MySource:Cos1776/Ogle, Henry C. Letter of 2 Jan 1903

Description

Original Source of this letter is unknown at this time.

Accounts of the tragedy at Ruddle's Station can be found in numerous places. Probably the best from the Conway point of view is a letter written in Paris, Kentucky, January 2, 1903, by Henry C. Ogle, Sr., a grandson of John Conway, Jr. It is addressed only "Dear Sir"; the addressee was a grandson of John's brother Joseph; it could perhaps have been George Pohlman; it is possible but unlikely that it was Father; most probably it was a Conway. I shall copy here only the portion relating to Joseph although the letter discusses several other Conways. [1]

Transcription

I will now take up the history of John, Joseph, Elizabeth, Sally and their parents, and their removal to Kentucky. John first came in 1777 as one of a company of soldiers sent out by the garrison of Virginia to guard the settlers about Boone' Fort, or as was now more commonly known, Boonesboro. This is the present county of Maidison on the Kentucky River. He remained a year during which the Fort was twice attacked by the Indians and during one of the attacks besieged 8 or 9 days. In fact, parties of Indians were frequently skulking about the country adjacent to the Fort watching for chances to kill the whites, and many of them were waylaid and murdered. He returned to Virginia in 1778, and in a short time after, probably 1779, he came to stay, accompanied by his father, mother, his sister Elizabeth and her husband, William Dougherty, and one child, Joseph and Sally, also several other families. They settled about 10 miles north of Paris in the neighborhood of what was then called Riddle's Station [Ruddell's Station]. It was really a Stockade or Fort, built for the purpose of sheltering the settlers from attacks by the Indians.

Early in the spring of 1780 a number of the families of the neighborhood moved into this Fort, also into another called Martin's, 6 or 8 miles south of Riddle's. The men would go out during the day to work, clearing the land, breaking and preparing for the planting of their crops, and while some of them would be at this work others would be on guard around them with their guns to protect them against the Indians. Oh, but the early settlers of Ky. had terrible times. ...

In June 1780, one morning (Sunday) 3 boys, Joseph Conway being one of them, were sent out early to drive in the cows for milking. They were found on the west side of the river. They started them back but on crossing the river, which was then a shallow ripple, they caught a large Loggerhead Turtle and carried it back to the sandy beach on the west side and began to tease it with willow twigs, watching it snap at them.?Some men from the Fort came down to the edge of the water on the east side washing their hands and faces for breakfast. An Indian lying concealed in the bushes fired on Joseph, wounding him in the side, and rushed out on him, knocked him down and tore off his scalp, then vanished from sight in the thick bushes.?It was done so quickly that the men on the other side could give no assistance. The alarm was given at the Fort, the men rushed out with their guns and scoured the woods but could find no trace of the Indian or any of his comrades. They carried the wounded boy into the Fort. The wounds from his head bled alarmingly. Finally an old lady named Wiseman succeeded by using cobwebs in staunching the blood. The wound in his side was a slight one only, the bullet glancing off from the ribs. His head was bandaged up the best they could.

Two or three days afterward the inmates of the Fort were terribly alarmed one morning by hearing the report of a cannon near them, and were soon surprised by the appearance of a larger force of British and Indians, several hundred. All were under the command of a Col. Byrd of the British Army. They had come from Detroit which was then a British possession.?They brought cannon with them, cutting a road through the forest and hauling them. They demanded the surrender of the Fort, promising in the name of the English King to protect the inmates against the cruelty of the Indians. The walls of the Fort, while proof against the common rifle balls, were not sufficient to resist cannon. Col. John Hinkston, the commander of the Fort, agreed to surrender

The gates were opened, the Indians rushed in and at once began pillaging the inmates of everything they could find in cooking utensils, bed clothing and the like. It was with the utmost difficulty that the English soldiers could prevent the Indians from wrecking their fury on the women and children. They would jerk the feather and straw ticks off the beds, empty them to get the ticking. While at this work they came to the bed where the wounded boy lay, and it happened to be the very Indian, as was afterward learned, who had wounded him. He instantly raised his tomahawk to complete his work, but the English soldiers jerked him away.

After robbing the Fort of everything of value, they put their prisoners under guard and then went on to capture Martin's Fort. It was the intention, it is said, to go to all the other forts to capture them in the same manner with their cannon, but the British commander was so shocked at the terrible barbarities of the Indians that he refused to go any further, and started back toward Detroit.

On the way many shocking cruelties were enacted by the Indians. A number of very old men and women too feeble to travel as fast as their captors wanted, were tomahawked and scalped. My grandfather says that one of the men named Riddle had a stone bruise on his foot and limped badly, said he saw him lie down to drink at a spring and while down an Indian drove his tomahawk into his brain and jerked off his scalp. A few minutes after, the Indian passed him and other prisoners and shook his poor victim's bloody scalp at them as a warning what their fate would be unless they hurried along.

