordly Monongahela. She was seated at an

inlaid rosewood desk, writing a letter to her husband, when the German

chief steward entered to inform her of the strange visitor waiting on

the lawn, whom she would know by the name of Suckaweek.

Taking the quill pen from her lips, for she had been trying to think of

something to write, the dark beauty directed the steward to admit the

visitor at once, and show him into the library. Hurrying to a pier

glass, she adjusted her elaborate apparel, and taking a rose from a

vase, placed it carefully in her sable hair, before she descended the

winding stairway.

“Suckaweek” (Black Fish), which was a pet name she used to call Girty in

the old days, was waiting in the great hall, and the greeting between

the ill-assorted pair seemed dignified, yet cordial. They spent the

balance of the afternoon between the library and strolling over the

grounds, admiring the extensive views, dined together in the state

dining room, and the last the stewards and servants saw of them, when

informed their presence would be no longer required, was the pair

sitting in easy chairs on either side of the great fireplace, both

smoking long pipes of fragrant Virginia tobacco.

In the morning the Indian and Madame Claypoole were missing, and an

express was sent at once to Carlisle to acquaint the Colonel with this

daring abduction of a lady of quality. The news came as a great shock to

the young officer, who obtained a leave of absence and a platoon of

riflemen to engage in the search for his vanished spouse.

The marriage had seemed a happy one, but in discussing the case with his

father-in-law, “French Louis,” indiscreetly admitted that his daughter

had once seemed a little sweet on Simon Girty, the outlaw. All was clear

now, the motive revealed.

It was the truth, the lovely “Lady” Claypoole, as she was styled by the

mountain folks, had gone off with the seemingly uncouth renegade, Simon

Girty.

Why she had done so, she could never tell, but doubtless it was a spark

of love lain dormant since the old days at Chateau Gaspar, when she had

seen the young outlaw breaking her father’s unmanageable colts, that

furnished the motive for the elopement.

In the glade, where at an early hour in the morning, Girty and his fair

companion joined his entourage of Indians and white outlaws, Simon, in

the presence of all, unsheathed his formidable hunting knife, a relic of

his first campaign against the Indians when he belonged to the Virginia

“Long Knives,” and cut a notch on the stock of his trusty rifle, which

was handed to him by his favorite bodyguard, a half Jew, half Indian,

named Mamolen, a native of Heidelberg in Berks County.

Although during the past eight years he had personally killed and

scalped over a hundred Indians and whites, Girty had never, as the other

frontiersmen always did, “nicked” his rifle stock.

Turning to Lady Claypoole with a smile, he said: “Some day I will tell

you why I have cut this notch; it is a long and curious story.”

In order to have her safe from capture or molestation, Girty took the

woman on a lengthy and perilous journey to Kentucky, “the dark and

bloody ground.” To the country of the mysterious Green River, in what is

now Edmonson County, land of caves, and sinks, and knobs, and

subterranean lakes and streams, amid hardwood groves and limestone, he

built a substantial log house, where he left her, protected only by the

faithful Mamolen, while he returned to fight with the French and Indians

along the banks of the Ohe-yu, “The Beautiful River.”

The defeat of the allied forces by the British, and the abandonment of

Fort Duquesne, were sore blows to Simon Girty’s plans and hopes, but his

position and prestige among the Indians remained undimmed.

Claypoole, though promoted to full Colonel, did not take part in any of

the battles, being intermittently off on leave, hunting for his recreant

wife, and spluttering vengeance against “that snake, that dog, Girty,”

as he alternately called him. It seemed as if the earth had swallowed up

the lovely object of the outlaw’s wiles, for though Girty himself was

heard of everywhere, being linked with the most hideous atrocities and

ambushes, no Indian prisoner, even under the most dreadful torture,

could reveal the Lady Claypoole’s whereabouts. The reason for that was

only two persons in the service knew, one was Mamolen, the other Girty,

and Mamolen remained behind with the fair runaway.

It was not until after the final collapse of the French power in 1764,

and the western country was becoming opened for settlement, that Colonel

Claypoole received an inkling of Eulalie’s whereabouts. It did not

excite his curiosity to see her again, or bring her back, but merely

fired his determination the more to even his score with Girty. When he

was sober and in the sedate atmosphere of his correctly appointed

library on Grant’s Hill, in the new town of Pittsburg, he realized how

foolish it would be to journey to the wilds to kill “a scum of the

earth,” he a gentleman of many generations of refined ancestry, all for

a “skirt” as he contemptuously alluded to his wife.

But when in his cups, and that was often, he vowed vengeance against the

despoiler of his home, and the things he planned to do when once he had

him in his clutches would have won the grand prize at a Spanish

Inquisition.

If it was Girty’s destiny to notch his rifle once, Nemesis provided that

Colonel Claypoole should also have that rare privilege. At a military

muster on the Kentucky side of Big Sandy, during the Revolutionary War,

Simon Girty boldly ventured to the outskirts of the encampment, to spy

on the strength and armament of the patriot forces, as he had done a

hundred times before. Colonel Claypoole, riding on the field on his

showy, jet black charger, noticed a low-brewed face, whiskered like a

Bolshevik, peering out through a clump of bushes. Recognizing him after

a lapse of over a quarter of a century, he rode at him rashly, parrying

with the flat blade of his sabre, the well directed bullet which Girty

sent at him. Springing from his mount, which he turned loose, and which

ran snorting over the field, with pistol in one hand, sabre in the

other, he rushed into the thicket, and engaged his foe in deadly combat.

He was soon on top of the surprised Girty, and stamping on him, like

most persons do with a venomous snake, at the same time shooting and

stabbing him.

When his frightened orderly, leading the recaptured charger, rode up,

followed by a number of excited officers and men, and drew near to the

thicket, they were just in time to see Colonel Claypoole emerging from

it, red-faced but calm, carrying a long rifle.

“I see you have put a notch in it already,” said one of his companions,

as he eagerly wrung his hand.

“So I perceive,” replied the Colonel, “but it was hardly necessary, for

I have only killed a snake.”

There are some who say that Colonel Claypoole’s victim was not Simon

Girty at all, but merely a drunken settler who was coming out of the

bushes after a mid-day nap, and a coincidence that the fellow was armed

with a rifle on which there was a single nick. Yet for all intents and

purposes Colonel Claypoole had killed a good enough Simon Girty, and had

his rifle to prove it.

Other reports have it that Simon Girty survived the Revolution, where he

played such a reprehensive part, to marry Catharine Malott, a former

captive among the Indians, in 1784, and was killed in the Battle of the

Thames, in the War of 1812.

C. W. Butterworth in his biography of the Girty family, says that Simon,

in later life, became totally blind, dying near Amlerstburg, Canada,

February 18, 1818, was buried on his farm, and a troop of British

soldiers from Fort Malden fired a volley at his grave.

XIII

_Poplar George_

“I have been reading your legends of the old days in the ‘North

American,’” said the delegate to the Grange Convention, stroking his

long silky mustache, “and they remind me of many stories that my mother

used to tell me when I was a little shaver, while we were living on the

Pucketa, in Westmoreland County. There was one story that I used to like

best of all. It was not the one about old Pucketa the Indian warrior for

whom the run was named, but about a less notable Indian, but more

esteemed locally, known as ‘Poplar George.’

“It isn’t nearly as interesting an Indian story as the one that Emerson

Collins tells, of the time when his mother, as a little girl on the

Quinneshockeny, went to the spring for a jug of water, finding a lone

Indian sitting there all by himself, looking as if he was in deep

thought. As he made no move to molest her, she filled her jug, and then

scampered back to the house as fast as she could tote the jug there.

