George Peck's WYOMING, 1858 - Pennsylvania - Chapter 10 Contributed for use in the USGenWeb Archives by Judy Banja jbanja@comcast.net USGENWEB ARCHIVES (tm) NOTICE All documents placed in the USGenWeb Archives remain the property of the contributors, who retain publication rights in accordance with US Copyright Laws and Regulations. In keeping with our policy of providing free information on the Internet, these documents may be used by anyone for their personal research. They may be used by non-commercial entities, when written permission is obtained from the contributor, so long as all notices and submitter information are included. These electronic pages may NOT be reproduced in any format for profit. Any other use, including copying files to other sites, requires permission from the contributors PRIOR to uploading to the other sites. The submitter has given permission to the USGenWeb Archives to store the file permanently for free access. http://www.usgwarchives.net/copyright.htm http//www.usgwarchives.net/pa/pafiles.htm ________________________________________________ HTML with illustrations: http://www.usgwarchives.net/pa/1pa/1picts/peckwyo/peck-wyo.htm WYOMING; ITS HISTORY, STIRRING INCIDENTS AND ROMANTIC ADVENTURES. By GEORGE PECK, D.D. WITH ILLUSTRATIONS. NEW YORK: HARPER & BROTHERS, PUBLISHERS, FRANKLIN SQUARE, 1858 THE BENNETS AND HAMMOND. 291 X. CAPTIVITY AND ESCAPE OF THOMAS AND ANDREW BENNET AND LEBBEUS HAMMOND. "Near where Meshoppen meets our river, When in the quiet night Through trees we saw the star-beams quiver, We nerved us for the fight. Where stood the arms we quickly drew, No gentle blows to strike or die; Two wounded fled, the rest we slew, In ghastly death we saw them lie: E'en now I see them glare, as in cold death they lie." Susquehanna, an unpublished Poem. IN 1779 General Sullivan had pursued the Indians with the scourge of war, and driven them west of the Genesee River. Colonel John Butler and Brant had been worsted at every point, and had fled to Niagara. It was obvious enough to the fierce braves that it was in vain to attempt to meet the Americans in force in the open field, but they shrewdly concluded to take vengeance upon them by visiting their settlements in small parties, and by stealthy approaches to take property and prisoners, or murder and scalp, as the case might be. They consequently, in small gangs, followed down General Sullivan upon the very heels of his army, and he had no sooner disposed the garrison at Wilkesbarre, and crossed the mountain with his army, than the work of plunder and murder was resumed on the north and the west branches of the Susquehanna and on the Delaware. In some instances these parties were fearfully successful, and in others they met with a terrible retribution. 292 WYOMING. The following is a true account, communicated by the parties engaged, of one of these savage expeditions, and the tragedy with which it wound up. On the 27th of March, 1780, Thomas Bennet, with his son Andrew, a lad of thirteen or fourteen years of age, commenced plowing on the flats on land now owned by Elijah Shoemaker, of Kingston. They took their guns with them, and tried to shoot some ducks in the river. Hiding their guns, they commenced their work. Their team consisted of a yoke of oxen and a horse, the boy riding the horse. They had been watched by four Indians, who stole up to the place where the guns were concealed and broke them. They then sprang upon Mr. Bennet and his son, and hurried them away. On the same morning, Lebbeus Hammond had left Wilkesbarre in pursuit of a fine horse, which he found on a place he had occupied a few miles up the river, on the west side. He made a bridle of hickory withes, and was proceeding homeward, when he saw moccasin tracks. He was much alarmed, and expected every minute to be fired upon. All at once two Indians leaped from the bushes, and one seized his horse, while the other pulled him off. After a brief consultation in Indian, which Hammond did not understand, they led him a short distance into the woods and pinioned his arms, and then tied him to a tree. In this situation they left him for about an hour, when they returned with four others, having Bennet and his son as prisoners. Their greetings were such as might have been expected. Hammond had made an almost miraculous escape from "Bloody Rock," and Bennet was a notorious patriot, and their prospects now were any thing but agreeable. THE BENNETS AND HAMMOND. 