Christmas in 1812

 

                                Celebrations - Food - Decorations

           While celebrations at Fort Amanda in 1813 may not have been as elaborate as those described below, an inventory in June of that year showed 3,657 gallons of whiskey was stored at Fort Amanda and my hunch is Captain William Ramsey ordered some of it distributed to his company from Preble County to celebrate the occasion.    

In one of the first orders concerning Christmas in North America offers some insight into the experience of the common soldier:

"Tomorrow being Christmas Day it will be observed by the Troops in Garrison as a Sunday in every respect, and the civil artificers and Labourers in the Royal Engineers Department will be allowed a holiday from two in the afternoon on condition of their taking no time for dinner."

This "Scrooge" sounding order is contrasted by the Christmas preparations across the Atlantic in Gibraltar in 1806. At that station, the soldiers received advanced pay for three meals "for the purpose of providing a Good dinner for the different messes on Christmas Day. A drummer and psalm singers were selected from the garrison's regiments and, after practicing for a couple of weeks together, performed religious airs for the assembled church masses on Christmas Day.

Soldiers Eating and Drinking at a Sutler Booth,

Note: The Sutler contracted with the army to provide soldiers with personal iterms. Today it's called the "PX." (post exchange).

The soldier's food fare on Christmas day depended on where he was stationed. One soldier of the 40th Regiment in 1807 noted going ashore at Cork, Ireland to purchase "raisins, flour, fat and beer, and so being enabled to enjoy ourselves very comfortably." Naturally, if a soldier was engaged in active field service, it was difficult to celebrate Christmas. In 1813, John Cooper of the 7th Royal Fusiliers recounted the following while serving in the Peninsular War:
"Here for the first time in the Peninsula we kept Christmas. Every man contributed some money, meat or wine. A sheep or two were bought and killed. Pies and puddings were baked, etc. Plates, knives and forks, were not plentiful, yet we managed to diminish the stock of eatables in quick time. For desert we had plenty of apples; and for a finish, two or three bandsmen played merry tunes, while many warmed their toes by dancing jigs and reels."

A soldier room the 68th Regiment felt a little luckier about having a simple Christmas meal the previous year: "...we killed a young kid for our Christmas dinner, and we had what we considered a delightful repast, but nothing to be compared to what some of the poorest." peasants have in England." Christmas was also modestly celebrated by the soldier's family in the Peninsula. One 43rd Light Infantry officer in 1813 recounted:
"Just before dark while passing a corporal's picquet, an officer and myself stood for a few minutes, to contemplate a poor woman, who had brought her little pudding and her child from her distant quarters, to partake of [Christmas] with her husband, but the side of a small fire kindled under a tree.."

Because the British soldiers in Canada were lodged in comparatively comfortable quarters in the winter it is likely they fared better at Christmas time than their comrades serving in the Peninsular War. For example, purchases could be made a local stores to improve the soldier's lot at Christmas. For example one Royal Artilleryman purchased all spice on December 24th in Amherstburg, Upper Canada obviously for festive beverages for he and his comrades at the fort there.


Officer's Mess

The activities of British officers significantly contrasted those of their soldiers. In the Peninsula, one lieutenant noted dinner of "soup, salt fish, roast beef, boiled beef, mutton, vegetables and a remove of turkey, fowls, ham, and tongues - afterwards pastry." To wash this meal down, alcoholic beverages flowed freely for the Regency officer. For the mess of the Royal Artillery in Spain "the empty champagne bottles met in the centre of a long table forming an uninterrupted line of communication between the President and Vice-President." Similar scenes would have been found in the messes of regiments stationed in North America. One guest to the mess of the 41st Regiment expressed a fear that he should be made tipsy adding "'tis the fate of all Strangers, I hear; What think you? I think that when "I've got my quantity I shall walk away. We both realized our expectations. When I found myself on the point of trespassing against sobriety, I walked off, my friend stayed to finish the Campaign; or, without metaphor, the Champagne."