“She was a little shy about telling of her strange experience, but

finally, when she mentioned the subject, her mother said, ‘maybe the

poor fellow was hungry.’ Quickly spreading a ‘piece,’ she hurried back

to the spring, but no Indian was to be found, only a few prints of his

mocassined feet in the soft earth by the water course. If it hadn’t been

for those footprints she would have always felt that she had not seen a

real live Indian, but a ghost.

“It was the last Indian ever heard of on the Quinneshockeny, and he had

probably come back to revive old memories of his happy childhood. No,

Poplar George was hardly like Emerson Collins’ ‘last Indian,’ as he, my

mother averred, was part Indian, part ghost. He was also the last Indian

that ever visited the Pucketa, which had been a famous stream in its day

for redmen, from the time when old Pucketa, himself, came there to spend

his last days, after having been driven out from his former hunting

grounds at the head of Lost Creek, which runs into the ‘Blue Juniata’

above Mifflintown.

“The principal part of this story revolves around two large trees that

used to stand near the Pucketa, one a big tulip or ‘whitewood’ tree,

hollow at the butt, so much so that a half grown person could hide in

it, and a huge water poplar tree, or ‘cottonwood,’ a rare tree in

Pennsylvania, you know, that stood on lower ground directly in line with

it, but on the far side of the creek, which ran parallel with the road.

It wasn’t much of a road in those days, I’m told, isn’t much of one yet,

little better than a cow path, with grass and dandelions growing between

the wagon tracks, and worn foot-path on the creek side of it. Many’s the

time I’ve gone along that path to and from school, or to fetch the cows.

[Illustration: AGED FLAX-SPINNER AT WORK, SUGAR VALLEY]

“In my boyhood there were two big stumps which always arrested my

attention, the stumps of the ‘cottonwood’ and the tulip which I have

already mentioned. The native poplar stump, which was chopped breast

high for some reason, had been cut before my day, but the tulip tree had

stood a dead stab for many years, and was not finally cut until my

babyhood. I was too young to recall it, and its stump had been sawed off

almost level with the ground.

“When my mother was old enough to notice things, say along six, or seven

or eight years of age, both trees was standing, and despite their

venerable age, were thrifty and green; the hollow trunk of the tulip did

not seem to lessen its vitality. Trees in those days, of all kinds, were

pretty common, and regarded as nuisances; the farmers were still having

‘burning bees’ in the spring and fall when all hands would join in and

drag with ox-spans the logs of the trees that had been cut when they

were clearing new ground, and making huge bonfires, burn them like a

modern section foreman does a pile of old railroad ties, and by the way,

the time is going to come soon when tie burners will be as severely

condemned as the instigators of the ‘burning bees’ in the olden days.

“Trees were too plentiful to attract much attention or create affection

or veneration, but these two trees had a very special human interest.

“Long after the Indians passed out of our country they came back as

ghosts or ‘familiars,’ just as the wolves, panthers and wild pigeons do,

so that the stories of folks seeing them after they became extinct,

while not literally true, are in a sense correct. Closely associated

with the life of the big cottonwood was an old Indian, mother said; he

wasn’t a real live Indian, yet not a ghost, was probably a half ghost,

half Indian, if there could be any such thing.

“The tulip tree was inhabited by a very attractive spirit, an Indian

girl, an odd looking one too, for her smooth skin was only a pumpkin

color and her eyes a light blue. They all called her ‘Pale Eyes,’ and

she was described as slight, winsome and wonderfully pretty. The Indian

man, because he spent so much time under the cottonwood or water poplar,

became generally known as ‘Poplar George.’ He would appear in the

neighborhood early in the spring, in time to gather poke, milkweed,

dandelion and bracken for the farmer’s wives, and to teach the young

folks to fish, to use the bow and arrow, and snare wild pigeons and

doves.

“It was a sure sign of spring when the young people would see him

squatting before a very small fire of twigs under the still leafless

branches of the ancient poplar tree. He would remain about all summer

long, helping with the harvest, so he must have been real flesh and

blood, in a sense, and in the fall he gathered nuts, and later cut some

cordwood for those who favored him–but in truth he never liked hard,

downright work overly much.

“He was a creature of the forests and streams. When he went away in the

fall, after the wild pigeons had left, he always said that he wintered

south, on the Casselman River, where the weather was not so severe, in

that wonderful realm of the Pawpaw, the Persimmon and the Red Bud.

“Often when he took the young folks of the neighborhood on fishing

trips, and his skill with the angle and fly were unerring, the pretty

Indian maiden, ‘Pale Eyes,’ would turn up, and be with the party all

day. When asked who she was, he would sometimes say that she was his

daughter, other times his niece, or grand-daughter, but when anyone

asked of ‘Pale Eyes,’ she would shake her pretty head, indicating that

she only spoke the Indian language. Poplar George could speak Dutch and

a little English.

“No one knew where Poplar George slept, if it wasn’t in the open, under

the cottonwood tree. If he slept in barns, or under haystacks, no one

had ever seen him coming or going, but a detail like that, mattered

nothing as long as he was kindly and harmless, and took good care of the

children.

“He was a master of woodcraft, much like that old Narragansett Indian

‘Nessmuk,’ who furnished the late George W. Sears with his inspiration

as well as ‘nom de plume.’ Poplar George could call the wild birds off

the trees, so that they would feed on the ground before him, the

squirrels and even the shy chipmunks climbed all over him, and extracted

nuts from his pockets.

"The old Indian was an odd person to look at, so my mother said; of

medium height, meagre, wrinkled and weazened, tobacco colored, with

little black shoe-button eyes, and a sparse mustache and beard. He

dressed in rags, and was often bare-footed, yet he never complained of

the cold. He was always jolly and cheerful, had always been the same; he

had been coming to the Pucketa Valley for several generations before my

mother’s day; in fact, no one could remember when he hadn’t been there,

but that wasn’t saying much, as it was a new country, dating only from

the time when Pucketa and his tribesmen had enjoyed it as a hunting

ground for big game.

"Once when some hunters killed a bear, they were going to nail the paws

on the end of a log barn, but Poplar George begged for them, and invited

the children to a feast of ‘bear paw cutlets’ under the cottonwood tree.

My mother sat beside ‘Pale Eyes,’ and took a great fancy to her; she was

able to talk with her in sign language, and Poplar George, seeing how

well they got on together, occasionally interpreted for them.

"Mother managed to learn that ‘Pale Eyes’’ abode was in a huge hollow

tulip tree, but that she, too, wintered in the south, but beyond the

Maryland line. Those were all gloriously care-free, happy days, and my

mother, in later life, never tired talking about them.

"Once in the fall when the buckwheat harvest was in progress, millions

of wild pigeons came in, and mother could never forget the sight of old

Poplar George sitting on a ‘stake and rider’ fence, with a handsome cock

pigeon resplendent with its ruddy breast, pearched on one of his wrists,

while it pecked at some buckwheat seeds in his other hand. Beside him

sat the demure ‘Pale Eyes,’ a speckled squab of the year in her lap,

stroking it, while other pigeons, usually so wild, were feeding in the

stubble about them, or perched on the stakes of the fence.

"Some of the boys of sixteen years or thereabouts, grown lads they

seemed to my mother, wanted to be attentive to ‘Pale Eyes,’ but she was

so shy that she never let them get close to her. As it was a respectable

backwoods community, and all minded their own business, no further

efforts were made to have her mingle in society.

