Head of Auglaize - Part 3

Head of Auglaize - Part 3 

Chapter 3 

The following blog is one of a seriespresented to support my proposal that in 1794/95 General "Mad" Anthony Wayne constructed a post on the banks of the Auglaize River at or near the site of what later became Fort Amanda. He named his new post "Head of Auglaize."

NOTE:  Some of what you read in this first blog is  gleaned  from previous blogs and my first book; "Fort Amanda - A Historical Redress."  These are included to help create a timeline and continuity of events leading up to Wayne's decision to build his post on the Auglaize. 

Each blog will be presented as a separate "chapter" containing information on a topic relative to the overall proposal. All will be listed in the Blog Archive on the home page. If you miss or want to revisit a particular blog, simply click on the chapter you wish to read.

RECAP

1.  Wayne has orders to destroy the Indian villages at Kekionga (Fort Wayne, Ind.) 

2.   He comes to Ohio and builds Fort Greenville (Greenville, Oh.

3.  Wayne is trying to get the Indians to come to Greenville for peace talks  (no luck).  

4.  Wayne is also negotiating with contractors who will keep his troops supplied.

4.   Wayne’s concern is his army and supplies could get bogged down in the swamp,  .

5.  Wayne begins to look at using local rivers to transport his supplies.   

6.  This blog will cover Wayne's interest in the Auglaize River 

The Rivers

The St. Marys River

If you recall from previous blogs, Wayne's mission was to attack and destroy the Indin villages at Kekionga (Fort Wayne, Ind.).  He needed an alternative to land casrriage of supplies.  At Greenville he decided to see if local rivers were navigable enough to ship his supplies.  He had three large rivers to his south and north; the  The Great Miami, the St. Marys and the Auglaize.  One advantage of using  the St. Mary’s river was it flowed directly to the Miami villages.  A disadvantages is it was very difficult to navigate.  The St. Marys River  is very crooked and shallow in spots with  a very large number of bends and hairpin curves making it very difficult to navigate even in the spring and summer months.  It would be especially difficult particularly for boats loaded with heavy cargo.  In 1795 the trip from St. Marys to Defiance took seven days.

  

 

Another disadvantage of using the St. Marys River was it was prone to freezing.  This is evidenced in a letter from by Quartermaster Thomas Bodley, to General William Henry Harrison in Oct 1812 in which he described how ice had literally blocked the St Marys river for miles  and that supplies had to be unloaded and placed in shelters until conditions improved. 

Frozen In On the St. Marys  

“A messenger arrived with information that the last boats were stopped by the ice below this about 40 miles by water and about 12 by land that they had used every exertion but could proceed no further and in the Evening our express arrived from the first boats that they got to Shanes Crossing about 60 miles by water and 18 by land from this place where they were frozen up and no possibility of them getting on. There was no alternative left but to secure the craft and properly which Col. Barbee taken every necessary step to effect Captain Jordan’s company remain with the first boats and to build storehouses etc.  The roads are so extremely bad and the waters have been so high as to render it impossible for wagons or horses to travel.The St. Marys is so extremely crooked and blocked up with drift wood in many places where its out of the Bank and overflowed for miles in short terns. The slush has collected and frozen solid so as to dam it up for miles. Consequently nothing but a general thaw or hard rains can give us the benefit of the navigation of this stream.  The Auglaize is much straighter, has more water and will not freeze up as soon as the St. Marys”.

The Auglaize River

The major advantage of using the Auglaize River  was it flowed directly to Grand Glaize.   Another is as Bodley pointed out in his letter to Harrison, the Auglaize River was much straighter, had more water and wouldn't freeze up as soon as the  st. Marys.  

 Wayne's Sends Scouts to the Auglaize

  In late December (1793), General Wayne sent out a 15 man reconnisance party to look for a route from Greenville to the Auglaize River where the water was deep enough to support watercraft.  On January 2, 1794, the  group stumbled into a large Indian encampment.  Deciding it was too dangerous to retreat, attacked the camp.  Three soldiers and five Indian warriors killed in the fight and one soldier received a slight sholder wound.   The group returned to Fort Greenville the following day.  The ferocity of the fight is best described in Waynes report to Secretary Knox in which he described the clothing of the returning soldiers as “perforated by rifle balls.”    