If not with their messes officers were often invited to the homes of local citizens. This was the case for Lieutenant John LeCouteur of the 104th while stationed in Kingston, Upper Canada. "That day, for amusement LeCouteur had fun with an old Christmas custom of the "First Footing", which determined the fortunes of the family in the coming year by the first visitor on Christmas day. A good year was expected if a handsome man visited bearing coal or salt; whilst a poor old woman arriving at your door was considered a bad omen. After arriving at the Christmas party the young LeCouteur set his plan into motion:  After tea well over and arrangements were making for forfeits or some amusement to be fixed upon, I slipped out with Miss Ph__s, an ally who lent me one of Her Mother's dresses. In a short time I was fully equipped, slipped out of the back door, knocked at the front door, and requested to speak to the kind Old lady as a decayed Gentlewoman requiring aid. Miss Ph. was of course sent out to hear my story and thought it would be better the poor Lady should tell her own story to the whole party who might become interested in her welfare. This was reported and the decayed Lady told her piteous tale, loss of Husband, children, fortune. The old Lay herself was completely won and a large sum was preparing for her relief but a certain occasional twinkling in the unfortunate Lady's eye led one or two of the fair sparklers [to] suspect the truth - a whisper went about and screams of laughter following, the poor Lady had to cut and run."

One of the most significant Christmas parties during the War of 1812 occurred thousands of miles away from North America. In Ghent, Belgium, after signing the peace treaty ending the War of 1812 the previous day, the British and American representatives sat down on December 25, 1814 to a Christmas dinner of beef and plum pudding brought especially from England. Toasts were drunk to the health of King George and President Madison and the orchestra played "God Save the King" and "Yankee Doodle."


A satire showing the Christmas dinner of roast beef, plum pudding, and beer at the time war was declared on France, 1803

Holiday decorations put up by British officers and soldiers would have appeared Spartan by today's standards. The English soldier would likely have continued the ancient custom of "decking the halls" with greenery. Substituting for holly one new English settler to Canada in the 1820s noted bringing in "a wreath of boxleaved trailing wintergreen (which with its scarlet berries reminded me of the varnished holly with which we were wont to garnish the house at home), and hanging it over the mantel piece, and above the pictures of my host's parlor, in honor of [Christmas] day."  It is possible English officers would have done likewise.


Halls decked with holly and mistletoe in England. Note the ladies wearing holly in their hair.

The German soldiers brought the Christmas tree to Canada. The commander of Hessian troops, Baron Von Riedesel, was first to introduce it in Sorel, Quebec in 1781. It is likely the German troops of 7th Battalion 60th, De Meuron's, and De Watteville's Regiments would have carried on this tradition during the War of 1812. Indeed in the middle of the Peninsular war, an officer of the King's German Legion decorated a lemon tree with lights and oranges to serve as his Christmas tree. It would be another 40 years before the Christmas tree would become common place in English society.

41st Regiment's Mess at Fort George National Historic Site decorated for their Christmas Program

While there are some accounts of Christmas celebrations in the army as noted above, the majority of soldiers' diaries and accounts of the time are quite silent on the matter. It would not be until the 1840s and 1850s that the celebration of Christmas by British soldiers became a major affair with decoration committees and significant fanfare. One dilemma encountered by historic sites portraying life during the War of 1812 is that the public expects Christmas decorations and festivities that did not, in fact, take place until Victorian times. One possible solution would be to decorate the site as it would have appeared during a wintertime ball. This would allow staff at historic sites to simultaneously present two themes: Christmas in 1812, and leisure of the British Army during the winter months. The resulting decorations would surely kindle the festive spirit of any visitor, all the while avoiding an unfortunate misrepresentation of Christmas during the War of 1812. Lastly Christmas carolling by the poor was quite common in this time period. If that doesn't entertain visitors, brewing up some Christmas ale could lift some spirits.
 

They Didn't Teach Us This in High School

Why weren't we taught this in high school history class?

First let me be clear; I'm not a Canadianphobe or an anti-Canadianite, in fact, nothing can be further from the truth. I've always viewed Canadians as a soft spoken, friendly and gentle people (and I still do), however years ago, I experienced a new behavior in a small handful of locals that made me scratch my head wonder if all these years my perception had been wrong.