"There was a rich boy, Herbert Hiltzheimer from Philadelphia, whose

father was a great land owner, and who sometimes came with his parents

to stay with their Agent while inspecting their possessions, who, at

first sight of ‘Pale Eyes,’ fell violently in love with her. On rainy

days he was not allowed out of doors, and sent word to Poplar George

that ‘Pale Eyes’ should go to the Agent’s house, and play with him. Old

Poplar George replied that he was willing if his niece would consent,

but she always ran away into the depths of the forest, and was never

once induced to play with him indoors. She did not dislike the city boy,

only was very timid, and was afraid to go inside of a house.

"My mother was made a confidante of by Herbert,who offered her five

dollars, a collosal sum in those days, if she would induce ‘Pale Eyes’

to at least come into the Agent’s yard, and play with him alone. He had

her name cut on everything, even on the window frames, and wrote verses

about her which he carried in his pocket, and sometimes tried to read to

her.

"In the fall he was taken back to Philadelphia to school, but said that,

the evening before, when he walked up the lane, weeping over his

misfortune, he opportunately met the fair Indian maid alone at the tulip

tree, and actually kissed her. She broke away and ran into the hollow

trunk, and while he quickly followed her into the aperture, she had

disappeared.

"The lands on which the cottonwood and the tulip tree stood were a part

of a farm belonging to ’Squire George Garnice, an agreeable, but easy

going old gentleman, who never learned to say ‘no’ to any one, though

not much to his detriment for he was very generally respected.

"One fall some of the Fiedler boys suggested to him, that he let them go

on his property and cut up a lot of old half-dead good-for-nothing trees

for cordwood and of course he assented. The first tree they attacked was

Poplar George’s favorite, the mighty cottonwood. They were skilled

axemen, and cut a level stump but too high for these days of

conservation. Soon the big poplar was down, and the boys were trimming

off the sweeping branches. Before cutting into stove lengths, they

hopped across the creek and started on their next victim, the hollow

tulip tree, the home of ‘Pale Eyes.’

"One of the boys, the youngest, Ed, had gotten a new cross-cut saw, and

begged them to try it on the tulip. They notched, and then getting down

on their knees, started to saw a low stump, for some reason or other.

They had sawed in quite a distance on both edges of the hollow side when

they heard a piteous shrieking and wailing down the road, toward the old

’Squire’s barn.

"Leaving saw, axes and wedges, they ran to where the cries came from,

and to their horror, found ‘Pale Eyes’ lying on the grassy bank beside

the road at the orchard, her ankles terribly lacerated, front and back,

clear in to the bones, and bleeding profusely. On this occasion she was

able to speak in an intelligible tongue.

“‘Run quick to the ’Squire’s, and get help,’ she said, in Pennsylvania

German; ‘I am dying, but I want something to ease this dreadful pain.’

“The sympathetic boys, without waiting to inquire where she received her

grevious hurts, scurried down the road and through the ’Squire’s gate.

The old gentleman was in his library, drawing up a legal document, when

the long, lanky youths, hatless and breathless, burst in on him.

“‘Oh, sir,’ they chorused, ‘the Indian girl, ‘Pale Eyes,’ you know, has

cut herself, and is dying up the road, and wants help.’

"The ’Squire always kept an old-fashioned remedy chest in his desk, so

seizing it, and adjusting his curly wig, so that it would not blow off,

he ran out after the nimble mountaineers. As they left the gate they saw

old Poplar George running across the orchard in the direction of the

wounded girl. Evidently he, too, had heard her cries.

"When they reached the spot where marks on the greensward showed where

‘Pale Eyes’ had been lying, she was nowhere to be found, neither was

Poplar George. There were no signs of blood, only a lot of sawdust like

comes from the workings of a cross-cut saw.

"The old ’Squire was nonplussed, but consented to accompany the boys to

the scene of their wood cutting operations. ‘Pale Eyes’ was not there

either, nor Poplar George. The newly formed leaves of the cottonwood–it

was in the month of May–although the tree had only been cut and sawed

into but an hour before, were scorched and withered.

"The ’Squire showed by his face how heartbroken he was to see the two

picturesque trees so roughly treated, but he was too kindly and

forgiving to chide the boys for their sake. As he was standing there,

looking at the ruin, a number of school children, among them my mother,

came along, for it was during the noon recess, or dinner hour. They saw

the butchered trees, and learned of the events of the morning; several

of them, prosaic backwoods youngsters, though they were, shed bitter

tears.

“‘Dry your eyes,’ the ‘’Squire urged them, ‘else your people will think

that the teacher licked you.’ Then they all chorused that it was a shame

to have ruined the retreats of Poplar George and ‘Pale Eyes.’

“Evidently ’Squire Garnice was wise in the lore of mysticism, for he

shook his head sadly, saying, ‘Never mind, you’ll never see Poplar

George nor ‘Pale Eyes’ again.’

“It was a dejected company that parted with him at his gate. The old

’Squire was right, for never more was anything seen or heard of Poplar

George and the mysterious ‘Pale Eyes.’ They must have been in some

unknowable way connected with the lives of those two trees, the

cottonwood and the tulip–their lives or spirits maybe, and when they

were cut into, their spirits went out with them.

“I knew of a wealthy man who had a cedar tree in his yard, that when he

fell ill, the tree became brown, but retained a little life. Finally it

was cut down as an eyesore, and the gentleman died suddenly a few days

afterward. That tree must have contained a vital part of his spirit.

“By fall the tulip tree looked as if it had been dead for years, and the

bark was peeling off. As the wood of the poplar would not burn, and set

up a fetid odor, the Fieldler boys never bothered to finish cutting down

the hollow tulip tree, of which the shy wood sprite, ‘Pale Eyes,’ had

been the essence.

"Much of the mystery and charm of that old grass-grown way along the

gently flowing Pucketa had vanished with its Indian frequenters. But the

memory of Poplar George and ‘Pale Eyes’ will never be forgotten as long

as any of those children who were lucky enough to know them, remain in

this world."

XIV

_Black Alice Dunbar_

Down in the wilds of the Fourth Gap, latterly used as an artery of

travel between Sugar Valley and White Deer Hole Valley, commonly known

as “White Deer Valley,” a forest ranger’s cabin stands on the site of an

ancient Indian encampment, the only clearing in the now dreary drive

from the “Dutch End” to the famous Stone Church. Until a dozen years ago

much of the primeval forest remained, clumps of huge, original white

pines stood here and there, in the hollows were hemlock and rhododendron

jungles, while in the fall the flickers chased one another among the

gorgeous red foliage of the gum trees.

Now much is changed; between “Tom” Harter and “Charley” Steele, and

other lumbermen, including some gum tree contractors, little remains but

brush and slash; forest fires have sacrificed the remaining timber, and

only among the rocks, near the mouth of the gap, can be seen a few

original yellow pines, shaggy topped in isolated grandeur. Some day the

tragic Indian history of White Deer Hole Valley will come to its own,

and present one of the most tragic pages in the narrative of the passing

of the red man.

It was into this isolated valley, that terminates in Black Hole Valley,

and the Susquehanna River, near Montgomery, that numbers of the Monsey

Tribe of the Lenni-Lenape, called by some the Delaware Indians,

retreated after events subsequent to the Walking Purchase, made them

outcasts on the face of the earth. It was not long afterwards that

warlike parties of their cruel Nemesis, the Senecas, appeared on the

scene, informing the Monseys that they had sold the country to the

whites, and if they stayed, it was at their peril.

Even at that early day white men were not wholly absent; they came in

great numbers after the Senecas had sold the lands of the Lenni-Lenape

to the “Wunnux,” but even coincident with the arrival of the Delawares,

a few white traders and adventurers inhabited the most inaccessible

valleys.