293 An Indian mounted Hammond's horse, but when they came to the marsh, which lies between the river and the mountain, he ran the horse into the mire and left him there. The Indians hurried on with their prisoners over the mountain, and lodged that night near the foot of "Cummings's Pond," in what is now Northmoreland. The Indians evidently did not know the prisoners, for they left them unbound; and Bennet was for attempting to escape, but Hammond thought it not possible to succeed, and the idea was given up. The next day they proceeded on to Bowman's Creek, and when they came into "the green woods" they found the snow "waistband deep." Of course it was laborious traveling, especially for a man of years like Mr. Bennet. But the party pushed on, and made what progress they could. Occasionally one of the Indians would yell horribly, as though he wished to attract the attention of another party. At length they met a party of about forty Indians, commanded by a white man - a Tory, of course. An old Indian belonging to the party sung out, "Ah! old Bennet; I'd rather see your scalp." Some of the Indians fell back and held a council, while the Tory asked Bennet many questions with regard to the situation of the fort, the number of fighting men, the number of inhabitants in the settlement, and the like. He was told that there were three hundred fighting men in the fort, that they were well armed and provisioned, and that they had cannon, and that the settlers had all taken refuge there. They then concluded to strike the river below the fort. They divided their company into three parties, and committed various outrages, some of which will be noticed in another connection. Before the two parties sep- 294 WYOMING. arated, an Indian went up to a burnt stump and blackened his face, and coming up to Mr. Bennet, he directed his attention to his face, with the significant sentence, "Ho! Bennet." The movement was well understood. One of the party of Indians which they met joined their party, which made seven. That night the prisoners were pappoosed, that is, fastened down with poles laid across them, with an Indian on each end of the poles. The prisoners had as yet little or nothing to eat, and were heavily burdened with the luggage belonging to the Indians. Of course, they were worn down, and nearly ready to give up and die. The next day - the third day of their captivity - Mr. Bennet accidentally pulled a button from his coat, and put it in his pocket. They were now searched, and the button being found, Bennet asked for it, saying he wished to put it on again. The Indian flung it away, saying, "Fool, Bennet; only one day more. You die at Wyallusing." That day the Indians hunted for deer, and starting one, left the prisoners a few rods behind, and gave them an opportunity to consult. Bennet said to Hammond, "We must rise upon them to-night." "It will be a great undertaking," said Hammond, "but it may be our last chance." "They will kill me," answered Bennet, "and I know not with what cruel tortures. It may be we shall succeed, and if we do we will again return to our families; but if I am to die, I will sell my life as dearly as possible." In the consultation the boy said little, but thought much. In his heart he said with Percy, "I tender you my service, Such as it is, being tender, raw, and young, Which elder days shall ripen and confirm To more approved service and desert." THE BENNETS AND HAMMOND. 295 How he acted his part will appear as the story proceeds. The arrangement was made by the time the deer was taken, and the party proceeded to cross the river. They came up to the Meshappen, which was much swollen by the melted snow, and before they could venture to wade the stream they went up two or three miles. Having crossed the creek, and descended to the place of encampment near the Susquehanna, they built a fire under a shelving rock. While the Indians were seated around the fire, roasting and eating the meat of the deer, the leader of the party entered into conversation with Mr. Hammond. He spoke tolerable English, and seemed particularly free and communicative. He said he had expected to meet a large company of Indians at that place, but he supposed they had encamped farther up the river. He then asked him various questions about the war. Would there be peace? Did the white men wish to make peace with the red men? He had been told so. Did he know Lieutenant Boyd? Hammond said he was intimately acquainted with him. In September Boyd had been sent out with a reconnoitring party by General Sullivan, in Genesee, and had been surrounded by a superior force, taken, and most barbarously tortured. The Indian said he led the party that took Boyd, and he further said, "Boyd brave man - as good a soldier as ever fought against the red man." He said they tortured Boyd, cut off his fingers and toes, plucked out his eyes, etc., "still brave Boyd neither asked for mercy nor uttered a complaint." Ah! "brave Boyd" knew very well the character of the Indians. "You may as well go stand upon the beach, And bid the main flood bate his usual height; 296 WYOMING. You may as well use question with a wolf, Why he hath made the ewe bleat for the lamb; You may as well forbid the mountain pines To wag their high tops, and to make no noise When they are fretted with the gusts of heaven; You may as well do any thing most hard, As seek to soften that - than which what's harder? His [Indian] heart." SHAKESPEARE. He then brought a sword and said, "There Boyd's sword." Hammond took the sword, and