Back in the 80's, my wife and I decided to go on a road trip to Ontario Canada in search of the site where the Battle of the Thames took place and where the Shawnee war chief Tecumseh was killed.

My Johnson Scandinavian ancestors were adventurous Viking sea faring people, I have a genetic propensity for knowing where I am, geographically, at any given time in any given place. My car is equipped with a compass, but I rarely use it and only in extreme situations. Much to my wife's dismay, I also have a gender propensity for never asking for directions. Anyway, once we got to Detroit I knew all I had to do was point my car east. I was wrong and after wandering around the Canadian countryside for more than 3 hours I decided to swallow my Viking pride and asked my wife to look at her paper map and find out where we were. Turns out we were just a few miles from Thamesville.  Sounded right so I swallowed my Viking pride and we headed that direction.

Cold shoulder, indifference or passive-aggression?

Driving into town I pulled over to the curb and asked a passerby if he could tell me how to get to the Thames battlefield. He just stared at me, turned and walked away. My first thought was perhaps he didn't speak English (lots of French people in Canada). I continued on and found another person and asked him the same question. That individual said he didn't know where it was and walked away without saying another word. I thought this was odd because here I was in the town of Thamesville, supposedly located near the famous battlefield yet no one could tell me how to get there.  One would have thought I was asking for directions to some small town in Eastern Ukraine.

Are they hiding something?

Leaving Thamesville as ignorant as when I first arrived, I decided to fend for myself and drove on following the only road heading east out of town.  Turns out the battlefield site was only 2 miles from town.  This was the site of one of the most significant battles of the War of 1812, the site where the great Shawnee chief, Tecumseh had been killed, and  marked began the beginning of the end of British domination in Canada, yet for some reason area residents couldn't OR wouldn't tell me where it was. WHY?  

 

AAAAAHHHH!  Now it's all starting to make sense

One of the things my high school history teachers failed to teach us was tell us that while we were ramping up to fight the British on American soil (again), we were also ramping up to fight them on Canada soil as well.  Hmmm, here all this time I'd thought Canada was just an innocent bystander when in fact, they were actually a target in Americas "crosshairs."  
 

Setting the Stage

Seems England was not getting along with anyone in 1813.   In addition to our outrage  at England for taking American sailors off American ships, England also entering it's 9th year of war with Napoleon in France.   

The British were very much aware that another war with the Americans was possible but also they also knew they couldn’t afford to fight two major wars on two different continents. Sensing England was backed into a corner, President Madison saw this as the opportune time for the United States to rid itself once and for all of English interference, not only on the high seas, but on the entire North American continent as well. Madison's solution; invade Canada and annex it as part of the United States.

The plan 

During March 1812, one month before the U.S. declared war with England,  Madison and his war counsel worked on creating a war plan designed to take advantage of England's preoccupation with the French.  The plan they came up with involved a  three-prong attack into Canada; 

1)  a right prong would advance from Lake Champlain (Vermont) and capture Montreal 

2)  a center prong would march across the Niagara frontier and capture Toronto 

3)  a left prong, already in place at Detroit would cross the Detroit River and seizing the British fort at Amherstburg then advance into the western districts of Canada where they would get support from the large numbers of Americans who had recently been given large land grants there.

The 3-Prong Attack Into Canada

The West Prong Failure

 

The main characters in this drama were American Gen. William Hull and his counterpart, General Isaac Brock of the British Army.

Creating Illusions

Ironically, the British were outnumbered 2 to 1 at the time. Brock learned from reading some of Hulls captured papers that he (Hull) was almost paranoid that if he lost a fight with the British and its Indian allies, all the residents of nearby Detroit would be massacred by Brock's Indian forces. Brock decided that if he could at least create the illusion that his forces were superior in number to Hulls, he might gain an advantage over Hull's troops.

