Person:William Walker (130)

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Indian Captivity Stories of the Cowan Family

Thelma Marsh, Moccasin Trails to the Cross

Indian Captivity Stories of the Walker Family

Document:Obituary of William Walker, 1874

Wigton Walker YDNA Analysis

Transcription:Treaty with the Wyandot, Mar. 17, 1842

Overview

This William Walker was the son of John Walker IV of the Wigton Walker line. William was captured by Indians during a raid on the Castle's Woods settlement about 1777; at the same time his uncle Samuel Walker was killed, and his aunt Ann Walker Cowan, wife of Samuel Cowan, was captured. Ann was eventually released, and apparently rejoined her family, probably in Tennessee. William, however, was captured at about the age of ten, and was eventually adopted into the Wyandotte Indian Tribe....

Life

William was probably born about 1766 in Orange County, NC. His paternal grandparents (John Walker III =Ann Houston) had moved there from what is now Rockbridge Co VA, sometime about 1756. About 1771 the family moved to Castles Woods, in modern Russell County, VA. Williams father, John IV, appears in various records in SW VA after this date, and it is presumed that his young son came to that area with him.

In 1777 an Indian raid on the Castles Woods settlement occurred. William was captured during this raid, along with his aunt Ann Cowan Walker. His uncle Samuel Walker (?-1777) was killed during this attack. This event is well documented with eyewitness accounts and other confirming records. Connelly, 1899 provides a version prevailing among the Wyandot, and collected from interviews with his son Governor William Walker, and others. According to this tradition, William was plowing a field with his uncle when they were attacked. His uncle was killed, and he was captured.

Other accounts of the same event (notably by a Mrs. Scott, indicate that Samuel Walker was killed while escorting his sister Ann Walker Cowan, across a field going from Cowan's Fort to Moore's Fort in Castles Wood, and that William was captured separately. While there are some differences between the two stories, they are clearly the same story, albeit with different understandings of the same events. Given that Mrs. Scott could only tell us what was generally believed about the capture of Ann and William, and William knew at first hand what had occurred to him at least, it seems likely that his version of the story is more apt to be accurate in details. In otherwords, it is likely that he and his uncle Samuel Walker were plowing a field, probably near Moore's Fort, when they were attacked, and that Ann was captured independently, but at the same time, under circumstances that were not clear to the survivors, and are certainly not clear to us. Perhaps Ann was taken at home, or perhaps she was heading toward Moore's Fort. No version of the story seems to have survived to tell us what she herself experienced.

One thing the two stories do agree on, is that both Ann and William were captured separately, and that their captors met up to take them both north. Somewhere on the Ohio River they were separated, with Ann taken by one group, while William by another. Ann would be eventually released after the end of the Revolution, while William would be sold to the Wyandot, and eventually became a member of their tribe. Williams life with the Wyandot is well described in Thelma Marsh's 1974 work Moccasin Trails to the Cross:

Young William was taken from Greenbrier County, Virginia and brought to the Delaware settlement on the Whetstone Creek, now Delaware, Ohio. Here he was adopted into a family who treated him very well. It is not known just how long he remained with this family, but probably four or five years. The Delawares and the Wyandotts met in a large body at Detroit. Here a white man by the name of Adam Brown saw Walker and recognized him. He had known his family in Virginia, for Brown had been captured by the Wyandotts after he was a grown man, and had been adopted into the Wyandott Tribe. Brown decided to ransom young Walker from the Delawares. This took considerable time in negotiations, and some stretching of customary proceedings, but it was done. The family he had lived with was to get valuable presents from the King's store-blankets, clothes, guns, ammunition, etc. William Walker made his home with Adam Brown from then on until his marriage to Catherine Rankin.

The reference to his capture in Greenbriar County, VA, requires some discussion. In his Journal, William Walker, Jr discusses the history of his father, and states that he was captured in Greenbriar County. This is repeated in White 1902, and is consistent with the information provided by Marsh. There is little doubt that this reflects what William said to his family, and that he thought he was captured in Greenbriar County. There is solid evidence that Williams family was actually in Washingotn County Virginia (now Russell County), at the time of this event. Mrs. Scott confirm this in her eyewitness account, identifying both William and Ann by name, and describing with reasonable accuracy their relation to the the Walker and Cowan families. She is mute about Williams eventual fate, but she recollects seeing Ann after her release some years later. In addition, we know that Ann's borther (and William's uncle, Samuel Walker, did in fact die about this time, as his estate is probated in the Washington County courts the following year. Finally, the fact that William Jr's story matches up in most particulars with that told by Mrs. Scott also helps confirm that the event occurred in Southwest Virginia.

That said, we have to ask why did William think he was captured in Greenbriar County? The answer to that lies with his benefactor among the Wyandots, Adam Brown. William Jr tells us [that

While his party attended a council at Detroit...[about 1782, based on the statement that William was with the Delaware for at least four to five years] these Delawares there met with a large body of Wyandotts, among which was an adopted white man named Adam Brown, who, when a man grown, had been captured by the Wyandotts in Dunmore's war in Greenbrier County, adopted and was married, was influential and respected by the tribe. The youth attracted his attention and a conversation in English ensued, the latter not having entirely forgotten his native language. Brown, finding out where he was from, and knowing his family, determined upon ransoming him. Negotiations for this purpose were opened.

One possibility is that Brown was simply mistaken about knowing Williams family in Greenbriar. But since William was only 11 at the time of his capture, it may well be that he himself did not know where he had been taken. As a result, he simply assumed that Brown knew his parents from Greenbriar, and accepted that as the basis for his capture there.

Wyandotts

From: Thelma Marsh, Moccasin Trails to the Cross (Fair Use)

William Walker made his home with Adam Brown from then on until his marriage to Catherine Rankin. Catherine Rankin Walker had a fine education. She had been a teacher before her marriage to William Walker. She showed great wisdom and influence in her support of the mission which was established among the Wyandotts. Even the neighboring tribes would seek her counsel before making important decisions. Rev. James B. Finley said of her.

"Mrs. Walker was a most amiable woman, of good education, and half Wyandott. She possessed great influence in the nation; and this whole family were his (Stewart's) hospitable friends, and the untiring friends of the mission which was afterwards established there. Her mind was well enlightened and she could expose the folly of their supersti tions better than anyone I knew."

She was a descendant of the French Montours and the Irish Rankin families. A French gentleman by the name of Montour came to Canada and settled there. He married a Huron Indian woman. Their daughter, Mary Montour, married James Rankin. She was of the Big Turtle clan of Wyandotts. Catherine was the daughter of Mary Montour and James Rankin.

It is not known just how she met William Walker, or when she came to Upper Sandusky, Ohio. Their eldest son, William, Jr. taught at the mission school, was the first postmaster of the village, and a chief and leader in his tribe. When the Wyandotts went west, he went with them, and became the first governor of the Provisional Government of the Nebraska Territory.

Catherine Walker died in 1844. Her stone is in the circle of markers above the Harrison Smith Park, along Fourth Street. Why she was buried in the old Indian cemetery is not known, for she was a member of the Wyandott Mission Church and entitled to burial at the Old Mission cemetery. Her husband had never joined the church, which was very new at the time of his death in 1824. It is not known where he was buried, but quite possibly it was in the old Indian burial ground. This might account for Catherine being buried there, for she wished to be near her husband in death as she had been in life.

Footnotes

1. ↑ Commonly said to be age 11 at the time of his capture by Indians in 1777. This is consistent with his general life history, but a more closely defined DOB is needed.