discovered the initials of Boyd's name stamped on the blade near the hilt. To the whole tale Hammond listened without expressing the slightest emotion, well knowing the consequences of the least manifestation of the indignation which he felt burning in his bosom. When the Indians were ready to lie down, they pappoosed the prisoners as on the preceding night; then they drew their blankets over their heads and fell into a sound sleep. One only seemed to be on the watch. About midnight Bennet manifested great uneasiness, and asked to get up. He received for answer, "Most day - lie down, dog." He insisted that he was sick, and must get up. About one o'clock the Indians all got up and relieved the prisoners, allowing them to get up and walk about. Bennet brought wood and flung it on the fire. In about two hours all the Indians were snoring again except the old watchman, and he commenced roasting the deer's head, first sticking it in the fire, and then scraping off the meat with his knife and eating it. Finally the old fellow began to nod over his early breakfast. Hammond placed himself by an Indian axe, and Andrew Bennet, the boy, stood by the guns, which were stacked. Both watched the movements of Mr. Bennet, who was poking up the brands. He had on a long great- coat, and, as he came SLAUGHTER OF INDIANS BY THE BENNETS AND HAMMOND. [illustration] THE BENNETS AND HAMMOND. 299 round near the Indian, he cautiously took hold of a spontoon, or war-spear, which lay by his side, and stepped back with the instrument covered by his coat, holding it in a perpendicular position behind him. When he had reached the right point behind the Indian he plunged it through him. He gave a tremendous jump and a hideous yell, and fell upon the fire. "If death so terrible appear, die thou. With cruel spear he lanced his naked side, Warm streams of blood his arms o'erflow: His panting bosom heaves with dying sighs, Hard lab'ring to retain departing breath; At length he yields; black darkness veils his eyes, Sealed in eternal sleep of iron death." SAMUEL WESLEY - Battle of the Frogs and Mice. The spontoon was so firmly fixed in the body of the Indian that Bennet was obliged to abandon it, and to use a gun and a tomahawk during the rest of the fight. Hammond used the axe, dashing it into the head which was first lifted. The old Indian who had given the account of Boyd's massacre was the first to take the alarm. He yelled out " Chee-woo! chee-woo!" when Hammond buried the head of the axe in his brains, and he fell headlong into the fire. The next blow took an Indian on the side of the neck, just below the ear, and he fell upon the fire. The boy snapped three guns, not one of which happened to be loaded, but his operations made the Indians dodge and jump straight under Hammond's axe, or the breech of a gun which old Mr. Bennet had clubbed, and with which he did terrible execution. A stout Indian undertook to secure a weapon by a rush upon the boy. He sprang upon him with the fury of a demon, his eyes seeming to blaze, when the brave little fellow swung the breech of a gun, and buried the cock in the top of his head 300 WYOMING, Just at that moment the only two Indians remaining alive took to their heels, when Mr. Bennet, who could throw a tomahawk with the precision and force of any red-skin on the frontier, picked up a tomahawk and let it slip, and it stuck in the back of one of them. The Indian turned round, being at about the distance of forty feet, and hollowed out "whoo," and his blanket fell from his shoulders, and the hatchet was left with it on the ground, he running off naked. It was an awful struggle, but it was not long. A minute and a half or two minutes, and the work was done. Five of the savages were piled up on and around the fire, and two had fled badly wounded. There was a great contrast between the present appearance of the Indian camp under the rock, and that same camp the evening before, when the bloodthirsty savage gloried in the barbarous deed of cutting off Boyd's fingers and toes, and pulling out his eyes; and looked forward to, perhaps, the next night, when he would glut his savage vengeance in a similar manner upon the prisoners, who were obliged to listen to the recital without the slightest expression of sympathy for their brave companion and friend. The prisoners were now free, and no time was lost. They supplied themselves with good moccasins from the feet of the dead and dying Indians, and took guns and ammunition for defense, and blankets for their protection from the cold, and fifteen minutes from the moment the last blow was struck they were upon the line of march for their home and friends. THE FLIGHT OF HAMMOND AND THE BENNETS. The wounded Indians took a position on the side of the mountain where they had a fair view of the THE BENNETS AND HAMMOND. 