BUILDING OF THE FIRST FORT DEARBORN.
[Illustration: A "red-coat" of 1812.]
DELAYING our narrative for a moment, we here bring upon the scene
another figure--the most distinguished and heroic of all who were to
play a part in the terrific tragedy which formed its climax--William
Wells.[S] This brave fellow, born of white parents, but early stolen
by Indians, and only restored after arriving at manhood, was a friend
and agent of General Harrison, who was at that time Governor of
the Indian Territory. Captain Wells had come to Chicago in 1803 on
official duty, as appears by a license (which the writer has had the
privilege of inspecting) issued to Jean B. La Geuness, to trade with
the Indians. This paper is still in existence, in the possession of
Dr. H. B. Tanner of Kaukaunee, Wis., having come to him from among the
papers of Judge John Lawe of Green Bay, who was for many years agent
of the American (John Jacob Astor's) Fur Company. The license bears
the name of "William Henry Harrison, Governor of the Indian Territory
and Superintendent of Indian Affairs," and is signed "by order of the
Governor. William Wells, Agent at Indian Affairs, Chicago, August the
30th, 1803."
[S] See Appendix E.
This license must have been signed in the old De Saible house. No fort
was here yet, nor any government office or officer, so far as we know.
Indeed, this page records, for the first time in history, the fact that
William Wells was in Chicago before 1812. Eight years later his niece
was to appear on the scene, arriving as the bride of Captain Heald,
then commanding Fort Dearborn.
But to return to Captain Whistler and the embryo fort.
A glimpse of early garrison-life appears in the personal narrative of
Captain Thomas C. Anderson, published in Volume IX of the Wisconsin
Historical Collection:
During my second year [1804-5] at Min-na-wack, or Mill-wack-ie
[Milwaukee] Captain Whistler, with his company of American soldiers,
came to take possession of Chicago. At this time there were no
buildings here except a few dilapidated log huts covered with bark.
Captain Whistler had selected one of these as a temporary, though
miserable, residence for his family, his officers and men being under
canvas. On being informed of his arrival I felt it my duty to pay my
respects to the authority so much required by the country. On the
morrow I mounted Kee-ge-kaw, or Swift-goer, and the next day I was
invited to dine with the Captain. On going to the house, the outer
door opening into the dining-room, I found the table spread, the
family and guests seated, consisting of several ladies, all as jolly
as kittens.
The fort consisted of a stockade large enough to contain a
parade-ground and all the fort buildings, officers' quarters, barracks,
offices, guard-house, magazine, etc., and also two block-houses, each
built so that the second story overhung the lower, thus giving a
vertical fire for musketry to guard against an enemy's setting fire
to the house. One of these was at the southeast corner and the other
at the northwest. There were entrances on the south side (Michigan
Avenue), and on the north or water side, where a sunken road led down
to the river. Mr. Blanchard, in his "Chicago and the Northwest," says
that the armament consisted of the musket and bayonet, and three pieces
of light artillery--probably the old six-pounder, which threw a round
ball about double the size of a child's fist.
[Illustration: FORT DEARBORN, 1803-4. (Fergus' Series, No. 16)]
Beside the fort, the government put up an "Agency House," which stood
on the river bank just west of the sunken road that led from the fort
to the water. Mrs. Kinzie describes this building as an old-fashioned
log-house with a hall running through the middle, and one large room on
each side. Piazzas extended the whole length of the building, in front
and rear. It played a part in the final tragedy, and was destroyed with
the fort on August 15, 1812.
Munsell's "History of Chicago" gives the following picture at and after
the building of the first fort:
When the schooner Tracy set sail and slowly vanished in the
northwestern horizon, we may fancy that some wistful glances followed
her. For those left behind it was the severing of all regular ties
with "home," for years or forever. An occasional courier from
Detroit or Fort Wayne brought news from the outside world; a rare
canoe or bateau carried furs to Mackinaw and brought back tea,
flour, sugar, salt, tobacco, hardware, powder and lead, dry goods,
shoes, etc., perhaps a few books[T] and, best of all, letters! But
between-times, what had they to make life worth living? Which of the
compensations kind Nature always keeps in store, for even the most
desolate of her children, were allotted to them?
