Preble County, Ohio - Chapter 5: Wayne's War.--Fall of Lowery, 1881

IMMEDIATELY after the defcat of St. Clair the general government sought, by friendly negotiation, to secure peace, though vainly. Preliminary steps were also immediately taken toward bringing about a reorganization of the army, putting it into a thoroughly efficient condition, and liberally eqipped it, that it might be in readiness should necessity require.

General Wayne (the Mad Anthony, of Revolutionary fame, and the companion-in-arms of the President), was chosen by Washington, as commander of the army of the Northwest. He spent the winter of 1792 at Legionville, below Pittsburgh, in collecting and organizing his army, and at the close of April, 1793, moved down the river and encamped near Fort Washington, at a place called *Hobson's Choice." Here Wayne was engaged during the negotiations for peace, in drilling his soldiers, in cutting military roads through the forest, collecting supplies in the Indian country, and in making preparations for an immediate campaign, in case the efforts of the commissioners to obtain peace should be unsuccessful. On the sixteenth of August, 1793, the commissioners received the final answer of the Indian council, and on the twenty-third they sent messengers to Wayne, informing him of the outcome - the failure to secure peace. The general being authorized to move into the Indian country and wage war against the bostile tribes, did so as early as was possible. He had an army of about three thousand men, consisting in about equal parts of the mounted riflemen, volunteers from Kentucky, and of troops brought together in the vicinity of Pittsburgh, very many of them hard characters, and some from the prisons - outlaws and renegades, who were reckless of what the future had in store for them, and actuated only by the spirit of action and adventure. 'The Kentuckians were commanded by General Charles Scott, the second ranking officer in the army, and who, as wcll as General Harry Lee (the Light Horse Harry, of Revolutionary fame), and General William Darke had been favorably. considered by Washington in connection with the chief command of the expedition.

General Wayne began his march northward into the Indian country on the seventh of October, 1793, not following St. Clair's trace, but cutting a new one for his army on the east side of Seven Mile creek. Many of Wayne's soldiers were superstitious, and had they advanced into the enemy's country upon the road which St. Clair's ill-fated army had taken, they would have felt an apprehension of defeat which possibly might have brought on one, or which would, at least, have had the effect of lessening their faith in the force of arms and demoralizing their spirit. From Fort Hamilton, Wayne's trace diverged more considerably from St. Clair than it had south of that post. He marched through what is now Preble county, a short distance east of Eaton, and that portion of the route lying south of the town has been adopted as the location -of a public highway, long known as "the old trace road." The trace crossed Banta's fork at or near the forty foot pitch, and ascended the high bank north at'a point on the east side of the present north road, from which point it bore a little west of north to Eort Greenville. A portion-of the old trail have sprung up where the forest was cut away. Many of the first settlers saw on the uncovered roots of trees, along the trace, the indisputable marks of wagon wheels or of the heavy ordnance trains. On his way northward on this expedition, Wayne named the streams according to the distance from Fort Hamilton at which he crossed them, as Four Mile creek and Seven Mile creek. The latter had before that time been known and mapped as Ct. Clair's creek.

Of the march, and one of the sad incidents of war, the death of Lowery and his brave companions, which occurred subsequently, we will let General Wayne testify, in his own language. On the twenty-third of October he wrote to the Secretary of War from his camp on the southwest branch of the Great Miami, six miles beyond Fort Jefferson (six miles south of the present town of Greenville, Darke county):

I have the honor to inform you that the legion took up its line of march from Hobson's Choice, on the seventh inst., and arrived at this place in perfect order, and without a single accident, at ten o'clock on the evening of the thirteenth, when I found myself arrested for the want of provisions. Notwithstanding this defect, I do not despair of supporting the troops in our present position, or rather at a place called Stillwater, at an intermediate distance between the field of St. Clair's battle and Fort Jefferson. The safety of the western frontiers, and the reputation of the legion, the dignity and interest of the Nation, all forbid a retrograde manoeuvre, or giving up one inch of ground we now possess, until the enemy are compelled to sue for peace. The greatest difficulty which at present presents itself is that of furnishing a sufficient escort to secure our convoys of provisions and other supplies from insult and disaster, and at the same time to retain a sufficient force at camp to sustain and repel the attacks of the enemy, who appear to be desperate and determined. We have recently experienced a little check to our convoys, which may probably be exaggerated into something serious, by the tongue of fame, before this reaches you. 'The following is, however, the fact:

'Lieutenant Lowery of the second sub-legion, and Ensign Boyd, of the first, with a command consisting of ninety non-commissioned officers and privates, having in charge twenty wagons belonging to the quartermaster general's department, loaded with grain, and one of the contractors wagons, loaded with stores, were attacked carly on the morning of the seventeenth inst., about seven miles advanced of Fort St. Clair, by a party of Indians. Those gallant young gentlemen (who promised at a future day to be ornaments to the profession,) together with thirteen non-commissioned officers and privates, bravely fell, after an obstinate resistance against superior numbers, being abandoned by the greater part of the escort, upon the first discharge. The savages killed or carried off about seventy horses, leaving the wagons and stores standing in the road, which have all been brought to this camp, without any other loss or damage, except some trifling articles."

Lowery died urging his men to fight and doing all in his power to beat back the savage horde that had assailed him. His last breath sent forth words of encouragement to the brave men who fought by his side.

-Wayne met the Indians.of the confederated tribes in battle array, and achieved the brilliant victory which brought long enduring peace to the troubled borderers.

'The winter season was regarded as an unfavorable time to carry on hostilities against the Indians, and on its approach General Wayne dismissed the Kentucky militia men and placed the regular troops in winter quarters. He erected Fort Greenville near tbe site of the present town of Greenville, in Darke county, and made that post his headquarters. On December 23, 1793, he ordered eight companies of infantry and a detachment of artillerv to take possession of the ground on which St. Clair was defeated in 1791, and to erect a fortification at that point. The order was executed, and the new fort was appropriately named Fort Recovery. Soon after the completion of this defence, Wayne received from some of the hostile tribes a message, in which they expressed a desire to make peace with the United States. The terms, however, on which the commander of the army proposed to make a treaty were either evaded or rejected by the Indians, probably because they were led by Lord Dorchester, governorgeneral of Canada, and others, to believe that Great Britain would, in the course cf the year 1794, assist them in their attempt to force the American settlers to retire from the territory lying on the northwest side of the Ohio river. At this period, too, a critical and unsettled state of relations existed between the governments of Great Britain, France and Spain, on the one side, and the United States on the other, and it was only by skilful diplomacy and decisive measures that our government escaped being drawn into the vortex of European politics. But this complication of troubles is too broad for treatment in these pages. It belongs to national rather than local history, and reference is merely made to it that the reader may be reminded of the other perils which surrounded the infant Republic while this harassing Indian war was being waged upon the western border.

On the thirtieth of June, 1794, an escort consisting of ninety riflemen and fifty dragoons, a detachment of Wayne's army, commanded by Major McMahon, was attacked by a large body of Indians, under the walls of Fort Recovery. The Indian force, variously estimated at from seven to fifteen hundred, and probably assisted by a small number of British agents and French Canadian volunteers, made several attacks on the fort within twenty-four hours, and then retired. In these attacks the Americans lost twenty-two men killed, thirty wounded, and three missing. They also lost two hundred and twenty-one horses killed, wounded and missing. In a letter from Wayne to the Secretary of War, dated "Greenville, 7th July, 1794," he says: "The Indians left eight or ten warriors dead on the field; although they were employed during the night, which was dark and foggy, and carrying off their dead and wounded by torchlight."

. Major General Scott, with about sixteen hundred mounted volunteers from Kentucky (the men who had been dismissed in the autumn previous) arrived at Fort

Greenville, and joined the regular troops on the twentysixth of July. On the twenty-eighth the entire army commenced their march for the Indian towns on the Maumee. About twenty-five miles from Fort Recovery, on the St. Mary's river, Wayne built a small fortification which he named Fort Adams. The army marched from this point on the fourth of August, and on the eighth arrived at the confluence of the Maumee and Auglaize rivers. The advance of the army carried terror into the Indian country. Wayne, writing upon the fourteenth of August, says:

"I have the honor to inform you that the army under my command took possession of this very important post on the morning of the eighth instant, the enemy on the preceding evening having abandoned all their settlements, towns and villages with such apparent marks of surprise and precipitation, as to amount to positive proof that our approach was not discovered by them until the arrival of a Mr. Newman who deserted from the army at St. Mary's. = i x 7 Thus, sir, we have gained the emporium of the hostile Indians of the west without loss of blood. The very extensive and highly cultivated fields and gardens show the work of many hands. 'The margins of those beautiful rivers, the Miami of the Lakes (or Maumec), and Auglaize, appears like one continued village for a number of miles above and below.this place; nor have I ever before beheld such immense fields of corn in any part of America from Canada to Florida. Wc are now employed in completing a strong stockade fort, with four good block-houses by way of bastions, at the confluence of the Auglaize and Maumee (on the site of the town by the same name), which 1 have called Fort Defiance. * * M = = Everything is now prepared for a forward move to-morrow morning, toward Roche de Bout, or foot of the rapids. 2 E 2 z= + Yet I have thought proper to offer the enemy a last overture of peace, and as they have everything that is dear and interesting now at stake, I have reason to expect that they willlisten to the proposition bei ls

"n * dispatched yesterday by a special flag (Christopher Miller), whom I sent under circumstances which will ensure his safe return, and which may eventually spare the effusion of much human blood. But should war be their choice, that blood be upon their own heads. America shall no longer be insulted with impunity. To an ali-powerful and great God I therefore commit myself and gallant army."

On the fifteenth of August, 1794, General Wayne moved with his forces from Fort Defiance, and on the twentieth he gained a complete victory over the army of Indians. A force of about two thousand men collected near the foot of the rapids, near a British fort, erected subsequent to the treaty of 1783, and in violation of its obligations. After a short and sharp engagement, the Indians fled, and were pursued under the guns of the British fort. The number of Indians in the battle has been estimated all the way from one to two thousand. They were probably in larger number than Wayne's troops actually engaged against them, whose number, there is every reason to believe, was short of nine hundred. Good authorities say that there were in the action four hundred and fifty De/awares, one hundred and seventy-five 7Mzamis, two hundred and seventy-five Sharnees, two hundred and twenty-five O/azvas, two hundred and seventy-five Wyandofs, and a small number of Senecas, Pottawatomtes and Chippewas. 'They had about seventy white allies, including a corps of volunteers from Detroit. The lass to Wayne's army was thirty-three killed and one hundred wounded. The Indian loss was more than double that of the Federal army. The woods were strewn for some distance with the dead bodies of Indians and their white auxiliaries - the latter armed with British muskets and bayonets.. The Indians were

The Miami chief, Little Turtle, under whom the Indians in 179t so overwhelmingly defeated St. Clair, was in the battle, but had little share in the control of the forces. Drake, in his Indian Biography, says:

It has been generally said that had the advice of this chief been taken at the disastrous fight he ANNE S with General Wayne, there is but little doubt he had met with as ill success as General St. Clair. He was not for fighting General Wayne at Presque Isle, and inclined rather to peace than fighting at all. In a council held the night before the battle he argued as follows: "We have beaten the enemy twice under separate commanders. We cannot expect the same good fortune always to attend us. The Americans are now led by a chief who never sleeps. The night and the day are alike to him; and during all the time that he has been marching on our villages, notwithstanding the watchfulness of our young men, we have never becn able to surprise him. Think well of it. There is something whispers to me it would be prudent to listen to his offers of peace." For holding these views he was accused by another chief of being a coward. This ended all further discussion. Little Turtle fought bravely in the battle, and its issue proved him a truer prophet than his accuser had believed.

After the engagement of August 2oth, generally known as the battle of the Maumee, or the battle of Fallen Timbers, Wayne's victorious army destroyed all the cornfields the Auglaize. Indian hostilities were at an end, and in the summer of 1795 the peace was perfected by Wayne's treaty made at Fort Greenville, where the army headquarters had been again established, in the fall of 1794. The most important of the provisions made at this council, by the action of which the last remnant of Indian title to the lands in this part of the State was removed, are given elsewhere. The Greenville treaty was the negotiation which secured and perpetuated the peace won in Wayne's battle.