301 camp, and watched the movements of the victors. When they had gone, the poor wretches returned to see if any thing remained by which they might be saved from freezing or starvation. Here the miserable savages saw their companions, with whom they had shared common dangers and hardships, all gory and cold in death. They laid them down to sleep the stern, cruel masters of a band of helpless captives; they awoke to see their own weapons in the hands of those captives, and to feel the cold steel which they had often stained with the blood of the white man. Their comrades were dead, and they were naked and helpless. This was a terrible lesson to the infuriated savages, and one they did not forget. The victors made their calculations to take as straight a course as possible through the woods to the "Capouse Meadows," near where the flourishing town of Scranton is now located, avoiding all Indian trails. They pushed on up the Meshoppen about three miles. The stream was high and the current rapid; but there was no alternative; they must wade it, if possible, at that point. The two men took the boy between them, lest the angry current should sweep him away, and, with tremendous efforts, succeeded in reaching the other shore. The morning was extremely cold, and they had proceeded but a short distance before their clothes were frozen stiff. They had brought away with them no provisions of any kind, and such was the excitement under which they labored that they scarcely felt the need of any. They toiled on, alternately inspired by hope and depressed with fear. The danger was that a fresh party of Indians might get upon their track and overtake them. They had reason to think that there was a large 302 WYOMING. party above, and that party might meet the wounded Indians, and learn the story of the slaughter of their fellows, and give the escaped prisoners chase, or they might meet a party crossing over from the Delaware to the Susquehanna, and in either event there would be scarcely a ray of hope of their escaping the most barbarous tortures. The images of their loved ones at home stood before them every moment, and stimulated them to hold on their way. Every step brought them nearer the goal, and enlarged the space between them and the scene of the fearful tragedy at Meshoppen. The excitement of the journey was little inferior to that of the terrible struggle with the savages through which they had just passed. Such fearful tension of the nerves can not long be endured, but for a time will almost perform miracles. They were hungry, but thought not of food; weary, but there was no place of rest short of friends and home. From early dawn till late at night they were on full stretch, heeding nothing which they passed, and taking no note of time, simply marking the ranges of the hills which bordered the large streams which empty into the Susquehanna from the east. When they saw the last range peering up in the distance, they, like Paul when he saw "the Three Taverns," "thanked God and took courage." SAFE AT HOME AGAIN. Mr. Bennet was an old hunter and understood the ground. They kept their course, crossing the high ridges and deep valleys which lay across their path, generally being able to walk on the frozen crust, until, on the second day, they reached the south side of the mountain range northwest of the Lackawanna valley. Here they found bare ground, and now they paused occasionally for a few minutes and picked win- THE BENNETS AND HAMMOND. 303 tergreen to eat. They pursued their journey down the side of the mountain to the mouth of the Lackawanna, and so found their way to the fort at Wilkesbarre after an absence of six days. The appearance of the Bennets and Hammond at the fort was an occasion of great joy, as they had been given up for lost. When the excitement passed off, there was little of life left in the returned captives. Nursing and rest finally brought up their emaciated forms and their exhausted spirits to their former condition. Lieutenant Boyd's sword was brought away by Hammond, and was afterward presented to his brother, Colonel John Boyd. As to the two Indians who escaped, one died in the woods from his wounds and subsequent exposure, and the one tomahawked by Mr. Bennet was taken up in a state of insensibility by a party of Indians coming over from the Delaware. After they had restored him to consciousness, he gave an account of the slaughter of the Indians by Hammond and the Bennets, which was communicated to Mr. Bennet in a letter from Esquire Consollus, who was a prisoner in the party, and listened to the Indian's story. Seven years after the terrible scene which we have described, at an Indian treaty held at Newtown, Hammond saw the old Indian who had been wounded by the tomahawk, considerably disfigured, walking with his head bowed. Hammond was not altogether certain that he was the same Indian, and requested a friend to ask him what was the cause of his stooping. When the question was asked, the Indian promptly replied, "A Yankee tomahawk me at Wyoming." The poor fellow lingered out a wretched existence for several years, and then was drowned in crossing the Canisteo, falling from a foot-bridge.