Alexander Dunbar, a Scotchman, married to a Monsey woman, arrived in

White Deer Hole Valley with the first contingent of his wife’s

tribes-people, settling near the confluence of White Deer Hole Creek and

South Creek. Whether he was any relation to the Dunbar family, who have

long been so prominent in this valley is unknown, as his family moved

further west, and the last heard of them was when his widow died and was

buried in the vicinity of Dark Shade Creek, Somerset County.

Dunbar was a dark, swarthy complexioned man, more like an Indian than a

Celt, and dressed in the tribal garb, could easily have passed off as

one of the aboriginies. At one time he evidently intended to remain in

the Fourth Gap, as in the centre of the greensward which contained the

Indian encampment, he erected a log fortress, with four bastions, the

most permanent looking structure west of Fort Augusta. In it he aimed to

live like a Scottish Laird, with his great hall, the earthen floor,

covered with the skins of panthers, wolves and bears, elk and deer

antlers hanging about, and a huge, open fireplace that burned logs of

colossal size, and would have delighted an outlaw like Rob Roy

MacGregor.

When the Seneca Indians penetrated into the valley they were at a loss

at first to ascertain Alexander Dunbar’s true status. If he was related

to the prominent Scotch families identified with the Penn Government, he

would be let alone, but if a mere friendless adventurer, he would be

driven out the same as any one of the “Original People.”

Dunbar was a silent man, and by his taciturnity won toleration for a

time, as he never revealed his true position. When the Senecas became

reasonably convinced that, no matter who he had been in the Highlands of

Scotland, he was a person of no importance in the mountains of

Pennsylvania, they began a series of prosecutions that finally ended

with his murder. This took its first form by capturing all members of

the Lenni-Lenape tribe who ventured into the lower end of the valley,

for those who had settled further down, and on the banks of the

Susquehanna and Monsey Creek had moved westward when they learned that

they had been “_sold out_.” However, the residents of Dunbar’s

encampment occasionally ventured down South Creek on hunting and fishing

expeditions. When the heads of half a dozen families, and several

squaws, young girls and children had been captured, over a dozen in all,

and put into a stockade near the present village of Spring Garden, and

rumor had it that they were being ill-treated, Alexander Dunbar,

carrying a flag of truce, set off to treat with the Seneca Council, at

what is now Allenwood, with a view to having them paroled.

The unfortunate man never reached the Senecas’ headquarters, being shot

from ambush, and left to die like a dog on the trail, not far from the

Panther Spring, above the present John E. Person residence.

While the surviving, able bodied Monseys could have risen and started a

warfare, they deemed it prudence to remain where they were, and to make

Sugar Valley, and the valleys adjacent to White Deer Creek, their

principal hunting grounds.

While Dunbar had lived, squaw man, though he was, he was the leader of

the Indians among whom he resided, else they would never have permitted

his erecting a pretentious fortress in the midst of their humble tepees

of hides and poorly constructed log cabins. At his death the leadership

devolved on his eighteen-year-old daughter, “Black Agnes,” his widow

being a poor, inoffensive creature, a typical Indian drudge.

“Black Agnes” was even darker complexioned than her father, but was

better looking, having fine, clear cut features, expressive dark eyes

which flashed fire, although she was much below medium height, in fact,

no bigger than a twelve-year-old child. She wore her hair in such a

tangled way that her eyes, lean cheeks and white throat were half hidden

by the masses of her sable tresses. She usually attired herself in a

blue coat and cape, a short tan skirt trimmed with grey squirrel tails,

and long Indian stockings. She was in miniature a counterpart of Miriam

Donsdebes, the beautiful heroine of one of the chapters in this writer’s

book “South Mountain Sketches.”

While it may have given the Senecas added cause to repeat their jibe of

“old women” at the Lenni-Lenapes, for not avenging Dunbar’s death, it

was a case of living on sufferance anyway, and foolish to have attacked

superior numbers. The Senecas always had white allies to call on for

arms and ammunition, while from the first, the Delawares were a

proscribed people, slated to be run off the earth and exterminated.

During this lull, following the Scotchman’s murder, which the Senecas

would have doubtless have disavowed, an embassy appeared at the Dunbar

stronghold to ask “Black Agnes’” hand in marriage with a young Seneca

warrior named Shingaegundin, whom the intrepid young girl had never

seen. While it would have been extremely politic for “Black Agnes” to

have accepted, and allied herself with the powerful tribe that had

wronged her people, she sent back word firmly declining.

After the emissaries departed through the gate of the stockade, she

turned to her warriors, saying, in the metaphorical language of her

race: “The sky is overcast with dark, blustering clouds,” which means

that troublesome times were coming, that they would have war.

The embassy returned crestfallen to Shingaegundin, who was angry enough

to have slain them all. Instead, he rallied his braves, and told them

that if he could not have “Black Agnes” willingly, he would take her by

force, and if she would not be a happy and complaisant bride, he would

tie her to a tree and starve her until she ceased to be recalcitrant.

The bulk of the Monseys having departed from the valleys on both sides

of the Susquehanna, to join others of their tribe at the headwaters of

the Ohe-yu, left the Dunbar clan in the midst of an enemy’s country, so

that it would look like an easy victory for Shingaegundin’s punitive

expedition.

“Black Agnes” had that splendid military quality of knowing ahead of

time what her adversaries planned to do–whether “second sight” from her

Scotch blood, or merely a highly developed sense of strategy, matters

not. At any rate, she was ready to deal a blow at her unkind enemies.

Therefore she posted her best marksmen along the rocky face of the South

Mountains, on either side of Fourth Gap. Behind these grey-yellow,

pulpit-shaped rocks, the tribesmen crouched, ready for the oncoming

Senecas. “Black Agnes” herself was in personal command inside the

stockade, where she was surrounded by a courageous bodyguard twice her

size. The women, old men and children, were sent to the top of the

mountain, to about where Zimmerman’s Run heads at the now famous

Zimmerman Mountain-top Hospice. At a signal, consisting of a shot fired

in the air by “Black Agnes” herself, the fusillade from the riflemen

concealed among the rocks was to begin, to make the Fourth Gap a

prototype of Killiecrankie.

In turn the entrance of the Senecas into the defile was to be announced

by arrow shot into the air by a Monsey scout who was concealed behind

the Raven’s Rock, the most extensive point of vantage overlooking the

“Gap.”

When “Black Agnes” saw the graceful arrow speed up into space, she again

spoke metaphorically, “The path is already shut up!” which meant that

hostilities had commenced, the war begun.

The little war sprite timed her plot to a nicety. When the Senecas were

well up in the pass, and surrounded on all sides by the Monseys, whom

they imagined all crowded into the stockade, “Black Agnes” fired her

shot, and the slaughter began. The Senecas began falling on all sides,

thanks to the unerring aim of the Monsey riflemen, but they were too

inured to warfare to break and run, especially when caught in a trap.

Shingaegundin, enraged beyond all expression at again being flouted by a

woman, and a member of the tribe of “old women,” determined to die

gamely, and within the stockade which harbored “Black Agnes.” He seemed

to bear a charmed life, for while his cohorts fell about him, he plunged

on unhurt. The gate of the stockade was open, and “Black Agnes” stood

just within it, directing her warriors, a quaint but captivating little

figure, more like a sprite or fairy than one of flesh and blood.

[Illustration: OLD CONESTOGA WAGON, BRUSH VALLEY]

Shingaegundin espied her, and knew at a glance that this must be the

woman who the wise men of his tribe had selected to be his bride, and

the cause of this senseless battle. His was a case of love at first

sight, the very drollness of her tiny form adding to his passion, and he

ran forward, determined to be killed holding her in his arms and

pressing kisses on her dusky cheeks.