Brock had high embankments built near the river’s edge. Because many of Brock's troops were inexperienced fighters, he had them dressed in the uniform of regulars giving the impression that all his men were battle hardened veterans. He then had his the men march in front of them, so Hull's men could see them. What Hull's men didn't see was that when the men walked behind the embankments, they circled around behind it and walked the same route in front giving the impression that he (Brock) had several hundred more troops than he actually had. At night, Brook had his Indian allies build huge fires along the Detroit River creating the illusion that in addition to his large numbers of "experienced regulars," he also had a very large number of Indians in his force as well.

The "Tour of the Beans"

The "tour of the beans" was another ingenious ploy designed to create the impression that Brooks force was larger than it was. At meal time, the "tour" began with soldiers walking in front of the embankment with their food, walk to the end of then walk behind it where they ate their meal (beans). Once finished, they walked around the front and again encircled the embankment, adding to the illusion that his fighting force was much larger than it actually was.

It Worked

The ploy worked, On August 16, 1812 after a standoff that had lasted several weeks and fearing an Indian massacre Hull surrendered his 2500 men army along with hundreds of thousands of dollars worth of military equipment. Hulls troops had marched over 200 miles from Dayton to Detroit and their commander surrendered is army WITHOUT FIRING A SINGLE SHOT. The officers were taken to Detroit and the militia troops pardoned to go home after signing a document saying they wouldn't fight again.

Marched over 200 miles, outnumbered the enemy 2 to 1 and surrendered without firing a single shot.

  

Terror in Ohio

 

With no army to protect them, Ohio citizens feared that the British, Canadian and Indian forces would swoop down into Ohio and murder innocent civilians in their beds. Luckily that didn't happen but as a precaution, the Kentucky militia was called up to build forts along the Auglaize (including Fort Amanda) and the rest is history. Hull was eventually courting martialed and sentenced to be hung but because of his Revolutionary War service, he was saved by President Madison. General Brock didn't live long enough to gloat over his victory, he was killed 2 months later Oct. 13th at the Battle of Queenstown.

Why Did The Invasion Plan Fail?

The  3-prong attack looked good on paper but it didn't work for several reasons.

1.   July (West prong) - Hull surrendered at Detroit.
2.   Oct    (Center prong near the Niagara Border) - New England governors claimed that their militia troops were only to be used defensively.
3    Nov. (East prong) - Militiamen refused to cross the Canadian boarder to take Montreal.  Fear was the Federalists opposed to the war and would not come to aid the troops if they needed help.

At the end of the day, America won no Canadian battles and won no territory

Why did the Brits burn our Capital?  We burned theirs first

Wait, there's more. There's something else my history teacher failed to tell us in high school. We were taught that the nasty British soldiers marched into our nations capital in Washington, D.C. on August 24, 1814 and burned the White House and several government buildings including buildings were much of the wars military records were kept.  

What they didn't tell us was that  year earlier (April 27, 1813), American troops marched into Canada's capital (York) and set fire to the buildings of the Legislative Assembly, the Printing Office, used for publishing official documents as well as newspapers and looted homes.    The burning of the U S Capital wasn't a random act of war, it was retaliation, pure and simple. 

Two parallel points of view

A few years ago, I was talking with a man from Canada who had just become an American citizen. He was also interested in history, so I asked what they taught Canadian school kids about the War of 1812. He said Canadians teach their school kids that Americans attempted to invade Canada and annex it but failed. He added, "We've only been in 2 wars and both of them with the United States?" I really wanted to ask him if he thought Canada won or lost those wars, but I thought it best not to go there. My lasting impression of him was that he was a "soft spoken, gentle and kind individual" and I'd prefer to leave it that way.

Talking with him reminded me of a similar situation involving my family. Like a lot of people, we had family who fought on both sides during the Civil War, one of ours served with Gen. William Tecumseh Sherman's army on its famous or infamous "March to the Sea" in 1864. We thought that was pretty cool. When my brother moved his young family to Tennessee years ago, his kids made it known early on that they were proud of their northern heritage and that their granddaddy was not only a Yankee, but a Yankee in Sherman's army. Needless to say, the other kids whose granddaddies fought on the other side weren't quite as impressed and they let the family know that.
I mention this because the Canadians and their view of the American invasion of their country in 1812, are probably no different than the view of Georgians and their thoughts on Sherman's march through their state in 1864. The fact is, when we only look at history from only one point of view and we do it without question, we miss the whole story.   