A short time later Wayne sent out a second group to look for a portage portage route to the Auglaize,  not from Greenville this time, but from  from Loramie’s store.   The group returned the 18^th of January and reported that not only had they found, a good portage route, they also a spot on the river where the water was deep enough for watercraft and it was only 22 miles from Loramie’s store.  Wayne referred to the site as  as the “north end of the portage.”   

During the same period Wayne dispatched two small boats manned by experienced river boatmen down the Great Miami from Loramie’s store to determine if indeed the river was  navigable from Cincinnati to Loramie’s store.   The boats left Loramie’s store on February 22nd and arrived at Fort Hamilton, the armys main supply depot north of Cincinnati  two days later (February 24th) The 110 river trip had taken only 2 days.

In Letter No. 70  Wayne estimated the distance from Loramies store to the "north end of the portage"  on the Auglaize where he wanted to build a post is actually 22 miles "as the crow flies."  

Wayne now had a river transport system that stretched from Fort Hamilton north of Cincinnati to Grand Glaize with only 22 miles of land carriage.  From his new post at Grand Glaize, boats could merge  into the Maumee River then  travel west to the Miami villages or east to Roche de Boeuf another major Indian stronghold 9 miles to the east.   The Auglaize route  to Grand Glaize was approximately 70 miles by water, compared to 170 mile using the St. Marys.  Plus, as Major Botts pointed out in his letter to Harrison in 1812, The Auglaize is much straighter, has more water and will not freeze up as soon as the St. Marys”.

Letter No. 73.  What Wayne needed now was a post at the north end of the portage.  On March 3^rd, in his letter to Secretary Knox, Wayne wrote that he was “determined to build a strong post” on the banks of the Auglaize at the “north end of the portage.”  

He told Secretary Knox that he wanted a post on the Auglaize River because it would be almost imposible to keep troops supplied so far in advance of their supply base using only packhorses and wagons.  He added that building a post there would serve as a wake-up call to  the  Indians at Grand Glaize that his army was practically in their back yard.  He went on to say that he needed to act advance his army quickly to take possession of the gound at the north end of the portage as well  as taking advantage of the natural resources and foreage for his packhorses and cattle. 

 On the 20th of March he wrote:

Wayne's Auglaize Post Plans Put on Temporary Hold

In Knox letter No. 69, Knox tells Wayne that the British have built a post within American territory.  

Wayne

Game Changer - On to Fallen Timbers

 

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[1] Bodley Family. Papers, 1773-1939.  Kentucky Historical Society.

 

Head of Auglaize - Part 2

2.  "Mad" Anthony Wayne's Post on the Auglaize

Chapter 2

Note:  During the period letters exchanged between individuals were numbered.  That was done to ensure it had been received, i.e the individual received a letter with No. 75 and the next was No. 77, it indicated that No. 76 had either not been received yet or it was missing.

 A Change of Plans

General Wayne received his mission orders while in Philadelphia (1792): advance to the Miami villages at the junction of the St. Marys and St. Joseph Rivers (present day Fort Wayne, Ind.) destroy the villages, build a fort on the site and garrison it with at least 1500 troops.  A short time later, while still in Philadelpha, Secretary of War Knox wrote Wayne (Letter No. 3) to tell him that he had received reports that the Miami Villages had all but been abandoned and the Indians were gathering at Grand Glaize (Defiance, Oh).  

                             

Apparently the "good authority"  wasn't entirely correct abour the Miami villages being abandoned.  While the main encampment was all but abandoned, many of the groups simply scattered to the north while the majority went east toward Grand Glaize (Defiance, Oh).  

As you can see in Knox letter to Wayne (No. 64), the plan was still to go to the Miami villages and eliminate the resistance there.  If nothing else it should scare the indians enough to flee the area.  

Wayne had long suspected that in addition to the Miami villages, he would eventually have to confront the hostile tribes at Grand Glaize as well,   For or the moment however,  his main focus was on trying to persuade leaders of the hostile tribes to come to Ft. Greenville and negotiate a peace treaty.  He made several overtures for peace but his attempts were repeatedly met either with excuses or no response at all. As weeks passed, he became more and more frustrated, sensing the Indians were simply stalling for time so they could prepare for war and move their families to safety.  His hopes for a peace settlement were fading.  