Such thoughts enhanced his ambition and courage, and he shouted again

and again to his braves to pick themselves up and come on as he was

doing. Dazed with love, he imagined in a blissful moment that he would

yet have the victory and carry “Black Agnes” home under his arm like a

naughty child.

Just outside the palisade he was met by three of Agnes’ bodyguard, armed

with stone hatchets. None of his warriors were near him; shot and

bleeding, they were writhing on the grass, while some were already in

the hands of the Monsey braves, who had come down from their eyries, and

were dexterously plying the scalping knives. Few of the mutilated

Senecas uttered cries, although as the scalps were jerked off, it was

hard to suppress involuntary sobs of pain.

“Black Agnes” saw nothing in the long, lank form of Shingaegundin to

awaken any love; she detested him as belonging to the race that had sold

her birthright and foully murdered her father, and she called to her

warriors: “Suffer no grass to grow on the war-path,” signifying to carry

on the fight with vigor.

Shingaegundin was soon down, his skull battered and cracked in a dozen

places. Even when down, his ugly spirit failed to capitulate. Biting and

scratching and clawing with his nails like a beast, he had to have his

skull beaten like a copperhead before he stretched out a lifeless,

misshapen corpse. As he gave his last convulsive kick the Monsey

warriors began streaming through the gates, some holding aloft scalps

dripping with blood, while others waved about by the scalp locks, the

severed heads of their defeated foemen.

Never had such a rout been inflicted on the Senecas; perhaps “Black

Agnes” would be a second Jeanne d’Arc, and lead the Lenni-Lenape back to

their former glories and possessions!

The victorious Monseys became very hilarious, hoisting the scalps on

poles, they shimmied around “Black Agnes,” yelling and singing their

ancient war songs, the proudest moment of their bellicose lives.

“Black Agnes” was calm in triumph, for she knew how transitory is life

or fame. Biting her thin lips, she drew her scalping knife and bent down

over the lifeless form of Shingaegundin, to remove his scalp in as

business-like a manner as if she was skinning a rabbit. Addressing the

grinning corpse, she said: “Bury it deep in the earth,” meaning that the

Seneca’s injury would be consigned to oblivion. Then, with rare

dexterity, she removed the scalp, a difficult task when the skull has

been broken in, in so many places.

Holding aloft the ugly hirsute trophy, she almost allowed herself to

smile in her supreme moment of success. Her career was now made; she

would rally the widely scattered remnants of the Delawares, and fight

her way to some part of Pennsylvania where prestige would insure peace

and uninterrupted happiness. But in these elevated moments comes the

bolt from the blue.

One of the panic-stricken Senecas, bolting from the ignominious ambush

of his fellows, had scrambled up the boulder-strewn side of the

mountain, taking refuge behind the Raven’s Rock, lately occupied by the

chief lookout of the Monseys–he who had shot the warning arrow into the

air. Crouching abject and trembling at first, he began to peer about him

as the fusillade ceased and smoke of battle cleared. He saw his slain

and scalped clansmen lying about the greensward, and in the creek, and

the awful ignominy meted out to his lion-hearted sachem, Shingaegundin.

At his feet lay the bow and quiver full of arrows abandoned by the scout

when he rushed down pell mell to join in the bloody scalping bee.

The sight of “Black Agnes” holding aloft his chieftain’s scalp, the

horribly mutilated condition of Shingaegundin’s corpse, the shimmying,

singing Monseys, waving scalps and severed heads of his brothers and

friends, all drew back to his heart what red blood ran in his veins.

“Black Agnes” stood there so erect and self-confident, like a little

robin red-breast, ready for a potpie, he would lay her low and end her

pretensions. Taking careful aim, for he was a noted archer, the Seneca

let go the arrow, which sped with the swiftness of a passenger pigeon,

finding a place in the heart of the brave girl. The tip came out near

her backbone, her slender form was pierced through and through. The

slight flush on her dark cheeks gave way to a deadly pallor, and, facing

her unseen slayer, “Black Agnes” Dunbar tumbled to the earth dead.

The dancing, singing Monseys suddenly became a lodge of sorrow, weeping

and wailing as if their hearts would break. The Seneca archer could have

killed more of them, they were so bewildered, but he decided to run no

further risks, and made off towards his encampment to tell his news,

good and bad, to his astounded tribesmen.

When it was seen that “Black Agnes” was no more, and could not be

revived, the sorrowful Monseys dug a grave within the stockade. It was a

double death for them, as they knew that they would be hunted to the end

like the _Wolf Tribe_ that they were, and they had lost an intrepid and

beloved leader.

According to the custom, before the interment, “Black Agnes’” clothing

was removed, the braves deciding to take it as a present to the dead

girl’s mother, to show how bravely she died. They walled up the grave

and covered the corpse with rocks so that wolves could not dig it up,

graded a nice mound of sod over the top, and, like the white soldiers at

Fort Augusta, fired a volley over her grave.

That night there was a sorrowing scene enacted at the campground near

the big spring at Zimmerman’s Run. The grief-stricken mother wanted to

run away into the forest, to let the wild beasts devour her, and was

restrained with great difficulty by her tribesmen, who had also lost all

in life that was worth caring for, peace and security.

With heavy hearts they started on a long journey for the west, carrying

the heart-broken mother Karendonah in a hammock, to the asylum offered

to them by the Wyandots on the Muskingum. The bereaved woman carried the

blood-stained, heart-pierced raiment of her heroic daughter as a

priceless relic, and it was in her arms when she died suddenly on the

way, in Somerset County, and was buried beside the trail, on the old

Forbes Road. The Monseys, however, took the costume with them as a

fetich, and for years missionaries and others interested in the tragic

story of “Black Agnes” Dunbar were shown her blue jacket with the hole

in the breast where the arrow entered.

That arrow pierced the hearts of all the Monseys, for they became a

dejected and beaten people in their Ohio sanctuary.

While it is true that most of the very old people who lived in the

vicinity of the Fourth Gap have passed away, it may yet be possible to

learn the exact location of the cairn containing the remains of “Black

Agnes” and place a suitable marker over it. One thing seems certain, if

the tradition of the Lenni-Lenape that persons dying bravely in battle

reach a higher spiritual plane once their souls are released, her ghost

will not have to hunt the hideous, burnt-over slashings that were once

the wildly romantic Fourth Gap; it has gone to a realm beyond the

destructive commercialism of this dollar-mad age, where beauty finds a

perpetual reward and recognition.

[Illustration]

XV

_Abram Antoine, Bad Indian_

Abram Antoine, a Cacique of the Stockbridge Tribe of Oneida Indians, had

never before while in Pennsylvania been off the watershed of the Ohe-yu,

or “The Beautiful River,” called by the white men “Allegheny,” until he

accepted the position of interpreter to a group of chiefs from the New

York and Pennsylvania Indians, to visit “The Great White Father,”

General Washington, at Mount Vernon.

While the General had not been President for several years, and was

living in retirement at his Virginia home, the red Chieftains felt that

his influence would be such that he could secure redress for their

wrongs. Cornplanter had been on many such missions, and come home elated

by promises, few of which were ever fulfilled in any shape, and none in

their entirety, consequently he declined to accompany the mission on

what he termed a “fool’s errand.”

Abram Antoine, through life in New England, New York and Canada, had

become much of a linguist, speaking English and French with tolerable

fluency, besides being well versed in the Seneca and other Indian

tongues. He was a tall, handsome type of redman, powerfully muscled, his

career on “The Beautiful River,” where he rafted and boated between the

Reservations and Pittsburg, and his service as a ranger for the Holland

Land Company, had developed his naturally powerful form to that of a

Hercules. Previously he had served in the American Navy, during the

Revolutionary War, which had instilled in him a lifetime respect for the

name of Washington. He was eager therefore to act as interpreter on an

occasion which would bring him into personal contact with the Father of

his Country.