Conclusion 

While I am sorry that some of my friends to the north are still a little testy about our uh little disagreement 200 years ago, I now understand why.   I am also  happy to learn that the Canadian teachers don't sugar coating the 1812 event and they're telling it like it was. (If only we could get our history teachers to do the same.).    

 

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My book "Fort Amanda -A Historical Redress is an 8" x 10" softcover book with 360 pages of information I've gathered about the fort over a 40 year period. In addition to historical data about the fort, its construction and expansion, it includes 60 pages of biographical / genealogical information of more than 100 men who served there.

If you'd like a signed or personalized copy, send $20 for the book and $4 for shipping ($24 total) to me at:

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So That's Where That Term Comes From

Hmmmmmm. So that's where that term comes from!

My ancestors weren't just poor, they were ..........

In the Paleolithic period, around 40,000 years ago, people started making moccasin-like wraparound footwear out of softened animal skins, or rawhide. This seemingly simple advancement gave humankind a major leg up in long-distance travel and marked the beginning of leather-making. Over time, it was discovered that human urine was an excellent chemical to use for tanning the animal skins. To help offset family expenses, families kept a pot in their homes where family members could empty their bladders"(peed). When the pot was full it was taken and sold to the local tannery.

If you had to do this to survive you were thought to be "piss poor."

But worse than that were the really poor folk who couldn't even afford to buy a pot; they "didn't have a pot to piss in" & were the lowest of the low.

A Watched Pot Never Boils

The next time you are washing your hands & complain because the water temperature isn't just how you like it, think about how things used to be. Here are some facts about earlier times. 

Why brides carry a bouquet of flowers  

Most people got married in June because they took their yearly bath in May, and they still smelled pretty good by June. Since they were starting to smell, however, brides carried a bouquet of flowers to hide the body odor. Hence the custom today of carrying a bouquet when getting married.  I wonder if in modern times Brides throw their bouquet over their shoulder to a group of unmarried women is the same as saying, "I don't need to worry anymore about how I smell, I found my guy.  Maybe this can help you find yours."  Anyway just a thought. 

Poor Baby

Baths consisted of a big tub filled with hot water. The man of the house had the privilege of the nice clean water, then all the other sons and men, then the women, and finally the children. Last of all the babies. By then the water was so dirty you could actually lose someone in it . . . hence the saying, "Don't throw the baby out with the Bath water!"

Raining Cats and Dogs

Houses had thatched roofs-thick straw-piled high, with no wood underneath. It was the only place for animals to get warm, so all the cats and other small animals (mice, bugs) lived in the roof. When it rained it became slippery and sometimes the animals would slip and fall off the roof, resulting in the idiom, "It's raining cats and dogs." 

There was nothing to stop things from falling into the house. This posed a real problem in the bedroom where bugs and other droppings could mess up your nice clean bed, therefore, a bed with big posts and a sheet hung over the top afforded some protection. That's how canopy beds came into existence.

They were so poor, they were dirt poor.

The floor was dirt. Only the wealthy had something other than dirt, leading folks to coin the phrase "dirt poor." The wealthy had slate floors that would get slippery in the winter when wet, so they spread thresh (straw) on floor to help keep their footing.

As the winter wore on, they added more thresh until, when you opened the door, it would all start slipping outside. A piece of wood was placed in the entrance-way, subsequently creating a "thresh hold." Get it, it held the thresh in place; a thresh hold. :-)

Carrying the bride over the threshold

The tradition of carrying the bride over the threshold is not a new tradition; it dates back centuries and has a few different origins.