[T] John H. Kinzie used to tell how, as a boy, he learned to read from
a spelling-book which was unexpectedly found in a chest of tea, and
that books were associated with the smell of tea in his mind forever
after.
They had the lake for coolness and beauty in summer; the forest for
shelter, warmth and cheer in winter; masses of flowers in spring,
and a few--very few--fruits and nuts in autumn, such as wild grapes
and strawberries, wintergreen-berries, cranberries, whortleberries,
hazel-nuts, walnuts, hickory-nuts, beech-nuts, etc. There was no lack
of game to be had for the hunting, or fish for the catching. The
garrison had cattle, therefore there was doubtless fresh beef, milk
and butter. So a "good provider," as John Kinzie doubtless was (we
know that he was the soul of hospitality) would be certain to keep
his wife's larder always full to overflowing.
The garrison officers' families made company for each other and the
Kinzies and Jouetts; the soldiers gave protection and a thousand
other services to all, and the two fifers and two drummers made
music--such as it was. This rude melody was not all they had,
however, for John Kinzie was a fiddler as well as a trader and a
silver-smith ("Shaw-nee-aw-kee," or the "silver-smith," was his
Indian name), and in the cool summer evenings, sitting on his porch,
would send the sound of his instrument far and wide, over river and
plain, through the dewy silence of the peaceful landscape.
They had love and marriage, birth and death, buying and selling and
getting gain; and, happily, had not the gift of "second sight," to
divine what lay before them; what kind of end was to come to their
exile.
Mr. Wentworth's Fort Dearborn speech (Fergus' Historical Series No.
16, page 87) quotes a letter he had received from Hon. Robert Lincoln,
Secretary of War under President Garfield. From it we learn that no
muster-roll of the garrison at Fort Dearborn in 1811 or 1812 is on
file at the War Department, but that the general returns of the army
show that the fort was garrisoned from June 4, 1804, to June, 1812,
by a company of the First Regiment of Infantry. In these returns the
strength of the garrison, officers, musicians and privates, is given as
follows: Under Captain John Whistler, June 4, 1804, 69; Dec. 31, 1806,
66; Sept. 30, 1809, 77. Under Captain Nathan Heald, Sept. 30, 1810, 67;
Sept. 30, 1811, 51, and June --, 1812, 53.[U]
[U] See Appendix B for a muster-roll dated Dec 31, 1810 (the latest
entry which gives names), wherein are shown several who appear later as
victims of the massacre.
The deficiency of records in the archives of the War Department may
perhaps be accounted for by the fact that the British, after the
so-called "battle" of Bladensburgh, took Washington and burned all the
government buildings.
In 1811 Captain Nathan Heald, then in command of Fort Dearborn, went
down to Kentucky, where he married Rebekah Wells daughter of Captain
Samuel Wells and niece of William.[V] The newly married pair came up
overland (probably following the trail marked by Mr. Jouett), bringing
the wedding treasures of the bride--silver, etc., and her own personal
adornments, which interesting relics, after vicissitudes strange and
terrible, are now in possession of her son, Darius Heald, and, with
him, are depicted elsewhere in these pages.
[V] See Appendix E for additional details regarding the romantic
history of the Wells and Heald families.
Mrs. Heald's narrative of these events, as reported to me by her son,
is as follows:
In the summer of 1811, Captain Heald, then in command of Fort
Dearborn, at Chicago, got leave of absence to go down to Louisville,
to get married. He went on horseback, alone, traveling by compass.