The Indians took the usual overland route, coming down the Boone Road,

to the West Branch of the Susquehanna at the mouth of Drury’s Run; from

there they intended _hiking_ across the mountains to Beech Creek, there

to get on the main trail leading down the Bald Eagle Valley to Standing

Stone (now Huntingdon), and from thence along the Juniata to Louisbourg,

then just beginning to be called Harrisburg. It had been an “open

winter” thus far.

At the West Branch they met an ark loaded with coal, bound for

Baltimore, in charge of some Germans who had mined it in the vicinity of

Mosquito Creek, Clearfield County, near the site of the later town of

Karthaus. A friendly conversation was started between the party of

Indians on shore and the boatmen, with the result that the pilot of the

ark, Christian Arndt, invited the redmen to climb aboard.

The invitation being accepted with alacrity, the ark was steered close

to the bank, and the Indians, running out on an uprooted snag which hung

over the water, all leaped on the deck in safety. It made a jolly party

from that moment on. The time passed happily, and many were the

adventures and experiences _en route_. No stops of any consequence were

made except at the mouth of Mianquank (Young Woman’s Creek), and

Utchowig (now Lock Haven), until the Isle of Que was reached, where

other arks and flats and batteaux were moored, and there were so many

persons of similar pursuits that a visit on dry land was in order.

There was much conviviality at the public houses of Selin’s Grove, and

the Germans amused themselves trying to carry on conversations with the

native Pennsylvania Dutchmen, dusky, dark-featured individuals, who saw

little affinity between themselves and the fair, podgy “High Germans.”

In wrestling and boxing matches, throwing the long ball, running races,

and lifting heavy weights, the Germans were outclassed by the native

mountaineers, but they took their defeats philosophically. A shooting

match was held, at which all the Indians except Abram Antoine held

aloof, but his marksmanship was so extraordinary that he managed to tie

the score for the up-river team. This was a consolation for the Germans,

and they left the Isle of Que well satisfied with their treatment.

Other arks left their moorings at the same time, mostly loaded with

grain or manufactured lumber from the Christunn and the Karoondinha, and

the fleet was augmented by a batteau loaded with buffalo hides, at the

mouth of the West Mahantango. This was the last consignment of

Pennsylvania bison hides ever taken to Harrisburg, the animals having

been killed at their crossing over the Firestone or Shade Mountains, the

spring previous.

It was a picturesque sight to see the fleet of arks and other boats

coming down the noble river, the flood bank high, driving up flocks of

water birds ahead of them, while aloft like aeroplanes guarding a convoy

of transports, sailed several majestic American Eagles, ever circling,

ever drifting, and then soaring heavenward.

Out from the Juniata came several more arks, consequently the idlers in

front of the rivermen’s resorts at “The Ferry,” as some of the

old-timers still called Harrisburg, declared that they had never seen a

flood bring in a larger flotilla at one time. All, however, were anxious

to get in before the river closed up for the winter.

When the up-river ark with its load of Teutons and redmen made its

moorings for the night near the John Harris tree, they noticed that all

the flags were at half-mast–there were many displayed in those days–and

there was a Sunday calm among the crowds lolling along the banks in the

wintry sunshine.

“Who’s dead?” inquired Abram Antoine, as he stepped on the dock; his

naval training had made him alert to the language of the flag.

“_General Washington_,” was the awed reply.

The big Stockbridge Indian’s jaw dropped, his lifetime ambition of

conversing with the “first in the hearts of his countrymen,” and the

purpose of the mission had been thwarted by a Higher Will.

Turning to the gaudy appareled chief behind him, he conveyed the unhappy

message. The Indians shook their heads so hard that their silver

earrings rattled, and were more genuinely sorry that Washington was no

more than the failure of their quest. All ashore, they held a conclave

under the old Mulberry tree, deciding that there was no use to go any

further, but would spend a day or two in the thriving new town,

Louisbourg or Harrisburg, whichever it was proper to call it, and then

return home. There was no use going to Philadelphia again, and a new

prophet sat in the chair of the Father of his Country at the Nation’s

Capitol.

The party then separated for the present, most of them hurrying to the

nearest tavern stands to refresh thirsts made deeper by the sharp, fine

air on the river. Abram Antoine stood undecided, one hand resting on the

trunk of the historic Mulberry, a crowd of small boys watching him

open-mouthed and wide-eyed, at a respectful distance.

Pretty soon he was accosted by a very old, white-bearded Dutchman, with

a strip of soiled gray silk on the lapel of his coat, which indicated

that he was a veteran of the Royal American Regiment of Riflemen that

had figured at Fort Duquesne in 1758. Abram Antoine had seen many such

veterans in and about Pittsburg, and held out his hand to the aged

military man. The old soldier signalled with his cane that the Indian

come and sit with him on a nearby bench, which he did, and they passed

an hour pleasantly together.

The conversation turned principally to soldiering, and then to firearms,

and all the ancient makes of rifles were discussed, and their merits and

demerits compared. The veteran allowed that the best rifle he had ever

owned was of Spanish make, the kind carried by the Highlanders in the

campaigns of 1758 and 1763; it was of slim barrel, light and easily

handled, and unerring if used by a person of tolerable accuracy.

There was one gunsmith in the alley over yonder, a veteran of the

Revolution, named Adam Dunwicke, who made a rifle close to the early

Spanish pattern. It was the best firearm being turned out in the State

of Pennsylvania. The gunsmith, anyhow, was a man worth knowing, as his

shop was filled with arms of many makes and periods, and he liked to

talk with any one who was an enthusiast on guns.

Abram Antoine was fired by what the veteran told him, and as it was

still early in the afternoon, asked if he would escort him thither. It

would be fine if he could get an extra good rifle as a souvenir of his

ill-starred trip to Mount Vernon. The old man had too much time on his

hands as it was, and was only too glad to pilot the redman to the

workshop. They made a unique looking pair together, the old soldier,

bent and hobbling along on his staff, the Indian, tall, erect, and in

the prime of life. Their high, aquiline noses, with piercing, deep-set

eyes, were their sole points of physical similarity.

When they reached the gunshop, in the dark, narrow alley that ran out

from Front Street, the veteran banged the grimy knocker, and it was

almost instantly opened by Dunwicke himself, a sturdy man of medium

height, who wore great mustaches, had on a leather apron and his sleeves

were rolled up, revealing the brawny biceps of a smith.

Standing by the gunmaker, in the shadowy, narrow entry, was a very

pretty girl in a dark blue dress. She was as tall as the smith, but very

trim and slight, and her chestnut brown hair was worn low over her ears,

throwing into relief her pallid face, and the rather haunted, tired look

in her fine grey eyes, the marvelous smooth lines of her chin and

throat.

A third figure now emerged from the gloom, a small Negro boy, to whom

the girl was handing a letter, with her trembling white hands. As the

Indian, the veteran and the gunsmith withdrew into the workroom, Abram

could hear her saying to the lad, as she closed the door by way of added

emphasis: “Tell him to be sure and come.”

He could hear the footsteps of the girl as she went upstairs, and

henceforth he lost most of his interest in the question of obtaining a

rifle of the Spanish design. All his _designs_ were elsewhere, and he

was glad when the smith suggested they visit another room on the

opposite side of the entry, to look at several sets of extra large horns

of the grey moose or elk, which had recently come down on an ark from

somewhere up Tiadaghton.

