SENECA COUNTY OHIO - HISTORICAL COLLECTIONS OF OHIO
***********************************************************************
OHGENWEB NOTICE:  All distribution rights to this electronic data are
reserved by the submitter.  Reproduction or re-presentation of copyrighted
material will require the permission of the copyright owner.  The submitter
has given permission to the USGenWeb Archives to store the file permanently
for free access.  http://www.usgwarchives.net/oh/
***********************************************************************
File contributed for use in USGenWeb Archives by
Gina Reasoner 
greasoner@prodigy.net
November 14, 1999
***********************************************************************

Historical Collections of Ohio By Henry Howe, LL.D.

SENECA COUNTY - Part 6

INDIAN AMUSEMENTS
All the hunters and warriors continued in town about six weeks after we
came in. They spent this time in painting, going from house to house,
eating, smoking and playing at a game resembling dice or hustle cap. They
put a number of plum-stones in a small bowl, one side of each stone is
black and the other white; they then shake or hustle the bowl, calling
"hits, hits, hits, honesy, honesy, rego, rego;" which signifies calling for
white or black, or what they wish to turn up, they then turn the bowl and
count the whites and blacks. Some were beating the drum (described
elsewhere as "a short hollow gum closed at one end, with water in it, and
parchment stretched over the end thereof, which they beat with one stick")
and singing; others were employed in playing on a sort of flute, made of
hollow cane, and others playing on the jews-harp. Some part of this time
was also taken up in attending the council and as many others as chose
attended and at night they were frequently employed in singing and dancing.
THE INDIANS PREPARE FOR WAR.
Towards the last of this time, which was in June, 1756 they were all
engaged in preparing to go to war against the frontiers of Virginia. When
they were equipped they went through their ceremonies, sung their war
songs, etc. They all marched off from fifteen to sixty years of age, and
some boys only twelve years old, were equipped with their bows and arrows,
and went to war, so that none were left in town but squaws and children,
except myself, one very old man and another about fifty years of age, who
was lame. The Indians were then in great hopes that they would drive all
the Virginians over the lake, which is all the name they knew for the sea.
They had some cause for this hope, because at this time the Americans were
altogether unacquainted with war of any kind, and consequently very unfit
to stand their ground with such subtle enemies as the Indians were.
SMITH'S TALK WITH TWO OLD INDIANS.
The two old Indians asked me if I did not think that the Indians and
French would subdue all America except New England, which they said they
had tried in old times. I told them I thought not; they said they had
already driven them all out of the mountains and had chiefly laid waste the
great valley betwixt the North and South mountain from Potomac to James
river, which is a considerable part of the best land in Virginia., Maryland
and Pennsylvania, and that the white people appeared to them like fools,
they could neither guard against surprise, run, nor fight. These, they
said, were their reasons for saying that they would subdue the whites. They
asked me to offer my reason for my opinion, and told me to speak my mind
freely. I told them that the white people to the east were very numerous,
like the trees, and though they appeared to them to be fools, as they were
not acquainted with their way of war, yet they were not fools, therefore
after some time they will learn your mode of war and turn upon you, or at
least defend themselves. I found that the old men themselves did not
believe they could conquer America, yet they were willing to propagate the
idea in order to encourage the young men to go to war.
SMITH GOES A HUNTING.
When the warriors left this town we had neither meat, sugar or bear oil
left. All that we had to live on was corn, pounded into course meal or
hominy -this they boiled in water, which appeared like well thickened soup,
without salt or anything else. For some time we had plenty of this kind of
hominy; at length we were brought to very short allowance, and as the
warriors did not return as soon as they expected, we were brought to very
short allowance, and as the warriors did not return as soon as they
expected, we were in a starving condition with but one gun in the town and
very little ammunition. The old lame Wyandot concluded that he would go a
hunting in the canoe and take me with him, and try to kill deer in the
water, as it was then watering time. We went up Sandusky a few miles, then
turned up a creek and encamped. We had lights prepared, as we were to hunt
in the night, and also a piece of bark and some bushes set up in the canoe,
in order to conceal ourselves from the deer. A little boy that with us held
the light. I worked the canoe, and the old man who had his gun loaded with
large shot, when we came near the deer in part of one night. We went to our
fire, ate heartily, and in the morning returned to town, in order to