They were married, and after the wedding started north on horseback
for Fort Dearborn. There were four horses--two for the bride and
groom, one for the packs and blankets, and one for a little negro
slave-girl named Cicely. This girl had begged so hard to be brought
along that they could not refuse her request, although it was, as
the Captain said, adding one more to the difficulties of making the
long, lonesome, toilsome trip on horseback. They traveled by compass,
as before. The horses were good ones, and not Indian ponies. Those
that the Captain and his bride rode were thoroughbreds, as was the
one ridden by the slave-girl, and they had also a good one to carry
the pack, so that they made the trip in about a week's time; starting
Thursday, and reaching Fort Dearborn on the following Wednesday
night, making about fifty miles a day. Nothing of importance occurred
on the bridal trip; they arrived safely, and the garrison turned out
to receive them with all the honors of war, the bride being quite an
addition to the little company.
Rebekah was much pleased with her reception, and found everything
bright and cheerful. She liked the wild place, the wild lake and the
wild Indians; everything suited her ways and disposition, "being on
the wild order herself," she said; and all went on very pleasantly.
Among other gayeties there was skating in winter up and down the
frozen river, and Ensign Ronan was a famous skater. Sometimes he
would take an Indian squaw by the hands, she holding her feet still,
and swing her back and forth from side to side of the little stream,
until he came to a place where there was a deep snowdrift on the
bank, when he would (accidentally, of course) loose his grip on her
hands, and she would fly off into the snowdrift and be buried clear
out of sight.
In 1812 the peaceful quiet was rudely startled, then assaulted, then
destroyed. The first breach of the peace was the killing by Mr. Kinzie
(in self-defense) of one John Lalime, Indian interpreter at Fort
Dearborn.[W] This was early in 1812. It had, however, nothing to do
with the friendliness or enmity of the red-men.
[W] See Appendix F.
The second event was of a different kind. A man named Lee.[X] who
lived on the lake-shore, near the fort, had enclosed and was farming
a piece of land on the northwest side of the South Branch, within the
present "Lumber District," about half way between Halsted Street and
Ashland avenue. It was first known as "Lee's Place," afterwards as
"Hardscrabble." It was occupied by one Liberty White, with two other
men and a boy, the son of Mr. Lee.
[X] This name I find sometimes spelled "Lee," and sometimes "See."
[Illustration: CABIN IN THE WOODS.]
This spot was not far from the place where Père Marquette passed the
winter of 1674-75; perhaps the very same ground. (See Munsell's History
of Chicago for a copy of the good Father's journal, with parallel
translation.) Mrs. John Kinzie, first in a pamphlet dated in 1836, and
published in 1844, and later in Wau-Bun, gives an extremely picturesque
account of the alarm, evidently taken down from the lips of those who
had been present; namely her husband (then a boy), his mother, Mrs.
John Kinzie, and his half-sister, Mrs. Helm.
It was the evening of the 7th of April, 1812. The children of Mrs.
Kinzie were dancing before the fire to the music or their father's
violin. The tea-table was spread, and they were awaiting the return
of their mother, who was gone to visit a sick neighbor. [Mrs. John
Burns, living at about where is now the crossing of Kinzie and State
Streets, had just been delivered of a child.] Suddenly their sports
were interrupted; the door was thrown open and Mrs. Kinzie rushed in
pale with terror, and scarcely able to articulate.
"The Indians! The Indians!"
"The Indians! What? Where?"
"Up at Lee's place, killing and scalping!"
With difficulty Mrs. Kinzie composed herself sufficiently to give the
information that while she was up at Burns's a man and a boy were
seen running down with all speed to the opposite side of the river;
that they called across to give notice to Burns's family to save
themselves, for the Indians were at Lee's place, from which they had
just made their escape. Having given this terrifying news they made
all speed for the fort, which was on the same side of the river that
they were. All was now consternation and dismay. The family were
hurried into two old pirogues [dug-out tree-trunks] that were moored
near the house, and paddled with all possible haste across the river
to take refuge in the fort.