Contractors

Another issue facing General Wayne was how to keep his troops supplied as the campaign progressed. This was normally done by civilian contractors.   Contractors tended to be both very  expensive. and notoriously unreliable,  Wayne knew his troops and wagon trains would be traveling through a very dense and dangerous swamp and he needed assurrances that his supply chain would be dependable. While negotiations were normally done by the quartermasters department, the issue of reliability was so critical to Wayne, he negotiated details himself  including a clause in the contract that any breach of contract would result in severe penalties and/or other conseuences.

The Great Black Swamp

 

The hardships of traversing through the Great Black Swamp can best be described by comments by early travelers who passed through it.   

As settlers traveled through the area they suffered from physical ailments; the humid wetness, the sucking mud, the darkness of the swamp forest, chills and fevers, malaria from mosquitoes, and difficult navigaion.  But trouble in the swamp was more than physical.  There was a nearly religious fear of the swamp.  As one settler remarked, "We read that God divided the land from water; but here is a place He forgot."  John Stilgoe writes of the fear of forests in folklore, describing ti as a "Great chaos, the lair of wild beasts and wilder men, where order and shaping are not, that would lure  hapless peasants into sinful schemes."  A solder lost his way in the swamp forest during the War of 1812 fearfully recalled teh swamp as "the home of Satan." 

And Then There's The Rainy Season 

Transporting supplies overland through the swamp was going to be difficult enough during dry wether, what concerned Wayne most what conditions could be like during the rainy season.  His troops  and  wagon trains, artillery and other hevy equipment could easily bog down in the muck and mire of the swamp, causing delays, lost or damaged goods, something General Wayne absolurtly could not afford.  At this point he had only two opions; transport his supplies through the Great Black Swamp by oveland carriage or transport them through the Great Black Swamp by water and fortunately he had 3 available, the Great Miami, the St. Marys and the Auglaize Rivers.  The question is; if he was going to attack the Miami Villages and the St. Marys River flowed directly to it, why would he need the Auglaize River.    The story continues in Chp. 3

  

 

  

Head of Auglaize - Part 1

 

1.  Anthony Wayne's Post on the Auglaize -Chp. 1

Proposal

The following series of blogs will be presented to support my proposal that in 1794/95 General "Mad" Anthony Wayne constructed a post on the banks of the Auglaize River at or near the site of what later became Fort Amanda. He named his new post "Head of Auglaize."

NOTE:  Some of what you read in this first blog is  gleaned  from previous blogs and my first book; "Fort Amanda - A Historical Redress."  These are included to help create a timeline and continuity of events leading up to Wayne's decision to build his post on the Auglaize. 

Each blog will be presented as a separate "chapter" containing information on a topic relative to the overall proposal. All will be listed in the Blog Archive on the home page. If you miss or want to revisit a particular blog, simply click on the chapter you wish to read.

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I'd like to go west into the Ohio Country but it's far far too dangerous

 

A Gruesome Gift

How dangerous was the Ohio country in the 1780s? During the 10-year period leading up to 1790, Indians, with the help of their British allies, had murdered over 1,500 settlers in Kentucky and along the north side of the Ohio River. On May 7, 1782, a British officer sent a letter to the British Governor of Canada, along with eight packages, containing the scalps of 983 men, women and children murdered by the Indians. While Indians did on occasion kidnap children and raise them as their own, as the inventory of scalps listed below shows that was not always the case.

Pkg. #1	43	Soldiers surprised at night and killed by bullets
Pkg. #2	98	Farmers killed in home in daylight protecting families
Pkg. #3	97	Farmers shot or killed by hatchet in their fields in daylight
Pkg. #4	102	Farmers young & old killed after torture of various types
Pkg. #5	88	Women scalped then killed or clubbed to death
Pkg. #6	193	Boys killed by knife, hatched or club
Pkg. #7	211	Girls killed by hatchet or scalping knife
Pkg. #8	151	A variety including a minister and 29 infants
Total	983

1790

In 1790 George Washington decided it was time to put an end to the atrocities on the Ohio/Kentucky frontier.  He ordered 37-year-old General Josiah Harmar, a Revolutionary War veteran to organize and army with orders to advance to Kekionga, a large complex of Miami,  Shawnee and Delaware tribes at the junction of the St. Marys and St. Joseph Rivers and destroy them.  