As they crossed the hallway, Abram Antoine looked up the flight of

stairs–there were three that he could make out–wondering on which floor

the fair apparition retired to; he presumed pretty near the roof, as he

had not heard her on the loose laid floor above the workshop.

When they returned to the gun shop, the Indian, knowing the smith well

enough by then, inquired who the lady was whom they had seen in the

entry.

“Oh, I don’t quite know what she is,” he replied. “She stays upstairs,

under the roof; you know that the upper floors of this building are let

for lodgers.”

Instantly a life’s story, tragic or unusual, grouped itself about his

image of the girl, and his heart was filled with yearning. He was hoping

against hope that she would come down again. He had no excuse to go up,

but several times while the smith was chatting with the veteran of the

Royal Americans, he managed to wander across the hall, looking up the

well towards the grimy skylight, and then took another perfunctory

glance at the huge antlers standing against the wall. He prolonged his

stay as long as he could, saying that he liked to watch gunmakers at

work, and having ordered and paid for a costly rifle, he felt that his

presence was justified.

It was well into the gloaming when “knock, knock, knock” on the front

door resounded through the hollow old building. Abram Antoine’s blood

ran cold; he could have shot the visitor if he was the slender girl’s

recalcitrant lover, but fervently hoped that, whoever it was, would have

the effect of bringing her downstairs.

True enough, before he could get to the door at the smith’s heel, he

heard the light, familiar footsteps, and the girl, trying to look

unconcerned, was the first to turn the lock.

It was only Simon Harper, a big, lean hunter from Linglestown, over by

the Blue Mountain, who had come to take delivery of a rifle made to

order.

“Oh, I am so disappointed,” said the girl, as she turned to run

upstairs.

The smith was escorting his swarthy customer into the shop. Abram

Antoine’s opportunity had come, if ever.

“Do you have the letting of the rooms upstairs?” he said, politely, hat

in hand.

The girl looked at him; it was probably the first time during the

afternoon that she had noticed his presence, so pre-occupied she had

been.

“No,” she said, softly; “the lady lives on the next landing, but I saw

her going out.”

Abraham was well aware how closely she had been watching that doorway!

“Are there any vacancies?”

The girl dropped her head as if in doubt about carrying on the

conversation further, then replied: “I think there are.” “said the

Indian.

Whether it was loneliness or desperation at the non-arrival of the

person to whom she had sent the letter, or the tall redman’s superlative

good looks and genteel demeanor–for a handsome man can attempt what a

plain one dare never aspire–at any rate without another word, she turned

and led the way up the long, steep stairs.

It was with no sense of surprise that she brought him to the top of the

house, into her own garret, with its two small dormer windows which gave

a view in the direction of the Narrows at Fort Hunter, and the broad,

majestic river. There was a narrow bed with a soiled coverlet, a

portmanteau, a brass candlestick, and two rush-bottomed chairs, and

nothing else in it. In those days lodgers washed at the well in the back

yard.

Both sat down as if they had known each other all their lives; the

frigid barrier of reserve of a few minutes earlier had broken down. They

were scarcely seated when the ominous “Clank, clank, clank,” that the

girl had been listening for so intently all afternoon, resounded up the

dismal vault of the stairway.

Casting a frightened look at the big Indian, as much as to say, “What

will _he_ say if he finds you here?” she bounded out of the room,

descending the steps two or three at a time.

Abram Antoine did not take the hint to retire, if such was meant, and

sat stolidly in the high-backed, rush-bottomed chair, in the unlighted

room. It was only a few minutes until she returned, her face red, all

out of breath, carrying the same letter which he had seen her hand to

the colored boy earlier in the afternoon.

[Illustration: OLD SCHELLSBURG CHURCH, LINCOLN HIGHWAY]

“Not in town, don’t know when he will return,” she was chanting to

herself, as she came through the open door. She started back, as if

surprised to find her new champion _still_ there. Without speaking, she

dropped down on the bed, facing him, fanning her flushed cheeks with the

envelope, although the little room was quite cold.

“I am sorry that your letter was undelivered,” said Abram Antoine, after

a considerable silence. There was another pause, and then the girl,

still clutching the fated letter, revealed her story of embarrassment.

“It isn’t a long story,” she began. "My name is Ernestine de Kneuse. My

father is the well-known miller and land-owner at New Berlinville, in

Berks County–Solomon de Kneuse. About a year ago a young stranger, Carl

Nitschman, I think a High German, came to the town, stopping at the

‘Three Friends’ Inn, which it was rumored he was to purchase. While

negotiating, he naturally met many of the leading people. He was

handsome and engaging, and all the girls went wild over him. It gave me

a fiendish pleasure to think that he favored me above the rest, and one

afternoon I cut my classes at the Select Academy, where I was in my

third year, and went walking with him.

"My father, who belonged to the old school, had a hatred for any one who

might even consider going into the liquor business, saw us together and

told mother. On reaching home, although I was eighteen and had not had

even a spanking for several years, and thought I had outgrown it, my

mother took me to my room and administered a good, sound ‘scotching’

with the rod.

"Previously they had forbidden the young man the house, and when I

informed him how I was treated, he told me if I was disciplined again,

to run away.

"Not long afterwards I was kept in at school, and mother accused me of

meeting my lover. I told her to go to the school and find out for

herself, which she did, but nevertheless that evening my mother visited

me in my room with the strap, and walloped me until I was black and blue

from shoulders to ankles.

"Meanwhile Carl’s negotiations for the purchase of the tavern had fallen

through, and he was preparing to leave for Reading. Through one of my

girl friends who was not so strictly raised, I communicated to him the

story of this latest indignity, begging him to take me with him. He

replied that he would be traveling about for some time before settling

down there, but as soon as he was located, he would send me his address,

and to come.

"I recall the morning of his departure, how I crawled out of bed before

dawn, and pressed my tear-stained face against the window lights as he

climbed on the coach at the inn, which was across the street from where

we lived, and settling down among his goodly store of bags and boxes,

was driven away.

"Weeks passed, and I eventually got a letter through one of my girl

friends whose parents were less strict, that he had gone to Harrisburg,

and I should join him there. By exercising a great amount of ingenuity,

I got out of the house, and on the night stage for Reading, during one

of the terrible Equinoctial rains, making close connections with another

stage for Harrisburg, and I came to my present abode a month before, but

have never once seen Nitschman in the interval.

“I’ve now learned that my parents are on my track, and will reach town

tonight; I have spent my last cent, and my letters to Nitschman receive

no satisfactory answers. I am now penniless, and cannot pay my lodging,

have eaten nothing all day, and have no place to go. I would not return

for all the world and subject myself to an irate mother.”

The Indian was much interested by the recital, and told her that he had

loved her the minute he laid eyes on her, and would marry her if she

would return with him to his home, which adjoined the Cornplanter

Reservation, in Warren County. “I will marry you right away if you will

accept.”

Pressed and harassed on all sides, and hungry as well, Ernestine,

looking up into the handsome face of the redman, capitulated. Closing up

her scanty belongings in the shabby portmanteau, she went down to the

landlady and settled her bill in full out of a “Double Eagle” which

Abram gave her, and then the pair quickly left the building. The gunshop

was locked, and dark, the veteran of the Royal Americans and the smith

had forgotten all about their Indian friend and gone their ways

regardless.

They soon found the leading hotel stand, where they enjoyed a good

supper and learned of a preacher who would marry them.

Just as they were about to leave the tavern the stage from Reading and

Stitestown pulled in, horses and running gear all spattered with mud and

slush. Among the first to clamber out was old Solomon de Kneuse and his

wife, but they gave them the slip in the darkness and confusion.