The first idea for carrying the bride over the threshold stems from the same ancient belief as the idea of an aisle runner and throwing flower petals on the aisle. This belief is that the newlywed couple is very susceptible to evil spirits. By carrying the bride over the threshold, the groom is putting a protective space between her and the floor; thus, protecting her.

Generations ago, it was considered lady like for the new bride to be, or at the very least appear to be, unwilling to “give herself” to her new husband. Whether she was or not was not the issue, it was all about appearances. At the threshold to the bedchamber, the husband would have to carry her over to encourage her to go in.

Another tradition dictates that the new wife must enter her home for the first time by the main door and to avoid bad luck, she must not trip or fall. To avoid this, the groom would carry her into the house.

During the ancient times when people were married by capture, the bride obviously would not go willingly into her husband’s home. So she was either dragged or carried in. Over time it evolved and became the tradition that is practiced today.

Even earlier times believed that family demons followed the bride to her new home. To keep them from entering the home, the groom would carry her across the threshold the first time she entered the home. After that demons could not come in and the bride was free to come and go as she pleased.

In those old days, they cooked in the kitchen with a big kettle that always hung over the fire.. Every day they lit the fire and added things to the pot. They ate mostly vegetables and did not get much meat. They would eat the stew for dinner, leaving leftovers in the pot to get cold overnight and then start over the next day. Sometimes stew had food in it that had been there for quite a while, and thus the rhyme, "Peas porridge hot, peas porridge cold, peas porridge in the pot nine days old."

Bacon a status symbol

Sometimes they could obtain pork, which made them feel quite special. When visitors came over, they would hang up their bacon to show off. It was a sign of wealth that a man could, "bring home the bacon." They would cut off a little to share with guests and would all sit around and "chew the fat."

Killer Tomatoes

           

                                Pewter for the wealthy              Wood for the common folks

Those with money had plates made of pewter. Food with high acid content caused some of the lead to leach onto the food, causing lead poisoning death. This happened most often with tomatoes, so for the next 400 years or so, tomatoes were considered poisonous.

Bread and Crust

Bread was divided according to status. Workers got the burnt bottom of the loaf, the family got the middle, and guests got the top, or the "upper crust."

The Bell Tolls for Thee

Lead cups were used to drink ale or whisky. The combination would sometimes knock the imbibers out for a couple of days. Someone walking along the road would take them for dead and prepare them for burial.. They were laid out on the kitchen table for a couple of days and the family would gather around and eat and drink and wait and see if they would wake up, creating the custom of holding a wake.

England is old and small and the local folks started running out of places to bury people. So they would dig up coffins and would take the bones to a bone-house, and reuse the grave. When reopening these coffins, 1 out of 25 coffins were found to have scratch marks on the inside and they realized they had been burying people alive, so they would tie a string on the wrist of the corpse, lead it through the coffin and up through the ground and tie it to a bell. Someone would have to sit out in the graveyard all night (the graveyard shift.) to listen for the bell; thus, someone could be, saved by the bell or was considered a dead ringer.

He's So Nice the Indians Would Never Harm Him

The Interviews

1794

 Interviews With Early Settlers

Stations

"He’s So Nice the Indians Wouldn’t Hurt Him

Spencer was taken the summer before we came.  His mother had a nephew living with her and Mrs. Spencer said she was glad it was her son that was taken for she knew he was so good natured they wouldn’t hurt him.

 

("Taken" was a term referring to individuals being "taken" or kidnapped by the Indians.  Kidnapping was common on the frontier during early times.   The mortality rate among Indian children made white children prize targets as "replacements."

 

Interview with James Beasley: (1794).  He lived 15 miles east of Cincinnati near Milford, Ohio.

A Non-Fatal Gut Shot

 Major Benjamin Stites & Nathaniel Reeder were going down to Cincinnati from Columbia.  They were fired on by perhaps a party of 30 Indians.   Stites when he saw the Indians raising out of a hollow dropped right down on his horse and hear the bullets go over him.  Stites got in first and the two soldiers ere coming out of the fort, when they met Reeder, whom they supposed to be killed.  Reeder had been shot right in front of the abdomen, but so the bullet passed in and came out without hurting a vessel.