General Josiah Harmar

  

           The Miami villages at Kekionga                    The site today  (Fort Wayne, Ind.

When Hardin and his men arrived at Kekionga, they found it deserted so they returned to the main encampment. Over the course of the next several days, Harmar’s men were constantly harassed by enemy sniper fire forcing them into small sporadic skirmishes, which created a critical shortage of ammunition for the soldiers.

Early in the morning of October 22, 1790, Harmar ordered Col. John Hardin to return to the Miami village and complete the destruction of the site. When  Hardin and his men arrived, they found themselves facing an Indian force of nearly 1,100 Indians. Being outnumbered almost 2 to 1; Hardin immediately dispatched a courier back to General Harmar pleading for reinforcements. Harmar who was reportedly drunk at the time, was visibly shaken by the news, and instead of sending reinforcements to Hardin, he panicked and ordered his men into a defensive position leaving Hardin and his men to fend for themselves. The ensuing fight was very costly for the Americans. Major Wyllys, one of Harmar’s key commanders, was killed along with 180 soldiers. A large number of others either were wounded or had deserted. The Indians’ casualties numbered between 120 and 150 killed. Feeling he could no longer continue the mission, Harmar retreated to Fort Washington[1], arriving there on November 3. Soon thereafter, he resigned his commission. While the losses his army suffered were significant, it paled in comparison to what was to happen next.

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[1]  Fort Washington was located in Cincinnati, Ohio, near the intersection of 4^th St. and Ludlow Ave.    

1791

The following year (1791) Washington ordered General Arthur St. Clair, a 54- year-old Scottish-born Revolutionary War General, then serving as governor of the Northwest Territory to  finish the work Harmar had failed to do, return to Kekionga, destroy it and establish a permanent military post there.  

General Arthur St. Clair

St. Clair's  original army was made up of 2000 mostly ill trained soldiers. By the time he left Cincinnati, illness, desertions and deferments had reduced it to less than 1,500.  By the time St. Clair's army reached the Wabash River (Fort Recovery, Ohio) on November 3, 1791, his force had been  reduced to only 920 officers and men and 200 contractors and camp followers.  Waiting for them was an enemy force of nearly1,400 Indian warriors.  St. Clairs misioned was doomed from the beginnning.  On the morning of Nov 4th, his army was attacked and the was catastropic.

While the exact number of Americans killed will never be known, the best estimates are that 632 officers and soldiers were killed outright or died on the battlefield and another 264 were wounded. Of the nearly 200 camp followers, children and contractors, nearly all were killed or kidnapped. Indian losses that day were estimated at only twenty-one killed and forty wounded. Of St. Clair’s 920-man force, only 24 men returned to Fort Washington unharmed. The Army’s casualty rate (killed and wounded) was a staggering 97% while the casualty rate of the Indians was less than 5 percent.  The battle, known as St. Clair’s defeat, has gone down in history as the worst defeat of a United States Army at the hands of Native Americans. Nearly one-quarter of the entire United States Army had been slaughtered in a single three-hour battle. 

Our Nations Reputation on the World Stage

By 1792, the stakes had been raised considerably in terms of national security. Not only was there a major concern with the continuing Indian hostilities in the northwest, there was an equally growing concern that the disastrous campaigns of Harmar and St. Clair could create the impression that the United States was weak and incapable of dealing not only with her internal problems with the Indians, but equally incapable of defending herself against foreign powers as well. What the country needed was a victory and it was and it was about to get one a major one.

1792

By the spring of 1792, President Washington and Secretary of War Knox had re-structured the United States Army into what they called a “legion,” modeled in part from the ancient Roman legions. What they needed now was a battle-hardened General to lead it. Their choice - Anthony Wayne.  