Mrs. Kinzie goes on to give the fullest account we have of this initial
murder, fitting prelude to the bloody drama to follow a few months
later. Here is a condensation of her narrative:
In the afternoon a party of ten or twelve Indians, dressed and painted,
arrived at the Lee house, and according to their custom, entered and
seated themselves without ceremony. Something in their appearance
and manner excited the suspicions of one of the family, a Frenchman
[Debou], who remarked: "I don't like the looks of those Indians; they
are not Pottowatomies." Another of the family, a discharged soldier,
said to a boy (a son of Lee): "If that is the case, we had better get
away if we can. Say nothing, but do as you see me do." As the afternoon
was far advanced, the soldier walked leisurely toward the two canoes
tied near the bank. They asked where he was going. He pointed to the
cattle which were standing among the hay-stacks on the opposite bank,
and made signs that they must go and fodder them and then return and
get their supper.
[Illustration: KINZIE MANSION--1812]
He got into one canoe and the boy into the other. When they gained
the opposite side they pulled some hay for the cattle, and when they
had gradually made a circuit so that their movements were concealed
by the hay-stacks, they took to the woods and made for the fort. They
had run a quarter of a mile when they heard the discharge of two guns
successively. They stopped not nor stayed until they arrived opposite
Burns's place (North State and Kinzie streets), where they called
across to warn the Burns family of their danger, and then hastened to
the fort.
A party of soldiers had that afternoon obtained leave to go up the
river to fish. The commanding officer ordered a cannon to be fired to
warn them of their danger. Hearing the signal they took the hint, put
out their torches and dropped down the river as silently as possible.
It will be remembered that the battle of Tippecanoe, the preceding
November, had rendered every man vigilant, and the slightest alarm was
an admonition to "beware of Indians."
When the fishing-party reached Lee's place, it was proposed to stop and
warn the inmates. All was still as death around the house. They groped
their way along, and as the corporal jumped over the small enclosure
he placed his hand on the dead body of a man. By the sense of touch he
soon ascertained that the head was without a scalp and was otherwise
mutilated. The faithful dog of the murdered man stood guarding the
remains of his master.
Captain Heald, writing from the fort, gives a shorter statement, adding
some further particulars:
Chicago, April 15, 1812.--The Indians have commenced hostilities
in this quarter. On the sixth instant, a little before sunset, a
party of eleven Indians, supposed to be Winnebagoes, came to Messrs.
Russell and See's cabin, in a field on the Portage branch of the
Chicago River, about three miles from the garrison, where they
murdered two men; one by the name of Liberty White, an American, and
the other a Canadian Frenchman whose name I do not know. [Debou.]
White received two balls through his body, nine stabs with a knife
in his breast, and one in his hip, his throat was cut from ear to
ear, his nose and lips were taken off in one piece, and his head
was skinned almost as far round as they could find any hair. The
Frenchman was only shot through the neck and scalped. Since the
murder of these two men, one or two other parties of Indians have
been lurking about us, but we have been so much on our guard they
have not been able to get any scalps.
[Illustration: HUMAN SCALP.]
* * * * *
Among all the tribes of savages met by various immigrations of
Europeans, a thousand differences of arms, implements, manners,
habits and customs were observed. Some were more barbarous, others
less; but there was one trophy one weapon, one trait, invariable and
universal--the bleeding scalp, the sharp scalping-knife, the rage for
scalping. This proves much. It shows that killing was not a mere means
to an end, but the end aimed at. It shows that sheer, unadulterated,
unmitigated murder was the ideal grace of manhood. The brain-pan of
man, woman or child yielded its covering, torn away warm and quivering,
and the possessor was sure of the honor and favor of his fellows, men,
women and children. No woman shed a tear over the locks of a sister
woman; no child over the curls of a baby.
Savagery the world has ever known, and isolated instances of wholesale
destruction of non-combatants in the drunkenness of victory; but there
is no record of a whole race, consisting of many tribes, spread over
many lands, enduring for many generations, where such diabolism was the
general ethnic trait.
[Illustration]