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