Many of the little boys would be so tired when they came to logs they would climb up on them and roll over. One woman had a sick baby which kept crying. In passing along the bank of a river an Indian jerked the baby from her arms and threw it far out into the deep water. She tried to rush in after it, but they caught and held her, and she was compelled to witness the dying struggles of her child. At night the men prisoners were confined by driving stakes crosswise over their legs and arms, first extending them their full length, then passing a thong around their necks and tying this to another stake. The night after their capture a very heavy rain fell. Grandfather says they had no protection, and their faces and whole bodies were thoroughly drenched. The rains raised the river very high. In crossing the Main Licking in carnoes two old ladies, a Mrs. Spears and Mrs. Eastin, and a little child were drowned.

During the confusion and trouble of the march no effort could be made to dress the scalp wound on Joseph's head, and the weather being hot, the green flies made their appearance, and afterward the creepers. The same old lady Wiseman who first staunched the blood in the Fort, now again came in as the good Samaritan and picked out the loathsome insects and dressed the boy's head, and continued to wait on him till the wound finally healed. Let the memory of this old lady never be forgotten by the descendants of Joseph Conway.

One other incident I remember. Sally, then a little girl of 6 years, wore a nice little sun bonnet when captured and of which she was very proud. In crossing the river one of the Indians jerked it off and threw it in the river. Another incident. Some Indian squaws accompanied their husbands. On the first night, during the heavy rains these squaws came to our great grandmother and threw some blankets over her and the other women to try to shield them from the storm.

When they reached Detroit the provisions were divided out among their captives. Several small children were separated from their parents and scattered about among different tribes of Indians. Sally was adopted by an old Indian and his wife who had no children. All of the family, 4 years after their capture, were released, and got back to Kentucky except Sally. Nine years after, a white man who had been among the prisoners (a half grown boy when captured) managed to get away from them and return to Kentucky and told my grandfather where his sister was. He went back and found her about 40 miles west of Detroit. At this time peace had been made with the Indians. He bought his sister from the old Indian by the payment of 40 silver brooches. I have the story of her ransom in a minutely written account of it from my kinsman, Mr. Underwood, her grandson. It is a very affecting story.

The men prisoners after awhile were allowed the liberty of the town and to work for any of the citizens who would employ them. Detroit was quite a trading place then. The whites were a mixed race of French and English. The country all south of it was a very heavy forest, and in winter, next to the town for some half mile or so, covered with water from 3 to 4 feet deep. This was crossed by a causeway. My grandfather, Mr. Dougherty, and Joseph would frequently go out in the forest during winter to chop wood for the citizens - would also go out and kill hogs for them. They fattened on the acorns and hickory nuts and would soon become wild and had to be hunted with dogs and shot. On one occasion while returning at night on the causeway they met a drunken Indian whom they gathered in their arms and pitched out onto the thin ice, and left him breaking through and floundering in the water.

In what manner they traveled to get home I don't remember that my Uncle ever told me. ...

Our great gr-father died shortly after his return to Kentucky, but his wife lived a long time after, dying about 1803 at my grand-father's from a cancer on her forehead. ...

Joseph, your grandfather, grew up to full manhood and was for a number of years engaged as a spy to watch the Indians. Although peace was made with England in 1793, the Indians would still make raids into Ky., stealing horses and murdering the settlers. The house of a settler named Shanks, living in Bourbon Co., was attacked in February 1787 and the house was burned to the ground, and all the family murdered except one daughter, a widow Gillespie, and one son. Your grandfather was at the house in the early part of the night but left shortly after dark. The attack was made about 10 o'clock. If you could manage to get hold of any of the histories of Kentucky, you will find a full account of this tragedy under the history of Bourbon Co. A party was hastily organized the next day to pursue them. Your grandfather was one of the party. They overtook them down on the Licking Hills. Two of the Indians dropped behind and showed themselves, and kept jumping from tree to tree to make the whites, as was supposed, think they were a number of them. Your grandfather rushed up in shooting distance of them and got behind a tree. Putting his hat on a stick he poked it slowly and continuously around the tree. The Indians, thinking it was his head, fired. He then jumped out and rushed up on them and succeeded in killing one of the Indians. The other, with the balance, escaped.

I was a little too fast. When the Indians attacked the house, which was a double cabin, they managed to break into one of the rooms where a couple of the grown sisters were weaving, and tried to carry them off. One of them defended herself with a knife which she used about her work on the loom, and killed one of the Indians. They then killed her and took the other girl captive. When they found the whites on the pursuit they were about to overtake them, they sank their tomahawks into her heart.