General Anthony Wyne 

 Wayne had earned the nickname “Mad Anthony” from a bold nighttime bayonet-only attack on a British position during the Revolutionary War. Despite being outnumbered, his efforts proved successful and the victory provided a much-needed morale booster to the Continental army who was desperate for a victory of any kind. His fiery temper and unquestionable courage made him the logical choice to lead a new campaign. The 48-year-old Wayne came out of retirement and accepted the commission of Major General and Commander-in-Chief of the United States Army.  

 During the spring and summer months of 1792, Wayne assembled his army of 2,500 men at an encampment near Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. Needing a more suitable place to winter his troops, Wayne moved the camp twenty-two miles to the west on the banks of the Ohio River near present day Baden, Pennsylvania. He named the encampment Legionville.[1]  

Legionville  (1792-93)

During the winter months 1792-93, Legionville evolved from being a temporary encampment to a small city covering approximately 35 acres. It contained over 500 buildings, a parade ground for practicing maneuvers and a rifle range for target practice. By spring, the population of Legionville had grown to nearly five times that of nearby Pittsburgh.

Sadly on April 18, Mary Penrose Wayne, General Wayne’s wife of 27 years died at the age of 44 at their family home in Radnor, Pennsylvania. It was 320 miles from Legionville to Radnor and a trip to and from home would have taken several weeks.  Dates on letters sent from Wayne indicate that he remained at Legionville and as a result, it was nearly three years before he was able to return home and visit his wife’s grave.  

The Flotilla Departs

On April 30, 1793, the first boats pushed off heading west. The 464-mile journey by boat from Legionville to Cincinnati took six days, traveling an average of 77 miles a day. The boats landed near a swampy area a quarter mile southwest[2] of Fort Washington, Harmar’s base of operations in 1790.

Wayne’s operational plan called for floating his men and materials down the Ohio River on barges to Cincinnati, disembark, and then advance overland to the north. Contractors had been working for months building large flat bottom boats capable of carrying 40 men and able to navigate the shallow Ohio River. Sixty boats had been built to transport Wayne’s 2,500-man army and another eight designed to carry heavy artillery pieces, powder and shot. Riders and drivers for the supply trains, horses, cattle and forage were loaded onto twelve additional boats that had been built specifically for that purpose. Early on the morning of On April 30, 1793, the first boats pushed off heading west. The 464-mile journey by boat from Legionville to Cincinnati took six days, traveling an average of 77 miles a day. The boats landed near a swampy area a quarter mile southwest[2] of Fort Washington, Harmar’s base of operations in 1790.  Scouring the area, Wayne quickly determined that there was not enough open area between the fort and the Ohio River for his encampment. In addition, the area was too close to the lure of the temptations of the nearby town of Cincinnati with, as Wayne put it, “its ardent poison and caitiff wretches to dispose of it.” He finally decided on an area of high ground a mile west of Fort Washington and named his new encampment appropriately enough - Hobson ’s Choice.[3]

During the months of April – August 1793, Wayne’s men spent their days practicing battle formations and of course, target practice. In addition, recruits were reminded of the consequences of desertion and cowardice. On the morning of September 17 the men took down their tents, loaded their personal baggage onto wagons and at the beating of the tattoo[4] formed into columns and began their march north out of town following the same trail Harmar and St. Clair’s armies had taken years earlier. By the middle of October, the army had advanced 70 miles north where it stopped and began construction of a fort and made plans to winter in place. The finished fort covered sprawling 55 acres and was the largest wooden fortification ever built in the United States. Wayne named his new fort, Fort Greenville, in honor of his friend Nathaniel Green.

 

                            Fort Greenville                                                              Overlay

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(NEXT CHAPTER)

Site of Hobson’s Choice

  Decisions, decisions, decisions

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[1] Legionville was located in Harmony twp. Beaver County, Pennsylvania just west of the intersection of Legionville road and Duff Ave.  GPS coordinates for the site are: N40°37’16”W80°13’42

[2] The site today is the center of the Great American Ballpark in Cincinnati.

[3] Webster’s dictionary describes Hobson’s Choice as, “an apparently free choice when there are no alternatives.”  The site today is at the intersection of Gest and west. 6^th Sts. in Cincinnati.

[4] A signal sounded on a drum to summon soldiers to report to stations or to their quarters at night.

 

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