Isaac Beasley lived about 5 miles up the Little Miami, west side.  One night in the spring or summer of 1794 the Indians were around his house, he knew from the dogs barking.  In the morning he got up and went back and forth till he could see if he saw anything of the  yet moving so they couldn’t fire.  As many as 7 or 8 guns were fired at him, all missing and he ran to the door.  His wife hearing the guns supposed he was dead and was pushing it too but he prevented and got in and then got his gun and ran to the stairs to shoot.  Here he was seen through the chink and was shot in the arm, the bullet entering above the wrist and coming out at the elbow.  By the time his sons 7 or 8 were up and fired at the Indians who fled.  One was supposed to be killed but never found.  Beasleys was about ½ mile from Frazier’s Station where I lived. 

Apparently Beasley was outside pushing on the door of the cabin trying to get in and his wife, thinking he was dead, pushed against it from inside the cabin thinking it was Indians trying to get in,. Luckily they figured it out.

Shot In The Leg and It Proved Fatal.

 

 Hinkle’s. a company of 15 up to Covaltt’s helping him build it. They were on horseback and were waylaid by a party of 40 Indians who fired on them, and killed two horses, Gabriel Hutchings shot down under him and Hinkle’s who was wounded in the calf of the leg.  When the horse fell Hinkle jumped to his feet and ran till he got close to his door and he died in about an hour.  A vein in the balf of his leg was cut.  His door at at the Round Bottom , he ran 200 yards so near his home it was.  There was no station at Round Bottom only one or two houses there yet.  The alarm was given but the Indians discontinued the attack.

 

The fact Hinkle could run 200 yards with a bullet through his ankle is a testament to his stamina.  Hinkle was related to Ensign Schillinger, the soldier who kept a journal at Fort Amanda in 1813 

“I killed your father.”

Ephraim Covalt killed at his own station. He was out, supposed to have been straggling.  Covalt wore a pair of silver sleeve buttons.  About 3 years after an Indian came along & asked his son if his name wasn’t Covalt.  He said it was, “Me kill your father.”  The Indian then said and showed him the buttons.  He had his father’s gun too.  Some blamed Covalt for letting him go.         

I've read this account many many times and I'm still amazed at how the Indian tells Covalt's son, in an almost nonchalant manner that he had killed his father, and even tole him he had some of his possessions.  We'll never know the Indian's  demeanor the time but because the son took no action, one must wonder if the Indian said it jokingly as if to say, "Gee, now this is really  a coincidence, I killed your dad and have his buttons and gun and now I meet his son.  This is really a coincidence," and then blew off the entire incident as if it was a non-event.  We'll also never know what Covalt's reaction was to incident but we do know neighbors criticized Covalt for not retaliating. 

Flinn

 Olcott was shot through the shoulder.  James Newell was killed, he had been thrown.  Henry Ball was taken prisoner.   The backwater was up very high,, they went up in a pirogue and brought him down the next morning, he was not yet dead.  He was killed by Mrs. Ferris this side the middle gate. 

"He was killed by Mrs. Ferris"?  Was it an accident on purpose??  We may never know.

Pirogue

James Newell was my uncle's wife's brother. Robert Griffin was killed alone, his father had brought down a large family from Pa. He had gone out a hunting and had killed a turkey and a raccoon. This was on another branch of Duck Creek from Mrs. Ferris' just below Dr. Duncan's place. Griffin had been living at my father's before he was killed, and was living with my mother at the time. He was on his return home at the time. Old Mr. Paul was killed a week or so before or after, his son had like to have gotten killed at the same time. Nelson's station was about 100 yards just in front of the mound where John Ferris lives. I think this station must have been established as early as 1791. After Robert Griffin's death his father and brother's family moved to Nelson's Station. Alexander Gordon's children were taken while they lived at this station. I think they were out after the cows.

The following reads as if children being kidnapped by Indians was an everyday event.  "Alexander Gordon's children were taken while they lived at this station. I think they were out after the cows."

James Newell Killed

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