Now that we have briefly outlined Wayne's campaign, let us revert to that bloody event which gives local interest to the war, in Preble county, and the memory of which has been so imperishably fixed by the rearing of Lowerey's monument at the Eaton cemetery.

The exact spot where Lieutenant Lowery and his companions were ambuscaded and killed by the Indians is on Lowery's branch of Banta's creek, in the northeastern part of Washington township, and a few rods up the branch from Zion (Lutheran) church. On the day following the fight the bodies of Lowery, Ensign Boyd and thirteen others, who gave up life with them before the overpowering force which made that sudden, fierce attack, were removed to Fort St. Clair and buried a few rods southwest of the stockade, side by side. The remains of Lieutenant Lowery were removed on the fourth of July, 1822, and interred in the northwest corner of the old burial ground. 'The sad but patriotic ceremonial was conducted with military honors, and an appropriate funeral oration was delivered by Jonas A. Mendel. For fifty years the resting place of the other soldiers was under the long grass by the old fort, but on the seventeenth of October, 1843, the fiftieth anniversary of their death, their remains, too, were removed and with the bones of Lowerey, permanently deposited in a beautiful and symmetrically formed mound, one of the many memorials of a lost race, which dot the surface of

Ohio and the valley of the Mississippi. On this occasion the late Rev. Charles W. Swain acted as chaplain, and the late A. Haines, sr., delivered an eloquent and appropriate memorial oration. Upon the apex of the mound was reared, through the enterprise of a number of public spirited citizens of Eaton. a marble shaft, suitably inscribed to the memory of the soldiers who sleep at its base. And so the gratitude of the people who have occupied the.country, has been shown to a few of those who led the way in the wilderness and assisted in making it possible that tthe had should be opened to settlement. - ___

Parker, who was a soldier of Wayne's army, and had encamped during the campaign on the very ground which he a'terwards owned, and on which he spent the greater part of his life.

As Wayne's army was advancing toward the Indian country in the spring of 1793, and when in that part of the wilderness which is now Butler county, a man by the name of Newman deserted. Wayne, fearing that he would do harm by carrying information to the Indians, sent out a party of men to capture and return him to the camp, where, doubtless, it was Mad Anthony's intention to have him shot. Jacob Parker was one of the men detailed for this arrest. The little company started out in a northeasterly direction and soon came upon the fugitive's trail through the woods. They followed it the greater part of the day, and when overtaken by nightfall had reached Twin creek. | Upon the west side of this stream and about half a mile from the site of West Alexandria, and perhaps eighty rods from the present site of the Dayton and Western pike, the party encamped. In the morning, while some of the men were engaged in preparing breakfast, young Parker took a ramble through the luxuriant forest, and along the ravine running back from the stream. This was about the twentieth of April, and, the season being unusually forward, nature wore a very attractive garb. The loveliness of the locality made a deep impression upon the young man that spring morning, and on returning to the camp he exclaimed to his comrades: "If I live and get safely through this campaign I mean to own this very piece of ground and open a farm here and live and die upon it." 'The older men laughed at what they regarded as Parker's boyish enthusiasm, but he insisted that he meant to carry out his intention, and should some day own a cultivated farm where all was then an unbroken wild. The subject for the time was forgotten in the discussion that followed upon the feasibility of following further the deserter. It was decided that further pursuit would be in vain, and the men, after partaking of a hearty meal, took up their march for the army, which they regained upon, or near, ths site of Eaton. Parker followed Wayne through his victorious campaign, and, when discharged, began to think longingly of the beautiful valley on Twin creek, where he and his comrades had camped. He had saved his pay as a soldier, and, on the declaration of peace, added to his means by laboring as a cooper in the village of Cincinnati. About 1798, before the lands were in market, he visited the cherished site and built there a log cabin. From that time until the lands were surveyed he remained there off and on, and, as soon as he was permitted, he purchased the quarter section, of one hundred and sixty acres of land, including the very spot he had encamped upon. Here he lived until his death, February 26, 1848, thus fulfilling his boyish prediction which had been laughed at by the older soldiers. Jacob Parker, the humble hero of this little incident of Wayne's campaign, was one of the most worthy and well-liked of Preble's pioneers. He was born in New Jersey in 1778, and was, therefore, about seventy years of age at the time of his death.