relieve the hungry and distressed.
When we came to town the children were crying bitterly on account of the
pinching hunger. We delivered what we had taken and though it was but
little among so many, yet it was divided according to the strictest rules
of justice. We immediately set out for another hunt, but before we returned
a party of warriors had come in and brought with them on horseback a
quantity of meat.
PRISONERS RUNNING THE GAUNTLET.
Those warriors had divided into different parties and all struck at
different places in Augusta county, Virginia. They brought in with them a
considerable number of scalps, prisoners, horses and other plunder; one of
the prisoners was one Arthur Campbell, who was eventually taken to Detroit;
his company was very agreeable and I was sorry when he left me. When the
prisoners were made to run the gauntlet, I went and told them how to act.
One John Savage was brought in and a middle-aged man about 40 years of age.
He was to run the gauntlet and I told him what to do. After this I fell
into the ranks with the Indians, shouting and yelling like them, and as
they were not very severe with him, as he passed me I hit him with a piece
of pumpkin, which pleased the Indians much but hurt my feelings.
KINDNESS OF THE INDIANS.
About the time the Indians came in, the green corn was ready, so that we
had either green corn or venison and sometimes both, which was
comparatively high living. When we could have plenty of green corn or
roasting ears, the hunters became lazy and spent their time in singing,
dancing, etc. They appeared to be fulfilling the Scriptures beyond those
who profess to believe them, in that of taking no thought of to-morrow; and
also in love, peace and friendship, together. In this respect they shame
those who profess Christianity.
Sometime in October, another adopted brother, older than Tontileaugo, came
to pay us a visit at Sunyendeand, and asked me to take a hunt with him on
Cayahaga. As they always used me as a freeman and gave me the liberty of
choosing, I told him that I was attached to Tontileaugo -had never seen him
before, and therefore asked some time to consider this. I consulted with
Tontileaugo on this occasion, and he told me that our old brother
Tecaughretanego (which was his name), was a chief, and a better man than he
was, and if I went with him I might expect to be well used, but he said I
might do as I pleased, and if I stayed he would use me as he had done. I
told him he had acted in every respect as a brother to me, yet I was much
pleased with my old brother's conduct and conversation, and as he was going
to a part of the country I had never been in, I wished to go with him. He
said that he was perfectly willing.
A TALK UPON THE WHITE MAN'S RELIGION.
I then went with Tecaughretanego to the mouth of the little lake, where he
met with the company he intended going with, which was composed of
Caughnewagas and Ottawas. Here I was introduced to a Caughnewaga sister and
others I had never seen before. My sister's name was Mary, which they
pronounced Maully. I asked Tecaughretanego how it came that she had an
English name. He said he did not know it was an English name; but it was
the name the priest gave her when she was baptized, and which he said was
the name of the mother of Jesus. He said there was a great many of the
Caughnewagas and Wyandots that were a kind of half Roman Catholics; but as
for himself he said, that the priest and he could not agree, as they held
notions that contradicted both sense and reason, and had the assurance to
tell him that the book of God taught him these foolish absurdities; but he
could not believe that the great and good Spirit ever taught them any such
nonsense, and therefore he concluded that the Indian's old religion was
better than this new way of worshipping God.
THE TENTS OF THE OTTAWAS.
The Ottawas have a very useful kind of tents which they carry with them,
made of flags, plaited and stitched together in a very artful manner, so as
to turn the rain and wind well -each mat is made fifteen feet long and five
feet broad. In order to erect this kind of tent they cut a number of long
straight poles, which they drive in the ground, in the form of a circle,
leaning inwards; they then spread the mats on these poles, beginning at the
bottom and extending up, leaving a hole in the top uncovered -and this hole
answers the place of a chimney. They make a fire of dry split wood in the
middle, and spread down bark mats and skins for bedding, on which they
sleep in a crooked posture all round the fire, as the length of their beds
will not admit of their stretching themselves. In place of a door they lift
up one end of a mat and creep in and let the mat fall down behind them.
These tents are warm and dry, and tolerably clear of smoke. Their lumber
they keep under birch bark canoes, which they carry out and turn up for
shelter, where they keep everything from the rain. Nothing is in the tents
but themselves and their bedding.
After remaining here several days the party embarked in their canoes,
paddling and sailing along the shore until they came to the mouth of the
Cayahaga, which empties into Lake Erie on the south side betwixt
Canesadooharie and Presque Isle.

-continued in part 7