At the manse, after the ceremony, the clergyman mentioned that his

brother was to be a juryman the next day at the trial of Nitschman, the

highwayman, who had held up and robbed the aristocratic McAfee family on

the road to York Springs. “May he pay dearly for interfering with

quality,” he added, seriously.

Ernestine hung her head; she understood now why it was she had been

unable to see her lover since she came to the town; he had been in jail,

and perhaps she was stung with some tiny feelings of remorse to have

renounced him so quickly. However, necessity knows no law, but she

thought she knew her man.

Before daybreak the newly married couple were ensconced in the stage

bound for Northumberland and Williamsport, and in due course of time

reached their future home, just across the river from Corydon.

None of the other Indians returned for several weeks. When they did,

they were miserable looking objects from drink, and Abram half blamed

himself for not looking after them, but love had blinded him to

everything else. He provided a comfortable home for his bride, and as an

agent for the Holland Land Company, mingled with respectable people, who

were considerate to his wife. Among these were the family of Philip

Tome, that indomitable Indian-looking Nimrod, author of “Thirty Years a

Hunter,” whose prowess in the forests of Northern Pennsylvania will

never be forgotten while memory of the big game days lasts.

Ernestine was really happy, and did not aspire to any different lot.

Though she was fearless, she hated to be left alone when her husband was

absent on inspection trips, and he generally managed to have an Indian

boy or girl–one of the O’Bails or Logans–remain with her when he was

away.

In due time his handsome Spanish-type rifle, with its stock inlaid with

mother-of-pearl and silver, like the gun of some Moorish Sheik, reached

him, and of it he was justly proud, partly because it was the instrument

of his meeting Ernestine.

On the first anniversary of their wedding he killed a fine stag with it

on the Kinzua, while hunting with Philip Tome. It was in the fall of the

second year of their marriage that Abram Antoine was called away during

a heavy flood in the Ohe-yu, which flowed in front of their house. Old

Shem, the one-eyed, half-breed ferryman, had difficulty in getting him

across in the batteau, so swift was the angry current. He was to be

gone, as usual, several days.

On the night when she was expecting him home, Ernestine heard a loud

knocking at the kitchen door. Opening it she beheld Old Shem standing

outside, the rain dripping from his hat and clothing.

“Missus Antoine,” he wheezed, “Abram is over to the public house at

Corydon, a very sick man, and wants you to come to him at once.”

Ernestine was horrified, but, jerking down her cloak from the nail on

which it hung, ran out into the storm, and followed the aged ferryman

down the steep bank to the landing. The wind was bellowing terribly

among the almost bear hickories and butternuts along the shore, the

current was deep, dark and eddying.

When one-third the way over, Old Shem looked up, saying: “Missus, it

hain’t Abram that’s sick; it’s your _other_ man, Mister Nitschman, what

wants you.” “shouted Ernestine. “I never had any other man. Take me back

home at once, you treacherous old snake in the grass.”

Just then a pile of buffalo robes in one end of the deep batteau

stirred, and the form of a man arose–Carl Nitschman, back from jail.

“Talk sensibly, Ernestine,” he said. “I have come for you, and will

forgive everything. You know you belong to me; your going off with that

Indian was all a hasty mistake.”

Ernestine glared at him and again ordered the ferryman to take her home.

Instead he seemed to be trying to reach the Corydon shore the faster.

Just then Nitschman stepped forward, with arms outstretched, as if to

seize her.

The slight and supple Ernestine sprang up on the gunwale, the boat

tipped; she either fell or jumped into the dark, swirling current. She

was gone before an effort could be made to save her, and the two

frightened men, white as ghosts, pulled for the light which gleamed

through the storm, in the tavern window at Corydon, with redoubled

energy. With a thud the prow hit the muddy bank and slid on shore.

To their surprise Abram Antoine was standing on the bank. The one-eyed

ferryman began to cry, a strange thing for any one of Indian blood. “I

was fetching your wife across to meet you and she fell in the river.”

Just then Nitschman, who had climbed out of the boat, was passing by

Antoine, who seized him by the collar. “Who is this son of –--?”

demanded the six-foot Indian.

It was then that the ferryman broke down completely and confessed all.

Antoine shook his captive like a rat, and slapped his face many times,

eventually tumbling him into the mud and kicking him like a sack of

flour. Then, picking up an oar, he beat the ferryman over the head until

he yelled for mercy. The noise roused the habitues of the hotel, and as

the victims were shouting “murder,” the local Constable, who ran the

hotel, placed Abram Antoine under arrest, beginning his fatal brand as

“Bad Indian.”

Nitschman did not appear to press the charge next day, and the ferryman

apologized for his part in the affair, so Abram was free, minus his

beautiful wife and his reputation.

It was beginning with that terrible tragedy that he began to find solace

at the tap room of the public house at Corydon. Philip Tome and even old

Cornplanter himself tried his best to save him, but he became an Indian

sot, losing his position with the land company, his home and his

self-respect. All that he held on to, and that because being an Indian

he was sentimental, was his Spanish rifle with the inlaid stock. He

spent more and more of his time in the forests, shunning white people

and fraternizing only with his own kind. He made a protege out of young

Jim Jacobs, a Seneca hunter of unusual ability, and they spent many

weeks at a time in the forests.

To him he confided that before he died he would literally have

Nitschman’s scalp, have the blood atonement against the destroyer of his

happiness.

A score of years had to pass before he met the ex-highwayman face to

face. He had heard of the early exploits of this modern Claude Du Val,

who was supposed to have reformed, and his blood boiled that such a

villainous wretch could wander about scot free.

It was in the fall of the year, about 1822 or thereabouts, when the

great county fair was in progress at Morris Hills, one of the leading

towns above the New York State line, adjacent to the Indian

reservations. All manner of persons were attracted by the horse races,

displays of cattle, Indian foot races and lacrosse games, as well as the

more questionable side shows and gambling performances.

Abram Antoine’s Indian friends had been sobering him up for weeks, and

he presented a pretty good appearance for a man of over sixty, when he

appeared to challenge all comers in tests of marksmanship with the

rifle. Never had “The Chief,” as everybody called him, done better than

the afternoon of the first day of the fair. The wild pigeons were flying

high overhead in the clear, blue atmosphere of that fine crisp autumn

day, but whenever he turned his rifle upwards he brought one down for

the edification and applause of the crowd.

Just as he had shot a pigeon, his keen eye noticed a medium-sized,

fair-haired man, loudly dressed, edging hurriedly through the throng, as

if trying to get away. Antoine had never seen Nitschman except that

night when he had trampled him into the mud, but this fellow’s size and

general demeanor Corresponded with his mental conception of the one that

he had ever afterwards regretted that he had not slain.

Moving with rapid strides through the crowd, pigmies beside his giant

stature, he blocked his little enemy’s further progress. “Nitschman, I

believe you are,” he said.

“No, no; that hain’t my name,” spluttered the short man, coloring to the

roots of his faded yellow hair.

“Yes, it is, Chief,” yelled a young Indian who was standing close by.

That confirmation was all that Abram Antoine, bad Indian, wanted.

Swinging his rifle above the crowd, he brought it down with terrific

force on the head of his foe, crashing right through his high, flat

brimmed beaver hat and shattering the lock.

To use the language of Jim Jacobs, Nitschman fell to the turf like a

“white steer,” and laid there, weltering in blood, for he was dead.

All the latent hate and jealousy in the crowd against Indians

immediately found vent, and an angry mob literally drove Abram Antoine,

bad Indian, out of the fair grounds to the town lockup. It was some time

during 1823 that he expiated his crime on the gallows.

[Illustration]